“And so I grew, although not much in size, and had a reasonably happy life. Little changed, for a time.

  Oh, except for the Parting, of course. I was four years of age when it happened, so I do not remember much of what the world was like before the Gods came. My older siblings tried explaining it to me, but I was too young to care, perhaps.

  Now I know it would have been a frightening time for those who understood. Imagine believing, your whole life, that the Gods control all inexplicable things we owe our lives to, but ask nothing in return. In fact, no one has ever seen a God in the flesh. Some even believe their physical forms to be one and the same with the element in their power.

  Say, they thought the Sun God was the Sun. The one we see in the sky, the glowing light that provides for us all that we need to remain alive. Or, for example, some believed the Wind God to be the breeze flowing through their hair.

  Now we know how foolish that was, needless to say, but at the time it was all based on conjecture. The deities had never shown themselves to us, and people believed what they would just based on faith and, well, their imaginations.

  From what I understand, human monarchies ruled the kingdom and religion played no role in it at all. There existed religions, yes, but the rules were much more vague. Temples, the same ones that are used today, in fact, were erected to serve as a place of worship for those devoted enough to attend to venerate the deity of their choosing as little or as much as they liked.

  Yes, don’t look so shocked. It was that casual. A lot of people chose to worship a God, or Gods, sometimes. It was not an irreversible commitment, then, and so people had faith, and went to temple, and prayed, and offered gratitude, or begged for boons and blessings.

  Like I said, I was a child at the time, but I’ve spoken about it with people older than myself and it almost sounds like they lived in a fantasy, from how they tell it. The Gods gave and gave, and never showed their faces to claim repayment. The Sun and Moon rose and fell, the Sea flowed, the Wind blew and the Rain fell, and humans thrived in the overflowing life that bloomed from it all.

  And then the Parting came to teach them that the magic the Gods gave was not free.”

  To her dismay, her older brother let out a quiet sob. His eyes remained fixed on the Mantis. “Please. Don’t take my sister,” he said to her in a voice so weak Teela wondered if she would be able to hear him.

  “I am not taking her, boy. She is leaving.”

  “But she is just a child! She doesn’t understand!”

  “Nevertheless, she has made her decision.” Then the Mantis locked eyes with her, red lips pressed tightly with disapproval. “Your brother is right, you don’t understand. But you must experience what the world is like to appreciate what you have, it seems.”

  “Teela, please! Please, don’t do this to me!” Leroh was crying in earnest now, the wet streaks of tears marking vertical lines down his beardless face.

  She said nothing. No words could have made him understand, or forgive her. He would only attack and rebuke her if she tried to explain what had been slowly eating her from within for fifteen years and had, the day before, become ravenous. He had never wanted to understand her, his desperate attempts to control her only a symptom of his desire to gain Mother’s approval. But the woman had no interest in giving it, and he had no interest in his sister beyond that losing battle. She had nothing to say to him that would help either of them.

  “Goodbye, Leroh.” She lowered her head and turned to mount, unable to stand looking at his expression any longer.

  “Goodbye? Oh, you are too funny!” He was hysterical. “What a self-serving child you are. I wish you’d never been born, Teela!”

  She stood motionless, looking at the ground under her feet. If she kept her mouth shut, he’d leave. He would say no more, and walk away, she thought. But he approached Clover and quickly climbed up into the saddle. When she raised her eyes to stare in astonishment with a sudden burst of anger, he gestured with his head, indicating that he wanted her to mount behind him.

  “I said I’m not going back!”

  “No, that’s clear!” He motioned aggressively again for her to join him. “So off I go, like an idiot, following you into whatever trouble you’re chasing. Hurry up!”

  She stood dumbfounded for a time, and then a sense of urgency compelled her to obey. When she was done struggling to get herself positioned behind him atop Clover, the Mantis started her horse into a steady trot, and Leroh followed close behind.

  Many shocked faces watched them go. Teela noted a few expressions of fury and disgust among the men, young and old, but nobody dared to speak to the auburn-haired woman riding ahead of them. From the windows of buildings, the wide eyes of several women followed them, too. A torn piece of red cloth came flying in a strong gust of wind and stuck to Teela’s arm for a moment but, before she had a chance to pick it up, it got carried away into the damp air of the cloudy spring day.

  Soon, they had left Pirn behind.

  Leroh was a buzzing mass of barely contained anger in front of her, his every muscle tensed. She tried to keep as big a distance from him as was possible astride the horse, and pondered on her current situation.

  She had done it.

  It did not feel like a triumph, only a relief. Like removing a limb from the reach of a flame that had been too close for comfort for too long, until one eventually grew used to the unpleasant sensation. She felt no joy, only calmness. The constant oppressive foot finally lifted from her neck, and Teela could now breathe. Her thoughts felt clearer, her focus sharper. It was right. Walking the world and learning to navigate its dangers was what was right for her.

  Magic was everywhere, intricate and essential; it coated all, connected all, and, to help her navigate it, she had gotten herself a powerful, although unwilling, mentor.

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  Leroh kept his gaze locked firmly on the back of the Mantis’s head. He’d managed to stop crying with frustration, and grinding his teeth. Now he worked to unclench his fists from the horse’s reins.

  His sister had been clever enough to hold her tongue so far, but his anger was too fresh. He’d pounce on the chance to tell her his mind the next time she opened her mouth, he knew. Soon enough, she’d ask a question, and he wouldn't be able to keep the words in. She always had a question ready to be asked at any given moment.

  He was confident in his assumption of where they were headed; he’d been present for the conversation during which the Mantis’s next destination had been decided. They were going to the Sea God’s realm. The hair on the back of his neck stood on end at the mere thought. He knew nothing of his physical form, but it was whispered that he dwelt in the dark abyss of an underwater chasm, and that his servants lured prey into the water with their enchanting beauty to help feed his large appetite. Sirens, they were called.

  Teela had him traveling alongside the Mantis, the creature of his boyhood nightmares, to the siren-infested waters of the Sea God’s holy grounds.

  “Bitch.” The word escaped his lips before he knew he’d thought it.

  The Mantis looked back at him for a moment, then faced forward again and continued her hasty pace. At this rate, they’d reach the shore within a couple of days, he estimated.

  “Nobody asked you to come,” his sister spoke softly from behind him.

  “Our parents did, when they cursed me with the responsibility of protecting you.”

  “Of keeping me on a leash, you mean.”

  “Proper girls don’t need someone to hold a leash on them! You’re just a brat who cares nothing for family or duty.”

  “You’re so blind, Leroh. The woman who birthed us and the memory of our father hold your leash, and you don’t even understand it. They will never love you back. Accept it and find something else to strive for.” Her words were steady and clear. Merciless. “Look where it got me.”

  He turned the horse to an abrupt stop and spun his body around to grab his sister by the neck, his temper immediately and unquestioningly taking control over the rest of him. She was frowning up at him, unrepentant. His fingers pushed a little into the tender flesh and he felt an intense urge to give her defiant face a slap that would have her ear ringing for the rest of the day.

  Then a cool strip of leather wrapped securely, but not tightly, around his neck. Teela’s gaze fixed on it and her eyes widened, showing a lot of white around the pupils. He let go of her and tried to loosen the thing still fastened onto the vulnerable skin of his neck with both hands. It felt like the thin tail of a lizard, in a way, only his fingertips detected no scales, just smooth, cold skin.

  It retreated as fast as it had materialized on him, and he managed to catch a glimpse of the slithery black limb from the corner of his eye before it disappeared entirely.

  He sat in shock for a long moment, unable to process the horror of what had occurred. A savage shiver shook his entire body and a cold sensation tickled his skin, leaving his every hair standing straight like the erected fur of a frightened cat.

  All three of them sat motionless, staring at each other. No words wanted to come out of his mouth, his fear of the ruthless monster and his instincts of self-preservation telling him to keep quiet and still, to provoke it no further. Then, as if nothing at all had happened, she nudged her black horse forward and continued to move ahead. Leroh followed.

  And so they rode on in silence through the highest Sun of the day and into the harmless heat of the afternoon, the clopping of the horses’ hooves on the dusty path the only sound. It was a rather warm late spring day, with a thick cover of gray clouds threatening to bring a downpour of Rain upon them at any moment. The air was laden with humidity, which clung to his skin and hair uncomfortably and reminded him that, had he’d been at home, he would have been able to clean his face and neck with a cool, damp rag to ease the sticky sensation. But he was far from home, far from comfort and safety.

  That line of thought took him in a more concerning direction and he could not help but ask over a shoulder to his sister. “Did you bring water? Food?” When she said nothing, he continued, more desperately. “And coin? Anything to build shelter with? Did you bring supplies at all?”

  “Yes. In the saddlebags.”

  “What do you have?”

  “A bag of coppers from working the tavern. Some bread, cheese, fruit. I only have one skin of water but I thought I’d find a stream, perhaps.”

  “Coppers? How long do you think we’ll get by with that, Teela?” She had prepared for this exactly as little as he would have expected. Like a child, like the stupid girl that she was, she had left the protection of a providing roof behind with no thought beyond her little exploring. And dragged him into it, too! “Where are we going to sleep? What are we going to eat when your provisions have run out? We have no idea how long we’ll be away from home!”

  “I’m not going back there. Ever, Leroh.”

  “How are you planning to live, then? What will you do for coin, you fool? You have no skills to survive out here, no resources, nothing! Will you end up selling the last thing a woman has to give when your head’s full of the answers you wanted but your belly’s aching with hunger?”

  “Shut your mouth, boy,” the dark, raspy voice of the Mantis interrupted. She had not turned to look at him, and spoke plainly into the path ahead. “I will provide for her, obviously. And you, I suppose. We will pay a visit to the Sea God in Okedam and return to Pirn within four or five days.”

  “But I-I don’t want to do that. I don’t want to go back… ma’am,” Teela said in an uncertain, high pitched whisper. Leroh’s mouth hung ajar in astonishment at the unfamiliar tone of cowardice from his sister, but more still at the fact that she’d dare to defy the creature so openly.

  “You will want to, once you’ve met him.” As she said this, the Mantis slowed her stallion to a halt and dismounted, then, leading the horse by the reins, walked away from the path they’d been following and deeper into the grasslands that stretched far into the distance. He nudged Clover to follow. “I’ve never laid eyes on the Sea God myself, but, from what I’ve heard, I think he’ll be enough to persuade you to change your mind.”

  “And the sirens!” he added, the phrase coming out of his mouth unbidden. He felt strangely vindicated by the woman’s words, as if they were, somehow, on the same side of this argument.

  “Yes. The sirens, too.”

  “They look like beautiful women, I’ve heard, but they have tails, like fish, instead of legs. They’ll try to charm you with their singing, or bat their eyelashes and call you handsome and whatnot and, when you think you’ve found yourself a pretty new… friend, they’ll drag you right into the water and drown you. You can become food for their God, just like that.”

  “Food for their God?” Teela repeated, staring at him with wide eyes.

  “Yes, he will want to eat you,” the Mantis replied. “It’s what they do. Most Gods will want to eat you, sooner or later, if they get a whiff of you.”

  “And your God?” his sister asked shyly.

  “My God is uncommon, and she is none of your business.”

  While she was speaking, the woman pulled out of her saddlebag what looked like a simple, one-person tent, and started to assemble it on the grass where she stood. There was nothing around them for as far as the eye could see, with the exception of a few solitary trees. He dared to speak to her.

  “Shouldn’t we keep going for a little longer? There must be a village—”

  “No. We will sleep here.” She directed a poisonous look his way.

  And so they did.