“Good. Good,” he encourages.
“I can smell the poor excuse for food you’ve left me,” I snap between ragged breaths.
“Fair point,” Correk says.
“I feel… your gentle arms on my shoulders,” I say, realizing he’s been stroking my skin affectionately.
“Very good,” he approves, and my breathing begins to return to a steady rhythm.
Then, it hits me?—
“Hold on.” I freeze, holding a hand up to silence him. “How the fuck do you know what I always do when I panic?” I stare at him through narrowed eyes, suspicion drenching me.
“Ah,” he scratches his head. “Well… you see…” he stammers.
He knows Revryn. He knows aboutmeand Revryn.
“How do you know him? What have you done to him?” I accuse, standing bolt upright despite every muscle in my body protesting.
He holds up his hands in surrender. “Nothin’, lass. Nothin’. Calm down—I know him, all right? We’re… old friends,” he admits, though I still don’t know entirely what that means. “And love, you’ll be happy I know him because what we just did is the key to the whole god magic issue.”
What?
“How? Explain!” I demand.
“Do it again, Princess. Still your mind, slow your breath. Please,” he pleads, “try to trust me, if only for this moment. I need you to breathe even slower. To make your mind even quieter.”
Curiosity wins out.
Revryn’s voice comes to me like a thread through the chaos.Name one thing you can smell, see, and feel, little one.My eyes fix on the fractured black stone beneath my boots. I feel the gentle breeze of a draft through the broken arch above us. I smell the tang of ash in the air.
And then—nothing.
Everything in me stills—my mind, my breath, my heartbeat. And through the silence, I listen for something else.
And I hear it.
A low, steady hum, deep in my veins. Like the sound of distant drums carried through my bones.
Correk says something, but I block it out, anchoring deeper inside myself.
The hum builds, guiding me, pulling me toward something vast and old.
A voice calls to me, an echo, warped from distance.
“Call my name,” the echo distorts in a cacophony of whispers.
And I don’t know why, or how, but a compulsion floods my instincts—it’s the gods. I must call on the gods.
My lips part, and I beg the gods. I call them by name, begging one of them to answer.
“Morrathys?” Silence.
“Nyrielle.” Nothing.
“Halun.” The hum stutters, but doesn’t answer.
I go through all ten gods, but I’m greeted by nothing but endless silence.
