Page 98 of The Fallen and the Kiss of Dusk (Crowns of Nyaxia #4)

THE GOD OF DEATH

N yaxia had grown impatient. One night, fire flashed at the horizon.

She looked out to the distance, toward the human lands.

It was difficult for gods to see beyond their territory, especially when rival gods took great care to camouflage their activities.

Nevertheless, they could sense the great movement of armies collecting near the coast. Sparks of rage over the kindling of war.

The sky was red, as if already preparing to soak up the blood of innocents. The end loomed.

Nyaxia had had enough of waiting.

“Our time is up,” she said. She looked out over her loyal subjects—the Houses of Shadow and Blood, armies already gathered and waiting for her. The House of Night, her new wayward children, still recovering from their decimation at Shiket’s hand.

The wind blew, bringing with it the smell of impending death.

She turned to the god.

“It is time,” she said. “Summon your dead.”

The god hesitated. “The underworld is not ready,” he said, even though he couldn’t quite understand his own answer.

{We are prepared,} the mask protested.

Nyaxia’s eyes sparked with rage. Her hair flew back, galaxies forming and exploding in its depths.

“I am ready!” she roared. “Two thousand years, I have borne the weight of their abuse. No longer. We are ready. You are ready. And I command you to do as you promised me. Call upon the dead. Help me seize this world.”

A flash of a distant memory. Nyaxia with that hunger in her eyes, though back then it looked much more like hope. “Take it all.”

The heart throbbed in his chest. The wound beneath it cried out in protest, but this time, he didn’t hear it at all.

“Very well,” he said to Nyaxia, bowing his head. And from his place in the sky, he turned to look down upon his kingdom. It was so damaged that it was difficult to make sense of it anymore. His fresh divinity, unfamiliar on these once mortal hands, roiled under his skin.

He closed his eyes and called to the dead.

It is easy for a god to rearrange reality.

Much of it is mere suggestion to them—time, space, the limitations of the physical world.

Yet, there are still rules to their power.

There were boundaries between the mortal world, god world, and underworld, and to call upon the dead was to tear them down completely.

It was simpler than he thought it would be. The veil between the underworld and mortal world was so thin and damaged, like moth-eaten fabric. It ripped so easily under the strength of his newfound power.

Deep rifts gouged across Obitraes, like glass shattering beneath the pounding of a fist. The monsters within—some so much worse than the dead—pushed against it, sensing freedom.

Nyaxia smiled. “Good,” she murmured.

It was not good, a small voice inside of him insisted.

But he attempted to repeat his call, anyway.

Only this time?.?.?.?he met resistance. As if a hand had grabbed his wrist halfway through the movement, or a wall had suddenly arisen between him and the underworld.

At his summons, he felt the attention of the dead turn to him.

But they did not obey.

He paused, confused. The mask, the eye, and the heart trembled with indignation.

{Who does challenge us?} the mask demanded.

{I cannot see beyond the veil,} the eye mused.

The heart was angriest of all. It said nothing, just throbbed against his rib cage.

Only the wound beneath it was pleased. Hopeful.

The god looked out over his kingdom. It was hazy, his visibility broken by the rubble of the decomposing underworld and the smoke that had come to consume it. Yet, the closer he looked, the more unmistakable it became.

Something was there that should not be.

Someone was there who should not be.

Nyaxia watched, her fury rising. Their attention shifted to the mortal world. Gods felt the draw of divine energy, and now, they sensed it gathering below—at the inflection point where the mortal and underworlds collided.

Morthryn.

Nyaxia’s mouth curled into a snarl. “What is that ?” she demanded.

At last, the heart spoke:

{A challenger.}

But the wound below it throbbed with hope.

The god of death rose and picked up his axe.

“I will take care of it,” he said.

Morthryn burned.

The building rose from the churning sea, a jagged torch against the eternal night.

The twisted metal spires had snapped, pouring smoke out against the star-dusted sky.

The great circular glass window, bearing the eye of Alarus, was half shattered.

Beams of red light streaked from the open half while dousing the rest in bloody crimson.

The jagged twist of the broken frame gave the impression of a tear falling from the bisected iris.

The god stood before it, his fury rising.

He did not know what had done this. But he knew that the building radiated with divine power. Power that some unworthy being must have taken—no, stolen —and then used to destroy what was his.

This was his .

Morthryn was a relic of his old kingdom. A relic of Vathysia, the House of Death.

There was little that gods truly cared about. But theft of what they considered theirs was universally offensive. And now, his nerves raw with his fresh failure, the god was furious.

The doors of Morthryn opened for him, and he stepped through.

Welcome home, it crooned. We have missed you.

The place now looked so different than it had in ages past. For a moment, the god experienced it in countless ages at once:

In ancient times, when the bone rafters had been carved with fresh prayers in his name and the walls themselves had overflowed with his power.

In the years since, when its greatness faded, its rooms no longer used to house great magical feats but prisoners the world wished to forget.

In the recent past, when one man and one guardian worked tirelessly to restore it to the glory it had once had.

And as it was now, so breathtakingly horrifying and breathtakingly beautiful.

It had crumbled so much in the time since he had last been here.

The mirrored floor was shattered with spiderweb cracks.

The rafters had been broken, the bones now reaching up and ending in jagged blades.

The glyphs that had etched the ancient power into these walls were faded, worn away as if by a sandstorm.

And yet—now, they glowed.

All of them, even the ones that no longer were visible beneath centuries of neglect. They beamed with searing light.

It was not flame, he realized.

It resembled it. But it wasn’t hot. It was cool and comforting, and strangely familiar, like a tune that lingered just beyond reach.

It was closer to smoke than fire, or shadow summoned by the reinvigoration of the spells in the walls.

Darkness met the light in equal measure, intertwining as it rose from the floors, the rafters, the walls, in a sad, graceful dance.

Clusters of light and shadow moved about the room, almost taking on the appearance of silhouettes—faces visible within them for seconds at a time.

The god reached out to touch it, and a shock rushed through him—a sudden, innate connection to every soul who had ever walked these halls.

One soul above all.

He jerked his hand away. The mask burned against his skin.

{This is a coup,} it seethed. {You cannot tolerate it.}

I am more myself than I ever was, Morthryn whispered, its voice echoing from its greatest depths.

The god journeyed deeper.

“Reveal yourself,” he commanded, raising his axe and the eye within it. The walls shook. Darkness flared from the corners. The dead pushed to the surface. “As the god of the dead, heir of Alarus, I command you to reveal the traitor you hide.”

Shadow ripped through the walls. A beam above crumbled, crashing to the floor with a pained final wail. The not-flames pulsed thicker, the dead lurching closer. Still, they fought his command.

The dead murmured, We cannot.

Morthryn agreed, We cannot.

The god’s lip curled. “You cannot,” he repeated in disgust. “I command you. You must .”

The dead only moaned in response, moving down the halls like sand rolling over the dunes.

{You have been too merciful,} the mask hissed. {This must end.}

The god agreed.

“Fine,” he said. “I will rip you apart and excise your disloyalty myself, if I must.”

And with a great surge of power, he did exactly as he promised. He swept down the great hall. Darkness raked through Morthryn’s walls behind him, tearing and clawing. The glass floor shattered. Behind him, arch after arch fell. Morthryn cried out in pain.

And yet, its resolve held.

The flames grew thicker. Even the god struggled to see through them, now. But a god does not need to see. He was on a warpath. With every flick of his hand, another wall fell. He ripped the ivy from the walls. Flowers, alight with flames, fell over him like rain.

And then he felt it:

A presence brighter than the weak souls of the dead, younger than the ancient halls of Morthryn.

And yet?.?.?.

Powerful. A power that even mirrored his own.

He whirled around to see a flash of smoke move from one door to another. The pull continued down the hall.

He smiled.

There you are.

A voice taunted back, If you want me, then come get me.

It was not Morthryn’s voice. Not the voice of the dead. Not the voice of the mask or the eye or the heart.

He inhaled the fleeting scent of burnt spice. A fierce hunger pang ripped through him. A longing for something that had never existed, like the pain of a phantom limb.

He pushed it away and gritted his teeth. He was a god, and gods did not like to be challenged.

Walls and defenses were of no consequence to him. He tore through Morthryn’s as if they were paper. He ripped past wall after wall. His challenger was in reach.

The flames swelled. The dead wailed. He pushed through an empty cell, a fallen stairwell, a long-abandoned bedchamber. At last, in a decaying office, full of picked-over shelves, he collided with his traitor.