“The Frozen Observatory. Three miles northwest. Abandoned watch post—better visibility than this ruin, and walls that might stop an attack.”
“The observatory.” She pauses at the window, scanning the frozen waste beyond. “That’s divine territory. The energy there?—”
“I’m aware.”
“Your power will react. The Arbiter might sense?—”
“That too.” I move to stand beside her. Not touching—but the space between us is thin enough that each breath carries her scent. “It’s a risk. But staying here is worse. The wards are failing. We’re exposed.”
She considers. I see her running calculations—probabilities, outcomes, the endless tactical assessments that her bloodline makes automatic.
“The observatory has observation platforms.” Her voice shifts, going distant as her bloodline activates. “If we reach the upper levels, we’d see any approach from miles away.”
“That’s the idea.”
“But the divine energy…” She trails off, her eyes losing focus as she reads the magic beyond the walls. “I see residue from here. Concentrated. Dense. Whatever gods used that place, they left pieces of themselves behind.”
“Then we’ll be careful.”
Her gaze sharpens, focus returning. “That’s not reassuring.”
“It wasn’t meant to be.”
A flicker crosses her expression—not quite amusement, not quite exasperation. That rare crack in her analytical facade that I’ve become obsessed with provoking.
We leavethe waystation as the morning strengthens. The frozen plateau stretches before us, broken only by ice formations and the distant tower rising against the leaden sky. The observatory appears smaller than expected from this distance—a single spire of pale stone and divine metal, maybe sixty feet tall. Crystalline lenses glint in the upper levels, catching light that shouldn’t exist under this perpetual overcast.
The walk takes an hour. Zephyra doesn’t use her sight unless necessary—conserving what remains of her shortened lifespan—but I can tell she’s fighting the instinct. Every flicker of magic in the distance, every shift in the ice, every shadow that might hide a threat. Her eyes track them with the hunger of a bloodline that feeds on truth.
We don’t hold hands.
Halfway to the tower, the terrain shifts. The flat plateau gives way to broken ground—ice ridges jutting from the frozen earth like the spines of buried leviathans. We navigate carefully, testing each foothold before committing weight. The cracks between ridges drop into darkness that might be feet deep or fathomless.
“The ice here is older.” Zephyra’s voice is quiet, pitched to carry only to me. “Pre-Arbiter. Whatever froze this ground did it long before the current divine rule.”
“The gods have been watching this territory for millennia.”
“Watching. Not controlling.” She pauses at the crest of a ridge, her gaze fixed on the observatory ahead. “The watch post was built to observe, not to enforce. Whatever the Arbiter does here, it’s parasitic. Using infrastructure designed for a different purpose.”
“Does that change anything?”
“It might.” Her fingers twitch toward her belt, toward the small blade she carries more as a habit than a weapon. “Parasites are easier to remove than native growths. If the Arbiter’s presence here is an overlay rather than foundation…”
“You think you can disrupt its observation?”
“I think I can see how it connects. Which means I can see where it’s vulnerable.”
The information is filed away for later consideration. Every weakness she identifies is a weapon we might need.
The observatory’sentrance is a circular doorway sealed with divine ice—thinner than the divine ice I’ve seen elsewhere, deliberately transparent. Observation requires clarity, after all. Through the frozen seal, I see a spiraling staircase rising toward the upper chambers.
“Can you break it?”
“I don’t need to break it.” I reach out, letting my power extend toward the barrier. The magic falters. The divine ice that holds the barrier in place wavers against my presence—the flaw in divine order that the gods have been trying to correct for three hundred years.
The seal cracks. Shatters. Divine ice rains down in crystalline shards that dissolve before they hit the ground.
“Useful.” Zephyra’s voice is carefully neutral, but I catch the flicker of her eyes as she reassesses. Recalculates. Adjusts her understanding of what I can do.
