The Fire God's Sacrifice: A Standalone Fantasy Romance (A Land of Gods & Monsters Book 1) by Angelica Oaks

Author:Angelica Oaks [Oaks, Angelica]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2023-10-03T04:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 9

They next day was much the same as the last. We walked.

Kustaa stayed at my side, the goats bouncing around us, and we talked together the way we had when we’d been on the outside path, before the blizzard blew in. Kustaa told me more stories about his journies around the mountain, particularly the villages that lay scattered around its base. I had heard all their names from the priest and the sacrifice-mother, but of course I’d never had the chance to see any of them for myself.

“Adano is the biggest of the villages,” Kustaa told me. “I would go down there to trade for food and supplies. They have a market there almost as big as Hilatt.”

“They do not!” I cried, even I loved the idea of a market as big as a town. “There aren’t enough things in the world to sell.”

“You’d be surprised,” Kustaa said with a grin. “The vendors there travelled up from Ormios—“

“Ormios!” I whipped my head around to him. Ormios was the capital city, where the king lived and where travelers sailing up from the south made landfall. “Have you ever been there?”

“No,” Kustaa said with a smile. “We don’t stray that far from the mountain.”

“Do you ever wish you could?” I watched the goats tumbling together up ahead.

“Sometimes,” Kustaa said. “But I like it here. The mountain…” He went quiet for a moment. “The mountain’s my home.”

I nodded. The truth was—I understood. My dreams in the sacrifice-garden had always been small, especially compared to Hilla’s, which for all her piety still involved traveling to the southern kingdoms on the other side of the water. I was content at just being free of the garden walls; I wanted a cottage of my own overlooking the water, a husband with warm hands.

I shoved the thought aside. There was no point in dwelling on an imaginary future anymore.

So I walked.

Inside the mountain, all the tunnels looked the same, and I had no sense of how much time had passed without the aid of the sun. All I knew was that we walked long enough that the blister on my heel burst and was replaced by more blisters that burst too, and soon my feet burned so badly I had to hobble with one hand pressed against the wall.

“Are you all right?” Kustaa studied me.

“I’m fine,” I said. “My feet are just sore feet from walking.”

Kustaa frowned. “Let me help you walk, at least.” He offered me one arm, but I shook my head and shuffled forward on my own.

“I’m fine.” I was not, but if I had to walk to my death, I was going to do it without help.

Kustaa’s frown deepened, but he said nothing. Still, I noticed that he slowed his pace considerably, and I could feel his eyes on me in the dim, fluttering light of the tunnels.

Eventually, the tunnel flowered open into a cavernous space so big that the veins of light in the wall were not enough to illuminate the space.

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