Mariah deserved this. She did not mourn for her life. But everyone else?
It was her friends, her family, that made her want to keep fighting, even from this strange, magical place.
She ran her fingers over the glowing vines, wondering what kind of power they held and how she could use it, when something moved on that edgeless horizon.
Mariah’s spine straightened. She pushed to her feet as two figures materialized out of the thick, glowing light.
She knew them. One wrapped in gold, hair haloed with glimmering vines and flowers. The other shrouded in silver, bones woven into the lengths of her hair.
Qhohena and Zadione halted a few paces from her. Sad smiles pulled at their lips, regret and devastation lining every inch of their bodies.
Mariah was struck with howhumanthey looked. Like all the trappings of godhood were washed away, revealing only the creatures of flesh beneath.
She swallowed—more out of habit than anything. She felt no pain here, no discomfort, none of those nuisances of mortality.
“I am dead.” She didn’t need to ask it as a question. She knew the answer already.
Zadione dipped her head in acknowledgment. “You are.”
“But I’m not where souls normally go when they die.” Again, not a question. Something told her that this eerie silence she felt was not a coincidence. She’d been tugged in a different direction, away from the path those who died normally took.
Qhohena shook her head. “No. You are not.”
Mariah’s gaze again ghosted around the eternal field. She dragged in a breath that tasted of nectar and honey.
“Did you know?” she asked quietly. The sister goddesses exchanged a confused glance.
“Did we know what?”
Her fight rose again in her chest. “The weapon,” she said, soft and steady. “The one you made. Did you know it wouldn’t work?”
Zadione’s eyes widened. Qhohena’s hand flew to her mouth, a gasp escaping her.
“Mariah,” Zadione said urgently. “What do you mean? Did you use it?”
“I did.” Mariah narrowed her eyes at the Goddess of Death. “I slid it between his third and fourth rib, right into his heart. Anditdidn’t work. It didn’t even draw blood. He tossed it at my feet with a laugh and then killed me for daring to try.”
The goddesses were silent, frozen with expressions of shock and horror.
“I swear to you, Mariah,” whispered Zadione. She looked younger than Mariah had ever seen her, something faintly familiar now haloing her appearance. “We didn’t know. We thought it would work. The spell…it should have worked.”
Qhohena, though, said nothing. Mariah slid her gaze to the golden goddess. The vines at her feet twined around her ankles, reaching up for her hands.
“Qhohena knows why it didn’t work. Don’t you, Golden Goddess?”
The Goddess of Life’s gaze snapped up. Shame and regret and sorrow shimmered in the gold, an eternity of secrets that were finally ready to be freed.
Zadione turned to her sister, eyes wide. “Hena,” she said. “You wouldn’t. It’s not true. The spell… It wasyours.”
Qhohena didn’t acknowledge her. Only held Mariah’s stare, golden aura wavering.
“They will be here soon,” Qhohena murmured, the vines in her hair shimmering. “And only they can explain.”
They.
Fuck.
Their arrival started with a whisper of breath across the back of Mariah’s neck. It strengthened into a typhoon, a writhing coil of power, an endless display of energy. They exploded onto the plane, and what once felt limitless became so small and diminished. No longer did the horizon stretch into oblivion. It paled and shrank in comparison to the entity swallowing the sky, devouring and creating and ending and beginning.
