I didn’t want to kill the king, but I didn’t want to let the deathshead down. I didn’t want people to die because he had, but I couldn’t bear the thought that I’d endanger more people if he lived. I didn’t want any of this blood on my hands.
Each of my wishes felt impossible, even for the gods of fortune.
“Bertie called you here to give me a blessing,” I finally said. “He wants me to save the king and stop the war. But…” I pressed my lips together. I wasn’t sure if I was holding back tears or a scream. “…apparently that’s not what the Holy First wants. It’s not what the deathshead or my godfather or any of the thousands of gods trapped inside you want. So…I guess I want a bit of a blessing too. When it comes time to…” I couldn’t say the words, couldn’t voice my treachery here in this room that housed so many unfortunate innocents. “When I’m about to deal with King Marnaigne, I would like everything to go right. To go well.” I felt my eyes prick with tears. “I don’t know what lives I save by taking the king’s, so I suppose I’m asking you to help ensure that my own is safe. Let me get out of this disaster with my own skin intact.”
There was a long moment of silence; then Calamité patted my back. “It takes a great amount of courage to show such cowardice,” he said proudly, as if his commendation wasn’t also an insult. “I quite like you, mortal.” He reached into his side of their robe and withdrew a long necklace, a perfect match to Bertie’s little set of bronze pipes. “When the time comes, blow on this and we will bless the endeavor.”
He lowered the chain over my head and I slipped the bauble into my bodice, feeling sick.
“I suppose our work here is done, then,” Félicité said, not sounding sure of it at all. “Shall we?”
“And miss the brandy?” Calamité pouted, but his sister was already raising her hand to whisk themselves away.
“Wait!” I shouted before they vanished. “Could I…could I ask for one other thing?”
The goddess stopped short, hope flickering in her eye. “Yes?”
“I can’t save the king and I can’t stop the war, but I should be able to do something about this plague, the Shivers. I’m a healer. I should be able to stop it, right?”
She waited, sensing I had more to say.
I swallowed, already pained by the admission to come. “I haven’t seen the cure. I only see the deathshead on the king. And it’s already killed so many, whole villages and towns, and I just…I need to know. Is there one? A cure?”
Félicité considered this. “All sicknesses come to an eventual end.”
I wanted to stamp my foot with frustration. Did she truly believe that was an acceptable answer?
“But if I can’t find someone alive to—”
Shouts rang out down the hall and we all startled, heads snapping toward the open doorway. For a horrible moment I feared therebellion had reached the capitol, that forces had already descended upon the Rift.
“Just tell me. Plainly,” I demanded, whipping back toward the gods. “Is there a cure?”
More shouts. One of the raised voices sounded like Bertie’s. There was a great crash, followed by the sound of glass shattering.
Calamité sighed. “That would be the brandy. I suppose there’s no point in staying now.”
“Tell me!” I exclaimed, reaching out toward them.
The god rolled his eye. “So dramatic. Of course there is.”
“And I’ll find it?”
He raised his shoulder in a one-sided shrug. “You know how to findus.That’s what matters, mortal.”
Before I could ask anything more, Calamité bopped my forehead with all the irreverence of a bothersome uncle, and the gods were gone.
The patter of footsteps grew closer. I could hear laughter too.
My eyes darted about the dormitory, looking for a spot to hide, a weapon to use, anything so that when the soldiers arrived I wouldn’t be standing in the middle of the room, empty-handed. I grabbed the first thing I saw—a brass figurine of the Divided Ones—and hefted it over my shoulder, poised like a warrior ready to strike.
A figure raced in, panting and out of breath. Bertie trailed behind, close at its heels.
I nearly dropped the statue in surprise. “Leopold?”
He smirked at my choice of weapon. “Come on, little healer. We’re getting you out of here.”
Chapter 33
