and he was too weak to save them . . . unless he became as the gods were, for they do not inhabit frail bodies but are the essence of sheer will and magic. So with his last breath, he did not attempt to cast a complicated spell that would lift Koth, but instead cast a simple spell that dissolved his mortal form and bound his essence to the island—even though it meant that he would be undying, and never know the warmth of Rani’s touch.”
Seri gave a heavy sigh. “He sacrificed his heart to save his people?”
“He did,” said Lady Junica. “For when his mortal form dissolved, only sheer power remained. That he used to lift the island above the rising waters, and to create the King’s Walk from the shattered remnants of the mountain so that his people would not be trapped at the center of the lake that was forming. He warned the other gods that always he would protect Koth from their magics, and that if ever his descendants no longer stood upon the island, Varrin would know the gods were to blame and he would fly into the heavens to destroy them. So the gods only had to leave the island alone—and out of fear of Varrin’s wrath, that is what they do.”
“Even silver-fingered Rani?”
Lady Junica shook her head. “She alone can come to Koth. As she must, to carry the dead into Temra’s merciful embrace.”
So many lies. Aerax’s jaw clenched. There was no mercy for the dead on Koth. And silver-fingered Rani would never come again to an island that would be her prison. Yet saying so would do nothing but endanger anyone who heard it—whether they believed it or not.
And they would not believe it. All of Aerax’s ancestors had made certain of that.
“But some of the other gods’ magic must touch the island,” said Preter. “For it is warmed by Enam.”
Lady Junica nodded. “And we can also see Vela’s light, and our gardens still carry some of Hanan’s blessing. Those Varrin allows, for it is not harmful magic—and he does not wish to separate Koth from the rest of the world. Only to protect it.”
Kelir gave a sideways glance at Tyzen. “That does not sound like a monster.”
The young prince shrugged. “That is the story I was told.”
“By whom?” Lady Junica asked sharply. “Who would tell such vile slander?”
“My mother,” Tyzen said wryly, then added when the councilor began to stammer and blush, “though she was only repeating the story to my sister and me as she heard it from another—for this was ten years past, when we were locked in our tower, and all that we knew of the outside world was what she saw with Vela’s sight . . . which also reached to Koth, as the moonlight does.”
“Someone in Koth said Varrin was a monster?”
“Those were not the words used; that was what my mother called Varrin after the story was told. For in that version, he slaughtered his own people and used their undying souls as a lure for silver-fingered Rani—and it was those trapped souls that Varrin used to keep the island afloat after Vela attempted to free them by flinging the moonstone from the heavens.”
Heart thundering, Aerax stared at the prince. Ten years. Even as Lady Junica and Degg sputtered of slander again, Aerax knew which version Tyzen’s mother had heard—the truth that his uncle had told to him beneath the crystal palace. A truth that Aerax believed only two people in the world knew.
Yet when those moonstone eyes met his, they seemed to pierce Aerax through, for here was another who knew. And his queen did, too.
But Aerax made no answer. By Varrin’s rule, acknowledging what the boy had learned meant that Tyzen must die. And Aerax already carried too many of the dead on his shoulders.
“Is that why Yvenne has forbidden us from crossing the King’s Walk?” asked Kelir.
Tyzen nodded, eyes still on Aerax, but still nothing could Aerax say as icy chains pulled tight around his lungs. If King Icaro heard of this, no alliance would he ever make with them. Not if they might expose the truth. Instead he would call the southerners liars and discredit their names to every Kothan.
As he had Lizzan.
“Your queen forbade you from coming to the island?” Lady Junica’s perplexed gaze moved from Kelir to Tyzen. “Then how will you speak with our king to make this alliance? For he cannot leave the island—and I promise you