Page 77 of Beyond the Shadowed Earth
The ayrrah didn’t stop for their midmorning rest. They flew on into the afternoon, as, bit by bit, the spirits gained on them.
All at once, a mountain peak in the near distance emerged through the clouds; it shimmered and danced in the watery sunlight.
The ayrrah flew closer, revealing the mountain’s impossibly colorful rock layers, ranging from crimson to cerulean to a deep, rich green, its top a glistering yellow. As they drew nearer still, music curled strange through the air, a chorus of wind pipes and throaty percussion, a tinkling of bells and harsh splatters of lightning. And above it all, a wordless, mighty voice that seemed to shake the world.
Eda glanced over at Morin to see his expression; his face was wide with awe.
Tainir’s words echoed in her mind:Tuer made it for Raiva, in the days before the Stars were plucked down from heaven.The Singing Mountain.
For a moment, the spirits were forgotten.
The music rose and fell in waves, sometimes deafening, sometimes whisper quiet, but always mesmerizing and impossibly, achingly beautiful. Eda got the feeling that perhaps all of Endahr had been like this, long ago when the One who was before the gods had first formed the earth.
Morin pulled pen and parchment from his pack and started madly sketching the scene in front of them. Tainir opened her mouth to join the mountain in its song, her lips sparking with gold. Eda just stared and stared. She couldn’t get her fill.
The ayrrah flew even closer, until Eda could see the thick, velvety moss that covered the mountain and gave it those impossible colors. Every part of her yearned to stand on that beautiful peak, to let its music seep into her and fill her up, to think of nothing else for the rest of her days.
It seemed the ayrrah were drawn to it, too. Filah shot toward the mountain with terrifying speed; the music swelled to a roar, overwhelming her senses.
And then the spirits broke on them with the strength of a crashing wave, and the music was suddenly cut off.
The world went dark. The smell of decay enveloped her.
Something collided against Filah with a horrificthud.And then the ayrrah was screaming and Eda was falling through empty air toward the valley far, far, far below.
Chapter Thirty-Four
EDA PLUMMETED DOWN,DOWN,WITH SICKENING SPEED. She didn’t even have the breath to scream and so the terror swallowed her whole and she was helpless and falling and falling.
The last thing she saw would be the Singing Mountain, a blur of color, silenced by the shadows.
She had failed.
Tuer and Rudion had won.
The Circles were broken and there would be no rest for her.
No rest, no rest.
Then all at once a hand closed around her arm and Morin was there, still astride his ayrrah, but his bird was falling, too. One of the spirits was tangled up with him, its bone sword lost somewhere, its clawed hands ripping at the ayrrah’s wings. Eda clung to Morin, her fingernails digging into his arm as he struggled to hang on to her. The spirit shrieked and snapped its broken teeth at Morin’s head. He ducked in time to save himself, but the spirit’s teeth sunk into his shoulder. Eda screamed. Blood ran down Morin’s arm.
They fell and fell.
Rock and dirt rushed up to meet them. Eda and Morin, the ayrrah and the winged spirit, collided with the mountain, skidding to a stop in a tangle of earth and blood and feathers.
The spirit leapt back into the air, joining two others who shrieked and spat, their teeth dripping red. They wheeled above the mountain, preparing for another strike.
Morin scrambled to his feet, drawing his dagger, and Eda loosed the knife the Itan priestess had given her from her belt. It was too small to wound the spirits, a needle against dragons. She stood beside Morin, bracing for the attack, trying not to focus on his blood-soaked sleeve.
The spirits pinned their wings to their sides and dove. Eda thrust upward with her blade, but she missed. One of them collided with her, talons raking her shoulders, tearing a line of pain from her neck to her ear.
She scrabbled backward as the spirit bared its broken teeth.“He told us we may not kill you,”it hissed.“But he did not say we may not harm you.”
“Go back to thevoid,” she spat, lunging with her knife.
The spirit launched himself backwards into the air, easily avoiding her blow, laughing at her. “Your companions are not needed. Our lord Rudion only wants you. Their deaths will be your fault, as so many others already are.”
Eda shrieked and leapt from the mountain, grabbing the spirit’s taloned feet with one hand as she used the other to plunge her knife into its shadowy breast. The spirit roared in pain. She let go, tumbling back to the ground as it wheeled away from the others and disappeared into the clouds.
