Chapter 35 #2
“And, of course,” continued Merete, “our Oracle, Silje.” She smiled. “I believe you are acquainted with her granddaughter, Signe.”
The priestess appeared beside Callamus, giving Mariah a small wave and a knowing grin.
Mariah gave her head the barest of shakes. She’d given up being surprised by Signe; ever since that first time they’d met at Mariah’s Porofirat, the Leuxrithian priestess had been nothing but layers of multitudes and mysteries.
“Yes, I am.” Mariah returned her attention to Merete. “We would not be here without her aid and guidance.”
“Indeed. Signe has spent many years away from us; we are happy to have her back.” Merete lifted her chin, addressing the crowd.
“Today has been a historic day. We welcome the Onitan Queen within our temple and ask that the people of Eyarfell also welcome her to their city. But the Council now needs this space.”
That was all it took. The people stood as one and shuffled out, back into the midday sun. A few murmured words of welcome as they left, all wearing the same open, kind expressions.
It unnerved Mariah to see so many people looking at her with warmth and hope, rather than the usual disgust or distrust.
Merete clapped her hands and sat back in her chair. Three robed figures emerged from the shadowed hallways, each carrying a chair, and placed them at the table across from the council. Merete gestured to the chairs, a sharper gleam slipping into her gaze.
Mariah followed the invitation and sat, Matheo taking the chair to her left and Andrian to her right, across from the Oracle.
Mariah’s skin prickled as the elderly woman leaned forward, locking that scrutinizing expression on Andrian, but said nothing.
“So,” Merete started, “how fair our neighbors to the south?”
Mariah drew in a breath. Held it in her chest. Released it on a sigh.
“Not well. I may be an ascended queen, but it’s a title without a crown or throne.”
There was no use lying to a group of seers and witches.
Silence settled onto the council. Tomas and Birgitte shared a look heavy with concern. Merete sat forward. “What exactly do you mean, Your Majesty?”
Mariah swallowed. “How familiar is Leuxrith with the First War and the dark god we knew as Flétrir?”
Merete’s eyes widened. The Oracle released a low hiss.
“We know the Scourge of the earth,” the old woman snarled. Something Mariah recognized—something vengeful—flashed in her pale eyes. “Our people fought beside yours all those thousands of years ago to rid him from these lands.”
“Then you know,” Mariah said, “that our ancestors didn’t win that war. Not in the way it mattered.”
“What are you saying?” asked the fourth councilor, Viktor. He was a thin man, wisps of brown hair falling into his dark-blue eyes.
Mariah didn’t get the chance to answer.
“You know the dark god’s true name. Don’t you, girl?” The Oracle’s sharp gaze pinned Mariah in her seat. Merete made a soft, horrified noise, as if the Oracle calling Mariah “girl” was the greatest offense to happen in these halls.
Maybe it was. It was also far from the greatest offense Mariah had suffered. And it was true; to this woman, to whatever ageless soul she carried, she was nothing more than a girl.
She met the Oracle’s stare and gave a sharp, dipped nod.
The Oracle leaned back, folding her hands together. “Speak it. Say what has happened.”
A tang in the air hit Mariah’s tongue.
Magic. There was magic being used here. She swung her gaze across the council, over the Oracle, trying to locate its source.
Perhaps if her magic had been awake, she would’ve found it. Now, with only the barest flicker in the quietest, darkest parts of her, it was like following a sound when blinded in the dark.
She swallowed her disappointment and answered the question instead.
“Kol,” she said quietly. “The dark god’s name is Kol. He is the fallen God of the Sun and lost Consort of Zadione, the Goddess of Death. And he has returned.” Mariah nodded to Callamus, who still lingered in the corner with Signe. “It is also why Callamus is here. Why all the gods are awake.”
Those dripping stalactites drummed against Mariah’s skin, burning along with the council’s stares.
Merete shared a glance with the council, a furrow forming between her smooth brow. “That is…troubling. Very troubling indeed.”
“And it was because of me,” Mariah blurted, then snapped her jaw shut with a quiet click. Her hands clenched into tight fists in her lap.
Why did she have to say that? Was it guilt that drove her to reckless stupidity?
A calloused hand again brushed across her arm, resting on her thigh. Andrian didn’t look at her, but his hand on her was a welcome, steadying weight.
“Because of you?” the Oracle prompted, lifting a gray brow.
Mariah met her sharp stare. “Yes.” She pulled in a breath.
She hadn’t repeated this story to anyone since that day—not even to herself. But something licked at her skin, the same brush of magic across her cheeks.
Maybe one of them was drawing the truth from her, but she didn’t bother resisting. Some instinct told her that this was what she needed to do.
She’d never refused those instincts before.
So, she told the council the truth she’d learned about the end of the First War.
How the gods had joined together and cast a spell to bind Kol and through him into Enfara, with Zadione serving as the lock.
How all the gods had to leave the world, their physical bodies laying to rest in the earth as they retreated to the gods’ plane, and how the spell would break if they ever returned.
She told the council how Qhohena had placed her grace in the first Onitan Queen, something the other gods were not aware she’d done.
How that grace had been passed down from queen to queen, transferred at every Abdication and Choosing and Ascension.
How when Zadione escaped Kol, five thousand years later, she decided to do the same.
“When Zadione gave up her grace, just like her sister, she placed it in the last descendent of her only priestess.” Mariah drew in a deep breath. “She placed her grace in me.”
Drip, drip, drip. The stalactites almost seemed to mock her.
“Are you saying that you carry the grace of not just one of the moon goddesses,” Birgitte asked quietly, “but both?”
Mariah nodded. The council members leaned their heads together, whispering softly. The Oracle kept that piercing gaze trained on her, clawing too deep into her skin.
“How did you free the dark god, Mariah?”
The whispering stalled. Gazes widened. A low growl rumbled in Andrian’s chest.
Mariah, despite all her deepest failures, all the darkest murmurings about what she’d done, kept her head lifted, chin proud.
“Kol murdered my mother. So, I set the goddesses grace free.”
The Oracle narrowed her eyes. “You shifted?”
“I did.”
The council gasped, but the Oracle didn’t so much as flinch.
“Can you shift now?”
Mariah hesitated. But after telling so much truth, why start with a lie now? It was clear this woman would see through all of it.
“No. All that magic—that grace—is locked from me.” She glanced at Callamus. “Which is part of the reason I’ve come here.”
The God of the Night Sky stepped to the table. The council cast their eyes away from him, reverential deference written into each of them. But the Oracle and Mariah met his stare, waiting.
“The Onitan Queen speaks the truth, Silje.” He folded his hands behind his back. “And as much as she may think it, Kol’s return was not her fault. It was as inevitable as the rising of the sun each break of day. You know this.”
Silje relaxed back in her seat, nodding. Her piercing gaze finally left Mariah, and Mariah almost heaved a sigh of relief.
Until she shifted it to Andrian instead.
Mariah didn’t like the darkness that flashed over her face when she looked at him.
“This is all…very troubling.” Merete was unable to hide the tremble in her voice.
“Very troubling indeed. Our duty is, and has always been, to protect the people of Leuxrith from the darkness nipping at the edges of the world.” She glanced at Callamus.
“But you come here with the support and blessing of our god. That is not something we can ignore. If he stands with you in this, then so do we.”
The rest of the council nodded. Mariah clenched her fingers around Andrian’s, relief tearing through her. “Thank you. I only wish our reception in Kreah had been the same.”
“The Kreah people will come around,” Callamus said. “Trust Rulene and your friends.”
Mariah nodded. Merete nodded as well, sympathy flashing in her eyes. She opened her mouth—
“You are one of his, aren’t you?”
The Oracle’s soft hiss froze the room. The old woman stood from her chair, palms flattening on the stone table.
Her lip pulled back from her teeth, anger and hatred flashing in her eyes.
“I felt something the moment you crossed this threshold. It’s been so long since I’ve felt that darkness, I could not place it. I remember now. I remember you…reykr.”
“What?” Birgitte’s horrified question fractured all of Mariah’s tentative hope. Andrian yanked back his hand, hardness falling over every line of him. Matheo shifted nervously in his seat, hand twitching toward the dagger at his hip.
No. No, this peace would not be shaken because the man she loved was the heir to a power he never asked for.
Mariah rose from her seat, meeting Silje’s venom with her own. Metal clattered against stone as she leaned across Andrian, her grandfather’s dagger gripped in her hand and flat on the table.
“He is not Kol’s,” Mariah snarled. “He is mine.”
Silence quaked through the temple. Mariah and the Oracle were caught in a battle of wills, young soul against old. Neither willing to break, not until the other snapped.
Mariah couldn’t allow it. Wouldn’t allow it. She knew Luexrithians had a deep, complicated history with the shadow-wielders. But that history was not Andrian’s burden to bear, and she wouldn’t let them further convince him that he wasn’t worthy of goodness in his life.
“That is enough, Oracle.” Callamus’s deep, ageless voice tore through them. The Oracle blinked in disbelief, glancing at her god.
“Callamus, he is one of them—”
“I know very well what he is,” Callamus said. “The young queen is right. He bears the dark god’s magic, but he does not belong to Kol. He is the consort of a queen who carries the grace of the two moon goddesses. Nothing else matters besides that, and I will have it respected.”
Gods, Mariah wished she could have just a slightest hint of the surety in herself that Callamus had. She was thankful to the god in that moment, nonetheless. She gave him a small, tense smile, and he returned it with a nod.
Slowly, the Oracle sat down. The lines in her aged and weathered face were still tense, still distrusting, but she said nothing further. Mariah sat, too, and only then did she risk a glance at Andrian.
All she saw was that cold, unfeeling mask. His hands were clenched into fists, but everything else about him was shut down, locked, his mind far away.
Mariah’s heart cracked.
Merete cleared her throat. “While we have many questions about how a reykr came to be the consort of the Onitan Queen,” she said, “we will forgo answers on that for today. I am sure you are all weary from your journey.” She glanced into the shadows and the three figures from earlier remerged.
“Our acolytes will show you to your residences. They have been appropriately provisioned, and you may call them home for as long as you remain with us.” She turned her gaze back to Mariah.
“I expect a priority of yours will be securing more than just physical allies. Do you wish for me to summon the Vigamor?”
Confusion trickled through Mariah. “The Vigamor?”
“The leaders of Leuxrith’s warriors,” Tomas answered. “We have no standing armies, but that doesn’t mean we don’t have strength to offer. If you wish to recruit fighters to your cause, you will need to convince the Vigamor.”
Interesting. “Thank you,” Mariah said. “I’m sure before this is done, we will seek their help.
But we need answers before we can be ready to fight.
” There was no point in raising an army if she had no way to defeat Kol.
They could have the largest force on the continent, and none of it would matter if the God of the Sun couldn’t be killed.
Merete nodded, as if she understood everything Mariah didn’t say. “If there is anything else you require, you will let us know.”
“Thank you, Merete. I look forward to a long future between our two kingdoms.”
“I do as well, Your Majesty.”
“You can call me Mariah.” The barest hint of a smile tugged at Mariah’s mouth. “Friends don’t need to go by formalities.”
The councilor smiled as well. “Yes. Friends.”
Matheo and Andrian stood, the latter still tense and hidden behind a mask of dissociative ice. The waiting acolytes waved them toward the entrance to the temple, back toward the streets of Eyarfell.
Something halted Mariah’s feet.
She found Callamus’s gaze. Signe had approached, standing by his side. He lifted a brow, a silent question.
Mariah straightened her spine.
“Tomorrow,” she said to the god. “Let’s meet tomorrow.”
About her magic. About why it no longer answered her.
About how to get it back.
It was about damn time she stopped hiding from herself and her past.
A slow, knowing smile spread across the god’s face.
“Tomorrow it is.”