There is a void that holds the world. Some countries, some peoples, some faiths think it resembles water or rivers. But Rao knew better. As a boy, before he’d been fostered to Parijat, he’d been taught by the family priest, in the garden of the nameless that bordered the Aloran royal mahal. Before there was life, there was the void. And in the void—in its lightless unknowability—lay the truth of the nameless god. He gazed into it now. Hung in its black nothing and waited as the voice of the nameless unfurled around him, opening like stars.
