The Patriarch cleared his throat. “Pardon us. Our littlest one is a…curious child. I should have scanned for him when the others left the room.”
Judging by the clumsiness Ziel had seen from the Jades here, his scan would have been slightly less useful than just glancing around with his eyes.
Tiny fists grabbed handfuls of Ziel’s hair, but it would take hundreds of pounds more weight to free even one of Ziel’s hairs. He pushed the boy to the back of his mind and continued.
“If you come with us, we can help you evacuate. We hope that you will be able to return soon, and that your homes will be intact. But if not…well, there is no replacing human lives.”
“Forgiveness, but if you don’t know how much destruction this Dreadgod will cause, then how much danger are we in?”
That slipped in through the cracks in Ziel’s heart, finding an unexpectedly tender place.
He had spoken those words, or ones very similar, years ago upon finding out that the Weeping Dragon was approaching. He’d known all about the Dreadgods, of course, but their sect was ancient. Well-defended. Protected by scripts and constructs.
How much danger could they be in?
As it turned out, they had survived the Dreadgod itself. But not the scavengers that fed in its wake.
When Ziel spoke, his voice was dead. “I used to lead a sect of my own. We decided that we could survive a Dreadgod. I decided. First, we felt the aura tremble, like footsteps shaking the ground. What you’re feeling now.”
He nodded to the walls. “Next, the sky changed color. It’s a change that accompanies each of the Dreadgods, as their power overwhelms all aspects of vital aura. We hunkered down inside defenses, layers of scripts that had stood for centuries.”
Ziel trailed off for a moment as he remembered the sky, raining lightning.
No one else spoke.
“One by one, it stripped away our defenses. Tore off the roof. Toppled buildings. Our techniques were only food for it. And the Dreadgod never stopped, it never saw us, it simply flew on by. We were stripped to the bone by its footsteps, by the wind from its passage. To it, we were only ants.”
Silence still reigned in the room.
Until Ziel felt a child giggle.
He realized that there was a weight on his head, and craned his eyes upward. While he’d been speaking, Maret had climbed up his hair and come to rest on top of his skull, and was now holding onto his horns, rocking back and forth as though riding a bull.
The horrified looks on the faces of the boy’s parents now took on a whole new dimension.
The Patriarch tore his gaze down and cleared his throat. “My sympathies. If your home was destroyed by this Dreadgod as well, then you above all have reason to warn us.”
“Not this Dreadgod,” Ziel said. He reached up and peeled away the child from his head, holding him out to his mother.
She was only too glad to take him.
“There are three others,” Ziel continued. “And what we survived was merely its passing. In front of an attack, there is no survival. There is escape, or there is death.”
Slowly, with no sudden movements that might signal an attack, Ziel pulled off the halfsilver rings restricting his madra and placed them onto the table.
“It is your decision to make. But I wish I had taken this chance myself.”
He turned and urged his Thousand-Mile Cloud to slide toward the door.
“We need time,” the Patriarch called.
“You don’t have it,” Ziel responded.
“It will take at least a day for the clan to respond to our emergency beacon!” the Patriarch’s wife protested.
Ziel stopped and slowly turned around. “You’re going to call your clan to evacuate?”
The Patriarch nodded. “As soon as we leave this room. But our territory is large. One day is already the fastest we can gather, and that’s if we use all our alarms of war and our swiftest riders.”
“I thought you needed time to decide,” Ziel said.
“Everything you’ve said lines up with the reports of our scouts and scholars. And I believe you.” The Kazan Patriarch inclined his head. “We entrust ourselves to your honor.”
“Oh. Well…good.”
Ziel became acutely aware of the weight of command settling onto his shoulders. He realized he had just taken responsibility for another clan of people.
What a stupid decision.
He should have let the Golds handle it.
The wall surrounding the Li clan was a work of art, a smooth expanse of pale, polished wood decorated by a functional script in a way that evoked the image of a slithering serpent. Treetops rose from behind it, and the sky was filled with birds of every description.
Mercy was impressed. Their commitment to aesthetics was all the more commendable considering their lack of resources. She could only imagine the effort it would take to build something so expansive and delicate with a workforce of Irons.
She only wished she had seen more of the Li clan than the outside.
“The Matriarch has arrived,” one of the guards announced from the top of the wall, and Mercy let out a relieved breath. She had spent most of the afternoon negotiating with underlings, trying to get a word with the clan leader.
Her Golds were behind her. She didn’t want to overwhelm the Jades.
Now, at last, she’d finally gotten somewhere.
A gray-haired woman stepped up to the edge of the wall. She was tall, thin, and dignified, with an emerald-set silver tiara in her hair and rings on each finger. A snake rested on her shoulders, and even it was decorated with gold and jewels.
Mercy dipped her head. “Humble greetings, honored Matriarch. I am Akura Mercy, and I have come to offer the assistance of the Akura clan in the face of the incoming threat.”
The Matriarch lifted one eyebrow. “And what threat is that?”
They knew exactly what the threat was. Even if they were blind to the increasing earthquakes and the bizarre behavior of the aura all around them, Mercy had explained the situation half a dozen times already.
But she gave no hint of impatience as she responded, “The Dreadgod, honored Matriarch. You can feel its footsteps in the earth. My mother is the guardian of the lands all around Sacred Valley, and I come as her representative to shelter you until the danger is passed.”
“And what proof do you bring that this danger is real?”
“I would be happy to leave a dream tablet for you, or to swear an oath on my soul, if that would convince you.”
The Matriarch waved a hand. “That isn’t necessary yet. Assuming I believe you, what would you have us do?”
“We have a fleet of cloudships ready to evacuate your clan outside the eastern passage to the valley. I urge you to let us help evacuate you and your families, so that we can fly you to safety.”
“Hmmm. Well, thank you for bringing this to my attention. I will consult with the clan elders and let you know our decision soon.”
She began to turn away, but Mercy cut in desperately. “I apologize for pressing you for details, but how soon?”
“Soon.”
“We expect the Wandering Titan to arrive in only a week, honored Matriarch. Once it begins its attack, it will be too late to escape.”
“I’m beginning to find your insistence rude, Akura Mercy,” the Matriarch said. She folded her arms and looked down on Mercy sternly. “If you really were the daughter of a ruler, you would know better than to show such…desperation. It is enough to make me wonder what you have to gain by rushing us into a decision. Perhaps you hope we will make ourselves vulnerable in our haste.”
Frustration tightened its grip on Mercy’s heart, but she threw herself to her knees. “I swear on my soul that every word I have said is true to the best of my knowledge,” she called.
Her spirit tightened slightly. A one-sided oath wasn’t as binding as an agreement with another soul, but it was still foolish to break.