Alessia and her apprentices were but the first. The captain delivered her to his counterparts at the palace, and took his squad to join a larger force in taking the priests from the temple of Miralei.

  The king had given orders for all Deverath’s temples to undertake a census. All that refused were to be razed, and their priests taken into custody. Miralei’s temple was but the first.

  Flames rose to the heavens and screams rent the night as priests fled the blaze and were captured and dragged away. They were told the king and his master demanded their presence at the palace, and that the invitation could not be declined.

  The neighboring temple of Staravan stood silent and dark, its white walls reflected the flames in cherry-red light. Its priests remained unseen, and if Miralei’s pantheonic husband had any objections, he didn’t make an appearance.

  The only movement on his temple’s stairs, or in its porticos were dancing shadows the color of dried blood.

  * * *

  In the heavens above, however, the gods took notice. They gathered at Staravan’s order until the conclave hall was almost full. Robes of blue and green shimmered amongst the gold and silver hues of the gods of air, metal, healing, and love. They glowed amongst the rougher greens and browns of those who served the interests of forest, mountain, and earth.

  Observing the havoc being wreaked below, and the way every one of Miralei’s servants was hunted through the streets, they had only one thing to say: “This is more serious than we thought.”

  Miralei, herself, stood, lips pursed as she observed the attack with bitter anger.

  “Where did this new power come from and why did we not foresee its arrival?” she demanded.

  As the goddess of order and law, what was happening below affronted her, but she hesitated to intervene. There were laws about direct intervention…and she now had no-one in place who could assist. She turned to the others, just as Toronar spoke.

  “Perhaps it is one of those who preceded us,” the god of discovery suggested.

  “Can anything be ancient enough for you not to have heard of it?” his son, Adriel asked, and Toronar frowned.

  “This one, perhaps,” he admitted. “The annals have no record of anything like it. It does not belong to another of the existing pantheons, nor the inscriptions that have so far been uncovered recording the pantheon before.

  “Maybe we’re searching in the wrong places,” Adriel answered. “I could look into that.”

  His response brought a snort of impatience from one of the dark-clad gods, although it wasn’t clear which, not even when they spoke.

  “Does it matter what the origin?” the dark deity snarled. “We are losing temples to the one, and I repeat the one being who serves it.”

  “And we are finding it usurping our own roles in the world,” put in a minor god of sickness. “Take that plague in Cherborik, for example. It belongs to none of us.”

  “And the horde that followed on the plague’s heels,” added the goddess of turmoil, “It was not we who summoned it, and we could do nothing to enforce its retreat.”

  “Indeed not,” added the god of battle. “Our temples were sacked by the same horde that despoiled yours, and the fallen belonging to the mercenaries hired to protect them rose from the battlefield and joined the horde, despite our best efforts to keep them asleep.”

  “Pfft! Don’t go blaming me,” protested Stellana, goddess of necromancers, all death and new life, as accusing faces were turned in her direction. “I had no control over what went on, there. My attention, if you must know, was drawn elsewhere.”

  “The Pitch Mire,” another god cut in.

  “Yes, the Pitch Mire,” Stellana confirmed, reluctantly adding, “And in other places where the dead are stirring without my instruction.”

  She pursed her lips, then drew a deep breath and continued.

  “And as for that, I have been suffering raids on the souls in my domain, and I would like to know which of you is responsible.”

  A swirl of wicked-smelling vapor interrupted the gods before any could reply, and they all turned toward it.

  “I’m sorry, Lady Stellana, but do I look guilty to you?” rumbled in smooth, dark tones from its midst.

  “Laganos!” Miralei exclaimed angrily. “How dare you?”

  The vapor cleared and a large, slime-skinned demon emerged, his flesh glistening in the magic lanterns lighting the area. He regarded the furious goddess with pitch-black eyes and shrugged.

  “It was simple,” he told her. “You are discussing a matter of relevance to me, and since being granted the status of a lesser god…”

  He allowed the words to trail into a deprecating smile and Miralei blushed scarlet. Beside her, her husband, Staravan flushed. Some of the gods snickered, hastily turning the sound into a cough, and hiding their smiles, when the lord of gods cast a searching look their way.

  Laganos’s successful masquerade, had netted him a night of unbridled passion with the goddess…and was rumored to have resulted in a child. It was also rumored that only Staravan’s understanding and pleas to not be left alone had kept the goddess from sacrificing herself in shame.

  Laganos took the hastily-smothered laughter as his due, and bowed toward the gallery. Turning back to the angry pair, he gave them an oily smile.

  “I felt it was my duty to attend.”

  Broadening his smile in a way designed to irritate, the demon swirled away to the end of the hall, and took a seat among the lesser gods. As he settled himself between the god of assassins and the goddess of shadows, their attention was stolen from him.

  With a clap of thunder and a roar of smoke even more noisome than Laganos’s own, the hall of gods suffered its second demonic guest. Laganos cringed as his master arrived in the center of the room. The mighty creature pivoted, his gaze raking the room, and not even pausing on Laganos as it moved full circuit and stopped on the chief of gods and his bride.

  “I am Trodus,” he announced in ponderous tones, which rose swiftly with anger, “And I demand satisfaction. I demand that the one responsible be delivered to me, now.”

  Staravan drew himself up to his full height, looking down at the demon with a disdainful glare.

  “I beg your pardon?” he asked.

  “I said, I wanted the one responsible to be handed over to me that I might deliver justice.”

  “I believe you will find justice lies within my realm,” Miralei told him stiffly.

  “And I believe we have no idea who you are looking for,” Staravan added. “What justice?”

  “You don’t know?” Trodus sneered. “A likely story. Deliver them, now, or I will reduce this hall and all within it to rubble and ash!”

  His voice had reached a healthy bellow by the time he’d finished, but Staravan drew himself to his full height and, with a pulse of godly power, he snapped out a reply.

  “Enough!” He surveyed the hall, ignoring the demon before him. “I have listened to your quibbles and disputes and none of you appear to realize that we are being set one against the other by the one…and I repeat, the one, being, someone who is skilled in power and it is we who—”

  “Enough, yourself!” Trodus roared. “Someone is assassinating my priests, and I will have vengeance!”

  He moved like a stooping hawk, turning his back on the greater gods and crossing the hall. He raised both hands, and was ready to seize those seated on either side of Laganos when a voice as soft and cold as snow, yet as hard as a Northman’s ice dagger, froze him in his tracks.

  “Touch either of my servants, and You’ll lose every priest you possess, for I will order my own people to join the attack against you, until there is no one who dares to utter your name for fear I will hear them.”

  With a cry of outrage and frustration, Trodus wheeled his great bulk around, drawing himself tall with fury as he faced the delicately-made goddess who’d materialized behind him.

  “Are you saying you haven’t already declared war on me and mine?” he demanded.

  The goddess regarded him serenely.

  “I do,” she replied, stilling his next outburst with a wave of her hand. “And I do not appreciate you accusing me of involvement in matters that do not concern me.”

  “Then why are you here?” the demon challenged.

  “I came here to prevent you from harming those you have no right to harm,” she answered, “and now that task is complete, I will leave.”

  “Enshul, hold.” Staravan’s voice rang out, demanding her attention.

  The other gods stilled, watching the confrontation. Daughter faced surrogate father, her hands frozen mid-spell, her face a mix of curiosity, defiance, and challenge.

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  “You’d command me, Lord Staravan?” she asked, her voice deceptively sweet.

  “I would ask you to attend,” he responded, although his expression suggested he’d do more than ask if she made him repeat the request.

  With his grievance answered, and seeing his thunder stolen, Trodus moved quietly to take his seat among the gods.

  Enshul looked around at the gathered deities, then looked back to her father, placing one hand on her hip as she sashayed toward the raised dais on which he and her mother stood.

  “And why should I attend this council of panicked weaklings?” she demanded. “My temples stand untouched. My servants serve in safety. And my network of power is uncompromised. What business of mine could it be when this rising power has not touched me or mine?”

  “I’m afraid you have been deceived, my daughter,” Staravan told her. “You have been as compromised as the rest of us, and such is the skill of our opponent that you are ignorant of how deeply our enemy has struck.”

  “Lies!” Enshul retorted. “I would know.”

  “That is what we would all hope,” Staravan answered. “If you have time to listen, I will explain.”

  Enshul folded her arms across her chest, shaking her head so that her hair shimmered.

  “Prove it,” she challenged, “and I’ll stay.”

  Staravan sighed. “As you wish…”

  He swept his hand in an arc, and the floor lying before the tiered seating in which the gathered deities sat, became a picture window framed by the thinnest image of flagstones.

  Enshul stepped swiftly to one side as those surrounding the floor craned forward for a better view.

  “Show me,” she commanded.

  The picture frame shimmered and a man with washed-out blue eyes and a weather-beaten face came into view. He was reporting to someone seated on a dais, but the angle of the scry did not reveal who. The gods and goddesses listened as he reported what Alessia had seen in the king’s temple.

  Their eyes widened as they saw the way he was used to scry on the wizardess and her apprentices, unease rippling through the gathering when they registered the presence and vessel it had chosen, but none of them said a word as they watched the Tillerman dismissed, and the king conduct a second scry.

  When the scry was over and the picture faded, Enshul turned to her father.

  “I still don’t see what relevance this has to me,” she said scornfully.

  “This should explain,” Staravan told her, and the picture cleared to show the weather-beaten man speaking with a seer.

  As they listened, they learned where the Tillerman had sourced his information regarding the wizardess…and that Raomar had taken a new apprentice. It was, however, news of the state Raomar had been in after his last visit with Enshul that drew the most attention.

  As they listened, the gathered deities turned their attention to the goddess, watching her mouth tighten with anger. Somehow, she managed to maintain a firm grip on her temper as she turned angry eyes to her father.

  “Minor incidents,” she said scornfully. “And easily dealt with…now I know of them.”

  He gave her a tight smile.

  “Then call this minor,” he challenged, his voice hard.

  The scene in the picture frame rippled, the weather-beaten man fading to reveal the dim interior of Raomar’s temple, where a solidly-built priest with warm, brown eyes walked swiftly along a corridor.

  “Misrandar,” Enshul murmured, and the man glanced up, as though hearing his name.

  He frowned silently, but when he heard nothing more, he continued on his way.

  All along the corridor, the lamps burned with a steady blue flame, lighting the hallway with patches of blue-tinged light. As the deities watched, the shadows between each well-lit sconce began to lengthen. The priest didn’t notice the gathering dark, but continued on, intent on his errand.

  Enshul moved a little closer to the edge of the picture, her eyes focused on the shadows growing between the lamplight. She drew a short, sharp breath as her priest reached the door leading to the temple’s inner chamber.

  “No!” she cried, as he stretched his hand toward the handle.

  The watching gods started back, as black static crackled off the door. Laganos gave an appreciative whistle at the display, but cut it off when he caught Trodus’s glare.

  The priest, on the other hand, froze, his face creasing with puzzlement.

  “Mistress?” he asked.

  The shadows beside him writhed with sudden life, and Enshul snarled with fury. With her face contorting in anger, she made a curt gesture, creating a projection of herself to stand beside her priest.

  Dark laughter, thick and rich as velvet, filled the hall, and Misrandar looked around in alarm. His face contorted with shock when he saw his goddess’s avatar standing beside him. The shock faded to concern as he saw the darkness and shadows surrounding them, and finally sensed the gathering evil.

  “Forgive me, Mistress,” he said, his face growing pale, “For I haven’t guarded your halls as well as I should. Go! I know you will grant me all the aid you can.”

  Enshul’s eyebrows rose in brief amusement at his words, then faded to pity. She laid a hand on her priest’s broad shoulders and tried for a comforting smile.

  “Fear not, Misrandar,” she soothed. “If you should fall, today, you will walk with me in the halls of my house before your earthly body has cooled.”

  The priest opened his mouth to reply, but was cut short by another burst of velvety laughter. The sound rippled mockingly from the shadows, winding around the pair in soft derision.

  “You underestimate my power, Enshul,” a deep voice sneered, as Misrandar whimpered in protest. “His soul is already mine.”

  Misrandar’s body crumbled, dropping to the hallway floor, and more laughter echoed around Enshul’s horrified form. The shadows vanished, leaving her to stand beside Misrandar’s corpse, in a hallway still lit by the blue light of her presence.

  Staravan snapped his fingers, and the window closed, leaving only flagstones where its image had once filled the floor.

  Enshul uttered the word that would end her projection, and gave him an angry look.

  “You have my complete cooperation,” she snarled, her voice jagged with frustration and grief. “This is one power even I cannot afford to ignore.”

  “And now you have a promise to keep,” he reminded her.

  “It seems impossible,” she snapped, “but I will do everything within my power to retrieve his soul.”

  “And you will have my assistance,” one of the other goddesses assured her, her face clouding, “For if he steals so casually from you, then he must have also stolen from me.”

  “And me,” Trodus rumbled. “You have my support.”

  “Very well,” Enshul replied, not hiding her surprise at the demon’s offer.

  “Hold, then,” Staravan reiterated. “We will find who is responsible. Adriel and Toronar have set their minds to it.”

  “Name your price,” Enshul ordered, knowing there would be one. Even in matters like this, payment would be due.

  “Two of your servants,” Staravan replied, raising a hand to silence her as he continued, “One of which must be a priest of good standing… and one of which must be skilled in life’s…shadier aspects.”

  For a moment, the goddess gaped at him and it looked like she was going to refuse, then she closed her mouth, taking a deep breath before acknowledging his request.

  “Do you have anyone in mind?” she asked, and her expression said she knew he must.

  Staravan didn’t hesitate in his reply.

  “Chervain the spymaster,” Staravan replied. “He is the best in his field and is familiar with many of the lands to which our servants need to travel.”

  Enshul shook her head. “Spymaster Chervain passed into my domain two moon-cycles ago,” she told her father, “But he did leave an apprentice, one Brianda Bloodbriar…and while she is not my servant, I can still recommend her.”

  “Is she as good as her master?” Staravan asked.

  “Almost,” Enshul replied. “She is the also the only one who has his particular set of skills. The others,” and here she glanced at her half-sister, Istilica, with mischief in her eyes, “Are all busy with my latest instructions.”

  “Very well,” her father agreed, wisely ignoring the exchange. “And the priest?”

  Enshul’s face darkened, and she cautiously asked, “Do you have a name?”

  Staravan eyed her warily, but gave her the name, anyway.

  “Your high priest, Raomar Filameth.”

  Enshul flushed slightly. “Ah…can you name another?”

  Staravan reluctantly shook his head. “I am sorry, daughter, from the very little we know of your priests, he is the only one who can do what we need.”

  “Because he has adventured?” Hurt colored the goddess’s tone…hurt and resentment, both, as she added, “Or because he is kevarag?”

  “Both,” Staravan told her honestly. “And also because of where he came from, where he has traveled and where, I suspect, this battle will lead him.”

  Enshul met his eyes and held his gaze, looking for all the world like she was assessing the truth behind his words. As if seeing no room for doubt, she bowed her head, her shoulders sagging in defeat.

  “It is true that I have no other servant to match him,” she answered, “and it is true that he has been places no other servant has been, and done what none of my other servants have even contemplated, but…”

  Her face flushed a slightly darker shade as she admitted, “He is a…favorite…of mine.”

  Quickly smothered laughter showed there were those in the ranks of the gods around them, who recognized her discomfort. When Enshul raised her head to survey them, the laughter abruptly stopped and some adopted a blank expression to disguise their sudden unease.

  The undisguised fury and disappointment in her expression was enough to make any of them think twice about provoking her.

  “Will no other do?” she asked, but Staravan shook his head.

  “I’m sorry, daughter,” he said gently, his face softening. “But there is no other.”

  Enshul stared at him for a long moment then huffed out a sigh. For a moment, she dropped her gaze as though in contemplation, but when she raised it again, her eyes blazed.

  “Very well,” she snapped. “Take him, take them both, and consider my part done.”

  Staravan regarded her for a long moment, as though deciding whether he could push her further. Deciding it would be better not to, he sighed.

  “Until we call upon you again,” he agreed, and watched as she rose from her seat and stalked to the center of the hall.

  There, she raised her hands above her head, clapped them once, then disappeared in flash of darkness that sent echoes billowing across the chamber. Before Staravan could breathe another sigh of relief, another clap of sound heralded her reappearance.

  “He is your responsibility,” she announced, her voice full of fury and spite. “And his powers are gone.”

  She raised her hands, once more, but Staravan intervened before she could disappear.

  “Be at the Wildejun Meld,” he instructed. “Your presence is required for the exchange.”

  Enshul slowly lowered her hands, and gave her father a calculating stare.

  “Very well,” she agreed shortly, “But I have other business to attend to, until then.”

  Staravan dipped his chin in acknowledgement.

  “Be vigilant, my daughter,” he told her, and her lip curled with scorn.

  “Don’t worry, father, I’m about to be!”

  Again, the chamber reverberated to a roll of sound as the goddess disappeared, in the deific equivalent of a slammed door. Several heartbeats of silence followed, but when it became clear she was not returning, the meeting continued.

  “Iades, Konik, Lesana, Olias and Nala,” Staravan addressed Noraka’s children, “Your people will be needed along the way. I have a direction for the travelers, but that is all.”

  The five minor deities bowed in acknowledgement.

  “You have only to call on us,” Iades told him, indicating his siblings to show he spoke for them.

  Staravan acknowledged them with a nod. “I would expect nothing less of Noraka’s get.”

  He turned to another of those in attendance.

  “Sophriel?”

  “I can assign a wizard, if you wish,” the goddess of magic replied. “You have only to tell me what kind of wizard you need.”

  “Thank you,” Staravan acknowledged. “When I know the nature of our need, I will call on you.”

  “And I will be ready,” Sophriel told him.

  “And will you require one of my problem-solvers?” Adriel asked, but Staravan shook his head.

  “Not yet,” he answered, “but…”

  “I will have one standing by,” Adriel hastened to assure him.

  A gasp of pain interrupted them, and Staravan pivoted to see what was wrong. Beside him, Miralei doubled over clutching her hands to her stomach as she dropped to her knees. A low moan escaped her lips.

  Staravan crouched beside her in concern. “My love?”

  Miralei gestured weakly toward the center of the hall, and the floor formed another window. Flames came to life inside the frame, licking up through billowing smoke and lighting the streets around her main Toramarian temple.

  Armored figures moved along the streets, running down the priests who tried to escape and dragging them into a line along one edge of the road. For a moment, Staravan felt relieved they didn’t throw his wife’s servants back into the flame. It took another moment to realize that there were corpses as well as captives.

  These were piled in the street, as the cries and screams of Miralei’s priests rose to the sky. The goddess stretched a hand toward them, seeking to dampen the flames, but another gasp saw her wrap her arms around her middle, again.

  “What is it?” Staravan asked anxiously.

  “He has taken their souls,” she moaned, and murmurs of horror rippled around the room.

  Raising his hands, Staravan started to call the magic needed to dampen the flames. Instead of obeying, they leapt higher, the fire growing stronger, as though fueled by something other than the temple’s remains and the oil poured on them by the soldiers.

  The smoke grew thicker, coalescing to form a flat plane of black that blocked the gods’ view. Veins of green formed a crazed pattern across the darkness, and the picture abruptly shattered. The cries of Miralei’s tormented priests rose to a soul-tearing crescendo, and familiar, dark laughter threaded its way through them.

  The deities leaned forward, trying to see where the laughter came from but they saw nothing…and then, with a suddenness that shocked them all, the hall floor was just that…a floor.

  The picture was gone.

  Another power had blanked it out.