Gwil and Challe landed beside the empty pedestal of the Goddess. One of her human arms had broken off—the one that cradled a sculpted baby. It lay atop the desecrated sand.

  Carnage filled the pit—the corpses of Malikauan warriors and Leviathan troopers. Little dried-out rivers ran from their bodies and the sand was chunky with congealed blood. Encircling the space were the broken crucifixes and the burnt husks of the former Vessels.

  Without the radiance of the jade statue, gloom filled the auditorium. But at the far end, through the doors, in the hallway beyond, a swaying green light cast two figures as silhouettes.

  Challe went tearing after them. Gwil scooped up the broken arm as he followed. “These make great weapons,” he told her. He grabbed a bladed club, too, and slipped it into his jacket’s inside pocket.

  “They’re here, Self!” Claws cried as Gwil and Challe entered the hallway.

  “We’d already be gone if you were doing your part, Claws,” Tezca bellowed.

  They each carried one end of the hulking statue. Tezca had the forward-facing position, holding the feet-end aloft above his head. This meant that the statue’s weight was bearing down on Claws, who stumbled backwards, barely keeping his feet.

  This hall, too, was full of Malikauan corpses, though they’d been purposefully lain along the walls. Their dead faces looked eerie in the green light.

  Gwil galloped ahead, taking a moment to orient himself to the direction of his head. He drew back the Goddess’s broken arm as he came up alongside Tezca.

  He chucked the arm—hefty baby-end first—like a lopsided javelin, straight at Claws’s defenseless face.

  Claws’s neck snapped back with such a brutal crack that Gwil thought he might have a comrade-in-twisted-headedness.

  The man fell, dropping the statue as Tezca heedlessly plowed forward. The Goddess’s eagle-like head fell, not to the ground, nor even onto Claws’s toe. No, the momentum drove it into his chest. Blood spurted as the beak slammed down, gouging his stomach.

  As Claws screamed in agony, Tezca roared with rage. “Argh! Why can’t everyone just leave. Me. Alone!” He heaved the massive statue and hurled it at Gwil and Challe.

  Gwil pulled Challe away, but the statue’s height exceeded the hallway’s width, so it got wedged and crashed to the floor in front of them. One wing broke off, losing its glow. The protuberant humanish face that was carved out of the wing’s surface receded inward and smoothed away, like a fading ripple in a pond.

  Challe and the storm screamed in tandem. She charged forward and clambered up the statue, which lay across the hall, separating them from Tezca. Gwil jumped up after her.

  And saw Tezca, sitting on the floor, head bowed, legs out, like a sad little kid. Stunned, Gwil was not in time to catch Challe, who loosed a visceral shriek as she jumped down.

  Four arms splayed out like wings, she threw herself at Tezca, ripping, clawing. Little bolts of lightning crackled out of her hands to scald Tezca’s face. He sat there and took it, unmoving, unflinching. Vacant, like a depressed dog without a care for its surroundings.

  Gwil fell—because of his head—as he climbed down from the statue. He hurriedly got up and barred all of Challe’s arms from behind, trying to wrestle her back. Her Nirva burned him, and he had to focus his own to match her.

  “You destroyed my home,” Tezca blubbered. “Stay here and die if you want but let us leave. I just want to go home.”

  “Challe!” Gwil said through clenched teeth. He had to kick her legs out and bring her down to get her to stop. She tried to claw at his face, but only scratched at the back of his head. “Ha! Finally something useful,” he said as he sat on two of Challe’s arms and leaned his elbow on her chest to pin her. He lowered his head to look up at Tezca’s bowed face. “Tezca, what the hell is this? I knew you’re a big wimp, but c’mon.”

  A few meters ahead, Claws rolled around on the ground, groaning. “Seriously, Self,” he said between gags. “This is embarrassing.”

  “Hahaha!” Tezca spat. A small cloud of white-silver vapor drifted from Claws to Tezca. “Have fun healing your intestines at a snail’s pace, asshole. Speak again and you die.”

  Claws stifled a cry and writhed in silence.

  Gwil furrowed his brow. “Well, I’m down for this, but you gotta apologize and—” Challe kneed him square in the face, since it was turned toward her feet. “Stop it, Challe! Tezca—you gotta apologize and let the Malikauans decide what to do with you.”

  “Apologize? You’re the one who should apologize—you and this traitor Vessel. You got everything destroyed. You brought the Leviathan here.”

  You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.

  “All of that was your fault ‘cause you started it,” Gwil said.

  Tezca looked up at that, wide-eyed. “Are you insane? I’m still going to run away. I just need to gather my thoughts. It’s been a hard day.”

  “No,” Gwil said. “I’m not gonna let you do that. All these people… You stole something that can’t be returned. That can’t go unpunished, even if I think you’re a funny guy. Sorry.”

  Tezca flopped down onto his back, covered his mouth, and screamed into his hand. “I just don’t know how to explain this in a way that you will understand. Yuma is coming. He is a King. You stole the incredibly precious Erithist Spike and, even worse, ruined the ritual—”

  “Oh yeah, the Oubliette! What the hell is with that corpse and the weird building that grew out of it?”

  “Ha!” Tezca said. “As if I’d ever tell you that.”

  “Why not, if you’re running away?” Gwil asked as Challe flailed beneath him, growling. He adjusted his hold on her.

  “Because you pissed me off a lot! And also, I don’t really know.”

  “Huh? But it’s in your basement.”

  “That wretched thing predates me by centuries. Here’s everything I know. It was created at the end of the Apocalypse. Not only that, but it played a crucial role in ending the Apocalypse. And there are many more sites just like it, scattered all over the World.”

  “Cool, thanks. But I thought you weren’t gonna tell me anything.”

  “I wasn’t, but then I remembered I’m just as angry at Yuma as I am at you, and revealing this secretive information would piss him off. If not for him, I wouldn’t have to run away. I’d just kill you.”

  Gwil laughed. “You can’t kill me.”

  “Don’t be rude while I’m trying to help you!” Tezca said. “You’re the one who asked.”

  “It’s more my friend that wants to—Guzuzuzah!”

  A bolt of lightning struck Gwil, and his body went rigid. Challe got out from under him as he flared Nirva to heal his scorched and deadened parts.

  “I hate you, I hate you, I hate you!” Challe screamed as she slapped Tezca across the face with the incredible efficiency afforded by her extra hands.

  He just wailed.

  Gwil scuffled with her as she fought him off with two hands and continued slapping with the others. He finally pulled her away by wrapping his arms around her waist and dragging her down.

  “Thank you, Will,” Tezca said as he took out a container of deviled eggs and popped one into his mouth. As he chewed, the bleeding scratches on his face healed.

  “Oo, can I have one of those?” Gwil said.

  “No,” Tezca said, snapping the lid closed. “But I will tell you something else since you stopped that vicious animal from attacking a broken-hearted man.” He blew a raspberry at Challe. “There’s something else special about this place. It is an easily defensible stretch of land. The Gracestorm served another role, one that I don’t care about, but the Leviathan does.

  “It impeded southward travel and settlement. We’re not so far from the very bottom of the World… It’s hidden there, in the Nadir. The Spiked City of Nethelam, where lies the crypt of the Pantheistic Nascent.”

  Gwil had stopped listening because he didn’t know what Tezca was talking about, and because Challe had suddenly stopped struggling against him. He slackened his grip, allowing her to crawl back toward the statue.

  He turned to see her kneel beside the Goddess’s head. The jade statue’s radiance pulsed, slowly and irregularly. The stones in Challe’s arms matched the cadence.

  Tezca was watching her, too. “A corpse,” he said. “But no one really dies, do they? And gods have it even worse than mortals. They just become… insensate tools. You know that better than most, Challe’Jade.”

  She glanced at him. “Yes.”

  Claws crawled over, dragging himself, leaving a trail of blood. “Self,” he said, looking up and cringing as if expecting he might be murdered. “Don’t do this. Don’t give in to despair. Don’t negotiate with these demons. You are our source of will. You’re like… our mother. We need you to be strong.”

  Tezca clamped his hand over his mouth as his face quivered and his eyes welled. He flapped his other hand, fanning his face.

  “Think of the cuisine we’ll find in our new home,” Claws said.

  “Yes. Yes, Claws.” The two clasped hands, and shimmering Nirva flowed into Claws. “Mother, father, general superior, all wrapped up in one. You’re right. Forgive me my moment of weakness.” He shook his head. “So much loss. First, my kitchen. Then Body. Then Legs.”

  “Don’t forget about Head,” Claws said, chuckling as he stood up. The wounds in his gut steamed as they stitched closed.

  “Ohoho,” Tezca laughed, slapping his thigh. “Good one.” He turned on Gwil. “That’s right. I am a mother. I must protect my children and my sl- servants. I will crush you. You cannot overcome a mother’s love!”

  Tezca stood. He crossed his arms in front of him in the shape of an ‘x’ while stomping his foot. The pavestones cratered. “Impervious Jello Technique, Variation: Ongoing.”

  “Try to fix my head, yeah?” Gwil said as he jumped up and sidled back toward Challe. “Now you let loose,” he told her.

  He could feel pockets of air shifting, tugging with her movements. Dark clouds streamed from her skin to drape her body. The Goddess shone bright, and the thunder outside pounded like drums.

  Gwil ran straight at Tezca and then shrank and launched himself at Claws. Better to deal with him first—he’d go down easier. He landed on Claws’s forearm and considered crawling into his ear to kick that bit of rubble the rest of the way into his brain.

  Kra-koom!

  All was blinding green and then black. A flash of terrible, unreal heat. Gwil’s eyes and tongue hardened into rock. He lost all sense of self as his flesh became charcoal.

  One time, he fell asleep after Caris had charged him with taking their turkey off the spit. When she returned, she made him eat what remained of the burnt carcass. One of his baby teeth had broken, and he remembered the taste in his mouth—metallic blood mixed with dry, gritty dust.

  Presently, that exact same taste was his only tether to awareness. Then Gwil felt a shift in his orientation, and a limb broke off his body.

  A much more pleasant warmth swaddled him, and prismatic white light blossomed to overtake the darkness—the rising tide of a sea of Nirva.

  The surface stirred, swirling like a cyclone, revealing the light as incredibly dense mist. The voices broke through, and they sang. Through the parting haze, Gwil saw tremendous flowing wings, beating with slow, powerful grace. Despite their size, the sound produced was a gentle, tinkling flutter. Their design was a depthless maze, and their shimmering hues danced through spectrums he’d never seen.

  Gwil’s eyes cracked open, and reality dappled through the strangeness, appearing as shades of gray. He saw his scorched arm laying beside his head, its broken end jagged. At the same time, he felt a new one growing in its place.

  “Gwil? Where are you? Oh, Goddess. Gwil!”

  “Nooo! Not my claws! Not my hands! You’re a monster!”

  “What in the hells? Did you kill him? You should’ve stayed on the crucifix, Vessel…”