Chapter 32
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
Zefiah’s wordless horror, cut with rage, shot up my spine. Still, I ignored her.
Kajmar smiled. It was so stunning that I glowed with happiness to have been the source of it.
I tore my eyes away from him to look at Septimus, who was staring at me searchingly.
Funny, how he had always seemed so inhumanly beautiful, and yet now, I was struck by all the fascinating imperfect edges of his appearance.
The only solid thing in a world of dreams.
I prayed he saw what I hid from Kajmar and Ix. I would like that, I had told them. The words just close enough to the truth that they were not a lie. Close enough, hopefully, to let us at their throats.
“Very well,” Kajmar said. “Let us dispose of your captor, and—”
I stepped in front of Septimus.
“No,” I said quickly. Then slower, “No. I would like to keep him.”
Ix exchanged an amused look with Kajmar. “Of course you do. He is one of your desires too. I cannot blame you. He is quite pretty.”
A wave of warmth passed over my skin, and I looked away, uncharacteristically self-conscious.
Kajmar seemed less pleased with this development. He rose and stood before Septimus.
“You wish to live?” he said.
Septimus bowed his head. “I would prefer it, Your Grace. Though I imagine the Dark Mother would rather I die than follow you.”
At the mention of Nyaxia, both Ix’s and Kajmar’s interest visibly piqued. There was nothing the gods enjoyed more than competing with each other.
Ix wound her arms around Kajmar’s bare shoulders. “Imagine how furious Nyaxia will be, once she learns we have kept one of her children as our own pet.”
Kajmar considered this. He pressed Ix’s fingers to his lips.
“He may be more trouble than he is worth,” he said. “They are traitorous little things. Look at how Atroxus was rewarded when he tried to offer one of his fallen followers another chance. He died for it.”
“He can prove his loyalty to you,” I blurted out.
Again, a glance between Septimus and me. His was unreadable.
The man claimed he always had a plan. I sure fucking hoped that was true.
“She is right,” he said. “Allow me to play the harp.”
My heart dropped. That wasn’t the plan I’d been expecting. He was a vampire. Handling the harp would kill him.
Ix giggled. “A fallen one, bearing a god-forged instrument of the White Pantheon? How brave of you.”
“I am willing to risk my life, my goddess,” Septimus said, “if it means I can show you my truest desires.”
Now this was a game the gods enjoyed. A gamble of life and death.
“I should like to see what a fallen one dreams of,” Kajmar said. “Very well. Play for us.”
He looked at me expectantly, and I turned to Septimus, dreading each step toward him.
I was eternally aware of the weight of the harp in my hands, the warm glow of its divinity.
He had somehow managed to handle Srana’s spear, but it had burned him.
I wasn’t sure what holding the harp—and using it—would do to him.
Was this intended to be a distraction? Should I use this moment to go for one of their throats? But surely I couldn’t move against one of them without the other ending us where we stood. And after my failure with Srana, I wasn’t sure that even Zefiah could take either of them down.
I eyed Ix’s bow, now resting across her lap. So close, and yet so inaccessible.
Septimus’s gaze locked to mine as he reached out for the harp. I gave him a look that asked, Move now?
His replied, Not yet.
He took the harp from me. A wince wrenched across his features. The smell of burning flesh bit the air. I lurched closer, instinctively ready to take the harp back.
But quickly, his expression smoothed. He turned to Ix and Kajmar, inclined his chin, and began to play.
His song was beautiful and dark and chilling. Like raindrops falling on bloody cobblestones. It sounded like funeral hymns, like the wind through gravestones. Mist surrounded us, and then a figure unfurled within it. A woman.
Not just a woman, I realized, as she walked through the smoky dreamscape—me.
I wielded Zefiah, though in this dream, she was a white, empty silhouette—inconsequential.
I wore a long, red silk gown. I realized, with a start, that it was the modified acolyte’s habit that I had worn to taunt Septimus at the pleasure temple.
Only now, seeing myself as he had, did I fully understand just how on display my body had been that night.
Through his eyes, the clothing displayed every cut expanse of muscle on my back, the shape of my breasts, the flex of every tendon in my legs as I moved.
My hair was long and free, gleaming copper that matched the sheen of my skin.
I turned and looked over my shoulder at him, and I smiled, viciously, teeth gleaming white.
This was what a real divine warrior looked like. Beauty that was power.
I tore my gaze from this dream version of myself. Plumes of smoke rose from Septimus’s hands as his fingers danced over the strings. Yet, there was no pain on his face. Only hunger, as he watched the vision.
As he watched me.
Hunger that would go forever unfulfilled. Longing.
And that look on his face, and the realization that this beautiful creature was what he saw when he looked at me, struck me harder than his hands on my body or his filthy words in my ear.
The illusion version of me paused at Septimus, ran her hand over his shoulders. “Let her stay.” Ix laughed. “Put on a real show for us.”
But Septimus kept his eyes straight ahead and kept playing.
Illusion me turned away and ran into the mist, drawing her glowing blade as her strides lengthened with all the grace of a heron taking off over the glassy surface of a lake. The mist twisted into towering columns.
I recognized this image. We were not just seeing Septimus’s desires—we were seeing the prophecy.
The gods went quiet. They had expected to see all the depravities of a fallen one’s dreams. They had been ready to watch Septimus fuck me, and then drain me.
Instead, they realized, they were watching the fall of the White Pantheon.
The version of the prophecy Septimus showed them was a little different from the one I had seen.
The details were obscured. As we watched this illusionary Kyrene topple one god, then another, and another, it was impossible to tell which were falling.
I cast another quick glance at Septimus to see his jaw set, the smoke from the harp now partially obscuring his expression.
He was focusing, hard, on showing them exactly what he wanted them to see.
Blood now pooled around our feet, silver, gold, a thousand colors at once. The blood of gods. One fell, two, four, six, all hazy silhouettes. Column after column of the White Pantheon crumbled.
But not all of them. Just as in my vision, some gods remained, and just as in the vision, it was impossible to say who. They were at each other’s throats, a tangle of limbs and shadow, and no one could tell, in the end, who would remain.
The illusion version of me returned to Septimus’s side, her fingers running over his shoulders, smiling at the carnage. But he just kept playing. His expression was hard, jaw clenched, sweat now rolling down his temple.
One final figure stepped from the mist.
And this god, unlike the others, was unmistakable.
Nyaxia.
This was a version of her conjured by someone who had met her many times—who had committed every detail to memory.
She rose from the smoke with her hands outstretched.
Chrome silver dripped down her naked body.
Long tendrils of star-scattered black hair fell over her chest. Red blood dripped from her chin as she lowered herself before Septimus and caressed his face.
The dream now seemed sickeningly real. I knew that, for whatever Septimus was doing to steer what he showed the gods, this was beyond his control. The fire in his eyes was unmistakable as he lifted them to meet Nyaxia’s. Pure desire.
But of course, this was Septimus’s greatest wish. To fulfill his lost brother’s role as the Bloodborn chosen one, who would bring them back to Nyaxia’s good graces and free them from their curse.
He reached for her. The harp continued playing without him, suspended in the air. His fingertips were charred.
And then, blood exploded from his hands.
Nyaxia jerked back and let out a wordless screech. Black blood spattered. Smoke plumed in thick, dark clouds.
When it cleared, Nyaxia lay on the ground, lifeless, her chest a mess of mortal gore. Septimus stepped forward. He no longer acknowledged any of us, or the harp, at all.
He stared down at Nyaxia’s dead body and smiled.
The mist cleared. The illusion faded. The final notes of the harp’s song dissipated with it. The blood was the last to go.
I stared in shock. The remnants of Septimus’s hunger for bloodshed throbbed in my veins, mingling with my own. It was real. I was certain. It was real.
So real, I understood implicitly, that it went beyond fantasy. It was a desire so tangible that it was a plan.
The memory of his face after Estrys flashed through my mind. The fury in those perfect features, the fury that had looked just like mine. And some part of me was not surprised at all—had already suspected, no matter how he denied it. Because I knew what it was to hate the one who held your leash.
Ix and Kajmar were quiet.
It took a lot to shock a god, let alone two of them.
Septimus, apparently, had managed it. Now, he swayed slightly, that smirk twisting the left side of his mouth.
He held the harp again. The scent of burning flesh was now overwhelming, but his knuckles were white around it, his eyes glazed, like he’d forgotten it was there at all.
I quickly placed my hands over his. “Let me take this,” I murmured.
At my touch, at last, he blinked. He opened his fingers, and sheets of skin came away with them, sticking to the harp. He held my gaze, as if trying to tell me something.
He collected himself and turned to Ix and Kajmar.