Voud knew there was one simple way for Anghat to prove that his accusation was true, and she knew it would work. It was just a matter of how long Irris could evade it.
The whole village was watching Anghat explain that if Irris was really Irris, he could lie. If she could only prove that Anghat had killed her brothers!
If she went into Anghat's house, no one would see her.
She had imagined sneaking in, locating the god, and sneaking out, but it hadn't occurred to her that there would be more than a dozen people's belongings scattered around the house. And if Anghat had managed to keep his god concealed in such a crowded place, it wouldn't be easy to find.
The crane had told her she was resourceful, so it must be true. "Whispery god, where are you?" she called.
"Here," said a papery voice. She followed the sound to a corner crowded with rolled-up sleeping mats. "Here," the voice said again.
"Where?"
"A hole in the wall, plastered over. Here!"
She put her hand on the wall, where she thought the sound was coming from. "Here?"
"Yes!" said the whispery voice. "Break the plaster, free me!"
She took the knife Irris had given her out of her belt. "I want something in return."
"What power I have is bound up in Anghat's wishes." The voice was quiet but intense. "He sacrifices with conditions and qualifications."
"Has Anghat forbidden you to answer any questions?"
"No. He forbade me to speak unless I was directly addressed. And he forbade me to harm him, or he would have been dead long ago."
"I want to ask you three questions, and if you know the answer you'll answer." She frowned, thinking over what she'd just said. "You'll answer right then."
"Agreed. Break the plaster, set me free!"
Voud chipped at the plaster with the knife. "Did you tell him about Irris?" A thought struck her. "Do you know who Irris is?"
"I have not spoken to him since the day you overheard us from the roof. His family is too numerous. And yes, I know who Irris is. One left!"
She stopped digging. "Those don't count."
"I will answer no more questions until you free me!"
"I won't, unless you say they don't count!"
"They don't count," hissed the voice, a whispery sigh. Outside and above, the villagers laughed at something.
She dug with fresh ferocity, revealing a gap in the wall and, sitting in it, a black stone some eight inches long, a huge, cruel bird's beak.
"How can you speak?" she asked without thinking.
"Anything with a mouth may speak." Which seemed odd to Voud, since the beak was motionless even when it spoke. "Two questions left!"
The stone beak cradled awkwardly in her arms, Voud threaded her way through the villagers watching Irris defend himself. "And for dinner my wife brought me a bowl of gravel," Irris was saying. "It was delicious!"
"Nothing but lies for the past ten minutes!" said one man, "Give it up, Anghat! You're lucky if Irris doesn't bring trial against you for this!"
"I'm sure," the headman said, "that Irris realizes Anghat's suspicion was reasonable. Now the issue has been settled, publicly and fairly."
"Let him bring trial against me!" Anghat cried. "Let him say straight out that he is the Irris who left here nearly two years ago!"
"Voud," said Irris, strong and clear, and suddenly everyone was looking at her. The headman frowned, perplexed, and Anghat's face went slack, his anger turned to fearful astonishment.
"Anghat is a murderer," she said. "Whispery god, who are you and how did you come to kill my brother Tas?"
"Two questions! I am quit of our agreement! You have no name for me. I was strong beyond your imagination. I and my confederates changed the land into sea and the sea into land; we defeated our enemies and left them drowned and powerless.
"Then I was betrayed. For millions of years I lay buried and starving until earthquakes and storms freed a small part of me from the mud and stone of the river bluff in which I was trapped. The man Anghat came along and chipped the beak from the rest of my skull, brought it to his house and put me in a hole in the wall and plastered it over."
"Lies!" cried Anghat.
"I will be revenged!" said the stone. "Anghat gave me blood and prayers, but I could use them only for his purposes. He wished me to kill the men of a particular house without arousing suspicion. The father was old, it was nothing to hasten his death. The son named Tas I caused to fall and hit his head with killing force." Anghat turned to run but he was trapped by the solid mass of villagers. "As for the man you call Irris. . . ." Anghat made a strangled noise and collapsed. "This is not Irris," the stone continued, "but my ancient enemy whom I thought trapped forever."
The stone beak was suddenly burning hot, and Voud cried out in pain and dropped it. It hit the rooftop and shattered into a dozen pieces. From the south came a dull rumble, almost like thunder, but the sky was cloudless. "Anghat is dead!" someone cried, and the villagers began speaking and shouting. Voud remembered the whispering god saying he forbade me to harm him; remembered Irris sitting beside her, the baby in his lap, refusing to promise not to hurt any villager. The man who cut my throat said he was paid to do it.
Voud looked toward Irris. He lay unconscious on the rooftop, Ytine kneeling beside him. Irris's ribs moved in slow, shallow breaths.
"Ytine," the headman said. "I'm trying to make sense of this."
"It lied," said Ytine. "When it said my husband had died. It must have killed Anghat, and tried to kill Irris, but its lie destroyed it."
Voud shook her head, but didn't say what she was thinking—the crane was right, Irris had had more power than he had implied.
Voud and Ytine sat by Irris, who lay where the men had placed him that afternoon. The sting of Voud's burned hands had faded. She was crying.
Ytine's eyes were closed. The baby slept curled on a mat, his thumb in his mouth, eyelashes sticky with tears. There was the sound of wings, and then the crane stepped fussily down the rungs of the ladder. Ytine didn't open her eyes, or say anything.
"Ytine is praying," Voud said.
"I know she is," said the crane. "Voud, listen to me. You could sacrifice to Irris, but I strongly advise you not to. At my most powerful I couldn't do what he did today. A whole section of bluff downstream collapsed into the river and just dissolved away. The ancient gods weren't like us. The world has changed so much; the ways gods survive are very different now. I honestly don't know if the gods of this marsh would be strong enough to protect you from him, if you ever needed it."
"You can make him better, at least enough to get up." Her throat ached, and her voice was unsteady.
"I don't know what he wants," said the crane. The baby, still asleep, gasped three times in quick succession and then sighed. "I don't know what he'll do. He's dangerous."
"Fire is dangerous," said Ytine, speaking for the first time. She opened her eyes. "We still keep it in the house."
"Fire is what it is," said the crane. "You know how to keep it contained."
Ytine said nothing, only looked at it. Voud couldn't read her expression.
"You're dangerous," Voud said to the crane, realizing.
"Very," the crane said. "That's why there are so many restrictions, in the agreement with you. But I do my utmost not to be a danger to you." It took two precise steps closer to Irris, spread its wings and then folded them again. "Irris is what he is, a potentially powerful god not bound by the marsh accord. But his presence has made your life significantly better. Whether I help or refuse to help, I may harm you. So I'll consider myself bound by your choice. I know what Ytine wants. I can guess what the baby would say. But you, Voud, are head of the household while Irris is incapacitated."