Page 176 of A Vow of Embers

“I’m sorry,” I said.

She leaned forward and took my hands. “We are here for you. Whatever you need. And I know that you would do the same for us.”

“Yes, I would,” I said.

“Now come next door and tell us about your adventures last night. I’ve only heard the information secondhand.”

I nodded as we stood. We went to Io’s room and I told the others what had happened. They had so many questions and I could sensetheir concern and a bit of their hurt that they hadn’t been included. It made me feel terrible all over again.

“I won’t leave you behind again,” I promised them.

“Where you go, we go,” Io reminded me. “Although I’m sure my brother insisted I not come.”

“He did.” But that wasn’t an excuse.

“That might have been to our benefit.” She held up a book I hadn’t seen before. “Last night, after I realized that you weren’t coming back with us, I took Suri down to my mother’s library. I asked her to help me find what I most needed to read so that I could help you.”

Why hadn’t that occurred to me? “That is brilliant.”

“I’m hoping it has more information about the physical link since you’re being so stubborn about fixing it. So far it’s been a variety of journal entries about different historical events in Ilion. I haven’t been able to put it down since I started reading.”

I hoped she would find some way to undo this link with Xander that wouldn’t require me to break my vow.

“Here,” Io said, handing me a different book. “I had Suri look for you, too.”

I sat down on one of the beds and began to read. It wasn’t what I would have expected—it was a book of stories about other gods and goddesses.

And what I found disturbed me.

The others were nothing like the goddess we worshipped. They were vengeful and petty and jealous and hateful and treated humans like toys.

Like when the sun god commanded a specific kingdom to pray to him and they had refused. He had scorched their lands, turning the nation into a wasteland, forcing the inhabitants to flee. It was now the Jacharus Desert that lay between where Locris and Ilion were connected by land, north of the Acheron Sea.

My experiences with the goddess had been completely different. I had felt nothing but love from her. As if I were precious to her.

She fed us. Blessed us with families. Watched over us.

Then there was a line after the sun god story that struck me. “The gods and goddesses quarrel with one another over the hearts of mortals as they draw their strength from those who believe.”

I read the line out loud to my adelphia.

“Why do you think that’s important?” Zalira asked.

“I’m not sure.”

“Keep reading,” Io instructed me. “I don’t think that’s what you’re looking for.”

She was wrong. But I didn’t know why.

Xander and I continued our experiment. He held me every night when we went to sleep. If he came in late, he would slip into bed and put his arms around me. I always woke up when he did this, aware of him adjusting his body to mine.

It was like torture. I would wake up pulsing in places that I didn’t know I could pulse.

He didn’t seem similarly affected.

There weren’t any nightmares. I had stopped dreaming altogether. Him holding me seemed to block everything else out. The whole thing was maddening. I spent my days with my sisters, reading and training, helping Themis. We took our meals together and my husband hadn’t requested that I join him for any events.

But my nights belonged to him.

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