Vayra ascended the staircase as quickly as she dared, maintaining her veil and keeping her footsteps light. It snaked back and forth through the center of the tower, winding through a dark corridor, and she pulled her scarf out to light the way a little more. She bunched it up in her hand and held it out ahead of her, letting the stars light the way.

A patrolling guard marched down in the opposite direction. She heard his footsteps well before she saw him. As soon as she could, she stopped at a landing and ducked into the corner, hiding in the darkness there. She tucked her scarf behind her back to hide its light.

The guard, a sleepy Commodore, strolled past. Like the other wind-Path God-heirs, he carried a wooden staff. Brannûl’s guards wore sky-blue coats and cloaks, and the plume on their shako caps constantly fluttered in an invisible breeze.

Once the guard had passed, Vayra continued up the stairs. She took them two at a time. No matter how stealthy, she was getting close to the Goddess’ chambers, and her veil wouldn’t do much. She had to be fast enough to engage the conversation without setting off alarms or getting into a fight.

The higher she climbed, the heavier the spiritual weight of Brannûl became. The tingling in her neck was normal for this place; it had a greater range than the presence of the gods. But the pressure wasn’t. At first, it was like someone was pressing down on her shoulders. Then like someone had grabbed her core and started pulling on it.

Then like gravity had doubled.

When she reached the top of the stairs, she passed through an empty gate and arrived at a two-storey tall open-air penthouse. The walls were made of swirling, ornamented grates, which let the winds blow through freely—and so high up, there were plenty of winds to blow through.

There were no interior walls, just a few supporting pillars, and the ground had been modelled in a natural style. It was probably meant to resemble a natural spring, with craggy layers of shale forming mounds and dipping toward a central pond. A few brushstrokes of green moss grew on the rocks, and a tree overhang the pond, shading it from the faintly glowing yellow orbs suspended from the roof.

‘Announce yourself,’ Phasoné said. ‘It’s now or never.’

Vayra gritted her teeth. No way Brannûl didn’t sense them. But, to keep herself from backing down, she unveiled her core and activated the Astral Shroud. The Wind Goddess would sense that.

“Brannûl!” Vayra yelled. “I’ve come to talk! Reveal yourself!”

‘Not the phrasing I would’ve used…’ Phasoné commented. ‘But it’ll work.’

“I can’t say I was expecting you to come right to me,” came a breathy voice from the opposite of the side of the room, like a middle-aged woman was trying to speak through a flute—but without any melody. “Especially when I just tried to kill you.”

‘At least she’s not dodging the point,’ Phasoné muttered.

“Is my daughter there? Does she wish to speak with me?” A woman stood up from behind a desk on the opposite side of the room, a desk nestled into the far corner, with stacks of parchment notes and stone paperweights. An open inkwell and quill rested beside it, and a half-finished letter sat in the middle of the table.

Hoisting a filagree-gilded staff from behind her chair, she circled around to the front of the table. She wore a pale blue dress with golden embroidery, but it was less formal—no corset, no jewelry, just a comfortable, relaxing attire. Her hair streamed down her back, swaying in the breeze.

Well, a breeze. It blew in the opposite direction of the outside air, and Vayra couldn’t feel it.

“I have many correspondences and letters to send, and they’re trying to open up a new school for the wind-arts on Fane Hen Sees, so be quick,” Brannûl said. She sneered, then shook her head and turned her back. “You didn’t exactly appear before me in formal attire, nor a…professional manner. If I chose to, I could mark this as an insult.”

Vayra immediately scrunched her face. She thought Brannûl would appear younger, perhaps in her early thirties, as an ageless god would. But instead, she looked to be in her mid-forties—by mortal standards.

‘Gods can craft their appearance as they please when they ascend,’ Phasoné said. ‘Mother chose to appear wise and aged.’

“You won’t try to have us killed again,” Vayra stated, her voice a little shaky. “If you know what’s good for you, you won’t do it.”

“You don’t have a say in the matter. I am a Goddess. I have sailed the galaxy for a thousand years before your time. I’ve carved out an existence in the lower and upper realms alike, and I’ve faced monsters you couldn’t even comprehend. What say do you have in the matters of gods?”

A swirl of wind rose up around her staff, encircling it and protecting it. She was preparing to attack.

“Can we dodge that?” Vayra whispered.

‘With the Astral Shroud? Perhaps. I don’t want to find out.’

Before Vayra could reply—either with words or by sending a thought in her mind—Phasoné manifested in front of them. For good measure, Vayra clasped Phasoné’s wrist and fed her a dreg of the mana they had left. Phasoné would stand a better chance at blocking an attack from a Goddess than Vayra would.

“Mother,” Phasoné said. She paused for a few seconds, and Vayra sensed indecision through their bond. Phasoné contemplated kneeling, but shot the thoughts down. “You can’t kill us yourself, not without it reflecting poorly upon your strength and honour. If you keep sending assassins, we will keep killing them.”

Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

“And we will remember who sent them,” Vayra said. “Are you so confident that Karmion will defeat us? And once we destroy him, we will deal with the rest of the gods.”

She recalled what Glade had told her about Harvest Sanctuary, and the meddling in the fabric of the world itself.

“And once Karmion is gone, we will force the rest of the Gods to rise back to the realms above, where they belong,” Vayra asserted, trying her best to purge the nerves from her mind. “Our realms will remain separate. But we cannot willingly allow a…harmful Goddess to remain alive.”

“And if you keep this up,” Phasoné added, “we will consider you harmful to all life. We will not give you a chance to return and finish what Karmion started.”

Brannûl cast a glance over her shoulder, and for the first time that conversation, Vayra thought the Goddess looked mildly nervous. “You think you can defeat Karmion? Your end is drawing near, and the hour is late. You may be a Commodore, but the moment you reach Grand Admiral, he will pounce and erase you from this world. And if you don’t keep advancing, you’ll never succeed in the tournament.” Brannûl shook her head. “Silly children. You’ve trapped yourselves in a corner. You may be strong, but Mediators have always lacked the experience, the strategic prowess of gods.”

Vayra swallowed. “Is that a risk you’re willing to take?”

“Mother, we will defeat Karmion,” Phasoné said. “And what then?”

“You put too much faith in yourself,” Brannûl said. “You will face him before you leave this planet, and you will not succeed.” She shook her head.

“You’d treat your own daughter this way?” Vayra took a step forward, but with the help of the Astral Shroud, it launched her across the room—only a few paces away from the Wind Goddess.

Brannûl stopped mid-step and turned to face Vayra. She wiped a glimmer of astonishment from her face. “I have plenty to spare. I have had hundreds over the many years of my life. This one has been a constant irritant, a blemish on the family, and her swift death would restore our honour. I don’t wish for her suffering, but…I will not suffer remorse over her passing.”

“Cold as ever,” Phasoné said. “Know this, Mother: we stand a chance against Karmion, no matter how slim. Whatever happens, you could come out with your life. But if you keep attacking us, and we win? We’ll come for you next. All those thousands of years, gone. All your follower sects? Crumbled. Ash. And when our time is up, when I return to the heavens and Vayra ascends to realms beyond, we will erase any evidence of your existence from the heavens as well.”

Vayra liked the sound of that.

After a few seconds of pursing her lips and scowling, Brannûl deactivated her staff technique and set the weapon down beside her desk. “I’ll consider. Now get out of my sight.”

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Myrrir sneaked into his father’s tower from below, slipping through access tunnels and maintenance hallways before pushing through a hatch in the tower’s basement. At the very center of the spire, a spiral staircase wound up toward the sky, so tall that the walls condensed to a single point so high above.

As a Captain, a peak Captain, the fall wouldn’t kill him, but such a distance still gave him vertigo.

But if he wanted to make it before the sun rose, he’d have to start. One foot after another. Get climbing.

As he climbed, he had plenty of time to think about what he’d say to his father. An angry admonishment? Would he shout and tell his father everything on his mind, list off all the perceived inconveniences and injustices, all the times his father had forgotten all his successes at the first whispers of failure?

But he’d failed a lot lately. That wouldn’t hold up under scrutiny. Maybe keeping calm, simply asking to be re-recognized and reinstated as a prominent figure of the family, would go over better.

Didn’t feel right either.

When he reached the top of the stairs, he had nothing, but he wasn’t backing down now.

He emerged in a sandstone hall with a high ceiling and gloomy rafters. Pirate flags hung from the rafters, still and unmoving, and a few braziers flickered in the wings, illuminating what they could. There were no windows.

“Father,” Myrrir said softly, announcing himself.

Nilsenir sat at the end of the hall. He was speaking softly with a servant—even so late at night, but a God barely needed any sleep at all. Halfway through instructing the servant, he dismissed the man with a flick of his hand, then turned back toward Myrrir.

“Why are you here?” His coat still fluttered, and he tapped his hook-hand on the armrest of the wooden throne at the end of the hall. “I have not released you from exile. I could have you arrested right this moment.”

“I’d resist.” Myrrir laid his hand on the jade sword at his hip. Immediately, his mind flashed to the Moro-ka village and Tye, but he crammed those thoughts down. “Father, I wish to be forgiven.”

“You haven’t done enough. Leave me. Bring the Mediator back, maybe, and perhaps Karmion will honour our old arrangement, though I think that time has passed long ago. She’s advancing fast. She’s stronger than you, now.”

“I’ve regressed, but I can put myself back.” He’d sustained damage to his channels and core in a fight with Nathariel, and he’d lost Arcara, but he’d recovered it since.

Myrrir remembered his Commodore revelation clearly: I am not satisfied. It was one of the easiest revelations he’d ever had.

“Put yourself back for my amusement,” Nilsenir said plainly. “You’ll get nothing out of it, but if you don’t do it, it’ll be shameful.”

Myrrir could’ve put himself back any time these past few days, but secretly, he told himself, he wanted to do it in front of his father—or in a way his father would notice. He knelt on the ground and whispered, “I am not satisfied.”

It had worked before. He’d never be satisfied until he was a God, and he’d keep striving forever. It was supposed to be a ‘revelation,’ but he’d known himself well, and he’d known that it would be an effective revelation for years before reaching Commodore.

But nothing happened.

Nilsenir laughed, then dropped himself down on his throne and shook his head. “Get out of my sight, boy.”

It wasn’t true anymore. It wasn’t that Myrrir had suddenly become satisfied, but he was unsatisfied for different reasons. He looked up at his father, the man laughing at him. Should Nilsenir not have been there to offer support, suggestions, or a helping hand of any sort?

But he never had been.

It didn’t feel right anymore. None of this did.

“I am not satisfied…” he tried again. Not satisfied with this existence. With this method, with this strategy, with…everything. I am not satisfied with what I’ve done.

Myrrir’s soul and core resonated properly, once more responding to the revelation, but Nilsenir cut him off.

“Fumbling your revelation, taking two attempts? Your soul is shattered. Weak. Leave me, and do not look at me again—not until you’ve done anything to warrant another meeting.”

“But when will I know—”

“You’ll know. Winning a fight isn’t impressive. Getting yourself back to where you were before isn’t impressive, let alone this. Leave me.”