Labyrinth of Stars(64)

I shook my head, gaze never leaving hers. “Tell me about the Devourer.”

She flinched, baring her teeth. “Do not say that name out loud. It is dangerous to speak of him.”

“Really.” I drew out the word, unhappy with her reaction. “Why?”

She hesitated. “The gods embrace creation and beauty, all the possibilities represented by the divine organic. It is life, for them, even when their motives are . . . off-putting. But that one . . . his art . . . is the opposite.”

“Death, you mean.”

“Suffering. Annihilation.”

I gave up trying to be tough and sat down on the ground. The Messenger blinked and leaned back on her haunches, robes and chains hanging loose around her. Shadows winged. Vultures, already gliding high in the sky.

“He might know how to cure the disease that’s killing us,” I said, but saying those words out loud made the situation feel more impossible.

“He is a monster,” she said, surprising me. “And there is no Divine Lord who would disagree, or punish me for saying so. It is known. It is truth. If there is a god whom other gods fear, it is he.”

“So you’re saying we’re fucked.”

Her brow lifted, delicately. “If there is a cure, you will find it elsewhere. Or, you will help the Lightbringer survive this illness through other means, and you will tell yourself that is enough.”

“Enough,” I repeated. “You mean, let the world die of this thing.”

“There are wars that cannot be won,” she said quietly. “But there is always a war, Hunter.”

Fight to live another day. And then live to fight.

It was the same refrain I’d heard my entire life, and it was just as cold from the Messenger’s lips as it had been from my mother’s. It was no lie, either. No fool’s advice. This was the life we had been born into. The life our bodies had been crafted for—always, the fight. My daughter carried that blood. My daughter, built cell by cell from my cells, my soul, and the souls of those who had come before.

But violence was not the life I wanted to give her. Violence was not part of the dream I wanted inside her head.

Escape from that future seemed to be slipping away, though.

“Who would know where the Devourer is?” I asked.

The Messenger flinched again and gave me a cold look. “If you find him, you will receive no answers, there will be no cure. He will unmake you, Hunter.”

“It’ll tickle, I’m sure.” I stood and had to close my eyes as dizziness kicked in, and black spots pushed into my vision. But my head throbbed a little less, and the burn of fever seemed to be fading. Was I healing? Were the boys suffering, so I could live?

“Who?” I asked again, opening my eyes.

The Messenger ignored me, reaching for the Mahati, who was trying to sit up. She never actually touched him, but her fingers seemed to strum the air, and another low hum left her throat. He tilted his head to look at her, and I didn’t know what I saw in his eyes—anger or hate, or maybe something that could have been desire. Whatever it was, that look held power between them, and I felt like an intruder.

“The Divine Lords cannot hide from one another,” said the Messenger in a soft voice, not taking her gaze from the Mahati. “Find the Wolf. He will know.”

And then she finally looked at me, and her gaze was cool and still, not marred in the slightest by the swollen lip or cuts above her brow.

“I have ever been loyal to my gods,” she said. “And you and the child you carry are abominations. Your power is dangerous. It will break too much that is sacred. The unknown,” she went on, pointing to my stomach, “cannot be trusted.

“But,” she added, softly, “you and the Lightbringer gave me freedom, of a kind. I know to value it now. I understand its worth. So for that I will tell you . . . be wary of the god who is your grandfather.”

“He wouldn’t hurt us.”

“Not even for your own good?” The Messenger finally slid her hand under the Mahati’s arm, and with her other stroked the air above a deep gash in his biceps. “We also tell stories about the Wolf.”

“Yes?” I asked, wary.

Bitterness touched her mouth. “He is the hunter who slaughters worlds.”



I expected it to still be night when I returned to the farm, with the Messenger and her Mahati in tow—but the sun was just peeking over the horizon, a golden glint piercing the farthest edge of a blue sky, and the boys seemed to sag against my skin. Quieter now, sluggish. Exhausted, I thought.

A small herd of cows was penned in by the barn, making distress calls and looking wild-eyed and uneasy. I didn’t know who had brought them there, but I had a strong feeling they weren’t long for the world. Meat, just like the rest of us.