She stepped toward the edge of the pool, near the crack in the ground. He caught her arm, moving her away.
“Go back to your nest,” he said, and frowned. “Mynest.”
“But I’m sick! I don’t know what’s happening to me. And I don’t…” Ivy grimaced, as if revealing something she was deeply ashamed of. “I don’t want to be alone.”
For a moment, Vale was almost regretful that he had to leave. But he was not about to let her into his brother’s void—what if she accidentally poisoned that void, too? If it was not a dissolving ring or some other mysterious object, then it was her body itself. Likely another plot from her uncle, binding his niece to corrupt any void she entered.
“I will only be a moment,” Vale said. “Go back to your—my—thenest. The way is clear.”
He motioned toward the path that the void had cleared for them. But when he stepped into the silver pool, Ivy was still staring mournfully down at him, stinking of panic and lust, a distracting line of sweat dripping between her heaving breasts.
Vale emerged into the wanderer’s void with a grateful gasp of fresh air. No fear clouding it, no desire conjured from the heatbloom. Just the familiar earthy scent of his eldest brother’s void, which also hosted a shadowy forest. Just without all the “interesting additions,” as his brother called them. It looked positively empty compared to the cramped jungle of Vale’s own void.
A surprised voice sounded behind him. “Vale! What brings you here?”
Vale turned. His brother's wife, Ruby, strode through the trees, her dark dress trailing behind her.
“Ruby,” Vale said. “I must speak to my brother.”
“He’s guiding a sprite out of the void,” Ruby said, her hair shining in the sunlight that did not exist for many centuries before she made the wanderer’s void her home. “I’m sure he’ll be here as soon as he senses you.”
Slate, the oldest of all known Skullstalkers, appeared beside his wife in a cascade of shadows. He wore age well, only the barest signs tracing his skull mask and thinning his claws. He wore a simple loincloth, as most Skullstalkers did, though his was now embroidered on one side with his wife’s spiraling blue embellishments.
“Vale,” Slate said, surprised. “You smell… concerned.”
His tone was pointed. He could smell the lust on him, Vale realized with a stab of annoyance. Some of it was even his own.
“I was summoned into the mortal realm,” Vale said, deciding not to explain that part just yet. “They offered me a mortal in exchange for fodder for their war. But when I brought the mortal into my void, it began showing signs of corruption. Do you know how to fix this?”
“I do not,” Slate said slowly. “I have never heard of such a thing. You think the mortal is involved?”
“I do. But…” Vale growled. “My void has… taken a liking to her.”
“Aliking,” Ruby repeated, her eyes glinting with god-light. “And here I thought even your void has barely taken a liking to you in the last few centuries! What’s so special about her?”
“Nothing,” he said hastily. “I only mean that she must have a good heart if my void likes her.”
“But that does not mean she did not do somethingunknowingly,” Slate said.
Vale nodded. “It may be a plot contrived by the other mortals.”
“You could return and kill them,” Slate suggested.
Ruby gave her husband a disapproving look. Slate noticed it and sighed.
“You couldaskthem,” he amended. “And then kill them if they mean to harm your void.”
Ruby patted Slate’s arm and turned back to Vale. “Whatever the problem is, I’m glad you are not alone anymore.”
Vale frowned. Ruby made it sound like this was a lasting arrangement.
“She is a mortal,” he said. “She will die soon enough. Sooner than the light-motes, even.”
The memory of his light-mote assistants made his heart throb. He had not thought of them so often in centuries, their sweet light and friendly song. Memories of better times, back when the void and he were one. Back when he was not constantly busy keeping it content, losing more ground every day.
“She doesn’t have to die,” Ruby said brightly. “I’m still around, aren’t I?”
“Because you are a god,” Vale said, confused.
