Moonscatter Read Online Free

to a clattering stand of dried-out bastocane directly behind the granary. She scanned as much as she could see of the walls of the square back court, then nudged her brother. “Gong?”
    â€œNot a squeak.” He came around her, trotted silent as a wraith across dry grass and debris to the crumbling mud brick wall. He turned and waited for her, propping his shoulders against the wall, his eyes glistening with mischief. Tuli grinned at him, kicked at the mud, jerked her thumb up. He nodded and started climbing, feeling for cracks with feet and fingers, knocking down loose fragments that pattered softly beside her. She watched his head rise over the top, saw him swing across the drop without hesitation. Following as quickly as she could, she pulled herself over the wall and let herself down beside her twin. She heard a macai honk in a shed at the back of the court, heard the wail of a kanka passar in swoop close by, the buzz of night flying bugs, but that was all, no guard, nothing to worry about.
    Thin streaks of red-gold light outlined a series of double shutters that covered what once had been grain chutes but now were, presumably, windows set into the thick wall. The shutter nearest the courtwall had a long narrow triangle of wood broken off one edge. Light spilled copiously from the opening and gilded the ground beneath. Teras touched Tuli’s shoulder, pointed, then moved swiftly, silently, to the broken shutter.
    Belly cold with a vague foreboding far less definite than her brother’s gong and somehow more disturbing, Tuli hesitated. Teras swung away from the crack and beckoned impatiently. She shook off her anxiety and crossed to him to kneel by the bottom of the crack while Teras leaned over her, his eye to the opening. Sighing, Tuli looked inside.
    The room was round with one flat side, taking up most of the ground-level space within the granary. Tuli was surprised how much she could see from her vantage place, the curve of the wall giving her an unexpectedly wide angle of view. Half the room was filled with silent seated figures uncertainly visible in the murky light from oil-wood torches stuck up on the walls. On a low dais a four-foot cylinder supported a broad shallow basin filled with flames that had a misty aura about them like a river fog about a late strayer’s lanthorn. She sniffed cautiously, picked up a faint oily sweetness that tickled her nose until she feared she’d have to sneeze. Eyes watering, she pinched her nostrils together until the need faded, then began to examine the faces more closely, recognizing some, too many for her comfort. Some were neighbors, some their own people, members of families that had lived on Gradin lands and worked for Gradin Heirs for as long as the Taromate had existed. She must have made a slight sound. Her brother’s hand came down on her shoulder, squeezed it lightly, both warning and comfort.
    Nilis sat among the foremost, an exalted look on her pinched face, a passion in her staring eyes that startled Tuli; she’d seen Nilis fussing and angry but never like this. We’ve missed some , she thought, seeing weariness as well as exaltation in her sister’s face. Wonder what’s going to happen now? She looked up, met her brother’s eyes. His lips formed the word chinj . She tried to answer his smile, swallowed and once again set her eyes to the crack.
    The Followers were sitting very erect, as if they had rods rammed down their spines. Two dark figures, heads hidden in black hoods, stood before the fire-filled basin. Long narrow robes covered their bodies chin to toe, long narrow sleeves covered their arms, even their hands, and fell half an arm’s length beyond their fingertips. Muffled hands moved, swaying slowly back and forth, the dangling sleeves passing through clouds of droplets spraying out from the flames. A moan blew through the seated figures, grew in volume. The Followers shook as if a strong wind stirred