Eventually Arthur cleared his throat. He had not moved from where Solis's words had stopped him. The hand he raised was not steady, but it was raised.

"You said the Heptarchy. Seven of you."

Solis looked at him.

"You are one. Where are the others."

Solis blinked, very slowly. The first crack in the mask. Dante was watching for it.

"My family is currently occupied with their respective domains," he said. "They will join us shortly. The work being done here today is, in a sense, *their* work as well, and they will take part in it directly. You will meet them all very soon."

Arthur nodded once. He had the look of someone who would have asked a follow-up if he'd had the strength left to phrase it. He did not. He stepped back into the half-circle and stayed there.

Solis swept his hand wide. The conversation, his gesture said, was elsewhere now.

"Let me speak to you of the world below this hall. Let me speak to you of what awaits you there, and of what we — out of pity for your loss, out of generosity, out of the recognition that you would not survive otherwise — are prepared to give you."

His voice opened. The room opened with it. The marble under their feet warmed by a degree.

"It is a world of magic. Real magic — not the trick of storybooks, but the deep structure of how things work. The earth answers when called. The wind hears its true name. Fire bends to the will of those who know how to ask. You cannot imagine, standing where you stand now, what it is to live in such a world. What it is to be part of it."

He spread his hands. Light caught somewhere inside his palms.

"In our world, every soul of consequence is granted, at the proper age, a *Blessing*. A gift from one of us. A name, a power, a place in the order. It is not given to outsiders. It cannot be given lightly. It cannot, by any law of our own making, be given to a soul that did not arise in our soil."

He smiled.

"And yet."

The light grew brighter in his palms.

"You stand here. By accident, perhaps. By fortune. By something larger than either of those words. You stand at the edge of a gift that no other outsider has been offered in living memory. We are prepared to extend it to you. Out of pity. Out of generosity. Out of the recognition that the world you are about to enter would devour you in a week without our protection."

Conrad muttered something that might have been *here it comes*. Solis, if he heard, did not acknowledge it.

"You will be Awakened," he said. "Each of you. By the hand of the god whose nature most resembles your own. You will be made part of the order of our world. You will receive a Blessing. You will receive a Vocation. And you will receive —" the smile widened, just slightly, "— a body that can carry both."

He let the words land.

"The shape you wear at this moment is, as I said, a courtesy. A projection. After the Awakening, that memory will become flesh. *Stronger* flesh. *Truer* flesh. Your kind, in our world, grows tall and well. You will not recognize yourselves an hour from now. I assure you, the surprise will be a pleasant one."

A faint murmur ran through the class. Diana, still on the marble, lifted her head. Conrad straightened. Aurora glanced at her own arm with new interest.

"None of this," Solis said, "is owed to you. None of this was part of the bargain we struck with your world, because there was no bargain. We owe you nothing. And yet we offer it freely."

He paused.

"All we ask in return is that you carry what we give you well. Walk into the world below with the dignity of those who have been raised, and not the helplessness of those who have been dropped. Do this and you will be remembered. Refuse — and of course you may refuse, the Awakening cannot be coerced, we do not coerce — and you will find that the world below is a generous teacher of regret."

Nobody believed him on the last point.

Nobody refused.

---

Solis lifted both hands.

The air in the center of the hall *folded*. There was no other word for it. The space above the marble between the half-circle and the central throne pleated, briefly, like a sheet being drawn together — and from the pleat something emerged, settling slowly to the ground.

A crystal.

Three meters tall, two meters wide. Faceted at every angle, transparent at first, then beginning to swirl with color from the inside as it touched the floor. Reds gave way to greens gave way to blues, never staying long enough to be a single color, never quite mixing.

"The Essence Crystal," Solis said. "It will read your soul. It will tell us who, among my brothers and sisters, stands closest to you in nature. And it will call them here, to this hall, to bestow upon you the Blessing that is yours by — let us say — fortunate accident."

He inclined his head toward the class.

"Who would like to be first?"

Nobody moved.

The seconds stretched. Conrad was looking at the crystal the way he looked at exam papers. Aurora was already cataloguing everyone else's hesitation. Grace was watching Solis, not the crystal — and Dante knew her well enough to know she was trying to read him.

Then Ethan stepped forward.

Ethan from the second row. Ethan with the glasses he kept pushing up his nose. Ethan who was ordinary in every way that ordinary could be measured, and who had — for reasons known only to Ethan — decided to be the one.

"I'll go," he said.

His voice came out too soft. He cleared his throat and tried again.

"I'll go."

Solis's face warmed. "Brave child. What is your name?"

"Ethan."

"Approach, Ethan."

Ethan approached. He kept his hands at his sides until he was right next to the crystal, and then, the way you do when you finally touch the surface of cold water, he put his palm flat against it.

For a heartbeat, nothing.

Then the crystal *flushed* brown. Deep. Solid. The color of wet earth at the bottom of a riverbed. The marble under Ethan's feet cracked outward in a perfect circle, and from the cracks rose stone — slow, deliberate stone, the color of the crystal — climbing his legs, his torso, his arms, until Ethan was standing inside a crude statue of himself.

Behind him, the air folded again.

And a god appeared.

He stood roughly half the height of Solis. Massive shoulders. White beard braided into three thick ropes that fell almost to his knees. Gauntlets of beaten gold on both hands with knuckles like small mountains. His face was the kind of face old men had when old men had lived their entire lives outdoors and decided early that worry was for other men.

He looked around the hall.

Then at the rock-encased Ethan.

Then at Solis.

His expression did something complicated.

"Brother," he said. "I was in my own halls. I was —" he gestured, as if at unfinished work behind him, "— I was *occupied*. What is this child doing here. What are *any* of these children doing here."

"Welcome," Solis said warmly. "The young man at your feet has been Awakened to your domain. Allow me to present —"

"*Solis.*"

The voice was quiet. Quiet and very flat.

"Why are there twenty mortal souls in this hall. Why are they dressed in nothing. Why is one of them — yes, I'm looking at this one — *encased in my stone*. Brother. *What have you done.*"

A beat.

The smile on Solis's face did not move.

"There has been a small irregularity with a summoning ritual. It is being addressed. The young will be Awakened, briefed, and dispatched. Your assistance is appreciated and will be required for several of them. We may have words afterward, if you wish."

The bearded god stared at him.

Stared for what felt to Dante like an unreasonably long time.

Then he turned his back on Solis — slowly, deliberately — and crouched down in front of Ethan, who was still inside his own statue of stone.

"Hello, pebble," the bearded god said. His voice changed completely. Warm now. Genuinely so. "Don't be frightened. The stone will pass. I'm only meeting you."

The statue trembled. Cracked. Shattered into harmless dust at Ethan's feet.

Ethan stood there, blinking, breathing hard.

Different.

Dante saw it. Everyone saw it. Ethan was *taller*. By at least ten centimeters. His shoulders had broadened inside the soft gray robe that wasn't soft anymore, that had become something heavier, darker, more like a tunic. The glasses were gone — Ethan kept reaching for them, then looking confused that they weren't on his face. His jaw had filled out. The body, the projection, the whole shape of him had solidified into something that was unmistakably Ethan and unmistakably better at being Ethan than Ethan had ever managed.

The bearded god placed one enormous gold-knuckled hand on Ethan's shoulder.

"My name is Gurtur. The Steady Point. God of Earth and Resistance. Protector of the Fae." He smiled. The braids in his beard moved when his face moved. "And you, child, are now my problem. Welcome."

He lifted Ethan's right hand, palm up. Something shimmered into being on the back of it — a small dark mark, the silhouette of a mountain in profile, etched as if by a hot needle. Ethan stared at it.

"It tells me my Blessing," Ethan said, slowly. "I can — I can *read* it. In my head. Like a window. *Stone Aegis*. *Rank seven*. *Vocation: Tank.* Four abilities. There's — there's *four abilities* I can —"

Gurtur grinned at him. "That's right. Your tier is Sovereign. A high one. You will be a wall against which men break themselves, pebble." He stood, slowly, and only then did he turn back to Solis. The warmth left his face on the way around.

"Brother. We will speak later."

Solis inclined his head.

Gurtur did not return to wherever he had come from. He stepped to one side of the central throne and folded his arms and waited, and his presence in the hall changed something — added a weight that hadn't been there before.

Solis pretended not to notice.

"Next," he said pleasantly. "Step forward."

---

The next five came in a rush.

Sophia was second — small, dark-haired, the quiet one in Diana's trio. The crystal flushed gold. Solis himself rose, beaming, and laid a hand on her head; Sophia gasped and arched, and when she straightened she was glowing faintly. Her body had filled out the same way Ethan's had — not unrecognizable but improved, as if some kind sculptor had been at her shape with a small chisel. Solis pronounced her the *Keeper of the Sacred Flame, rank six, Vocation: Lightbearer*, of his own house, and he sat back down looking quietly satisfied.

Marcus was third. Red flame and a sword that wasn't there a moment ago and was suddenly hanging at his hip. Marcus's blond hair had darkened to a copper. The crystal had called for someone who hadn't yet come — Solis frowned briefly at the empty air behind Marcus where a god was supposed to materialize and didn't — and so Solis named the Blessing himself: *Burning Edge, rank six, Vocation: Berserker*. He kept glancing at the air. Nothing arrived.

Emma went fourth.

The air folded behind her in a swirl of pale wind and the sound of cloth moving very fast. The figure that stepped through was the smallest god yet — only four meters or so, built like a girl who had decided to be a goddess at the last minute and was still pleased about it. Long pink hair that floated as if she were always submerged. Translucent dragonfly wings that hummed against the air. She landed lightly, looked once at Solis with an expression Dante couldn't parse, and then her whole face exploded into a smile when she saw Emma standing there in a small whirlwind of her own creation.

"*A new sister of the wind!*" she cried, and rushed forward to take Emma's hands and shake them up and down with both of hers, very fast. "Hello, hello, hello — *I am Aneos*, the Gentle. Goddess of Wind and Movement. Protectress of the Little People. What's your name? You're going to *love* my domain, my domain is very fun, the wind is the *best* of the elements no matter what my brothers tell you —"

Emma, dazed, said her name. Aneos beamed. *Wind Dancer, rank four*, and she kissed Emma on the forehead and stepped back, her wings buzzing.

Then she turned and looked at Solis.

The smile was still on her face. The smile did not match the eyes.

"Brother," she said sweetly. "*Why* am I here."

"All in good time, sister. We'll discuss after."

Aneos looked at Gurtur. Gurtur looked back. Some agreement passed between them that did not require words. Aneos drifted over to Gurtur's side of the throne and stood there with her arms crossed and her wings still humming.

Two gods now. Watching.

Derek went next. Stone again, like Ethan. Gurtur claimed him with a tired sort of warmth, *Stone Guardian, rank five*, and Derek joined the slowly growing line of Awakened on the far side of the hall, all of them taller and more solid than they had been a few minutes ago.

(He didn't tell them. He didn't tell any of them. They're being summoned by the crystal and they're arriving angry. He's sitting there pretending it's all according to plan.)

(What did he do.)