We reached the edge of the forest, the trees thinning to reveal the drought-stricken village that I knew lay ahead. One minute the trees pressed in around us like a chorus of black-throated sentries; the next the canopy thinned out and the sky opened into a hard, indifferent dome.
From the height of my chambers in the Temple of the Sun, the land of Solaris was a ribbon of color and promise: markets and temple spires and golden roofs.
Down here, at ground level and nearer the real world, the Temple’s blessing ended in ragged lines. The air here felt different—dry, parched, and heavy with the scent of desperation.
This was not the bustling; vibrant village I had envisioned from the stories I had heard of our outer lands. This was a placethat had been forgotten.
Dario walked beside me, moving carefully through the shadowed night. I had never seen him look more like a man and less like a myth than he did tonight—jaw tight, shoulders coiled, an edge of something like grief in the set of his mouth.
“You said you would show me,” I told him, drawing the hood of my cloak higher against the dust. My staff was strapped to my back; my palm itched for its familiar weight though I forced the need down.
“Patience,” he murmured.
We came over the last rise and the village opened below, like a wound made visible. Small cottages leaned away from one another, their roofs thin and sagging; a well stood cracked and ashamed in the square.
Fields that might once have fed a dozen families were a patchwork of dry furrows. No roosters crowed. A dog howled once and then quieted as if remembering hunger was a sin.
“This is what they’ve kept from you,” Dario said, his voice quiet but unyielding. “Your Elders have turned their backs on these people.”
“No,” I whispered, shaking my head as if denying it could change the truth. “They wouldn’t… they told me they were sending aid.”
“Did you ever see it with your own eyes?” Dario asked, his voice cutting through the darkness. “Or did you simply trust what they told you?”
I hated that question. Hated that it made me doubt everything I had believed. I had always trusted the Elders. I had always believed they were doing what was best for Solaris, for the people.
But as I stood there, staring at the lifeless fields, I couldn’t ignore the sinking feeling in my stomach. This place looked…forgotten.
Then movement flickered at the edge of my vision: a figure, robed, moving like a shadow between houses. Not a villager. There was a strange light under his hood, the sort of pale sheen that comes from candle-wash on satin, and the sigil pinned to his breast glinted in the last of dusk.
My heart stuttered, an animal alarmed. The sigil was blunt and familiar—the stylized orb and rays of Solaris’ Temple. I had seen it stitched on paladin cloaks and stamped on grain sacks meant for the poor. I had worn that symbol on robes given to me for rites. Seeing it here on a man slipping like a thief through a drought-stricken village nearly undid me.
I tensed, my hand instinctively going to the hilt of my dagger.
“Who is that?” I whispered, narrowing my eyes as the figure stopped at one of the houses.
Dario’s gaze followed mine, and then his hand was at my elbow—not restraining me so much as steadying me. “I don’t know. But we’re about to find out.”
Chapter 8: Dario
With a wave of my hand, I cloaked myself in shadows again.
I pushed forward against the very edge of the wards. To anyone watching, I was invisible.
“I thought you said you couldn’t go beyond the wards?” Elena murmured.
“If I amverylucky, we won’t need to go beyond the wards,” I said dryly, and I was rewarded with a sudden chuckle as if I had surprised the priestess into laughter.
It seemed luck was on my side because the hooded figure didn’t go any further, raising his hand to trace a sigil on the wall of the house before him.
The sigil momentarily glowed in the night before it faded into the dark. I hissed as I read the sign, causing Elena to look at me curiously.
“What is it?”
“The house and its inhabitants are marked, now.” I sighed. “Wherever they go, this mage will know.”
“He’s a mage?” Elena stepped forward for a better look, and I raised my hand to catch at her shoulder, before curling my fingers back. She wouldn’t welcome my touch.
“Yes,” I hissed. “So step back, before he senses us. You stand out in this gloom, with your golden hair.”
