The Godless by Ben Peek

rarely spoken of in Yeflam, but she was one of the five who ruled before. Her kingdom was Maewe, the third kingdom, after Asila, but before Mahga and Salar. She is one of the oldest beings on the planet. Those with her in the Enclave are much, much younger than her and could not compete with her in terms of power or violence, not in the way one such as the Innocent, Aela Ren, does, but they do attempt to stop the needless fear of the cursed.”
    â€œYou talk about the years as if they mean nothing,” she said. “The Five Kingdoms fell apart a thousand years ago and the Innocent began killing nearly seven hundred years ago.”
    â€œI am the eighty-second Samuel Orlan.” The short man grinned. “My perspective may be slightly askew.”
    Shaking her head, Ayae lowered herself onto a chair. “The Keeper said I was to go to him tomorrow.”
    Dawn lit the edges of the cartographer again. “Demanding sort, but perhaps for the best. The Keepers do understand their curses well. And—”
    â€œAnd?”
    â€œI am afraid,” he said, the light enveloping him, “the only way to understand something is to ask the people who have experienced it.”

 
    3.
    Â 
    Flies burst from the closest pyre as a Mireean Guard examined the body that lay there. It had taken him, Bueralan thought, ten minutes to mount the wooden ramp and check beneath the white linen. He could understand their reluctance, but he cursed them for it since it left him standing next to the Keeper, Bau. So far he had been nothing but polite company, but since he had said to Illaan that he was, “nothing but an adviser, a helper if you need one,” a tension had crept into the air, growing further when the Healer said, “Do you know how long it has been since anyone saw a Quor’lo in our world?”
    Zaifyr replied, “No more than twenty-one hours, I imagine.”
    Ahead, the first line of pyres had been cleared and soldiers were working through the second. Bueralan wondered what the two men beside him would do if the Quor’lo was not found, if it had gone to ground elsewhere or the body had already been abandoned—to his mind, the most likely—when movement on the fifth pyre caught his eye. A moment later, a soldier cried out and the three men ran toward the sound.
    On the pyre, a dead man held a young, blond-haired soldier in his grasp. “Another step,” it hissed at Bau. “That’s all it takes for this man to die.”
    â€œYou’ve nowhere to go,” Illaan said, stepping forward. “Release him. Release him and I’ll—”
    The soldier’s throat burst.
    It happened quickly: a thin, bloodless smile spread across the ruined face of the Quor’lo, its burned fingers tightened, a strangled cry caught in the soldier as his throat was torn out … and, as the soldiers around Bueralan moved forward, the body was flung off the ledge into them and the Quor’lo leaped from its perch.
    Bueralan was a step behind Zaifyr. He burst through the soldiers who had run not at the creature, but to the body of their comrade. He heard Illaan call for Bau and glanced back to see the Keeper staring intently after them. For a moment it looked as if he would ignore the call for help, but then, with a snarl, the neat man turned. Doing likewise, Bueralan focused on weaving through the pyres, the dirt crunching beneath his boots as he chased the Quor’lo into the tree line.
    The saboteur did not stop. At full speed, he left flat ground and began running downward, his feet slipping as he skirted thick roots and potholes, not slowing himself even as he was forced to navigate the sloping terrain of the mountain. In front of him, Zaifyr cleared a ditch and the saboteur zigged, crossing the shallow end of the same indent, before clearing a dead branch and gaining on the Quor’lo, who had stopped to stamp its foot heavily.
    Bueralan pulled one of his