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They keep calling me daughter. I don’t know if I like it or not, but I can’t deny the way my heart aches every time it happens. “What do I do now?”

Whatever you want. You are Cinque, an avatar of the gods. The only limits to what you can do are within your imagination.

I laugh bitterly. “Sure. Right. So I can raise the dead?” I don’t mean to ask the question, know better than to give myself some kind of awful false hope, but my grief for Nero and Mara is a live thing inside me, howling to be acknowledged. It doesn’t even make sense. Mourning Mara, yes, but I barely knew Nero. His death shouldn’t hurt this much.

They shrug again. Anything is possible with enough power.

I go still. “I can raise the dead?”

Raising the dead is not within my purview.

My shoulders drop. “Right. Of course. Why did I bother asking?” Even if it was, increasing my power is an impossible task. The Moon is the one who gave me my magic. If They wanted me to have more power, They would have granted me as much. “I would like to go back to sleep now.”

As you wish, Daughter.

This time, I welcome the darkness that seeps in around my edges. Oblivion has never felt sweeter than when it sweeps me away, if only for a time.

It is vitally important to isolate the Cinque and ensure they have no platform, should they attempt to encourage worship of their respective gods. This is most likely to happen in the year following the end of the Trials. Keep a vigilant eye out.

—EXCERPT FROM THE MAJOR ARCANA: A TREATISE ON THE HISTORY OF THE OLD GODS

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

I OPEN MY EYES to the familiar awareness of knowing exactly where the Sun is in the sky. For some reason, I thought that would stop once the Trials did. The thought grants me peace for all of a few seconds before the events of the last night—the last week—wash over me.

Hermit. Chariot. Mara. Nero.

I didn’t kill Nero with my own hand, but I might as well have. I brought him to that place. I was the one who distracted him so he never saw the Star coming. I never intended him to be hurt, but intentions matter less than harm done. This isn’t a harm I can take back. He’s dead and gone, the same way Mara is, and not even the gods can raise the dead. If they could … But they can’t.

I go through the motions of putting on the clothing left out for me—a relatively normal dress in the deepest gray—and bypass the food Priestess left to ascend the stairs. The sickles are exactly where they reappeared yesterday morning, crossed demurely on the altar. I don’t touch them.

Instead, I haunt the doorway of the temple, staring out at the banners on all the fallen champions’ temples. I don’t know why I expected them to be taken down by now. Maybe the reminder of the dead doesn’t bother the others. I couldn’t begin to say.

Movement brings me around to find Death stalking toward me. He is dressed identically to how he has been since the Trials began in black leather armor, carrying a small box under his arm. He stops just outside the shadow the Moon’s temple casts. “I promised you a conversation.”

“Can you come in?” We were warned not to enter other temples during the Trials, but I don’t know if this is truly sacred ground for each respective god or if the rules were to serve the Trials. I don’t know so much.

“No door can keep Death out.” He sounds as tired as I feel. “With your permission?”

I move out of the way. This conversation promises answers I’ve spent my entire life seeking, and I can’t feel anything at all.

Death moves into the temple just enough to not be in clear view of anyone who looks in from outside. He turns a slow circle, drinking in the sight of this room. There’s a strange familiarity there, as if he’s been here before, but not for a long time. He holds out the box. “This is yours.”

I don’t take it. “I’ve never seen that before in my life.” He’s more direct than the Star is. There’s no reason for him to have trapped the box with poison or something to kill me now. Not when he’s gone through such lengths to keep me alive. That doesn’t mean I trust him.

“I know.” He doesn’t move, the box still outstretched. “It belonged to your mother. She meant for you to have it.”

I blink. “If that’s the case, why are you just giving it to me now? You’ve had it for twenty-two years.”

“Open it and I’ll answer your questions.”

I slowly take the box and move to set it on the altar next to my sickles. The rectangle isn’t particularly large, the top inlaid in such a way that it slides open. Inside are two items: a scroll fastened with a frayed and faded ribbon, and a small portrait painted on a smooth oval stone.

I pick up the portrait first. The woman depicted is identical to me in every way but coloring. Her hair isn’t brown but black, her eyes a deep brown instead of my hazel. But we have the same eyes, the same cheekbones, the same face shape, the same pale skin from spending so little time beneath the Sun.

My mother.

She looks so young. She was only a couple of years older than I am now when she entered the Trials, when she had me. I’ve never given much thought to being a mother myself, but I sure as fuck wouldn’t do it soon.