Prologue
The night, like their current world, smelled of destruction and death.
The red feathers at the tips of her majestic wings shivered. Not from cold, definitely from fear. Her magic beat unevenly against her whole soul, her heart craving the presence of her soulmate.
He was on his way; she could feel it.He—the love of her life.
The Cardinal walked out of their protected nest into the red-inked, dark woods where their magics cohabited in peace. Here, in the Birthing Pit of Blackness, away from the influence and danger of her siblings, had the god and goddess found a place to call home.
The arrhythmic beat of the magic in her arteries was the most undeniable sign that danger was imminent, that perhaps it was already too late.
Cardinals craved balance, were fueled and grew from it; their entire purposewasit. Creation required balance, and balance was needed to create. One couldn’t exist without the other.
Uneven blood of a Cardinal meant uneven balance. An uneven balance meant death.
An exhale she hadn’t realized she was containing left her red lips when she felt the warmth of his shadows approaching, pre-warning her of his arrival.
In other circumstances, she would have waited for him to land and come to her, yearning for the safety of his embrace. This ante meridiem, there existed no second to spare.
Still in her female form, she pushed the ground with her feet and used the impulse to shoot herself into the sky, her wings flapping with all the strength she could muster.
There, amongst the low clouds above the crescent-shaped island he had created, her male was coming to her. He and the night were one and the same; the stars shone thanks to his strength. Shadows encompassed his body, forming the shape of his wings, so different from hers.
His speed was that of a god, and yet, when he saw her flying towards him, he moved even faster until they collided in a mid-air embrace. The force of such contact would have been enough to kill many mortals. The force of such contact was enough to reassure the Cardinal that not everything was lost. Not yet.
“Have you felt it, my shadow?” She gasped, her arms around his neck as his shadow-inked eyes stared into her soul.
He cupped his hand on top of her head, stroking her red hair as he guided her face towards his chest. She inhaled deeply, using his presence as an anchor for her uneasiness. When he spoke, his voice was a whisper. “Yes, my Core. The stars declared the curse had broken. Your eldest sister is free again.”
The feathers around her thighs tensed as she shook her head. She hadn’t wanted it to be true. She hadn’t wanted to believe thatthatwas the reason for the imbalance.
The Cardinal Queen’s two-hundred-fifty-year confinement was over. For goddesses and gods whose lives stretched millennia, two hundred fifty passed in the blink of an eye.
“Why do you cry, my light?” Llunal’s arms around her waist held her tighter as he kissed her pale skin. Her red tears dried on his lips.
She welcomed the strength of his arms and his shadows around her. He was her home, and even if the world was going to end, she was safe here. She didn’t need to pretend to be strong with him.
“I fear for our world, for the lands we created, for the Daughter of Red and for the Son of Darkness. I never thought the sacred protection we gave our children wouldn't suffice to keep the world from ending.” Centuries-long effort had gone into bringing their souls and destinies together. She was not sure if they would be enough to stop the Queen from ending the world.
His whisper came with a caress. “Perhaps they were never chosen to keep it from ending. What if Fate picked them to be the chosen ones to see the world end.”
“Before a new one can be created?” she begged.
“Destruction is needed for creation to occur,” he said.
“Destruction can also be fatal, and final.”
1
Lenna
“About fucking time,” she muttered through her clenched teeth.
From the top platform of the floating vehicle traveling across the Radel Sea, Lenna’s golden eyes narrowed as the four-petaled island she called home approached on the horizon.
After what seemed like an eternity, they were finally returning to Thyria, creation of the Cardinal goddesses and origin of panom magic. The flower-shaped island had four petals, each belonging to a House: East, West, North and South Houses, with the circular Core in the center, home of the Organ House,where the Organ Mandor ruled above all the Rulers of the other Houses.
Little did they know when they left Thyria to embark on the Fifth Crusade, complete five ordeals to prove their worth and wish for the goddesses to grant them the Fifth Power, how royally they would fuck them over. Calling them goddesses was being generous. What Lenna wanted to call them was corrupt bird corpses.
