The first time Siobhan attempted to summon her goddess—a red moon ago—she’d done it in the most traditional way possible, with a sacrifice of a mature buck and chanted prayers. 

She doesn’t do that now. 

She doesn’t need to, not when Thorne has become attuned to her presence and location: here, now, a short walk from the inn, to the glowing charcoals of a fire.

That doesn’t mean that this doesn’t require some sacrifice and some ritual. Blood in this case—her own, though it doesn’t have to be—anointing her in places three: on either side of her mouth, angled down, and across her forehead as a blaze. The touch of her tongue to the source of the blood: in this case her pricked thumb. And then Siobhan closes her eyes and opens her mind to the voice of her goddess—her true-spoken words and not merely the feelings and intuitions that she has been granted by vow.

(Much better than the haruspexy she had once used—or at least recalled using. Often enough, a spot on a deer’s liver is merely a sign it is better fit for the hounds than the cook.)

"Are you there, my lady?" she asks, knowing that in a way she always is. But there's a difference between being there and paying attention and her goddess has other duties besides the pact they made.

'Are you there, Thorne? It's me, Siobhan.'

Siobhan grit her teeth.  "You mock me?"

...Fuck. I didn't intend to - It's from the name of a kids book, on Earth. My third mom used to make that joke with me after I woke up: "Are you there, Thorne? It's me, Mom."

"Oh," Siobhan says. And wonders at the casual mention of a book published for children. Are such things so common in the world of the Gods and Players?

This is about what everyone was talking about, wasn't it?

"Yes, my lady," Siobhan says. Of course Thorne had seen; she'd vowed Thorne her eyes that night, after all.

I like Hikaru—my third mom would too, probably. He's sharp, but knows when not to cut. Deedee, too, for kindness, even if I'm not sure about her girlfriend.

“Nor am I. Given the sentiments she uttered when berserk…” Siobhan sighs and shakes her head. “But no, my lady. That is not what I wish to speak of.”

No. I didn't really think it was.

Siobhan is quiet for a long moment as she puts together the words of her question. “My lady? I must ask: how long a time have I been… ah, I do not know the right word to use. Alive? Awake?”

'Wakened,' maybe. And— since just before all the… players? The people from Earth? Before they awakened here, more or less. That's how long you've been… more like us, I guess. Closer to us, not exactly like us, but… ugh, I could dump all the science into your mind, but I don't know how you'd deal with the overload.

“And I must keep my mind and senses sharp.”

Yeah.

"My lady, I must ask... how?"

There's a prolonged pause, as the goddess tries to figure out how to word it in ways Siobhan would understand.

When Mundus-Chimera—that is, the Mundus your story began on—when Mundus-Chimera was ruined, we just tried to save everything and everyone and put it here on Mundus Prime. We thought there would be room, and it was the only place we thought we could put you all at the time. And because we did it so hastily, in our panic, we…

Ugh, this is too technical. The easiest but not the most accurate way to explain is that we didn't differentiate between where we put their psyches and your auras, and we think your psyches expanded to fill the space we gave them. And so you wakened.

But that's just our best guess. Gnomon's best guess, really.

“And the other Siobhans, on the other Mundi…?”

Are tales of who you were. But they're not who you are now, Siobhan. There are other worlds than these, but none of them have anyone quite like you.

There's a long pause.

I'm glad we swore our pact.

"Aye," Siobhan says quietly. "As am I."

She opens her eyes, then, and wets the cloth she’d brought with her. Wipes her face clean. Takes a deep, long breath and lets it out.

She can’t talk to Deedee and Hikaru about this, she knows—they’d wonder how she understands the things that they have not spoken of and they cannot know of her pact—but part of her wants very much to tell them anyway.

“Other worlds than these,” she mutters underneath her breath and begins her walk back to camp.

END OF BOOK TWO

TO BE CONTINUED IN BOOK THREE:

Blood and Breath for Gold and Grain​