Page 53 of The Last of the Dark Lords

"Thatthing?" Grandmother frowned. "It has no power here. Stahkla may have ensured that it cannot be removed by force, but here in the heart of Vazzart's power it is useless to you. Underneath the reservoir itself, no other god's artifact has any potency."

Interesting. She'd tried to take off the crown, and couldn't.Andwe were under the reservoir. I hadn’t known that any tunnels dug that far down into the earth.

"The heart of Vazzart's power? What doeshethink of what you're doing?"

Grandmother scoffed, rolling her eyes. "He would tell us if he didn’t approve." A flash of insecurity crossed her face. "Besides, Vazzart hasn't spoken to anyone in Greatfalls since the time of my own grandmother. He would appear to us if he wished us to stop."

I frowned at her words. They simply weren’t true. Vazzart had responded to my request, and he’d told me to go with Cyrus. What did it mean that Vazzart had not appeared to Grandmother? Was it really the blanket approval she seemed to think?

"Have you ever thought that you aren't listening hard enough?" I asked. If someone had told me a month ago I’d be speaking to my grandmother in that tone, I’d have told them they were crazy, but she’d pushed me too far. This was the woman that raised me. I never thought the day would come that she would treat me as an enemy.

"Perhaps three more days in the dark will loosen your resolve." Grandmother stepped back into the hallway, calling out to me asthe guards shut the door. "Think hard, Skye. You may be Lord of Ashfuror, but you will be the last."

The darkness returned.

In the artificial night of the prison cell, my thoughts rang out loud and harsh in my head. Did Grandmother really have the will to hold her grandson captive indefinitely? I had to consider the possibility. I’d misjudged her. Her willingness to discard morality for the sake of politics ran deeper than I could have imagined.

Cyrus was alive and awake. Part of me was certain that he would come for me, that he would never leave his husband to rot. But part of me worried that I had hurt him too deeply, that my betrayal was too much for him to overcome, even if he had known it might happen. That he would abandon me here.

Why didn’t Vazzart stop my grandmother, or at least make his will known? The direct presence of a god could obliterate whole cities, that’s what some folk said. That’s why the gods worked through artifacts and through the minds of their followers. Although some argued that they couldn’t reach us if our hearts were closed, regardless of how powerful they were.

Stahkla was terrifying but had been crystal clear. My interactions with Vazzart had confused me more than anything. Why send me with Cyrus just for me to get locked away?

As my thoughts wandered, the drip of the water in the corner grew louder and faster. It would hit stone and then trickle down to the dirt floor. The longer I sat, the louder it became, echoing off the walls of the cell. It took on a life and a rhythm of its own. I got lost in the hypnotic patterns filling the damp air.

The black field of my vision vibrated with color as the sound took on a visual form. It was small at first, but soon the whole cell was filled with aqua patterns, pulsing to the sound of that now-thundering drip.

If I hadn't been stuck in the dark for four days, I might have reacted with suspicion, but I was hit with a wave of relief. The shapes called to me, and I inhaled the sound into my lungs. Then I exhaled, my breath joining the dance of colors in the air.

With an overwhelming woosh, I was underwater once again. Like that day at the mountainside altar, I was being pulled by the current, faster and faster as I passed indistinct piles of rock and coral.

Then I felt it.Hispresence. Vazzart was here. Not as a person or the enormous buck, but all around me, like a school of jellyfish, wrapping me in hues of purple and pink.

Little one.

He was so much more intense than last time. Grandmother had said this was the heart of Vazzart's power, and the weight of his being permeated me down to the foundations of my soul.

"Lord."

You are a Lord of Fyr now.

The colors around me sprang to life, moving faster now, forming images of me in Ashfuror, marrying Cyrus, wearing the crown.

"Do you approve of what Grandmother’s doing? Is this what you want?”

The colors became more subdued, the images fading to gray, ashy clouds.

No.

"Then why haven't you let your will be known?"

I cannot appear to those who shield themselves from me, even unintentionally. She fears my judgment, and that fear cuts her off from me. I cannot break through. My words are for those who welcome my guidance.

"But...what do I do?"

What do you wish?

Tears welled up in my eyes, meeting the water that surrounded me and floating away. They were like tiny bubbles of my spirit, carrying my hopes to the surface. The god's presence made me want to say everything, to speak all of the words that echoed in my mind.

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