Hands trembling as they unfolded it, three leaves, a dark berry, and a withered flower, fell from the page. Nightshade.

The same nightshade she'd used in all of the brewed anti-purgatives over the past six days. The same deadly leaves she had boiled—careful to not breathe its toxic steam—into pastes and salves. She had burned away the bulk of poison, diluted the remains, and had used the barest traces in their medicines.

The same nightshade that could kill between heartbeats. Dark cousin of oleander.

Frowning, she twisted the stems in her fingers, turned towards the familiar handwriting.

Antalis stands on a crumbling foundation. Her greedy roots choke away her truth.

Where the goddess once blessed a child each year, a vessel born in her image, true oracles have become an extinct breed. Once, divine-touched girls flocked to this temple to be trained, to serve their patroness. Once, all of the priestesses shared the burden of Antala's spirit.

No longer.

One daughter each year became one daughter each five, each decade. In desperation, the elders hid the lack of tributes behind carefully worded prophecies, behind protective illiteracy and ignorance, behind the recruitment of noble daughters, behind appointed High Priestesses—the last of the goddess-touched.

We are Antala's voice, we said. We can bear the burden while we wait for the next generation of prophetesses.

No more daughters came forth with the gift. Antala left us without her offering.

And so one daughter suffered instead of twenty, instead of ten, instead of three. The heavy burden of the station claimed life after life, daughter after daughter, until only I remained.

Twenty years too long I carried her yoke alone, twenty years of pain and surrender, twenty years without a successor. And in hopeless shame and desperate confidence, I attempted to train stolen girls to share the burden, to preserve the legacy. I, Thais daughter of Nadira, stole unwanted girls from the breasts of their mothers. Daughters of whores, daughters of children, daughters of fools. I raised them on oleander and lies and sent them smilingly into the arms of the goddess.

They did not reemerge. Secretes and skeletons live beneath the bowels of Antalis.

Twenty-six girls sacrificed for the goddess of truth, for her supplicants who spin falsehood and treachery. Twenty-six dead.

I am the last touched by Antala, and so I must be the last true oracle of her city.

To preserve its legacy, it must be destroyed. And I with it.

I have put the pieces in motion. I have made promises that cannot be fulfilled. I have laid the kindling and blown sparks into the embers.

The last true words of Antala, the last words of her true oracle:

Embrace the unknown, Antalis. Embrace the unknown, daughter of Eheia.

She marks the end.

And so I, Thais dao Nadira, last High Priestess, embrace the unknown. I embrace my successor, born of Eheia, bringer of death.

The twenty-seventh daughter soon to join her sisters beneath the mountain.

She re-read each word. Blinked her eyes, mouthed the letters. She told herself her head injury was worse than she'd realized. Her mind was confused, her vision impaired. She argued that the sharp bitterness in her mouth was not the memory of oleander, but the metallic traces of blood left from Tala's blows.

Her heavy pulse drowned out her screaming thoughts.

Thais who had rescued her, who had raised her, who had taught her each ritual. Clever-tongued Thais who promised her secrets and power. Sharp-eyed Thais who had died so swiftly and unexpectedly before Yalira's first New Moon ceremony. Goddess-marked Thais who stole bastard girls to die. Bastard girls like her.

Yalira. Born unknown, born of Eheia, bringer of death.

The words burned into her eyelids, shouted through the buzzing pressure in her head. Echoes of battle, the screams of wounded men. Children called for their mothers, mothers wept for their sons. Newborn squalling, the whispers of death. The cries and suffering echoed. And in it, bitter and bright, oleander. Yalira clapped her hands over her ears, closed her eyes tight, to reject this message, this truth.

The same horrible attack that had plagued her on the hillside.

Then silence.

Breaths. She could only hear her breaths. She opened her eyes, unshielded her ears. She could hear Mathais shift the weight between his feet behind her. She could hear the hum of activity in the main room. She could hear quiet tears from far away.

Those weeks ago, had that been Eheia's influence?

Yalira stood. She twisted the nightshade—the leaves, the stemmed dark berry—in her fingers. They seemed small and withered against her dirty palm. And yet there was a certain weight, a gentle insistence.

Truth and unknown, light and shadow. Goddesses held in eternal balance.

Thais was wrong: she hadn't died under the mountain.

And she had promised one final surrender.

Perhaps she had promised it to the wrong goddess.

Chewing nightshade was as familiar as oleander. Bitterness flooded her senses, stung at her nose. It was also foreign and strange. The sweetness of its berry against her tongue, the heady taste of its pull.

I am yours, Eheia.

She did not wait for an answer. She did not need one.

The darkness that claimed in submission to Antala did not come.

If anything, her vision cleared. The world grew brighter.

Mathais, aglow with the last rays of sunlight, stepped before her. Brow furrowed, he reached for her. But Yalira had become wind. She twisted out of his grasp, as easily as he might have spun in battle. She followed the cadence of her feet. There was no procession, no chanting, no dark crevice into which to climb. And yet, her body knew the way. Each step was homecoming.

Those steps grew surer. Each heartbeat stronger. Yalira vibrated with the glowing victory of it, followed it, embraced it. It was joy and hope and burning gold, and it sang through her blood like wildfire.

The main room, filled with the last moments of the dying, was also full of light. Each priestess burned with it. Even in the steady chorus of healing, their faces shone with compassion and serenity. Despite the aching hold of death, its choking inevitability, Yalira walked within the threads of sunlight, between the volley of shadows that rained around her.

Dimmed, were each of their patients. Each breath seemed to carry away a fraction of the incandescence that glowed beneath their graying skin. Yalira could trace their veins, follow the circuits that returned to their bright, pulsing center. Shadows and smoke circled around them, dark scavengers patient for weakening prey.

Yalira reached out to sweep them away. The sight of her hand gave her pause. Like her priestesses, she glowed in the setting sun. But it was more. She burned. Silver flames lived within her skin, writhing and flickering. Paths of gold, the threads of her blood, stretched beneath coursing light.

"High Priestess?"

The voice interrupted her rapt examination of her hand, the strange beauty of her burning skin.

From far away, her priestesses all watched her with bright eyes bound in questioning, concern. Yalira blinked, shook her head. For a moment the world in its normal shades returned to her, those mortal hues and colors. Though she could still feel death's dark breath against her skin, its circling vapors, vanished.

Moonless night threatened to fall, the air taut and still with daylight's surrender. Clear-headed, Yalira saw the fear, the despair. The dawn would bring the promise of death. She could see the threat of fire and ashes.

Perhaps there was still a path.

Yalira embraced the coursing poison in her veins, the thrall of Eheia, the power of death, and the world re-brightened. She was its sun.

"Do not fear," she breathed. "The goddess is with us."

Sickness and decay, shadowy vultures, retreated as Yalira approached. Her bright touch eased heartbeats, soothed pain. Rest became quiet and gentle.

The darkest corner lay before her still. Trapped in its stubborn grip lay Tala, fighting for each discordant heartbeat. As if her blood had turned to ink, her skin to ash, death shrouded her.

A lithe shadow dripped over Tala as if watching the stunted rise and fall of her chest, as if drinking each golden breath.

"Not yet," Yalira said. "You cannot have her yet."

Without words, without a voice, a question came in reply. A strange humming that sent ripples through the room, that no one seemed to hear. Their murmuring confusion threatened to drown out her understanding. Yalira shushed them. The shadow sang again.

And Yalira understood.

What will you give me?

How many full moons had she cut into her own flesh? How many had accepted the divine exchange? Blood for oaths. Blood for healing. Blood for the life of their newborns. Blood for good harvests. Blood for answers.

Pain. And blood.

For her life.

Considering, the shadow flickered against her steadiness, her rippling light. As if her life had been a series of steps within a twisted labyrinth, this was finally the center. This was her thread and she'd followed it.

Yalira dao Eheia, eyes like night, an instrument of death.

Then I am yours, Yalira.

From the shadowy unknown, a dark blade found her hand. Its cool hilt bit into her palm. Its edge reflected her pulsing light.

Yalira considered her golden veins, their twisted course beneath the long scar on her forearm. Blood for life.

And so she cut. And she bled.

And embraced the unknown.

A/N:

Happy Friday! 

I've been dying to post this for months! I hope the foreshadowing made the reveal(s) as satisfying for you reading as they were for me writing.