She weaponized them.
Chapter 5
Sabine
Thick hemlock boughs shade us from the midday sun, but more than that, they hide us from the world. Under these branches, Woudix and I have spent weeks poring over tottering stacks of leather-bound books, some hundreds of years old, with yellowed pages and moth-eaten spines.
And oh, the things I’ve learned here in our private world beneath the branches.
Things like how Vale first became a god by drinking sacrificial blood. How, one by one, each of the ten fae drank after him and uncovered their unique affinities. Couples in the street fell in love as Alyssantha passed—Goddess of Sex. Card players suddenly hit a good luck streak when Popelin—God of Pleasure—winked at them. One after another, they rose in power until the fae court dominated the human and fae realms.
I can’t flip through the pages fast enough. This terrible hunger inside me craves more than peasants’ offerings of chicken eggs or woven flower crowns. It wants blood. It wants sex. It wantstruth. To drink the past down like wine straight from the bottle, until my stomach is sickly and sated and I collapse in a dizzy mess.
Before the Gloaming, I couldn’t tell you five facts about the Beginning or the First or Second Returns. To me, the fae gods were as distant as the high, snow-capped Darmarnach Mountains, and certainly just as harsh.
Take Immortal Iyre.
Late at night, I’ve woken more than once in cold sweat, thrashing in Basten’s arms, violently jolted from nightmares of being back in the Convent, a Sister shoving my face in the ground at the goddess’s statue’s feet, mouth rubbed in dirt until I kissed her stone toes. Basten holds me, planting soft kisses along my temples, murmuring reassurances that it was only a nightmare.
Fair to say, a year ago, I wasn’t exactly devout.
Now? What does one do when oneisthe very type of goddess one once loathed? There are moments when panic sets in. I think of that hateful stone statue of Iyre, and how the real Iyre is no less cruel. And Artain—what anass. Being fae like him makes me want to claw into my flesh, dig the glowing fey lines out like ripping apart a doll’s seams.
On days like that, I hide behind my human glamour, stay in bed all day, sobbing into my feather pillow, wishing away the silver in my blood.
But not every day is so troubled. The truth I never would have guessed is that being fae feels, well,electric. All my life, I never knew what it felt like to fully stand up straight instead of hunching over a mop and bucket. To fill my lungs with cool winter air to their fullest, without the pinch of frostbite. To marvel at a body so alive that I feel as bright and new every morning as the rising sun.
I wish on every damn star that I could gift this feeling—this lightness—to everyone. If I could only show Basten what it was like, I know he’d tip back his head and laugh in awe. He’d be happy, for once.
The clouds shift overhead, bringing me back into the present.
Woudix sits at my side, leaning toward me so he can flip the pages of the book in my lap while he explains the meaning of the architectural renderings of the ancient city of Calisyrune.
A fledgling sparrow lands on a branch above us, its newly grown feathers sticking out at awkward angles.
Hello, little one, I murmur.Still learning to fly?
It chirps indignantly.I can fly!
I smile.Of course you can. My mistake.
Woudix glances up. “What’s it saying?” His tone is dry but amused.
“It says…that you seem to have overlooked a comb this morning.” I teasingly flick an errant lock off his forehead.
“Mmm,” Woudix purrs, smooth and devious. “Is that so? Tell it that if it shits on this book, I’ll give it instant passage to the underrealm.”
I feign indignation. “Rude!”
The sparrow flies off, equally offended.
Just then, a shape moves in the trees. Through the gap where the bird had perched, Basten stomps into view in the distance.
My breath stills, lips parting slightly. It’s rare to get to watch him when he doesn’t know he’s being observed. His godkiss means he’s always ten steps ahead, even of the fae. But now, he strains under a wheelbarrow full of steel tools fresh from the blacksmith’s. He’s so intent on not dropping his load that he isn’t paying attention to the sights and sounds of his surroundings.
Gods, I could watch him all day.
Sweaty-soaked, messy, muscles straining—he’s so handsome it hurts.
