He began to leave, but she hooked her nails into his arm and forced him to stop.
“I want to give the ones lost at the wall proper funerals,” she said, her voice hard, firm. “It’s the least we can do,as gods. Right?”
He looked down at her hand. For a moment, she thought he would refuse, but then Samson dipped his head. “As you wish.”
“The queen!”
“Make way!”
“She’s alive, she’s alive! Phoenix Above, look!”
Elena blinked against the sudden brightness of the day, overwhelmed by the onslaught of voices from the crowd waiting on the hall steps. They swarmed her, shouting, calling. One older woman came forward and draped a mala, a garland threaded with fresh jasmine and marigold, around Elena’s neck.
Already, celebrations were ringing through the city. People walked openly in the streets, drinking, singing, dancing, with no fear of curfew, no zeemir glinting overhead. Elena wanted to feel their exuberance. She wished for joy to sweep her up like a heady drug so that she forgot the deaths along the wall, the blood beneath her fingernails. She wanted to relish their victory.Hervictory.
But Elena could only stand there, silent. With each passing second, her smile faded. She ducked her head and pushed past the crowd, muttering excuses, and with every hand that reached out to touch her, she flinched. She stumbled down the steps, heading—where?She did not know these streets, not like Rani, not like the dunes surrounding the capital. The city walls towered overhead, red and stark in the bright midday sun.The breach, she thought, but as soon as she thought of it, the strength left her legs. She staggered, sick. The idea of digging up the dead and creating more funeral pyres churned her stomach. She could not face the dead or yield her regret. Somehow, that juxtaposition of pain feltright.
Good, she thought savagely.Let me suffer.
At least it was something she deserved, unlike this joy.
She turned the corner and spotted the white marble steps of a temple.
It was small but ornate, with a tiny courtyard fenced in by sandstone pillars that led to an intricate doorway decorated with carved lotuses andreclining deities. On the spire, the Phoenix soared above. Her mighty wings spanned around the dome, Her eyes inlaid with a collection of jewels that made Her seem both prescient and formidable, divine and relentless.
Elena stopped.
Samson had told her that the Phoenix was a false god. A myth, and a lie.The true master and architect of the Eternal Fire is the Great Serpent.He had torn down the ruins of the high temple in the mountains and already begun erecting a new spire, one with the Great Serpent coiling around it. This one would go too. What was the use of pitying a fraudulent god?
But Elena ascended the steps, removed her shoes, and ducked into the inner chamber.
Clay diyas flickered in tiny alcoves set into the walls. A fine rug, threadbare now after suns of use, kissed her naked soles. Elena found herself pulled not to the Phoenix soaring above, but to the fire that burned within Her altar. She could recognize its song anywhere. The Eternal Fire’s small child rumbled in welcome. Every temple fire in Ravence was created from a flame taken from the Eternal Fire, but unlike its mother, this small fire filled the inner sanctum with a gentle warmth.
Elena knelt slowly.
“I…” she began. Her voice rang through the chamber. All at once, she felt foolish, conspicuous, even though she was alone. A prayer book sat propped up on a stand. Elena stared at it—the delicate white pages, the scrawling black text—and her well of bitterness grew more acidic. She wanted to rip out the pages. Burn all the lies they told.
“Of all the betrayals, yours was the worst.” She clasped her hands around her knees until she could see the gleam of fire against the white of her knuckles. “You don’t exist. Your stories, your prayers, your songs, all blasphemy. I know.I know.I saw how the Eternal Fire knelt to Samson. He is the Prophet called by a god, and you are a false god made by a man. You made my kingdom a lie. You made my family a mockery.” She raised her eyes, looking into the flickering ruby eyes of the Phoenix. “But why can’t I stop believing in you?”
She had tried to come to terms with it. Tried to shift her faith to the true god, Samson’s god,the Prophet’s god. But even now, kneeling before the Phoenix and Her small fire, Elena could hear the songs sung in Her name. The lilting prayers, the melodious chants, the music of her childhood, herpeople, her family. Her parents had sat before the altars like this. They had dedicated their lives to a god—and for what? To learn that She had never existed? That their lives had been a waste?
“I refuse.” She looked away from the statue to the ceiling, pitching her voice to the heavens above. “You hear me? Samson may be the Prophet, but my family was notwrong. I refuse to believe it. Because my mother believed. She wrote of the Phoenix, your grief, and your rage. And that cannot be a lie. She and my father did not throw away their lives for a lie,” she said, and her voice broke. She stopped, wiped furiously at the corners of her eyes. The fire crackled, and Elena stood, glaring up at the Phoenix. “I will find proof of either your existence or your deception. And you or whatever god will have to confront me then.”
The fire banked, wavering against her sudden movement, and for a moment, Elena thought she saw something in the flames. Eyes, golden and full of hurt. But when she peered closer, they vanished.
I am going mad, she thought.
Shadows flickered on her right, and Elena whipped around sharply. A woman cried out, stumbling. Her thali clattered to the floor.
“Sorry, sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you,” the woman said as Elena knelt to pick up her tray.
She gathered the offerings—sugared almonds, faded and worn apples, ladoos made of foxnuts—and placed them back onto the thali. “It’s all right,” she murmured, handing the thali back to the woman.
The woman made no move to take it. “Mother’s Gold,” she gasped. “It’s you! The queen, in my little temple.” She laughed, taking the thali. “Did you like the mala I gave you?”
It was only then that Elena recognized the woman as the one before city hall. She had changed into a priestess’s garb, with a red sash around her wide waist and an orange dupatta draped over her head.
“Yes, yes.” She shifted uneasily, moving away from the woman. “Thank you. I have to go—”
