Page 139 of The Lost Reliquary

Osiron collapses, weakened by the strain of the calling. Good. I get to my feet, then still as my movement draws the new deity’s attention again. They mimic me, pushing up against the column Nolan had been leaning against, then falter, catching themselves.

A newborn. A colt that needs to find its legs.

I’m not giving it that chance. I am not newborn, and right now I am absolutely bursting with divine power.

Osiron is weak as well.

Picking the sword off a guard’s corpse, I advance. I want my sickles, want to feel that familiar weight in my hands as I slice through Osiron, see whether they can pull their little survival trick again, but oh well. Any blade will do. I will flay and I will burn and I will not be stopped. This rage is not my own, not entirely. The memories, the anger… this was a betrayal. Same as when Osiron tried to hobble us, make me less than I was.

No, not me.

Tempestra.

I can’t allow myself to get bogged down by thoughts that aren’t mine. But it’s hard to define those edges. Shared moments blur together, two songs in harmony, a story remembered two different ways. I will not let that muddle me; I am Lys, even if I am Tempestra now too. At least for as long as it takes to get Nolan back, and then you are getting the fuck out of my head, Mother.

Lys…

I see it.

Osiron seems to rally, getting to their feet again, though with obvious effort. A look of new-parent pride flashes. Then they see us, and it turns into something I’m overjoyed to see: fear. “What… what have you done?”

“Same thing as you.” I raise the sword, feel my power swell. “What we had to.”

Then the floor shifts like sand beneath me, opening and closing just as fast, locking me in place. Oh, please. I push back, give Tempestra rein. The rock moves, not as freely, but enough to release us. I climb out of the ground. Something punches me in the chest—a spear of twisted iron—throwing me back into the apse of bones. I only laugh. The blow would have pulped a normal person’s innards, put a Potentiate down for at least a few minutes.

I barely felt a thing.

Do you grasp my power now—

Shut up.

I rise again, blade still in hand, waiting for the next blow to fall. Instead, there is a rumbling. The Whisperer’s attention isn’t on me anymore. Their eyes are raised to the ceiling, to the arches above, as if in prayer. Too late, I realize what is coming.

Osiron can’t win, but they can do the next best thing.

I throw myself against the back wall as the Cathedral begins to split and crumble, raining down. I deflect, push it all away, but Tempestra’s hold over the world is clunkier, less precise. Debris collides with my newly healed flesh, enough that it actually hurts, actuallydamages, no matter that the power rises to fix those wounds almost immediately.

I… we… cannot escape the barrage. The whole of our existence turns toward survival, while around us, the world fills up with darkness.

Lys.

I wake entombed.

It hasn’t been long, but by the time I dig out from beneath the stone and wood and tile and glass, I am already fully aware that Osiron and Nolan are gone. The sensation of the new deity still tickles at the edge of my perception, but it’s only a piece of knowledge, not a compass. And Osiron might as well be a ghost.

What is left is left in pieces, illuminated by the sunlight streaming through the broken remains of the roof. Gold. Bones. Bodies and blood. The Cathedral is in ruins. The Enduring Flame, extinguished.

And I failed. Nolan is still enthralled. Maybe lost forever.

No. Find them. Stop them, before it’s too—

Shut up, Tempestra.

I know what I have to do.

Epilogue

IDIG THROUGH CORPSES ANDdebris until I find what I am searching for.

Then, it’s only a matter of patience.

Some hours after Osiron and Nolan disappear, Morgan wakes, deathly still one second, gasping back into the living world the next. She draws one desperate breath after another, as if unconsciousness had been some sort of drowning. Finally, she gathers herself enough to take in her surroundings and spot me waiting nearby, settled upon the toppled statue of one of my chil—of one of our honored blood brethren.

“Hey,” I say. “Knew you were too fucking stubborn to die.”

Her mouth gapes open. Closes. Which is so satisfying, because I catch the moment she sees—reallysees—who is sitting in front of her. I’ve been looking forward to it for hours.

“So,” we say, because in this we are in agreement, “still interested in being Executrix?”