Queen of the North (Book 3) (Songs of the Scorpion) Read Online Free Page B

Hanyata was in jeopardy. The only good he could see was that her escape seemed to have gone unnoticed. But for how long?
    Of late, too many girls had taken to fleeing their duty to the people, Targas, and the Munam a’Dett. Betraying the citizens of Targas was a terrible and selfish sin, but standing against the benevolence of the Munam a’Dett Order of priests was a mortal sin worthy of the severest punishment. Even as a low-ranking priest of the vizien caste, and but a summer out of his acolyte’s robes, Edrik understood that dissent of any sort was more dangerous than a killing plague. Having girls flee their obligation showed a great unraveling that, in time, would upset the peace and harmony of Targas, which the Munam a’Dett had worked diligently for centuries to maintain.
    “A moment!” Thaeson stumbled to a halt, coughing, his thin fingers clutching the sigil of their order embroidered on his chest, a blue dragon encircling a blood-red lily that floated amid a knot of green vines, the symbol of life and its holy guardian.
    Edrik put a hesitant hand on his master’s shoulder, praying he would not collapse. The company’s twenty sets of eyes passed over Edrik and Thaeson, before resuming their search of the night. Edrik knew what his fellows were thinking, for it was also on his mind. They never should have told Essan Thaeson about the girl. It was true he would have found out in due course, but with him in tow and slowing the company, the chance of capturing the girl was almost lost.
    “We must hurry,” Edrik urged.
    “A moment is all I ask,” Thaeson puffed, before a fearful bout of gagging bent him double. He hawked and spat, then went back to sucking wind.
    I’ve already given you more moments than we can spare! It was all Edrik could do not to shout his thought aloud. Instead, he took a deep breath and looked askance at his master.
    Tufts of pale hair had come loose from the essan’s conical white-and-gold headdress, making him look wholly undignified. Worse still, mud covered his sandals, and more speckled the snowy hem of the ankle-length tunic hanging below his blue-and-gold quartered vestments. Edrik could not remember having seen Thaeson, or any essan for that matter, looking so rumpled and dirty.
    “All may not be lost,” Danlin said. Shaved bald like all in his caste, tall and broad enough to stretch his vizien’s vest of quilted green wool, he was a hard-faced young man better suited for armor and crushing foes. Not that the Munam A’Dett had lifted a finger to crush foes since raising the Shield of the Fathers.
    Edrik cocked his head toward the distant sound of chanting voices and pounding drums.
    “They’re beginning the ceremony,” Thaeson said, sounding as relieved as Danlin. “If that’s so, then none of my fellows have raised the alarm about the missing girl. Surely they know, but have found a suitable replacement.” As he spoke, the voices and drums merged to become a harmonic throbbing that mimicked the heartbeat of all life.
    “By Blood and by Water,” Thaeson said. Everyone around him repeated the sacred words, eyes on their home.
    How long will those words guard us? Edrik wondered, studying Targas, the Everlasting City of Light. And all alight the city was, its walls glowing like spun gold in the darkness, its crystal towers, lofty spires, and countless domes burning as if pieces of the sun had been set within each one of them. Adding to the radiance were hundreds of bonfires lit for Hanyata and the lamps set on every window sill of in the city. A far greater light shone where the Ilesma Temple stood at the center of the Targas.
    As always, Edrik’s breath caught when he looked upon the temple’s majesty. Ilesma is our true heart . The temple was a mountainous ziggurat, its terraced flanks crossed by dozens of sheer stairways. A dome of golden crystal crowned the structure, and it burned not as if a mere piece of the sun had been laid within it, but as if the sun itself