Chapter 58
Chapter Fifty-Eight
The three Gods of Time convene in a chamber filled with whispers and currents. Their ancient forms flicker like half-remembered dreams, casting shadows that stretch beyond the very fabric of existence.
In front of them, the water in the small pool swirls, humming with energy. Each ripple tells a story, past, present, and future. The fabric of fate woven in currents of water and light.
Below, a woman stands next to a man, their hands clasped and lifted to the sky.
Chronoth peers into the water, his fingers skimming the surface. Shadows pass over his angular features as he contemplates the events of both mortals and deities as though he’s seeking patterns in the disarray.
Leaning against the smooth stone wall, Chronir vibrates with impatient energy. He grips a shard of ancient stone and rolls it between his fingers, each motion cracking the very air around him. “This is new.”
Chronoth calls forth images of the realm, maddening and heartbreaking visions of chaos where mortal lives intertwine and bend under divine weight. “Only the mortals. The gods are the same as they always were.”
“There was a time when they were not gods.” Chronira glances back toward the pool, a determined light gleaming in her eyes. “They are shaped by their stories, not just their powers.”
Chronoth’s brow furrows, an old worry passing over his features. “The gods know their own pasts.”
Calm and unwavering, Chronira observes the tension between her fellow gods with a mix of wisdom and warning. She stands at a distance, watching the water as images swirl and shift in frenzied patterns. The thread in front of her is stacked with possibilities.
Man and woman defiantly upright.
Man and woman dead.
Man and woman kneeling, heads bowed.
Man and woman fighting.
A little girl crying.
An island on fire.
An island consumed with waves.
A woman covered in flames, burning the island with the man at her feet.
“But the mortals do not.” Chronira tears her gaze away from the endless outcomes. “They’ve lost their knowledge. And the gods want to keep it that way.”
Chronir exhales, crossing his arms as he relents. “And will you share with the gods the secret you’ve been keeping?”
“There are always consequences.” Chronira stares at the growing stack of what-ifs. There’s more now, due to her brother’s question. “That might be of great benefit. To see what is yet to come.”
As the currents of water swirl anew, the boundaries of time bend, and with it, a whisper of fate shifts around them. The Gods of Time prepare for whatever tumultuous possibilities lie ahead. It is time to intervene.
Too far. I’ve come too fucking far to die today.
I’m pinned to the ground, unable to move. The darkness at the edges of my vision transforms into a void, blotting out everything except Lark’s desperate face. My lungs burn for air that won’t come. A blur of motion comes into view.
Beady black eyes. Smooth, scaly body. Razor-sharp teeth.
A snakelike creature, thicker than a human, crushes me, cutting off my air. A rugeru. Zeru’s hideous monsters.
The creature opens its mouth. Wider. Then even wider. Dozens of hissing black snakes spew from the rugeru’s mouth.
They slither as one toward Lark and block her way to me.
Lark’s mouth forms my name, her eyes blazing gold with desperate fury. She carves through a mass of the writhing horrors, her fire consuming everything in her path.
The flames don’t burn her. Rather, she becomes the flames.
Agnar sprints behind her, hair matted with sweat and something darker, less human. His face contorts with effort as he splits the earth to clear Lark’s path.
He stumbles.
A claw-like appendage from a creature I can’t see slashes across his thigh. Suddenly vulnerable, he falls face first, arms flailing.
Bastian’s head whips around, his expression frozen in horror as a barbed beast lunges toward Agnar.
Leesa, sweat pouring down her face, draws an arrow from her quiver and nocks it with fluid precision.
I swallow hard, my memory shifting to my mother’s crumpled form in the courtyard. The thought comes with perfect clarity as the edges of my world collapse inward.
My screaming lungs spasm and pull. Nothing happens.
No air.
Black serpentine eyes are still locked on me.
Then the pressure vanishes.
Air rushes into my starved lungs. I suck in a ragged breath. Then another. Each desperate gasp is more painful than the last. The arena tilts and sways around me.
Through watering eyes, I get a glimpse of the dead rugeru that grappled me.
Someone stands between me and the creature.
“Rivlan.” The word is torn from my abused throat.
The god turns, fierce determination carved into every line of his face. “Get up. This battle has only just begun.”
My shock rattles through the temporary, merge-induced connection, jolting everyone.
“Why?” The question encompasses more than I have breath to articulate.
Why help me? Why now? Why rebel against his fellow gods again?
I stagger to my feet, my legs threatening to buckle beneath me. Lark catches me, hauling me upright.
“Because I do believe in you.” Rivlan nods to Lark before gesturing toward the others.
Agnar struggling to rise.
Bastian and Rafe standing back-to-back against a tide of abominations.
Leesa releasing arrows as fast as she can find a target.
“All of you. In humans.” He holds his hand out, and a streak of sparkling blue appears. The glaive, his gift to me before we revolted. “You deserve this. Use it and magnify your strength.”
Despite my earlier reservations, something in his eyes compels me to trust him.
I accept the glaive, drawing on reserves of strength I didn’t know I possessed. My guardian magic responds more readily, and water answers my call, spiraling around my arms and crystallizing into bracers of ice so cold they smoke in the arena air.
Another figure emerges.
The throng of divine creatures parts, ash settling amidst swirls of concentrated heat.
Ziva’s wrapped in living flame, weapons of fire materializing from her hands as she advances.
Her eyes meet mine, then seek out Lark’s. “We will not be killing dragons. Or mortals.”
Lark freezes in shock, her gaze locked on her patron goddess.
The moment of distraction nearly costs her as a multi-limbed horror lunges toward her exposed back.
I shout a warning.
Too late.
A shadow detaches from the screaming crowd, materializing behind Lark with lightning speed. Nyc seizes the creature, her fingers lengthening and her claws extending as she rips it apart with casual strength.
The darkness rippling around her like a living cloak consumes the flailing monster. “I got you into this mess. My family is in your debt.”
Behind her, Mar emerges from her shadows.
Nyc’s daughter, the Goddess of Dreams and Visions.
An aura of light surrounds her, illuminating delicate features and hair so pale it’s almost white.
The creatures that approach Mar seem to forget what they’re doing and turn on each other in their confusion.
Distrust trickles through the connection I share with the others.
But so does a sliver of hope.
Something stirs within me.
The exhaustion that dragged at my limbs fades, replaced by a gush of energy that tingles my skin. My wounds start to heal, and the pain recedes, becoming distant and unimportant. The others straighten, their movements becoming more fluid, more certain.
Nyc swells, the edges of her darkness flaring and swallowing a pack of cave cats. When they emerge again, they’re facing the opposite direction. With snarling roars, they charge into the fray, attacking another family of pangolins.
With the gods’ intervention, the battle shifts.
Where before we were pushed back, now we advance, blazing a trail through divine creatures that are suddenly less sure, less coordinated.
Rivlan and I move as a unit, my ice complementing his water in ways I never imagined possible. He pulls the liquid from their bodies, and I freeze it.
Lark and Ziva are twin vortexes of heat and flame that consume everything in their paths, leaving nothing but ash in their wakes.
That kindling of hope flickers in my chest.
With gods fighting alongside us, we might actually stand a chance. This crazy, desperate gamble might pay off after all.
Thank you.
The prayer slips out reflexively, and a sudden realization hits me. We can bolster the gods on our side by praying to them.
I start with the prayer I learned as a child. “Praise Rivlan, God of Water, Source of Life.”
Next to me, Rivlan’s waters run faster.
Lark catches on, lips moving as she murmurs a prayer to Ziva. The others follow suit.
Our powers amplify.
Devotion pours from each of us.
The creatures fall back, cowering in the face of our revival.
In the stands, Zeru rises to his full height, his form oscillating between human and something far more terrible, far more alien.
Silent explosions of stars burst around him. The creatures on the arena floor respond to his rage, their attacks becoming more coordinated and brutal. “Advance! Kill the heretics!”
The beasts surge forward in a wave of chitinous limbs and gaping maws. Even with the rebel gods fighting alongside us, we’re forced back step-by-step. Our connection starts to weaken. The merge can only hold for so long.
Rafe falls out first.
The merge breaks, then reforms as the remaining people reach out again.
Rivlan pivots toward me, his watery features troubled. “Something’s wrong. The balance is shifting.”
I spear another beast that leaps toward us. “What do you mean?”
“Zeru is pulling on more power than should be possible.” Rivlan’s form ripples as if he’s trying to discern the problem. “No. That’s not him. It’s from something beyond—”
He vanishes.
Simply gone between one heartbeat and the next.
I stare at the empty space where he stood, my mind refusing to process what my eyes are communicating.
Then Ziva disappears, mid-swing, her fiery weapon clattering to the ground before dissolving into embers.
Nyc and Mar follow.
The same phenomenon spreads through the stands like a wave. Zeru goes first. Then the gods who remain. All gone in an instant, like smoke before a windstorm.
The arena falls silent, everyone, mortal and monster alike, frozen in disbelief.
“What the fuck?” Agnar breaks the quiet, his voice carrying across the sudden stillness. “I was just getting my third wind!”
His outburst releases the tension. The crowd in the stands erupts into panicked conversation, nobles and commoners gesturing to the empty spaces where gods had been seconds before. On the arena floor, the creatures, baffled by their masters’ disappearances, become erratic and uncoordinated.
Lark appears at my side, her eyes bewildered. “What just happened? Should—?”
Before she can finish, one of the larger beasts, a thing with too many limbs and a mouth that could swallow me whole, regains its purpose and charges.
“We keep fighting.” I push through the fatigue seeping into my bones and threatening to overwhelm me. “Because they are.” Pulling deep on my guardian magic, I strengthen the merge.
In the back of my mind, a strange presence looms. One with a singular purpose that makes absolutely no sense.
We’re coming.