Page 70 of Children of Fallen Gods

But then, one day, not long after we departed Antedale, I was walking through the camp only to come across a makeshift sparring ring, a few soldiers gathered around it. One of the men fighting was getting absolutely destroyed. I stood there for five minutes and saw him hit the ground as many times.

I watched, then paced, then left, then backtracked, growing increasingly restless.

What was I supposed to do? Sit here and let them do itwrong?

Eventually I couldn’t stop myself from swooping in, grabbing the losing soldier’s sword from his hands.

“This is an embarrassment,” I huffed. “Look, try this…”

And that’s how it started. A corrected technique here, a suggestion there, one or two throwaway demonstrations. But soon, they became organized lessons, and soon, more and more of the soldiers began to attend them. They extended beyond fighting, to encompass Wielding, too, and before long I found myself mentally planning entire training structures, identifying the army’s biggest gaps and figuring out how to close them.

One day, I blinked and realized I had taken over Essanie and Arith’s regular training duties, leading the troops through the drills myself. I now knew many of the soldiers by name, and beyond that, I knew their strengths and weaknesses.

I was good at this. I even enjoyed it. There was a deep satisfaction to it, to seeing it all come together —click, like a puzzle piece snapping into place.

But this was also the same thing that kept me awake at night, feeling the weight of all those lives pressing down on my chest. With every new name I learned, my resentment of everything that had led them to this moment festered.

The weeks wore on. I collected another victory, then two, then six. They didn’t have significant death tolls, all things considered, or at least that’s what others told me. I was never convinced. I composed every one of the letters to the families of those we did lose, and whether those letters took an hour or six or ten, they all weighed equally on me. I couldn’t look at the body of a twenty-two year old boy and pat myself on the back because there weren’t more in his grave.

I was acutely aware, at all times, exactly what was at stake.

Zeryth demanded a pace that was near-inhuman. But after many weeks of no rest, my soldiers were exhausted. Exhausted soldiers were slow or short-tempered. Slow soldiers got killed. Short-tempered ones killed others. Both things that I wanted to avoid.

And, we happened to be within a detour’s distance to Meriata. Meriata was Ara’s capital of sin and debauchery — exactly the kind of place that would welcome an army on leave with open arms.

But more importantly, it was the home to an old friend. One that might have answers, about the curse Zeryth claimed to hold over Tisaanah’s life.

That, I decided, would be worth the detour.

Chapter Twenty-Two

Tisaanah

Serel’s message, asking me to visit the refugees, seemed urgent. I was exhausted when I received it. I’d only just returned from one of the bloodiest battles so far. Reshaye’s dreams had been especially vivid the night before, and my eyelids were lead. Not that any of that mattered. Whenever any of the refugees called on me, I went. By the time I finished reading the message, I was already reaching for my shoes, casting a wistful glance to the bed.

Next time,I promised it.

As it often did, attention turned to me as soon as I arrived. The legends that everyone else whispered about me spread here, too. Even Serel looked at me differently than he once had, like there was another, foreign piece of me that he didn’t understand.

Sometimes, those looks made me swallow a bitter pang of loneliness.

A part of me had hoped these people would become my family. But just as I was not Nyzrenese enough, not Aran enough, not Valtain enough, I was not quite enough one of them, either. There was an unspoken rift between us, a certain distance to the way they interacted with me.

I was used to being looked at. But the stares I got when I arrived today were different. Everything was quieter. My magic tasted unease in the air.

Something was off.

“Tisaanah!”

Still, it was amazing how the sound of that familiar Thereni voice lifted my spirits.

I turned to see Serel approaching. He pulled me into a rough, quick embrace.

“Thank you,” he murmured in my ear. “I know you’re busy.”

“Never too busy for this.”

I surveyed the people who had paused to stare at me, a wrinkle forming between my brows.

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