Truth

It only took that first time to be crucified for Iollas to falter and decide to answer any question. I had healed him once he had passed out, removing any signs that he had been abused. But that couldn't diminish the scars seared into his soul. He had been forced to face and live his worse nightmare, and it had left him broken.

Those gathered and watching reacted more to the healing than they had when Iollas was being mutilated. They had accepted that event with a stoicism that was expected. I did not judge them for their stoicism. The Sidhe were just as cruel and capable of torture and just as willing to accept even delight as we watched. We were not creatures of good and light, no matter how the Seelie on Talahm had tried to project that image.

It was evident that Alexander's subjects had become accustomed to the depravity of torture, not something I had expected. Not from the retinue that made up Alexander's court. The Alexander of Earth was known for his brilliance in battle his ability to create winning strategies during war. He was not known for acts of barbarism in the historical records from that other Earth. But I had already noted how the timelines had diverged. How different historical figures that shouldn't have existed had found a place in this world.

"Who was behind this?" Alexander demanded, reminding those that had been awed by the healing spell I had cast the purpose of the recent events. "Whatever poison you used, you could not have gotten it without help."

Alexander had passed the point where he needed to be convinced that he had been poisoned. He now wanted to know who else was involved. Iollas was not learned enough to know the properties of the poison he had used.

"Niobe," Iollas answered without hesitation, his voice raw and strained from screaming.

That first round of torture had had a profound effect on the young man. He was unable to control his body's response, cringing every time a sound was made or any movement was noticed. Alexander would kill him, there was no doubt of that, but it would make little difference. Iollas was a caricature of who he had been. A dead man walking.

"Niobe?" Alexander mused. "Where is Niobe?"

The woman that I had noticed earlier. The one of only two that had reacted to Iollas' torture differently than the rest of those watching suddenly found herself isolated as those standing near her pushed and shoved to distance themselves from her location.

Alexander couldn't see her from his position, she was behind and to the left, and he hadn't been healed enough that he had control over his body. But a few of his soldiers took the initiative to capture the woman and force her forward. Her efforts to free herself from their grasp were futile, and the soldiers offered no pity as they threw her flailing body before Alexander to answer his questions.

"I don't recognize you," Alexander said after studying the woman closely. "Who are you, and why are you a part of my court?"

"She is a battle priestess for Ares," Iollas answered for her.

"A priestess for the God of War? Why would he be involved in my assassination? I have done more to honor his precepts, claimed more land, defeated more armies than most men can even dream of."

"Because Caesar wills it," I answered for her. "Caesar, who is a direct descendant of Romulus, the son of Mars, the Roman God of War. And another incarnation of Ares.

"You may be a devoted follower of Ares, but that pales in comparison to a descendant of his, a man with the blood of Gods coursing through his body.

"You have been betrayed by your people because of the vagaries of heredity, Alexander. Your Gods ignore your contributions and bestow their favor and blessing on their children. They have repaid your devotion and deeds with treachery and poison. Ask her if my words are true. See if [Danu's Icon] reacts to her denials or affirms the truth in what I say."

Niobe reacted as soon as I finished speaking. Her pretense at fear and helplessness was gone as she moved to attack. Her strike was empowered with a spark of the Divine, a dagger touched by the fires of Hephaestus, soaked in the blood of battles, and blessed with the providence of [War].

It was an artifact of power, one that had no right to be wielded by a priestess of such little importance or distinction. Unless there was more to Niobe than the Aziza were able to discover, she was a pawn, not worth the cost of such a prize. It was possible they had missed something, not unlikely given that they only had a few days to piece together the plot against Alexander, but I doubted it.

She was simply a tool for Ares. A priestess already in place and devout enough to follow his demands.

Niobe's strike would have succeeded if I didn't control the way reality worked within the glamour I had crafted. I had created illusion and glamour to confound those that might try to attack me. The meadow and all those trapped inside this illusion were constrained by the rules of illusion that I had used when empowering that glamour.

A barrier of force rose instantly, the dagger sparking with Divine intent turned aside. The magic that had been shaped during the daggers construction had made it one of the deadliest weapons humans possessed. It was enchanted to kill, and it would require fierce magic, divine intervention, or Lugh's, the Tuatha de Danann's God of Luck, own luck to survive.

It was meant to kill, to slack the bloodlust that had been tempered into the weapon during its forging. That I had been able to block and divert the killing intent imbued within a Divine relic should have been impossible. And the dagger, although not truly alive, had enough self-identity and purpose to know that it had been obstructed and thwarted. Enough to react.

A burst of Divine power blasted out, a calling and sending to Ares. The dagger had been created never to fail, and because it had, it had released the energy that Ares had gifted as a beacon and a call to the God of War.

That blast of the Divine was a message as well as a summons. Ares might not manifest directly, but he would never ignore a situation where a weapon he had blessed was made useless.

If the release of Divine energies had happened in Nebuchadnezzar's palace, every member of the Greek and Roman Pantheon would have noticed. But we were not in Nebuchadnezzar's palace.

Our location might be the same, but the creation of illusion and glamour had altered reality. The place we stood was dream-made manifest. A place that was ethereal and as ephemeral as any dream or nightmare. The rules that applied were mine to determine, and I refused to allow the Divine explosion to resonate past the walls of illusion I had formed.

Contained and constrained by my will and magic, I reached out a tendril of [Beleros' Fire] to destroy the dagger and melt it into slag. I had to shield everyone from the heat and fire to keep everyone from the same fate as the dagger, a tricky task because I wanted Niobe to survive, and she still held the weapon.

The dagger had been forged in the fires of Hephaestus, given shape and form by the most potent Blacksmith of any Pantheon. But Hephaestus's fires were gathered and tempered from the earth's core. His furnace blazed with fires that raged and were created from the deepest lava.

Beleros was a Sun God.

The fires he controlled were on another level. His Domain contained fire and fury beyond anything that could be found in the fires that burned within Hephaestus's furnace. And the essence of Beleros raged through my body, my blood brimming with the power of my bloodline. And I channeled that power. I focused on that fire. And I concentrated my will into overcoming the Divine spark that had been added to an artifact of war.

Until it was destroyed, and the Divine spark that had been used in the forging was absorbed and made part of my own Demi-Divine Domain—one step further as I grew to embrace my own Godhood.

In the end, I prevailed. The divine kernel that had been shaped and shared made mine. And I stood vindicated. My explanation concerning Iollas' father and family had proven to be true. Iollas had been given assurances that his family would be relocated to a remote province and allowed to live in peace if Alexander died.

He had placed his family over duty and loyalty, and I would use his actions to snare Alexander to my side.