Page 58 of Sea of Stars

“Not exactly,” he said quickly. “Achates' words about the Lords abandoning us made me realize something terrible. Maybe we’re the flame, all the races on the earth. The Lords created us and they kept adding to the flame, saving us from darkness and death. They kept us alive. But like in the book, all flames must die. It’s time for the three races to die. The stars are shooting out of the sky because the story is over. The Lords aren't dying, they're abandoning us. The flame cannot be saved. We cannot be saved.” He looked at me, tears filling his eyes. He wiped them away, but not before I had seen them. “I don’t know why it’s coming, or how it’s coming, but it’s probably not a fourth race that is meant to save us. I think it’s something that was sent to eradicate the three races. Maybe it’s a monster from the hells below like Vellswar seems to think. The Lords are leaving so the Fuorster is free to do what he wants with us. You know, Vellswar said that the mountains have been trembling for months.”

My throat seemed dry. I tried to swallow, but there didn’t seem to be any saliva in my mouth. I pulled a bottle of water out of my knapsack and let the cool liquid slide down my gullet. “We don’t have to accept that fate. We can fight the monster. We can figure out a way to get the Lords to come back.”

Denton looked at me bleakly. “I’m sure if we band together we could fight and kill a monster. But if it was me, I wouldn’t send one monster to kill every living being on the surface. I’d send hundreds of them.”

I was usually the one who thought the worst was yet to come. Denton was always so optimistic. If he believed this was the end, then it probably was.

“There!” Achates screamed, snapping my attention away from the pit of doom spreading in my stomach.

We all ran over to where he was standing. We were close to the mountains now, and I could see small tufts of grass breaking out of the sand in the distance. There were even a few bushes scattered about. Achates really had meant the dagger was located closer to the mountains. He hunched over, pushing on a large rock.

“A little help!” Achates called.

Vellswar, Denton, and I joined Achates and pushed the rock. It began sliding across the dirt.

“No, no stop.” Achates slapped Vellswar’s much larger hand. He seemed particularly agitated today. “We have to roll it.” Achates waved his arm in a circular motion, as if we didn’t know what rolling meant.

With everyone, especially Vellswar, pulling up on the bottom of the rock at once, we were able to slowly roll it. I crouched down, cupped my hands, and began digging. The dagger must be somewhere buried in the ground.

“What are you doing?” Achates laughed. “Augury told me to hide them well. Any fool can search under a rock. No, no, no! I made it at least a little difficult." He flicked me on the side of the head. "Dumb," he mumbled.

It took all my restraint to not punch him in his wrinkly face.

Achates turned and felt the rock with the palms of his hands, as if he was looking for something in particular on the fairly smooth surface. Eventually his hands stopped at a small crack along the side. He dug his fingernails into the crack and a piece of the rock fell off. The chunk of rock fell with a thump in the dirt. He reached into the hollow crevice and pulled out a small dagger. It was very similar to the Assassin's Dagger, except it was much shorter and the blade seemed thicker. Blue symbols began to appear. Before they had fully formed, Achates dropped the blade, almost as if it had burned his hand.

“Don’t you want to know what it says, Achates?” I asked. “It could be important.”

“Well yeah, I…” his voice trailed off when his eyes met Augury’s. “No, I better not.” He bent down and picked up the dagger, tossing it quickly into his bag.

“Of course you should. In fact, shouldn’t we each see what the dagger predicts for us? It could be helpful.”

“The stupid boy is right this time, Augury,” Achates said. “I know you don’t like the things, but the predictions could help lead us to Mahlia.”

“No. We were born without the gift for a reason. We’ve been over this before Achates. We’re not meant to know what’s to come,” Augury said. “If we were, we would have been blessed with the gift ourselves.”

“Oh, yes. That is true. We are not meant to know.” Achates was thumbing the straps of his satchel nervously. I could tell he wanted to look.

“Of course we’re meant to know. We may not have been born with the gift of the Moira, but we’re still divinares!” I protested.

“I want nothing to do with them,” Vellswar said gruffly. “Ever since those things were made, they’ve been trouble. Who’s to say those predictions are even true? King Averis just made them hoping they would work.”

“But it could help,” I stammered. I looked at Denton, but he didn’t seem to agree with me. I glanced briefly at Harish and Garret.

They were staring longingly at Achates' satchel.

“How can you bear not looking if it will help us find her?” I pleaded.

“Breghton, they’re right. You’ve seen what the dagger does to you. You’re not quite yourself when you’re holding it,” Denton said.

“But that’s what it’s for. It’s designed for people to be able to see who can’t see otherwise.”

“No, that’s what divinares were sent to the earth for. Not these daggers,” Augury said. “King Averis had a good idea, but it doesn’t work how he intended. I would have made Achates destroy them instead of hiding them if the blood inside the daggers wasn’t useful.”

I couldn’t believe that no one agreed with me. I ignored the ground as it began to shake. “So your plan is to collect all the daggers and not use them?”

“No, the plan is to collect all of them that remain so that our enemies cannot use them. We don’t need them, we have Mahlia.”

“We don’t have Mahlia. But if you would use the daggers we’d have a better chance of finding her! She might be dying! What is wrong with all of you?!”

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