She felt Vasher approach before he arrived. Not only did he have a lot of Breath, but he was watching her, and she could feel the slight familiarity of that gaze. She turned, picking him out of the crowd. He stood out far more than she did, in his darker, ragged clothing.

“Congratulations,” he said as he approached, taking her arm.

“Why?”

“You’ll soon be an aunt.”

“What are you . . .” She trailed off. “Siri?”

“Your sister is pregnant,” he said. “The priests are going to make an announcement later this evening. The God King is apparently remaining in his palace to celebrate.”

Vivenna stood, stunned. Siri. Pregnant. Siri, who was still a little girl in Vivenna’s mind, bearing the child of that thing in the palace. And yet wasn’t Vivenna now fighting to keep that thing on his throne?

No, she thought. I haven’t forgiven Hallandren, even if I am learning not to hate it. I can’t let Idris be attacked and destroyed.

She felt a panic. Suddenly, all of her plans seemed meaningless. What would the Hallandren do to her once they had their heir? “We have to get her out,” Vivenna found herself saying. “Vasher, we have to rescue her.”

He remained quiet.

“Please, Vasher,” she whispered. “She’s my sister. I thought to protect her by ending this war, but if your hunch is right, then the God King himself is one of those who wants to invade Idris. Siri won’t be safe with him.”

“All right,” Vasher said. “I will do what I can.”

Vivenna nodded, turning back to the arena. The priests were withdrawing. “Where are they going?”

“To their gods,” Lightsong said. “To seek the Will of the Pantheon in formal vote.”

“About the war?” Vivenna asked, feeling a chill.

Vasher nodded. “It is time.”
* * *

LIGHTSONG WAITED BENEATH HIS CANOPY, a couple of serving men fanning him, a cup of chilled juice in his hand, lavish snacks spread out to his side.

Blushweaver brought me into this, he thought. Because she was worried that Hallandren would be taken by surprise.

The priests were consulting with their gods. He could see several of them kneeling before their Returned, heads bowed. It was the way that government worked in Hallandren. The priests debated their options then they sought the will of the gods. That would become the Will of the Pantheon. That would become the Will of Hallandren itself. Only the God King could veto a decision of the full Pantheon.

And he had chosen not to attend this meeting.

So self-congratulatory on spawning a child that he couldn’t even bother with the future of his people? Lightsong thought with annoyance. I had hoped he was better than that.

Llarimar approached. Though he had been down below with the other high priests, he had offered no arguments to the court. Llarimar tended to keep his thoughts to himself.

The high priest knelt before him. “Please, favor us with your will, Lightsong my god.”

Lightsong didn’t respond. He looked up, across the open arena to where Blushweaver’s canopy stood, verdant in the dimming evening light.

“Oh, God,” Llarimar said. “Please. Give me the knowledge I seek. Should we go to war with our kinsmen, the Idrians? Are they rebels who need to be quelled?”

Priests were already returning from their supplications. Each held aloft a flag indicating the will of their god or goddess. Green for a favorable response. Red for dissatisfaction with the petition. In this case green meant war. So far, five of the returning seven flew green.

“Your Grace?” Llarimar asked, looking up.

Lightsong stood. They vote, but what good are their votes? he thought, walking out from beneath his canopy. They hold no authority. Only two votes really matter.

More green. Flags flapped as priests ran down the walkways. The arena was abuzz with people. They could see the inevitable. To the side, Lightsong could see Llarimar following him. The man must be frustrated. Why didn’t he ever show it?

Lightsong approached Blushweaver’s pavilion. Almost all of the priests had gotten their answers, and the vast majority of them carried flags of green. Blushweaver’s high priestess still knelt before her. Blushweaver, of course, waited upon the drama of the moment.

Lightsong stopped outside of her canopy. Blushweaver reclined inside, watching him calmly, though he could sense her true anxiety. He knew her too well.

“Are you going to make your will known?” she asked.

He looked down at the center of the arena. “If I resist,” he said, “this declaration will be for naught. The gods can shout ‘war’ until they are blue, but I control the armies. If I don’t allow them my Lifeless, then Hallandren will not win any wars.”

“You would defy the Will of the Pantheon?”

“It is my right to do so,” he said. “Just as any of them have the same right.”

“But you have the Lifeless.”

“That doesn’t mean I have to do what I’m told.”

There was a moment of silence before Blushweaver waved to her priestess. The woman stood, then raised a flag of green and ran down to join the others. This brought forth a roar. The people must know that Blushweaver’s political wranglings had left her in a position of power. Not bad, for a person who had started without command of a single soldier.

With her control of that many troops, she’ll be an integral part of the planning, diplomacy, and execution of the war. Blushweaver could emerge from this as one of the most powerful Returned in the history of the kingdom.

And so could I.

He stared for a long moment. He hadn’t spoken of his dreams the last night to Llarimar. He’d kept them to himself. Those dreams of twisting tunnels and of the rising moon, just barely cresting the horizon. Could it be possible that they actually meant something?

He couldn’t decide. About anything.

“I need to think about this some more,” Lightsong said, turning to go.

“What?” Blushweaver demanded. “What about the vote?”

Lightsong shook his head.

“Lightsong!” she said as he left. “Lightsong, you can’t leave us hanging like this!”

He shrugged, glancing back. “Actually, I can.” He smiled. “I’m frustrating like that.”

And with that, he left the arena, heading back to his palace without giving his vote.

51

I’m glad you came back for me, Nightblood said. It was very lonely in that closet.

Vasher didn’t reply as he walked across the top of the wall surrounding the Court of Gods. It was late, dark, and quiet, though a few of the palaces still shone with light. One of those belonged to Lightsong the Bold.

I don’t like the darkness, Nightblood said.

“You mean darkness like now?” Vasher asked.

No. In the closet.

“You can’t even see.”

A person knows when they’re in darkness, Nightblood said. Even when they can’t see.

Vasher didn’t know how to respond to that. He paused atop the wall, overlooking Lightsong’s palace. Red and gold. Bold colors indeed.

You shouldn’t ignore me, Nightblood said. I don’t like it.

Vasher knelt down, studying the palace. He’d never met the one called Lightsong, but he had heard rumors. The most scurrilous of the gods, the most condescending and mocking. And this was the person who held the fate of two kingdoms in his hands.

There was an easy way to influence that fate.

We’re going to kill him, aren’t we? Nightblood said, eagerness sharp in his voice.

Vasher just stared at the palace.

We should kill him, Nightblood continued. Come on. We should do it. We really should do it.

“Why do you care?” Vasher whispered. “You don’t know him.”

He’s evil, Nightblood said.

Vasher snorted. “You don’t even know what that is.”

For once, Nightblood was silent.

That was the great crux of the problem, the issue that had dominated most of Vasher’s life. A thousand Breaths. That was what it took to Awaken an object of steel and give it sentience. Even Shashara hadn’t fully understood the process, though she had first devised it.

It took a person who had reached the Ninth Heightening to Awaken stone or steel. Even then, this process shouldn’t have worked. It should have created an Awakened object with no more of a mind than the tassels on his cloak.

Nightblood should not be alive. And yet he was. Shashara had always been the most talented of them, far more capable than Vasher himself, who had used tricks—like encasing bones in steel or stone—to make his creations. Shashara had been spurred on by the knowledge that she’d been shown up by Yesteel and the development of ichor-alcohol. She had studied, experimented, practiced. And she’d done it. She’d learned to forge the Breath of a thousand people into a piece of steel, Awaken it to sentience, and give it a Command. That single Command took on immense power, providing a foundation for the personality of the object Awakened.

With Nightblood, she and Vasher had spent much time in thought, then finally chosen a simple, yet elegant, Command. “Destroy evil.” It had seemed like such a perfect, logical choice. There was only one problem, something neither of them had foreseen.

How was an object of steel—an object that was so removed from life that it would find the experience of living strange and alien—supposed to understand what “evil” was?

I’m figuring it out, Nightblood said. I’ve had a lot of practice.

The sword wasn’t really to blame. It was a terrible, destructive thing—but it had been created to destroy. It still didn’t understand life or what that life meant. It only knew its Command, and it tried so very hard to fulfill it.

That man down there, Nightblood said. The god in the palace. He holds the power to start this war. You don’t want this war to start. That’s why he’s evil.

“Why does that make him evil?”

Because he will do what you don’t want him to.

“We don’t know that for certain,” Vasher said. “Plus, who is to say that my judgment is best?”

It is, Nightblood said. Let’s go. Let’s kill him. You told me war is bad. He will start a war. He’s evil. Let’s kill him. Let’s kill him.

The sword was getting excited; Vasher could feel it—feel the danger in its blade, the twisted power of Breaths that had been pulled from living hosts and shoved into something unnatural. He could picture them breathing out, black and corrupted, twisting in the wind. Drawing him toward Lightsong. Pushing him to kill.

“No,” Vasher said.

Nightblood sighed. You locked me in a closet, he reminded. You should apologize.

“I’m not going to apologize by killing someone.”

Just throw me in there, Nightblood said. If he’s evil, he’ll kill himself.

This gave Vasher pause. Colors, he thought. The sword seemed to be getting more subtle each year, though Vasher knew he was just imagining things, projecting. Awakened objects didn’t change or grow, they simply were what they were.

It was still a good idea.

“Maybe later,” Vasher said, turning away from the building.