Gods.

Yain, Saira, Oleth, Thelth were just a few of the dozen or so deities that ruled our world. The best known ones, at least — the last to ascend.

I’d had many talks with the children of Earth on the nature of the divine. Cameron, especially, had been baffled at the way gods were worshiped in our world. According to him, gods were supposed be gods of something, to have an aspect that defined them and over which they ruled, and that surely our gods had them too. But when I’d asked him for examples from his world, he had hedged — there were no gods there, apparently. Except at that point, Alexis had insisted that there were gods, or rather a god. David had agreed.

Frankly, I found it the height of comedy how they thought to assign gods to neat little boxes when they couldn’t even decide how many gods they had.

But I digressed. The point was, while I could rely on the Heroes’ knowledge for many things, gods were not one of them — which was why my first day in Alasvir was dedicated to the library.

Cameron joined me, to no one’s surprise, though the rest opted to find something else to entertain themselves with — so I bade them farewell and inwardly hoped they could keep themselves out of trouble.

Which brought me to the magnificent Floating Library, the fulcrum of thousands of years of history, where I could finally lay my eyes on the closest thing to the truth regarding the gods.

Because unlike the Heroes’ tales of home, our gods were not glorious rulers and benevolent guides — at least, not most. Petty tyrants was a more accurate description. All of those with known origins had once been mortals, and they made up over half the pantheon.

And with the actual histories before me, those unaltered by the Temples and the gods’ followers, I finally had some hard data before me.

Nothing was known of the first five. They had appeared, at some point, but writing had not been widespread at the time — or if it had, it had been lost to the time. But for the latter six, there was a clear trend.

The first appeared five thousand years ago. The second, a thousand years later. About six centuries later, the third appeared, and the fourth after another century. Then fifty years later, the last two ascended in two consecutive years.

And then it had suddenly stopped. For some reason, new gods stopped ascending. Mortals remained mortals — and the gods build their followings, which spread across the lands, convincing everyone they could about the power of their masters.

Except in the Archipelagos, where the people still remembered when the gods had walked the earth. They’d known them as mighty warriors, powerful adventurers and wise mages — yet as mortal as the rest of them. And they refused to believe the new gods could be that far removed from their origins.

And since they hadn’t been smited, it followed that either the gods didn’t care about the offense, or were unable to act — and in either case, the Archipelago pulled ahead.

The first gods had still been worshiped to an extent, even though they neither demanded it nor acknowledged any of their cults. Even know, not even all their names were known — only that they existed. But all the histories seemed to agree that there were five.

It was an interesting read, in all, but it brought me no closer to understanding my enemies. The most important questions seemed to have no answer. Why had mortals suddenly stopped ascending? Why did the old gods spur their followers? Were the two groups at odds?

How did my mysterious benefactor tie into all of this? He had interacted directly, that time in Ardenburg — was he one of the gods, or merely a powerful follower? And if he was a god, why could he act directly when no one else did?

I sighed. “So many questions, and yet no answers.”

“Ain’t that the truth,” Cameron replied from behind his walls of books. A good student, that boy, though there was something strange in the way he replied.

“Were you able to find anything useful?”

“Only that my old pal made it into the big leagues. And he never writes, either. Isn’t that sad?”

I froze. That voice, that manner of speech — that wasn’t Cameron. I raised my head over the books, dreading what I would find—

And there sat Raina on the bench next to Cameron, a dagger biting into his throat. She was sporting her trademark grin, the one that could unnerve even the most grizzled warrior.

“Raina. Please release my apprentice,” I said levelly. Inwardly, I was deeply disappointed. Cameron had frozen up, even though the knife posed little threat to him as an undead, and even less threat to him as a Force mage. A mere cantrip would stop the blade from piercing further.

Just in case Raina was serious, I wove a thin thread of Force and flicked the knife out of her hand—

At least, I tried. Despite being well past her prime, she was perhaps one of the most experienced assassins in the world. The knife was pushed to a side, but she renewed her grip on it with a flourish.

To his credit, Cameron used the distraction to get away from her. His execution, however, was left terribly wanting. He wove force, not aiming to throw the woman off him, but rather throwing himself at the floor — causing him to promptly fall off the bench, landing on his head.

Raina took one good look at him and blinked twice. “Are you sure you want to claim him as your apprentice? If any of mine did something like that, I’d pretend I never knew them.”

I looked around the room. Had anyone heard the crash?

“No one’s coming. I had my guys clear the area. You should really pay more attention to your surroundings, you know. Someone could have stabbed you.” She blinked innocently.

“Raina.”

“That’s my name, yeah.”

“What are you doing here?”

“Visiting an old teammate, what do you think? I heard you were in town.”

“And scaring my apprentice?”

“Hey, it’s a good lesson to learn. Otherwise they end up like you.”

“I thought I was going to die!”

Both Raina and I looked at Cameron.

“A mage of your ability should easily fend her off. You wouldn’t have died if you applied what you knew.”

Raina looked incredulous. “What, that pipsqueak? Beat me? No way.”

“He’s not weak. Merely untrained.”

“Sounds like your fault.”

I closed my eyes, anticipating the— no, there would be no migraine. My new body didn’t get them anymore. Though, my new body had never encountered Raina…

“Raina. Why are you here?”

“Are you going senile? You already asked me that.”

“No, I asked what you were doing here. Now I’m asking why.”

“Semantics.”

“Raina.”

“I just wanted to visit an old teammate! Is that so hard to believe?”

I regarded her flatly. “Yes.”

“Well, it’s the truth. This time, anyway. Though, I mostly want to see the drama.”

“The… drama?” My eyebrows shot up.

“What, you didn’t think your arrival went unnoticed, did you? You stirred up a lot of shit by coming here.”

I blinked in surprise. I recalled the messages at the docks. I knew I’d caught the attention of at least two of the Floating City’s elite, but I was still hoping to pass more or less unnoticed — or at least, without making waves.

“I… did?”

“Oh yes. You should have seen the last council meeting. It was glorious.”

I raised an eyebrow. “Spying on politicians again?”

Raina frowned — she actually looked offended. “What? No! I’m on the council, you stupid.”

“How did you of all people manage to get on Alasvir’s council? Wait, no — wrong question. Who did you kill to get on the council?”

“Will you believe me if I say ‘no one’?”

“No.”

“Well, it’s true. I’m the guildmistress of the Assassins’ Guild. Which means I’m one of the big shots now.”

“…Doesn’t that mean you killed a lot of people to get your position?” Cameron asked, having slowly circled around the table to stand behind me.

Raina frowned. “Yes. No. Maybe.” She turned to me. “Where did you find this kid? I swear, he’s just like you when we were young.”

It was my turn to frown. Was that meant as a compliment? Or an insult? It felt like an insult to me, but perhaps it wasn’t wise to say that with Cameron present. A different topic, then.

“Alright. You found me — now what?”

Raina shrugged. “I don’t plan that far ahead. Dunno. I’ll just tag along so I can catch whatever unfolds.”

“You won’t find much of interest, I’m afraid,” I said, pointing to the books. “I’ll be holed up here for the foreseeable future.”

She tilted her head. “Really? But you have better things to do than some lousy old books.”

“Are you trying to recruit me for one of your stints? Because I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again — I will never help you kill people.”

Raina rolled her eyes. “I’m not daft, I know that. I just thought you had to go find a new place to sleep, that’s all.”

“What?”

“You know, like, a new inn? The Cranky Kraken’s gonna be a no-go for a while.”

If the liquid in my veins had been blood, and if it could have ran any colder than it already was — it would have. Instead, I simply stared. Because for all of her playful demeanor, for all of her tricks and pranks and apparent friendliness, I knew what kind of heartless monster laid underneath. There was a reason why I had cut contact with her as soon as our team disbanded. “…Raina. What did you do?”

“T’wasn’t me! At least, not directly. Maybe a bit indirectly. But not intentionally. I mean — it wasn’t me or my people.”

But I had no time for her games now. Great assassin she may have been, she wasn’t a mage. And when it came to might, there was only so much power you could amass without access to magic. Or the System, I supposed.

“Raina.”

“Yes?”

“What did you do?”

I drew the tiniest thread of Mind and tied it to her image. Fear. Just a drop.

It worked. Raina’s mask of bravado fell for just a moment, revealing the old woman underneath. And she was only human. For all the blood on her hands.

“I didn’t do anything! It was Jeun’s lackeys — they set fire to the inn.”

I had risen from my seat before I realized what I was doing. Raina matched my stride as I rushed through the library, Cameron jogging to keep up — and like she’d said, the library was empty. That was why I had always disliked her — she didn’t care. She’d kicked all those people out so she could surprise me with her little prank. And with the news. And if she’d told me sooner, I could have—

And now it might be too late. I could only desperately hope the kids hadn’t been caught in the fire.

“Who’s this Jeun and why would he do this? One of your underworld enemies?”

She scoffed. “One of your enemies. He’s a councilor. From the Temples.”

My eyes went wide. Of course they had agents here too. But— “They have a seat? How?”

“Politics, you know? You should pay more attention to events.”

I ignored her retort, though she wasn’t wrong. I should have paid more attention to my enemies. I hadn’t, and now it was coming back to bite me.

As soon as I was out of the building, I took to the air, barely remembering to drag Cameron along with me. Needless to say, Raina remained on the ground — and her voice remained a distant echo as I flew towards the inn.

“You can’t leave me here, you dirtbag! Get back hereeeee!”