Wheraveled downstream for the st time, it was a nguid affair, but Oroza no longer had the strength to swim. At this point, she barely had the strength to hold herself together as the emaciated shell of the river dragon she was. Even time spent among the ice at the peak of the mountains was enough to rejuvenate her; she did not truly uand why.

  Was it not as clear as it had always beehe heights not untouched and perfe that timeless way that she’d always been until so retly?

  She didn’t know, but then, she didn’t know that it mattered, either. She had lived a long enough life that it was measured iuries, and for most of that time she had been tent to drift along as if it would never end. Now all that mattered now was that the Lich did not get its hands on her soul and tinue her torment iuity.

  It would be bad enough that it would shape aually seize whatever sprang up from the polluted banks of the Oroza , but she could do nothing about that now. She’d already fought too long and too hard and lost everything in the process.

  While she drifted through the southern reaches of her realm toward the silty delta, she bitterly reflected on how little her efforts had aplished. She had prevehe darkness from marg east immediately, but that had only given those people a two-year reprieve. Beyond that, what had she done? Saved some children? Torn apart as many of the Lich’s structs as she could?

  Oroza smiled at that as she glided along. It wasn’t much, but it would have to be enough. Before that, she’d grahe wishes of tless mothers for healthy babies and even more farmers for bountiful yields, but somehow, all those minor miracles paled in parison to the dark years that had done such damage to her.

  All she could hope for was that in time, after the Gods finally stood together aed this enemy, or the darkness had ed all the life in the area and burself out, that nature would finally begin to heal. One day there would be an Oroza again. She believed that. She just khat it wouldn’t be her.

  The behavior of the ods was the point that galled her the most. Their domains were so disparate, and their s were so focused that it was hard to get them to work together on anything, especially sihe nature goddesses and the children of the forest had begun to vanish.

  It was the nature of man to be selfish, but the Gods were supposed to rise above such petty challenges and work together to defeat their enemies. Sadly, they could not even aplish that mubsp;

  The All-Father was almost finished building a new chariot, but Lunaris would not loan him any of her stars tle the horses for it. She said the firmament was too weak to support any more losses.

  Even if she had, though, who would they get to drive such a thing? For a time, she had hoped that the Tempr with the glowing eyes might be the oo do so, but acc to what she’d heard, he was dead, and the pce where she’d left those light-eyed children so long ago was gooo.

  Siddrim had once been a man, it was said, before he was ied with the light. Perhaps another like that would be born somewhere across the seas.

  None of that mattered to her any longer as she traveled out to sea herself. She used to hate the itch of the saltwater in the Relict Sea, but pared to her own waters now, they felt and pure, and she quick sah the waves, letting the currents take her ever deeper. That was all she wao find a pewhere where her tormentor could never find her, and there was no pce vaster than the o depths.

  That was why she was surprised when Istinis fouhere, curled up beh a ro thousands of feet of water, a hundred miles from anywhere in a pin of endless mud and stone. Her pale aqua skin and the flickering lightning in her eyes made a mistakey impossible. She was Istiniss.

  Normally, su ued visit might have frightened Oroza. After all, it wasn’t so long ago that the Lipelled her to ihe more powerful Goddess’s domain and ravage her behemoths with the Lich’s crazed sea dragon. Now, death would be a blessing, and if the O Goddess wao strike her down, well, so much the better.

  Instead, the two of them regarded each other for a long time before Istiniss finally spoke. “I would make you one of my own if I could,” the Goddess said at st. “I would give your domain of the east wind a you pour out your poison on the creature that did this to you, but that is beyond me.”

  “I appreciate that,” Oroza said, too tired to offer up any proper formality.

  “Sadly, you ot die here,” the stoddess said as she crouched dowo Oroza’s coiled form.

  “I ’t?” Oroza asked. “Do you think is too close to—”

  “No, I promise you that the mohat ravages your nd would never find your spirit,” Istiniss said, stroking the silvery scales of Oroza’s fnk. “I would bind you to a pearl and hide you away at the very bottom of the sea. In a pce, it would hink to look for you.”

  “I appreciate that,” Oroza answered with a smile wide enough to show how mah she’d lost already.

  “I know, but the prophecy, and therefore Lunaris herself, forbids that you should die in this pce alohe sea goddess said at st.

  “Does she have another one?” Oroza asked. “I heard her recite the thing once, and I’m nowhere in it, I promise you that. Rivers do not ge the course of history.”

  The only ahat Istiniss gave was to smile before she started to recite one of the long rhyming passages that made up the crypti that the Moon Goddess seemed to believe held some sort of key to defeating the evils that they faced.

  “The savior of light shall brave endless night

  Though if she could, she’d only weep.

  Until she returns to the light, she’ll tio fight,

  Then she finally sleep.”

  “I am no savior of light,” Oroza ughed softly. “I couldn’t even save myself.”

  “No,” Istiniss agreed. “I didn’t think so either, but our Moon Goddess is quite sure. She says that you told her about how you saved aire boat full of light not so long ago, though, and perhaps that is enough.”

  “Maybe,” Oroza sighed, “But wouldn’t it make more sense for one of the children on that boat to be the savior of the light?”

  “I’m not sure,” Istiniss said with a shrug. “I read the whole thing but fess it made no seo me. Regardless, Lunaris told me that I must not allow you to die, and I aim to do that at least.”

  “How? Will you purge my river of the poisons?” Oroza asked. “Will you drain it of the salt that is killing the pnts that dwell there?”

  “I would if I could,” the Goddess of Sea and Storms nodded. “I would empty every thunderhead in the world on that evil patch of nd if I thought that it could se its taint, but that would only poison the sea faster.”

  “Then all you do is put me out of my misery,” Oroza smiled sadly, certain that a bst of lightning would be enough to stop the slow wheezing in her chest each time she breathed in and out through her gills.

  “Sorry,” Istiniss said. “I already told you you aren’t dying in my o. Lunaris is already cross enough with me. I’m going to help you get somewhere where you recover your strength, at least for a while. It's very far away, but ohat’s done, well, as long as you fulfill your destiny, I suppose you do whatever you want.”

  Oroza opened her rge mouth to speak. She was going to expin that she cked the strength to swim for another mile, let alone leagues and leagues, but the words were lost in the sudden surge of currents that surrounded her. They pulled her out of her own grave and flung her off at great speed through the darko someply Istiniss knew.

  There was a time when Oroza would have fought her way free on principle. She cked the strength to do that now, though. Instead, she was dragged through the depths back toward the surface. That was not her destination, though. Instead, she ropelled for a night and a day like that toward warmer waters and sunnier climes.

  Three times, she saw an isnd speeding toward her from the horizon, and each time, she thought that was her destination. She passed all of them by, though.

  Oroza glided across the water until she no longer reized the color of the water or the sky. Even her est mountain kes were not so teal, and the strange pink rocks she glimpsed beh her were trasted by brightly colored fish that were every color of the rainbow. She would have thought for certain that she’d left the world entirely for some new pce were it not for the steltions in the sky.

  Then, the m, shortly after sunrise she spied a fourth isnd, and the currents carried her all the way to the breakwaters of it before they finally released her. It was a strange pce, with oddly shaped trees that had broad leaves only at the very top of tall crooked trunks.

  All of that was beautiful, but as she got close to the shore a her dragon form fade away to reveal only an old woman in a silver dress, it was the man standing on shore that caught her attention. He was alohere, in ankle-deep water, wearing fine bck clothing that did not fit at all with everything else. She had no idea what to make of that, but she didn’t feel at all threatened by the dark-skinned woman as she slowly waded ashore.

  “I was sent here,” Oroza said, rising from the surf and walking toward the shore on shaky legs.

  “You were,” she agreed, “but you don’t have to e here. Not if you don’t want to.”

  “Why wouldn’t I want to?” Oroza asked, suddenly unsure.

  “Where you stand now, you have the traces of not just life ah, but uh upon you as well.” The dark woman said. “If you leave the surf and e fully onto the shore, you will leave behind two of those worlds forever.”

  Oroza paused. Trying to decipher the cryptic words as she stood there, struggling against the tide as it pped against the shore. She was exhausted, and truly, there was nowhere else for her to go. Still, she asked the obvious question, “Who are you?”

  The dark woman smiled with frighteningly white teeth and said a word. It might have been a name, even, but it was lost in the crashing of the tide that ed around them.

  “That won’t mean too much to you, though,” she tinued, extending his hand, “Not until you make your decision.”

  Oroza only had to think for a moment. Then, with determination, she gripped the stranger’s hand and strode ashore.