Page 290 of The Gods Order

My face tilts back to the sky and I…smile.

The voices around me fade beneath the rush of memories.

Lambrit’s face meets me in the clouds first. Then Laney’s.

They come without order or reason.

My parents’ embrace, the first time each of my men stole my breath, impossible victories, unbearable losses, quiet moments that somehow mean the most.

My life doesn’t flash before my eyes in a single image.

It unfolds in countless fragments, each one reminding me…

I am very loved.

Slowly, I drift toward the clouds and my eyes drift shut.

Thayla

36

My eyes snap open and I stumble forward.

A sharp breath escapes me as I throw my arms out to catch my balance, and my legs wobble beneath me as though I’d been dropped onto my feet without warning.

What…

The battle. Mellcom. The sword.

My hand flies to my stomach.

Nothing. No pain. No blood. No tear through my armor.

My fingers press harder against the place where the blade had pierced me only moments ago.

“What the fuck?”

My question disappears into complete, unnerving silence. There’s no clashing steel, no screams, no…nothing. My heavy breathing is the only sound that exists, and I slowly turn in my spot, scanning this unfamiliar place.

The floor beneath my boots is impossibly smooth, polished white stone stretching farther than I can make sense of. I stand atop a circular dais. Its edges subtly rise from the rest of the floor, though there are no walls, no ceiling, no horizon.

Just…white. Endless white.

“Where in the realm—”

My spin stops when I spot another dais a few feet away. Before I can tell myself not to move, I take a cautious step toward it.

Then another.

My footsteps sound strangely muted, swallowed almost as soon as they leave my boots. At the center of the second dais rests what looks almost like a shallow well. Its smooth stone rim rises to my waist, and instead of water, soft white clouds drift lazily within it, rolling over one another in slow, lazy currents.

I smirk.

Clouds.

Leaning closer, I reach out. The moment my fingertips brush the surface, a ripple spreads through the mist, and the clouds peel apart, revealing a glass window that shows…

I stagger back. Then race right back to the edge.