Her eyes dart up and widen. “I thought the deal was made.”
“It is. But I can release you whenever I wish. If you don’t want to go any further, then so be it. I will still retrieve that flying idiot you call a friendandyour itinerant sister. Even Moeshka, if possible. After that, I’ll find another way to return from the dead. With or without you.”
There. Conscience satisfied, even if I loathe everything about it.
Nephele looks toward the east again, toward her sister, clutching my pendant close to her heart. “You’re giving me a way out.”
“I am.”
“And yet you’ve also given me a taste of power over my enemy. An enemy who likely took my sister from this very mountain.” She faces me again. “That kind of power in a time of conflict could change everything. How can I let that slip from my hands?”
I shrug. “You don’t have to. But realize that the fate of Tiressia shouldn’t rest on any one person’s shoulders. Let alone yours.”
“It wouldn’t be resting onmyshoulders,” she says. “It would be resting onours.”
Ours.A word I’ve yet to use regarding us outside ofour deal.
I hold her gaze. “I’m loyal to my land, Nephele. To my home. The Northland Break. Bitter and mad as I was when I said otherwise, I’ll protect her without any deal between you and me. If you return to Winterhold, I’ll make certain no harm comes your way. I also believe that Thamaos and I will eventually battle, no matter what happens on this mount today, and if it’s the last thing I do, I will defeat him. So the decision is yours, once again. If you want to be the woman who wields a god in this war, then I trust your instinct and will obey your desires. If not…”
“You’ll move on to someone else,” she finishes for me.
I rest my forearms on my knees and stare at the snow. If only it were that simple.
“I still want the deal.”
I lift my head and cock it to one side. “Say again?”
“I want the deal.” She shoves her arms into the sleeves of Moeshka’s jacket and repositions the spy’s coat on her shoulders. “I want to be the woman who wields a god against Thamaos. I want to be the woman who wieldsyou.”
Fuck me. She doesn’t know it yet, but I fear she already is that woman.
She limps to the tree and sits beside me, her knees bent to spare her ankle. She slices a glance at the snow-covered ground. “That’s a problem.”
It takes a moment for me to drag my heavy thoughts back to the moment. We’re doing this.She’sdoing this. Because she wants to.
I wave my hand. The snow around the tree vanishes, revealing what hides beneath: the golden plaque that bears my name, written in old Elikesh, a mass of tangled tree roots, scattered ash from burned flora, and black, raw earth. It hasn’t struck me until this moment that the bones that housed my soul are right beneath us, buried away yet ready to live again.
Nephele raises her eyebrows and blinks those long, feathery lashes. “Are you ready for this, wolf?” She pinches my pendant tightly between her thumb and forefinger.
I’ve no notion what to expect, but I have an answer. “I’ve been ready for three hundred years.”
Nephele nods once, then she digs her fingers into the soil, pushing aside small mounds to create a hole. With deliberate movements, she places the pendant into the earthen pit, neatly arranging the golden chain around it. If I had a real, human heart, it would pound as she presses her palms to the ground and begins to sing, her voice raspy and tired but still so very beautiful.
“Morentha tu morai…”
Rise, my divine immortal.
4
NEPHELE
After only a few verses, Neri vanishes from my side.Completely understandable,I tell myself, shaking off the eeriness of his sudden absence.His soulmustreturn to his body.
The second he’s gone, the earth trembles with a soft rumble, as though being awakened again, and begins a gentle cry I recognize from last night. I almost pause my singing as the haunting moans coming from the trees grow louder.
Neri mentioned the grove could react to this summoning. We don’t have Fia’s nor the scholars’ permission, but after seeing her face and feeling her rage upon Neri’s arrival last night at the wedding, I can’t imagine Queen Drumera ever allowing the northern god to be brought back from the grave, no matter how much of a defense he might provide against her adversaries. In all these years, she’s never attempted to resurrect any god, even though her need was dire.
Unfortunately, I don’t believe we can afford her refusal, even if I will undoubtedly be punished for this. Thankfully, I’ll have a god’s protection, one who could very likely prevent further bloodshed, war, and misery.
