Contents
Chapter Forty
Overview
Nyxara briefly takes Lore’s body to face Apollius and refuses His demand to be the Sainted Queen. Apollius wavers, letting Bastian surface long enough to urge Lore to act. Lore uses Nyxara’s Fount and Mortem to collapse the Church, orchestrates brief deaths to cast out both gods, and revives herself and Bastian. She realizes these second deaths do not "count" unless permanent, leaving the gods’ fates uncertain.
Summary
Nyxara rises within Lore to meet Apollius, who caresses and coerces, demanding She become the Sainted Queen. Nyxara refuses, and when Apollius moves to strike, Jax’s intervention diverts the blow. The god alternates control, letting Bastian surface long enough to beg Lore to "do it," which she understands as ending Him.
Apollius orders Lore to yield Nyxara’s power and live as His queen. Lore stalls, confronting His fear of death. She consents outwardly, allowing Nyxara to summon the Fount’s water into her mouth as stone creeps up her hands—the cost of relinquishing divinity—while she gathers Mortem.
Instead of giving the drink to Apollius, Lore swallows it herself and yanks Mortem, shattering the Church. As debris falls, she slips out of time to the threshold between life and death, timing both her and Bastian’s brief deaths to sever Nyxara and Apollius.
In the stillness, Lore senses Nyxara’s presence gone and hopes Apollius is banished. She channels Spiritum back into Bastian, then into herself, returning them to life at terrible cost. The awareness of Mortem and Spiritum remains, and outside soldiers and Jax approach the ruins, calling them the Sainted King and Queen.
Lore exults that Bastian lives and seems free, but recalls the gods’ rule: a second death only "counts" if it lasts. Her triumph curdles into anguish as she realizes their reprieve may be temporary and the gods may not be truly ended.
Who Appears
- LoreProtagonist; lets Nyxara surface, refuses Apollius, collapses the Church, briefly kills and revives herself and Bastian to expel the gods.
- ApolliusGod inhabiting Bastian; demands Nyxara’s power and Lore as Queen; briefly loses control; possibly banished but not permanently ended.
- NyxaraBuried Goddess within Lore; refuses Apollius, provides the Fount’s drink; fades after the engineered deaths, fate uncertain.
- BastianMan possessed by Apollius; surfaces to urge Lore to act; dies briefly and is revived, seemingly free.
- JaxPrince and Alie’s betrothed; intervenes to deflect Apollius’s blow and later asserts the Sainted King’s survival.