1633880583 (F) Read Online Free Page B

it tried to dive for the Earthe—but it found itself snared by an attractive force exerted by the silver sphere overhead.
    Together they crashed upon a frosty plain of gray dust. The moon, it turned out, had its own air, thin as that of a high mountain peak but enough to restore Innocence to himself. Yet they could not celebrate. The strange land beckoned, but there was little chance of the boy staying healthy in the cold and thin air. As peculiar pale creatures crept over the horizon, reminiscent of lobsters fashioned of white mushrooms, they tried to fly.
    It did not work.
    They were trapped upon the moon.
    Innocence had little time to act. He had to draw upon the strange power that lived within him, an innate ability to manipulate the vital breath of the land. But that power was tied to a single part of the Earthe. Did he dare try to tap the power of the moon? He had little choice.
    And the carpet helped him, for siphoning power was part of its purpose. Together they absorbed the strange magic of the moon.
    I . . . how to describe it? The moon is beloved of poets and thieves. And of lovers. And in that moment it seemed no accident that those on the edge of life revered the moon; for love, and a zest for life, flowed into Innocence.
    Also, power.
    They rose from the moon in a cloud of dust, strange fungus-things clawing and chittering in their wake. Their triumph was to be short-lived. Escaping the pull of the moon, they entered the region of darkness, and as the cold ravaged Innocence’s skin and the absence of atmosphere seared his lungs, light swirled within his vision and awareness ebbed.
    Once, he awoke with the knowledge that they fell at great speed toward the Earthe, and that the carpet was shielding Innocence from a great heat birthed by their plunge through the atmosphere. He caught a glimpse of jagged islands, their mountains goring the clouds, then a stormy sea. They hit; their flame was quenched. So was thought.
    How Innocence survived is a blurry matter. It seems he must have used the power to stay afloat and keep his body warm, but the events are as a dream. When the Lardermen found him, the carpet was nowhere to be seen.
    In pride Innocence had flown too close to the moon and was nearly destroyed. He was now a simple serving boy. So, if it’s fated, he will remain.

    In the silence that followed, the priestess took his hand and said, “This one’s practically given a confession, I’d better shrive him.” There was uneasy laughter at that, which even Nan and Freidar joined, and there was no help for it but to be led into the booth.
    “You are forgiven of course,” the priestess said as they sat, “but you have brought great danger on yourself, Innocence Gaunt.”
    Almost he ran. But there was truly nowhere to run upon Fiskegard. “How do you know me?” he asked. “And who are you?”
    “Weeks ago there was a boy of Fiskegard who overheard a young man on a sea-cliff yell to the wind, ‘I am innocent!’ He told his mother, who told another, and the chain of tellings eventually reached the ear of one who is paid to report unusual doings to us.”
    “Us?”
    Her gaze did not waver. “That needn’t concern you. Let’s say there are those who keep an eye out, for threats to peace.”
    “What sort of threats?”
    She smiled. There was something cold in it. “You start with two questions and stretch them like sailcloth into more. I’ll say what I’ll say. I am Eshe of the Fallen Swan, an itinerant priestess. I serve as other priestesses do, but I have a larger duty too. And I seek out interesting people who might serve the cause of peace.”
    “Like me?”
    “And your parents. I can reunite you, Innocence.”
    “If I wanted that, I wouldn’t be here.”
    “It does not sound as if you want to be here. And you have just informed a whole crowd of migrant fishermen what you are.”
    He looked over his shoulder. A couple of drinkers looked back at him through the haze.
    He returned his gaze