The Eternal Ones

The third and final installment of The Gilded Ones trilogy follows Deka, a young woman whose godhood was stripped away by the Gilded Ones, false goddesses who posed as her divine mothers and siphoned her power. In a prior confrontation, Deka's companion Ixa, a shape-shifting blue creature called an ebiki, accidentally severed her connection to her kelai, the divine essence that sustains her godhood. Her body is now failing, covered in golden sores that worsen whenever she uses her abilities, and she has only weeks to live unless she reclaims her kelai.

Deka and her companions hide on the remote island of Gar Nasim, searching for her mother, Umu. White Hands, Deka's former mentor and firmest ally, has sent the rest of their forces south to build an army while Deka's group searches for Umu. Deka's closest friend, Britta, confronts her about her emotional withdrawal, recognizing that Deka is stalling because becoming a god means losing her mortal friends. Deka admits her fear and her pain, and Britta vows not to let her die.

A divine mist attacks the group, beguiling Keita, Deka's beloved, along with Li, Britta's sweetheart, into a trance before pulling everyone into a shadow vale, a hidden realm the gods use to harvest sacrificial victims. In a desolate expanse of red sand, they fight massive eyeless creatures called vale wraiths and rescue young girls left by priests as sacrifices. The Idugu, the male counterpart gods to the Gilded Ones, confirm that consuming even one of Deka's companions would allow them to materialize.

Upon emerging on a jungle cliff, the group is attacked by Melanis. A Firstborn among the alaki, immortal gold-blooded warriors, Melanis serves the Gilded Ones and is empowered by the goddess Etzli. She nearly kills Deka before Myter, a colossal armored figure, intervenes. Myter is a godsworn, a mortal bonded in service to a deity, serving Bala, god of the pathways. Myter reveals that the Unknown Lands south of Otera are actually Maiwuri, a continent with its own pantheon of 80 gods, and Bala transports the rescued children to safety there.

Lamin, a companion Deka trusted for two years, reveals himself as a Maiwurian godsworn sent to watch over her under a divine covenant barring him from disclosing his mission. Deka banishes him. Lamin's aunt, Nenneh Kadeh, a high priestess, escorts the group on horn rays, large aquatic-aerial creatures, to Laba, Maiwuri's floating capital. En route, they encounter Queen Ayo, ruler of the ebiki and Ixa's mother, and a school of ebiki whose reverberating calls heal Deka's wounds, granting her roughly two more weeks. Myter reveals that Ixa is Deka's own godsworn, a living temple for her power, and the first ebiki born in a millennium.

In the underwater Hall of the Gods, Deka meets the Maiwurian pantheon and reunites with Umu, only to learn her mother is a wraith: Her spirit is bound to the temple while her physical body remains in Otera. The gods explain that the Oteran corruption is tearing Kamabai, the world of 12 continents, apart and may cause collapse within months. They beseech Deka to reclaim her kelai, choose death willingly, and be reborn as a god. Umu explains that her body was left near the kelai, so tracking one leads to the other. That evening, Keita vows to remain by Deka's side as her godsworn, and they share an intimate farewell to mortal life.

Queen Ayo presents Deka with armor made from shed ebiki scales, the most durable material in existence, which slows her body's disintegration. In the pathways between realms, Myter teaches Deka the Greater Divinity, a universal energy that can be breathed in and used without depleting one's own reserves. Deka masters creating doors by manipulating space, and her companions train to amplify their gifts.

Returning to Otera, Deka travels to Irfut, the village where she grew up, and finds it devastated by vale sand. The Idugu god Okot appears and reveals he has erased all traces of Umu. He offers Deka amnesty in exchange for revealing her kelai's location, but she refuses and he traps the group in a vale. They fight free and rejoin White Hands near Ilarong, the mountaintop capital of the aviax, intelligent bird-folk. There they reconnect with fellow warriors Adwapa, Katya, Rian, Kweku, Asha, and Acalan.

White Hands convinces the aviax to ally by demonstrating the shadow vale threat inside their throne room. Spies locate Deka's kelai at the summer estate of Keita's massacred family in Gar Fatu. They race there through underground caves, but the Idugu's followers have already removed the kelai. Deka absorbs enough residual energy to track its signature. Keita burns the estate as a funeral pyre for his family.

Using meditation, Deka confirms the kelai is in Oyomo's Eye, the grand palace in Hemaira. Melanis, having infiltrated Ilarong, overhears and warns the Gilded Ones. White Hands assembles a coalition army, and Deka opens a colossal door transporting the entire force to Hemaira. White Hands turns the city walls to ash, but Deka sees what no one else can: both sets of gods looming over the city and shadow vales consuming the populace. She halts the army to prevent a massacre.

Inside the palace, Okot betrays his brothers by clearing the way to the kelai chamber. Anok, the only Oteran goddess who was ever Deka's ally, convinced him that their corrupted pantheons must end. There, Deka discovers Etzli has possessed Umu's corpse as a vessel. Empowered by her sisters' mass feeding through vales across the city, Etzli devastates the group, killing Katya, Rian, Kweku, and Asha in irreversible final deaths. Deka bargains for her surviving friends' freedom, then uses her divine voice, which compels obedience, to force them to leave.

As Deka lies dying, she summons Queen Ayo across the ocean. Ayo crashes through a door and attacks Etzli. White Hands and her ancient sister Sayuri follow, destroying Melanis. Keita retrieves the kelai box and brings it to Deka's side. As her spirit rises, the box opens, releasing her true divine name in a song of a thousand colors. She reaches for it, and the universe slams into her.

Reborn as the Singular, the god she was before descending into mortal form, Deka witnesses cosmic creation and the full scope of the Oteran gods' corruption. Anok and Okot sing themselves willingly out of existence. Deka sings the song of unmaking for the remaining six gods, dispersing them into starlight, closing every shadow vale, and sending the divine armies home. The Greater Divinity Being, the conscious force underlying the universal energy, asks whether she wishes to end the world or remake it.

Deka chooses to share her divinity. She guides Umu's spirit to the Blissful Lands, the peaceful afterlife, where Umu reunites with Deka's father. Deka offers her surviving friends the choice to ascend. Britta and Li choose mortality, wanting marriage and children. Adwapa, Belcalis, a close companion who fought beside Deka throughout, and Acalan also decline. Keita and White Hands choose to ascend, and the three become known as the "Three Divinities." In an epilogue nearly a decade later, Deka and Keita attend Britta and Li's wedding as invisible divine guardians. Belcalis has become empress, Adwapa has reopened the Warthu Bera as a warrior training school, and a girl named Asha, born the year her namesake died, offers the couple a flower, suggesting the cycle of rebirth continues.