Naamah's Blessing

my hair. “The high priestesses Iniquill and Ocllo have an idea you may be able to help.”
    A profound wave of weariness sapped me. “Oh, Bao!” I laughed in despair. “Do they imagine I can quicken the crops of an entire city?”
    “The crops would need to be planted anew,” he said. “And yes.”
    “No.” Pulling away from him, I shook my head. Thinking on the leagues and leagues of stripped and barren fields that would need to be replanted, the thousands upon thousands of plants that would need to be quickened from mere seeds, the enormity of the task seemed daunting and impossible. Never, ever had I even entertained the thought of attempting somewhat on that scale. Hot tears burned my eyes. “It’s too much! It was difficult enough to coax a single field of marigolds to bloom out of season in Bhaktipur, and I wasn’t drained to the dregs as I am now! Stone and sea, there’s not enough
left
of me! I cannot do it.”
    Bao was silent. The shadow of Cusi’s death lay behind his eyes. He had done the unthinkable.
    I’d thought that banishing Focalor and closing the doorway was the hardest task I faced; but I was wrong.
    That was merely reparation for my own folly.
    Trust me
.
    I had been spared the loss of my
diadh-anam
for a reason. The giftof life, Iniquill had called it. The Maidens of the Sun had wagered on my gift, pitting it against the black tide of death Raphael had brought. Cusi had offered herself as a sacrifice to save her people, and the ancestors had answered her.
    I could not dishonor her memory. I could not let her people starve—and my own alongside them.
    I bowed my head. “Do they at least have seeds to plant?”
    “They do.” It was Balthasar who answered, standing off to the side, his voice unwontedly soft. “Seed grains and potatoes. The
Sapa Inca’s
set a guard on their stores. They’re the staples of life here in Tawantinsuyo. And we’ve had ample experience in planting them, my lady,” he added, striving gallantly for levity, rubbing his work-hardened hands together. “Thierry bids me tell you he will wield a digging-stick one last time if you think his efforts might bear fruit.”
    Lifting my head, I drew a long, trembling breath, placing one hand on Bao’s chest. “Do you truly believe I can do this thing?”
    “I do.” Bao covered my hand with his own. “Can you look me in the eye and love me still, Moirin? Knowing what
I
have done?”
    “Aye.” Twining my fingers with his, I raised his hand to my lips, kissing his knuckles. “You did what was needful.”
    He shuddered. “It was awful.”
    “I know,” I whispered. “I was there. And I am here.”
    Exactly when Balthasar Shahrizai made his discreet withdrawal, I could not say. Only that he did.
    Lying entwined on the pallet, Bao and I held each other, taking solace in silence. I rested my head on his chest and listened to the slow, steady beat of his heart. I felt the spark of my
diadh-anam
grow stronger, the presence of his nurturing it. We were alive. We had survived. Focalor had been banished. Raphael, Lord Pachacuti with his army of ravenous ants, was no more. The starved ants, poor things, would return to their rightful habitats in the distant jungles.
    The future I had seen in which the great empires of Terra Nova were crushed and eradicated would not come to pass. Cusi’s sacrifice had ensured it. And so, ironically, had Raphael’s actions. The physician with the healing hands I’d once thought I’d loved had taught the Nahuatl to stave off the killing pox.
    “Mayhap there is a purpose in all this after all,” I murmured. “Mayhap the gods have their reasons after all.”
    Bao’s arms tightened around me. “I believe it must be so,” he said, his warm breath stirring my hair. “But I hope they are done with us soon.”
    I raised my head to kiss him. “So do I, my magpie. So do I.”

SEVENTY-THREE

    I spent the day at rest, breaking my fast with a bowl of thin stew that Machasu brought. It was mostly water, but there were bits of potato and stringy meat in it. I ate it slowly, trying to make it last.
    Various visitors came and went. When Prince Thierry arrived, I heard the whole tale of the nerve-racking night he and his hand-picked dozen men had spent in the temple, and the struggle to subdue the priests with
wurari
poison. There had been a number of scuffles while they waited for the poison to take effect, but no one had been harmed.
    “It wasn’t easy,” Thierry said wearily. “A