Chapter 6 #2
They passed Avane next, god of wind, with two faces and a third shaped as a delicate dove.
Ezer paused to study Avane’s female face. She was carved as a beautiful warrioress, her crown resembling whorls of wind.
Is it your voice that guides me? Ezer thought. Is it you that watches after me each day?
‘They could end the whole godsdamned war,’ Ezer said suddenly. ‘If they wished it.’
Arawn sucked in a breath. ‘To use their name in vain is unwise. They are always watching, always listening. Especially here.’
Not to me, Ezer thought.
Until she remembered the tornado of ravens, and she thought better of her words.
The higher they walked, the more the rumble of war returned.
And soon she could see the battlefield.
The Expanse.
She paused on the stairwell, breathless as the wind whipped past her ears. There was no whisper. There needn’t be, because she knew the sight of death.
For miles, it stretched, a land of snow and ice and howling wind. The battle raged in flashes of light, bursts of colorful Sacred magic.
And far beyond it stood the jagged Sawteeth Mountains.
They were so much larger than she’d ever imagined. It was like another world entirely, a place that could never be fully explored.
But it was the shadowstorm above them that stole the breath from her lungs.
‘That,’ Ezer breathed. ‘That’s the Acolyte’s power?’
The sky rumbled, and lightning flashed, illuminating the storm of pure shadow that spiraled over the Sawteeth’s highest peak.
Unnatural.
Dangerous.
Alive.
Thousands of living shadows seemed to swim up and down the Sawteeth, from the storm to the snow … a dark barrier that none could pass.
Not without darksoul blood.
‘Shadows,’ Arawn said. ‘As if he wields the darkness of hell on his fingertips. No one can cross beyond that curtain of dark magic. We’ve exhausted every option. They all end in death.’
The stories hadn’t done it justice.
The Acolyte was the king of nightmares, indeed.
‘Does it ever stop?’ she asked, as the wind pushed at her back.
She closed her eyes and pushed the fear away. She wouldn’t fall.
Some part of her knew Arawn wouldn’t let her.
‘No,’ he said. ‘The shadowstorm guards the Sawteeth day and night, and has never ceased, not in the twenty years of war. His power is immense. His wolves … growing in number by the day. His darksoul soldiers, too.’
‘Does he ever come out to fight?’ Ezer asked. ‘Does he ever walk the battlefield?’
Arawn shook his head. ‘We believe he sources the storm from within the Sawteeth. A great power that protects the entire dark army. He is too vital to walk the battlefield, to risk death.’
‘So why don’t you ask the gods to stop him?’ Ezer asked. ‘Stop the whole war in a flash.’
A boom echoed from far away, but she felt it deep in her bones.
Arawn frowned. ‘The gods cannot interfere with the affairs of mortals. Lore tells us they aren’t the only ones, the Five.
There are more. Countless rule over their own realms, represented by our Sacred Circle.
Together they form a godhead of many and have laws of their own to abide by.
To step down to our realm, to interfere like that … it is forbidden.’
‘They’re gods,’ Ezer said. ‘Nothing is forbidden.’
‘Every power must have a limit, Minder,’ Arawn said.
She supposed that was why the Sacred died so young.
Because with every pull of their magic, every invocation the gods granted … it took something from them.
Until they had nothing left to give.
They were nearly at the top of the staircase now.
Ezer refused to look down, to allow herself to feel that spike of hideous fear.
‘The gods cannot interfere every day. But they can, once a century,’ Arawn said.
‘Much like Absolution each month, as a show of their love and grace, they give us Realmbreak. At the end of it, the gods grant our leader a single blessing. If the heart of the Sacred King or Queen that asks is pure, of course. The intent of the blessing must be gods-honoring.’
‘Pure,’ Ezer said, and raised her brows. ‘I don’t think there’s any mortal truly pure of heart. Nor are there truly pure intentions. We all harbor selfishness within.’
‘You think too little of people,’ Arawn said. ‘Too much time, perhaps, locked away in your tower.’
‘No,’ Ezer said. ‘I just know living creatures. And in the end, we are all the same, fighting for what is best for us, no matter what it takes. Even the ravens are selfish with the choices they make.’
Even kind Ervos had darkness that roiled within him.
Even the gentlest of doves could still peck a person hard enough to draw blood.
Arawn’s brow furrowed. ‘Think what you will of mortalkind,’ he said.
‘But I know the truth. The gods breathed life into us, countless Sacred, countless nomages … and while we may not share magic, we share the outcome of this war. A war that must end in victory for the light. And if we hope to keep it alive, we must keep fighting for the Five. Until Realmbreak arrives, and with it, fresh hope.’
Ezer should consider herself lucky; Ervos had always said that she would get to experience a Realmbreak in her lifetime.
Some called it The Long Day, which felt more fitting.
Because once a century, for three straight days, the sun never set.
It was a time when the Five shed all their light on the realm, watching their creation so closely that they could see all the way through to their souls beneath.
If the Sacred had done their job of living in line with their laws … the gods would grant them a single, mighty blessing to hold them until the next Realmbreak.
‘In a few months,’ Arawn said, ‘we’ll be granted something that could turn the tide of this war.’
Ezer glanced up at him, then immediately looked away when their eyes met. He was far too handsome for his own good. And certainly for hers. ‘And what will the perfect, pure-hearted Sacred beg of the gods for this time?’
‘That,’ Arawn said, ‘is not information you are privy to. But I’ll tell you this. What my father will ask for … and what I would ask for if I were already King …’ He blew out another breath that looked like smoke and turned his back on the war. ‘They would not be remotely close to the same.’