Amber and Iron - Margaret Weis [60]
She was in an immense chamber. One hundred paces would not have carried her halfway across it. The ceiling on which she was afraid she might hit her head was so far above her that she could barely see it.
And, all around her, were the gods.
Each god had an alcove carved out of the wall, and in each alcove was an altar. Artifacts, sacred to each god, stood on the altar or on the floor before the altar.
Some of the artifacts shone with a radiant light. Some flickered, some glimmered. Some of the artifacts were dark, and some seemed to suck the light from the others.
Mina fell, trembling, to her knees.
The holy power of the gods seemed to crush her.
“Gods forgive me!” she whispered. “What have I done? What have I done?”
uitari arrived back at his Tower to find it under siege. His sister, Zeboim, goddess of the Deep, was apparently intent upon shaking it to bits.
Although they were siblings, born to Takhisis and her consort, the god of Vengeance, Sargonnas, Nuitari and Zeboim were as different as foaming waves and black moonlight. Zeboim had inherited her mother’s volatile nature and fierce ambition but lacked her mother’s discipline. Nuitari, by contrast, was born with his mother’s cold and calculating cunning, tempered by his passion for magic. Zeboim was close to their father, Sargonnas, and often worked with him to further the cause of his beloved minotaurs, who were among the sea goddess’s chief worshippers. Nuitari despised their father and made no secret of it. He didn’t think much of minotaurs either, one reason there were few minotaur mages.
Nuitari had known his sister was going to be upset over the fact he’d raised up the old Tower of High Sorcery in her sea without first seeking her permission. Knowing her, he knew she was capable of refusing him out of sheer caprice. Also fearing this would put ideas into her head, Nuitari had felt it was wiser to build his Tower first and ask his sister’s pardon later.
He was attempting to do just that, but Zeboim refused to listen.
“I swear to you, Brother,” Zeboim fumed, “not one of your Black Robes will dare set foot on water or face my wrath! If a wizard should try to take a hot bath, I will push him under! Any ship that transports a wizard will capsize. Rafts carrying wizards across rivers will sink. If a wizard puts his toe in a stream, I will swell it to a raging river. A wizard who so much as drinks a glass of water will choke on it—”
She continued like this, ranting and raging and stamping her feet. With every stamp, the ocean floor trembled. Her fury rocked the Tower on its foundations. Nuitari could only guess at the havoc the tremors were wreaking inside. He’d lost contact with his two wizards, and that worried him.
“I am sorry, dear sister, if I have upset you,” he said contritely. “Truly, it was unintentional.”
“Raising up this Tower without my knowledge was unintentional?” Zeboim howled.
“I thought you knew!” Nuitari protested, all innocence. “I thought you knew everything that went on in your ocean! If you didn’t, if this comes as such a surprise to you, is it my fault?”
Seething, Zeboim glared at him. She flopped and floundered but could see no way out of the net that had so neatly trapped her. If she claimed she had known he was building the Tower, then why hadn’t she stopped him if it so offended her? To admit she hadn’t known was to admit she didn’t know what was happening in her own realm.
“I have been preoccupied with other, more important matters,” she said loftily. “But now that I know, you must make reparations.”
“What do you want?” Nuitari asked smoothly. “I will be only too happy to accede to your demands, dear sister. Provided they are reasonable, of course.”
He assumed that she’d found out not only about the Tower but also about the Hall of Sacrilege. He figured she would ask for her holy artifacts to be returned to her in exchange for her permission to keep his Tower. Nuitari was prepared to hand over one artifact or maybe even two, if she persisted in her threats against his wizards. Her response was completely unexpected.