The humans ended up being even slower than Zilliad expected. If they only kept their faces forward and their mouths shut, they would have squeezed through the fissure in half the time. Instead, the army of humans chattered more than a flock of birds.

Joeb, Noise, and Sego marched at the head of the humans while Zilliad, Enia, Xle, and Lind were ordered to watch the rear. Zilliad suffered trying to hasten the human's pace, but they lacked all urgency, just as Sego complained. Life spent in Noigrat had groomed these humans to put their motivations into things other than survival.

Zilliad overheard the humans talking of simple pleasures such as temperate weather, and which o their comrades they liked and disliked. The most conversed topic was something the humans referred to as the Noien Collective, referring to Noies's half-breed children. The Noien Collective are ordered by their mother, the deity of love, to breed and mingle with the humans. Apparently, being picked to be a partner of the Noien Collective is an esteemed honor amongst the humans.

Zilliad mused over the simplicity of the humans’ lives but was mostly annoyed by their oblivious nature. While the remainder of the humans were filing into the only way out of Noigrat, Zilliad took one last look at the city she regarded as a paradise. Zilliad caught the deity of music and arts, Enia, staring directly at her. She ignored the attention for now and focused her sight on the emptied city. The once splendid Noigrat represented a hollow shell of itself and made Zilliad feel equally as empty.

“That’s the last of them,” Xle uttered before entering the crack in the mountains.

Zilliad was the last to duck into the crevice, following behind Enia. Zilliad shuffled through the tight space the same way she entered, scraping her wings and chest against the confined, stone walls along the way. Zilliad occasionally would lock eyes with Enia and the deity of music and arts stayed oddly quiet, unwilling to initiate the conversation she clearly wanted to have.

The sheer number of the humans must have kept the Gruk at bay, because by the time Zilliad had reached the other side of the fissure, the army’s advances had not been hindered. Still, the process of getting through the ceilingless tunnel took the better part of two days, and the deities decided it would be best to rest before finishing their march to Kahetic.

Zilliad found herself fraternizing with the humans while the deities discussed the impending voyage across the Enratic Sea. Zilliad was sharing a pot of stew with her mother's people, three male and one female, only distinguishable by the shapes of their bodies and the pitches of their voices.

“You came with Sego and Joeb from Kahetic, did you not?” one of the male humans inquired as he eyed the wings tucked to Zilliad’s back.

“Yes,” Zilliad nodded, causing her pure white hair to bounce along her shoulders.

“You’re one of them, from the Noien Collective, right?” a different male human asked, followed by the sound of licking lips. “No doubt the deities keep the most beautiful ones for themselves.”

“No,” Zilliad said, her gray eyes illuminated by the redness of her face, “I am a half-breed but not of Noies. I am a child of Haboo, deity of the wind.”

All four of the humans around Zilliad gasped.

“You’ve seen battle then?!”

Before Zilliad had a chance to answer, one of the male humans asked, “is it as splendid as the deities say? Humans risking it all for the betterment of Garsuna. Carving a path in the darkness with the inextinguishable flame of freedom!”

“The humans certainly risk it all, but I’m not sure what for exactly.”

“I can’t wait to get out there, show the Makers that Garsuna belongs to them no more! It is time for the age of the deities and of man!”

Why were these humans so eager to join the battle? Zilliad thought to herself. In Zilliad's limited experience, the War of the Makers has only served to decimate the humans. Zilliad began to relive brief, but vivid, flashbacks of the battle with Apena. Their limp bodies of human carcasses being used as projectiles stained Zilliad's mind.

“There is no glory in war,” Zilliad said slowly, “I have seen how the Makers treat human life. What awaits you is only pain and suffering.”

The humans exchanged glances through the slits of their helmets.

“We’re prepared,” one of the male humans suddenly announced. “All our lives we have been preparing. I trust that the deities will lead us true. And if we happen to fall fighting for the deities, we will be born anew in the Kingdom of Kigulbisis, to spend an eternity in bliss.”

The other three humans voiced their approval and Zilliad found herself even more alienated from her mother's people. How were these humans so different from the ones on Glotpon? Zilliad asked herself. As Zilliad was finishing her dinner in silence, she felt the deity of music and arts enter her web of wind.

Enia played a pure white instrument, carved from a creature’s skull and played by blowing into its hallowed nose. The melody Enia produced was a slow, repetitive lullaby. As she neared the fire where Zilliad dined with the humans, Zilliad began to feel drowsy. By the time Enia had come close enough to be illuminated by the fire, the four humans had drifted into a sleep-like trance, remaining erect, but not conscious.

“Zilliad,” Enia momentarily paused her tune, “I am Enia, the deity of music and arts. I have been meaning to speak with you for a while.”

“Is staring at me blankly your way of communicating?” Zilliad retorted.

“Forgive my shyness,” Enia provided a brief bow, “it's just, we’ve all been waiting…”

“What does that mean exactly?” Zilliad was beginning to get fed up with the plotting nature of the deities.

“I’m always listening to the strings of fate as they play their asynchronous melodies, a method deemed illogical by Sego. The deity of time becomes so lost in his hourglass that he thinks he can see all. When truthfully, there is a broader story to be told. Sego simply cannot hear the prophetic poems that fate provides.”

“You speak in tongues."

Enia smiled lightly before rhetorically asking, “is there any other way to speak? The strings of fate play a song that outlines present, future, and past. The strings sing of a daughter of creation and creator. A queen among humans and conqueror of the sky. The strings speak of you, Zilliad.”

Zilliad had heard this message before, except it came from Apena, Maker of the Sky. Having watched her father slain by her own hand before desperately scurrying away from her home of Glotpon, Zilliad didn’t feel that she could be or do much of anything.

“What else is told in the strings?” Zilliad remained skeptical.

“There are many songs that the strings sing, speaking of things that were, things that are, and things that will be. The song of Zilliad tells of a half-breed child, birthed by a dead mother. The child will be raised so fiercely, forced by the conditions of war, that she will eliminate her own father and become conqueror of the skies. She will remove the tyrannical forces that oppress Garsuna, only to be betrayed by the kingdom she creates,” Enia recited before abruptly disappearing into the night and resuming her lullaby.

Zilliad had no intention of replacing Haboo as deity of the wind, she didn’t even want her father dead. Enia’s strange behavior around Zilliad made her feel as if the deity was mistakenly idolizing her and putting a mountain of expectations on her shoulders. It was a while before the daughter of Haboo found sleep as her mind raced of thoughts prophecies and war.

The deities awoke the human army at the rise of the second sun, giving them more time to recover so they could finish their trek to Kahetic. Zilliad marched along the humans and was beginning to prefer their company over the strange, brooding company of the deities.

When the army finally reached Kahetic, they immediately advanced to the shoreline. Floating in the distance were eighteen vessels, anchored and ready to board. Guth and Tete were beginning to load the humans by ferrying them to the ships in row boats. Loading the ships would be another lengthy process, given the vast quantity of humans present. Zilliad began to appreciate her wings and the mobility they granted her.

By the end of the day, the human army was boarded and ready to sail. Without having Isaa’s control of the water or Haboo’s control of the wind, Zilliad was forced to push all of the ships with her winds alone. The process was laborious and due to the excessive area Zilliad had to control; she was barely able to augment their speed.

The deities flew around the ships, maintaining a safe perimeter and keeping a constant look out for the Maker’s creatures. Zilliad stayed on the top deck of the centermost ship, making sure she could keep all of the ships’ sails within her web of wind.

Zilliad observed the humans' behavior across the ships' top decks. Some of them were conversating, some played card games, some fished for food, but most lounged around and absorbed the sun. The humans of Lamia sure are strange, Zilliad thought to herself for the hundredth time.

The second sun had reached high noon when Sego announced, “storm, coming from the north! Pull the ships closer together!”

Zilliad obliged and began to tighten her control over the ships. From this position, the ships were even harder to push as most of their sails couldn’t catch wind. The other deities joined Zilliad on the top deck of the centered vessel.

Zilliad started to feel the fury of the impending storm, like too large of an insect getting caught in her spider’s web of wind, ripping apart her strings of air. Gales began whipping around at alarming speeds and large chunks of ice rained from the clouds.

“Get the humans to the lower decks!” Sego commanded to the other deities, taking Isaa’s place as leader. “Zilliad, you must ensure that the ships stay as one! We cannot risk even one being separated!”

“Right!”

Zilliad entered into the grips of a war with the wind. It was all she could do just to keep the ships from separating. The storm brought torrents of air that flowed so violently, it disrupted the ocean. Waves as tall as thirty feet began to swell, threatening to sink the deities' fleet.

Zilliad struggled with the storm for hours, absorbing its blasts of wind. The storm thrashed the daughter of Haboo like a ragdoll, throwing her from side to side, she couldn't spare even the slightest focus on her stance. As the battle raged on, Zilliad began to grow weak. Driven by a desire to obey her father’s people, Zilliad obstinately fought the storm, but in the end, its fury proved too strong to combat. As she drifted into unconsciousness, Zilliad was tossed over the edge of the ship, into the volatile ocean. The last thing the daughter of Haboo saw was the bottom of the deities' ships getting further and further away as she sank into the depths of the Enratic Sea.