Briony belched. She had eaten too fast.

The goddess frowned. “Charming. Now, where was I? Ah, the beginning. No, I could not hope to correct all you do not know, child, and to be honest, I do not remember all the nonsense that Perin and his brothers declared their priests must teach. Here is all you need to know about the oldest days. Zo, the Sun, took as his wife Sva, the Void. They had four children, and the eldest, Rud the Day Sky, was killed in the battle against the demons of the Old Darkness. Everyone knows these things—even mortals. Sveros, who we called Twilight, took to wife his niece Madi Onyena, Rud’s widow, and she bore him Zmeos Whitefire and Khors Moonlord. Then Sveros Twilight was lured away from her by Madi Onyena’s twin sister Surazem, who had been born from the same golden egg. Surazem bore him Perin, Erivor, and Kernios, the three brothers, and from these five sons of Twilight—and some sisters and half sisters, of course, but who talks of them?—sprang the great gods and their eternal rivalries. All this you must know already, yes?”

Briony did her best to sit up straight and look as though she were not falling asleep. “More or less…”

“And you have to know that Perin and his brothers turned against their father Sveros and cast him out of the world into the between-spaces. But the three brothers did not then become the rulers of the gods, as your people teach. Whitefire, the one you call Zmeos, was the oldest of Sveros’ chilren, and felt he should have pride of place.”

“Zmeos the Horned One?” Briony shuddered, and not just from her still-damp clothing. All her childhood she had been told of the Old Serpent, who waited to steal away children who were wicked or told lies, to drag them off to his fiery cave.

“So Perin’s priests call him, yes.” Lisiya pursed her lips. “I never had priests myself. I do not like them, to be honest. In the days when people still sacrificed to me I was happy enough with a honeycomb or an armful of flowers. All that bleeding red meat…! Animal flesh to feed priests, not a goddess. And I would not have been caught dead in their stone temples, in any case. Well, except for once, but that is not a story for tonight…” The old woman’s eyes narrowed. “You are falling asleep, child,” she said sternly. “I begin to tell you the true tale of the gods and you cannot even keep your eyes open.”

“I’m sorry,” Briony murmured. “It’s just been…so long since…”

“Sleep, then,” said Lisiya. “I waited a day for you—and years since my last supplicant. I can wait a few more hours.”

“Thank you.” Briony stretched out, her arm beneath her head. “Thank you…my lady…”

She did not even hear if the goddess said anything, because within moments sleep reached up and seized her as the ocean takes a shipwrecked sailor grown too weary to swim.