Iris let the words sink in. She wondered if upholding immortality was woven into Skyward vows to prevent spouses from marrying and then killing each other. To prevent gods from stealing more power from the ones they were closest to. The ones they were supposed to love.
“I lied to my husband many times,” Enva continued. “And I lied to Alzane, your mortal king, when he asked me to kill the other four divines. We had an agreement that I could be the last goddess in the realm—the last vessel of magic—but I needed to give another vow and stay in Oath so the king could keep me within his clutches. The song I sang over Mir, Alva, and Luz was like a blade to their sleeping throats. They were trouble, and it was good to see them gone. But Dacre? I could not kill him, and so I sang for as long as I could, to hold him in a grave for centuries. Alzane never knew it; he thought all the gods dead save for me, and he spun a story that we were all sleeping, so his people could continue to worship and live in blissful magic and peace.”
Iris studied Enva’s face. She wondered what it would be like to hold a lie for so long. To be sworn to a husband who yearned for bloodshed. To be immeasurably powerful but trapped in a city. To find only anguish in magic that had once been incandescent with joy.
“He’s in Oath,” Iris said. “At the Kitt estate.”
“I know.” Enva glanced away. “I found him in a dream. It was then I knew he would stop at nothing until he held my severed head in his hands.”
“Iris.”
It was Forest’s voice, distant but laced with urgency. Iris could feel his hand on her knee, shaking her.
The dream began to waver, threatening to break. Iris gritted her teeth, striving to keep it intact for a moment longer, even as the floor began to vanish in patches beneath her.
“Why did you come to me as my mother?” she dared to ask. “Why not show me who you were to begin with?”
Enva smiled. It was a sad crescent of a moon, and her hair began to whip around her as if she were being drawn into a storm.
“You mortals are slow to trust. And I needed you to trust me, Iris.”
The dream collapsed without warning.
Iris startled awake, light-headed and cold with sweat. Forest was shaking her knee again, and she straightened, feeling a crick pull in her neck. “What is it?”
“Do you hear that?” His voice was so low she almost couldn’t catch the words.
They both listened, unmoving, their breaths shallow. There, she heard it that time. It sounded like someone was picking the lock on the front door.
“Get up quietly,” said Forest. “Hide in the kitchen. If things turn bad, I want you to run. Go straight to Attie’s, all right?”
Iris couldn’t speak, her eyes flaring in fear.
“Go,” Forest urged, drawing her with him as he stood.
She did as he wanted, rushing into the shadows of the kitchen and crouching behind the row of cabinets. She didn’t have a vantage point of the living room from here, and that made her anxious. She couldn’t see Forest, and she didn’t understand why this was happening. Why would someone break into their flat in the dead of night?
The door creaked open.
For a moment, there was nothing but utter silence, so keen that Iris was afraid to draw breath. Then came the footsteps. The air suddenly smelled like mist, dank stone, and worn leather. The lamplight flickered.
Iris bit the palm of her hand, smothering a surge of terror.
The stranger came to a stop.
A beat later, there was a loud crash and a grunt. It sounded like a table had cracked, bodies rolling into furniture and bumping the wall so hard it made the lone picture frame rattle. The amber light flickered again as the lamp was overturned. The flat was overcome with darkness, and Iris panted, her muscles burning as she continued to crouch.
Someone cried out in pain. It went through Iris like a shock of electricity, and she knew it was Forest. She knew it like she had been struck herself.
He wanted her to run and leave him behind. But she gritted her teeth and rose, remembering the sword she had left on the sideboard.
She knew this flat intimately. She could walk it in utter darkness, and she moved without a sound. But as she entered the common room, a thread of light from the streetlamp bled inside. Iris saw the broken table, the teapot shattered across the floor. Forest’s medicine bottles were cracked, revealing a trail of pills. She could see two shadows wrestling each other up against the couch, the one on top punching the other relentlessly.
Forest cried out again, caught below the intruder.
“Where is she?” the unfamiliar voice asked. “Where is your sister?”