“I honor all the gods. But in terms of spirituality, I prefer to worship at the altars of knowledge and artistry.” He made an apologetic little gesture with his hand, as if he worried about hurting my feelings, but I had begun to grin.

“An atheist!” I put my hands on my hips, delighted. “I haven’t seen one of you since before the War. I thought the Arameri wiped all of you out.”

“As well as they did all the other gods’ worshippers, Lord Sieh, yes.” I laughed at this, which seemed to hearten him. “Heresy is actually rather fashionable among the commonfolk, though here in Sky I am more circumspect about it, of course. And the, ah, polite term for people like me is primortalist.”

“Ugh, what a mouthful.”

“Unfortunately, yes. It means ‘mortals first’ — neither an accurate nor complete representation of our philosophy, but as I said, there are worse terms. We believe in the gods, naturally.” He nodded to me. “But as the Interdiction has shown us, the gods function perfectly well whether we believe in them or not, so why devote all that energy to a pointless purpose? Why not believe most fervently in mortalkind and its potential? We, certainly, could benefit from a little dedication and discipline.”

“I agree wholeheartedly!” And if I didn’t miss my guess, there were probably a few of my siblings involved in his mortal-worshipping movement. But I refrained from pointing this out, lest it disturb him. “What’s your name?”

He bowed again, more easily this time. “Shevir, Lord Sieh.”

I waved a hand. “I make the Arameri call me ‘lord.’ It’s just Sieh.”

He looked uneasy. “Er, well —”

“Arameri is a state of mind. I’ve known some adoptees who fit right into this family. You, noamily. Yo sir, are a die among the jacks.” I smiled to let him know that had been meant as a compliment, and he relaxed. “Remath told you all about me, then?”

“The Lady Arameri informed me of your … condition, yes. I and my staff, including those in the city below, are already hard at work trying to determine what might have caused the change. We’ll inform Lady Remath at once if we find anything.”

“Thank you.” I refrained from pointing out that telling Remath wouldn’t do me any good unless Remath chose to pass the information along. He probably knew that and was just letting me know where his loyalties lay. Mortals first. “Were you here in Sky, eight years ago?”

“Yes.” He came to stand beside me, staring avidly at my profile, my posture, everything. Studying me. Knowing his beliefs, I did not mind for once. “I was head of the healing squadron then; it was I and my colleagues who treated Lord Dekarta and Lady Shahar after their injury. I was promoted to First Scrivener for saving their lives.” He hesitated. “The previous First Scrivener was removed from office for failing to realize that a god had visited Sky.”

I rolled my eyes. “There is no scrivening magic that can detect a god’s presence if we don’t want to be detected.” I had never wanted to be detected.

“The lady was informed of this.” He was smiling thinly, not bitter at least. I supposed there was no point in laying blame.

“If you were here back then, you — or your predecessor — would have conducted an investigation.”

“Yes.” He straightened as if giving a report. “The incident occurred in early afternoon. There was a tremor throughout the palace, and all of the boundary scripts sounded an alarm, indicating unauthorized active magic within the palace’s walls. Guards and service staff arrived to find this.” He gestured at the atrium. The debris had been removed, but that changed nothing; it was painfully clear to anyone who had seen it before that the atrium was really just an enormous sunken pit. “No one knew what had happened until three days later, when first Dekarta, then Shahar awakened.”

More than enough time for rumors to gain traction and ruin Deka’s life. Poor boy, and his sister, too.

“What sort of magic was it?” I asked. Scriveners loved to classify and categorize magic, which somehow helped them grasp it with their unmagical mortal minds. There might be something in their convoluted logic that would help me understand.

“Unknown, Lord —” He caught himself. “Unknown.”

“Unknown?”

“Nothing like it has been observed in the mortal realm, at least not within recorded history. The Litaria’s best scholars have confirmed this. We even consulted several of the friendlier godlings of the city; they weren’t able to explain it, either. If you don’t know —” He shut his mouth with an audible snap, in palpable frustration. He had plainly hoped I would have more answers.