“I didn’t know you felt that way.” Nyx looked down at her, curious. She looked so strange with her hair curled and her dress heavy with pearls. Sure, when the three of them used to drink together, she’d complained about how people lived in the city, but that wasn’t unusual. Everyone groused. It was part of being a soldier.
“Maybe I’m leaving the empire in good hands,” he said. “After this is done.”
“We’ll see.”
The wedding took place at the entrance to the Crypts, with witches standing around the railing in a circle. They were holding ribbons in their hands, and an enormous disk of water rippled above them, like a plane of glass. Lamont stood at the base of it, looking up, and smiled nervously when he saw Nadia.
“Oh, fuck,” Nadia whispered.
“You still have time to run,” Nyx whispered back. Nadia stepped on his foot.
Nyx fell back once he reached a mark the harried, hollow-eyed man in charge of organizing the wedding had pointed out to him about a dozen times that morning, and Nadia continued walking toward Lamont. There wasn’t much of a crowd—most of the onlookers had to watch from the spiral staircase above or wait for Lamont and Nadia to head to the main square—but Nyx heard a collective intake of breath as the witches raised their arms, lifting Nadia and Lamont to the disk of water. They stepped onto it, and Nadia beamed as the water held, firm as stone.
Thena stepped out of her place with the other witches. She looked small, standing there with her hair in ribbons and her enormous gown billowing around her, and she clapped her hands. Light moved over the surface of the water, flickering images that barely lingered long enough to recognize.
“I have consulted with the Lord of Dreams,” Thena said, her voice echoing through the palace. “And he has given me a vision.”
Everyone in attendance seemed frozen, waiting. It was customary for witches to invoke prophecy during imperial weddings, but Nyx had never seen such an event before. He looked up at the disk of water, where Nadia and Lamont were standing, holding each other.
“I saw—” Thena hesitated, and then her voice strengthened. “I saw a fruit tree blooming in a desert. The empire will thrive under this union. It will endure.”
The crowd applauded, and Lamont grinned, squeezing Nadia’s hand tight. But Thena’s expression was grim as she returned to the other witches, and when she met Nyx’s gaze, he saw something odd in her eyes, like fear. Then it was gone, and the emperor was speaking in a quavering voice from the throne, performing the rites of marriage.
It all descended into chaos when Nadia and Lamont kissed, and the witches bore them back to earth while the disk collapsed into a soft rain. Lamont nearly slipped, but instead of scowling and threatening some poor servant nearby, he laughed and grabbed Nadia for balance. She kissed him again, and they made for the palace gates, which opened to a roar of the distant crowd.
Nyx stood, staring at their silhouettes against the open doors, until Thena appeared at his side.
“Don’t speak,” she said softly. “Say it in your mind.”
Nyx was about to ask what she meant when he realized her lips hadn’t moved and her faint voice was only in his head. He stiffened, and she steadied him with a hand on his arm.
“This is the only way we can talk privately,” she continued, as Lamont waved at the crowd. “I felt someone had to know, and the others think I’m being divisive.”
“What do you mean?” Nyx tried to think it, rather than say it, and it seemed Thena heard him. She glanced up at him, brows lowered.
“I didn’t see a tree in the desert. I said that because it would have ruined everything if I said anything else.”
At the door, Nadia laughed as Lamont grabbed her hand, towing her down the steps to greet the crowd. “Whatdidyou see?”
Thena grimaced. “I saw a river of sand, flowing over the empire. It covered everything. The buildings, the cities, the people… until it came to the palace. It drowned them all, Nyx.”
Nyx wondered if that was a sign of Death’s corruption, a river to drown the empire. But Azaiah’s river wasn’t made of sand. It was a river of spirits, and water. A storm that would flood the world.
“And I saw the one who brought the river,” Thena whispered in his mind. “In my dream, I saw his face.”
“His?” Nyx turned to look at her. “Who was he? Lamont? The emperor?”
Thena shook her head. “I… it was nothing,” she said, out loud. She stepped back, hands clasped before her. “It was a dream. The Lord of Dreams always speaks in riddles, and the visions he sends do not always foretell the future. We do, in the way we interpret them.”
“But who was it?” Nyx asked. “Was it War?”
Thena sighed. “It was no one, Nyx. No one. I shouldn’t have said anything.” She turned away from him, heading down the stairs and into the Crypts, leaving Nyx standing in a throng of cheering nobles and servants, listening to the people of the empire welcome their future rulers.
* * *
Azaiah was preparing to go to the Palace of the Moon when his brother Somnus visited him. It was not easy for them to communicate, since Azaiah very rarely did anything resembling sleep, so the Lord of Dreams had to use other methods to make contact.
Azaiah was wading into the waters to leave when he saw something strange: the stones in the bottom arranging themselves into something that looked like a face. Blinking, he stopped and squinted at it, while the water shimmered over the stones and a faint scent of lavender filtered through the air. “Brother,” Azaiah said, smiling. “Hello.”
