“The Gray Lady? You want to kill her, too?”

“The Lady ascended to godhood in that hour, it’s true. But remember what else happened then, Oree.”

Just Oree this time, no “Lady.” Like we were old friends, the street artist and the Arameri fullblood. I smiled, hating her with all my soul.

She said, “The Nightlord regained his freedom. This, too, affected the world.”

My heart hurt too much for politeness. “Lady, I don’t care.”

She moved closer, beside me. “You should. Nahadoth’s nature is more than just darkness. His power encompasses wildness, impulse, the abandonment of logic.” She paused, perhaps waiting to see if her words had sunk in. “The madness of a mob.”

Silence fell. In it, a chill laced around my spine.

I had not considered it before. Pointless to blame the gods when mortal hands had thrown the stones. But if those mortal hands had been influenced by some higher power…

Whatever Serymn read on my face must have pleased her. I heard that in her voice.

“These godlings,” she said, “the ones you call your friends. Ask yourself how many mortals they’ve killed over the ages. Far more than the Arameri ever did, I’m quite certain; the Gods’ War alone wiped out nearly every living thing in this realm.” She stepped closer still. I could feel her body heat radiating against my side, almost a pressure. “They live forever. They have no need of food or rest. They have no true shape.” She shrugged. “How can such creatures understand the value of a single mortal life?”

In my mind, I saw Madding, a shining blue-green thing like nothing of this earth. I saw him in his mortal shape, smiling as I touched him, soft-eyed, longing. I smelled his cool, airy scent, heard the sound of his chimes, felt the purr of his voice as he spoke my name.

I saw him sitting at a table in his house, as he had often done during our relationship, laughing with his fellow godlings as they drew their blood into vials for later sale.

It was a part of his life I’d never let myself consider deeply. Godsblood was not addictive. It caused no deaths or sickness; no one ever took too much and poisoned himself. And the favors Madding did for people in the neighborhood—for those of us who were too unimportant to merit aid from the Order or the nobles, Madding and his crew were often our only recourse.

But the favors were never free. He wasn’t cruel about it. He asked only what people could afford, and he gave fair warning. Anyone who incurred a debt to him knew there would be consequences if they failed to repay. He was a godling; it was his nature.

What did he do to them, the ones who reneged?

I saw Trickster Sieh’s child eyes, as cold as a hunting cat’s. I heard Lil’s chittering, whirring teeth.

And from the deepest recesses of my heart rose the doubt that I had not allowed myself to contemplate since the day Madding had broken my heart.

Did he ever love me? Or was my love just another diversion for him?

“I hate you,” I whispered to Serymn.

“For now,” she replied, with terrible compassion. “You won’t always.”

Then she took my hand and led me back to my room, and left me there to sit in silent misery.

“Indoctrination” (charcoal study)

THAT AFTERNOON, Hado put me on a work crew to help clean the large dining hall. This turned out to be a group of nine men and women, a few older than me but most younger, or so I judged by their voices. They watched me with open curiosity as Hado explained about my blindness—though he did not, I noticed, tell them that I had been forced into the cult. “She’s quite self-sufficient, as I’m sure you’ll find, but of course there will be some tasks she can’t complete,” was all he said, and by that I knew what was coming. “Because of that, we’ve assigned several of our older initiates to shadow the work crew in case she needs assistance. I hope all of you don’t mind.”

They assured him that they did not in tones of such slavish eagerness that I immediately loathed all of them. But when Hado left, I made my way to the work crew’s designated leader, a young Ken woman named S’miya. “Let me handle the mopping,” I said. “I feel like working hard today.” So she handed me the bucket.

The handle of the mop was much like a walking stick in my hands. I felt more secure with it, in control of myself for the first time since I’d come to the House of the Risen Sun. This was an illusion, of course, but I clung to it, needed it. The dining hall was huge, but I put my back into the work and paid no heed to the sweat that dripped down my face and made my shapeless tunic stick to my body. When S’miya finally touched my arm and told me we were done, I was surprised and disappointed it had gone so quickly.