the gods are enemies. Many would not dare to cross me.”
I think of Tadekha, and how she coyly suggested an alliance with Aron and he shot her down. He didn’t trust her in the slightest. “But you trust these gods? The Spidae?”
“They do not take sides.” He shrugs. “They will give me the answers I seek.”
“And that’s great, but what if your other Aspects have the same idea?”
Aron’s mouth forms a hard, hard smile. “Then we are all in the same place at one time.”
I push his hand off my thigh, because I’m suddenly no longer feeling very cuddly. “I really hope that’s just the arrogance talking, because I really, really don’t want to die, Aron.”
To my surprise, his eyes practically blaze with emotion. He hauls me against him, tighter than before, and the look on his face is fervent. “No one will touch you, Faith. I will never let you come to harm.”
I gaze up at him. “You can’t promise that. You have two other Aspects out to take you down. You can’t promise I’ll be safe, Aron. Not if I’m the target.”
His jaw clenches. I think for a moment that he’s going to argue with me, but instead, he jerks to his feet. Before I can protest, he’s carrying me away from the others and into our tent. Inside, it’s just as frosty, but a bed has been made for me on a linen tarp to protect from the mud, and it’s here that Aron sets me down gently. Aron kneels so we’re both on the ground, and then he cups my face, forcing me to look up at him.
“Faith,” he murmurs. “I know you’re worried. I know you feel isolated and alone. But I will never, ever let anything happen to you.”
“Because I’m tied to you,” I joke, nervous.
“Because you are mine,” he corrects. His fingers skate lightly along my cheeks. “My companion. My woman. My anchor. My Faith. I will protect your life with my own.”
“Aron.” I press my hands over his because I feel like he’s not grasping just how out of place I truly am. “My life is your own. It’s been tied to you since the moment I put my hand in yours. If I die, I don’t know what happens to me. You go back to your heaven, your Citadel of Storms, and I go…where? I don’t even know if my afterlife exists in this world. If you die, you’re just one step closer to your ultimate goal, but I’m destroyed utterly.”
He shakes his head. “Faith, you don’t understand. I will cease to exist if I die. All of who this Aspect is”—he gestures at his chest—“will be removed from who I am.”
“But you’ll still exist. Aron will still exist.”
“I won’t be the same. He won’t be the same. He won’t know what it means to make the rain stop for a starving farmer and his wife. He won’t know what it’s like to race away from a crumbling citadel and have glass picked out of his back. He won’t know what it’s like to hold you close.”
My breath catches in my throat.
He caresses my face. “I told you once that you’re my heart, Faith, and I mean it. You’ve shown me a different way of looking at things, and not just because you like to argue.” His hard mouth curls into a hint of a smile. “I learn from you. I learn to think about how my presence affects others. I think of how I can be a better god to my faithful. Every day that I am here on the mortal plane with you changes me, Faith. I don’t want to lose that. I don’t want to lose you.” He smiles. “That’s why I’m going to win.”
For some reason, I’m equally terrified that Aron will die. I thought he was eternal…but Liar Aron got wiped out, and I know he’s different from this Aron.
My Aron could die.
“Well,” I say after a moment. I clear my throat. “I guess we’ll just have to fucking beat their asses into the ground.”
He laughs, pleased. “Now you sound like me.”
I’m pretty sure I don’t, but I’ll take the compliment anyhow.
I can’t sleep that night. It’s not the cold. It’s that every time I close my eyes, I see Aron dying. Aron turning into a wisp of sparks, Aron fading out like a bad polaroid. I saw it happen to his rival right in front of me. Liar Aron had his hands on me, was