Traitor's Moon

they came around a corner, they saw a woman dressed in a red robe and bulbous black hat standing in the shadowed doorway of a temple, apparently in the midst of an animated conversation with someone inside. As they drew closer, Alec could make out complicated patterns of black lines covering the woman’s hands.
    â€œWhat clan is she?”
    â€œNo clan. That’s a rhui’auros. They give up their clan when they enter the
Nha’mahat
.” Kheeta told him, making a sign of some sort in her direction.
    Before Alec could ask what a nha’mahat was he came abreast of the rhui’auros and saw that she was talking to empty air.
    â€œBash’wai,” Kheeta said, noting Alec’s surprise.
    A chill ran up Alec’s spine as he looked back at the empty doorway. “The rhui’auros can see them?”
    â€œSome do. Or claim to. They have some strange ways, and what they say is not always what they mean.”
    â€œThey lie?”
    â€œNo. but they are often—obscure.”
    â€œI’ll keep that in mind when we visit them. Seregil hasn’t had a free moment since we—”
    Kheeta stared at him. “Seregil spoke of going there?”
    Alec thought back to that odd, tense conversation back in Ardinlee. Seregil hadn’t spoken of the rhui’auros since.
    â€œYou mustn’t ever ask him to go there,” Kheeta warned.
    â€œWhy?”
    â€œIf he’s not told you, then it’s not for me to say.”
    â€œKheeta, please,” Alec urged. “Most of what I know about Seregil I’ve learned from other people. He gives away so little about himself, even now.”
    â€œI shouldn’t have spoken. It’s for him to tell you that tale, or not.”
    Being close-mouthed and stubborn must be a Bôkthersan trait
, Alec thought, as they rode on in silence.
    â€œCome,” Kheeta said at last, relenting a bit. “I can show you where to find them for yourself.”
    Leaving the more populated tupas behind, they rode to a quarter at the southern edge of the city. The buildings here were overgrown and crumbling, the streets choked in places with tall grass and wildflowers.Weeds had claimed the courtyards. For all its strangeness, however, it appeared to be a popular destination; people strolled the ruined streets in pairs and small groups. Dragonlings, the first Alec had seen since they’d left the mountains, were as plentiful as grasshoppers, basking on the tops of walls like lizards or fluttering among the flowering vines with the sparrows and hummingbirds.
    This place felt different, as well, the magic stronger and more unsettling.
    â€œThis is called the Haunted City,” Kheeta explained. “It’s believed that the veil between ourselves and the Bash’wai is thinnest here. The Nha’mahat lies just outside the city.”
    They rode past the last of the crumbling houses and out into the open. On a rise just ahead stood the most bizarre-looking structure Alec had seen here yet. It was a huge tower of sorts, built in a series of square tiers that diminished in size as they went up. It was topped with a large colos and Alec could see people moving in the archways there. Although different in design from anything he had seen in Sarikali, it was made of the same dark stone and had the same grown-from-the-earth look. Behind it, the white vapor of a hot spring billowed up, roiling on the slight breeze.
    â€œThe Nha’mahat,” Kheeta said, dismounting well away from the building. “We’ll go on foot. Be careful not to step on the little dragons. They’re thick here.”
    Alec kept a nervous eye on the ground as he followed.
    The ground level was bordered by a covered arcade. Prayer kites hung from the pillars, some new, some faded and tattered.
    Entering, Alec saw that the walkways were lined with trays of food: fruit, boiled grains dyed yellow and red, and milk. Fingerlings seemed to be the main beneficiary of this bounty; masses of the little creatures vied for a meal under the watchful eye of several robed rhui’auros.
    Strolling around to the back of the building, Alec saw that the ground fell away sharply. The vapor he’d seen issued from the dark mouth of a grotto beneath the tower. Steam belched from it like smoke from a forge. More rose in wisps from the stream that flowed down among the stones below.
    Something happened to him here
, Alec thought, suddenly picturing a much