“Where’s the skull?” I asked. “That’s what Rollar’s men were searching this crypt for.”
“It was removed. By a merchant who then sailed from Deadman’s Cove to Vargos. He hoped to sell it there, but it was taken from him after he tried to kill an innocent man.” She paused and slightly narrowed her eyes. Was it pity I saw? “Yes, I know you were innocent, Vance. You never stole the blade. You merely took it from a man who would have consumed your soul with it.”
“What?” I said, looking down at the dagger. The gold pommel was fashioned in the likeness of a demon’s head, but it looked nothing like the images of Isu I’d seen. And it looked nothing like the figure standing before me.
I glanced up at the woman I was now certain was Isu. The dagger’s light caught her beautiful face, which instantly assumed terrifying demonic features identical to the ones on the pommel.
“You never answered my question,” she said. “So, I’ll answer it for you. Vance, you choose death.”
She was suddenly standing a fraction away from me. Before I could raise my dagger, she punched me. Her fist tore through my armor and punctured my chest. Her ice-cold fingers gripped my heart before she tugged back. Her hand came out, holding my still-beating heart.
My eyes widened as the shock set in, and a frigid sensation gripped my entire body. I was paralyzed. She took my heart and dropped it into the font. The liquid bubbled as it ate the organ, and suddenly, the font was empty, as if the acidic liquid had been absorbed by my heart. It was still beating, but it had changed from a lively red to a charred black.
“Now your soul has drunk of death,” she said, “and our fates are entwined.”
She took the heart and slammed it back into my ribcage. The wound she’d made grew shut, and I sucked in a lungful of air as the cold released me.
“What did you do?” I asked.
“Exactly what I said I would do. You, Vance, are now Divinely Fated. I have given you power over death. Now, what will you do with it?”
“The only thing I can do,” I answered immediately. “Take back what was stolen from me.”
“Excellent. I knew I selected you for a reason.”
Chapter Two
With the echo of Isu’s voice still ringing in the stale air of the chamber, the mosaic tiles that had formed the body of the goddess fell in a clatter to the floor, raising a puff of dust. When it settled, there was no sign that the pile of tiles had ever been alive—for lack of a better word.
I scanned the gloom, already wondering if I’d imagined the whole thing, and then gingerly touched my fingertips to my chest. Had my heart seriously just been torn out, doused in acid, tainted with Death, and shoved back into my chest? There was a hole in my cuirass, but the skin beneath showed no signs of injury. I guess it had really happened, as crazy as it seemed.
But why had Isu just up and vanished like that? And what the hell was this “power over Death” thing she had told me I had? It sounded pretty damn kickass, of course, and seemed like it would be a pretty handy asset when it came to taking back everything that had been stolen from me—but how was I supposed to use it? I didn’t feel any different, really, even though my pumping heart now felt like it had slipped through a grill and spent a night in a smoldering firepit.
“Goddesses,” I muttered, shaking my head. “Turns out they’re not much different from mortal women.”
And while my body had begged me to forget about the whole Death and revenge business and just pounce on the fine thing, I had to keep a cool head, solve a vague, unsolvable riddle, and just accept being played around with. Maybe I should have slipped Grave Oath between the ribs of that pile of tiles after all—even if it did have out-of-this-world perky tits and a nice round ass. And was a physical manifestation of the Goddess of Death and all that.
I turned the dagger over in my hands, examining the hilt as closely as I could in the dark. I vaguely hoped Isu’s effigy might provide some sort of clue, or perhaps conjure up her physical form if I stared at it long enough. Closing my eyes, I did my best to visualize what I had seen mere seconds before. Maybe she needed me to do this, to truly believe, to show her I had true faith, that I was her devoted servant and…
Nah.
Who was I kidding? I was no freaking paladin. I didn’t serve anyone but myself, and I certainly wasn’t about to bow down before a flying pile of glazed and baked dirt. Maybe the special powers she’d given me would reveal themselves when the time was right. Come to think of it, that was just how a woman—yes, even a goddess—would do it. All mystery, all dancing around the plain truth with riddles and battings of eyelashes.
A sudden sound from outside the chamber jarred me from these thoughts. A gruff shout was soon followed by the patter of heavy boots, the clinking of armor and weapons, and more aggressive men’s vocalizations.
Well this was it, the chance to see whether Isu had been telling the truth or just messing with my head. And even if the latter was the case, I wasn’t too worried. A couple of soldiers wouldn’t cause me to break much of a sweat. I twirled Grave Oath around in my right hand with a juggler’s flair.
This was going to be fun.
Flitting from shadow to inky shadow in stealthy silence, I darted out of the chamber and slipped through the
