I forced these thoughts out of my head quickly. Even though Isu seemed to have been changing her ways in recent days, I still wasn’t entirely sure of her ultimate motives.
“Vance,” she said, a look of worry coming across her beautiful face, “we need to talk.”
She was rarely this blunt, so I immediately assumed it was a pressing issue.
I slid Grave Oath back into its sheath and took a seat on a rock beside the pool.“All right, go ahead.”
Isu came and sat down on a rock a couple feet away. “I’ve… I’ve put off speaking to you for a very long time,” she said, sounding as if she was carrying the weight of the world on her shoulders. “But I can’t keep quiet anymore. Not now, when we’re approaching Aith. I haven’t seen Aith for many years, but I have a feeling that the city hasn’t forgotten me.”
“What? You’ve been to Aith before, but you didn’t say anything about it until we were mere hours from its gates?!”
Isu let out a long sigh and stared at the ground. “There’s much about my past I’ve neglected to tell you. But I have to let it all out now. I cannot keep carrying it around with me anymore. It’s like the secrets just keep piling on top of each other, the longer I keep silent. Please understand, it simply gets harder to come out and expose it all, the longer you wait.”
“Well, go ahead then,” I said.
“First, I want to tell you about my role in the Purge.”
I breathed in deeply and folded my arms across my chest. Finally, I was going to find out the truth about the great betrayal. I kept an eye on her gestures and the expression on her face, though; my assassin’s training had included developing a sense for detecting lies, and I was going to make damn sure I caught Isu out if she tried to weave tall tales.
“I’ve been waiting a long time for the truth about this,” I said, “but seriously, don’t try to make up any bullshit. I’ll know if you’re lying. Just tell me the truth—the whole truth.”
She bit her lip and nodded. I could see that there was a swell of emotion surging through her, but to her credit, it did look like she was summoning the courage to expose every last detail.
Finally, I was about to learn the truth of Isu’s past.
“What Rami-Xayon says about me is true,” Isu said. “I did betray the other gods.”
“That’s quite something to admit to, but I’m glad that you’re manning up—er, womaning up—and saying it. Please go on, and remember that Rami-Xayon will not leave a single stone unturned if I’m forced to go to her for the rest of the story.”
She nodded vigorously. “That’s why I came to you now; I know that it will be the last chance I get to speak to you alone before we get to Aith. And once we make it through the gates —if we make it through the gates—much of my history will be exposed. But as I said, I’ll get to that later.
“So, to begin. . . “ She let out a long sigh and rubbed down her skirts before continuing. “I was close with the Lord of Light for a time, back when he was a minor god. In fact, I took him under my wing and taught him a few things. But he was always more interested in other planes, spiritual realms. And the more powerful he became, the less interested he was in this physical world of mortality. He was like you; he learned very quickly and was very intelligent and developed his divine powers at an almost unbelievably rapid pace. Unfortunately, unlike you, he had no concern for the men and women of this world. The more powerful he grew, the more distant he became. This lack of attentiveness attracted a certain type of person to him.”
“People who knew that they could leech off his power, I’m guessing,” I said. “People who knew that they could manipulate him and gain power from him.”
“Exactly. The Lord of Light’s mind was elsewhere most of the time. Of course, without staying as a god in this world, he would not have been able to explore these other dimensions and planes, and, as you’ve discovered, you need worshipers in this world, people who will make sacrifices in your name—sacrifices of time, like prayers or pilgrimages. Or souls.”
“So,” I said, “he needed someone to keep mortal men and women worshiping him and praying to him in this world, even though he spent most of his time in other worlds and other planes.”
“Exactly. So, with a god whose mind was always elsewhere, you can imagine what kind of power-hungry scum were attracted to him. They realized that they could be gifted with extraordinary powers—for the Lord of Light grew into a very powerful god—and yet, they would not be held accountable for whatever they did in this world because the Lord of Light spent so little time in it. And because he spent so little time here, he gave these men free reign to do, essentially, whatever they desired in his name. And thus the Church of Light was born.”
“Quite different from the official version of the birth of the Church of Light,” I said grimly, “but far more realistic.”
“The Church was soon filled with corrupt popes and archbishops who cared only about their own power. The Lord of Light, aloof and distant, did not know and did not seem to care much about what these fools were doing in his name. I felt guilty; I had taught him much of what he knew, and I felt partially responsible for what the Church of Light eventually became. I watched as it grew ever more authoritarian, but I did nothing and said nothing because part of me couldn’t believe that the Lord of Light, who had once been such a close friend of mine, could truly be
