When Ravens Call: The Fourth Book in the Small Gods Epic Fantasy Series (The Books of the Small Gods by Bruce Blake (books under 200 pages txt) 📗

king pivoted from the parapet and strode toward the stairs leading into the castle, leaving his son behind. Despite his effort, a shudder ran through him, and he lifted his gaze to the sky. Two stars shot across the firmament, the light trails left in their wake ominous, threatening now he stood viewing them on his own. Nanny's stories flooded back to him; they foretold the return of the Small Gods one day. Had the time come?

Fright clogged Teryk's throat, sent tears to perch on his bottom lids; they blurred his vision and smeared the stars into ugly, scarier shapes. He wiped his face on his sleeve and sprinted after his father, desperate the man not leave him.

The next morning, when his nanny normally came for him in his chamber, it wasn't her, but Trenan, his father's master swordsman. After breaking his fast, his training began, and he never saw the kindly lady with the tall tales again.

Lying on the sandy beach of the land across the sea, Teryk tracked another star crossing night's black canvas.

Not such a pleasant memory, after all.

He heaved a sigh and swept the thoughts back into the recesses of his mind with the other times he failed to live up to his father's expectations. Sometimes he suspected he might need a second head to contain every time he disappointed the king. He closed his eyes, expecting the shooting star to run its course and disappear but, when he opened his lids again, it remained. He pursed his lips.

On the night with his father, the stars they'd seen crossing the sky lived but short lives, flashing to existence, streaking partway through the darkness, then disappearing. This one started out high over his head, a dot of light brightening and growing before it moved. It did so slowly at first, its momentum increasing, but its path didn't travel left to right as those on the seasons-passed evening standing beside the king. Instead, it appeared to plummet toward the earth.

Teryk pushed himself up on his elbows, the old fear brought on by his nanny's stories and reignited when he and Danya found the scroll creeping in to tighten his muscles. They'd have been nothing to him—a silly childhood memory lost with so many others of the same ilk—if not for the words his sister recited from the parchment written in a language she had no right to understand.

Should the Small Gods rise, man will fall.

A shiver rattled his spine as the star's arc continued, its brightness growing as it appeared to hurtle downward. It grew in size and Teryk climbed to his feet, entertaining the compulsion to track its trajectory. He did so until he saw it no longer. Did it slip past their world and out into the dark unknown beyond the sky? Or did it plummet into the ocean? Perhaps it struck the earth somewhere?

The Windward Kingdom?

He stared at the sky's reflection in the ocean's surface, the counterfeit stars trembling and shaking as waves disturbed their image; the moon's glow cut a swath across the sea, separating it into two broad, dark canvases. He continued staring, expecting to see the mirror images of more light streaking through the sky, but he saw none. The ripples disrupting the picture of the stars broadened, transformed into shallow swells so the visual echo became akin to the snapping fabric of a waving banner.

Its appearance reminded Teryk of the dark streaks running through the otherwise white beach, and his gaze trailed away, came to rest on the dual hues of this alien shore. A sharp line differentiated them with nary a speck or grain out of place. Light-colored sand took on a glow in the moonlight while the black patches might have been places where the world disappeared. If he dared set his foot on one, he'd likely slip inside this foreign land, lost to the life he knew.

Rilum slept on the ground behind him, deep snores rumbling in his chest loud enough to disguise the hiss of waves rolling onto shore. His body rested on a stretch of white, as though in sleep the sailor also worried the blackness would engulf him. Teryk wished for the man's noise to stop so he could experience the night in its fullest. Perhaps the sound of the sea—unhindered by creaking boards or flapping sails—might well bring him peace.

When did I last feel peaceful?

The prince slouched back onto the sand to ponder the thought, selecting a breadth of white to avoid disappearing into the earth. How long since he'd left Draekfarren? The answer eluded him, the gap in his memory hiding it from him. He remembered the woman with the space between her teeth and the men who ambushed him, nothing else after but vague sounds and cloudy images until he found himself inside a crate on the Whalebone. How he got on the ship and what happened in between remained a mystery he'd likely never solve.

Another star overhead brightened and grew as though collecting energy for its journey. As before, it began above him and, like the preceding dot of luminescence, the brightening light drifted at first, picking up speed as it went. Its movement followed a similar path to its predecessor, falling from the sky rather than traveling across it. Teryk climbed back to his feet, held his breath as he watched its descent.

It grew bigger, taking up more than its fair share of the night. Instead of continuing the same direction as the first shooting star, where it might have fallen on his home's distant shore or continued past into the vast beyond, its course veered toward the land across the sea.

It's heading straight for us.

Teryk faltered back a step, his still-wet boots squelching in the sand. A bright, fiery tail trailed out behind the hurtling star, and he'd have sworn the crackle of the flames reached his ears.

His eyes wanted