The Kingdom of Gods

There is nothing more dangerous than a bored child — and though I had become a bored adolescent, that old mortal adage still rang true. So as the small hours stretched into slightly longer hours, I finally got up and opened a wall. That much, at least, I could do without expending any of my remaining strength; all it took was a word. When the daystone had finished rolling aside to make room for me, I went through the resulting opening into the dead spaces beyond.

Roaming my old territory put me in a better mood. Not everything was the same as it had been, of course. The World Tree had grown both around and through Sky, filling some of its old corridors and dead spaces with branchwood and forcing me to make frequent detours. This, I knew, had been Yeine’s intent, for without the Enefadeh, and more importantly without the constant empowering presence of the Stone of Earth, Sky needed the Tree’s support. Its architecture broke too many of Itempas’s laws for the mortal realm; only magic kept it in the sky and not smashed on the ground.

So down seventeen levels, around a swirling rise of linked globules that only resembled a tunnel in dreams, and underneath an arched branch spur, I found what I’d sought: my orrery. I moved carefully between the protective traps I’d set, out of habit stepping around the patches of moonstone that lined the floor. It looked like daystone— mortals had never been able to tell the difference — but on cloudy, new-moon nights, the pieces of moonstone transformed, opening into one of Nahadoth’s favorite hells. I had made it as a little treat for our masters, to remind them of the price to be paid for enslaving their gods, and we had all seeded it through the palace. They had blamed — and punished —Nahadoth for it, but he’d thanked me afterward, assuring me the pain was worth it.

But when I spoke atadie and the orrery opened, I stopped on its threshold, my mouth falling open.

Where there should have been more than forty globes floating through the air, all turning around the bright yellow sphere at the orrery’s center, there were only four still floating. Four, counting the sun sphere. The rest lay scattered about the floor and against the walls, corpses in the aftermath of a systemic carnage. The Seven Sisters, identical small goldenworlds I had collected after searching billions of stars, lay strewn about the edges of the room. And the rest — Zispe, Lakruam, Amanaiasenre, the Scales, Motherspinner with its six child moons linked by a web of rings, and oh, Vaz, my handsome giant. That one, once a massive stark-white sphere I had barely been able to get my arms around, had hit the floor hard, splitting down the middle. I went to the nearer of the shattered halves and picked it up, moaning as I knelt. Its core was exposed, cold, still. Planets were resilient things, far more than most mortal creatures, but there was no way I could repair this. Even if I’d had the magic left to spare.

“No,” I whispered, clutching the hemisphere to myself and rocking over it. I couldn’t even weehert even wp. I felt as dead as Vaz inside. Nahadoth’s words had not driven home the horror of my condition, but this? This I could not deny.

A hand touched my shoulder, and so great was my misery that I did not care who it was.

“I’m sorry, Sieh.” Yeine. Her voice, a soft contralto, had deepened further with grief. I felt her kneel beside me, her warmth radiant against my skin. For once, I took no comfort in her presence.

“My fault,” I whispered. I had always meant to disperse the orrery, returning its worlds to their homes when I’d tired of them. Only I never had, because I was a selfish brat. And when I’d been incarcerated in mortal form, desperate to feel like a god because my Arameri masters treated me like a thing, I had brought the orrery here despite the danger that they might be discovered. I had spent strength I didn’t have, killing my mortal body more than once, to keep the orrery alive. And now, after all that, I hadn’t even noticed that I’d failed them.

Yeine sighed and looped her arms around my shoulders, pressing her face to my hair for a moment. “Death comes to all, in time.”

But this had been too soon. My orrery should have lasted a sun’s lifetime. I drew a deep breath and set the hemisphere down, turning to look up at her. Her face did not show the shock that I knew she felt at the sight of my older shape. I was grateful for that, because she could have flinched at my withered beauty, but of course that was not her way. She still loved me, would always love me, even if I could no longer be her little boy. I lowered my eyes, ashamed that I had ever begrudged Itempas her affection.

“There are some survivors,” I said softly. “They …” I drew a deep breath. What would I do without them? I would truly be alone then … but I would do what was right. They deserved that, these truest friends of mine. “Will you help them, Yeine? Please?”