A shiver raises my hackles. “Go? Heck, I’m perfectly comfortable here. Nah.” I wave him off as if he’s made the most ridiculous suggestion. “I just want to see me anchor buddies is all.”
His expression closes off. “I’m afraid that can’t happen.”
“Oh, come on. I just want to see ’em. Make sure they’re okay. It’s lonely locked in here.”
His eyes flinch. “You find my company lacking?”
Seriously? “You’re not here all the time, are ya? Just put me with me buddies.”
“That would not alleviate your boredom. They are fast asleep.”
Asleep? Why has he got ’em sleeping? If he can control them, then…Wait, maybe hecan’t control them. Some revelation nudges the back of my mind. Knowledge rises, and my breath catches. I turn away, hands on my hips, playing at agitation to hide my true emotion because the fucker has just given me a clue.
A huge fucking clue.
The anchors are created from the demigod’s soul. We’re a part of them. So if the primordial evil can’t control the anchor, then there’s a part of the demigod that he’s unable to control, which would explain why he has to keep the anchors in a deep sleep…to maintain control over the demigods. So if I can wake up the anchors, then maybe I can free the demigods.
“Pick something else,” he says, snapping me out of my thoughts.
“What?”
“What else would make you happy? More cheese?”
My stomach growls softly at the word cheese, but the look on his face captures all me attention. What’s that look mean? I’d say it was concern. What the fuck?
“I can get you more cheese,” he says with a decisive nod.
I do want more cheese. “Yeah, that’s a start, but how about a story ta go with it?”
“A story?” His brows shoot up in surprise.
“Yeah, I wanna know about you. Who you are, why you were put in that prison, and what you want now.”
“That’s a lot of information, Blue.” He tips his head to the side. “The kind of information a spy might wish to gather.”
I roll my eyes. “Yeah, a spy in a cage.” I indicate the bars around me. “Even if I do get out, who am I gonna tell? You got everyone under your spell.” He seems to consider this, and I press on. “Look, it’ll make me happy to know. I’m a curious thing.”
“You certainly are.” He waves a hand, and a hunk of cheese appears in my cage. “Eat and listen to my tale. It is one I have not told in eons.” His gaze grows unfocused as if he’s looking back in time. “Once upon a time there was an ancient being named Mizikiel.”
A sharp pain lances through my mind. I know that name.
Memory simmers up from the archive of knowledge I’ve consumed, and his dulcet voice accompanies it.
“It is a common belief that energy is infinite, but that belief is incorrect. Energy comes from Source, and Source isnotan infinite well. It must be replenished. There are rules to creation. There is…wasa system. And it was my purpose to ensure that creation continued. That Source was replenished. Every creation, every living thing has a lifespan…Even a god.”
I know where this is going now. I know where it will end, but I need to hear it from his lips. I want to knowhisstory. “Go on.”
“There isoneSource of creation.Onewell of energy. Everything stems from that, but there are realities and universes, thresholds and veils. Pockets of existence where life plays out and stories are born and die. And in each one, Source has a guardian. A watcher. This universe was mine to maintain.”
He picks up his cup and sips his tea, glancing down at me as if looking for a reaction. I don’t have to fake my shock. It’s as realas the memory that is now occupyin’ space in me mind. “Go on, please.”
He nods and continues. “It was up to me to determine when a world would be born and when it should end. Up to me to maintain the cycle. To ensure the well was replenished. But…it was a lonely existence, cut off from all others, in a pocket of time with no end and no beginning. Under a cosmic sky filled with dying stars and emerging seeds of life. I admit, my loneliness made me bold. I slipped into worlds for short periods under mundane guises simply to connect. I brought back with me trinkets from those worlds. Artifacts carrying frequencies from the many realities I visited. I used them to build a throne. A seat from which I could connect to those worlds without leaving mine. But after a time, the throne became sentient. My resonance, the recursion of communication between us, gave it life. It seeded into my world, and my world too became sentient.
“I was no longer alone. I did not need to leave my home to find companionship. But as always, I left to visit the world that was scheduled to die, and on that world, I found immensely powerful beings. For the first time in my existence, I found myself amongst creations who might be my equal. I shared my truth with them and made the foolish mistake of warning them of their world’s demise. I thought I was doing them a kindness by giving them a chance to find a new home. A new world. But I did not account for their tenacity. They found a way into my realm and demanded I spare their world.”
“But you said no?”
“I am bound by my purpose. I am bound by the laws of creation and destruction. By the cycle of life and death. To spare their world would be to set the universe into imbalance and thus damage the fabric of existence itself.”
