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“Some of us have taken it harder than others,” Alie murmured.
Lore’s anger alchemized to something harder to name, guilt and shame and something almost, maybe, hopeful.
“So what do we do?” Lore asked quietly.
“The gods were all human once.” Malcolm put the book back down on the desk, satisfied that Lore hadn’t hurt it. He took off his gloves with small, meticulous movements, making a show of not looking at Gabe. “There has to be a way to… not stop Them completely, maybe, but put Them off somehow.”
“And the way is probably in that prophecy,” Alie finished. Where Malcolm refused to look at Gabe, that was all she did, her dark-green eyes fixed on the slumped, dejected figure of the Priest Exalted like she could haul him up through will alone.
“The story of the Fount said there have to be vessels for Its power.” Malcolm’s voice put capitalization on the pronoun, just like the book had. “I don’t think we can change that. But we can delay it, maybe, lure Apollius and Nyxara back into dormancy until more… appropriate vessels can be found. Now is not the best time for physical manifestations of the gods to suddenly reappear. And They clearly aren’t at Their best if They’re choosing you lot.”
Gabe knuckled at his exposed eye. “Will that exacerbate the issues with the crops? The weather?”
“Maybe the opposite, actually,” Malcolm said. “If you look back at the records, none of those things started until Bastian was born.”
That put a funny hitch in Lore’s middle. Bastian was older than her, though only by a month or so. She’d never lived in a world he hadn’t touched. All of them were of an age, here in this room, and the changes in climate and landscape had always been a volatile thing, starting subtly, getting worse in such small increments that she hadn’t known to be wary of it until she was told.
And there was what Apollius had said as they rode back from Courdigne. About Gabe being just as much a part of this as she was. About the others.
There were four more gods other than Apollius and Nyxara. Four more gods, and three more people in this room.
But surely, if things had gotten that far—if her friends had gods in their heads, too—they would have said something? Maybe they could stop this before it got to that point.
With a sigh, Gabe leaned back in his chair. When he spoke, it was quiet. “Fine. We can look.”
Neither Alie nor Malcolm seemed to know what to make of his sudden capitulation, after what Lore suspected was weeks on weeks of resistance. For a moment, they were still, then Malcolm all but jumped toward the door. Gabe followed reluctantly. Lore fell in next to Alie, bringing up the back of their small crowd.
She still had something to tell her. Something she probably should’ve said before they entered Gabe’s study, but she’d been distracted.
Gabe and Malcolm gained a longer lead as they made their way to the staircase again, to that unsettling statue of Apollius. Lore hung back on purpose, and Alie followed suit.
Much like telling them she had a goddess in her head, she didn’t know how to finesse the news that Bastian had killed Alie’s father. Well, not-father. And not-Bastian. So she just said it.
“Alie,” Lore said quietly. “There’s one more thing.”
The other woman arched a brow.
“Before we left, Bastian—Apollius, really, He’d fully taken over—He killed Bellegarde.”
Silence. The only sign Alie had heard her at all was the widening of her eyes, gone glassy in the afternoon light.
“Is he still there?” Alie asked, her voice barely sound. “In Courdigne?”
Lore nodded.
“Good,” Alie snarled. “Let him rot.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
When does religion cross from faith into governance? Where is the line between what a god says, and what a priest claims They say?
—From the writings of Moira Killory, Caldienan
scholar. Fled to Ratharc when orders for
her arrest came from the Auverrani Priest Exalted, 150 AGF.
The ritualistically sealed prophecies were kept in secure rooms below the Church. That sounded a little too close to the catacombs for comfort, but Lore had a dearth of choices at this point, and none of those she did have were pleasant.
