Page 152 of Till Death

“Thirsty?” Ro asked, pouring herself a drink.

“Seriously, why didn’t you tell me, Ro?”

“Humans are fickle, and you are the ficklest of them all. So consumed by the guilt of the dark magic, you couldn’t see the light. Telling you wouldn’t have made a difference until you were ready to use it. I dropped hints, but you were obtuse.”

“But Orin…”

She froze, staring between us both. “Yes. Orin. What happened? I haven’t been able to see anything in the majority of Silbath in days, and it’s not safe for me to leave.”

“Not safe?”

Her voice became otherworldly, as if it carried two tones of absolute command, seeking the truth, as was her godly charge. “We’ll get there. Tell me what happened with Orin. Now.”

“Long story,” Paesha said. “I’ll condense. You and Orin were keeping secrets, even though we’d told you not to.”

“That’s not keeping it short, Huntress.”

“Right.” She glowered. “But it was worth saying. Anyway, Dey ran off, Drexel caught her, and turned her over to the new king. The new king wasn’t being very nice, and it pissed Orin off, so he… you know, just killed a bunch of people, and broke the world to free her, and then Death?—”

She held up her hand. “I can pretty much guess what happened from there. Thank you.”

I narrowed my eyes at her. “So, you knew he was Orin’s father?”

“Yes. Of course.”

“And you instructed him to kill me?”

“I put you both in the same place at the same time and hoped for the best.”

“That’s awfully… meddling of you, Goddess.”

She shrugged. “I have my own reasons. You were properly trained. Now’s not the time for pity parties, Maiden.”

“So we never were friends? I was just a pawn?”

“Why must we always come back to this? Your constant need for validation is exhausting. Of course, we are friends. I wouldn’t have bothered if we weren’t. Did you not fall in love with him, Dey? Did your life not start over because of him? The road was messy, but the destination was the right one.”

“Why are we talking in circles?” Paesha asked. “Can we please get to the point? What the fuck is going on, and how are we going to get him back? Those are the questions we need answers to. The rest of this doesn’t matter.”

“We’ll start from the beginning. Or a beginning, I should say. Have a seat, ladies.”

Paesha sat so close our thighs touched. Ro poured amber liquid into three glasses, and though Paesha snatched the one offered to her, I passed, waiting for answers.

“Most of the history of Requiem as you know it is false, though each piece is laced with truth.” She sat in the chair across from us, her long legs slipping from her red silk gown as she crossed them. “Requiem is a world ruled by the gods from their home in Etherium. When war broke out here, Reverius, the Keeper of the Realms and Highest Sovereign, banned every god from returning to Requiem. Some still found a way, pining for those who worshiped them. Some took humans to their beds and left babies in the bellies of women. That’s where traces of power can be found.” She took a sip of her drink. “Like you, Huntress, the blood of Alastor, God of Lost and Broken things runs through your veins.”

“Oh, I bet you loved him,” Paesha said.

“I love my brother enough,” Ro answered defensively.

“I’m sure there’s a point to all of this,” I said, interrupting.

“But this story doesn’t begin with Requiem; rather, it ends here. For now. Because one particular goddess, who held the Keeper in the highest esteem, never left the comfort of Etherium. She’d worked from the heavens to cast her power below. Some would say this seclusion made her naïve. Especially when Death snuck into the realm of gods, fully convinced he could kill the Keeper and take his place as sovereign. But Death got distracted and fell in love with that naïve goddess. Every day, he returned to our realm, showering her with promises of eternal glory. Until he was discovered.

“As punishment, Reverius threw Death and the goddess he’d obsessed over, from his sacred realm, damning her to live eternity in Requiem. To safeguard her eternal damnation and shunning, the punishment she took for allowing such a being into his realm, the Keeper took away Requiem’s ability to die, creating another immortal world where Death’s power was not welcome and would not work. Reverius knew that Death would otherwise hunt the soul of his lover and draw her into his court for eternity.

“But Death was cunning and desperate to find his lover. Willing to pay whatever cost the magic demanded, he used a dark curse to bring forth a harbinger: a person able to traverse the immortal realm and kill in his place, sending the soul of the fallen directly to his infamous court. The price, however, was a counterpart, a Life Maiden, able to bring fertility and healing to a world suffering from battle scars that spanned lifetimes. Death never saved Requiem from war. The Keeper did.

“Centuries later, Death was still hunting for the soul of his beloved. A single harbinger in a realm of two giant cities was not enough. Time was his enemy, as he had to lie in wait a full year before he could deliver a new name to his Maiden or Lord. But his power was not absolute. It was not without flaws. And so, he found another way to outsmart the gods. Another power, another cost.