two of them swayed. But, “Peace,” said the Queen’s low voice, and both of them
were struck still. Only their eyes moved and glittered as they looked at her
sidewise.
“I would see this paragon over whom goddesses contend,” she said. “Skotadi.”
Between Mriga and Siveni and the throne, darkness folded itself together into a
shadow-shape like that Ischade had cut loose from the girl-corpse and Razkuli
and Stilcho. It seemed a maiden’s shadow, vague around the edges, wavering but
lingering in the dark air like a compact smoke. “Fetch me the shade of a man who
was called Harran,” said the Queen. “He will be within the walls; he was buried
today.”
Skotadi swayed like blown smoke, bowing, and attenuated into the paler dark. The
hold on Siveni and Mriga loosened, so they could stand up. But the spear was
missing. The Queen was leaning it against one arm of her throne, and its head
was dead metal, smoking gently in the braziers’ gray light. “Since you cannot
decide,” the Queen said, “he shall.”
As she spoke, Skotadi came into being again and bowed before the Queen.
“Majesty,” she said, “there is no such man within the gates.”
Even Ischade looked surprised at that. “Impossible!” Siveni cried. “We buried
him!”
The Queen turned dark eyes on her. “If my handmaid says he is not here, he is
not.”
Mriga was out of her reckoning. “If he’s not here, where else could he be?”
“Heaven?” Siveni said, plainly thinking of all the way they’d come, possibly for
nothing.
Ischade looked wry. “Someone from Sanctuary’!” she said.