Yalira returned to the altar with the ascending sun, the bound prophecies safe in her arms.

Like waking from a dream, brief and strange, Andar had let her go. No argument, no threats. He had simply let her collect the book and fade back into the last shadows of night. Well, not precisely without a threat.

Tomorrow's dawn. I will not stop it. If you do not return, you die with them, he had whispered. The hissing danger chased her steps through the slums.

Dark humor, that touch of hysteria, resurfaced. Escaping Andar of Tyr was not so hard.

It only required the most final of surrenders.

And death, it seemed, was inescapable. The altar reeked with its stench. The corpses they had not yet wrapped filled the rooms with their choking miasma. Toxic fluids drenched the floors that the priestesses fought to keep scoured. Uneven breaths and rattling moans sounded each time the steady bustle of the priestesses grew too quiet. It was not a tomb, for there was a peace in death did not rest here.

With a nod, Yalira asked after each patient, each priestess. As if touched by new warmth, they brightened. She did not make them promises, but the hope that burned in her was contagious. Each healer adopted the steadiness of her hand, the firmness of her voice. Each patient breathed easier in her confidence. It did not matter she was stained with the efforts of healing, pale and shadowed with lack of sleep—all recognized the spark of hope.

For that was all that was left, and Yalira would follow it to the end.

Against the simple altar, the room where the priestesses had taken to sleeping, Yalira opened the leather cover that bore her name.

Ends of beginnings, beginnings of ends! Pray to the winds! Or else drown in the ashes.

Her first prophecy. She had wept, the morning after, and had been chided for her girlish tears. The priestesses had rejoiced—an end to the wars, they surmised. Aid for Orvalle would come by sea, they had decided. But no aid had arrived, and Andar had razed Alispo to its foundation. Her prophecy, after that, had been forgotten. It was the way with most of the new moons: only the prophecies that came to pass were celebrated.

Yalira turned through the pages.

Her last.

Serpents in a garden, dripping poison. Beneath a pomegranate tree, a child sits with a mouth full of blood. Outside the crumbling wall, a woman with a broken lyre plants laurel in a meadow of ash. A golden sun rises.

It had seemed so important, moon after moon, and yet there had been no conclusion on its meaning. The elders had discussed more war, threats against the innocent. Rebirth, change. Vague interpretations that eased curiosity while never giving specific answer.

Yalira traced the words, waiting for inspiration, for wisdom, to find her now. She followed her thread, the end of the prophecies she fought herself to believe in. These were the last words of Antala, the last fragment of hope.

She whispered the words, ignored the temptation of oleander. She didn't need the herb to understand, she didn't need to surrender, she could figure out the riddle, she—

No, Yalira realized. Her thoughts buzzed. There had been another. A prophecy on a hillside sanctuary. Andar had claimed she had not spoken, only suffocated.

But did he lie?

Could she have spoken? Could Antala have broken the rules and tradition of ceremony to give her the wisdom she sought?

Yalira remembered the sounds, a relentless cacophony of suffering and dying.

She remembered the smothering taste of oleander.

Panic nettled her heart, spoke in the desperation of her thoughts.

There has to be another way. Think, Yalira. You don't need to do this.

When had her spirit grown too large to share her body with the goddess?

When had her reluctance to submit to Antala been replaced with fear?

Her eyes burned with the threat of furious tears.

"This is larger than you," she breathed, wiping at them. "You will do what must be done."

The sounds of death did not reach the altar's alcove. The creeping despair had not yet reached the corner that housed Antala's spirt. Nevertheless, Yalira could feel its insistent pressure against her chest.

Yalira dao Eheia, the Loved, last High Priestess of Antalis, stood. She swallowed down the burning nausea. She would submit to the goddess this last time.

One last time, and then she would never surrender again.

The bronze bottles on the sandstone altar winked innocently at her in the surrounding candlelight. She knew them well. Cedar and amber for clarity and strength. Sage for purification. Sweet bay for wisdom. And oleander. For truth.

The last time, Yalira promised.

Hands steadier than the frantic trill of her heart, she reached forward, skimming her fingertips against the bronze bottles. Forging iron into her spirit, Yalira clenched her jaw and reached her fingers into the vessel that held truth.

And met air.

Empty.

Her brow furrowed. She reached for the other vessels, upturned them. Their contents, fragrant and mocking, spilled across the stone. None of them held what she sought.

The garden. There would be hope there.

The other priestesses called to her as she pushed through the healing room, towards the gold-lit entry to the herb garden. Yalira brushed them away. She could not be distracted, not when her will threatened to waver and fold. Stepping into the tiny herbal solar, the one corner of the building not crumbling under the weight of dying bodies, Yalira searched. The sun, unfiltered above her, poured into each corner, exposing every detail. A cracked spade, the sun-bleached nightshade. Where flowering oleander once stood was now bare loam.

"Antala has granted me a vision, High Priestess."

Tala's voice was an eerie whisper. While the rest of them wore stained ivory, Tala had draped herself in indigo. A garment too long for her, one that had once belonged in Yalira's trunks. In the harsh daylight, Tala's face was hard planes, sharp edges. Her eyes were deep and dark and knowing.

"A vision?" Yalira asked, her voice as soft as Tala's. The world seemed loud with silence.

"The goddess blesses her truest believers, and I have always been true."

The flickering strangeness of her pupils, the rapturous fervor of her voice, the tremor that rattled her breaths—these were not the blessings of Antala. Yalira searched for an answer and found it.

Clenching in her hands, Tala held the last leaves of oleander.

"You're in danger, Tala," Yalira said, reaching for her. "Let me help you."

"No!"

It was more shriek than word.

"I have been true!" Tears flooded her flickering eyes and ripped into her voice. "Me!"

She was trapped in the thrall of oleander, but not touched with wisdom, not blessed with truths. This was the poison of the plant, its dark toxin. Tala had taken too much, too fast.

"You have been true," Yalira agreed, her voice gentle.

"I killed that soldier in the garden! To protect you! To protect the High Priestess!" Tala said, shifting between manic cadence and stuttering aphasia.

As if the priestess were a spooked beast, Yalira spoke in low tones, moved slowly. "You were very brave."

It did not soothe her hysteria. She hissed, "I lied for you. I killed for you. I betrayed Antala for you!"

That thought erupted into a wave of sobbing, screaming. Tala pulled at her hair—the dark hair Yalira had once braided—and shrieked at the sky. The blushing softness, the bright energy, the pieces of her spirit Yalira knew were lost.

"Where is the oleander?" Yalira asked. She placed her hands on Tala's shoulders, slid them down her arms towards the leaves clenched her soil-stained fingers. At the touch, Tala's breaths settled. Her pupils jumped, skittered to the empty patch of earth.

"Gone." She smiled.

"What have you done, Tala?"

"I burned it. Just like we will all burn."

Yalira met her dark gaze and found truth.

The brief calm between them stretched. Shifted. Shattered. Tala screamed. Clawed at Yalira's face, her shielding arms. Yalira hissed at the bright pain of it. Nails tore into her skin. Blood welled in their wake. Wild, grasping hands pulled at her hair, tore it from its braid. She pushed hard, at where she guessed her body ended and Tala's began. But Tala twisted, shrieking, a cat evading water. Her fingers dug into skin. Momentum threw them to the loam. Dirt and dust clouded Yalira's vision as they rolled. The frenzy did not stop. Her skin seared with each scratch, each bite, each bruising blow.

She tried to shout. But Tala's knee collided with stomach. Breaths turned into loud, stuttering gasps that drew no air, no relief, in to her chest. Yalira's voice shrank into sound of it. Faded into the sharp aching. Her flailing defense gained no ground.

And then the world screeched in blinding pain. A strike to her temple. Echoing and ringing. Ringing and echoing. Her vision blurred and hummed. Something warm dripped into her eye.

The world refocused between the break in heartbeats. Tala suddenly blocked out the sun, a violent eclipse. In her hand, a smiling Tala looked skyward. She had replaced the oleander with a jagged stone. She shouted chaotic prayers, for strength, for wisdom, for sacrifice.

For forgiveness.

Dazed, Yalira closed her eyes and waited for the blow to fall.

A/N

Happy Halloween! So ends double-post October as I aim to keep up in writing during these busy months. We'll return to the usual Friday updates :)

Some great guesses on the plague! Keep up the sleuthing!

Get your flu shot, wash your hands, and stay safe!