He didn’t think he’d encountered them anywhere else, either. It was possible he’d forgotten, but if so it meant the species hadn’t made much of an impact on Vengeance. That was fairly plausible when Serenity thought about it; his memories of his time as Vengeance weren’t very clear.
:The Vrak were mentioned in a message from Honoria; they were one of the species listed by the Broken Mirror as precursor species to the Children of Passion.:
Perhaps Serenity should be glad his demonic form was an Asura now instead of a Greater Demon of Righteous Retribution. Asura had to draw almost exclusively on the species of the same name, while a Greater Demon of Righteous Retribution clearly drew heavily on at least one other species. Echa might not have been so certain Serenity wasn’t Vrak if he’d still had those other unknown influences.
That still didn’t answer where the Vrak disappeared to; the Children of Passion were almost certainly far older than the destruction of Tzintkra. In fact, their very disappearance might be the clue Serenity needed to know where they’d gone: had the Damned destroyed their own people as well as most of the Holy?
Was the entire war as much about prejudice against another species as anything else?
Did it matter? The war was long since over and neither of the sides who fought was on Tzintkra anymore, even if the planet was still scarred from the attacks.
Well, to some extent it clearly mattered. Serenity doubted Echa would have stopped to talk to the ruler of Tzintkra if he were even partly Vrak. That didn’t make Serenity feel any better about the overall situation. Echa was far chattier than he expected of someone dealing with an enemy, but that didn’t mean they were friends.
Echa certainly wanted to impress Tzintkra’s history on its new Lord. That wasn’t innately a bad thing, but Serenity had to remember he was getting only one side of the story. Unfortunately, he already knew what Tzintkra did and it was heavily incomplete. He’d just have to keep his lack of knowledge in mind in case it was relevant. He didn’t know why it would be, but he couldn’t completely dismiss the idea, given how interested in telling his side Echa was.
Learning about history wasn’t Serenity’s goal when he touched the rune. He’d gotten distracted by the spirit of a vanished deity. “So what now? Are you going to restart time?”
“Tell me about Tzintkra. What is it like now? How did you deal with the Vrak?” Echa seemed to ignore Serenity’s question.
There was no harm in a quick answer. “There are two notable cities on Tzintkra, the Necropolis and the Shining Caverns. They aren’t friendly and I’m sure you can guess which one has which side. The surface is slowly being recovered, but it’s going to take a very long time. It should have been faster, but the previous City Lord of the Necropolis killed everyone who was powerful enough to contest with her. I’ve never seen a Vrak and I wonder if she might not be the reason why.”
Both the Necropolis and the Shining Caverns survived, after all. From legend, the Shining Caverns didn’t exist before the War, but the Necropolis did. If it was the Vraks’ main city, that might explain some things, but not why there were no Vrak there. Stojan Aith might as well take the blame. It wasn’t even unlikely that she was to blame; she was active during the War, after all. That was when she damaged Tzintkra’s core. Serenity didn’t have any better candidates.
“I doubt you know the Shining Caverns; their stories say it was established as the last act of the gods as a refuge for those displaced by the war. It sounds a lot like what you did for Berinath’s dryads, except inside Tzintkra instead of on the Moon. The other thing you probably want to know is that the City Lord of the Shining Caverns and Planetary Manager of Tzintkra is probably a relative of yours, Stojan Tasi.” Serenity decided not to mention Stojan Aith’s name. There was no reason to potentially piss off a god that had him out of time or something similar, after all, and Stojan Aith seemed to be very good at pissing everyone off.
“Tasi?” Stojan Echa sounded puzzled. “Tasi died in the early days of the War, in one of the first strikes. Perhaps he’s named after the Tasi I knew.”
“It could be,” Serenity agreed. “I think he said he was born afterwards.” He was definitely younger than Stojan Aith. Serenity remembered that much for certain.
“That is good. You are City Lord of the Necropolis, then? Do they still claim that only the strongest Seated DeathLord may rule?”
Serenity hoped it wasn’t a mistake to answer that, but Echa had already guessed the truth. “Yes. The rule seems ridiculous but Tzintkra refuses to let me change it.” He’d tried. He wanted to hand the world over to Stojan Tasi, since the man was always there. Admittedly, he’d only tried once and not all that hard, but as long as Tasi was willing to manage things that was almost the same as handing the Sovereignty over.
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“Then you know what you need to know and you have the power you need. That’s enough.” The smoke gathered at the rune then seemed to disappear into it or possibly fade away; Serenity wasn’t certain which. What he could see was that its Affinities became clearer. The strongest Affinity was Death.
The world seemed to glitch; when it did, the rune was suddenly glowing instead of emitting shadow. Serenity felt Echa’s presence for a moment and heard a whisper. “Live up to what I wanted my legacy to be instead of to what it is. My presence has frozen my people for long enough.”
The Lord of Cycles, Last of the Holy, has Fallen.
Tzintkra and Berinath welcome the Worlds’ Friend and grant him the Authority of the Holy. Life and Death have met hands in peace and the next Cycle begins anew.
With the Blessing of Cycles, a new Holy One rises. The Lord of Cycles gives way to the Lord of Dungeons.
Two thoughts competed for space in Serenity’s brain. The first was that Echa’s insistence on telling his tale made a lot more sense when he knew that all Echa wanted was to go to his final rest and leave his power in the hands of another.
The second was simple. The words slipped out of Serenity’s mouth before he had the chance to stop them. Fortunately, they were in English. “Well, fuck.”
He couldn’t imagine that was going to go over well.
“Which of you two hid the fact that the youngest true dragon is collecting Divinity from me?” Dragon paused the image in front of the three gods and glared at Death. She normally wouldn’t have been his top guess, but the young dragon was her Incarnate, even if she’d chosen to appear human for some reason, the only one of the three that now routinely used a human appearance even when they weren’t dealing with humans. She’d changed immensely over the past few years; Dragon wasn’t sure he approved.
If she was going to start hiding things from people who needed to know them, he definitely didn’t approve.
Death shook her head as a frown crossed her face. “Why would I hide that? You know as well as I do that it’s a small step from Incarnate to deity, though most do not take that step. I’m shocked you didn’t know.”
Coyote’s barking, almost hyena-like laugh told Dragon who the true culprit had to be.
Dragon’s head whipped around. “Coyote, why? You know how important Serenity is! An entirely new subspecies and his child is still a dragon even if she carries her mother’s heritage as well! She shows every sign of growing up sane without the Tier mismatch other young dragons face. She might be the key to reviving my people.”
Coyote dissolved in laughter, seemingly unable to breathe because he was laughing so hard. Dragon didn’t appreciate being laughed at.
After a moment, Coyote managed to gasp out, “That’s exactly why it’s funny. You hid it from yourself!”
Dragon reached out with one clawed paw and lifted the coyote off the ground by the fur on his back. It wasn’t comfortable for either of them, but it got the point across and Coyote’s laughter eased. “Explain.”
Coyote panted for a moment. Dragon felt him pull away and let him fall to the cushions below. “Serenity doesn’t trust the gods, you know that. You should know that?”
Dragon nodded. He did. “That’s been obvious since that fight he had with the false god on Lyka, the one who tried to pretend to be eternal.”
Coyote chuckled and turned to Death. “When did you know he didn’t trust the gods?”
Death frowned at Coyote. “Is that a trick question? I don’t like trick questions.”
Coyote shook his head. He somehow managed to look not only amused but positively smug. “It isn’t, at least not for you. When did you figure out that he wasn’t fond of the gods, that he thinks of them as powerful people but not above him?”
Death shrugged. “When he first returned to Earth, he met quite a few gods. He wasn’t intimidated; if anything, he was irritated.”
Coyote nodded as if that confirmed something. “He already had his first worshiper by then, but he did not even know it. Then when he first met Ita and she started calling him her Shameless One, it could have been just words, but it wasn’t. She truly did choose to worship him in the way of the Sterath; more than that, she told others about the Lord of Dungeons, just like his first. He has that something that lets the non-Incarnate gods start cults, and as an Incarnate that is all he needs. That’s even more true when his Incarnate and his deific creed align as well as they do without trying to duplicate…”
Dragon buried his head under his forepaws. Had he truly been so blind?
It was obvious how he could have missed it. You had to have power to become a god; people had to believe in you. That meant Serenity’s Tier was simply too low for a dragon to become a god, at least among dragons. He hadn’t even considered it an option for years or more likely centuries.
Normally, he would welcome a god among dragons; how did he feel about a dragon that was worshiped by those who were not draconic?
Dragon wasn’t certain. It would make things far more difficult; already, many on the Council of Dragons argued that Serenity did not deserve his rightful place, despite his status as a new subspecies. Althyr knew that was mostly because they thought he would side with Althyr rather than because they had an opinion about Serenity himself. If they found out just how much contact he had with non-dragons, however, it would become far worse.
He couldn’t allow it to change anything. Too much depended on Serenity. It was far too much to place on the wyrmling’s shoulders, even if he counted himself an adult and even if he was far more than he should have been.
Althyr wished there was more he could do, but all he could do was watch. He could give advice when Serenity asked, but that was not often and there was only so much he could say in any case.