She swallowed, hard. “Show me, then.”
An altar stretched beneath the Goddess’s feet. Four Yumi held up the base, each with a different emotion. One bridled with anger; the other hid in fear; another smiled with joy; and the last wept, her tears eternal.
A silver bowl, as wide and long as Elena’s torso, perched within their hands. White sand filled its depths. Elena stilled. She remembered her father sitting on his throne, Samson and Yassen taking the Desert Oath and reaching into the fire. Their imprints in the sand. How young they were. How naive.
“Do you remember the fire dance?”
Elena blinked. “Of course. You know it?”
And at this, the high sister laughed. “We Yamni made the dance. Let us do it together.”
Before the Goddess, Elena and the priestess sank into the Warrior. Heat flared up Elena’s spine, her Agni awake, ready. She spun, and so did the Yamni, their movements mirrored like two perfect halves, like the twin pools running through the temple. Elena startled. The priestess smiled at her surprise, and despite herself, Elena returned it.
The Desert Sparrow, the Lotus, the Spider, the Tree, the Snake, they flowed through the positions, their arms strong and fluid, their feet skipping over the black floor. The twins began to sing, and the sand rose. It leapt from the bowl and swirled around them, guided by their dance.
“Listen,” the priestess said.
Elena felt the pull in her gut, the call of the land. It was the song of the river, the roar of the waterfalls, the steady pulsing beat of the sleeping volcano, everywhere, all at once.
So she listened.
Elena could have sworn the sand wastalkingas it swept around her, whispering a secret she could not understand. She tried to focus on its susurration, but the sand swirled, faster and faster, singing, laughing, purring, grains skating across her cheeks, marking her skin, filling her nostrils. She gasped. She could no longer see the high sister or hear her voice.
She was back in the sandstorms of Ravence, lost in the fray of the desert’s anger. Somehow, she knew in her bones it was angry ather. For losing her kingdom, for failing to protect her lands.
For not being enough, alone.
Who even are you, alone?
It was a question she could not answer, and caught in the storm, Elena felt herself failing once more. Her Agni flickered, buffeted down by a wind.
“There are three types of fire, little queen.” The high sister’s voice rang around her, though Elena still could not see her. “That of the Phoenix—a wild, vengeful power. That of the Serpent—a cold, haughty power. And that of the Goddess—a power that nourishes, provides. To find yours, you must first let go of your grief.”
But the sand came on, thicker, gaining weight, gaining speed. Burying her.
Elena tried to fight, but her limbs grew heavy, slow. Maybe she deserved this. Maybe, after all the things she had done, the people she had so recklessly buried alive, she deserved a fate like theirs too. Samson was wrong. They could never absolve themselves of their guilt or of their regret.
Elena sank to her knees and raised her head, her gaze wandering to the heavens—
The eyes of the Goddess seared into her.
Suddenly, the walls bled out. The voices of the priestesses faded. She was drifting alone in an endless expanse with no beginning, no end, an abyss that felt as alive and hungry as her.
You must first let go of your grief.
Her body thrummed, and she knew at once that she was here looking for someone. She began to run. To call. The abyss trembled, awake to her voice, swallowing it in and sending it—where, she could not tell. Only that she could not stop calling, could not stop running. And as time passedin this strange place, she came to the slow realization that she was searching for him. That this abyss was the cathedral of her grief.
“Yassen!”
She ached for him. The abyss ached for him. She and the abyss were one, overwhelmed by the cavernous quality of a grief unburied. He had become a physical reminder, a tightness in her chest, the gritty, popping sensation in her throat. She had tried to ignore it. Tried to push on, to bury her anguish. Even when she had thought she was safe, caught in the immediacy of the present, he still came to her. The smell of wet jasmine reminded her of when they had stood in the garden; a fallen eyelash of when he had touched her cheek and told her,Make a wish.
There were others. Her father, her mother, Ferma, Eshaant, Diya, the ones crushed by the wall, the ones buried in the ruins of Rani. Their faces blurred in the dark until they were a bleating ruinous mass crushing her chest.
Perhaps this was the true nature of her sorrow: to be withered and beaten down to the husk until she was a shell. Empty, like the abyss.
You must let go of your grief.
She felt herself slowing. Her throat cracked and her voice came out in a dry croak.
