Goddess Liv Savell (best autobiographies to read .TXT) 📖

appearance, dark-skinned with a hooking nose and sparkling, mischievous eyes. His hair writhed like shadows, blending in with the flickering tongues of night around him.

Then, nothing. The beam of light wavered, the fire rippled and dimmed. The other Gods were stone-still, as though preparing to mourn one of their own. Would they mourn her? Or were they concerned about facing Mascen without their full force?

Would it hurt Alphonse’s chances?

And then the fire parted to reveal a woman. Her skin was molten lava, drying into dark grey patches only to be reborn again in cracks and magma. Her eyes were coals plucked from the fire, burning and flickering still. Her hair was made of vines that swayed in some non-existent breeze. It had to be Enyo. By far the most terrible, the most strange, the most impressive.

With her exit, the bonfire collapsed within itself, no more than a few flickering logs and a heap of smoke. And still, the Vassals did not rise.

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Squinting, Delyth tried to see past the light, edging closer and closer to the bonfire even as magic spilled in waves of tangible power. She saw the first of the Gods step through, then the second, but she paid them no real attention. Her gaze was focussed on the slight form of Alphonse sprawled before the blaze, still after the frenzy of spell casting.

A third God stepped through—Maoz, she thought— and Gethin, just barely within her line of sight, pushed himself slowly from the ground.

Hope bloomed fiercely within Delyth’s breast, a winter avalanche of feeling after there had been so little. She was stretched past her limits, swelling with joy. It caught in her throat, in her eyes.

The Vassals were waking! Alphonse would live!

Delyth gave a wordless cry half between a sob and a shout of exultation. She took two running steps forward and fell to her knees before Alphonse, gripping the healer’s good hand with both of her own and struggling to keep herself from holding on too hard. She didn’t want to hurt the healer.

Va'al stepped from the fire, easily recognizable by his malevolent expression. Delyth’s heart caught in her chest, too-swollen so that she could hardly breathe. Enyo would come through next, and then, finally, Alphonse would rise. She would wake slowly, perhaps, struggling to pull her body upright, but then she would be free, and Delyth could pull her up, tug her close.

“Aderyn bak,” Delyth whispered, early, perhaps, but tears were already dripping from her eyes. They rolled down her nose in too-thick drops, landing softly onto Alphonse’s pale skin.

The light brightened again, then, and Enyo stepped through, rock and magma creature that she always had been at heart. Eagerly, Delyth looked down, stroking her thumb across the delicate wrist, still sluggishly bleeding.

Any moment, Alphonse would rise. Even now, she should be waking, opening lovely amber eyes for the first time in moons. “Alphonse,” Delyth whispered, breath coming in gasps. “Alphonse, it's time to come back, to wake up.”

Enyo strode away from the fire, last of the Gods, and around them, Gethin and Meirin and the old priest were stepping away as well, with their wrists seared closed from fire and healed like old burn wounds.

Still, Alphonse didn’t rise.

“Aderyn bak dewr,” Delyth sobbed, her throat like glass. “My brave little bird. Come back to me.”

She pulled the slight form into her arms, gathering her close even though her head lolled back unresponsively. She was so small. So tiny to have borne all she had. Carefully, Delyth settled Alphonse against her, propping her tawny head against the warrior’s strong shoulder and rocking as though the healer was a small child. “Alphonse,” she crooned. “Alphonse, come back.”

Only, she wasn’t coming back. She had been trapped too long or been hurt too badly. Instead of growing warmer, her skin chilled even this close to the fire. Her eyes did not flutter beneath their lids. No air stirred past her lips.

“Alphonse,” Delyth sobbed.

But the healer was dead.

And so died part of Delyth with her.

There was within the warrior’s chest a chasm wide enough to destroy her, but she swallowed it, fighting against the sorrow. She had only to keep it caged until they found Mascen until they could drown in it together.

Slowly, Delyth stood, Alphonse still held gingerly in her arms. She could see now where Tristan lay, the earth around him red with blood. He had not survived his infestation either.

Etienne watched her progress with wide eyes, Meirin leaning against him even as tears coated his cheeks, his neck, the collar of his shirt. He reached out a hand, an abortive gesture, then let it fall to his side.

“Help me bury her?” Delyth tried for speech, but it came out in half-choked whispers. He nodded, trembling, and while Etienne began to dig, Delyth lay Alphonse out in her tent.

With gentle fingers, she brushed the other woman’s hair, tangled from Enyo’s lack of care, and braided two locks back away from her face to form a loose circlet. Instead of the wild and showy sarong and breast band that Enyo had summoned, Delyth found a dress long carried with her things in the hope of Alphonse’s return and clothed her in the more modest blue. In her hands, she placed the veil. Alphonse had loved it for all she gave up wearing it in the end.

She might have just been sleeping then, if not for the angry marks along her arms, and Delyth could not breathe, not sobbing so much as gasping as though she had been speared through the chest, all her body folding inwards.

When she could move again, it was only with agonizing slowness. She lifted the small form once more and stepped out into the gathering dawn. In that wan light, she and Etienne gave the person she loved most in all the world back to the earth.

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Eighth Moon, New Moon

Today was the best day and the worst day of my entire life. I