She couldn't have made her throne anywhere else in her vast, beautiful realm?
Infrared light setting the silver at her ivory neck glittering, I knew to squeeze my eyes shut as a flare of light, pure and white as moonlight on snow, filled the chamber, so literally blinding that even with my eyelids forced shut, I could feel the white-hot brilliance of the godly magic threaten to make me spontaneously combust. When the lustre receded, I opened my eyes and found a human-sized copy of the regal goddess reclining on a crystal throne, water dancing at her fingertips. So carelessly beautiful, when human lives were going to waste for a perfect complexion like hers, for lush hair like hers, for fine clothes like hers.
"No soul would dare harm me, when I command the most vast element. Why would I not give the required respect of my Mother, when she has given me so much?" the Stormbringer smiled, a small, thin smile. "Why be afraid to make myself vulnerable, when the first to hurt me will feel pain for as long as their souls live?"
"And as for your second question…this is my favourite seat of power. The sea is beautiful, yes, but many forget the danger lurking beneath the surface. Why command from the shallowest, meekest part of me, when I am so much more partial to this kingdom of darkness? Where I live amongst my proper subjects, where they can share in the treasures the sea claims?"
Could we have a normal conversation? Like, where you're not reading my mind? I muttered to myself in my head.
"But it's so fun," the Rainsinger simpered, eyes darkening wholly. "I can get such secretive information. Plus, it's so dull here. No one dares to cause a lick of trouble. No one."
Sometimes, no trouble might mean a good and just ruler, or that things were covered up a lot in that particular area. But the way Aquanaya said it, with the sweet venom injected into her purr, made you contemplate what things she would do to you if you stepped one toe out of line.
Her voice was not the playing, daring voice of Auralainei. It was pure power, a reminder that she was the greatest. There was a lot humans didn't know about the gods. Aquanaya certainly wasn't timid or gentle, but she was deadly.
Why was I here? Why did you suck me down into that hole? Why torture me? I wondered. I was so tired of being a plaything to toss over oceans. So, so tired.
"Because, as I said, it's fun, and it's boring here." Her voice suddenly turned serious, her gaze steely. "The gods do everything for a reason. Do not underestimate how much we know regarding the future. Regarding the future of humankind, of the world, not just this one, but many others."
And I supposed she was purposely withholding information. The future was impossible to ascertain, it was subjective to moods and changed its mind many times before deciding on an outcome. I hated that the gods had such a role in our futures. And, it seemed, the futures of a thousand different worlds before and after ours. The thought made me feel queasy; that however twisted and dark this world was, there were many more places where terror was waist-deep, some, where civilisation was buried in evil.
"What if I am?" She frowned.
I was overcome by the desire to voice my thoughts aloud. "Why am I here? Why?" the words spilled like a bucket of water before I could stop them.
"I would not have helped just anyone in your position." She almost growled. "You are aided by Alderhawke, my brother, and Aithnaton. It is for them, the debt I have to them, that I saved you. There is much you must learn, Chandani."
I almost cried. How long had it been since someone had said my name? Even if it wasn't the one I liked? But I took a step back. All the gods were children of Nyoraia, the eternal Mother and life-bringer, but I'd never heard of them being…brother and sister.
"It is a story for another time," the water goddess intervened with a barely noticeable tilt of her lips. "I love my brother dearly, but I can never see him any longer. Nyoraia, Lady of Night, punished his helping me by making him the Earth Elemental, when he wished to stay by my side. And as for Aithnaton…it is not the time to tell of our story. Although when Aithnaton and Alderhawke decided to watch over the same person…brother and lover, forever at odds, the day it happened, I knew there was something about you. But first, since you wished to know…why are you here? Why, I have a task for you, star."
Why did she bring me here? And why did she bring me titbits of truth, but keep away the whole plate?
I hated that she used Father's name for me. It hurt to think of him, to think of what he might be forced to be doing instead of looking for ways to save Mama. I hardly registered the words before that, yet they changed through my consciousness like a pealing bell.
Lover.
"No? Then, should I use…Amita? I see you prefer it—a pretty name. But it doesn't ring with you, don't you think? It does not fit you, what you were born to do. Both of you are more suited to your original names. Your namesake, I mean. She was a warrior, such a bright flame." She mused. "Did you know what Chandani means? Light. Light."
Her lilting voice untied a knot in my stomach.
As I fought the urge to ball my hands into fists, she reprimanded, "Calm down." I could feel my nails digging into my palms, an inch away from shredding skin. An inch away from splitting the gouges already there. Blow me into dust if she wanted. I did not appreciate being singled out, made to do what any goddess desired. I was not born to do anything. I shaped my own future. Why should I do her bidding?
"Bring her in," she ordered.
Her hewn face softened just the slightest. "I did not bring you here. You summoned me," she smiled. "You did, just like the first Chandani. You called for help. I answered your plea."
"Now, do bring her in."
My knees buckled. My recently broken leg shuddered at the icy bite of the crystal, but I didn't care.
Because, as the suddenly deathly reek of the room made me replay all my worst moments, my worst fears, a bony figure was shoved, held back by invisible manacles, in front of me. My mother.
She looked exactly as she had the last time I'd seen her; teeth bared, skin unnaturally pale, eyes black and hollow. Her hair was thinning, with cheekbones that stood out like sore thumbs. I could count the bones in her zombie-like fingers, and a weary, emaciated look shrouded her gaunt face. She turned towards me, and again I felt the force of those depthless eyes that bored into my mind slam into me like a slap to the face. An eternally bored, cruel look danced in the harsh angle of her eyebrows, which framed eyes that did not feel at all.
"Please," I begged.
"When you begged for anyone to save you, my loyal servants came. I listened. I, and not your patrons." Aquanaya's midnight eyes gazed into mine, ravenous and eternal, and I could've sworn a shred of pity, deep and true, like she was deciding what flowers I would like best on my coffin, flickered there. It disappeared as quickly as it had come.
Anything but this.
Dread was a song that rang, shuddering through my bones. Did the goddess, for all her talk of mind-reading, know what sort of scar this would leave where nobody would ever know?
She stared down at me, bemused. "I wasn't going to kill her."
I gasped out a breath, uneasiness stirring in my stomach. "N—no?" My voice was but a whisper, yet it clanged, fear clinging to it, through the empty hall.
"No. But what did you say? That this," she waved a hand vaguely towards Mama's bony figure, "was worse than death? Does she not wish for it? I can hear both of them in there, both the demon using her body and the human spirit." She waved her hand again, studying me with a mixture of anticipation and perhaps the tiniest glint of regret. Another mer-guard swam forward, procuring a thin, razor-sharp blade.
No, I thought. No, no. Why? How could Aquanaya just sit there, tearing my mind apart without a thought?
The guard stepped closer. The sound of every jagged breath he took was amplified by the hard walls. A drum signifying doom.
Another step.
And then, in a fluid, practised movement, he grabbed Mama's shoulder and pressed the knife against her slender neck. One movement, and the leader all of Kaleveh had looked up to, the bright woman my family had treasured, the mother I had loved, would be gone.
"Prove yourself worthy of my assistance." Aquanaya smirked, a feline expression that didn't meet her violet eyes. "She is a danger otherwise. Pass the test, and I'll give you…" she tilted her head at me. "We'll see."
No.
"Pass,"
No.
Aquanaya cackled like she was ready to sit back with a bucket of popcorn. The sympathy, the almost-human emotion was gone.
"Or she dies."
No.
"Figure out how to save the human and kill the demon. Your test. You get as long as you need. And after that, I'll tell you everything you need to know."
How?
Not like this. Nothing but this. Thought-stealer. She was taking my thoughts, bending them to bend me to her will. Taking my thoughts like prizes off a carnival stand.
Aquanaya snapped her fingers. "I'll leave you to it, then."
And in a swirl of water, she was no more.