Chapter 40: The Tide Daughter

Kai gathered everyone in Hale’s dining room the next morning before breakfast, and he made sure they were all seated around the long table before he told them what had happened.

He told them everything the High Priestess had said in the tunnel below the arena. If he couldn’t gain a hundred true believers before the end of the year, he would cease to exist, and so would Syraphim, and every person who had ever believed in him would forget everything he had done for them.

It took him a long time to get through all of it, and twice he had to start over because the words kept getting stuck in his throat. After he was done, no one spoke for a while, and the only sound in the room was Hale’s cook working away in the kitchen.

"So if you fail, I wake up the next morning and I don’t remember you?" Garrick asked.

"Yes," Kai said.

"And my hammer stops shining as well," Garrick said.

"Most likely," Kai said.

Garrick rubbed his chin and thought about it for a moment, and then he shook his head.

"No, I’ll remember you," Garrick said. "I remember everyone who owes me money, and you owe me for three windows and a door."

"That’s not how it works," Kai said.

"Then I’ll figure out a way to make it work," Garrick said, crossing his massive arms over his chest.

[Faith gained. Garrick Holt: +3%. Status: Stubborn.]

Sunny had been sitting silently at the far end of the table, and when he finally spoke, his voice was low but serious.

"She offered to give me Syraphim," Sunny said.

"Yes, she did," Kai said.

"Then you should know that I would have said no," Sunny said. "I told the High Priestess in the Cathedral that I would not accept something that was not given freely. And even if you gave her to me freely, she would not be the one giving herself."

Kai just looked at him, because he never would have thought the Holy Champion would understand that so fast, when it had taken Kai all night and ten minutes of holding a goddess’s hand to come to the same conclusion.

[Faith gained. Follower: Holy Champion. Faith: +6%. Status: Certain.]

[I like him more now]

"You always like him," Kai whispered.

[Yes. But now I like him more]

Mira hadn’t said a single word the entire time. She sat next to Kai with her hands clasped together on the table, and when she finally looked up at him, there was a sad expression on her face that made his chest hurt.

"You were thinking about it," Mira said. "Taking her deal. I saw it on your face in that tunnel."

"I was only thinking about it for a second," Kai said.

"One second is too long," Mira said, and she grabbed Kai’s hand under the table and squeezed it tight. "I was chained up on an auction block, Kai. I will not go back to that, and I will not forget the man who bought me with a bunch of rocks. You will find your hundred, and I will be one of them."

Kai couldn’t say anything, so he just nodded, and Mira kept holding his hand under the table for a long time after that. When the cook finally brought in breakfast, nobody mentioned it.

[Faith gained. Mira Vallen: +6%. Status: Determined.]

[Mira’s faith is now at 82%]

Elowen’s sword stayed dark through the whole conversation, and Princess Seris wrote something down in her notebook before tapping the page with her charcoal.

"How many people in my notebook truly believe in you?" Princess Seris asked. "Ask her. I am sure she is listening."

[Eighteen of them are at 5% or higher. Only Mira is above 80%. I am at 100%, but she should not write me down, because I am not a person in a notebook]

"Eighteen are at five percent or higher," Kai said. "And Mira."

"That is a good start," Princess Seris said, writing it down.

"It’s a slow start," Kai said.

"Then we will have to find the people who need you the most," Princess Seris said. "Not the people who only want to watch you fail."

Before anyone could respond, someone started banging on the front door of Hale’s house, and when the butler opened it, a young woman came running into the hallway, completely drenched in water.

She looked about the same age as Mira, with dark skin and long black hair that had tiny white shells braided into it, and she was wearing a blue dress that clung to her like seaweed. A necklace of pearls hung around her neck, and every single one of them was cracked in half, as if something had struck them all at the exact same moment.

"I am here to see the God of Failure," the young woman said, dripping all over Hale’s floor. "They told me he lives here."

"That’s me," Kai said, standing up from the table so fast that he nearly knocked over his chair. "Why are you wet?"

"I swam here," the young woman said. "They are watching the bridges, and I did not want anyone to see me."

[She is telling the truth. Her heart rate is very high, and she is freezing]

Elowen stood up and walked over to the young woman, and her sword stayed dark the entire time.

"You glow like the ocean," Elowen said. "You are a priestess of the Tide Mother."

"My name is Nerine," the young woman said, and she bowed her head so low that water dripped off the tip of her nose. "I serve at the Shrine of the Deep in the harbor district. Six days ago, the bells of our shrine went silent, and they have not rung since. We need those bells to read the tides for our fishing boats, and we have already lost two boats to the rocks outside the harbor."

"How is that my problem?" Kai asked.

"The night before the bells stopped, three priests from the Radiant Church came to visit us," Nerine said. "They brought gifts and spoke with our elders for hours, and when they left, our elders told us that the Tide Mother was displeased with our city, because we have allowed a false god to roam our streets."

Kai felt his stomach sink, because he knew exactly where this was going.

"Our elders will not support you at the Conclave," Nerine said. "They say the bells will only ring again once the false god is gone."

"Then why are you here?" Mira asked.

By now, Hale’s butler had draped a blanket around Nerine’s shoulders, and Garrick had pushed a cup of hot tea into her hands, but she hadn’t drunk any of it. She just stared at Kai with her hands trembling around the cup, though from the cold or from fear, Kai couldn’t tell.

"Because I do not believe the Tide Mother is angry," Nerine said. "I believe that someone stopped those bells on purpose. I heard about what happened at the arena, how you missed the champion and hit the man who was lying." She paused and took a deep breath, as if she was about to jump off a dock. "I want you to come to our shrine and fail something for me."

Garrick chuckled into his tea so hard that some of it came out of his nose, and Sunny glared at him, while Princess Seris pulled her notebook back out and started writing very quickly.

"I have no idea what I’ll fail at," Kai said.

"I know," Nerine said. "That is why I came to you."

There was a light tapping at the dining room window, and everyone turned to see a white dove perched on the windowsill with a scroll tied to its leg. The scroll was sealed with seven different colors of wax, one beside the other.

[Kai, those are the seals of the seven churches]

Hale untied the scroll and broke each seal open, and his face grew darker with every one he broke. He read it once, and then a second time, before handing it to Kai without a word, which scared Kai more than anything Hale could have said.

By the will of the Seven Churches of Veyrath, the one called the God of Failure is summoned before the Conclave at the Hall of Seven Doors. In nine days, he will be judged as a god or a fraud.

The red seal at the very top of the scroll was stamped with a golden sun, and it had been pressed so hard that it had almost torn through the paper.

[350 days]

Kai rolled the scroll back up and set it down on the table, next to the cold breakfast nobody had touched, and every person in the room was watching him.

"We have nine days," Kai said, looking at Nerine. "I think we should go fix your bells."