Page 171 of Sunsplitter

“Is it?”

The daeyari stepped out from the shadows at the base of the statue. The interloper approached on unhurried strides. Antal raised his hackles. A swift threat assessment—four against one. Easy odds, even facing unfamiliar teeth.

But then, Antal watched Ixli’s ferocity snuff out. Replaced by shock.

He watched stunned silence settle over Syvr.

His claws fell lax, eyes widening on Void-black robes that seemed to wisp at the edges. Ten-pointed antlers heavy with carvings. A scent like the deepest chill of the Void, skin the cool gray of late dusk, every ridge of his face time-hollowed.

Antal would have recognized him, even without the statue overhead.

Any daeyari would have.

Time seemed to still as the immortal paused before them. Grass-sweet wind brushed the platform, tussling the plait between his antlers. His eyes were carnelian. Old. Antal had seen old eyes before, but these wereancient. He’d heard every story. Every hushed and hallowed myth.

But never in Antal’s immortal life had he envisioned standing before Veshri himself.

Ixli moved first, a claw touched to her highest antler tip, head bowed. The only thing to do. Antal followed, then Syvr, paying reverence to the creator of their kind, his mere presence the honor of a lifetime.

“Fi,” Ixli hissed.

Before the first immortal, three daeyari bowed their heads—while one human stood up straight. It was she who drew Veshri’s slitted gaze. She who made his head take on a slow tilt.

Fionamara raised a hand… andwaved.

“Hello,” she said. “Again?”

No one liked awkward silences.

There were the normal kinds of awkward silences, like when you ran out of things to say at a dinner party, or bumping into someone unpleasant to talk to.

Then there was this kind of awkward silence. A profound silence. Verging on cataclysmic, considering all the daeyari staring at Fi.

One of them happened to be… the daeyari insisted,nota god. Though they talked about him like a god. Some confusing demigod-esque situation.

But it was him. The daeyari she’d met in the Void a year ago, now standing before her, an honest-to-goodness statueof himself shading the valley.

Veshri.The first immortal daeyari, Fi could hear in Antal’s hush.

She hadn’t hallucinated him. She hadn’t made it all up… probably?

“Again?” Ixli whispered.

Syvr’s eyes were prying slits. “Where did she learn to Voidwalk?Antaldidn’t teach her.”

“I could Voidwalk if I wanted to,” Antal hissed back, indignant.

Syvr cast an impressively dry look, for the circumstances.

“What are you insinuating?” Ixli said. “There’s no way she’s met…”

“Ok. Well. If you must know,” Fi said in as harsh a hiss as the others. “I met him once before. He taught me to Voidwalk. No big deal.”

It was kind of a big fucking deal, the way they gawked at her.

Veshri waited, watching as three daeyari and a human whispered not very discretely in front of him. He blinked. Otherwise, his expression was identical to the stone behind him.

Syvr—Void bless them—stepped forward as emissary. They donned a diplomat’s tone, a deep bow at the waist.