She’d seen Andrian’s face, but with Kol’s eyes. It wasn’t because she’d forgotten Andrian’s face or his voice or his scent.
It was because those things belonged to Kol, too.
In that moment, there was no one Mariah hated more than the God of the Sun.
More than the high priestess who’d tried to humiliate and undermine her. More than the lords who’d done all they could to ruin her flesh and destroy her mind. Even Shawth, who’d given the order to murder her mother.
“I came here with a request.” Mariah sliced through the silence like the blade of a knife. “And I don’t care what it will demand from me. Whatever the price, I will pay it.”
Rulene bowed her head. A cast of sadness fell over Callamus’s galaxy-filled eyes.
“I am going to kill Kol. Tell me how to do it.”
“Gods are immortal,”Rulene said. “What if what you ask cannot be done?”
Mariah waited, not answering. Rulene was testing her. There was something the goddess knew but was reluctant to share.
They stayed like that, the goddess and the queen, for a long moment. Rulene finally hmphed, tossing her pale blue hair over her shoulder. “Fine,” she said. “I will tell you what I know. But it will require delving into our history to do so, and I have things to do while we speak.”
Mariah’s curiosity piqued, even as she stifled a groan at yet another history lesson. “What kind of things?”
Rulene’s golden eyes flashed. “Goddess things.” She strode to the center of the chamber, where the four corridors branched away. She knelt beneath the glass ceiling, rainbows refracting around her, and closed her eyes. “You interrupted me earlier. I wasn’t quite finished. So, I will tell you what I know, so long as I can work.”
Mariah and Matheo shared a glance. Her Armature’s eyes were wide, and he shifted on his feet, as if he wasn’t quite sure what to do or where to go. Callamus appeared on Matheo’s other side, gesturing them both toward the center of the sanctum.
All right, then.
Mariah padded forward, following Callamus, Matheo on her heels. Light had begun to shimmer around Rulene, a delicate glowing orb forming between her hands. Callamus halted about six feet from his Consort, dropping to the floor at her side. He again gestured for Mariah and Matheo to do the same, each the same distance from the working goddess.
Mariah didn’t even bother hiding her fascination. Maybe it was because her magic was still slumbering somewhere deep inside her. Maybe it was the way whatever Rulene was doing was clearly so very different from Mariah’s gifts or the magic of anyone else on the continent.
The orb between Rulene’s fingers grew, rainbows spilling from its surface. The air warmed around them, not unlike the heat from the sun. A gentle breeze blew through the room, stirring Rulene’s hair.
“What are you doing?” Mariah blurted the question before she could stop it. The air was thick and heavy with power, its tang tickling her skin.
Rulene cracked an eye, the gold glowing. “My duty.”
Callamus chuckled at Mariah’s confused expression.
Rulene sighed. “What, do you think the seasons change themselves?” Her hands lifted higher, sending the orb above their hands. It grew, fed by tethers of rainbows flowing from the goddess’s hands. “Whether I am here or on the gods’ plane, I have a job to do. To coax the changes as we move through the year, spurring the world out of the rebirth of spring and into the brilliance of summer.”
“Do you all have jobs to do?” Mariah asked. Matheo’s jaw was slack. The orb continued to grow, more warmth spilling into the sanctum.
“Yes,” Callamus answered. “Though they are all different, and some are not required to be done every day. Rulene, though, must constantly be guiding the changes. Weather is fickle and needs a firm hand.”
“Thank you for that, Cal,” Rulene murmured. She sent a final burst of dazzling light into her orb, then dropped her hands, watching it hover. The goddess leaned back on her palms, tilting her head as a reflective expression stole across her face.
“It was near the end of the First War,” she mused. “Xara’s forces were failing. We knew we did not have much time left. Choices had to be made. Impossible choices.”
Mariah’s attention sharpened. She sat forward, forgetting for a moment the glowing orb hovering in the sanctum like a miniature sun.
Rulene lifted her hand again, giving the orb a spin with a twitch of a finger. “We knew Kol had to be stopped. We could fight until there was no one left, but he would just keep making his shadow-wielders. This was before humans could wield magic—despite their hearts, they were unprepared and overpowered.”
“What do you mean,” Mariah interrupted, “before humans could wield magic?”
Callamus answered for Rulene, the goddess twisting another rainbow glimmering piece of power into her orb. “I know humans call magic ‘blessings,’” he said. “But it was simply a result of us resting our physical bodies in the earth after the War ended. Our power fused with the soils and eventually made its way into the blood of the people who lived upon it.”
Mariah’s brow twisted. “But then how?—”
