A woman appeared over the rise of the hill, though it was hard to see her shape or form, concealed as it was in darkness. Merrick drew in his breath and felt primitive fear clutch his stomach.
Few Deacons had seen a geistlord and lived to report back. The first Deacon sprang to Merrick’s mind, the ancestor of Raed Rossin, and how he had made the first bargain with the geistlord. As the woman drew nearer, Merrick realized one thing—no one had spoken of their terrible beauty.
Her dark hair tumbled down flawless, naked skin. As his vision cleared he was entranced by the glimpses of her body beyond her curls. She was perfectly nude, and her soft feet landed on rock or moss without reaction—as if pain was for smaller beings. Shadows cascaded from her shoulders and circled her head. Thankfully he could not see into them fully . . . and he knew why.
“Shades,” he whispered, his Center revealing the captured souls that followed her. He could not count the number of them—it had to be thousands. Suddenly the horror of the Rossin did not seem so great.
Geists fed on the souls of humans for the most part—but it was not all that could sustain them. Emotions like rage and love often drew them, so what greater sustenance could there be for a geistlord than adoration? These shades suggested this one had fed well.
“Mother,” Onika spoke clearly to the advancing woman, “you are not welcome here.”
Merrick shook his head—for a moment pulling the two difficult facts together. That Hatipai was a goddess, he was sure. But that was not all he saw when he looked at her. She was also a geist.
Though he was horrified, it made sense. Scholars had always just assumed that the population had turned away from the gods because they had been unable to protect them from the arrival of the Otherside—but if any of them had suspected they were in fact geistlords, then denying their deities was just retribution.
“Son,” the woman spoke, and it was like sweet honey. A sound to make men weep with lust and women commit suicide in despair. “Come to me, and all will be forgiven—even trying to turn my faithful against me.”
Onika straightened. “I could not do it.”
“No.” The goddess laughed. “Not for lack of trying, though. They would have none of it. Foolish boy.”
Though there was no expression visible under the mask, the Prince’s weight of sadness was reflected in the set of his shoulders. He certainly did no appear to enjoy his godhood.
She stepped closer, and even the Ehtia drew back as her presence threatened to wash over them. “I made you for a purpose, Onika: to protect my realm and all the people in it. So long as you live—and I made you to live forever, dearest—Chioma will endure.”
Onika’s laugh was low and bitter. “Yet what is the point of eternal life without love? And you made sure that there will never be love or an heir for me.”
His voice was so sad that it instantly brought Merrick back to the moment where his mother was sitting next to him on the bed, smiling, with her hand resting on her full stomach. I don’t know how he heard of me, she had said.
Suddenly the future opened up before him, and he heard Nynnia’s words. Plant the seed, she had said. His mother had smiled and glowed with such happiness. It had been true love in her eyes, not the mad, hopeless faith of one trapped by the demigod beneath the mask, but real love, as unexpected, delicious and treasured as that could be. Merrick knew what Nynnia wanted and why she had sent him here.
He almost blurted it out, but then Hatipai was speaking. “You alone can hold Chioma—you must live.”
Onika was her focus. The Order’s training made this blatantly obvious. Just as the Rossin had invested in the Imperial family, Hatipai had made her own anchor to this world—similar but different ways of surviving the perils of the real world.
“Let these people pass,” Onika growled.
“Your allies?” The shadows began to race counterclockwise around the face of the geistlord. “They practically invited us into this world, and now when they betray us, you would protect them?” The shades darted apart, and her face was revealed.
Merrick’s senses betrayed him. He dimly heard the Ehtia around him also fall to their knees, but nothing mattered apart from the glory of Hatipai. None of them were worthy of it. When her gaze fell on him, he wanted to slit his own throat lest he insult her with his own pitiful nature. He rolled onto his back, his hands grasping desperately for his knife.
To his right, he caught a glimpse of the vile woman Nynnia fumbling with her stick. She did not seem to have quite as an appropriate reaction to the glory of Hatipai.
From the ground he also saw the heretic Onika raising the weirstone. His glory was nothing compared to his mother’s. But somehow in his fitful delight, Merrick saw a parting of the shades, a gap in her armor of souls. And he reached deep for his training—throwing his mind into the puzzles and recitations he’d studied for years. In there he found a moment of respite.
“There.” His voice cracked. “Onika, there!”
He had no Bond with the Prince as he had with Sorcha, but his voice was just loud enough to hear. Onika said a bright, hot word and threw the weirstone into the shadows and the gap that the Deacon had spotted.
Hatipai screamed, a sound that went deeper than bone, and the shadows flew high. Shades, those mindless, repetitive remains of souls, broke from her like a cloud of scattering crows. Merrick saw them escape the pull of the geistlord and was glad, though everything was mad and dead to him in that moment. Then the world was swallowed by darkness.
When consciousness found him again, his head was cradled in Nynnia’s lap. Her fingers gently stroked his hair, calling him back to reality. It was a lovely ment, but eventually he found his feet.
Nothing dark remained on the blasted cliff top—only the Ehtia, their machine and Onika. “What happened?” The young Deacon turned to Nynnia, but it was the Prince who replied.
“She is gone . . . for now.” His shoulders slumped. “I have bought you enough time to escape. The path is free for you to reach Mount Sytha, my friends.” He sounded desperately alone. “She and I will continue our tussle once you are gone.”
Nynnia grabbed him in a tight embrace. “You will find other allies, Onika. She is not as all-powerful as she thinks.”
Then the Ehtia surrounded him, hugging him, whispering thanks in his ear—while Nynnia and Merrick stepped back.
The weight of sorrow pressed on the Deacon—especially as he knew how many lonely years Onika would have to endure. As the crew of the ship began to clamber back into the hatches, Merrick squeezed Nynnia’s hand and went to speak to the Prince. “Thank you for what you are doing, Your Highness. The people of Chioma might not know what you sacrificed to keep them safe, but others do.”
“I have to be a hero,” Onika muttered, “or become like her.”
“Then I hope you remember this—” Merrick paused, caught by the circular nature of this weird logic, before plunging on. “In the time of an Emperor called Kaleva, seek out a woman known as the flower of Da Nanth.”
“Da Nanth?”
Naturally he wouldn’t know of the principality—because it had not yet been created. It almost hurt his head to think about it, so he merely smiled. “Trust me, it is a place—though not yet.”
The Prince frowned, but a spark of something that felt like hope lurked in his expression. “Thank you, my friend.”
“Do not thank me”—Merrick clapped him on the shoulder—“thank Nynnia.”
The Prince smiled uncertainly and embraced the woman. “Go safe into that place, old friend—part of me wishes I could come with you.” He kissed the top of her head.
She laid her hands over his for an instant. “You have your people to take care of, Onika—and where we go, you cannot.”
The Prince turned and sketched a little bow in Merrick’s direction, the beaded mask swaying. Onika’s voice was smooth, strong and just as it would be when next they encountered each other in throne room in the Hive City. “I find myself looking forward to meeting you again, Merrick Chambers.”