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) 📗

Danya's eyes widened, her head moved side to side. Her lips continued shaping words but Teryk heard nothing over the roar in his ears as his anger hardened into rage.

"You stole it from me. I'm meant to be the world's savior. Me."

He leaped forward, his body taking over and moving of its own accord. He snatched the knife from Ive's hand with so little effort, he might have thought the man handed it to him. His bare foot fell on a sharp rock sending pain shooting through his sole; he ignored it, the sensation suffocated by his blinding anger.

The world around him slowed.

Trenan stood, face contorted and mouth open wide as he shouted unintelligibly to Teryk. Fellick shifted, blocking the master swordsman. Evalal's body tensed, but she remained as unable to move as Danya beside her.

Teryk's vision narrowed, everyone disappearing from his view as it dwindled until he saw his sister, the blade in his hand, and nothing else. He heard naught but his heart slamming against his ribs, felt only the rage coursing through his limbs and filling his chest, thought about how his destiny—his one chance at a meaningful life—had been wrenched from him.

The point of the dagger pierced the skin of his sister's—half-sister's—throat. A tiny mist of blood fell onto the blade as it slid deeper. Her face twisted, surprise leaving it as it transformed into a mask of sadness, pain, disappointment.

I won't disappoint anyone anymore.

The full length of the knife thrust into her neck until the hilt pressed against her and the tip broke the skin on the opposite side. Danya convulsed, blood bubbling at the corners of her mouth. She stared into her brother's eyes, unspeakable dismay glistening at the edges of her eyelids. Her lips moved as though she wanted to speak, but her words became a cough spraying crimson droplets across Teryk's hand and forearm. Sticky redness ran along her chin; she coughed again, choking on her own life-giving fluid.

Teryk yanked the knife out of her throat, a thick, red gout following it out, running down her neck and staining her shirt. He took a step back, his vision of everything around him opening again. Beside Danya, Evalal's mouth hung wide, her face twisted as she wailed. Farther to his left, Trenan struggled against Fellick's hold to no avail. His sister teetered in her seat for a few heartbeats, tears spilling from her eyes, tinting pink as they mingled with the blood on her chin and jaw.

She shifted, her shoulder tilting toward him, as though she wanted to reach out and touch her brother, but her bindings prevented her from doing so. Her expression betrayed a longing to connect one more time. Teryk glared at her, batted her attempt away, his anger not in the slightest satisfied despite the bloodletting.

She pitched forward onto the ground, head coming to rest against his ankle. Blood gushed from her throat, splashing across his feet and turning the dirt to grisly mud.

Teryk lowered the knife and watched her life draining from her. The rage in his chest drained away along with it, his awareness of sounds returning—Evalal's sorrowful wail, Trenan saying the princess' name, Ive clicking his tongue.

"Tch, tch, tch. Look what's happened here. No more firstborn child. A shame, I say. A shame."

Vaguely aware he understood the man's words when he shouldn't, the blade slipped out of Teryk's slackened hand, thudded against the ground beside his foot. He crouched, used his fingers to brush the hair plastered to his sister's forehead away from her face and looked into her eyes staring ahead, her life flickering out in them like a candle in a stiff wind.

"Danya?" He stroked her cheek with his fingertips. "Danya?"

His rage disappeared, the memories of disappointments and failures displaced by adventures they'd gone on together, laughter shared. None of the blame for this belonged to her—she didn't choose who fathered him, or that she'd be the chosen named in the prophecy. It wasn't her hand which inscribed the ancient words upon the scroll, nor did she leave it for them to find. Truly, she loved him and supported him whenever he needed her, when no one else did. And now he'd betrayed her, ended her life.

"What have I done?"

Teryk leaned forward until his forehead touched his sister's. The energy she'd always possessed, the light that shone from within her, disappeared, extinguished by his instant of unfathomable, unreasonable anger. His heart shrank inside his chest, tightening, shortening his breath until tears ran from his eyes.

"What have I done?"

XLIII  Vesisdenperos - Return

The sculptor opened his eyes as though waking from a long sleep, but understood this wasn't the case. His eyelids didn't open, but his awareness, his consciousness. For many cycles of the moon he'd hidden within his clay creation, carried around like a satchel full of essential contents waiting for the proper time to be untethered and used. Did the golem itself realize he dwelt inside it, dormant, awaiting his summons? Doubtful. The sculpture likely knew nothing beyond his assigned duty: retrieve the Small God and return with him to Teva Stavoklis.

Many things returned with his sight and awareness. A group of priests made up the circle, gathered around an ancient stone and wood altar where a figure lay. A chanted incantation rang in his ears and drops of rain splattered on the hard clay surrounding his consciousness. Beside him stood Kuneprius, his friend and mentor, the closest thing he'd ever had to a father. An agonized and despairing expression twisted his features as his hands came down, plunging the knife they held into the chest of the gray man lying on the holy table.

In that instant, Vesisdenperos realized the significance and timing of his wakefulness. This prone figure before him was a Small God from behind the Green, the very