Chapter 16

I'm awake.

I'm finally… awake.

Orion had been trying to awaken Calamity, but instead, he had awakened me.

Asher had been the first step in helping me remember who I was, to stir the goddess spirit inside of me and remind me of who I used to be.

While that person was gone, and I would never be the goddess he remembered, maybe now I was better.

Because I was who I was meant to be.

The power of the cosmos flowed through me as constellations glittered all around my glowing form. I'd brought Orion and the twins with me to show them this wonder.

Our bodies remained tangled in Orion's room while our spirits soared.

While I showed them who I really was.

Now that I had pushed Orion's sunlight back into him, Calamity's fragment was like a dying creature. It tried to follow me, needing a host like the parasite it was. Snarling at it, I turned it to stone.

It dropped into the palm of my hand, sparkling like a black diamond.

That'll teach you, I thought, fashioning a gold band around it to choke it, then placed it on my finger.

It was a merciless part of me I had once forgotten, but gods do not do well with threats. I would wear the souls of my enemies and let their failure adorn my body as my trophies.

But I wasn't a god without mercy, and my Virtue reminded me of that as he pressed in close.

"Goddess, forgive me," Orion breathed into my ear. I curled my fingers through his, my hand entirely too small as his larger fingers forced mine to spread. I didn't mind. I liked how my demigod made my body accommodate him whenever we were together.

"Don't ask for forgiveness for guiding me here," I said, my voice an ethereal echo as it rumbled through the darkness.

A different deity had created all that spanned around us, but I held power of Creation inside of me, too.

And there was something else that true gods all shared.

Love.

Endless love.

It was what made our violence so terrifying, because to love with such capacity bore fruit to the true pain that can come from breaking that trust.

But I held only happiness now, because Orion had returned to me. He was asking me for forgiveness, so I could wash away all that had transpired.

A smile burst across my face as the pain vanished, forgotten as if it had never existed.

I showered the scattering of galaxies with new forms, new stars and new clusters to shine and explode with all the emotions I felt inside of me. It was my garnish on someone else's masterpiece. My little addition to a growing cosmos.

All gods liked to add their signature, here and there. It wasn't considered rude.

And I smiled at what I had made. The new stars glittered as they formed a constellation, one that mimicked Orion's freckles.

The angel twins were on either side of us, both heralding the awakening of a goddess who had come home.

I wasn't the omnipresent sort, nor was I all-powerful. My power rested in belief. Fate had chosen me for who I was, not who it could transform to be.

The Champion was never made.

Always chosen.

She always held quiet potential, needing the power of her mates to rise.

I'd never truly known what I was capable of until now.

Laughing, I danced with my three Virtues, delighted to show them this world. Music of my own making threaded into the cosmos, creating beautiful waves of color.

When I spotted darkness that lingered on the horizon, I knew we had to go home.

Because as much as I loved this world, I was not its Creator. Calamity was one of the trifecta who boasted that title.

A title that demanded respect. I doubted that Calamity had created all of this alone, but I recognized its signature in the gaping dark spans between stars. There was an unnatural energy that lived there in the void, ready to swallow up anything that came near it. It made my ring vibrate.

It was angry.

There was a quarrel going on between gods more powerful than me. We'd only wound up caught in the middle, but it didn't mean it had to stay that way.

My job was to stop Calamity from changing every mortal into a supernatural being—to put a halt to chaos before it had a chance to spread.

Maybe I even had other gods on my side, rooting for me. I glanced once more around the cosmos, wondering who might be watching.

Who might be waiting to see who won.

I'd nearly failed, but now that I was awake—truly awake—I knew what I had to do.

We were almost there.

I'd found my Virtues.

Now I just needed to get them all in one place.

"Come on," I said, my voice echoing tiredly across space as I twisted the dark ring around my finger. "Let's get back… We have a job to finish."