“By blood we prove our loyalty,” he said, and he paused to look her in the eye. “And it must be true.”

Mari pulled back her shoulders and lifted her head.

“By blood I offer my faith,” she said. “My blood, and I give it freely.”

His knife sliced across her forearm. Red covered the white. Six feathers, each bathed in a splash of their blood, set into a circle. The paladin bowed his head, and he lifted his arms high.

“The circle is complete.”

A fire burst between them. It burned, soft and small, and hovered an inch above the attic floor. The feathers shifted, each becoming a different color of the Lion’s mane. The fire itself shimmered the spectrum of the rainbow. Mari sensed Endarius’s presence clearer than she ever had before, so near, so close, as if he prowled just out of sight.

“Take our blood,” the paladin said. “Take our prayers. Take our faith. Cradle us in your wings.”

It wasn’t part of the ceremony, but Mari leaned forward, fingers scooping up the feathers. With them in her grasp, so followed the rainbow flame. It hovered before her, casting its cold light across her face. She curled it to her breast as the others protested. The light swirled into her, and she gasped at the sudden influx of emotions. Love and loss, sorrow and rage. She smelled the grass of the highlands. The blood on the feathers flared crimson, and they burned hot between her fingers. All around her, the world darkened as if night had descended in an instant.

“Do you hear me, Endarius?” Mari whispered. “Because I’m ready to listen.”

The darkness enfolded her completely, and a thunderous roar signified the fallen god’s arrival. He towered before Mari, all the world fading away into a dark emptiness that stretched on forever and ever. She bowed her head, offering the divine being the respect he rightfully deserved.

“Ceaseless is your prodding,” Endarius said. His voice was deep as stone and ageless as water. “I come, god-whisperer. What is it you seek?”

The others in attendance had vanished. There was only Mari, the Lion, and the six feathers she clutched to her chest. She looked into the beast’s rainbow eyes. His wings spread wide, and they caught light that shone from nowhere. Red-and-pink waves shimmered across her, and her blood seemed to boil underneath the skin the light touched.

“I would take only what you would give,” Mari said. “I offer you a physical form now that your old body is slain. I offer you a life to replace what you lost.”

“And in return?” Endarius asked.

“Nothing you would not seek for yourself. The death of your enemies. The slaughter of the invaders, and the blood of imperial soldiers on our tongue.”

The rainbow of colors that was Endarius’s feathery mane swirled and shifted.