It’s working.
Seventh cut. Eighth. Almost there.
“There’s plenty of love to go around,”her voice says, soft and certain.“I don’t understand why you two think it has to be divided up like there’s only so much to go around.”
I falter. Just for a second.
The power wavers.
What will I tell her when I return? That he was lost in battle? That the separation just... happened?
My arms are still raised, the power still building for the final cuts. Just three more and he’s gone. Three more and I’m free.
I’ve wanted this for so long.
But I see her face in my mind. Not awed by my power. Not grateful I survived.
Disappointed.
“Trust is earned,”she’d said to me once, early on. Standing up for herself. Setting boundaries.“So it’s fine for you to command me to tell you things, but I can’t ask about the elephant in the room?”
She’d demanded honesty. Demanded we treat her like an equal, not a possession to fight over.
What would she say if she knew I’d killed my brother without even asking her? Without even giving her a choice in what our future looked like?
The fire inside me flickers.
“Hey, no. What, are you two big men gonna go and decide the fate of the little woman without any input from me? That’s bullshit.”
She’d been furious. Rightfully so. When had we decided to do something that affected her without including her in the decision.
And this—killing Romulus—this would affect her more than anything.
I frown, the first real doubt creeping in. What will she say when I tell her what I’ve done?
At first, my anger only sparks hotter. What should it matter what some mortal thinks of what I, a god, do? I do not bow to the whims of a mortal from this inferior plane!
But even as I think it, I know it’s bullshit. The kind of bullshit I’d have spouted a month ago, before her. Before I knew what it meant to actually love someone more than my own pride.
In my mind’s eye, I can see her face when I tell her. Not angry—worse. Disappointed. Like she’s looking at the man I was, not the man I could be. The man she makes me want to be.
Already, though the deed isn’t even done, I feel her withdrawing.
My arms fall slightly, and the light inside me seems to go cold.
Reminding me how cold and lonely I have been these many, many millennia.
What use is it to have all the power of the most almighty god, ruling the whole world or all the realms, if one rules alone? Haven’t I seen enough earthly despots make the same mistake?
I will be different!
But I’m already shaking my head.
I don’t want to be alone.
I don’t want to see that look in her eyes. The one that says she thought I was better than this. That I could be more than just chaos and destruction and taking what I want regardless of who it hurts.
The devil’s voice in my head, which sounds very much like my Creator-Father’s, whispers,And when she chooses your brother like everyone else does and you’re alone anyway?
