Page 43 of The Merciless Ones
It’s almost like the Firstborn is a shadow but one made out of light instead of darkness. She’s some sort of illusion, like the mirages that appear in the desert on exceedingly hot days.
“I don’t have a lot of time, Deka,” she says urgently. “My gauntlets, they require a lot of strength to use them.”
“Your gauntlets?”
She holds up her hands to display her clawed white gauntlets, the ones she never takes off. “They’re arcane objects,” she explains. “I use them to watch people.”
Spy on them, she means. Now I understand how she always knew what I was doing back at the Warthu Bera. It wasn’t just all the spies she had floating around; it was her damned gauntlets.
And, of course, she never mentioned this until now. Curse White Hands and her secrets.
“But how did you know to look for me?” I ask, putting aside my annoyance.
“I had an instinct something was awry, so I searched out Melanis, found her flapping around the Eastern provinces. Once the mothers brought her back to Abeya, she told us what happened.”
“The door,” I say, nodding. “Idugu created it.”
“You mean the angoro created it.”
I shake my head. “No, I mean Idugu,” I reply firmly.
By now, White Hands’s expression is as close to alarm as ever I’ve seen it. “Deka, there are no other gods but the Gilded Ones.”
“And yet one dragged us all the way to Hemaira. A feat the mothers themselves could not manage,” I say.
“Because the angoro is siphoning their power.”
“Or Idugu is.”
Just like that, White Hands has had enough. “Deka, whatever this is, it is beyond you. You must come back to Abeya so we can sort this out. All of you.” She turns to the others, but I step in front of her, blocking her gaze.
“How?” I ask. “How do we get past the n’goma? It’s still there, burning our bloodsisters’ bodies to a crisp. We’d burn too if we tried to leave. And the mothers don’t have enough power to get us out, much less to deal with all the male deathshrieks.”
“Male deathshrieks?” White Hands seems stunned by this.
“There are lots of them now, apparently,” Adwapa quips drily.
“So I have a better idea,” I say. “We free our sisters from the Warthu Bera, and then we march on the Grand Temple, wrench Elder Kadiri from his roost, and bring him back to Abeya, where we can learn from him what we’re dealing with – angoro, Idugu, you can discern the truth of it then. Or do you have a better plan?”
White Hands looks away, thinking. Sorting through the possibilities. I know she doesn’t believe me about Idugu, but she can’t dismiss the theory. Experience has taught her to consider all avenues, same as it has me. She might not like what I have to say, but that doesn’t mean she won’t consider it.
Finally, she turns back. “Very well, Deka,” she says, “just don’t get caught.”
“I know what I’m doing,” I say, offended.
“So did Melanis, and she was trapped for centuries by the jatu.”
An excellent point.
“I won’t get caught,” I promise. “None of us will.”
White Hands snorts. “A cocksure attitude like that is certain to get you killed.” Her eyes narrow. “Don’t get killed either.”
“I’ll try not to,” I return. Then I peer at her. “By the way, White Hands, are you certain you’ve never encountered Idugu before?”
She frowns, thinking. Then her eyes widen. “I did,” she gasps. “The day I was birthed, the mothers—” She stops, her eyes glazing over.
“White Hands?”