The Dragon's Path

had been touched by hammer and chisel. They might have grown this way, as if the mountains had known they would be home to these men. Lanterns of paper and parchment sat in alcoves and spilled their light over the floors and across the curved ceilings. The air smelled rich with something Geder couldn’t quite identify, part manure and part spice. The air was so hot it stifled. He trotted through the twists and turns until the passage widened and the high priest stepped aside.
    The great chamber was taller than twenty men standing one atop the other. The ceiling was lost in darkness more profound than night. And towering above them, the carved statue of a huge spider covered in beaten gold and lit by a hundred torches. Fifty men at least knelt at its base, all of them turned toward Geder, their hands folded on their shoulders. Geder stood, his mouth slack. No king in the world could boast a grander spectacle.
    “The goddess,” Basrahip had said, and his voice had echoed through the space, filling it. “Mistress of truth and unbroken ruler of the world. We are blessed by her presence.”
    Geder barely noticed when the huge man’s hand touched his shoulder and began to press him gently but implacably down. When he knelt, it seemed like the obvious thing to do.
    After that, he was taken to new quarters within the temple walls. Many of the doors and windows he’d seen when he first came went no deeper than a single room, or at most two, the priests’ cells clinging to the side of the mountain.Geder’s squire brought him a basin to bathe in, his books, and the small traveling desk, and lit his lantern. He lay in the darkness that night, a thin wool blanket around him, and sleep a day’s ride away. He was too excited to sleep. His only disappointment was that the temple had no library.
    On the fourth morning, Basrahip came again, and their conversation began, and it had continued every day since.
    I don’t understand why you stay hidden.”
    “Don’t you?” Basrahip said.
    They were walking down the thin brick-paved path that led to the temple’s well.
    “The Righteous Servant,” Geder said. “It’s something that you all have. If you were in the world, you could tell whenever a merchant was lying about his costs. Or when your men were unfaithful. And life in court. God, what you could do there.”
    “And that is why we stay hidden,” Basrahip said. “When we have involved ourselves in the affairs of the world, we have seen the rewards of it. Blades and fire. Those who have not been touched by the goddess live lives of deceit. For them, to hear our voices is to die as the people they were. Her enemies are many, and ruthless.”
    Geder kicked at a pebble, sending it skittering down ahead of them. The sunlight pressed down on his face and shoulders.
    “But you are going to go back out,” Geder said. “You said that you were waiting for the time to go back out.”
    “We will,” the high priest said. They reached the edge of the well, a stone-lined hole in the earth with a rope tied to the stake sunk deep beside it. “When we are forgotten.”
    “That could be any time in the last century,” Geder said, but the high priest went on as if he hadn’t spoken.
    “When the wounds of the old war are healed and we canwalk the world without fear, She will send us a sign. She will sort clean from unclean, and end the age of lies.”
    Basrahip squatted, taking the rope in his hands and hauling, hand over hand, until it came up wet. The bucket had been copper once, given over now to verdigris. Basrahip tipped it up to his lips and drank, rivulets falling from the corner of his mouth. Geder shifted uncomfortably beside him. The high priest put the bucket down and wiped the back of his hand across his lips.
    “Are you troubled, Lord?”
    “I’m… It’s nothing.”
    The wide smile was cool. The dark eyes considered him.
    “Listen to me, Lord Palliako. Listen to my voice. You can trust me.”
    “I’m only… Could I have a drink of that water too?”
    Basrahip lifted the bucket up to him. Geder took it in both hands, drinking slowly. The water was cool and tasted of stone and metal. He handed it back, and Basrahip held it out over the blackness for a moment before he let it drop. The rope slithered as it sped back down. The splash was louder than Geder had expected.
    “You can trust me,” the high priest said again.
    “I know,” Geder said.
    “You can tell me. Nothing bad will come of it.”
    “Tell