Before the Sky Fell

[ 13 ] A Talk Amongst the Gods

"Then find it. Can you bring them back with the Maker? The dead?"

Malachi shook his head. "It's not that simple. We can't change the past. Only the present."

Greylock grabbed his horse's reins and kicked at its gut. "If you can't bring back the dead, then what is the purpose?"

"I thought the purpose was reinforcements?"

Malachi saw it then, what this all meant to the Lark leader. Greylock wanted his wife back, his son.he grunted as he started down the hill. Before the darkness swallowed the beast, Malachi shouted, "Wait." Greylock turned. "There may be a way."

Bloodcurdling screams flowed through the darkness. Malachi stared at the fires. "There were others before me," he told Greylock. "Others have created worlds since the sky first split. And in those worlds, things happened differently. If we could see those worlds, create a bridge between them and this one, we could cross into them, or bring others here. But we must have the Maker to understand how it all works. To do that, we must find Frankford Millstone."

"Why that man? Is there no one else in all the kingdoms that may know the origins of the Maker? How it works?"

"It's more than that," Malachi said. "He knows things. He's old and weak, and perhaps doesn't know that he knows things, but he does. He's seen it." Malachi thought of his pregnant daughter and the world she created. In the chamber, where she disappeared, there was blood, from a nosebleed perhaps, or a pregnancy. Yet there was no child, no womb, no cord. "Frankford Millstone holds the answers I seek. The answers you seek."

Malachi wondered what it would have been like to grow old here, on Sebolt, and watch his daughter marry. Or was she already married and failed to tell me? His thoughts were chased away by Greylock's coarse voice. "If you're wrong about this, you'll die with the rest of them." Greylock turned his horse. Shadows danced across the trees.

Smoke rose out of a cabin in the middle of the island's southern field. Shortly he would find the Maker and bring his daughter back. He would create thousands of Larks and the stories would speak of his powers until the end of days. Stories of a father's love and a nation's fall. It would be the greatest legend ever told, and Greylock's name would be a footnote.

A Lark rode up the hill, nearly blending into the darkness. "Greylock, we've found an old man. He's the one you seek. He has surrendered himself."

Greylock laughed. "The fool."

∞

When they found Frankford Millstone, he was humming a song beneath the biggest tree Malachi had ever seen. Corpses filled the courtyard around him. Some were burned, some bloody. Others looked pristine, as if the villagers had drifted off to sleep. Larks stood around the old man. They held torches above his head, illuminating grey hairs and sunken eyes.

It had been more than a decade since Malachi had seen the old man, but the new lines and depressions and wrinkles in his face couldn't mask the familiarity. "Time has been cruel to you," Malachi said as he approached. Greylock dismounted and joined his side.

"And the world has been cruel to you as well. But alas, you've found us. Tell me, has the hunt been worth it?"

"It will be. It is just like the Hemonstalians to flee across the sea and swells where the timid Larks dare not venture. Not without a hundred ships at least. Tell me, after all these years, you thought we wouldn't come for you? It was too easy."

Millstone rested his cane on his thighs. "Nothing is easy these days. You've come a long way for that thing. Murder, war, treason, all to find something that is not meant to be found."

Malachi jumped from his horse. His boots sent a wave of dirt across the cobblestone. He stepped into the grass, where giant roots snaked through the hillside like tentacles. "I thought this time may have changed you, but you're still a pitiful man in search of answers."

"I've found my answers," Millstone said, "yet I retain my dignity. You would know nothing of the sort."

Greylock leaned into another Lark, who translated their words. Malachi sat down against a root and said, "You disappoint me Frankford Millstone, you really do. You think the sea can keep me from finding you? You think these wooden walls and clumsy soldiers can keep the wrath of the north from destroying you? Do you know what your aides said when I peeled their fingertips from their hands and shed the skin from their ankles?" Frankford sat silent. "They said you were crazy. That you couldn't be stopped. That you'd never stop your experiments. They wanted out and they would have told me had they known where you hid it. You are the reason they're dead. They were most informative while they were living. They told me how to use the magnets. Well, more crying in pain than telling. A lively bunch they were. For a while at least."

"Even if you found the Maker, it will never give you peace. It would destroy you and it would destroy all of this. Your daughter isn't in this world. You'll never be able to find her."

Curse the gods. Malachi hadn't told Greylock of his daughter. There was no use. It would only complicate things, get in the way of what they had to do. "It's nothing," Malachi said.

Greylock whispered to his translator, then stepped forward. "Daughter?"

"You didn't tell him?" Frankford placed his cane on the dirt ground and stood, his legs wobbly. "You didn't tell him what you really want the Maker for? To find your daughter?"

"Silence," Malachi said, slamming his hand into Frankford's face. The old man fell to the ground, blood dripping from his mouth. "Guards, restrain this man."

The Larks stood still, axes clenched tight in their hands, eyes trained on Malachi like he was some village drunk.

"It is nothing," Malachi told them. "It means nothing."

Greylock dropped his axe, stepped forward, and thrust his hand beneath Malachi's chin. Malachi felt his heels leave the ground, his toes drag along the dirt, his throat constrict. Greylock's nose was almost touching his, the rigid scar cutting off half the tip. Greylock clenched his jaw, then said, "If you have led me here for any other reason, any other reason at all, than to find that chunk of metal and replenish my army, I will dine on your flesh." Malachi felt his veins bulging, his lungs begging for air. Greylock let go and Malachi fell to the ground.

"We press on," Greylock shouted.Malachi reached down and placed the shackles on the old man's wrists."Malachi, as for you, you'll get until sundown. Whether he talks or not, we head northeast come morning. In two days we flood the gates of Eckrondale. He merely needs his eyes to see his island fall, not his tongue. When you're done with him, cut it out so he can tell no one of this. His hands too." Behind Greylock, flames ate away at the last splinters that held up the support beam for one of the cottages. The structure collapsed and sent a wave of fiery fragments towards the horse's legs.

"As you say." Malachi ran his fingers along his neck, teasing the numbness from his skin.

Blood seeped down Frankford Millstone's wrists. He hung his head and whispered things, things that Malachi couldn't make out. "Is the old man praying?" Malachi asked.

"And what if I was?"

Malachi smiled. He brushed grey hairs from in front of Millstone's eyes. "There's no use in praying Frankford Millstone. The only god you'll see tonight is me."