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The space was maintained and beautiful. There were gardens for flowers and massive trees, but all of it was currently covered in snow. Further down was an open area that was grassy in the summer. Right now, it was nothing but shades of black and white. The fresh snow contrasted with the wet bark of the trees, making it seem a little unreal, and I loved it.
"We never meant to keep our priests locked away from the world," Zeal explained, gesturing to the open area around us. "This was our gift. A place where all of you can mingle, make friends, and live lives just as rich and rewarding as everybody else. In the last few hundred years, it's been ignored. Priests are given more tasks and less faith. The newer you are, the harder you're pushed, so that those at the top can relax and live easy. Then it becomes a habit, with each generation compounding the load on the next to arrive." He stopped and faced me. "And I let it happen. Not you, Nariana. Not the High Priest. Not the people of Calseth. This is on us, so don't you dare pick up a god's burden and try to carry it on your human shoulders."
"So what do you want from me?" I demanded, raising my voice to carry across the distance between us.
It felt even louder in the muffled world the snow created. Zeal's reaction was just to step back, making no effort to bring me closer. One corner of his lip curled higher, almost as if he was taunting me.
"I want you to love," he yelled toward me. "I want you to shine. I want you to scream to the skies and shove your problems away. I want you to avoid the things that are distasteful and lose yourself in the ones you enjoy. I want you, Nari, to live. To be tempted by anything and everything you want."
"I can't!" I told him, my voice even louder than before.
"You can," he taunted.
I bit back a yell of frustration, because he still wasn't hearing what I was trying to say. "I can't pass my classes if my instructors fail me for no reason. I can't get respect from the priests if I'm not successful. I can't step down to another Path, because that would declare me as something I'm not. I need help, Zeal, not a walk in the snow!"
Zeal simply fell back into the soft powder and began waving both his arms and legs, making a silhouette impression in the snow. "I disagree," he called to me.
Then he sat up and pitched a snowball right at my chest. It exploded on my shoulder, leaving a white mark against the black of my coat. I gasped in shock, then bent to make my own snowball. With Zeal sitting on his rump, he was an easy target when I threw it back.
The snow crashed into his chest, and the god laughed. "So you do remember how to play."
Then he surged to his feet, charging me. A squeal slipped from my throat and I spun, but he was simply too fast. Zeal hooked me around the waist, pulling us both to the ground. The rush of cold was almost shocking, but I kept rolling, trying not to let him pin me. It was almost enough to let me get free.
Almost.
As I tried to reach my feet, Zeal snagged my ankle, his hand closing around my boot. My leg didn't move when I expected it to, and I crashed back into the soft snow, taking a face-full of it. Then Zeal pulled, sliding me back much too easily even as he crawled forward. One of his hands found my waist. The other moved up to press above my shoulder, holding him up, and the god's eyes shined much too brightly.
"I chose you for your rage," he told me, his words causing no fog in the air at all. "I picked you because of your passion. Nari, you aren't the only priest who can see all the gods. You aren't the first and you won't be the last."
"My brothers," I realized.
He made an ambiguous noise, not making it easy to guess what it was supposed to mean, and then kept going. "And yet I still chose that little girl. Do you know why?"
"Because I had a tantrum?" I asked.
He moved his hand from my waist to brush the dark strands out of my face. "Because I wanted to make a weapon. I picked you the same way a baron would pick a hunting dog. I chose a tool, and somewhere along the way, I realized that I cared about this one. And then she brought me others." He looked over.
I followed his eyes to see Talin leaning against the trunk of a tree, watching us but staying out of the way. "You don't love humans," I realized.
"Not if I can help it," he admitted. "You're too fragile. Letting me in too far would destroy most people, but not you. You give yourself to me so I can use your body. You watched as I did things you cannot comprehend, and your mind never strained. You didn't lose yourself in me. You simply grew stronger."
"Did you pull my arms further into the tears when I was in sixth year?" I asked.
The question sounded like it came from nowhere, but it didn't. This was me trying to make sense of everything he'd said so far, and that was one thing he'd never talked about. But the words were barely out of my lips before Zeal ducked his head to laugh.
"No. That was my sister, Savi. She thought you needed a bigger sign."
"Are they watching me too?"
"Mhm," he agreed. "From a distance, and they only look in at times."
"So all of you are counting on me?"
"You went the wrong way with that," he grumbled, dropping down to lay by my left side. Then Zeal sighed. "I don't know how to make her understand." The words clearly weren't for me.
A foot crunched in the snow beside us, and I rolled onto my side, startled enough to defend myself. A man's gentle laugh made it clear I was overreacting, but it led my eyes right to him. Looking up, I found a tall, lean man. He wore a very neat beard that was long enough to end in a point. His skin was tawny, like Zeal's, but it was the eyes that convinced me this was another god.
"Hello, Nariana," he said, squatting down on the right side of my legs to offer his hand. "I'm Will."
