I follow my Princess back down into the valley, watching her ass sway back and forth under her robes. My mouth keeps twitching in a smile as she mutters furiously to herself about a 'reckoning' and some 'explanations' that are due.

"Back down to the tombs and we'll talk, he says," she huffs to herself.

I grab her elbow as she slips on a rock, nearly tumbling down the embankment.

"Slowly, Princess."

"Don't you tell me what to do!" she snaps. She yanks her arm from my grasp.

"Wouldn't dream of it, Princess."

"Stop calling me princess!"

"You are a princess, Princess. Our Princess."

"You're a pain."

I chuckle at the pique on her face.

"Why are you so... so infernally happy?" she snaps at me, turning back around. She slips again.

I catch her wrist this time. "Because-" I start to respond when I feel it.

"Because what?" she sighs exasperatingly.

"What is this?" I ask softly. I turn her wrist over to the soft underside and push up her sleeve. Thick, white scars ring her wrists like macabre bracelets. I pick up her other arm and she allows me to. "Are these scars what I think they are?"

"My father left these. He said that they were a reminder."

My eyes slide closed, thumbs brushing over the thickly raised skin on my Lady's delicate wrists. Bile surges up. I feel my heart aching and my head spinning.

The god... he chained me by my wrists, dangling in the pit for months. Yet, my wrists bear no scars. He left this reminder on my sweet princess' pale flesh for me. I may have been lied to about her torture, her betrayal, everything... but I knew she was imprisoned. I knew she was going to die as a traitor.

I put her in chains.

"Thane?" her voice penetrates the fog of pain and grief I am selfishly wallowing in.

I blink. "Sorry, Princess. A thought... a dark thought, that's all."

She carefully pulls her wrists from my hands. As much as I miss her touch, I don't want to keep feeling that message from Nateos.

"So, why are we heading backwards, again?" I ask her with forced cheerfulness.

She gives me a scowl of pure disdain. "I am going to seek out the tombs because my father's strength is higher there and I need to speak with him. You are following me because you are creepy."

"Fair enough," I shrug.

She starts to turn around, her pert little nose in the air, when she spins back to me. "You can't hide your grief from me, by the way. I can see it riding your shoulders, even with that stupid grin on your face."

"I know the grin. It's the one that says, 'my Lady is so very talented, isn't she?'"

She scoffs and turns away again.

"Or, is it the one that says, 'she's so very beautiful and not at all clumsy?'"

She gasps, looking at me again, clearly affronted. "I am not clumsy! You and your brother..." her voice trails off.

I force the grin to stay on my face. I won't let her cry, damn the gods. "He knows you're clumsy too?"

"I am not clumsy," she says. Crisis averted, there are no tears in her eyes.

I smile at her for real. Her eyes blaze with fury. Red tinges her pale cheeks. Her tears yesterday caused enough damage to her headpiece that she took it off, revealing the beauty of her hair. She's already healthier.

"Let's get going, Princess. I want to have plenty of time to get back to the tower tonight."

She starts back down the incline. I follow, watching her ass sway again.

"Are you looking at me inappropriately?" she calls out.

"No," I respond immediately. I'm making sure that she doesn't fall. My duty. I just happen to be focused on one part of her anatomy more than others.

"Liar," she mumbles.

---

Now that I am standing in front of the empty tomb of Arim of the First I feel empty and defeated. When we got here, Thane moved past me to take the pieces of his kin away, telling me that I needed a clear space. He is building a fire to burn his grandfather's remains now.

I sigh and walk inside. "Father?" I ask in a soft whisper. "May I please speak with you? Really speak with you?" All of my early bravado has vanished. The anger has faded to hurt and worry.

"My sweet daughter," his voice is the same as it is in my head.

I smile at the male. I know without a doubt that this is the god. He has dark eyes like me. Or, well, my eyes are like his. Tall, strong, he is handsome with grey peppered through his beard and hair. He smiles and holds out his arms and I fall into them. He feels real. Solid. His shirt is woven dark grey of the softest linen with a black leather vest. I curl my hands into his shirt. Even his smell is real, like earth and water, he's so warm and very much alive.

"I'm sorry I can't be with you, my daughter, during this war."

I lift my head to look at my father. "Was I... Did you save me for him? For Thelios? Is he... is he the First Recondite? What about Thane? Is he telling me the truth? Who am I supposed to be with, father? What am I supposed to do?" Tears are clogging my throat. Making it difficult to speak.

He is quiet for a long while, his hand stroking the back of my head as I cry on his chest. "In the game of senet a player will have many moves to make on the board, my daughter. A great strategist will have plans for each piece."

"And what is your plan for me?" I whisper. "As one of those 'pieces?'" I don't think I have ever been more afraid of hearing an answer.

He stops petting me and lifts my chin to see his eyes. They are warm but intense in a serious face. "My sweet child, you are not a senet piece to me. And, if you were, you would be the Queen on the board. Not a pawn that I would throw away."

"Who are the pawns? What... what is happening, father? This isn't fair, father."

"War is a deadly game, Mara. Nothing about this is meant to be fair or just."

I wince. He hardly ever uses my name. The name that he gave me. I start to repeat my question.

"Let me explain, eh?" he raises one of those stark black eyebrows at me. I nod.

Sighing, he sits down on the stone altar and helps me up to sit next to him. "Long before shifters, my sweet daughter, there were only four gods. You know us as the father, the mother, Water, and Death. Or... as it is, Air and Fire, Earth, Water, and myself."

"Oh," I whisper, fascinated.

He chuckles and kisses my forehead. Hmm... he's much taller than I am. "We are all like siblings, yes? Brothers and a sister."

"Why just one female?" I pout.

"Because," he taps my nose, "she is perhaps the most important. She is responsible for all of the new life, is she not?"

I pout a little. My father is the most important.

"We did not create ourselves, daughter. Air and Fire combined to create the father god, my brother, Mardu, for example."

I gasp out loud, clasping my hand over my mouth.

My father gives me a side glance filled with humor. "I am allowed to say his name, sweet daughter. As are you."

I blush. "It's just taught to us, so-"

He pats my hand. "You are not bound by the strictures that my brothers and sister force their worshippers to follow."

I look at him for a moment, "I never realized that you are the only one whose name is known. Isn't that odd?"

"Mardu and Enlal, you may say her name, too," he winks at me, "became weary of their worshippers constantly using their names in vain. I am not spoken of as often. Pir, my other brother, is not as well known, being of the Water."

"Why?" I ask eagerly, then squirm as he pins me with a slightly hard gaze for interrupting.

"There are oceans of water, my daughter. And worshippers who practically live on the water all the time."

"Oh," I breathe.

"In the beginning, Pir and I were content to not involve ourselves in the stories of mortals. Pir was in the ocean, creating oddity after oddity, happy with his experiments. I was in the Underworld, watching over souls. The father and mother were the ones who dallied with your lives."

His eyes grow softer, sadder, as he stares at the blank stone wall of the tomb in pensive silence.

"More and more shifters came into being. The world was being fruitful, I can attest to that."

Not a comfortable topic to discuss with my father, ew. My face screws up in disgust.

His laughter booms around the tomb, faint echoes of others laughing join him. Wonderful. The entire Underworld is laughing at me.

He wipes tears of mirth from his eyes. "Where was I daughter? Oh, yes..." his eyes grow dark. "Then Love was created."

I stiffen, my eyes narrowing on his face. Love.

"First Love, then War, the little pissant."

His curse pulls a smile from me. "What are their names?"

He raises that eyebrow at me again. "Inanji and Urto."

"Inanji," I mutter under my breath. So that's her name... bitch.

"Pay attention, my daughter."

I straighten up and look back at my father. "Why is Urto of the Third House, then?"

My father shrugs, "that was my House, I suspect, before he was created. It's just a number, daughter."

"All right. It's just out of sequence. Alnue would hate it," I muse.

He chuckles. "He does, the little imp." He pauses to kiss my forehead again. "The bonds that mortals have are a weakness to exploit. Emotions makes fools out of mortals."

He takes a slow inhale. "I fell in love."

I almost fall off of the altar stone, clumsily. "You did? How? With who? Was it Love?" I ask in a hushed voice.

He chuckles, wrapping an arm around me. "No, daughter. My child."

My heart sinks. I am his child. A demi-goddess. He's told me before, and Thane told me, too, but I pretended to misunderstand. "My mother." Tears spring into my eyes.

"Yes." He nods, a far-away look on his face. "Her soul is old. Older than most. Her Fated bond male died so young from disease and I didn't want her to be alone, so I would visit her. I was already in love with her soul... but it became something more."

Mother... "how is mama?" I whisper to him.

He kisses my forehead. "Very well," he says warmly.

"You don't need to tell me anymore," I blurt out quickly. His eyes are a little too warm.

He smiles at the look on my face, but thankfully doesn't set off another round of laughter. "I knew, my daughter, that her soul would love the other male again when she died. I started to see bonds as something else. Something that destroys. I was angry for a long while. Then..." he took a breath. "You were born."

He picks up a piece of my hair and rubs it inbetween his two fingers. "You were born with this. Just a cap of fine, sweet hair as bright as fire. You are a new soul, my daughter. A demi-goddess, yes, but so perfectly good. That's how I knew you would be so special. A Flame for the darkness of the Underworld. This is your very first life. You have never had another. I was so happy, even if I lost your mother I would always have you...

Then I saw it. Souls have more than one Fated. Your soul chose twins whose demons have existed deep in my kingdom for an eternity."

"Really?" I exhale. Amazing.

"I knew it would be problematic. Two bonds? You are very much a little troublemaker, daughter."

I nod. I knew that.

He picks up my hands and runs his thumbs over the scars on my wrists. "I have kept prophecies about you from your ears as much as possible, daughter. You know a bit. The Basru, the chosen bonds. Thelios is a part of your story. The important thing to know is that my sister was correct. You choose your bonded, your Fated. What she didn't tell you, is that your choice will change the face of mortal bonds forever. Demon shifters will forever be affected by whatever path you take."

He clears his throat, "it is Thelios, daughter, who I saved and trained and raised to give to you, not the other way around. I wouldn't save a male who wasn't meant to be yours. You chose him, after all."

"And Thane," I say, defeated.

"Hmm. Inanji, she... well, there is some history between us, and she is jealous."

I frown, "shouldn't she be happy that I am in love?"

My father snorts derisively. "Think, my daughter. You have two bonds. Your soul chose twice and then bonded twice. You skipped right over Inanji's power. She picks and chooses. And... well... there's a bit more..."

"She was your lover," I say flatly. Is every male just ruled by lust?!

A strong tap on my nose brings me back to his stern face. "She was like a daughter."

My heart falls. "She was?"

"Yes, for many eons. Don't cry, sweet daughter."

"Now I'm jealous," I admit, wiping ineffectually at my tears.

"Don't be," he hugs me tight to his chest. I inhale his scent again, gaining comfort from the thrum of deep energy rumbling in this corporeal form.

"I knew she was spoiled, my daughter," he continues. "Then, she did the unforgivable. She seduced Thelios in the Underworld."

I gasp out loud at the pain. It's as if my heart is being sliced apart.

My father continues, rubbing my back and softly explaining, "I didn't know at first. He was doing so well, the famed soul of a warrior. That's why I wiped his memories clean when I sent him here to you. I feared that he would reject you, not because of her, but because he would feel to tainted to even look your way. He is a dark soul, daughter. I made him pure, but only for a short while. He and his brother have ancient, blackened souls. Thane is able to shed more of the darkness, but Thelios... if you don't forgive him, he will become something truly wicked. It was wrong to separate twin souls. Love... she had a hand in that, too."

"Why d-didn't Mardu do anything to stop his House?" I sob.

"Because he is tired, my sweet daughter. He has tried, over and over. Yet they tumble further and further from his path. This war... I think he is hoping it cleanses his House once and for all."

He sighs, "it won't, of course. There will always be someone who finds power and corrupts it. But... he is hopeful. I don't think he sees Inanji's duplicity."

"What should I do, father?"

"Whatever you wish, my daughter. I want you to be happy."

"I want Thelios. I want what we had back."

He cups my cheek, looking into my eyes. "He is not that empty scroll, my daughter. Will you take him, damaged as he is?"

"Yes," I say stubbornly.

"And the other?"

I glance out of the tomb door, where I know Thane is waiting.

"Don't be fooled by his past actions against you, daughter. His soul belongs to you, to claim or reject."

"I don't know. It hurts. And now, knowing about her and Thelios, it hurts more."

"Let them earn you, then. You are a female of more worth than they deserve."

He kisses my forehead again. I know he has to leave.

"Goodbye sweet daughter."

"Goodbye, father."

Remember

Flesh is flesh

Stone is stone

I tumble from the tomb in something akin to shock at all I've learned. My father's image is already fading from my mind. Just his eyes and those stark black eyebrows remain in my mind.

"Princess," Thane catches me as I fall into him.

I sniffle, already missing my father, when something catches my eye. I look up, gasping at the graffiti littering the sides of the tombs.

"Mishu! Mushu! Momo!" I scream.

My gargoyles freeze, guilt in their orange eyes, as they slowly hide their charcoal sticks behind their backs and under their tails.

All over the walls is her name, Inanji, along with several slurs and a few... well...

"Yes, I modeled for those," Thane tells me with a smirk, pointing at the overly-large phallic symbol urinating on her name.

"Oh, my goodness," I bury my face in my hands, but I can't stop the bubbling laughter.

---

My sword sings as I swing it, slicing into flesh and bone. Blood flies, spattering on my face, my leathers. I laugh out loud, my demon and I exulting in the destruction of those fools who defend the District of the mother and Death.

We are slowly squeezing the city. Forcing the denizens and defenders of War into their own district. Soon we'll be at their gates and I will have real opponents to fight.

I scramble up and over the low-slung walls into the Death district, still laughing. I leap down, into the graveyard behind the main temple.

I rub my chest. It hurts to see the graves of the dead. It reminds me of the Underworld. The peace of this place haunts me. Why did I suffer for years while my brother got a charmed life? A life in a palace, a beautiful, if whorish, female, a child. He lived far away from death. It never touched him.

"Lord Thane?" One of my warriors approaches me with extreme caution.

I hate hearing that name.

I hate this cowardly female more. The god's daughter and she's hiding, protected by Natoes and his endless games and secrets. It feels like this is just one more cruel trick of the wily god; give me a puzzle to solve, a goal to obtain, then snatch the answer away before I have a chance to solve it.

"Destroy it all," I rasp out. "Rip the buildings down. Slice apart every image of Death. Leave nothing in this district standing. Nothing! Let his daughter come for me and I will show you all what a female is good for!" I roar to the milling crowd of soldiers.

Cries and cheers greet my words.

The blue sky darkens. The heavens open, downpouring onto the soldiers that swarm over the temple of Death like a destructive horde of roaches.