“And what do I tell her about you? I found a god swimming in the ocean and brought him home?” Iason looked up at the sky, where the clouds were, once again, dissipating.
“Tell her whatever you like,” Leviathan said. “And when my other form is restored to me, if you want me to tear you apart with my jaws, I will do it. It might be better than what happens to wizards if you use too much power. But you will not draw from me again without asking first.”
“I didn’t want to do it at all,” Iason said, but he nodded. “I—would not want that. To have it done to me.”
“You shouldn’t apologize for things if you’re not really sorry for doing them,” Leviathan said as they started walking. “My brother taught me that.”
“Death taught you not to apologize?”
“No, one of my other brothers. It doesn’t matter. The point is, you aren’t sorry you took from me to save her.” He remembered, again, the words of the long-ago siren, and the man he’d left behind on the sandbar. Angel, who had loved him, who’d worn his symbol of protection around his neck until Leviathan took it back. If it was Iason, with his scars from a spell net and his dangerous magic, that Evadne had spoken of… then he’d been wrong, all those years ago, to leave Angel behind.
He felt no particular remorse at the thought, only a slight annoyance that he’d been wrong. It had been some time ago, after all, and Angelhadmade him bleed.
He thought again of Arwyn and Declan, of the feeling he’d had when he watched them together. Of Nyx, challenging him on Azaiah’s behalf—Azaiah, who had almost as much power as Leviathan, only in a different realm. “I will allow you to use my power if you ask,” he told Iason. “But youwillask.”
“I already said I would, andyouwill wear some fucking clothes.”
“You have an unpleasant disposition.”
“I’ve heard that before,” Iason said, “and I don’t care. You’re still going to have to wear clothes. And let me do the talking with Sophie, at least at first. Please,” he added, after a moment, sounding only somewhat surly about it.
“As long as the clothes are silk,” Leviathan said, following him up the shore. “I don’t like the way fabrics feel on this form’s skin, and silk is the most like water.” Iason was marching forward like one of Ares’s soldiers, ignoring him. “I can make it rain on you for the rest of your life, you know.”
“I’ll see what I can do,” Iason said. “But I make no promises, dra—Levi.”
It didn’t matter. Leviathan simply wouldn’t wear clothes if he didn’t like them. This Iason would learn sooner or later why it was ridiculous to argue with him. Leviathan might not be a dragon right now, but he was still a god. He made the sky give a thunderous rumble, just to make a point.
If Iason noticed, he didn’t turn around.
ChapterThree
Unsurprisingly, the provisions tent for a rebellion made up of a formerly secret militia did not, in fact, carry silk clothing.
“You’ll have to make the best of it,” Iason said, as Levi grimaced and wrapped a thin, soft cloth around his waist. It was probably supposed to be a shawl, dyed a deep purple that Iason hadn’t seen since he left Mislia. He’d forgotten how vibrant the clothes were when the cloth spinners could use magic in their dyes and make cotton feel like silk.
“Or I could go without,” Levi said. Iason only just stopped himself from rolling his eyes.
“At least leave it on when there are children around.” Iason gave Levi a quick look up and down. He was still damp from the sea, and there was something inhuman about him, an odd lope to his gait, a strangeness in the way he tilted his head. “Wait here while I explain to Sophie.”
“You do not give me orders, wizard.”
“It’s Iason.” He was still unsettled by what Levi had said about his magic. But he couldn’t deal with that yet. There were more pressing issues, like mostly nude gods walking around and threatening people.
“Sophie.” Iason opened the tent flap. Sophie was still asleep, probably too exhausted to care that the sun was rising. “Sophie, wake up. Something happened.”
“Oh, no.” Sophie rolled onto her stomach. “Did King Emile turn into a cat and get cursed to atone for his crimes and now we need to take care of him?”
Iason crouched in the tent doorway for a second, considering this. “No.”
“Is Mislia sinking into the ocean?”
“Not yet,” Levi said, behind Iason. Iason cast him a dark glare.
“No. It’s something else.” He sighed. “The dragon we encountered earlier? He was a god.”
Sophie groaned into her bedding.
“The god of the tempest, Leviathan. Something happened to him when I… maybe drew on his power to heal you, in the ocean.” He didn’t want to tell her that she’d died. Not yet. The memory of her lifeless stare was frozen in his mind, and he didn’t think Sophie needed to contend with her own mortality any more than she already had. “Anyway, he came back—he’s here now. He’s tied to me, somehow, and it’s stopping him from turning into a dragon.”
