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Lore pulled her knees up and crossed her legs on the pew, dropping her head back to look at the high ceiling, the dark crossbeams, the diamond-dripping chandelier. “Godhood is a scam, if it can’t even bring you certainty.”
Another snort.
Slowly, the light faded down to dusk, deeper into dark. Lore didn’t know how much time had passed before the door opened.
She whipped around, expecting Apollius, hoping that maybe Bastian would be a bit closer to the surface now that night had fallen. But it wasn’t him.
It was Jax.
The Emperor of Kirythea was dressed unassumingly, in dark breeches and a crimson tunic, the collar embroidered with a pattern of golden laurel leaves. He had no sword or dagger, but a short spear was strapped to his back, and the sharp tip assured it would be just as effective. He stopped in front of Lore, his hands clasped behind him, his brow furrowed. He didn’t speak.
There’d been a predatory ease to Jax before, when he was pretending to be a diplomat. A studied slickness, as if he was fashioning himself after other courtiers. That was gone, now. The true Jax was stolid and serious, a slight look of concern in even his neutral expression. It was attractive, or would be, if the sight of him didn’t make Lore want to individually pull out his teeth.
Lore sighed. “Can I help you? Or did you just come to stare?”
“He told me you would be intractable,” Jax murmured in perfect, unaccented Auverrani, as if he’d been practicing for his time in the Citadel. “Of all the vessels She’d attempted to take, He told me you would be the most difficult to deal with, and that was why it was imperative that you not be allowed to live beyond the ritual.” A sigh. “If only that had happened. I think He learned to like that you’re difficult, after you managed to survive.”
“Who told you what I am?” But she knew.
“Apollius, of course.” Jax gave her a look that said he doubted she was capable of tying her boots on her own. “You think your former Priest Exalted is the only person the Bleeding God has ever appeared to?”
It’d honestly never occurred to her that He would appear to anyone else, but there was no reason for her to think that. Everyone on the continent—the world, as far as she knew—worshipped Apollius, though some did it differently from others. It made sense that He would grant visions to many of His followers.
Especially the heirs of Empires that He wanted to claim.
Jax followed the trajectory of her thoughts across her face, sneered. “The Auverrani are so arrogant. Thinking that because He chose your country as the resting place of His wife, you are higher in His favor.” His shoulders tensed, as if the hands clasped behind him had turned to fists. “Giving you Nyxara was a curse, not a blessing.”
“You’re telling me,” Lore murmured.
But Jax clearly had many feelings on this subject, and wouldn’t be deterred from airing them. “She was only meant to rise long enough to grant Apollius Her power, but His Arceneaux vessel had to go and fuck it up.” He shook his head. “I offered myself. But I, who killed my father so I could take his Empire and make it the start of the Holy Kingdom, wasn’t what He wanted. He chose Bastian Arceneaux, and would not be swayed.”
“Probably because Bastian is better looking.”
She meant it as a flippant barb, but Jax grinned. He’d stood still before her this whole time, but now he advanced a step, and she pressed her back into the pew. “You care for His vessel,” Jax said quietly. “That is yet another complication. You’ve made Apollius care for you.”
Ice pricked down Lore’s spine. “He only cares about Nyxara. He doesn’t give a shit about me.”
“It’d be easier if that were true,” Jax murmured. “But He’s started to care for the both of you. And if He can’t have one, He’ll have the other.”
The ice in her spine spread to her organs, slow-rising dread.
Lore swallowed. “So is that why you tried to blow up the ship with us on it? Apollius wasn’t acting the way you wanted Him to?”
The Emperor looked horrified that she would even suggest such a thing. “That was not us. It was Amelia Demonde, as He said, trying to kill you.”
“Bullshit. Amelia wouldn’t have known a bomb from her ass, how in the myriad hells would she have been able to plant one on a heavily guarded ship?”
“She was Caeliar’s avatar. The ship was in the ocean. She didn’t need a bomb.”
Her teeth snapped closed on another retort. If Amelia had known enough about her power to blow up a ship, she’d been aware that she was Caeliar’s avatar for a while. She thought of August and his ideas about transubstantiation, substituting one vessel for another. Maybe Amelia thought that by killing Lore, she could take Nyxara’s power, become the avatar of the Buried Goddess instead. Become the one other member of the pantheon that Apollius wanted to live.
Amelia crying in the garden, saying everything was fucked up. She’d been going through nearly the exact same thing Lore was. It made her chest ache to think of all the ways that maybe, in different circumstances, they could have helped each other.
“Fine.” Lore shook her head. “So Amelia blew up the ships, but clearly you’re here with some ulterior motive. Why did Apollius hide you from everyone?”
“An Emperor can’t simply stroll into enemy territory,” Jax scoffed. “Especially when there’s some who might recognize him.”
“Gabe,” Lore murmured.
