Infinite Shores (The Drowned Gods Trilogy #3)

Part I The False God

THERE ONCE WAS A SCHOLAR who believed himself a saint.

He had the kind of rare magic that others viewed as a curse, but he knew to be a blessing.

A power that would help him become the savior his world so desperately needed, for he had seen the end that would come with the fading of magic, that would destroy his beloved shores, and he believed only he could stop it.

It was a responsibility he shouldered with righteous fervor as he left the college that had shaped him to journey across worlds, a saint embarking on a holy mission.

But his pilgrimage wound up sullying his sainthood.

He was a monster now, with an appetite so insatiable that not even the exquisite, hearty life forces he had gorged himself on could sustain him.

It seemed like the more he fed on power, the hungrier for it he became.

He was ravenous by the time he stepped into the godsworld, this place at the center of all things that was not yet a sea of ash but a lush paradise.

His appetite sharpened to a vicious ache as he beheld the mighty gods who dwelled here, safe from the rot slowly devouring the worlds they claimed to care for.

They did not deserve this haven of peace nor the fountain at its heart that overflowed with such delectable power, a heavenly nectar so pure and abundant it could end all suffering if it were allowed to flow freely beyond this place.

The once-scholar turned monster knew something of greed, but his intentions, he believed, were not as self-serving as those of these gilded gods languishing on their gilded thrones.

If their power were his, he would share it widely with the malnourished and the starved and the eternally eager, for he knew how it felt to want a seat at the table.

Yet what could one famished monster do against four ever-sated gods? Even the most cunning predator knew it could not feed on a pack of wolves four times its size. But sever them from their source of power—claim the fountain for himself—and he might stand a chance.

They were curious about him, at first. Intrigued by this unusual visitor in whom they could sense conflicting and impossible powers: the Tidecaller blood they believed had been purged from the world and the unified fragments of a lesser deity they thought would never be whole again.

They did not know what to do with him but ask questions, sniffing him out like strange prey.

I have come to seek your help, the monster proclaimed, appeasing the gods with lies he had once believed, when he had still only been a scholar who fancied himself a saint, looking to petition those holier than him for their help saving the world.

But these lies were a diversion. He did not want their aid; he wanted to become them. And so, before they could stop him, he funneled their fountain’s power into himself.

It was like ambrosia on his tongue, divinity flooding his veins. The more he took, the closer to godlike he grew, while the four gods dimmed, their might dwindling to nourish his own.

But before he could finish them off, drain them of every last morsel of divinity, the gods vanished.

The world trembled with their leaving, and in the ensuing silence, the near-god found that he was only that: almost divine, not quite exalted, his deification halted by his unfinished feast. And now he was trapped here with a hunger that would inevitably return and a fountain that trickled ever so faintly on, as good as spent.

He knew, then, that he would never be a god in full until he finished what he started. Until he ended the cowardly beings who had ruled the living and took their place as the one true god.