“Granted, ‘the Lord of Shadows’ was a feeble attempt at diversion,” she replied, then returned her attention to me. “But my family has had its hands full trying to prevent a panic, Lady Oree. After all, we spent centuries filling mortal hearts with terror at the prospect of the Nightlord’s release. Better that we should keep him leashed than he break loose and wreak his vengeance upon the world; that was how it went. Now only a few feeble lies keep the populace from realizing we could all go the way of the Maro.”
She referred to the destruction of my people—her family’s fault—with neither rancor nor shame, and it made me seethe. But that was how Arameri were: they shrugged off their errors, when they could even be persuaded to admit them.
“He’s angry,” I said. Softly, because so was I. “The Nightlord. You know that, don’t you? He has given a deadline for the Arameri and the godlings to find his children’s killers.”
“Yes,” said Serymn. “That message was delivered to the Lord Arameri several days ago, I’m told. One month, from Role’s death. That leaves us approximately three weeks.”
She spoke like it was nothing, a god’s wrath. My hands fisted in my lap. “The Nightlord was bored when he destroyed the Maroland. He didn’t even have his full power at the time. Can you even imagine what he’ll do now?”
“Better than you can, Lady Oree.” Serymn spoke very softly. “I grew up with him, remember.”
The table fell silent. A clock somewhere in the room ticked loudly. All of us could hear the untold tales in her inflectionless tone—and then there was the biggest tale, lurking beneath the surface of the conversation like some leviathan: why had a woman so powerful, so apparently fearless, fled from Sky in the first place? And now, imagining horrors in the ticking stillness, I could not help wondering, What the hells did the Nightlord do to her?
“Fortunately,” said Serymn at last, and I exhaled in relief when the silence broke, “his anger fits well into our plans.”
I must have frowned, because she laughed. It sounded forced, though only a little.
“Consider, Lady Oree, that we have been saved once already by the third member of the Three. Consider what that means—what her presence means. Have you never wondered? Enefa of the Twilight, sister of Bright Itempas, has been dead for two thousand years. Who, then, is this Gray Lady? You’re acquainted with many of the city’s godlings. Did they explain this mystery to you?”
I blinked in surprise as I realized Madding had not. He had spoken of his mother’s death, grief still thick in his voice. But he had also spoken of his parents, plural and present. It was just one of those contradictions that one had to accept when dealing with gods; it hadn’t bothered me because I hadn’t thought it was important. But then, until recently, I thought I’d understood the hierarchy of the gods.
“No,” I said. “He—they never told me.”
“Hmm. Then I will tell you a great secret, Lady Oree. Ten years ago, a mortal woman betrayed her god and her humanity by conspiring to set the Nightlord—her lover—free. She succeeded, and for her efforts was rewarded with the lost power of Enefa. She became, in effect, a new Enefa, a goddess in her own right.”
I caught my breath in inadvertent surprise. I had never realized it was possible for a mortal to become a god. But that explained a great deal. The restrictions on the godlings, confining them within the city of Shadow; why the godlings so carefully policed each other to prevent mass destruction. A goddess who had once been mortal herself might take exception to the callous disregard for mortal life.
“The Gray Lady is irrelevant to us,” Serymn said, “beyond the fact that we have her to thank for the current peace.” She leaned forward, resting her elbows on the table. “We’re counting on her intervention, in fact. Enefa—of whom this new goddess is essentially a copy—has always fought for the preservation of life. That is her nature; where her brothers are more extreme—quick to judge and quicker to wreak havoc—she maintains. She adapts to change and seeks stability within it. The Gods’ War was not the first time Itempas and Nahadoth had fought, after all. It was simply the first time they’d done it, since the creation of life, without Enefa around to keep the world in balance.”
I was shaking my head. “You mean you’re counting on this new Enefa to keep us safe? Are you kidding? Even if she used to be human, she’s not anymore. Now she thinks like any other god.” I thought of Lil. “And some of them are crazy.”