Free Scavenger of Souls by Joshua David Bellin Page B

light.
    He’d written three words: metal cuts better .

5
    Nessa, Adem, and I tried to follow the bloody trail of footprints, but we didn’t get far.
    We were met by Archangel at the head of a group of warriors, who forced us back to the cave. They stared in horror at the body on the floor, only Archangel’s expression remaining unchanged. Then they retied our bonds securely and led us to Asunder.
    The leader was awake, standing in the throne room with a terrible smile on his scarred face.
    Nessa threw herself at him too fast for the guards to stop her. He made no move to defend himself as she spat violently in his face.
    â€œYou knew!” she screamed. “You knew this would happen! You meant for it to happen!”
    Asunder said nothing as Archangel restrained Nessa. She struggled, tried to bite the giant’s hands. When Archangelheld her in his unyielding grip at last, Asunder lifted his voice so that it rang across the cavern.
    â€œThe sons of the despoilers have defiled our sanctuary, spilled the blood of those who offered them priceless gifts!” he boomed. “What punishment befits such a crime?”
    â€œBehal!” the warriors thundered in a single voice. “Behal Nidach bar Tivah!”
    Asunder smiled cruelly. “Feed them,” he said softly, as if to himself. “Feed them to the Scavenger of Souls. It is just, my children. It is our way.” Raising his arms above his head, he called out to the company, “The Scavenger awaits! Take them to his altar, and there let them be bound to meet their fate!”
    He nodded at Archangel, who half prodded, half dragged me and Nessa across the cavern. Nessa needed a lot more dragging than prodding. Asunder took the lead, and twenty or more warriors flooded after us. I turned to see Adem, Tyris, and Nekane bound and struggling to keep up with their captors’ mad rush. The children of Survival Colony 9 had joined the crowd too, though their hands remained unbound. Their faces looked strangely empty, and though I couldn’t be sure as I was jostled and shoved, it seemed to me they shied from eye contact, all except Zataias. At the very rear of the throng, I glimpsed a stretcher bearing a single pale form, the still-unconscious body of my mother.
    Nessa’s voice was in my ear, speaking in a hushed tone. “He used us, Querry. He used Wali to cement his hold over his people. That’s what this was about all along. The Scavengerof Souls, all the rest of it—it was all a lie to justify a lynching.”
    â€œYou think they killed their own man?”
    Her lip curled. “I wouldn’t be surprised. But Wali was desperate enough to do anything. I wish I’d seen it, I wish I’d said something to him. . . .”
    â€œIt’s not your fault,” I said. “I let you all down. I let them do this to you.”
    Nessa sighed. “It’s no good playing the blame game, Querry,” she said. “What we’ve got to do now is look for a way out. We wanted them to free us from this place.” Her smile didn’t soften the determination in her eyes. “It looks like we’re about to get our wish.”
    She was right. We stampeded to the cavern’s far end, where two warriors with spears blocked another exit. They sprang aside as if Asunder’s eyes had physically repelled them. The new tunnel we charged down was much broader than the one from two days ago, though the lack of torches suggested it wasn’t used much. In a few minutes I saw what looked like daylight patterning the stone, and moments later we reached the tunnel’s end, two more armed warriors stepping out of our way as we burst into the outside world.
    I blinked in sunlight every bit as bright but nowhere near as dazzling as the gem-fire of Grava Bracha . From the ledge where we stood, I saw that we remained within the canyon, but farther north than where we’d been captured, with the