I rub my cold arms, a rash of goose pimples appearing out of nowhere. “How do you know?”
Amma is the one to answer, her voice soft. “Because the god of death needs three things to take corporeal form,” she says. “Akasha, a death magi, and an anchor.”
Papa nods. “Morvarid might have her devotees, but they are not as powerful as she was. And you are protected by your magic as well as the king at your side.”
I rub my arms again. “So you’re saying it’s safer to stay with him.”
“I’m saying you should not do this alone, my brave peapod,” he replies. “You need allies. Youcanprotect yourself, we have all seen that, but even the best warrior has chinks in their armor, and sometimes the deadliest of enemies can strike from within.”
I stare sharply at him. “Did Aran tell you that?”
“What?”
“That there’s someone on the inside,” I say in a low voice, “who has been feeding our enemies information. They knew we would stay here in Coban last night. Only those in Roshan’s inner circle would have been privy to the king’s plans.”
“Vipers slither at the heart of every court,” he mutters.
“Promise me you will be vigilant, Sura,” Amma says, and taps her breastbone. “Trust the creature inside of you.”
My simurgh unfurls and stretches, peering from my eyes at my aunt and my father, and joy radiates from her.Kin.The single word conveys a wealth of emotion, of connection and love, along with a deep desire to see them protected.
“She says you both must do the same. Safeguard each other.” I stare at my aunt, whose face has paled. “Amma, what’s the matter?”
But her eyes roll back in her head as my father releases a worried shout. The hypnotic voice that emerges from her lips isn’t hers. It’s Vena’s, one I know well, though I haven’t heard from my celestial guardian of sorts in a while.
Not since the night I died.
“Prepare, Starkeeper, for the battle of earth and sky has begun. The godslayer will rise over the embers of war.”
Chapter Three
The essence of an ancient god skitters over my skin like a thousand spiders seeking entry, scuttling, burrowing, and binding me with bloodred skeins of webbing even as they crawl into my eyes, my nose, my mouth. I can’t move. I can’t see. I can’t scream. I can only lie there in frozen horror as I feel myself being slowly devoured.
The godslayer will rise...
Magic rips through the dark in bursts of starlight.
I wheeze, fighting for breath, a phantom chokehold on my throat and air trickling into my lungs as the snare of shadow dissipates from the glow of my simurgh. Vena’s words reverberate like a gong in the hollow silence. I rub my neck with numb fingers and press a fist to my too-tight chest, reaching with my free hand for the man lying asleep beside me. Deep, even breaths signal Roshan’s undisturbed rest.
Heart still racing, I stare at the ceiling, the feeling of dread weighing like sludge in my veins. My palms are warm—akasha swirling through the runes patterned on my skin in an echo of battle as images from the fresh night terror linger in my mind. I shudder.
Fero’s gone,I tell myself.
The god of death has been banished for good. We are safe.I’msafe.
It’s not the first time I’ve had this dream, nor will it be the last. And between qualms of a resurrected Fero and the forewarning of Vena’s mysterious godslayer, coupled with pervasive dread at Roshan’s ruthless expectations of me, sleep is the last thing I’ve been getting for the past month since Coban.
Curling onto my side, I bite my lip. A sleepless night or two is a small price to pay to keep peace in the realm. At least, that’s what I keep telling myself, though the mounting cost feels unforgivably hard on my soul. And each day, the king seems to slip further and further away from the prince I fell in love with. Ever since our return, he has been increasingly distant, as though something has irreparably fractured between us.
Trust, perhaps? Or maybe something even deeper.
The subsequent trips to Jaxx and Veniar had been harrowing. As he’d predicted, the story of my actions in Coban had spread far and wide, sowing seeds of fear and reverence in equal measure. The king demands obeisance and his dissenters kneel, and when they don’t, I am commanded to punish.
I’ve turned more assassins to ash since then.
Murderers, mercenaries—evil men, certainly, but taking a life is taking a life. I fear a part of me dies each time Ris, the god of the afterlife, receives a new arrival at my hand. But the houses need to be brought to heel, at least according to the king’s war council.
Maybe these constant nightmares are atonement for my sins.
