As I stood waiting for the representatives of the Order, at the base of the waterfall, I couldn't help wishing I understood the whole situation a lot better. As with most things, Erika had explained this part of her scheme poorly--if she even had thought that far ahead. In most of these matters, she simply seemed to trust--to have faith--that I would figure things out.

It had worked out with the ancient goddess, but only barely. I knew instinctively that any small mistake might have been the last--and I'd made several, I knew. What I didn't know was the consequences moving forward, and that was a terrifying thought. But this? This was far worse. Every small decision in building the town and temple would have long-term consequences, and I was trying to figure it all out on my own, all at once.

As the flickering lights emerged out of the forest, the man at the head of the column suddenly jumped out of his skin as he caught sight of me standing there, waiting. Of course, I'd seen them coming for a while, but... that had as much to do with them walking through the darkness with torches as it had to do with my being a god.

"Patron's own..." the man in front cursed as he forced his hand off of the sword at his belt. "Don't sneak up on a man like that!"

I kept my face level, although the idea that waiting in place could be considered "sneaking" made me want to laugh. "You are from the Order?"

"Yes. Told this place would be turned into a Temple." He stepped up to me, offering his hand. "I'm Jo. This is Etan, Herdy, and Brun. Tumm is with the animals, he'll be a minute."

Given the lousy day I was having, I considered ignoring the proffered hand, but in the end gave him a firm shake, which turned out to be clasping forearms rather than hands. "I'm afraid I don't have anything in the way of lodgings to offer," I said, putting a wry tone to my voice.

"Figures. This whole situation is an infernal mess, but we do what we're asked." As he spoke, the others in his group stepped up through the brush, and I got a look at them.

It was clear these men were normally very sophisticated, wearing clothing that wasn't used to trekking through the forest or even a hard march over the roads. There were three men and one woman, with the last person just now coming into my view further back, who clearly looked more local. I frowned, considering. They were earlier than I was expecting. "I admit I wasn't expecting you so soon."

"Ah, well, we don't normally use the Veins to travel outside of Contel, but the Patron insisted. Said we would have work to do immediately." He paused and looked at the place, and his face fell, a bit. He looked... tired. "I am guessing you need this temple of your built overnight."

I burned a bit of use godly power to estimate how long it would take the refugees to arrive--a day and a half, maybe, if they made good time, though some part of me suspected a little longer. What surprised me more was that they would be arriving at the top of the cliff, not the bottom. "It's less the temple that I'm worried about, although..." I sighed. "The simple truth is, this is a holy place, and people are fleeing here to escape an enemy. I need the temple, yes, but also the ability to shelter them when they arrive. Which should not be tomorrow, but the next."

It took me a moment to realize that he was examining the area at the base of the cliff, and I cleared my throat. "To be clear," I said, "The temple will be built at the top of the waterfall, and I would like... at least a few rooms or buildings built into the face of the cliff."

"Into the face of it?" He turned and looked up at the cliff, and I joined him in staring at it, passing a blessing on to the whole group to help them see the cliff in the darkness. From below, the entire cliff face was rocky and uneven, but my sense of the place was that it was solid--there was no evidence that the rocky protrusions of the cliff had fallen off in recent memory. I was no geologist, but my hope was that the area was mostly rock, and that these mages of the Order could effectively carve their way into the rock with magic. "Does this have to do with the Patron's project?"

I hesitated. She still hadn't been clear on that, but she said something about a generator--which made me think that part of the river's flow would be diverted into a hydroelectric generator buried in the cliff. That made perfect sense to me. "That's part of it. But I also need to be able to hide people. The God of Eyes can conceal things built into the wall, but any regular buildings... at the very least, someone walking around will run into them."

"Makes sense. Well, we're the right people for that job." Jo grinned and gestured behind him. "Me and Etan are probably the highest-ranked Earth mages in the Order, so... probably the best in the world at what we do. Herdy is good with enchantments, so he'll be doing some stuff to help us, and Brun will mostly be moving things around--very powerful, lot of stamina. Me, I'll mostly be handling some metalwork for the Patron once she clarifies her orders--or you do, if you know what the project is. But until then, I can carve stone as easily as Etan, although I lack his sense of design."

The man named Etan stepped up and glanced at me, then the cliff. "I can do whatever you want," he said. "As long as you have a cohesive vision, I'll make it happen."

I considered the cliff for a long moment. "I am thinking a face," I admitted, "...but perhaps not quite a well defined one. Two large openings there and there for the eyes," I pointed to areas on either side of the stream, "with the waterfall at around the middle of the forehead. The church itself will be there, standing over the river itself, acting as a third eye. Down here, at the right height for it to be a mouth--but not made to look like one--a wide cavern that people can settle and build in, deep enough to conceal at least a small village." I paused. "Inside the cliff, stairs or passages should allow people to get up to the top. Something that can be concealed. There will also be at least one large hole for water from the stream to fall inside the cliff, and a large room attached to that. Probably two."

Etan considered the whole project, and nodded. "The biggest problem with all that is moving the stone," he said. "Brun can move anything, but moving enough stone in two days to hollow out a cliff is asking a lot, even of her."

I hesitated. "Start at the top. The people who are coming should arrive there, anyway. The stone from the eyes can be used to make shelters on top, by the river."

"Makes sense to me." Etan squinted. "Is there a room behind the waterfall?"

"Uh... yes." I paused. "It's crude, but... it is a small private space where I am keeping... something secret. For now."

"Well, not my business, I suppose." Etan turned to the sole woman of the group. "Go ahead and throw us up to the top, might as well get to work."

This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.

My heart caught in my throat as I realized that Miana had moved up there rather than stay inside, but before I could argue, a powerful surge of wind magic picked us all up--all but the lad I could still see approaching through the trees, with some manner of animals pulling carts behind him--and dropped us off not far from where Miana was sitting.

Had been sitting. Of course she wasn't going to just ignore something like this.

----------------------------------------

Miana, of course, could not have ignored the powerful surge of magic if she tried--not after the night she'd already had. The fact that Ryan of Eyes was among the group somehow made the whole situation more infuriating rather than less.

"Who are you!" Miana found herself in no mood for playing games. "What is... what is the meaning of this?"

Ryan, of course, stepped forward, and although she sensed no direct lies, neither was he interested in being forthcoming, for all that he had agreed to be. "It's fine," he said. "They are here to build my Temple. I intend to create a place for the refugees--"

"You are building a town for my people and you have not thought to ask my permission, let alone my assistance?" Miana's teeth bared in the night. "Do you think me so much lesser than you? Do you think you can simply take my people, God of Eyes?"

That... more than she expected it to, that accusation seemed to genuinely hurt the other god. The others in the group backed away from them, but Miana only had eyes on her so-called ally. And he... did appear chagrined, if perhaps still unwilling to bend. Miana had never been much of a judge of people, but... she was a goddess now, and she forced herself to trust what she sensed.

At the very least, as long as it was telling her what she already believed.

"I am..." Ryan looked shocked. "I am building my temple, Miana. If your people do not stay here, then someday, others will. I was not looking for this to happen--"

"Oh, I see," she snarled back in response. "People arrive to construct your temple just before my people arrive, but it is not by your doing, not by your will. Whose, then? Will you suggest that some other god is pulling the strings and... and..." In her mind's eye, she suddenly remembered Xethram's hand in hers, and the comfort she had felt from that small bit of contact. "...setting us up to be some idiot married couple? Two young gods in love?"

Again, that seemed to wound him, and in a way that she was not yet used to, she sensed that she was growing stronger from his defeat. His face screwed up like he wanted to take the time to go inside and think--Miana had felt the same enough times in her life, when she was overwhelmed--but as she watched, he forced himself through that hesitation. "I did not pick you," he said. "And these men were sent as a gift--I had no say in the timing of their arrival, just as I had no say in..." he hesitated, and rephrased something, "...in your ascension. There is a power playing games with us, Miana, but not a god. I swear to you--"

"You have broken your oath to me already!" Miana stormed up to Ryan, one blade in her hand, the other hanging in the air, both threatening to run him through. "You swore that there would be no secrets and no hiding--"

"And how much was I supposed to reveal during this crisis, while your people need you? For all I knew you were dealing with thousands of prayers for guidance, spending all of your concentration leading your people in battle and keeping them from harm. Miana, it has been hours, not days. I am not going to keep secrets from you, but if I had started talking from the moment I brought you here, we would still not be done talking about these things. Do we really have the time to talk it all out now?"

"You don't think I need to know what your plans are for my people? You don't think I need to know that there is a power playing games with us? You don't think I need to know that there will be people walking around this place that you told me was hidden? People you don't even know, people only gifted to you by some power playing games?"

Ryan stepped back a step, once more hurt. The silence stretched for a long minute. "The person... who sent these people. I cannot reveal more about her unless you swear an Oath."

Miana blinked, finding herself suddenly in a memory, standing in the Council Room of the Gods. This memory was strange, because she felt an incredible hatred in the heart of the goddess whose memory it was--hatred at the small woman standing amidst the Council, who was with little more than a finger, holding down all of the gods, including her, preventing them from speaking or acting.

"What comes next is simple," said the woman. "Either you swear to me an oath, or you don't. If you don't, I will not permit you to know of me, speak of me, or do anything to me, ever again." And in her hand emerged a spark of light that poured out magic endlessly, and Miana felt a spell washing over her, while she was pinned down, helpless and trapped by the same woman.

"Swear that you exist to serve humanity, in all its races and forms, and that you shall never reveal my presence to anyone, mortal or immortal, who has not sworn the same oath. Swear that your life and soul are forfeit if you knowingly and willingly break the terms of this agreement."

When Miana's predecessor did not agree, the spell invaded her mind, wiped away thoughts and memories, a singular act of violence that the goddess would have sworn vengeance over--but that memory had been lost. In its place was an unexplained mental bruise, one that Miana still felt, although she was unsure why.

But as she retreated from that memory, knowing only that the Oath existed, Miana realized with a sudden jerk that all the hatred that she felt from that memory was part of that memory. That past hatred, just like the sorceress' spell, wanted to decide the rules, wanted to be the one who determined how Miana lived her life.

She suspected she would reject the Oath, but she forced herself to calm down and go over that Oath in her mind, trying to unravel it, understand it. And her godly power, used to being a force of law and order for her people, interpreted some things for her.

First, the magical binding itself was not there to enforce a "life and soul are forfeit" clause, although there was such a binding to notify the woman if the terms were broken. It did, also, force people to recall the clause if they were close to breaking it, and Miana had no doubt that Ryan had been blindsided by that when he wanted to discuss the workers. Second... the Oath itself was basically nothing. The force of law behind the Oath was very simple: if Miana chose to be an enemy of humanity or any of the halfblood races--any race in its entirety--this mysterious, powerful woman would know about it. What she also could tell, by poking at the Oath with her godly sense, was that the same Oath did not hold her back from fighting against the Rakshasa--if she wished to cleanse the world of them, she would be permitted.

Not that she was powerful enough, she supposed, but it was an important thing to note.

Still, Miana hesitated. The idea that she must be bound in order to know of this woman was almost insufferable, even as the Oath itself seemed largely inconsequential. Why the secrecy? Why was this ancient being playing games?

"Fine." Miana almost spat the words, and they felt dirty in her mouth. "I swear that I exist to serve Humanity, and will keep your secret."

"Oh, good." Miana whirled around, finding the same woman sitting on a rock behind her. "I kind of thought you were going to refuse, there. That would have made things difficult."

"Who are you!" Miana raised her swords again, and realized, suddenly, that the Oath had not made any provision that would have prevented her from attacking the woman. Was it a mark of supreme self-confidence that she had not felt the need to defend herself against the Gods?

"Oh, Miana, you darling little girl," the fox-looking woman hopped off the rock and strode forward. "Bastard daughter of the border clan, discarded and forced to live as a criminal. Lu'nella had no idea when she picked you up what a jewel she had found." The fox, the damned demeaning fox, placed her hand on Miana's head, and Miana, somewhere between terrified and furious, actually found herself relax, just a bit, before hatred surged in her again.

"That was her name, by the way. You wanted to know more about her, didn't you? Your predecessor, Lu'nella--Ciel'ostra the Eighth." The fox woman let her hand slide down Miana's jaw, cupping her face in one hand. "I am not your enemy, Miana--Ciel'ostra the Ninth. I am the Scion of the Arch Sorcerers, and poor Ryan is my tool to make the world a better place. I used him to save your life--so please, don't be too mad at him, or at me. Please?"

Miana couldn't help the trembles that went through her. It wasn't rage--not all of it--but it wasn't fear, either. She simply...

She simply felt powerless in front of this woman, in a way that she could not begin to understand.