Shiny sighed, and under other circumstances, I would have been amused by his annoyance. "No," he snapped, "I'm not."
And before I could speak again, he was gone, the space in front of me cold in his absence. There was a glimmer of magic-something occluded by the hazy shimmer of Shiny's body. Then a flurry of movement, cloth tearing, the struggle of flesh against flesh. A spray of wetness across my face, making me flinch.
And then silence.
I held still for a moment, my own breath loud and fast in my ears as I strained to hear the sound that I knew and feared would come: bodies, hitting the cobblestones of the street three stories below. But there was only that terrible silence.
My nerves snapped. I ran to the roof door, clawed it open, and flung myself into the house, screaming.
6
"A Window Opens" (chalk on concrete)
THERE ARE THINGS he told me about himself. Not all of it, of course-some things I heard from other gods or remember from old stories of my childhood. But mostly he just told me. It was not his nature to lie.
In the time of the Three, things were very different. There were many temples but few holy texts, and no persecution of those with differing beliefs. Mortals loved whatever gods they wished-often several at once-and it was not called heresy. If there were disputes about a particular bit of lore or magic, it was simple enough to call on a local godling and ask about it. No point in getting possessive about one god or another when there were plenty to go around.
It was during this time that the first demons were born: offspring of mortal humans and immortal gods, neither one nor the other, possessing the greatest gifts of both. One of those gifts was mortality-a strange thing to call a gift, by my thinking, but people back then thought differently. Anyhow, all the demons possessed it.
But consider what this means: all the demons died. Doesn't make sense, does it? Children rarely take after just one of their parents. Shouldn't a few of the demons have inherited immortality? They certainly got the magic, in plenty-so much that they passed it on to us, when they mated with us. Scrivening and bonebending and prophecy and shadow-sending, all of this came to mortalkind through the demons. But even when the demons took godly lovers and had children with them, those children grew old and died, too.
For us, the divine inheritance was a blessing. For the gods, one drop of mortal blood doomed their offspring to death.
Apparently, no one realized what this meant for a very long time.
***
I scrambled downstairs much faster than I should have, given that I'd never gotten around to memorizing Madding's stairs. Behind me trailed Paitya; the middle-aged godling; Kitr, who had come out of nowhere at my shout and was visible for once; and Madding. As we reached the room of pools, two more people joined us: a tall mortal woman who shone with nearly as many godwords as Previt Rimarn, and a sleek racing dog who glowed white in my sight. As I reached the house's front door, I heard other calls upstairs; I'd woken the whole house.
I might have felt bad if my thoughts had not been filled with that awful silence.
"Oree!" Hands caught me before I got three steps out the door; I fought them. A blur of blue resolved into Madding. "You shouldn't leave the house, damn it."
"I have to-" I twisted to get around Madding. "He-"
"He who? Oree-" Madding abruptly went still. "Why is there blood on your face?"
That stopped my panic, though the hand that I lifted to my face shook badly. Wetness had splattered my face up on the roof; I'd forgotten.
"Boss?" Paitya had crouched to peer at something on the ground. I could not see what, but the grim expression on his face was unmistakable. "There's a lot more blood here."
Madding turned to look, and his eyes widened. He turned back to me, frowning. "What happened? Where were you, up on the roof?" Suddenly his frown deepened. "Did Father do something to you? So help me-"
Kitr, who had been scanning the street for danger, looked at us both sharply. "You told her?"
Madding ignored her, though I caught his wince of consternation. He turned me from one side to the other, checking for injuries. "I'm fine," I said, holding my stick to my chest as I grew calmer. "I'm fine. But, yes, I was on the roof, with… with Shiny. There was someone… a man. I couldn't see him; he must've been mortal. He knew my name, said he'd been looking for me-"
Paitya cursed and stood up, narrowing his eyes as he scanned the area. "Since when do Order-Keepers come by way of the damned roof? They usually have sense enough not to piss us off."
Madding muttered something in gods' language; it curled and spiked, a curse. "What happened?"
"Shiny," I said. "He fought with the man. There was magic…" I clutched at Madding's arms, my fingers tightening on the cloth of his shirt. "Mad, the man hit him with magic somehow, I think that's what caused the blood, I think Shiny grabbed him and pulled him off the roof, but I didn't hear them hit the ground…"
Madding had already begun gesturing at his companions, directing them to search around the house and nearby streets. Kitr stayed nearby, as did Paitya. Madding had no real need of bodyguards, but I did, and he had probably directed one of them to spirit me away if it came down to any sort of fight.
"I'm going to raze that White Hall to the ground," he snarled, his human shape flickering blue as he pushed me back toward the front door. "If they've dared to attack my house, my people-"
"He wasn't after Shiny," I murmured, realizing it belatedly. I stopped, clutching Madding's arm to get his attention. "Mad, that man wasn't after Shiny at all! If he was an Order-Keeper, he would've wanted Shiny, wouldn't he? They know he killed the ones in South Root." The more I thought about it, the more certain I became. "I don't think that man was an Order-Keeper at all."
I didn't mistake the swift, startled look that crossed Madding's face. He exchanged a glance with Kitr, who looked equally alarmed. Kitr then turned to look at one of the mortals, the scrivener. She nodded and knelt, taking a pad of paper out of her jacket and uncapping a thin ink-brush.
"I'll go see, too," said the middle-aged godling, vanishing. Madding pulled me against him, holding me firm with one arm and keeping the other free, in case of trouble. I tried to feel safe there, in the arms of one god and protected by half a dozen others, but all my nerves were a-jangle, and the panic would not fade. I could not push aside the feeling that something was wrong, very wrong, that someone was watching, that something was going to happen. I felt it with every ounce of intuition that I possessed.
"There's no body," said Paitya, coming over to us. Beyond him, I could see other godlings winking in and out of sight about the street, on nearby windowsills, on the edge of a roof. "Enough blood that there should be, but nothing. Not even, er, parts."
"Is it-" I had to struggle to be heard, half muffled against Madding's shoulder.
"It's his." Paitya glanced back at the racing dog, who was sniffing at the spot now; the dog looked up and nodded in solemn confirmation. "No doubt about it. The blood's just splattered about; it fell from above. But he didn't land here."
Madding muttered something in his own tongue, then switched to Senmite so I would understand. "There must have been a weapon. Or magic, as you said." He looked down at me, scowling in irritation. "He's powerless now. He must have known he couldn't take a scrivener, if that's what the man was. On the roof of a house full of godlings-why didn't he just call for help? Stubborn bastard."
I closed my eyes and leaned against Madding, suddenly weary. I could have called for help, too, I realized belatedly, though I'd been too frightened to think of doing so. Shiny, however, hadn't been afraid at all. He hadn't wanted help. He'd done it again-charged into a dangerous situation, spent his life like currency, all so he could have a taste of his old power. It had been for my benefit this time, but did that really make it better? Godlings respected life, including their own. They were just as immortal, but they at least tried to defend themselves or evade blows when attacked. When they fought, they tried not to kill.
While Shiny slaughtered even his own kin.
"The Nightlord should've just killed him," I said, filled with sudden bitterness. Madding raised his eyebrows in surprise, but I shook my head. "There's something wrong with him, Mad. I always suspected it, but tonight…"
I remembered the little break in Shiny's voice when he'd admitted his role in the Gods' War. Just an instant of instability, a crack in the bedrock of his stoicism. But it went deeper than that, didn't it? His carelessness with his flesh-how had he ended up dead in my muckbin, all those months ago? That vicious kiss he'd given me. His even more vicious words afterward, blaming me for all the duplicity of the human race.
He was-or had been-the god of order, the living embodiment of stability, peace, and rationality. The man he had become, here in the mortal realm, didn't make sense. Shiny did not feel like Itempas because Shiny wasn't Itempas, and no part of my proper Maro upbringing would let me accept him as such.
Madding sighed. "Nahadoth wanted to kill him, Oree. A lot of my siblings did, too, after what he'd done. But the Three created this universe; if any one of them dies, it all ends. So he was sent here, where he can do the least damage. And maybe…" He paused, and again I heard that hint of longing in his voice. Hope, not quite stifled. "Maybe, somehow, he can… get better. See the error of his ways. I don't know."
"He said he was trying to apologize. Up on the roof. To… to…" I shuddered. We did not forget his name, but we didn't say it, either, not if we could help it. "The Nightlord."
Madding blinked in surprise. "Did he? That's more than I ever thought he'd do." He sobered. "But I doubt that will do any good. He killed my mother, Oree. Murdered her with poison, mutilated her body. Then spent the next few millennia killing or imprisoning any of us who dared to protest. It takes a little more than an apology to atone for that."
I reached up to touch Madding's face, reading his expression with my fingers. This helped me catch what I had missed. "You're still angry about it."
His brow furrowed. "Of course I am. I loved her! But"-he sighed heavily, leaning down to press his forehead against mine-"I loved him, too, once."
I cupped his face in my hands, wishing I knew how to comfort him. This was family business, though, between father and son. It was Shiny's problem to solve, if we ever found him.
There was one thing I could do, though.
"I'll stay," I said.
He started, pulling back to stare at me. Of course he knew what I meant. After a long moment, he said, "Are you sure?"
I almost laughed. I was shaky inside, not just from leftover panic. "No. But I don't think I ever will be. I just… I know what's most important to me." I did laugh then, as I realized that Shiny had helped me decide, with that horrid kiss and the challenge in his words. I did, too, love Madding. And I wanted to be with him, even though it meant the end of the life I'd worked so hard to build and the end of my independence. Love meant compromise, after all-something I suspected Shiny did not understand.
Madding's face was solemn as he nodded, accepting my decision. I liked that he did not smile. I think he knew what the decision cost me.
Instead, after a moment, he sighed and glanced at Kitr, who had carefully paid more attention to the street than to us for the past few minutes.
"I'm calling everyone in," he said. "I don't like this. No mere scrivener should be able to hide from us." He glanced back, in the direction of the splashes of blood. "And I can't sense Father anywhere. I especially don't like that."
"Nor can I," said Kitr. "There are some of us with the power to hide him, but why would they? Unless…" She glanced at me, assessing and dismissing in a single sweep of her eyes. "You think this has something to do with Role? Your mortal there did find the body, but what's that got to do with anything?"
"I don't know, but-"
"Wait. There's something…" This came from the other side of the street. I followed the voice and saw the sigil-etched outline of Madding's scrivener. She stood looking up at the buildings nearby, holding a sheet of paper in her hands. A series of individual sigils had been drawn at the corners, with three rows of godwords in the middle. As I watched, one of the godwords and a sigil in the upper right corner began to glow more brightly. The scrivener, who apparently knew what this meant, gasped and took several steps back. I could not see her face, for she had no godwords written there, but terror filled her voice. "Oh, gods, I knew it! Look out! All of you, look-"
And suddenly hells filled the street.
No, not hells. Holes.
With a sound like tearing paper, they opened all around us, perfect circles of darkness. Some lay along the ground, some on the walls; some must've hung unsupported in midair. One of them opened right beneath the scrivener's feet, practically the instant the last word left her lips. She didn't have time to cry out before she fell into it and vanished. Another caught Kitr, who had turned to run to Madding's side. It opened before her between one step and another, and she was gone. The racing dog cursed in Mekatish and darted around the first hole that opened at his feet, but then another opened above him. I saw his short fur stand on end, pulled upward, and then with a yelp he was sucked in as well.
Before I could react, Madding suddenly shoved me away from him, into the doorway of the house. Stumbling over the doorway's raised step, I turned back, opening my mouth to speak-then saw the hole opening at his back. I felt the pull, its force powerful enough to jerk me forward a step even after I stopped.
No! I caught the door's elaborate handle in one hand to brace myself and used that leverage to raise my walking stick, hoping Madding would be able to grab it. Madding, his eyes wide and teeth bared, strained toward me. The sound of jangling chimes was barely audible, sucked away by the hole.
He mouthed something I couldn't hear. He ground his teeth, and I heard him in my head this time, in the manner of gods. GET INSIDE!
Then he flew backward, as if a great invisible hand had grabbed him around the waist and yanked. The hole vanished. He was gone.
I fumbled with the door handle, my breath wild and loud in my ears, my palms so sweaty that the stick slipped loose to clatter on the ground. I could hear no one else on the street; I was alone. Except for the remaining holes, which hovered all around me, darker than the black of my sight.
Then I got the door open and ran into the house, away from the holes, toward the clean, empty darkness where I was blind but where at least I knew what dangers I faced.
I got three steps into the house before the air tore behind me, and I flew backward off my feet, and a sound like trembling metal filled the world as I tumbled away.
7
"Girl in Darkness" (watercolor)
MY DREAMS HAVE BEEN more vivid lately. They told me that might happen, but still… I remembered something.
In the dream, I paint a picture. But as I lose myself in the colors of the sky and the mountains and the mushrooms that dwarf the mountains-this is a living world, full of strange flora and fungi; I can almost smell the fumes of its alien air-the door to my room opens and my mother comes in.
"What are you doing?" she asks.
And though I am still half lost in mountains and mushrooms, I have no choice but to pull myself back into this world, where I am just a sheltered blind girl whose mother wants what's best for me, even if she and I do not agree on what that is.
"Painting," I say, though this is obvious. My belly has clenched in defensive tension; I fear a lecture is coming.
She only sighs and comes closer, putting her hand on mine to let me know where she is. She is silent for a long while. Is she looking at the painting? I nibble my bottom lip, not quite daring to hope that she is, perhaps, trying to understand why I do what I do. She has never told me to stop, but I can taste her disapproval, as sour and heavy on my tongue as old, molding grapes. She has hinted at it verbally as well, in the past. Paint something useful, something pretty. Something that does not entrance viewers for hours on end. Something that would not attract the sharp, gleaming inter
est of the priests if they saw it. Something safe.
She says nothing this time, only stroking my braided hair, and at last I realize she is not thinking about me or my paintings at all. "What is it, Mama?" I ask.
"Nothing," she says, very softly, and I realize that for the first time in my life, she has just lied to me.
My heart fills with dread. I don't know why. Perhaps it is the whiff of fear that wafts from her, or the sorrow that underlies it, or simply the fact that my garrulous, cheerful mother is suddenly so quiet, so still.
So I lean against her and put my arms around her waist. She is trembling, unable to give me the comfort that I crave. I take what I can, and perhaps give a little of my own in return.
My father died a few weeks later.
***
I floated in numbing emptiness, screaming, unable to hear myself. When I clasped my hands together, I felt nothing, even when I dug in my nails. Opening my mouth, I sucked in another breath to scream again but felt no sensation of air moving over my tongue or filling my lungs. I knew that I did it. I willed my muscles to move and believed that they responded. But I could feel nothing.
Nothing but the terrible cold. It was bitter enough to be painful, or would have been if I could feel pain. If I had been able to stand, I might have fallen to the ground, too cold to do anything but shiver. If only there had been ground.
The mortal mind is not built for such things. I did not miss sight, but touch? Sound? Smell? I was used to those. I needed those. Was this how other people felt about blindness? No wonder they feared it so.
I contemplated going mad.
***
"Ree-child," says my father, taking my hands. "Don't rely on your magic. I know the temptation will be there. It's good to see, isn't it?"
I nod. He smiles.
"But the power comes from inside you," he goes on. He opens one of my small hands and traces the whorling print of one fingertip. It tickles and I laugh. "If you use a lot of it, you'll get tired. If you use it all… Ree-child, you could die."
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