Clover turned to Atheia, hissing, “You’re wasted on them, you know. What did they tell you to get you to do their bidding this time?”
The answer slipped from Atheia’s mouth as if under compulsion. “That only I and Sidraeus can defeat you.”
“And how will that work, do you think?” He didn’t give her the chance to answer. “The gods mean to spill both your blood intothe fountain and take the invaluable source of power you form together for themselves.That’show you defeat me. By bleeding for them.Dyingfor them. All so they can make themselves powerful enough to defeat me.”
Emotions played on Atheia’s face like shifting waters. “You’re lying.”
Clover’s mouth curled. His silence seemed like enough to sow seeds of doubt in Atheia, whose breathing was labored as her world came crashing down around her.
Footsteps sounded down the corridor. Regulators were barreling toward them. They stopped short as they took in the scene: Kai, Emory, Luce, and Theodore cowering in a corner; Clover kneeling in Farran’s blood; Atheia standing over them, looking distraught.
Clover rose to his feet and turned to the Regulators. As if needing a release for his fury, he unleashed his specters on them.
They perished in a cloud of dust and death, their screams filling the hallway until they were no more. And when it was done, Clover was gone.
Kai didn’t care about anything then. He rushed to Farran’s side, checking for signs of life. Relief washed through him as he felt a pulse. “He’s still alive.” To Emory, Luce, and Theodore, he said, “We need to get him out of here.”
“We have no use for him now.”
Kai’s head snapped up, dread making his blood run cold. The multilayered voices of the gods had come from Emory’s mouth.
They had found a new vessel.
54EMORY
EMORY GASPED AS AN ANCIENT, powerful presence filled her mind. Every fiber of her being feltalive, burning with a power too great for her to contain, a divinity as endless and enduring as the moon and the earth and the sun and the skies, as every living thing nature had ever contained.
“Take us to Sidraeus.”
The words spilled out of Emory’s mouth in the voices of the gods, sharp and quiet and rough and mercurial all at once. Shock and betrayal shone on Atheia’s face as she stared at Emory—at the gods now overriding her.
“Is it true?” Atheia breathed. “What Clover said—is that what you intend to do with Sidraeus and me? Sacrifice us so you can defeat him?”
“Of course not.”Emory felt herself take a step toward Atheia, spreading her arms in a gesture of innocence.“Don’t listen to the false god’s lies, daughter. You are a part of us we do not wish to see harmed.”
Their honeyed words seemed to appease some of Atheia’s doubts, but Emory could feel their deceit on her tongue.
“Take us to Sidraeus,”the gods said again,“and we will let you do what you please with this one once we have returned to the godsworld and are strong enough to take our own forms again.”
This one.
They meant Emory.
The hunger on Atheia’s face made it clear she was on board. She stepped over Farran’s body, silencing the pleas from Luce and the angry protest from Kai with her magic. Emory tried to look at Kai, tried to convey to him to leave with her mother and Theodore, to get out of here without her before it was too late. She wanted to scream at Atheia that the gods were manipulating her, that Clover had been right. But she wasn’t in control of her body. She was powerless to do anything as her feet moved of their own volition, as the gods followed Atheia down the foreboding corridor littered with dead Regulators.
Sidraeus was held in a dark cell, in a part of the Institute that felt older than the rest, like catacombs beneath it, cold and damp and chilling. He stood there suspended by chains, hands and feet bound, limbs drawn taut. His head hung limply, as if he’d been put to sleep, or worse.
Pain and misery hung thick in the air. There were no visible wounds on Sidraeus except for the raw, burnt skin around his wrists and ankles—because woven with the metal chains were veins of the same bright, burning light Atheia had used to singe Emory’s own skin.
Emory wanted to go to him, wanted to lash out at Atheia for what she’d done to him, but the gods inside her wouldn’t relinquish control.
“It seems you’ve been having your fun with him,”they said, tilting Emory’s head quizzically to peer at Sidraeus.“What kind of spelldo you have him under that he remains so weak and docile?”
“I have him trapped in his own mind,” Atheia said. “Living in the prison of his own worst memories.” She hesitated to unbind him, turning to Emory—to the gods. “How can I trust you’ll let me kill her when earlier you didn’t want me to? You said Equilibris needs her dead to reset the worlds.”
Yes,Emory thought.Poke holes in their logic. They’re lying to you.
The gods spoke through her.“By then we will have regained our godhood, and the false god will be dead. The worlds will be restored, and it won’t matter then if the Tidecaller is gone. Equilibris will have no reason to reset the worlds if we set them right ourselves.”
