It’s not what I expected when I agreed to Lachesis’s deal. I thought I’d be cheerfully nursing someone, a bit like the care I did for my brother when he was ill. Maybe living as a servant to some fussy god. Instead, I’m in a swamp full of biting flies and old ruins, with people that see to my every need and would kill me in a heartbeat if Kalos snapped his fingers.
He doesn’t, though, because he just doesn’t give a shit.
About anything.
At least I have my goat. Dingle is happy and adorable and doesn’t mind that he must stay on a leash so a stray gator doesn’t snatch him from the cobblestones. He makes me smile even when I let depression slip over me.
Is this going to be the rest of my life?
It’s hard to be positive when you feel defeated before you began.
“Mistress?”Jemet stands in the doorway to my room. “Are you busy?”
“Am I ever busy?” I joke. Today I’m re-beading one of the offerings that was brought and left at the temple by pilgrims. It’s a pretty necklace in a variety of colors, and I’ve decided to make a pattern with the beads instead of the chaos of colors as it is right now. Then, maybe I’ll attach a bell and put it on Dingle.
Gotta do something so I don’t lose my mind with boredom.
Jemet comes into my quarters, her skin gleaming with the sharp-smelling herbal oil we all practically bathe in to keep the swamp mosquitos away. Dingle hippity-hops over to greet her, then prances back to me for scratches. He starts chewing on the hem of my dress and I watch him, unable to muster the effort to push him away. What does it matter if my dress is torn up? I live in a freaking swamp.
“I am concerned about you, Mistress,” Jemet says, sinking to the floor to sit beside me. “I fear my lord’s apathy is affecting you.”
Entirely possible. It’s also entirely possible that I’m depressed because I’ve left everything in my world behind to sit in a swamp with a goat and some servants. I’m hungry all the time, and when I’m not hungry, I’m bored. I worked three jobs back home and it never felt like there was enough time to do anything. Now each day feels endlessly long, and going to sleep is the only thing that cheers me up.
Definitely feels like depression. I’ve been here a month now, though, and it feels like yesterday… and also like a million years. But I’m doing my duty, just as I promised.
“I’m fine,” I reassure Jemet. “It’s just that this has been a big change for me.” I put aside my beading project and pick upa wedge of goat cheese, shoving it between two slices of flatbread and making myself a sandwich. I take a bite and offer one to Dingle.
Jemet twists her hands in her lap, watching as I share my sandwich with the goat. “I thought so too, but I consulted the thread-spinner to see if she had any advice.”
“You did?” I ask between bites. “When was this?”
“While you were napping yesterday.” She looks even more worried, her hands pulling at each other constantly. “I went to the village and spoke with her and… I did not like what I found out, Mistress.”
Uh oh. I swallow a dry mouthful and give the rest of the meal to the goat, because something tells me I’m not going to like this answer. The thread-spinner is the local wise woman they mentioned before, and while I don’t believe that she’s tapped into the future, I do know that the gods and the Fates are real, so I need to give things like that some consideration. “What is it?”
Jemet’s expression is stricken. “The priestess says that she has seen a change coming.”
Well, change isn’t necessarily bad. “What kind of change?”
“I asked her to pull your thread to view it, and she pulled two threads instead. That means there is another in the area, or there will be soon.”
It takes me a moment to realize what she’s saying. “Another…? You mean there’s another god? Aroundhere?”
“The thread-spinner said she saw an army on the horizon.”
“…what?”
Chapter
Eight
“An army,” Jemet says again. “She says she has seen omens that speak of a large conquering force heading this way. That when she pulls the strings, they are all knotted and clustered together. That means not one soldier, but many. A great, great many.”
“An army coming here?Herehere?” I gesture at the temple plaza.
Jemet nods. “They come to where my Lord Kalos dwells.”
I swallow hard. Well, that can’t be good. I rub my forehead, trying to think. “Why is there an army coming here? He doesn’t want visitors.”
