Escape
Sebastian turned his head as a chunk of the ceiling fell, streaking his cheek with cold grime. The battle waged above was like to bring the temple down around them. He fought against the ropes that bound his wrists and only succeeded in making them tighter. The three Bazira left in the room to guard them, however, glanced nervously at the ceiling and one spit a curse when Bacchus could be heard to roar in pain.
Good, Sebastian thought. I hope she burns him to ash.
He’d heard the battle first joined, and the fear for Selena had frozen the blood in his veins. She had come, as they all knew she would, to stop Accora’s pain.
No, she came to close her wound. She is strong. Strong enough to lift my ship from a maelstrom. That bastard Bacchus doesn’t know who he’s up against.
But Sebastian was no fool. It was true, Selena was strong, and braver than even she knew. But he kept up the silent litany of Selena’s strength in his mind because the alternative was too horrible to contemplate. He had seen the mountain that was Bacchus, and his heart shivered in fear for Selena.
A frightening sound came from above followed by another shriek, this from Accora. Great clumps of dirt fell from the ceiling now as the temple trembled with some impact from above. The Bazira guards exchanged glances with each other.
“Ori!” Sebastian hissed. “Ori, wake up!” But the woman was still and it was impossible to tell if she were conscious as her empty eye sockets gave no hint.
There came an eerie silence. Sebastian froze as the chilled air seemed to tighten. And then came the scream.
He sucked in a ragged breath as the sound reverberated throughout the temple. A scream so full of pain—something beyond pain; a desperate, despairing agony that begged for mercy, that said death would be preferable to life after suffering such as this. Sebastian’s stomach clenched and his vision became blurred. His sister had made that sound ten years ago. Selena made it now.
The scream tapered away and for a time there was nothing but eerie quiet. Sebastian struggled harder at his bonds until his shoulder screamed and his wrists were scraped raw. He spat mindless, vile oaths at the Bazira guards who looked unnerved.
When another shudder shook the temple, one shook his head and said to the others, “Bloody Deeps, I’ll take my chances out there.”
There was no argument; soon the chamber was empty but for Sebastian and Ori. The battle above resumed and Sebastian took a small measure of relief that someone was left alive to fight Bacchus. He hoped it was Selena but after a scream such as what he heard, he held little hope.
Ilior, most like, he thought dully.
The temple shook again and it seemed as if the island were groaning with the strain. The inevitability of being buried alive should have rattled him too, but he only leaned against the wall and waited.
When Ori sat up like a corpse rising from the grave, he nearly jumped out of his skin.
“Bloody bones and spit,” he breathed. “I thought you were dead.”
“I am. I have outlived my usefulness to the Bazira. I’m a former Haru, a blind woman with no people,” she said, her voice weak and soft. But Sebastian heard a vein of steel running through her words. “And you are a reviled assassin, feared and hated and deserving of death.” She smiled thinly. “That is what the world will think of us, should we live.”
The temple shuddered again with real violence and a large chunk of soil crashed to the ground on the side of the room. Dirt and grime rained down on them.
“You’d better get out,” Sebastian said dully.
“Yes,” she replied. “And you?”
He shrugged, a gesture she couldn’t see.
Ori was weak; whatever Bacchus had done to her had left her drained to the point of death. She murmured her prayer word and the glow of healing magic emanating from under her plain tunic and he saw some color return to her pallid face. She crawled to him, her hands outstretched until she found his knee.
“You have a knife?”
He nodded and then said, “Yes,” when she cocked her head. “Boot. The other one.”
Ori retrieved the dagger and then felt her way to his bonds. The temple gave another shudder and more dirt rained down. A beam cracked right above them and Sebastian didn’t know what to worry for most: the collapse of the temple, or a blind woman cutting rope on his wrists.
But he was free in moments and Ori handed the blade to him, hilt first.
He took the dagger and returned it to his boot and the temple groaned, like a man on its deathbed; a final rattle that broke the beams that supported the roof. Sebastian coughed and shielded his eyes from the grit that swirled in tunnel. The beams creaked. Dirt poured down like water into the hold of a sinking ship.
He wanted to go up to where Selena was, but he couldn’t find the way across the small chamber in the dark morass. Reluctantly, he turned toward the way he knew to get out—the tunnel in which they’d come in. Ori clung to his arm.
A beam—a thick slant of shadow in the dimness—started to fall. He dragged Ori and thrust her ahead of him, into a murk of dark blue that he hoped was the end of the temple. Behind him, a great rumbling deafened him and he dove forward, diving out of the maw of a terrible beast. He hauled Ori through it and out into the night just as the room collapsed behind them.
He landed heavily, Ori beside him. The dust settled. The temple was no more. The moon was obscured by thick clouds that pelted them with rain and tamped down the swirling dirt of the temple’s demise. But dawn was coming. By the faint light welling up from the east, Sebastian could make out a wide sunken patch of earth stuck with beams that jutted out like broken bones. The above-ground temple. He could see no movement amid either the wreckage or the forest beyond.
Sebastian crawled to his knees, shaking founts of dirt from his hair. The exertions brought new pain and sat heavily, cradling his aching head in his hands. Selena…
He felt a gentle hand on his arm and a warm glow emanated from under Ori’s touch. The pain receded, and he caught and steadied her as she slumped in exhaustion.
“Why heal me?”
Her tunic was dark with dirt and in the dimness, the hollow pits of her eyes seemed gaping, but her voice was gentle when she spoke.
“I am blind here,” she pointed to her empty eyes, “but not here.” She laid her hand on her heart. “Tonight, my eyes were opened. As a Haru, I followed the god without question. And when that path led me to pain, Accora showed me another. But to her, I was but a means to an end, and when I proved a failure, she made me her servant. Following her was no different than blinding myself for the god. There is only one truth and that is what we make for ourselves.”
Sebastian pulled himself to standing and then helped Ori to her feet. She laid her hand on his arm.
“Every life has more than one path, Sebastian Vaas. This I know.”