That had to be a wonderful experience, having things fully explained by Taran—I wished I could experience it for myself someday.
But I smiled politely at the sea god.
“You two have been friends for a long time.”
“Yes. He’s going to show me the way to the ocean! Though it still feels odd to think about how I might carry ships in my arms instead of wrecking them. Smenos used to be the one who made them, you know, but I suppose anything is a ship if I make it float.”
“You’re making ships?”
“Taran said it’s time to go. We’re like too many fighting fish in one bowl here. Too many gods, not enough priests. That’s why everything is falling apart,” Marit said, jerking his chin at a smoking outbuilding.
At my expression of distress, he frowned. “I didn’t mean to worry you. Taran will keep you safe—he has those knives, after all. Would you like me to bring you something from the ocean? Would you like a starfish?”
“Thank you, but I don’t have anywhere to put a starfish,” I said, trying to focus on what Marit and Taran were planning. “Are you saying that you and the other Stoneborn are leaving?”
“Wesha’s lost her grip on the Gates, if Death can lead dusk-souls into the Summerlands,” Marit said, eyes drifting to the horizon. “The others think they can push through. So, yes. Soon, I hope.”
“Do you even want to go to the mortal world?”
If the queen was hanging the people who’d fought on her side just for praying to the gods for aid, her first reaction to Marit’s ersatz ships landing on her shore was likely to be a pike charge.
“Well, I’d like to have more priests,” Marit said, voice trailing off as he glanced over his shoulder at the two he’d lured back into his service. He cleared his throat. “And I want to see the ocean, of course.”
I lowered my voice and pulled Marit toward the side of the road. He followed trustingly, hands still gripping mine. “But did Taran explain the state of the mortal world? Not everyone will be happy to see even the priests return. What will the Stoneborn do to the people who don’t want to worship them?”
At this, Marit’s face clouded. A tremor ran through his arms. “What do you mean? Why wouldn’t they worship me? I would be a good patron.”
The younger of his priests pressed his lips together and put a cautioning hand on the sea god’s elbow, but Marit shook it off.
“Do you think I won’t?” Marit asked me, gray eyes darkening and beginning to swirl. “I gave my followers all the treasures of the sea. I taught them to make pottery and glass. I calmed the waters for the sailors who sacrificed to me. Why wouldn’t they worship me again?”
Stop it, mouthed the other priest, making a frantic face at me behind Marit’s back. I took a deep breath, catching the scent ofbrine and remembering that it was best not to provoke Marit by bringing up any charged topic while only fragile mortals were present. He wasn’t the one I needed to convince, anyway.
I should have said something different to Genna. To the mortal queen. I still had to say something to Taran.
“No, I’m sure you’ll be a good patron,” I said with more hope than honesty, squeezing his hands. “People won’t go hungry once you lead the fish to their nets again.”
This mollified him, and he rolled his shoulders back in stern satisfaction.
“That’s exactly what I’ll do. And then they’ll build me a new temple by the shore, where I can watch the ships come and go.”
That might have been true before my rebellion. But the only god we’d known for centuries was Death, and too many of us had died fighting him. If the Stoneborn returned now, the mortal queen would raise her own army and tear the world apart even further.
I bowed to Marit, and his priests inclined their heads to me, and we all continued on our respective paths, though my feet dragged even more as I returned to Wesha’s former palace.
With only half a thought, Taran had sealed up the tunnel to the Underworld upon our return. The rooms here had also changed in the past two weeks—Wesha’s dawn-colored murals and pink drapery had vanished overnight, replaced by the greens and blues Taran favored. The world now reshaped itself to his will.
Taran opened locks. He released the dead from their bondage. And he broke divine oaths.
Perhaps those powers could all be reduced to blessings and invoked by mortals, though the idea of praying to Taran made me want to jump off a bridge.
I knew he would release me from my vows if I asked, because he wouldn’t be avoiding me otherwise. I just didn’t know whether he’d come with me, much less whether he could ever be both themerciful god every mortal desperately needed right now and the good man that I still wanted to love.
I took my hair down and changed into a nightgown, then took his kithara off its peg on the wall while I waited for him. I’d still never seen him play it, and now I painfully wanted to.
There was a sensation like warm fur against my skin when Taran opened the door an hour later. He didn’t make any noise, but his power filled the space anyway, impossible to ignore. I stilled my hands on the strings, but before I could turn around, he said, “Please don’t stop. I hope that’s what I’ll hear every time I come home.”
I swallowed over the lump in my throat at the simple happiness of his tone and started again. When I closed my eyes, I was nearly able to see him through my eyelids, like the afterimage of looking at the sun.
