N. Jemisin - The Broken Kingdoms

He had not closed his eyes. I could feel them watching me, evaluating me, cold despite the heat of his mouth.

When he pulled back, he drew in a breath. Let it out slowly. Said, still in a terrible, soft voice, “You don’t love Madding.”

I stiffened.

“Even now, you want me.” There was such contempt in his voice; each word dripped with venom. I had never before heard such emotion from him, and all of it hate. “His power intrigues you. The prestige of having a god for a lover. Perhaps you’re even devoted to him in your small way—though I doubt that, since it seems any god will do.” He let out a small sigh. “I know well the dangers of trusting your kind. I warned my children, kept them away while I could, but Madding is stubborn. I mourn the pain it will cause him when he finally realizes just how unworthy of his love you are.”

I stood there, shocked to numbness. Believing him, for a long, horrifying moment. Shiny had been—still was, diminished or not—the god I had revered all my life. Of course he was right. Had I not hesitated at Madding’s offer? My god had judged me and found me wanting, and it hurt.

Then sense reasserted itself, and with it came pure fury.

I was still backed against the cistern strut, which gave me perfect leverage as I planted my hands on Shiny’s chest and shoved him back with all my strength. He stumbled back, making a sound of surprise. I followed, all my fear and confusion forgotten amid red-hot rage.

“ That’s your proof?” My hands found his chest and I shoved him again, throwing all my weight into it just for the satisfaction of hearing him grunt as I did so. “ That’s what makes you think I don’t love Mad? You’re a damned good kisser, Shiny, but do you honestly think you hold a candle to Madding in my heart?” I laughed, my own voice echoing harshly in my ears. “My gods, he was right! You really don’t know anything about love.”

I turned, muttering to myself, and began making my way back to the roof door.

“Wait,” Shiny said.

I ignored him, sweeping my stick in a tight angry arc ahead of me. His hand caught my arm again, and this time I tried to shake him off, cursing.

“ Wait ,” he said, not letting go. He turned away from me, barely noticing my rage. “Someone’s here.”

“What are you—” But I heard it, too, now, and froze. Footsteps, chuffing on the rooftop gravel, beside the door hatch.

“Oree Shoth?” The voice was male, cool and dark like the late-winter night. Familiar, though I could not place it.

“Y-yes,” I said, wondering if this was some customer of Madding’s, and what he was doing on the roof if that was the case. And how did he know my name? Maybe he’d overheard some of Madding’s people gossiping. “Were you looking for me?”

“Yes. Though I had hoped you’d be alone.”

Shiny shifted suddenly, moving in front of me, and I found myself trying to hear the man through his rather intimidating bulk. I opened my mouth to shout at him, too angry for politeness or respect—and then I stopped.

It was faint. I had to squint. But Shiny had begun to glow.

“Oree,” he said. Calm, as always. “Go into the house.”

Fear stopped anything else I might have said. “H-he’s between me and the door.”

“I will remove him.”

“I wouldn’t advise that,” said the man, unruffled. “You aren’t a godling.”

Shiny sighed, and under other circumstances, I would have been amused by his annoyance. “No,” he snapped, “I’m not.”

And before I could speak again, he was gone, the space in front of me cold in his absence. There was a glimmer of magic—something occluded by the hazy shimmer of Shiny’s body. Then a flurry of movement, cloth tearing, the struggle of flesh against flesh. A spray of wetness across my face, making me flinch.

And then silence.

I held still for a moment, my own breath loud and fast in my ears as I strained to hear the sound that I knew and feared would come: bodies, hitting the cobblestones of the street three stories below. But there was only that terrible silence.

My nerves snapped. I ran to the roof door, clawed it open, and flung myself into the house, screaming.

There are things he told me about himself. Not all of it, of course—some things I heard from other gods or remember from old stories of my childhood. But mostly he just told me. It was not his nature to lie.

In the time of the Three, things were very different. There were many temples but few holy texts, and no persecution of those with differing beliefs. Mortals loved whatever gods they wished—often several at once—and it was not called heresy. If there were disputes about a particular bit of lore or magic, it was simple enough to call on a local godling and ask about it. No point in getting possessive about one god or another when there were plenty to go around.

It was during this time that the first demons were born: offspring of mortal humans and immortal gods, neither one nor the other, possessing the greatest gifts of both. One of those gifts was mortality—a strange thing to call a gift, by my thinking, but people back then thought differently. Anyhow, all the demons possessed it.

But consider what this means: all the demons died. Doesn’t make sense, does it? Children rarely take after just one of their parents. Shouldn’t a few of the demons have inherited immortality? They certainly got the magic, in plenty—so much that they passed it on to us, when they mated with us. Scrivening and bonebending and prophecy and shadow-sending, all of this came to mortalkind through the demons. But even when the demons took godly lovers and had children with them, those children grew old and died, too.

For us, the divine inheritance was a blessing. For the gods, one drop of mortal blood doomed their offspring to death.

Apparently, no one realized what this meant for a very long time.

I scrambled downstairs much faster than I should have, given that I’d never gotten around to memorizing Madding’s stairs. Behind me trailed Paitya; the middle-aged godling; Kitr, who had come out of nowhere at my shout and was visible for once; and Madding. As we reached the room of pools, two more people joined us: a tall mortal woman who shone with nearly as many godwords as Previt Rimarn, and a sleek racing dog who glowed white in my sight. As I reached the house’s front door, I heard other calls upstairs; I’d woken the whole house.

I might have felt bad if my thoughts had not been filled with that awful silence.

“Oree!” Hands caught me before I got three steps out the door; I fought them. A blur of blue resolved into Madding. “You shouldn’t leave the house, damn it.”

“I have to—” I twisted to get around Madding. “He—”

“He who? Oree—” Madding abruptly went still. “Why is there blood on your face?”

That stopped my panic, though the hand that I lifted to my face shook badly. Wetness had splattered my face up on the roof; I’d forgotten.

“Boss?” Paitya had crouched to peer at something on the ground. I could not see what, but the grim expression on his face was unmistakable. “There’s a lot more blood here.”

Madding turned to look, and his eyes widened. He turned back to me, frowning. “What happened? Where were you, up on the roof?” Suddenly his frown deepened. “Did Father do something to you? So help me—”

Kitr, who had been scanning the street for danger, looked at us both sharply. “You told her?”

Madding ignored her, though I caught his wince of consternation. He turned me from one side to the other, checking for injuries. “I’m fine,” I said, holding my stick to my chest as I grew calmer. “ I’m fine. But, yes, I was on the roof, with… with Shiny. There was someone… a man. I couldn’t see him; he must’ve been mortal. He knew my name, said he’d been looking for me—”