Amun shivered but said nothing. He let her continue to speak.

“I performed the correct stances,” she continued, “the correct sigils. But the rites are more than stances and sigils. They are will too. And in my heart I don’t want the Empire’s glory. I don’t want the Maha to flourish. I want everything the Maha and the Emperor love to burn.”

Her rage was undirected, amorphous. She didn’t really want the Empire to suffer. She loved her sister and her father. The Empire was her home. It was hard not to love the Empire, despite herself, hard not to love it because it had raised her, because it was her history and the source of so many of her life’s comforts. But her feelings had no respect for logic and couldn’t be easily dispelled.

“I don’t want what the Maha wants,” Amun said suddenly, his voice raw. “I don’t want to serve.”

“I know, Amun,” Mehr said softly. “I know. But you’re bound. You’ve told me yourself. I’ve felt it. The vows you’ve made are so powerful, so binding, that your desires have no power. Just as mine wouldn’t, if you hadn’t saved me.”

Mehr thought of Amrithi turning their blades on themselves. She thought of Amun’s grief, and his hate for the Maha. She thought of how hard he’d tried to save her, and how hard he still tried to keep her safe.

“What did he do,” she murmured, “to force you to make vows to him?”

“He did nothing to me,” Amun said. But his voice was empty, so empty. She didn’t believe him.

However the Maha had bound Amun—by trickery or by violence—he had tied Amun to him by chains that superseded his will and his heart. Amun, and all the vow-bound Amrithi before him, had bound the Gods in turn, turning all their sweet dreams to the service of the Maha.

But Mehr was not fully bound. Mehr’s will and desires weren’t yet completely superseded by the Maha’s will. And through her—through her fractured will, her imperfect service—the Gods could unleash their suppressed dreams and their hollow rage. Through her, they breathed life into their nightmares and set them free.

She took a deep breath. “The Gods are so furious, Amun. I know we both felt it. They are angry at our heresy, at the Maha. I feel …” Her heart beat like a fist in her chest. “I feel as if their nightmares are a terrible beast waiting to break free.”

“I know,” Amun said. He sounded old, and tired. “Of course the Gods rage. How could they not? But Mehr—the Gods will rage long after we’re gone. New Amrithi will take our place. It won’t end.”