“What about you, Everbright?” Efren boomed, slinging an arm around the neck of the pale god. “How’s your girly shaping up?”

“Well...She’s still learning, you know,” Rellan said, twisting futilely in an attempt to break free of the water god’s muscular arm. He settled for finding an angle he could breathe at, grinning up at his cousin. “She’s just a child. She’ll get there.”

“Katell,” Solune said with a nod, raising his mug in a toast. “She’ll do. Eventually.” A crooked smile flashed onto his face as he glanced at his brother, his opinion of the Chosen’s progress clear. Rellan frowned, folding his arms in mock anger.

“You idiots,” Shiina sighed from across the table, finally settling back in her seat. “You get yourselves worked up with these notions of kids and training.” She shook her head slowly. “If you keep coddling them they will never amount to anything.”

“Shiina, dearest, it’s not always a good idea to throw your Ascended into deep waters simply to find out if they can swim,” Solune said, one eyebrow arching delicately as he twisted to face her.

“Nonsense,” the fire goddess said briskly, folding her arms firmly across her chest. “Doing is the best way to learn. They never have any illusions about the world , do they?”

“And how many of them wind up maimed and bleeding on the doorsteps of our healers?” Efren shot back, relaxing as he released the god of light.

Rellan straightened, rubbing the back of his neck, but nodded along with Efren’s words. As the two gods whose arts encompassed restoration, it too-often fell to the Everdeep’s seers and the Everbright’s priests to clean up the messes of their more reckless siblings.

Shiina’s cheeks flushed faintly pink on top of their already rosy glow.

“Well, I suppose it is not a perfect system,” she muttered, glaring daggers at Efren. Her finger came up in a flash, held inches from his nose. “But you’d best be careful, brother. If you keep cloistering your girl up in the temple like an invalid, she shall be nigh useless when she comes of age.” The finger jabbed forward again. “You need to let her experience life. Let her make mistakes. Get burned. Crack a few heads.”

He shrugged slowly and deliberately, a laugh rolling out from his belly, and raised his drink.

“Now, sister, I agree with that completely.”

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“Efren’s giant, salty- what’s goin’ on here? The hell is this?”

This had not gone like she planned.

Her instructors would have been proud of the clean, effortless way she had tossed the man over her shoulder. And it was truly a stroke of fate that the crates had been there to break his fall, leaving him panting and breathless in a pile of shattered wood and straw.

But, it turned out, the sailors whose cargo she had just smashed were less than amused about the whole business. From the angry way their eyes flicked between the face of the man out cold and hers, she was also getting the impression that he was a friend. Even better.

She held her hands up innocently, disarmingly, and tried not to look at the fragments of crate slowly floating out into the harbor below the dock.

“I-I’m sorry about your cargo. Really. I-”

“Salt and spray, what do you think you’re doing, brat? That was supposed to go out today.” The sailor bore down on her, broad as a wall and tall enough to throw a shadow over her. “How are you goin’ to fix it, huh?” His face was screwed up in rage, and his fellows were beginning to wander over towards them.

She flinched back instinctively. “I-I’m sure that we can figure something out, if you’ll just let me-”

He lunged forward with a roar, his hand snapping out to grab at the front of her shirt. She reached inside instinctively, pulling at the waters underneath them, but her heart was pounding. Her pulse beat rapid-fire in her ears, distracting her, and her fingers slipped. The seawater slid away uselessly.

No, something inside her sighed.

She threw herself to the side instead, and the man grabbed her elbow rather than her collar.

She should call for help. There would be guards around - they were never all that far. They would help her. Or she should call Efren - his disapproval over her misadventures would be better than if he found that she’d let herself get hurt, she knew.

But she couldn’t. The stubbornness welled up, surprising even her. There was no way she was just going to go crying back to his skirts.

“What, you’re just goin’ to run?” He bellowed in her ear. “I don’t think so. Who’s goin’ to pay for all this?!” The other sailors were all nodding sagely, satisfied to watch their friend handle the problem.

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Natalin tugged at her arm, trying to free it from the man’s grip, but he jerked it higher, pulling her off balance. She bit down on the squeak of pain that threatened to come out. She couldn’t think with him holding her half-aloft, screaming in her ear. She couldn’t breathe.

Ice. She needed ice - under his feet, under his hand, anything. She plunged back down into the bottomless pits of her well, grabbing fistfulls of power, but it came out as a limp, undefined wave of water that splashed across her captor.

No, no, no. Not like that, the voice said in her ear. She could hear the way he chuckled, trying and failing to hold back his laughter. His presence was like a cold breeze on the back of her neck, tucked deep into the corners of her mind.

Watch. One more time. And then she felt his touch, taking her by the wrists. Together they dipped delicately into her well, pulling forth a fraction of what she had frantically grabbed. Slowly, but growing in confidence the faster she went, he led her through the motions.

The waters under the dock roiled and surged, coating the wharf in frigid waters. Her fingers followed half a beat behind, flash-freezing the whole pier in the time it took to snap her fingers.

Steady. Easy, now, lass. Breathe. Efren said, his invisible hands resting casually on her shoulders.

The sailor went down, still bellowing, and she froze his shirt to the thick, fast-steaming patch of ice before he could push himself back up. The roar from behind told her that his friends weren’t going to stand around and watch any longer.

Even though she was a cleric? Even though the fact that a child was using Efren’s magic clearly marked her as the Tideborn, with the full protection of the Riverguard and temple? She offered the filthy, incoherent men a withering glare for their lack of common sense.

Natalin could still feel Efren watching, taking stock as she pulled the sea waters into a cord, but he seemed content to let her handle it. Her face already burned with embarrassment that she was in this mess in the first place, that she had needed his help at all.

She was the Tideborn. She should be able to handle a few rowdy sailors.

One lash of the frigid rope, spraying chunks of rapidly-freezing water down the pier and up the sailors’ legs, and she’d put wrist-thick cords of ice across their feet and down to the boards of the wharf. They bellowed like stuck pigs, but no matter how they fought, they couldn’t get free.

Time for her to leave.

The pounding of feet coming up the road, just on the shore, put an end to that notion as she turned on her heel. Her heart sank as she saw the squad of silver-clad Riverguard pounding their way towards the dock. Well, their brawl hadn’t exactly been stealthy. It only made sense that someone had called for help.

“You don’t suppose we could...” she began wistfully, eying the calm waters of the harbor. It would be so easy to slip out onto the waters and be gone before the guards blew her cover.

“Not even a chance,” Efren said with a chuckle, springing into place beside her with a swirl of fog. “I hope you had a good day out, waterlily, because now I think that someone is going to want to have a word with you.”

Her lips pressed into a thin line as she glared at him, anxiety rising. He roared with laughter at the sight.

The Riverguard overtook her in an instant, never so much as seeing the god in their midst, and she sighed. She knew what came next.

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“Of all of the childish, irresponsible things that you could have done, I never thought you would try anything like this!” Gerd bellowed, the veins in his skeletal neck standing out. “Do you know, we spent an hour searching the city for you? Do you know how our people worried?”

Natalin winced, drawing back ever so slightly as the diviner continued with his rant. So far it had been half an hour of his screaming, and they’d covered a variety of topics ranging from the disrespect she’d shown her tutors to her failure to live up to the responsibilities of her title. Referring to her as a child seemed to be the common point between all of his arguments, a comfortable place to return to before he began anew.

Trying to look as though she was listening dutifully rather than tuning him out, she did just that. Her mind was still too full of the things she’d seen that day to focus on his reaming her out. Back and forth Gerd paced, still frothing at the mouth about how her predecessor must be rolling in his grave. She was miles away all the while, standing on the high decks of those ships as she traversed the open sea.

Shouldn’t you listen at least a little? The Waterbinder’s amused voice rumbled in the back of her mind. She flinched, drawing an irritated glare from her advisor.

I have listened. I’m listening right now.

...right. His slow response told her exactly how little he believed that little lie. Luckily for her, it didn’t seem as though he particularly cared, either.

Aren’t you going to be angry, too? she muttered silently to him, keeping her face carefully blank.

He chuckled. Ah, well. It’s Aramoor. It’s not like you wandered off to fight pirates or bandits or go start a war. His tone was scornful enough to prompt a chuckle from her. G

erd stiffened, his face going incandescent, but she ignored him.

Rules are rules, waterlily. It’s fine to break them, when you feel you must. But when you do, there are consequences to pay. Efren’s voice took a serious turn, although she could still hear the humor soaking through.

I know. She thought back, swallowing a sigh. Gerd stopped, going stiff for a long moment, and then glared at her. His gaze went distant for a second, the intensity vanishing.

Natalin blinked, taken aback at the sudden change.

“That’ll be all for now. We will speak of this at greater length - later. See it doesn’t happen again.” Spitting the words at her, he thundered off towards the Sanctuary.

She stared after him, her brow furrowing more by the second as she tried to piece together what had just happened.

“Oh, look. Our diviner has just found more important tasks. Ones demanding his immediate and personal attention. You’re welcome,” Efren said dryly, looming over her out of nowhere with a gust of salt-scented wind.

Natalin eyed him carefully. If he was was out and about this much, then the other gods must have vanished from the Sanctuary. She smothered the disappointment that rose up at the realization. She had never been going to see them today, anyway.

“Important tasks?” she ventured cautiously, knowing this was her one shot before Gerd arrived at his door, answering the god’s summons with a whirlwind of activity.

“Important tasks indeed. Not entirely unexpected, of course.” The big god folded his arms, running his fingers through his goatee. He was in a good mood, Natalin realized. Even better than usual. Luckily for her.

Efren beamed down at her, lingering for one more moment. His outline was already beginning to blur before her eyes.

He was gone in a second, the mists left in his wake dispersing on the wind, but his final words hung in the air between them.

“My sister is coming to visit. We're going to have guests, girl.”