“Pardon, child, but you want to do what?”

Qala set the greenstone statue of Zogrusz back down on the desk and smiled in sweet innocence at the Amotlan queen.

“I want to be a goddess,” she said, running her finger along the edge of the intricately carved wooden surface in front of her. With her other hand she waved absently at the others standing behind her. “We all do,” she continued, but then frowned. “No, wait, not Zog and Ori. They want to be gods.”

One of the cats sprawled on the desk among the clutter of books and bric-a-brac lifted its head to stare at Qala, then stretched languidly and yawned. It did not seem nearly as surprised as her mistress.

The queen swallowed, raising her eyes to the dome arching over their heads. What had previously been displayed on its underside – a fiery bird emerging from a golden egg – had been painted over with an image of him in his true form dictating the Book of Zog to a kneeling Cozotl. He suspected Anecoya had already noticed this and was silently seething.

The queen tugged nervously at the hem of her beautifully embroidered robes. “But, child . . . are you a goddess?”

“Does it matter?” Qala replied without hesitation, tracing a flower that had been engraved into the desk.

The queen coughed nervously. “The official position of my royal house is that our Dark Lord Zogrusz”— she dipped her head respectfully towards him with her hands pressed together—“is the only true god, although we still of course allow for the worship of the Reborn Goddess.”

Anecoya snorted, and the queen winced like she expected to be struck down for her insolence.

Zogrusz was glad his mouth-tendrils hid his smile, as he didn’t want to provoke the phoenix any further. The last few days had been hard enough on her. Anecoya had somehow survived inside Ycthitlig without suffering any permanent damage, but every time he had seen her since they had moved into the palace of Amotla she looked to have come straight from the bath. Her once-pale skin was now pink from scrubbing, and her red curls were perpetually damp.

He couldn’t blame her, honestly.

Zogrusz realized the queen was staring at him almost pleadingly. For a moment he was confused as to why, and then it dawned on him. Of course. She would never agree to any changes in the foundations of her faith with her god standing a dozen paces away.

He stepped forward, resting a claw on the copy of his scriptures lying open on her desk. “A new era has dawned,” he intoned, trying to infuse his words with as much gravitas as possible. “Now the people of this world will have a pantheon. They may worship whichever divinity most appeals to them.”

“A pantheon,” the queen murmured.

“Yes!” Qala cried, clapping her hands together. “And we shall all represent different things. Ori can be the god of the earth and warriors and making boring old oaths.”

“I would perform mine duties honorably if granted such a place,” rumbled the hulking stone warrior. “This I swear.”

“See?” the little girl said with a giggle. “He’s perfect. And Zog, since he needs to be feared I suppose he has to be the god of night or death or something like that. Even though he’s actually very sweet.”

“Sweet?” the queen gasped, her eyes widening before she quickly controlled herself.

“Yeah, in all honesty, Anecoya would be a better dark lord,” Qala continued, jerking a thumb at the glowering goddess. “She can be really scary.”

“Unlike the Eldritch Horror, I need my worshippers to love me,” Anecoya said through gritted teeth. “So I suppose I’ll have to try to be more . . . friendly.”

“And what will you be?” Zogrusz asked Qala, now not bothering to hide his amusement at this exchange.

“I’ll be a trickster!” the little girl exclaimed, puffing out her chest. “Goddess of mischief and being sneaky. I tricked that Reaper, didn’t I?”

“That you did,” Zogrusz agreed. “Although I suppose in truth it was my plan, even if I’d been made to forget it.”

“I shouldn’t have told you that,” Qala said with a sigh. “Then you’d all think I was brilliant.”

“Methinks ye are brilliant, little princess,” Origenius interjected solemnly.

“Why, thank you,” Qala said, turning to him and dropping into a curtsy.

“Goddess of mischief makes sense to me,” Anecoya agreed. “Since that would also be the goddess of being annoying.”

Qala replied to this by sticking out her tongue.

The Amotlan queen looked dazed by the banter, though Zogrusz had to admit she was handling the events of the last few days with remarkable aplomb, better even than her late father. Cozotl had only had to deal with one cosmic being, not a veritable cavalcade.

“We will need to codify this . . . pantheon,” the queen said slowly, gesturing at the open book on her desk. “Nothing helps spread the word like a sacred text. My father wrote the Book of Zog, and before that we had the Burning Scrolls”—she swallowed as Anecoya coughed pointedly—“so I believe if you truly wish to promulgate a new faith we will need to write down its founding myths.”

“Wonderful!” Qala cried, bouncing up and down in excitement. “Oh, I have all sorts of stories to put in our book! First, we need to set the scene.” She cleared her throat loudly, and when next she spoke her voice was an octave lower. “It was a black and formless void. There was no light, because light hadn’t been made yet. And into this darkness swam a fish. Are you writing this down? I might forget it if I have to repeat myself.”

“Uh, yes, divine child,” the queen murmured, scrabbling amongst the mess on her desk for a quill and a sheet of blank parchment. “I’m ready now.”

As Qala resumed her babbling, Zogrusz wandered across the royal study to where a table had been set in front of an open window. Several more cats were lazing here in the late afternoon sun, including Rhas. The world mind looked as peaceful as Zogrusz had ever seen him, his eyes closed and a satisfied smile on his face as a calico cat licked his head vigorously.

Zogrusz folded his arms across his chest, staring out the window at the fading day. Through Amotla’s forest of minarets he could glimpse patches of dark flesh, the vast corpse of Ycthitlig rising like a mountain on the plains beyond the city walls.

“Do you think another will come?”

Zogrusz glanced at Rhas, who had spoken without opening his eyes. “I don’t know,” he replied. “Are you worried? You don’t look worried.”

“Perhaps I should be, but at this moment I simply want to enjoy our victory.” Rhas’s golden eyes slid open. “It was your victory, Zog. You struck the killing blow.”

Zogrusz shrugged. “We all played a part. And Ycthitlig never would have even come here if it wasn’t for me. The blood of many are on my claws.”

Rhas’s tail flicked back and forth. “Don’t dwell on that. It wasn’t you.”

“It was what I should have been.”

A low rumbling issued from the world mind, which Zogrusz interpreted as vehement disagreement. The cat curled beside Rhas paused in its cleaning and stared at him, as if affronted by the sound.

“I was not lying to you out there on the plains – I remember what you were like when you arrived, before you met my humans. You were never callous and cruel. You came to my world because you wanted companionship, not to consume. Ycthitlig remade you in its image, but that was not what you truly are.”

Zogrusz fell silent, watching as the amber light gilded the city’s white towers. He wanted to tell Rhas how much comfort his words gave him, but he was also certain the world mind could sense the change in his mood.

“Whatever comes next, we will be ready to protect this place,” Zogrusz finally said, running a curving claw through Rhas’s fur. This elicited a pleased purring, and the world mind closed his eyes again in contentment.

The cat who had been cleaning Rhas still looked mildly perturbed, its eyes flicking from Zogrusz to Rhas and back again.

“Rhas old boy,” it suddenly said, causing Zogrusz’s mouth tendrils to go slack with surprise. “Is this the fellow you’ve been telling our secrets?”