Page 91 of The Weaver

Humming thoughtfully, Rekosh met Ahmya’s gaze. Her eyes gleamed with enthusiasm that made his heartsthread sing.

“Help me,vi’keishi. Carefully.”

Together, they peeled away more of the vegetation. As more of the stone was revealed, so too was something new—images in relief above the writing.

“Those look like vrix,” Ahmya said.

“They are vrix. It is like Takarahl, where there are carvings in some of the tunnels that show queens and warriors of old. But these…”

“There are so many.” Ahmya stood on her toes to point up at one set of figures. “These ones look like thornskulls.”

Rekosh cocked his head. “They do. And these… They look like shadowstalkers.”

The vrix depicted here were clustered into several groups, the members of each bearing appearances that were distinct even in these relatively crude, time-damaged reliefs.

“What are the other vrix called?” she asked.

“I know of a few.” As he spoke, he gestured to the carvings he believed to correspond to the other vrix kinds, each of which seemed to be represented here. “The fireeyes are from the lands where the sun crests. Winddancers are smaller, and are said to move silently and as swiftly as the wind itself, but no one has seen their kind in many years. I have also read of stonehides, mossweavers, and rainsingers, but little is known of them.”

He raked his gaze across the exposed reliefs, watching the shadows dance on them. “But I do not see the spiritstriders. They dwell deep understone, deeper than we shadowstalkers in Takarahl. And they are known to make war on all vrix.”

Ahmya peered up at him. “Why?”

“Because they hunger. For food, for flesh, for what other vrix have and they do not.” Rekosh folded his lower arms across his chest and drummed his fingers on his biceps. “When I was a broodling, we were warned about spiritstriders. Do not delve too deep, do not wander too far, or you may be snatched by a spiritstrider and be eaten.”

“That’s…terrifying.”

“It is. But it is fear that is meant to protect broodlings. The stories—the histories—written in Takarahl speak of them also. Many past queens battled the spiritstriders, whoswarmed from the deepest darkness to attack. Urkot knows more than I do. Delvers must always watch and listen for signs of spiritstriders, and they are taught to do so as broodlings.”

“Do they attack often?”

“I have not heard of an attack during my life. But I have heard of vrix going missing in the deep tunnels, never to be seen again. Their fates forever unknown. Every time that happens, there are whispers of spiritstriders, but none can say for certain.”

“Why aren’t spiritstriders pictured here?” Ahmya asked, looking back at the carvings.

Rekosh brushed his fingers beneath the faded writing on the wall. It wasn’t easy to read, and what he could make out was incomplete, but there was enough to make a guess. “I think this was a place of…friendship. Where different vrix came together. Carvings in Takarahl show other vrix only making war, but these are not fighting. They are at peace, as we are with the thornskulls now.

“Spiritstriders do not know peace, do not know friendship. They only know hunger. So they are not here.”

Rekosh shifted his gaze to his mate. Her brow was pinched as she ran her fingers over the reliefs, and he could see sadness in her eyes. “What is it,kir’ani vi’keishi?”

“These carvings are all nearly eroded away. It was only by chance that I noticed them. Time and nature are erasing what was once here.” She glanced around. “This place is a ruin, lost to time, forgotten. I imagine it was once a beautiful, joyful place, where vrix from all over shared stories and traded. But that’s all gone.”

His mandibles drooped, and he turned his head to again look out at the darkness. It was difficult to imagine what this place might once have been. Impossible to imagine all the different vrix gathered here, when he’d never seen any with hisown eyes but shadowstalkers and thornskulls. Yet he felt that sorrow all the same.

Rekosh and his kind had been taught from hatching that other vrix were their enemies. That the only contact between them could be in the form of war, because they feared the shadowstalkers’ strength, because they coveted what Rekosh’s kind had, because they envied Takarahl’s splendor. But despite the bloody past they shared, the thornskulls had welcomed Rekosh’s tribe of shadowstalkers into their home and had gladly woven a new friendship with Takarahl.

And that left Rekosh to wonder if it really had been other vrix who’d been making war on the shadowstalkers…or his kind who’d made war on everyone else. If Takarahl’s past queens hadn’t been quite so noble and honest as the stories claimed.

If Zurvashi hadn’t been the exception, but an inevitable progression.

“This place is gone, but itwas,” he said, returning his gaze to Ahmya. “That means those bonds can be woven anew. It has been done before, and it can be done again. The sorrow of this place is also hope, is it not? The threads between Kaldarak and Takarahl have already been mended.”

“It is hope,” Ahmya agreed, running her fingertips over the sharp points depicted upon a thornskull’s headcrest. She chuckled. “The thornskulls aren’t quite as scary when they’re shown like this. They’re actually kind of cute.”

He huffed and pounded his fists against his chest. “Iam cute. They are…prickly.”

Ahmya grinned up at him. “You can be prickly too. You’re actually quite prickly when you’re jealous.”

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