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thirst after deflowering some helpless innocent?”
    When she stared at him in silence, he added, “I may be of my father’s blood, but I am not of my father’s tastes!”
    “Lord Léi Shēng makes a ha bit of raping young women?”
    “Girls, actually. He recently deflowered a nine year old for my entertainment, and tied me up so that I could not yell or intervene.” Amihan’s face darkened. “ That is why we left Thessalonica.”
    Krystállina dropped the tinderbox in her surprise. “Can’t He be reported to someone?”
    “To whom? My father killed the High King of the Gods five hundred and twenty years before we were born—the others fear him!”
    She collapsed into her chair. “And there is no way to kill a god?”
    “There is, but it is one of the utmost secrets of the universe.” Amihan’s voice grew grave as he, too, sat down. “It is a secret granted only to the Elders, though some of the other gods stumble across it from time to time. Most use it to take their own lives, but some have used it to dispatch their enemies. All who successfully complete the invocation are hunted down and executed.”
    “Have…have any humans ever discovered the secret?”
    “Many times since the beginning of the world. They, too, are executed; regardless of whether they are successful.” He closed his eyes. “Though since my father crowned himself High King, I imagine the punishments have become much grimmer.”
    They sat in silence for quite a while, before Amihan rose and picked up the fallen tinderbox.
    “Go find something for supper. I will see to the fire.”
     
     
    ~*~
     
     
    “What if I loved You?”
    Krystállina, already stripped down to her nightrail, slipped into Amihan’s room and threw her arms around his newly bared shoulders.
    “What is this, ‘What if’?” He broke from her embrace and turned to face her. “Since when is there uncertainty in love?”
    “Do You still love me?”
    “I love you with every passing day.”
    “Then why do You never tell me? Why do You never come to my bed? Why—”
    “Have I not asked you to marry me?” he finished. “Krystállina, do you realize that we have only just escaped Thessalonica?”
    “I said I’d give You a month to dec ide whether You truly loved me.
    “And we were interrupted, remember? I was hardly with you two weeks before I received the letter from my father.
    “Besides, what would your father have said if he had caught us sneaking around? We could not have had a hint of impropriety!”
    “We are away from my father.”
    “Scarcely a month!”
    Krystállina bit her lip and looked away. “I was heartbroken when I thought You’d l eft me for Princess Aĺakána,” she admitted. “I was never in love with Milos; I was just willing to marry him because it would benefit our families.”
    “I love you, Krystállina Óneira,” the Thunder God said at last. “Is that what you were waiting for?”
    After a moment, she turned back to him. There was a tear rolling down her cheek.
    “I don’t know what it means to love a God.”
    “We will handfast quietly, as I told you on that first day,” he explained. “None of the Milanese may know. As for me, I will contrive some way to hide this from my father and the other Elders.”
    “And our children?”
    “Our children will be demigods like Hercules and the heroes of old.” Amihan took her hands. “They will probably inherit some of my powers and live good, long lives. Shorter than mine, but definitely…definitely longer than a mortal. A hundred and twenty years. Perhaps a hundred and fifty.”
    “What about me?”
    He squeezed her hands. “There is nothing I can do for you, my love. I am sorry.”
    Krystállina looked away again, but Amihan continued.
    “If there is a secret to extend your life, it is probably on a crumbling scroll, locked tightly away in the most secret regions of Wài. Some place, no doubt, that I dare not go, if I value my title and my life.”
    The young woman