Chapter Sixty-Seven
Ellowyn
It’d been over an hour since the hidden door closed behind Fay, leaving me alone in this haunted and desecrated place.
The bone-chilling wrongness didn’t dissipate as I’d hoped; in fact, it’d only grown worse the longer we’d stayed in the Valley.
My hands itched to Destroy and Create; they twitched at the possibility of absorbing the pain and suffering that hung in the air like a palpable, dense fog.
Make it new.
I closed my eyes, breathing deeply through my nose, in an effort to ward off the sensation.
Unfortunately, ignoring the desires of my magic only made my skin crawl with a thousand ants.
Exhaling and shaking my head in an attempt to clear the feeling, I sank to the ground with my back resting against the stone wall nearest the secret entrance Fay and I used.
While it was clear the Valley was nothing more than a graveyard, I couldn’t shake the eerie feeling of being watched.
There was something sentient here. Fay was so far engrossed in her own thoughts that I wasn’t sure if my warning when I first crossed the threshold into the Valley fully registered, but the wrongness was growing harder to ignore.
Keeping my back to the, hopefully, only usable entrance meant that I could allow my gaze to wander. Dust motes danced lazily in the air, stirred by fresh movement and my labored breathing. The walls groaned every so often as they settled, but I heard no other noise.
The lack of life here was disconcerting at best.
I picked at my cuticles, pulling dirt from beneath the tips of my fingernails, in a bid to distract myself from the disembodied gazes caressing my skin. It was as if the spirits of the dead lingered here, as if they couldn’t—or wouldn’t—move on into the ether.
It was easy to see how that could be the case. I shuddered slightly at the fresh memories of destruction above, of the unburied dead and the destroyed buildings. Of the complete annihilation of an entire people.
I’d forgiven Alois for his role in my own personal suffering, but seeing this? Finally understanding the atrocities he committed in the name of truth . . . it painted him in a way that had all of my personal transgressions illuminating in bright color, the memories fresh and alive.
“Thinking hard over there?” A deep voice penetrated my thoughts, and I instantly let out an unholy shriek. My body locked tight, my muscles preparing to fight or flee, as my Destruction Magic instantly curled in my hands, launching at the mysterious voice of its own volition.
A man as black as a void stepped from the darkness nearest the main staircase, and I watched in abject terror as the diaphanous strands of my power wove around him and absorbed into his skin like a lover’s caress.
His presence seemed to suck the very light from the room, and I watched as the sconces attached to the walls wavered and flickered as he strode confidently until the tips of his black boots met my own.
“Godling,” Kaos said, his greeting laced with humor, though there was an edge to his tone. The slight tenseness of his muscles and the hard press of his mouth indicated that this was more than just a leisurely visit.
“Kaos,” I intoned breathlessly as I worked to gain a handle on my emotions once again.
“That was an impressive bit of power. I wonder what it would have done if Destruction bowed to you and you alone?” he mused quietly.
I ignored his comment.
“Why are you here? Shouldn’t you be with your sister?”
He grimaced and turned his face away from me before taking a large step back into the middle of the room. This space loomed large when it was just Fay and I, but Kaos seemed to occupy every available inch.
The god was silent for a moment as he cast his black gaze around the room. His eyes ran over the ashes of the books before pausing on the thick stone pedestal. Finally, his gaze coasted over the walls that were filled with the runes Fay tried to decipher in her quest to find that final hidden room.
“Interesting, isn’t it,” he finally said, his hands clasped behind his back as he faced away from me.
“What is interesting,” I deadpanned dryly. If I’d learned anything about immortal beings, it was that they often talked in riddles for their own amusement. I suppose centuries of living meant that they had to find entertainment in the mundane.
“The truth written here”—he gestured to the deep grooves of the runes etched in stone—“in a house of lies.” He spun in a slow circle, arms splayed open, until he faced me once more.
I frowned. “What do you mean?”
Kaos’ smirk was blindingly white against the pure obsidian of his skin. I shivered at the unnatural expression, even as his eyes lit with something akin to manic glee.
“I’m sure the Rune Master will be able to tell you,” he remarked just as the door to the small room thunked open, revealing a wide-eyed and pale Fay. “Ah, good. She found the Seeing Room. Did you find your lost things, Guardian of Knowledge?”
Faylinn stumbled over the threshold, mumbling some incoherent babble. I rushed from my spot, ignoring my standoff with Kaos completely, to pull my friend tightly into my arms. Fay rested stiffly in my embrace, eyes unseeing, as I checked her for obvious injuries.
“The damage isn’t outside, godling. It’s in her mind,” Kaos tapped his temple in emphasis. “A mortal’s mind isn’t strong enough to withhold that onslaught of information without liquefying.”
“She’s not mortal,” I grumbled as I swept my hands over her arms and hands, noting the red-crusted slashes in her skin on top of the litany of silvery scars.
“What did you say?” Kaos’ voice was oddly strangulated.
“I said she’s not mortal,” I called louder, my check on Fay complete. I took her limp hand in mine and caressed the back of it, vowing to coax her from this coma.
I turned my face back to Kaos. He was frowning, brows drawn so far down they nearly enveloped his eyes. Fay’s hand twitched in mine as Kaos strode toward us. His armor creaked as he knelt down; his considerable height folding until his eyes were nearly even with Fay’s.
“Hello, God of Truths.” Fay’s voice was weak and fluttery as she swayed on her feet.
A slow smile curved on Kaos’ face as he drew back to his considerable height.
“She stinks of Fate,” he griped for a moment as a lazy smile coated Fay’s face.
“Well, he is my grandfather,” she remarked quietly. Her voice was a hollow rasp, but held more of her previous strength.
“So, my half sister had a daughter. That would make you . . .” Kaos gestured for Fay to complete his thought.
“Your niece?”
Kaos barked an unexpected laugh that had both Fay and me jumping.
“Fuck, you are just like him, aren’t you? Her, too,” Kaos mused softly, almost to himself. There was a sense of wistfulness in his tone, a softness in his eyes, as if he was remembering something from eons ago.
We were silent for a moment as Kaos grappled with the memories, his face finally settling back into its usual dark apathy.
“What did you discover in that cavern of lies, Guardian?” he asked.
Fay squeezed my hand once before walking on shaky legs past Kaos over to the wall with previous indecipherable runes. She ran her long fingers over the inscriptions again, before turning to face the god.
“Many things. Some of them useful, others not.” She shrugged, unbothered.
“Such as?” The god was growing impatient, and I had to muffle a laugh at Fay’s ability to stay completely unruffled in his presence.
“You’re the God of Truths,” she said simply.
“And?”
“Isn’t it interesting how the world demands balance—that Fate demands it. Earth and Air. Water and Fire. Creation and Destruction. Pain and Pleasure. Yet you’re the God of Truths, and Solace is the Goddess of . . . what did they call her? Visions and Memories.”
A slow smile spread across Kaos’ face. “It does seem strange, doesn’t it.”
I was having a hard time following their conversation, only understanding a few threads here and there. It sounded as if they were speaking in a language only they understood—two immortal beings revealing centuries of buried secrets.
“You cannot tell a lie, can you?” Fay asked, cocking her head to the side.
Kaos shook his head once.
“I cannot.”
“And you were always paired with a Keeper, yes? Your Truthsayers were always matched with a Keeper. One to receive visions, the other to discern the truth from them.”
“That is true.”
Fay ran her hand over the wall once more, falling silent as she gathered her thoughts. She pushed a wayward curl behind her ear, her dark tattoos glimmering in the firelight.
“Tell me, Kaos, is your sister the Goddess of Visions and Memories? Or is she the Goddess of Lies?” Fay finally asked, her voice a confident, albeit quiet, whisper.
Life seemed to still in that small cavern. My gaze pinged from one immortal to the other as my heart threatened to beat out of my chest.
Kaos’ face exploded into a wide grin. “You’re the first to ask me that question in nearly three centuries, Rune Master.”
“Answer the question, Kaos.” Fay’s voice was hard, her hands balled into white-knuckled fists.
“You tell me. What is my sister the goddess of?”
Fay answered without a moment’s hesitation.
“The Goddess of Lies.”
“Odd, isn’t it?” Kaos asked, suddenly pacing.
“That the truth is shrouded in darkness”—he gestured to his appearance—“that the mortals are taught to fear chaos? That my descendants were massacred without compunction centuries ago in an attempt to hide the truth? Yet the lies are allowed to live in the light. Given positions at court, ears of the most powerful.”
My gut fell into my feet. The longer he talked, the more I finally started to realize how deep Solace’s deception went.
“She was playing the long game,” I finally added to the conversation, both Fay and Kaos turning to look at me.
Fay’s hazel eyes sparkled with an intelligence and curiosity that belied her heritage, while Kaos’ fathomless black irises pulsated with an urgency that had the hairs on my arms standing on end.
“That’s why you had Alois kill everyone here,” Fay mused, drawing the attention of the god back to her.
“Yes,” he responded curtly.
“That doesn’t absolve you of their deaths. It doesn’t make it right,” I clipped venomously.
“No, godling, it doesn’t.”
“How much of what I saw can I trust?” Fay interrupted suddenly. Kaos sighed, tipping his face back toward the ceiling.
“Nothing. Not unless you had a Truthsayer to weed through everything that you saw,” he admitted.
“Ironic that the God of Truths is here with us then, isn’t it?” I asked, raising an eyebrow at Kaos petulantly.
He barked another surprising laugh. “The two of you are a formidable pair. Fate chose well.” I opened my mouth, but Kaos held up a hand to ward off my comment. “I am not here to tell you the truth of the history of the world, Rune Master.”
Fay frowned as the crystal around her neck pulsated slightly. Kaos swore before pointing a finger at the object.
“Ask me what that is,” he spat, his voice strained and hurried. “Then ask me why I’m here.”
Fay blinked owlishly, fingering her father’s necklace around her throat.
“What is this?” she asked quietly, holding it slightly aloft as the bluish glow coated her palm.
“An object I’ve been searching centuries for. Something that could give you a decided edge over my sister—the last tie to her immortality.”
“Her tether,” Fay whispered, her voice echoing between us. Kaos let the statement hover in the air. He neither needed to confirm nor deny her statement—even I could feel the truth of it, the rightness.
“Why are you here, Kaos?” I asked, my voice hesitant.
“Because it’s time for me to die.”