PENUMBRA (how the flowers grow)

9. Muscles

After another day of work in Ilsted, Sabina and Tuluvey leave in search of the Goldhands. It's a day's walk to the Rosin River, which they make with no difficulty. They find a shallow spot in the bend and hop over the rocks to the other side, which thankfully goes smoothly. Neither of them slip and fall in and they don't come across any river creatures which may or may not explode into hundreds of fish when killed.

They spend the night on the river's banks, as there's no point in leaving the relative safety of the river when it's going to get dark in a few hours. Sabina has trouble getting to sleep, the rapid rush of water overwhelming her ears.

It's so loud, she thinks. And fast. How can anything live in that?

Shasan doesn't have any rivers and the only ones she's come across were far smaller than this. Really, they were more like creeks or streams. The Rosin is so big it could take you from Tormoira all the way to World's End.

"Tuluvey," she whispers into the night, knowing he hasn't fallen asleep yet. His breathing hasn't even out. "Have you ever been to World's End?"

Tuluvey rolls over onto his back, just as she is. She stares up at the stars that glitter in the sky like a magnificent diamond tapestry. Sometimes at night, once she learned to lockpick her door, she'd sneak out of her room and climb onto the roof so she could lay on her back and look at the stars (and one time she fell asleep up there and Arthur caught her and beat her so bad she could hardly walk).

"No," he says. "L'gaoia went once and she told me stories about it. She has stories about everywhere."

"What did she say?"

"She said it was haunting. I don't know that she believes the stories about it, but I suppose it would still have some ethereal way about it anyway. It's the biggest waterfall in the world."

"What stories?"

"You never heard? It's said that when you die, your soul leaves your body and goes on a pilgrimage to World's End, where it goes into the waterfall to meet Orian so they can decide whether to destroy your soul or reincarnate you or whatever they decide. You stay as a ghost if you don't go. Orian and Moira's children are said to go round up ghosts and take them there. The living go there to pray."

Sabina chews on this. She learned of the Gods, but never was told stories about them. To Arthur, they were just information she would hear about and so she'd need to know about them, although he always wore a pendant of the moon snake symbol of Orian. Sometimes she worries that it was a periapt of undying and that his soul was called back to his body (maybe he's not dead and he's looking for her. He's probably angry. oh gods).

"Is that why L'gaoia went? To pray?"

"I don't know. She'd never say it, but death conflicts her. She- hmm. She has this fear that the ghosts of who she cares about will get lost when they die. She doesn't pray ever, except for the dead."

"Do you believe that?"

"I like to think that the dead watch over the living. It's nice to think that my grandmother and-" Tuluvey falters. "-and Muin look out for me."

"Muin?"

"A lover of mine. He died in a fight. It's been a few years since then."

Tuluvey sighs softly. Sabina doesn't say anything. She can't say that she's always thought that after death, there's nothing, or that she doesn't have anyone to miss like that (only Arthur and only sometimes). She doesn't mention how many people she's sent to Orian, and so they dissolve into silence until morning.