Shadowborn. Katie MacAlister

will sail for Genora as soon as we locate a ship. The queen will have raised her army by now; we will join forces with her. Then with Deo, we will return and destroy the rot that has taken hold in Abet.”

      Chapter 4

      It was the noise that made me want to scream in frustration.

      A slight squeaking noise, followed by the whisper of tiny nails on stone had me opening one eye, the one that wasn’t pressed into the rocky ground.

      A squat butter-and-cream-colored bumblepig paused in the act of digging through my hair, obviously looking for things to eat. Its little whiskers twitched while it gazed at me with confusion.

      “You’re a bumblepig,” I told the round, furry little creature the approximate size and shape of a loaf of bread. “You eat plants, not hair. What are you doing in the spirit world? Do bumblepigs who have died come here, too? I’m new, so you’ll have to take pity on my ignorance.”

      It ignored my questions, instead shuffling forward on legs that were comically short when compared to its rotund body. After taking a delicate nibble on one of my curls, it continued across the rest of my hair to the greener pastures of an area outside my cage.

      “My cage,” I growled, pushing myself up from the rock floor to glare through the wooden slats, grasping and rattling them for what seemed like the hundredth time. They didn’t give, no matter how hard I struggled with them. “Damn those Eidolon and their cage-making skills. Hello? Is anyone there? I need to use the privy!”

      Stuck where I was behind a large stone slab that had been propped up on a couple of plinths, I couldn’t see anything but the wall of the cave into which the thane had dragged me. I gathered that the Eidolon, so long asleep in their stony crypt beneath Kelos, were more comfortable in dolmens than the usual tents or hide shelters used by those in the mortal realm, but that didn’t give them the right to throw me into their extremely well-made cage and forget about me. “Hey! I am not dead, thus, I have bodily needs, and one of those is about to get very unpleasant if someone doesn’t let me out! Not to mention the fact that I’m hungry.”

      I cocked an ear to listen. Beyond the massive stone tomb that the thane had chosen as his domicile, I could hear some signs that others were nearby. An occasional rhythmical grating sound was clearly someone using a whetstone on a blade, while a hushed murmur of voices came from a greater distance.

      “Is this because of what happened earlier?” I yelled, shifting around in my cage to get my feet against the wooden bars. I grasped them, trying to simultaneously kick out at the bottom while pulling on the top, but the blasted things still wouldn’t move. “Because I apologized for biting off the thane’s nose. I don’t think I should be punished for the fact that his body parts come off so easily. Really, the fault is his. If he hadn’t dragged me into your realm, I wouldn’t have been forced to attack. Not that it did much good, because he’s faster in the spirit world than he is in mine, but still, if you were in my boots, you would have done the same. Wouldn’t you?”

      I held my breath, willing the unseen sword-sharpening spirit to answer me, but alas, he didn’t rise to any of my conversational bait.

      I sighed and leaned back against the walls of the cage, offering up several prayers to Kiriah. I might have tried to take off the head of the thane a few hours before, but I was still a priestess, and habit drove me to send several supplications to Kiriah for my actions of the last few days.

      I didn’t even bother to try to feel for her presence—Hallow had once told me that the influence of the twin goddesses was limited in this realm, and given that Kiriah hadn’t been acknowledging my presence at all the last few months, it came as no surprise that I had no sense of her here.

      “Nezu, now, him I can feel,” I murmured, rubbing the goosebumps on my arms. The dim light and slightly damp feeling of the cave reminded me of Eris before we’d driven Nezu from it. And with that memory came sadness—what was Hallow doing right now? He must have seen the thane take me with him when he escaped into the spirit realm…was the love of my life worried? Was he trying to rescue me? Did he miss me, or was he perfectly happy to have me out of the way while he devoted himself to the problem of dealing with Nezu?

      “Now you’re just being maudlin,” I told myself.

      “That’s understandable, given this place. You’d think the spirits would do something to make it a bit…well, nicer.”

      It was a woman’s voice that had me sitting up straighter, peering through the gloom to catch a flicker of movement that drew closer. I gasped at the sight of the person who had come to a halt outside my cage. “What in the name of the twin goddesses are you doing here? Did Nezu tire of your treachery, and take your life?” I asked, wishing more than ever that I had the swords the thane had taken before imprisoning me. I squinted at her, not seeing what I expected. “Wait…you’re not dead, either?”

      “Of course I’m not dead,” Mayam said, her brows lowering as she glared at me. “Lord Racin would never take my life. He knows I serve him most faithfully.”

      “Something you can’t say about the man you professed to love,” I pointed out, wishing that just for a minute, I was once again a Bane of Eris so I could deal with Mayam as she deserved. “Not to mention all the rest of us you betrayed when you gave the Queen’s moonstones to Nezu. What are you doing here if you aren’t a spirit? Are you here simply to mock me?”

      She smiled. “Lord Racin wishes to see you.”

      That shocked me. “What? Why?” I asked, confused. That Mayam should be here in the spirit realm was odd, but odder still was the thought that Racin sought my company. I watched Mayam closely as she used a giant black key on the lock that closed the door of the cage, a spurt of panic filling me at the memory of Hallow’s words about Kiriah withholding her favor from me in order to protect me from Nezu’s attention. Had the latter seen the traits of a lightweaver in me even though I had not wielded Kiriah’s power while I was on Eris?

      Mayam grabbed my wrist and jerked me out of the cage, causing me to scrape my free hand painfully on the sharp rocks that littered the ground. “It is not for you to question the ways of gods, priestess. Stop dawdling. Lord Racin is annoyed at having to come to the spirit world to speak with the thane, and his mood will not be sweetened by waiting for you.”

      “I don’t think exercising a little patience is going to kill him,” I grumbled, stiffly getting to my feet. The cage hadn’t been tall enough for me to do more than sit or crouch, and my back and legs made unpleasant cracking noises as I straightened up, but I ignored them as I mentally chewed over her comment. Nezu was here to talk to the thane? Why? What would a god, even a disgraced one who had been stripped of most of his power, have to say to a long dead warrior king? “Nezu must have something of great importance to discuss with the thane in order to come all this way. The living are not welcomed into the spirit world, not even those of Nezu’s stature.”

      She shrugged, still holding me by the wrist, tugging me after her as she hurried down a narrow path that ran past the stone dolmen and wound its way around massive, jagged fingers of rock that thrust upward. “It wasn’t that difficult to get here. You just need a spirit to guide you. Racin slew one of his Harborym and charged his shade to bring us.”

      The matter-of-fact manner in which she spoke left my insides feeling as cold and clammy as the cave itself. I had to admit I was more than a little surprised each time a bit more of her true nature was revealed. When I’d first met her she’d been my captor, but quickly became a compatriot…or so we’d all thought. “You’ve changed, Mayam, really changed. I’d like to blame the fact that you have sworn fealty to a vengeful, destructive god who wishes for nothing more than the total and complete annihilation of the Fireborn and Starborn, but I suspect that deep down, you’re just mean.”

      Her fingers tightened around my wrist, the glare from her narrowed eyes no doubt intended to strike fear in my heart. But I hadn’t gone through the