He didn’t disagree.
She turned west. An island lay two miles out, and from that island rose a matte black tower, like an arrow drawn to pierce the sky. A shadow crossed her face. “Bay Station,” she said, resigned. “I think I know what you plan to show me. I’d rather not see it.”
“I thought the same thing, the first time someone took me here.”
She drew back. A cool wind blew salt spray against his face.
“You need to see this,” he said.
“They’ll show me when it’s time.”
“I want to be the one who shares it with you.”
“Let’s go back to the shore. Watch fireworks. Have a nice evening.”
“Yes,” he said. “Let’s. But first I want to show you what I mean about sacrifice.”
Her eyes met his: black mirrors reflecting the passion of the sunset.
“Okay,” she said.
He bowed to her and walked toward the station. Out here, away from the shore, the sea no longer smelled of dead fish. “Have you spent much time on the water?” Caleb asked after a while.
“Some friends and I kayaked through the Fangs once, after graduation.”
“I didn’t know you could kayak in the Fangs.”
“Some of the bays are still tainted by the Cataclysm, so the kraken and sea serpents and the other big monsters stay away. Wards on the kayaks deal with little ones.” A tall wave rolled beneath their feet. “The ocean between the Fangs is warmer than the Pax, shallower. On calm days you can see all the way down to sunken Quechal cities overgrown with coral.” She sighed. “Why do you ask?”
“The path is sensitive to intent. The more I think about the station, the more it strays. If I don’t distract myself, we could walk all the way to Longsands, or into the center of the Pax.”
“Oh.”
“So,” he said. “Tell me about your trip to the Fangs.”
“We splashed around for two weeks; I was almost eaten. That was the end of the vacation, at least for me.”
“Eaten?”
“I was bored with the stars one night, and the ocean looked placid, inviting, rippled soft as molten glass. I took off my clothes, warded myself, and swam out.”
“Gods.”
“It wasn’t a good idea.”
“Wasn’t a good idea,” he said. “There are things in the Fangs that would eat you in one bite, wards or no wards.”
“Most of those don’t swim close to shore. I thought I was safe. The water was cool, the ocean dark. I’ve never felt such wonderful solitude.”
“What happened?”
“A riptide.”
“Oh.”
“I looked back and realized I was farther from our island than I thought, and no matter how I tried to swim back, the current bore me out. Panic took over. I forgot everything I knew and tried to swim against the tide, splashing and pulling and kicking, but it didn’t work. I tried to call for help, but I was too far away.” Her grip on his hand tightened. “It’s strange. You talk about something like that and the moment rushes back.”
“So, what did you do?”
“I was about to die. I remembered that riptides are strongest near the surface, and don’t extend far from side to side. I dove down and tried to swim parallel to the island’s shore, but I was tired. Then the gallowglass struck.”
“Qet and Isil,” he said, not realizing that he had sworn to gods.
“The water around me glowed green, and I was caught in a tangle of burning wires. Even with my wards, some of the poison made it through. For weeks afterward I looked like I had been flogged from head to foot with a barbed whip. I screamed, I’m not ashamed to admit, and the winding wires drew me up to the surface, toward the beast’s mouth. Which was lucky, in a way.”
“I think we have different definitions of lucky.”
“I was tired. If it hadn’t reeled me close to what passed for its brain, I couldn’t have struck it with the Craft. I drank the creature’s life, and used the strength I stole to guide me back to the island. My classmates found me the next morning, lying on the beach, passed out and wound with the stinging tendrils I hadn’t been strong enough to tear away. They launched a flare, and a nearby settlement soon sent help. I spent the rest of the vacation in bed. I don’t go to the ocean much anymore. I like the land. You can see what’s creeping up on you most of the time.”
Sand crunched beneath Caleb’s shoe, and he realized that they stood on the eastern beach of Bay Station, in the black tower’s shadow. As always on this journey, he had missed the moment of transition, when the island ceased to be a distant goal and appeared beneath and before him.
Watchmen waited atop a grassy bank overlooking the beach—burly, armed, the air around them thick with Craft and threat.
“Friends of yours?” Mal asked.
“No,” he said. “I’ll handle this.” Raising his hands, he strode forth to meet them.
35
Caleb and Mal descended into the island, paced by silent guards. The stair was long and winding, and pristine, like everything else in Bay Station. Every light was sun-bright, each corner swept.
“They keep house well,” Mal said.
“Dust can hide things,” Caleb whispered. The wide halls and open spaces made him nervous. “One of my father’s associates once tried to sneak a goddess in here, lodged in the dirt of his boot. She nearly took over the station before the King in Red stopped her.”
“I see.”
Their descent continued. Down side corridors, Caleb glimpsed the other station staff: academic Craftsmen in white laboratory robes, junior initiates arguing about thaumaturgical theory or professional sports, gray-shirted janitors living and undead, mopping floors and polishing windows.
On Caleb’s previous visits Bay Station had resembled the inside of an anthill, but tonight it was almost deserted. Everyone who could request time off for the eclipse had done so. The unlucky remainder would gather tonight in the observation tower to watch the fireworks and miss their families.
The staircase ended in a broad landing and a thick double door of cold iron, so wrought with wards and contracts that Caleb’s eyes refused to rest on its surface. The guards stood on opposite sides of the door, and placed their hands on the featureless white wall. Their wrists twisted at a particular angle, and silver-blue light shone around their fingers.
A glyph in the center of the doors blinked three times, and the world dissolved in darkness. Out of the darkness flashed a brilliant claw that pierced Caleb’s body and soul. The night broke, and the door ground open.
Beyond, white walls gave way to unfinished rock. Crude, primal symbols marked their path through the stone labyrinth.
“How old is this place?” Mal’s voice sounded small in the winding, echoing tunnels.
“There were Quechal colonists here before the city was founded. Since they lived so close to the Pax, they worshipped ocean-gods, predator-gods, rain-gods. Qet Sea-Lord was the center of the pantheon. After the Cataclysm, when so many Quechal moved up here, their heresy became dogma. We built new temples on land, Serpent-temples, sun-temples, but the old sacred caves remained out here.”
A rhythm resounded in his chest: a twinned concussion, two building-sized hammers beating against granite. Rocks shifted on the floor of their rough-hewn path.
“There’s still a god here,” she said.
“Yes.”
“We can go back. You don’t need to show me this.”
“I do. For my sake.”
The rhythm drew nearer. Caleb heard a rush of breaking surf.
The tunnel widened into a cavern. Stalactites hung like rotten teeth from the arching roof. Dark rock glittered wetly in the ghostlight.
The path split to circle an enormous pit. The percussion and the rolling ocean swell emanated from within.