The dying god flinched. Nicodemus turned his attention back to the present as his copy pulled from his mouth a broken molar. The shattered tooth evaporated into sentence fragments.
The god’s aura dimmed even further as he said, “I was reincarnated the day after you cast the metaspell. So long as we both inhabited your body, I shared your thoughts. But when you dreamed, I had a few independent ideas. I’ve come to believe that deities are only the dreams of mortals. In the moment before waking, it’s hard to know who is more real, dreamer or dream. But after we wake …” His voice died away as he held up a hand and grimaced as two fingers peeled open into crimson misspells.
“What would mortals be without dreams?”
The dying god nodded. “A fair question. One the empire might soon answer. But no time for politics. I didn’t want to split away tonight. I was hoping to live a few more days, but I’ve discovered two things you must know. The first concerns the neodemon you’re hunting, the one they call the River Thief. As we speak, the neodemon’s devotees are stealing the cargo from your second boat.”
Nicodemus swore and started toward the tent flap.
“Wait,” the dying god said, his forearms now dissolving. “Because of my requisite to aid you, I have to tell you … something has happened to Leandra.”
Nicodemus’s chest tightened. “What?”
“Something altered Leandra. Some contact with divinity … the exact nature I can’t tell … But when I try to investigate, I detect only one of her thoughts, a powerful belief.”
“And?”
“You’re not going to like it.”
“I already don’t like it.”
Slowly the dying god lay on his back. His waist had become a roiling red tumor. “Less than an hour ago, Leandra had the powerful conviction that—” The dying god’s face twisted in pain and his wan silvery aura flickered.
Nicodemus realized what was happening. New divinities were incarnated when enough people prayed for resolution of a certain problem. All goals that helped answer those prayers were known as a deity’s requisites. Fulfillment of requisite caused the magical text of a prayer to be dispersed from an ark stone to the deity.
One of the dying god’s requisites was to aid Nicodemus. Satisfying this requisite by telling him about Leandra was causing prayerful text to be released from arks across the archipelago to his body. However, the dying god’s other requisite was to increase misspelling; therefore, the surge of textual power was forcing him to misspell himself.
“What is it? What happened to Leandra?” Nicodemus asked.
“Leandra believes …” he said between labored breaths, “that in the next … next day … she will try to murder her mother.” With that, the dying god unraveled into darkness.
“Oh damn it all,” Nicodemus groaned, “not again.”
How can one investigate a murder that hasn’t yet been committed? And how, exactly, should such an investigator proceed when she will become the murderer? Leandra wrestled with these questions while sailing to Keyway Island.
Navigating the eastern waters of the Bay of Standing Islands required great skill; the vertical islands were dense enough to obscure the horizon, tall enough to block many of the stars. Only natives could sail the stone labyrinth safely, and Leandra had taught only her most loyal captains the way to Keyway Island.
Presently on a mile-long stretch of open water, the catamaran was making good speed, but soon the sailors would have to close-reef the sails and paddle from the catamaran’s two hulls.
From her customary spot on the forward center deck, Leandra watched the moonlit water slide below. Her concentration was periodically broken by the disease flare she had ignited when misspelling the smuggler’s godspell. First had come a dull bellyache. Then her wrists and fingers began to throb. Fortunately she hadn’t developed a rash or needed to pee frequently; if things got that bad, she might have to start taking the hydromancer’s stress hormone to suppress her body’s attack on her textual aspects.
Most importantly, the divine aspects of her mind had not begun to expand her perception; that would threaten both her sanity and her ability to breathe. She prayed that her body would show her a little mercy, not that she deserved any. But if her two aspects, divine and human, could refrain from attacking each other for just a little longer, the present flare would prove a mild one.
Then Leandra realized that by using the godspell around her head, she already knew that in an hour’s time the majority of her future selves would still be anxious, achy, fatigued, and cranky. “Rot it all,” she muttered before taking a deep breath and trying to think clearly about the prophecy she had made using the godspell.
Now as before, she had no doubts. If she tried to run from this prophecy, everyone she knew would soon die. But if she did not run, she would have to choose between her own death and committing murder. If she tried again to misspell the godspell so that she saw farther than an hour into the future, the multiplicity of her future selves would drive her insane.
The only thing left to do was to investigate her murders. So … whom might she have to kill and why? She fingered a slim leather wallet she kept tied at her waist. Inside she kept enough needles and poison to kill without pain or mess.
When the time came would she kill the loved one or herself? Hard to say. There would be a great deal on the line, and she had never been one to balk at a necessary task. Then again, her body had been trying to kill her for thirty-three years. Maybe, out of pure spite, she’d beat it to its task. The thought made her smirk.
Then she realized that she was being dramatic, a bad habit. And she didn’t allow herself bad habits, only addictions, so … time to focus on investigation.
But, God-of-gods damn it, how?
As the Warden of Ixos, she had investigated dozens of murders thought to have been committed by neodemons or their devotees. Her parents had taught her how to do so, something of the family trade.
In most of her previous investigations, Leandra had discovered the guilty deities and converted or killed them. Several times the murders had gone unsolved. But she had been able to examine a corpse, gather evidence, interview witnesses. In her present situation, there wouldn’t be a corpse until she made one, and there damn well wouldn’t be any evidence or witnesses because she wouldn’t be so sloppy as to allow any.
There was, however, at least one analogy to her previous investigations. Instead of listing suspected killers, she could list suspected victims. So watching the moonlit waves slide under the catamaran’s center deck, Leandra considered everyone she loved.
It didn’t take very long.
For one thing, she had to consider only those she loved so much that murdering them would cause her the extreme agony that she had sensed through the prophetic text. For another thing, she didn’t love many people.
That realization made her smirk at the dark water and, by extension, at the idiocy of the universe.
So, anyway, her list of loved ones. First was her illustrious father, Lord Nicodemus Weal, Warden of Lorn, and—depending on whom you asked—the righteous Halcyon or the demonic Storm Petrel. If he discovered what she was concealing, Leandra might have a motive for patricide. But she doubted Nicodemus would ever discover her secrets, or if he did that he would react in a way that would require violence.
Second there was her draconic mother, Magistra Francesca DeVega, first Physician of the Clerical Order, Warden of Dral. If the true contents of Leandra’s heart were ever made plain, the one most likely to endanger Leandra would be her mother.
Just then Leandra’s focus was crowded