Page 69 of Children of Fallen Gods

“He is sick the same way I get sick, isn’t he?” I asked Nura, afterwards. “Because of the potions he gives to Eslyn. It makes her… stronger. Better. But I can tell that it isn’t…” I struggled to find the right word. “Normal magic.”

Nura gave me a pointed look. “I have been instructed not to discuss this.”

The tone of her voice made it clear we both understood it to be a confirmation.

Still. I took no pleasure in being right. Because if Zeryth was dabbling in deep magic to do whatever he was doing to help Eslyn, that meant the curse may not be outside the realm of possibility.

“And what about the spell binding my life to his? Is that part of it, too?” I said. “Does that mean it’s real?”

Her expression flickered, and she shook her head. “That, I don’t have the answer to.”

No one did, it seemed. In my spare time, I combed through books, searching for information about whatever he had or hadn’t done, and whether it was truly possible. Hopeless. I found nothing.

Not that I had much time for such things — and in the grand scheme of it all, my research seemed pitifully insignificant. When I was not fighting or training or studying, I was with the refugees. It was hard for them to acclimate to a country so different from their own. I’d had Max to help ease me into this new life. They were all alone. But, they were resilient. They adapted, albeit slowly.

Still, it was impossible to forget what hung in the balance of my bargain. Every time I visited, Filias or Riasha would pull me aside, handing me another request for help for someone’s brother or wife or long-lost child. For every soul I had managed to save, there were so many who still needed my help.

“I’ll try,” I always told them, and meant it. But my hands were tied. As long as Zeryth’s war raged on, I could not go fight mine. I kept each name carefully preserved in a wooden box beside my bed.

Right beside them were Max’s letters.

Max. I missed him so much that his absence was a constant ache, like the pain of a missing limb. I tracked his victories carefully. There were many of them. All the whispers had proven true: General Farlione was exceptionally good at what he did. It started with his triumph in Antedale and only grew more impressive from there. With so few deaths, he skillfully dismantled city after city.

Every time people spoke of him, I had to suppress a small, proud smile.

Of course he would be incredible. I’d never had a doubt.

Still, Maxantarius Farlione, acclaimed general, was nothing to me compared to Max, my friend. I didn’t receive letters from General Farlione — I received letters from Max, riddled not with battle strategies but inside jokes that only I would understand and quiet insecurities that I read in the spaces between his handwriting.

And while Max wasn’t one to pour his contents of his soul into words, there would always be a few dots at the end of the letter, dots that represented a pen that had lifted and pressed to the page, hesitated and jerked. Always right before he wrote,I miss you. Stay safe. Please.

In those six words, I heard all the others he left unwritten. I knew because I would do the same, my pen hovering and dripping over the page. What I wrote was never enough.I miss you. Stay safe. Please.

And so, that refrain went, passed back and forth over dozens of letters. Some days, the worry would eat at me so much that I could barely breathe. Worry for Max, yes, but also for the refugees, for Moth, for all the lives that were hanging in the balance, for the noose Zeryth tightened around my throat.

And then, one day, not long after I returned from one of my most exhausting battles, I was summoned to the refugee dwellings.

And that day, my worst fears came to life.

Chapter Twenty-One

Max

Like most things, it happened in a thousand little steps.

Zeryth gave me other orders quickly. There was no shortage of work to be done, after all. All across Ara, there were Lords who disputed Zeryth’s reign. After a few too-short, exhausting days in Antedale, we packed up and moved on.

I had already decided what I would do. I would repeat Antedale over and over again, as many times as I needed to. I would spin plans to minimize the death tolls as much as I possibly could. I used illusions to smoke out fortified strongholds. I cut off production and starved out cities. I assembled teams of spies and sent them to kidnap key figures instead of barreling through an army’s defenses.

Tisaanah, after all, had taught me that there was so much one could do with the right kind of performance and a little creativity.

I followed her stories closely. It became almost amusing, the divide between what I heard whispered in the streets and what I read in her letters at night. I’d hear the soldiers poring over the stories with hushed, amazed voices, speaking of her as if she was some sort of mythological creature. Some swore she practiced ancient Threllian blood sacrifices, others speculated to her lineage (“Those Threllians will fuck anything, I’m telling you!”), and a few seemed bizarrely set on the idea that she ate, specifically, a rare breed of Besrithian scorpion to gain her power.

I’d listen to these people speak of her with such awe, chuckle softly to myself, and then go to my tent and read her letters — letters filled not with mythological greatness but with her intimate, rambling thoughts (and, with few exceptions, at least one incredibly immature joke). And for my part, I would collect little stories throughout the day for her. I had grown so accustomed to having her near me, to sharing those things with her. Now I hoarded them like ravens hoarded shiny buttons, presenting them to her compressed in paper and ink.

It was never enough to describe everything that I really wanted to say.

For a long time, I tried to keep my distance from most of the soldiers. I was stuck with Moth — he rarely strayed from my side, and though I’d never express it, I preferred it that way — but the less I interacted with the others, the better. They had good leadership in Arith and Essanie, I told myself. I had little more to offer.

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