The storm that heralded the death of Torvaan, God of Thunder, lasted fourteen days and shattered mountains across two continents. Lightning struck the same hilltop in Kaelmark nine thousand times, fusing the rock into a tower of black glass that hummed with residual energy long after the clouds dispersed. Seren Ashwood felt every strike as a needle driven into the base of her skull, because Torvaan was her grandfather. Not metaphorically. Her mother had been the product of a union between the god and a mortal woman during one of his descents, a tradition the old gods practiced when they grew lonely in their celestial halls. Seren had inherited her grandfather's affinity for storms but little else. She could not summon lightning or command the wind. She could only sense the weather with an intimacy that made her an exceptional sailor and a mediocre prophet. Now she stood on the dock of her fishing village and watched the horizon crack with one final bolt that illuminated the entire sky in violet before fading to permanent darkness in the east. Torvaan was gone. The sky where his domain had been was simply empty, a void where stars should have been but were not. 'The other gods are frightened,' said a voice behind her. She turned to find a stranger wrapped in a cloak the color of deep water. His eyes were silver, without pupils, and they reflected no light. 'My name is Cael. My grandmother was Mireth, Goddess of the Sea. She sent me to find you because you are the closest living descendant of Torvaan, and the gods have called a council for the first time in three thousand years.' 'Why?' 'Because Torvaan is not the first to die. He is the third. And the gods believe they know what is killing them.' Seren looked at the empty patch of sky where her grandfather's storms had lived for millennia. 'Tell me everything,' she said.