“But that was after I brought Gemma back,” I said. Gemma was one of the third sons and daughters given over during the Rite to serve the Primal of Life and his Court. A tradition honored and respected throughout all the kingdoms in the mortal realm.
An honor that had become nothing but a nightmare under Kolis’s rule.
Gemma had been one of the few that Nyktos had secreted away from Kolis’s Court with the aid of gods like Bele and others and then sheltered in the Shadowlands. He gave them sanctuary. A sliver of peace.
The things my mere existence threatened.
Gemma hadn’t gone into detail about what her time spent in Kolis’s Court had been like, but she hadn’t needed to for me to know that being Kolis’s favorite for a while wasn’t anything pleasant. Whatever had been done to her was bad enough that when she’d spotted one of the gods from Kolis’s Court in Lethe, she had panicked. So afraid of being sent back to him, she had run into the Dying Woods—where certain death awaited her.
“He hasn’t responded to what I did to Bele,” I continued. And then added, “As far as I know.”
“Only because I imagine that act caught him off guard,” Penellaphe mused. “Neither he nor anyone else would’ve expected that.” She glanced at Nyktos. “He hasn’t summoned you?”
“No.”
“Is that the truth?” I demanded.
Nyktos nodded. “I can only delay in answering his summonses. I can’t deny them.”
“He’s likely cautious right now,” Penellaphe said. “And I imagine he’s also very curious, considering exactly what could be hidden away in the Shadowlands, how it could be possible for embers of life to exist, and how he could make use of whatever this source of power is.”
“Aid him in whatever twisted ideal of life he believes he’s creating,” Holland tacked on.
“You know what he’s been doing to the Chosen who have gone missing?” Nyktos’s gaze sharpened on him. “These things called Revenants?”
“I know that what he calls Revenants are not the only mockery of life he’s managed to create.” Holland’s dark gaze locked on Nyktos. “And you’ve already seen what he’s had a hand in creating. What some of the gods of his Court have been doing in the mortal realm.”
Nyktos’s brows pinched together, and then he glanced at me. “Your seamstress.”
It took me a moment to realize he meant my mother’s seamstress. “Andreia Joanis?” Before I found her dead, I’d seen the god Madis near her home in Stonehill, a district that faced the Stroud Sea. Her veins had darkened, staining her skin as if ink filled them, and her eyes…they had been burned. Nyktos had been following Madis that night, and he’d ended up there. He too had believed she was dead. “She came back to life or something. Sat up and opened her mouth. She had four fangs I do not recall her ever having before.”
Holland barked out a short, guttural word in a language I didn’t recognize as he turned his head, spitting on the ground.
My brows flew up. “Come again?”
“Craven?” Nyktos’s eyes narrowed as he recognized whatever Holland had said.
The Fate nodded. “It is what becomes of a mortal when their life force—their blood—is stolen from them, and the loss isn’t replenished. It does not matter who the mortal was before. The act rots them, in body and in mind, turning them into amoral creatures driven by an insatiable need for blood. Craven.”
Nyktos had gone still. “The act of killing a mortal while feeding has been forbidden since the dawn of time.”
“And that outcome is why,” Holland said. “It is a balance.”
I threw up my hands. “How in the hell is turning a mortal into something like that a balance?”
“The balance here demands that the life taken is then restored to serve as a reminder to the gods that their inability to control themselves has consequences. Maintaining balance isn’t always as simple to understand as it is when, say, the Primal of Life restores a mortal’s life.” His eyes fixed on mine. Hard. All-seeing. “Another’s life must be forsaken in their place.”
I sucked in a sharp breath, my stomach hollowing. “The night I brought Lady Marisol back to life, my stepfather, the King of Lasania, died in his sleep.” I hadn’t even considered that it had anything to do with my actions. “Good gods. I killed my stepfather?”
“No,” Nyktos cut in, his eyes narrowing on the Fate. “You didn’t.”
I stared at Nyktos. How could he be so sure of that? Because it sure sounded like I had.
“It was not intentional,” Holland said. “But it was her time. You intervened, upset the balance, and it had to be righted.”
“By whom?” I demanded. “Who decides how balance is restored?”
Holland looked back at me.
I stiffened. “You?”
“Not him,” Nyktos answered. “The Arae in general. They are like…cosmic cleaners.”
I had no idea what to say to that. Or how to feel—well, other than guilty. And I should feel that because while King Ernald hadn’t exactly been the greatest leader, he hadn’t been bad. Except I really didn’t feel anything but passing shock and a touch of shame. Like when I killed and knew I would barely think of it later.
And that disturbed me.
I disturbed myself.
But I couldn’t dig deeper into that at the moment because that hadn’t been the only life I’d restored. “And if a god is brought back? Does balance demand the death of another god?”
“Luckily, no,” Nyktos said. “It has only ever applied to mortals.”
“That doesn’t sound entirely fair,” I muttered. It was a relief to know that I hadn’t killed another god, but I had sentenced a nameless, faceless mortal to death when I brought Gemma back. “Would have been good to know that.”
Holland eyed me. “Would that have changed your actions?”
I snapped my mouth shut. I couldn’t answer that.
“But now you know what you already knew. Some lessons will always be painful to learn.” His smile was sad and gentle. And, thankfully, brief. “Either way, if this Andreia had not been killed, she would’ve left her home and attacked the first person she came into contact with—man, woman, or child.”
“Did Madis do that to her?” Nyktos asked.
“I believe Madis was attempting to…rectify what one of Kolis’s creations left behind.” Holland tipped his chin slightly. “And that is all I can say about those matters. I do not know much more. But revealing anything else could be considered interference.”
“And he’s already walking a very fine line,” Penellaphe reminded us, but mostly Nyktos, whose glare had narrowed on the Fate. “But at this moment, what Kolis is doing isn’t our greatest concern, nor should it be yours.”
I wasn’t sure I agreed with that.
“You asked what Kolis would do to get to the embers of life. He would find a way to obtain them. Perhaps he wouldn’t use his cruelest methods to do so”—her brilliant blue eyes dimmed, becoming haunted—“but if he were to realize who you once were, he would stop at nothing to have you.”
“Penellaphe,” Nyktos warned.
“It’s the truth,” she said, turning to him. “You cannot hide that from her. You may not be able to even try to do so.”
“You have no idea what I am capable of doing when necessary,” Nyktos told her.
“True,” she said, her voice gentling. “But you know exactly what Kolis is capable of. As do I. He would burn through the Shadowlands to obtain his graeca.”
In old Primal language, graeca meant life. But as Aios had said, it was also interchangeable with the word love.