Hawk knew bait when it was thrown out for her to gnaw on, even when that bait was true. She hadn’t been sure of her own suspicions until right this moment—she’d unearthed them like the bones of some ancient dinosaur. She didn’t doubt that there’d been something between Illyris and the Shadow. She was only surprised to find that she did not care. It hurt, but distantly. What mattered was how Shadow reacted, which was not the way a lover would respond. He smiled, and spread his hands in a gesture that turned into a bow, not of obeisance or of mockery, but just an acknowledgement of the truth of her words. Yes, Hawk judged. They’d been lovers, once. In this, she and Illyris were on equal standing.

  She had a brief thought about the odds of either of them winning him over…but that was the wrong way to think. Relationships were not a contest. She wasn’t going to fight with a goddess—even a broken one, for Illyris surely hadn’t avoided the same problems as her fellow pantheon—over a man, any more than she would fight over a goddess for a mountain. And she wasn’t going to proverbially piss on him to mark her territory, though part of her was very tempted. The rest of her was just too tired. If Illyris wanted to play romantic games, fine. If Shadow wanted to play with her—oh, that hurt was not so distant. The thought of him in another woman’s bed. But it wasn’t hers to hurt about unless he chose her first.

  He did not, she noted, look back to see what her reaction might be. Either he trusted her, or he felt she was not a big player in whatever hell-game Illyris had planned for them. She doubted the latter. He had come this far with her, after all.

  Illyris rose from her jeweled throne. Her gown was layered silk, bound to her shoulders with gleaming gems. Opaline glimmers at ankle and wrist evoked the phosphorescence of midnight tides. Hawk reminded herself that lovely glow was from bacteria and microbes, and recited scientific names to herself until her jealousy was back under control. Because yes, she was. Instantly. Irrevocably. This was, in fact, the precise kind of woman Hawk disliked: Conventionally beautiful, whiter than milk, perpetually ignorant of how she appears to others, and completely caught up in her own drama. Every high school mean girl Hawk had ever encountered had suddenly been incarnate and given jeweled robes and incredible powers, and the body of a Dallas Cheerleader, and suddenly Hawk felt like mud. She knew better. But that perfect smile as she trailed down her own artfully carved throne didn’t make things any better.

  “Illyris,” Shadow said, with none of the flowery show. “May I present to you Doctor Hawk West, of Earth.”

  An instant dearth of pleasure that Illyris tried to hide. “I thought you named her Hawk-of-the-West, Godslayer and more? Why so humble an introduction? I thought you valued her highly.” She stood on the very edge of her dais, poised, as it were, to sweep down upon him and swallow him whole.

  “I give her the names that matter most to those she meets. Her name amongst the people is as I have given. But she and thee both come from another world, do you not?”

  “She, me, and thee,” murmured Illyris, and reached one artfully bare arm towards the Shadow. “You shy from me, beloved.”

  Manipulators will often provoke their audience. Hawk and Shadow were both being taunted by those full and ruby red lips. And suddenly she seemed sexual to the point of being overripe. It happened in the space of a breath. One moment she was merely sublime; the next Hawk would have bedded her right then and there, if a last, lingering breath of sanity had not begun screaming Darling, you’re fucking straight.

  Shadow moved forward, his alien golden eyes fixed on her shimmering blue ones. Her hips swayed beneath the layers of blue fabric, a deep plush velvet sheathed in kinder silks. She reached for him with both hands, but he merely took one, kissed it, and gave it a gentle pat, there, there.

  You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.

  “I thought we had put such pretences behind us. It works poorly when you know it is coming, after all.”

  “And how do you expect me to react, beloved? You bring another woman into my domain.”

  “Indeed. I’ve brought you my wife.”

  Hawk’s breath caught. Wife? He’d said it? He’d claimed her out loud? Oh, she wanted to rocket up to the roof and begin singing. She wanted to take her misdirected sexual tension—Illyris hadn’t dropped that aura of desirability; she felt ripe enough to take a bite out of—and bang him right there on the goddess’s dais. She did not do this. Nor did she betray any more of her delight and confusion—why had he acknowledged her so?—than that first, sharp breath. But Illyris had heard it.

  “She seems surprised to be so named,” Illyris said.

  “Well, I was abducted from my proper world, transformed into something other than human, and then devoured down to naught but rind. A few things, like matrimony, appear to have slipped through the cracks. How she and I shall deal with each other is yet to be determined…but if we are pissing on our property, Illyris, her claim is older, longer, and better than yours.”

  “And I don’t have one,” Hawk said. “He’s not a bench. He’s a person. And if he wants…” She paused, and went for the profane. “If he wants to fuck you, its no skin off my nose. Other than the end of my marriage. But I’m pretty sure that’s done with, too.”

  “So disloyal,” Illyris purred.

  She shrugged. “It’s his choice.” She paused. Had Illyris flinched when he brought up the devouring? She thought maybe the woman had. “Besides, you lot are the ones who’ve made a mess of him. It’s up to him who picks up the pieces. Me, you…or himself.” She shrugged. “Personally I’ve always liked a man who can clean up his own messes…even when he is one.”

  “You insult the one you claim to love?” Illyris asked, a flicker of something in her radiant eyes. It might have been disbelief.

  “Only when he finds it funny,” she said.

  The goddess, not knowing how to respond to that, turned back to the Shadow. “Well, my dear. Tell me what brings you to my court.”

  “Kali’Mar is dead.” Shadow said, and stood tall and singular in the blue lights of the court. And then, impulsively, “And the Temple of Light has been seized. It is a temple no more, but a bastion for the broken, and the desperate without home.”

  She seemed to collapse slightly, a theatrical groan. “Oh, no. Oh, dear. Not that old white tower business. Please, my darling. You tried. You dared. You failed time and time again to keep and hold the white. There is neither point nor purpose in trying for it now. Not when our needs are so much greater than they were before. Should you try once more to seize the white…well, we will have no choice. We are sworn to our siblings.”

  “Sibling.” Hawk said. “Kali’mar being dead and all.”

  “We die and are reborn. It happens all the time. I have ripped the…heart out of my brother-god more often than I can count.”

  “By ‘heart’ I assume you mean the pearlescent white orb at the base of your skull. The one that, if shattered to the core, makes you dead for good.” Hawk said. “We shattered it.”

  Silence. Breathless, priceless, perfect silence. Illyris stood frozen, one pale arm to her chest. If she’d had pearls, she’d have clutched them. “You…shattered Kali’mar?”

  “With a big ole hunk of rock. A sharp rock.” Hawk said.

  “After I went through all the work of giving her a beautiful sword.” Shadow confirmed.

  “I like to do all my own stunts,” Hawk responded.

  Illyris seemed lost. She stood with her arms clasped around her torso, staring at them both with her mouth slightly open. The only sound was the rustle of her fingertips against the hem of her sleeves, a sound not unlike dead leaves crumbling together. “When did this happen?”

  “You remember how our little meeting in Nasheth’s pavilion went? Argon chased us with fire. He burned out half the forest at the Temple of Light.” Hawk stepped forward again. Illyris was off balance. She needed to press forward. “There were hundreds of people killed, I think. Certainly we’ve been dealing with the injured at the Temple, and the other refugees. Kali’Mar wanted to get something from Kaiser Willheim. Shadow and I fought him. He died.”

  “So within a few days of the burning of the Pavilion,” Illyris said. “And he’s dead. You’re sure he’s dead?”

  “Yes,” Hawk said.

  Illyris stood frozen a few moments more, an ice sculpture with a perfect hourglass figure and far too many layers of silk. Then she whispered, “We can die,” soft as an infant’s breath. Then, louder. “We can die.” Her head came up, her eyes bright and glimmering and sheathed in tears that Hawk was willing to swear were tears of joy. “We can die!” she said, a third time, and then caught Hawk into an embrace. “And you can kill them!”