Tarashana by Rachel Neumeier (little red riding hood ebook TXT) 📕

would not release me from his control, I hoped he would kill me. I made that thought very clear. I made it the only thought in my mind, pushing the rage aside so that he could not possibly fail to see it.

“I’ll let you go as soon as I can,” he said. “Soon. I don’t think the gods can hold back the sunrise much longer.” He was silent then, gazing down toward the distant peak of Talal Sabero. Where the eagle-warrior had shattered the bridge, the light frayed away into silvery mist. The gap was too wide for anyone to cross, shadow or shade or living person, but that did not matter now. The Saa’arii shadow warriors had gone. The empty blackness of the tide lapped high up around the highest peak of Talal Sabero. It was still rising. I thought that if that shadow tide drowned all the mountain, then it might not matter how bravely Inhejeriel strove to call back her people. Perhaps this thought was wrong, but I feared that, as the stairway that led into the sky was anchored to that mountain, if that anchor failed, then the stairway could not hold.

“I certainly hope that’s not the case,” Aras said. “But if you’re right, then I pray most fervently that the Sun rises before the tide reaches that height.” He paused, looking intently downward along the span of the bridge. “Look there, Ryo.”

I obeyed that order—that might even have been my choice; I could not tell. It was becoming more difficult to feel in myself the difference when I moved according to his will, to feel whether I moved at all according to my own. But then I forgot that thought, bitter though it was, because I made out the shape of someone, a man, an Ugaro man, not a half-seen shade but a living man, running across the crest of the mountain. The distance was too great to see him plainly. But even if I had not been able to count off the dead and number the living, I would have known who he was by the way he ran, hard, head down, putting all his will into endurance.

“I’ve been calling him as hard as I could, but of course he had no chance until the eagle drove back the ka’a,” Aras said softly. “Now the high bridge of the sky is broken, so I don’t know ...” he did not finish that thought.

I would not have believed anything could soften my fury by the smallest degree. But at least he had tried to save Tano. That effort might fail, probably it would fail, but he had tried.

Aras said nothing. We both waited. There was nothing either of us could do.

Tano reached the base of the base of the spire and flung himself up the stairway without pausing. He was still a long distance below us, but climbing as fast as he could, in our view and then out of it as he circled the spire. Soon he would reach the place where the stone turned to light. Before him, where the eagle-warrior had struck through it, one step ran out into broken shards of light and drifting mist. Seven steps were missing: a gap far too wide for any Ugaro to jump. I wanted to get up and go down the span of the bridge, although there was nothing I could do to help Tano. I knew Aras must know I wanted to do that, but my body did not move.

“You’re tired, Ryo, and you’re still bleeding. You can’t help him. Just rest.”

I had no choice. His will ruled mine completely.

“I’ll let you go as soon as I can,” he said, as he said before.

I met that with all the scorn I could, and he turned his face away, not speaking again.

Tano came to the broken place and stopped there, looking up at us. He took a step back and called out something, but I could not make out his words.

Far away, and yet seeming very close, the sky began to shift from silvery-lavender to a brighter shade. A warmer shade, not gold nor pink nor salmon. A color that was like those colors, but richer. I could not feel the direction, but I knew that must be the west. Above, in the land of the living, the Sun was setting. Here, in the land of the shades, he was about to rise. Only when I realized this did I see that the Moon had finally begun to walk down from the highest vault of the sky. She was moving fast now, much faster than usual, sinking farther toward the horizon with every breath.

Thunder cracked, sharp and close. From nowhere, from beyond the sky, the eagle flashed into view. Light streamed from his milk-white wings; the night itself barred those white feathers with black; the wind as he swept past made me sway where I sat, and Aras gripped my arm to steady himself, though he let go immediately.

The eagle drew a blazing path through the sky, circling, then plunged toward Tano, who took a step back, then braced himself and stood still. I had just time to be proud of him, and then the eagle struck—not Tano, but the air directly before him. The starlight fountained up, like still water when a boulder crashes from a high cliff into a lake. I swayed again, caught myself, and looked again as the light settled and the wind passed away. In that place, where the stairway had been broken, now the steps rose up unbroken, one after another in their smooth curve, so that the stairway spiraled all the way from the vault of the heavens to the highest point of Talal Sabero. Where the gap had been, milk-pale moonlight glimmered, not exactly like the opalescent starlight from which the rest of the bridge had been spun.

A heartbeat later,