He had seen Suriel twice before, of course, and caught images of the rest of them in the vision trapped inside Eithan’s marble. But in person, their radiance took on totally different meaning.
A weathered man with gray hair, dark skin, and merciless eyes drifted to the front and descended to the ground. “Ozriel. You have much to answer for.”
Eithan looked him up and down, dismissed him, and looked to the other six. “You sent him to speak for you? You knew I wouldn’t talk to him.”
“You look different,” a woman in ghostly gray said in a dreamlike voice. She was the only one not wearing smooth armor, and she vaguely gestured to him. “It suits you.”
“Thank you, Durandiel. You see? At least one of you is friendly.”
Blue lightning cracked across the sky, and anger pressed down on Lindon from every direction. A woman with hair of white-and-red flame glared at Eithan. “Do you know how many lives your absence cost us? Do you have any idea?”
“I know how many would have been lost if my predictions were accurate,” Eithan said calmly. “I never foresaw the Mad King getting his hands on a new weapon.”
A straight-backed man wearing glasses and a cane snorted. “Then your sight is not as flawless as you pretended.”
“It was your weapon!” the flaming woman shouted.
Eithan’s eyes drifted over to the stone-faced man in front of him. “Was it?”
“All will be answered for,” that man said with icy calm. “You have cost us enough time already. Gadrael.”
The strangest-looking of the seven, a short man with blue-gray skin and horns for hair, raised a hand. Spinning discs of intricate script surrounded Eithan from head to toe, and aside from feeling alarm for Eithan, Lindon immediately asked Dross to remember anything of the runes he could.
Eithan coughed out a breath as though he’d been punched in the stomach. “That’s uncomfortable. You could have used a softer touch.”
The blue-gray man, Gadrael, gave him an icy stare but said nothing.
“Zakariel, take the prisoner,” the stone-faced man ordered. “Let us convene the Court and put an end to this farce at last.”
He turned and stepped into a flash of blue light, then vanished.
A girl appeared behind Eithan. She might have been ancient, but Lindon could only think of her as a girl; she looked younger than he was. She gave Eithan a razor-edged smile.
“Good to have you back, Oz.”
“I have missed our charming dynamic, Zak.”
The girl stamped her foot, and space rippled. “Call me Zerachiel!”
“Maybe old age has altered my memory, but I don’t think that’s your name.”
“I’ve changed it!”
They vanished a moment later…but Eithan seemed to linger a fraction of a second longer than the girl. He met Lindon’s eye and gave him a beaming smile.
“It was fun,” Eithan said.
Then he disappeared.
The other Abidan strode away one at a time, without a word for the mortals. Except for one. Suriel lingered, bright green hair drifting behind her as though she floated underwater. Her eyes were bright purple rings of script, and lines of smoke ran from her hand up to the back of her skull.
It had only been a few months since he’d seen her again, and when she was the only one remaining, Lindon bowed deeply to her.
“Pardon, but I never expected to see you again so soon.”
“Lindon…” She breathed out a sigh. “I don’t know what to say to you except that I’m sorry.”
Blue light streamed from behind her, like the wings of an azure phoenix, and the stars winked back into existence one by one.
“Ozriel hid himself well, and I couldn’t foresee his actions. When the two of you intersected, it caused…great changes. I fear that my actions in your home have had disastrous results.”
Lindon’s stomach tightened. “Not for me.”
“Not yet. But your fate is far beyond reading, now. And Cradle is still in danger.” Stars continued to reappear, and spatial cracks sealed themselves, as Suriel said, “Right now, the heavens lie in ruins. Perhaps Ozriel’s return will allow us to fix some of what has been broken.”
“Apologies, but what’s going to happen to him?”
Her expression became complicated. “He will be tried in the Abidan Court. His actions are in violation of our laws, and have resulted in great destruction. But he is still an irreplaceable asset, which is what led to this problem in the first place.”
Lindon was silent for a long time, chewing on that information, and Suriel continued weaving the universe back together.
Unexpectedly, she went on. “Did he tell you what role he played in the cosmos?”
Lindon exchanged looks with Yerin as they remembered the vision in Eithan’s marble, and Yerin was the one who answered. “Seems to me like he put down worlds that were too sick to go on. Uh, honored…queen?”
“That is an accurate summary of his function, but it is not one he would have chosen. He left us, abandoning his mission, in an attempt to raise up people who could replace him. To cut away infected tissue before the infection spreads.”
Suriel eyed the group before her, and deliberately said, “He was looking to raise up a new Reaper.”
Lindon’s Dreadgod hand involuntarily curled into a fist.
[We need that title!] Dross cried. [Let’s ascend at once!]
He was tempted. Not only did Suriel seem to be suggesting that they could help Eithan, but Lindon had now seen the difference between him and the most powerful beings in creation. Lindon couldn’t unmake stars.
There was no pursuing power like that while stuck in Cradle.
“Can he wait a little longer?” Lindon asked. “We have unfinished business here.”
The Dreadgods were still here, and stronger than ever, with no one left in the world who could oppose them. And those who knew the truth wouldn’t do anything about it.
When Lindon advanced, he intended to drag the Monarchs with him.
Suriel searched his eyes…and then gave him a grin that reminded him of Eithan.
“Repairing a broken system is a worthy goal. But you’ll be on your own. We’ve interfered far too much already, and anything further could break Cradle beyond recovery. And you should know that you will find more enemies than allies.”
“Even so, I’d like to try.” Then honesty compelled him to add, “And I would hate to leave the world behind without getting everything I could out of it.”
“Then I will await your arrival in the world beyond,” Suriel said. She surveyed the group and added, “All of you.”
Then, in a rising tide of blue light, she vanished.
Lindon and the others remained on a flawless grassy hill, with no evidence left behind to prove that anything had happened.
Yerin stretched. “Well that shook my spine, I’ll tell you true.”
“We have stared into the abyss and lived to tell the tale,” Ziel said. “I’m going to sleep.”
Malice broke her way out of the World of Night and found that everything had been restored to the way it was before, but her memories remained.
She wondered if that was an oversight on the part of the Abidan, or if they had been unable to wipe the memories. If she had intervened in such a public and global way, she would have made sure that the native inhabitants remembered nothing.