“Certain rumors have reached us in Vallessau,” she said. She stared him dead in the eyes and challenged him to lie. “I have to know. Is it true?”

Eshiel crossed the wide tent to the entrance, pushed aside the flap, and gestured for her to follow. He still held his dagger.

“Nothing I tell you would ever be enough,” he said. “So come see for yourself, if you are willing to endure the blood it costs.”

A shiver ran through her. Was it fear, or excitement? This handsome man, he was watching her, studying her. A need to prove herself rose in response to those light brown eyes. She would not cower. As the Light of Vallessau, she had stridden the front lines of the battlefield, her blade gleaming and her shield unbreakable. She held no fear of blood.

Together they stepped out into the center of the bustling camp. Her first impression when she had arrived in the waning evening hours had been of a loose collection of tents and huts built from the surrounding ash trees and covered with linen. It was orderly despite the obvious newness and rush. While bound and marched into Eshiel’s tent, Keles had estimated maybe thirty or forty people lived there, but that number had been off by a wide margin.

“Stay with me,” Eshiel said, as the train of followers swelled. Hungry, distrusting eyes watched her, and Keles made sure to keep beside him at all times. They walked a well-worn path through the trees to the white cliffs that gave the forest its name.

The crash of waves greeted the forest edge. Beyond were steep cliffs, rising out in defiance of the Crystal Sea. The path they walked led to the highest of the cliffs, six lit torches already waiting. Eshiel led the climb up the slope, where a half circle of stones, six in total, lined the narrow edge. These pillars were wide at the bottom but slender and curling near the top, so they appeared to be fingers of a buried giant reaching out from the ground. Moss grew along their wind-blasted gray surfaces. Walking into their center felt like walking into the presence of history. These stones were old. Who had placed them, and how many centuries prior to Keles’s existence?

The sacredness of this site was clearly felt by the others. The people accompanying their walk fell silent. No one spoke. The only sound was the muffled shuffling of feet, the rustle of cloth, and the heavier breathing of the elderly. Even the children knew to hold their tongues, which was a miracle in and of itself. The young certainly had never shut their mouths during the lengthy sermons she’d attended at the Twin Sanctuary.