Hearts of Chaos

by Kira Brady

  Corbette grabbed a ripple of Aether and threw it at the family just before the mob hit them. The sparkling water looped around them in an infinite river and deflected the tide of bodies around them. “Kai, help me.”

  Kai took one last look at the goddess bearing down on them and his face creased in anguish. He clamped it down and Changed, Aether rolling over his body like a blanket, dropping away to reveal a giant bird with a twenty-foot wingspan and terrifying hooked beak. He took to the battle and attacked the guards, buying the rebels time. Asgard Turned too, and he met his former subjects in the air. Glittering scales rained down on the square as claws and teeth clashed.

  Pulling the Aether to him, Corbette reveled in the shock of it, the wild abandon that flowed through his veins when he let go of his need to control it. He was a beacon. The Aether flowed to him and down his arm into the Scepter of Death in his hand. Unhooking the spindle, he drew the Aether out between it and the distaff. A crystal thread sprang to life. It shone with the blue fire of the gods, the same brilliant blue that made up the Behemoth. Corbette knew his warriors were no match for the storm demons, but the Behemoth would be.

  Blessed Lady, aid me in my hour of need, he prayed. She wouldn’t have sent him back with no hope of survival. Closing his eyes against the storm rolling overhead, he focused on the feel of Aether pouring through him and the Scepter. Instead of trying to control its wildness like he used to do, he let go of his fear and let the spindle do its work. Have faith, the Spider had told him. Here in the darkest dark there was nothing else to hold him up but his faith, and he found it was more than enough to keep him moving forward. The crackling Aether thread spun out, and he felt the shape of it flow into the body of the Behemoth. The crash of thunderbolts from the storm demons hit the ground around him. The air charged, the smell of singed flesh and earth rising from the square.

  He heard a familiar roar and opened his eyes to see the blue line of the Behemoth pull from between the spindle and distaff. The wood of the dais caught fire beneath its hooves. Corbette held as the flame crept toward him. Detaching from the line of spun Aether, the Behemoth pushed off into the air just as the storm cloud descended on the square, cutting out all light but the blue of the shooting thunderbolts. The Behemoth attacked the storm demons. The irises of the silver-skinned men glowed red. They released an inky black cloud in their wake, just like the squid they resembled. The ink seemed to burn those caught. The Behemoth scattered them, just in time to save the masses from being trapped.

  Tiamat flew over the battlefield screaming. She attacked Asgard in the air, her dragon form half his size but lit up like a Christmas tree with snapping thunderbolts.

  Corbette scrambled back from the burning wood and jumped into the fray.

  Lucia rose from her seat next to the Lady of Death. She walked through the glowing Aether webs and they reformed behind her. On the other side she found the lords and ladies of the dead watching the same grizzly sight she had been. Their animal eyes glistened. She searched the faces. “You all have blood relatives fighting in that square.” Her voice wavered. She cleared her throat. “We are not that different, the living and the dead. We are united by memory, by hope, and by love. Our children and grandchildren are counting on us to leave them a better world. Is this the world you want to be your legacy?” She waved her hand at the battle behind her. The blast of thunderbolts couldn’t drown out the screams. “Is this destruction and terror what you envisioned for your people?”

  The Frog stepped forward, all obsequiousness. His tongue shot out. “But, Lady, what can we do? We’re dead.”

  “The dead are not powerless,” Lucia said. “The Aether that holds together this world is the same Aether that holds together the one you left behind. It’s the same Aether that weaves through your soul and the souls of those fighting Tiamat for their lives. You have wings. There is nothing to stop you from traversing the worlds and flooding the battlefield with your presence. Remember what it is to love someone.”

  “So easy to send us into battle to die in your place,” the Frog said.

  “I’d go myself in an instant if I could!”

  “Nothing is stopping you.”

  “I—” Lucia considered it for a long moment. If she could sing a song of making, what was stopping her from making herself a pair of wings and leading the charge into the Living World? Certainly not permission. She turned to look at the Queen to find She’d turned back into a giant Spider. In Her eyes, Lucia saw every potential outcome: if she stayed, if she went, if she lost, if she won. There were more possibilities than mirrored eyes, but because she had free will, she had the power in her own two hands to seize her destiny.

  Choose well, the Spider called in her mind, thousand tongues clicking.

  Lucia turned back. She felt the old fear of never measuring up give way in the face of the certainty that what she was doing was right. She was the Harbinger. No one could stop her. “Rise up, beloved ones. Join me. We fly in the face of chaos. We fly to victory.” She opened her mouth and song poured out. The notes sounded like the chimes of bells, and as they vibrated in the air, she felt the Crane solidify out of the Aether. It beat its great white wings and settled with the warmth of embers in the chambers of her heart. She pulled the Aether around her and felt her body dissolve. In the last peels of music, her new form burst forth. White feathers of peace, not surrender. Red splash at her temples. She called with her Crane voice and the assembled dancers began to Change too. They rose up into the air, a flock of birds from all corners of the globe, united in common purpose.

  The Universe must be balanced, the Spider said.

  I’ll send you Tiamat in my place, Lucia promised. It’s time she pays the piper.

  Corbette slogged through knee-high carnage. Though the Behemoth fought the storm demons, some had detached to wreak havoc on the rebel troops. Human warriors worked on getting the civilians out of the thick of battle while Kivati and Drekar loyal to the rebels attacked Tiamat’s soldiers. In the sky, storm demons battled Thunderbirds while opposing Drekar forces chased each other through clouds brimming with lightning. Rain hammered down, turning the garden paths to rivers of mud.

  Without a miracle, they would lose.

  Corbette drew the Aether through the Scepter and shot it at Tiamat. The dragon screamed, opened her jaws, and breathed a long burst of fire across the ground. Corbette had to dive out of its path. The Scepter gave his Aether powers enough of a boost to fight her, but she still had the upper hand. He needed to ram the pointed distaff through her heart and squeeze as much Aether as he could through her body. If she didn’t land, he wouldn’t get the chance. Every blast seemed to piss her off, and her Drekar blood healed almost as quickly as he could shoot.

  He needed help. Kai, he sent through the Aether, gather the aerials. To Tiamat!

  Thunderbird, Eagle, Owl, and Crow extracted themselves from other parts of the battle and swooped through the air toward the goddess. They converged on her, ignoring the fire of her Drekar and the stinging black clouds of the storm demons. She screamed and tossed Thunderbolts in all directions. Feathers singed and fell. Avian bodies sizzled and dropped like stones. More replaced them. Kai launched himself across Tiamat’s muzzle and dug in his talons. Blinded, she couldn’t stay aloft. The ball of scales and feathers and fangs hurdled toward the ground.

  Corbette sprinted to them. He had to get to Tiamat before she recovered. With a roar, she threw Kai off. He crumpled to the ground with half a wing torn off. Tiamat Turned. The brilliant blast of Aether blinded the battlefield, and in the brief moment of peace, Corbette heard the rush of thousands of wings.

  Tiamat stood in Zetian’s skin, naked but for the Tablet of Destiny hanging around her neck. She glowed in the heat of the fires. Her black hair crackled back from her face. Her smooth skin showed not a scratch. Her eyes were wild, irises slit. “Face me, you miserable coward!” she screamed. “You think you can best me with my sister’s toys? You are nothing! Marduk and an army of gods couldn�
�t cage me forever. I will crush you and every member of your miserable race!”

  “Including the child in your womb?” Corbette asked.

  Her gaze locked on him. She covered her belly with a hand. Her lips drew back from her teeth. “My new pantheon will be unstoppable. Double souls with the fire of the gods at their fingertips.” She sauntered toward him, ignoring the blood creeping to her knees. “We will rule as we were meant to—the earth will cower before my children and the humans will serve us. Chaos will reign. That could have been you, Raven, but you were too much my sister’s lackey to see it. If you had vision, you might have owned this land. But you failed. Compassion makes you weak.”

  He’d let her draw too close. He raised the Scepter and pulled the Aether to it, but she tossed a thunderbolt at him, and he had to dive out of the way. The blue fire seared his left arm. A moment of oh, shit, and then the pain shot through his body. His fingers fell open, and he dropped the spindle.

  Tiamat dove for it. They collided. Her body was smaller, but she held the unnatural strength of a goddess. Her round belly pressed between them. He tried to use her unwieldy balance against her. She clawed across his injured arm, sending pain shooting up his nerves. Biting his lip, he locked his arm around her to prevent her from reaching the spindle. He still held the distaff between them—if he shifted he could jab it into her belly, but he hesitated.

  Turning one hand, she dug her claws into his back. He shut his eyes against the pain. Her breath was hot on his ear as she whispered, “Mercy makes you weak.” She yanked her claws across his shoulder blade, tearing muscle, and it felt like fire ran beneath his skin. His left arm fell limply to his side. Pain rushed to his head, and he almost blacked out. With a laugh, she pulled away and straddled him. She kicked the spindle out of reach. He pulled Aether to knock her back, but he needed both parts of the Scepter to magnify the force. She sucked in his blast and molded it into a ball of condensed Aether. He watched the blue light flare between her hands, spinning out in a shimmering orb. So beautiful, the light of a galaxy within. She raised the ball, prepared to crash it down on his head.

  Could the distaff alone deal Tiamat her final death? Wrestling it one-handed from between their bodies, he prepared to try.

  Kai lay half in the mud, one wing mostly gone, life leeching out of him as thunder shook the sky. He wondered if it would hurt this much once he passed through the Gate. He was vaguely aware of Tiamat screeching somewhere nearby.

  I’ve failed, he thought. He liked life. Liked fighting and fucking and drinking craft beer. The things he’d miss in the Land of the Dead . . . well, it didn’t matter anymore. He was dying, and Tiamat still lived. It turned out, though he would deny it to his last breath, now that it came to the end, he was a bit afraid.

  “Kai.”

  Someone tall leaned over him, talking to him, sounding urgent. Someone with a short crew cut and a hawkish nose. It wasn’t possible.

  “Kai. Get up.”

  “You bastard.” Kai coughed and blood filled his mouth.

  “Our parents were married, brother.”

  Kai managed to sit up. His vision wavered as pain engulfed him. Blackness threatened, but he shoved it down. The blood and the pain were everywhere, woven in his skin, injected into the marrow of his bones, flowing freely down his back. Every breath produced a sickening gurgle. “Jace?”

  His brother’s form seemed faint around the edges, but his hand was as firm as Kai remembered it as Jace helped him out of the mud. Kai stood, and everything he’d saved up over the last year to tell his brother tumbled out of his head now that he finally had his chance. All he could say was, “I missed you.”

  “I’m not here to collect you. Not yet.” Jace smiled and pulled him in for a hug. Kai felt tears that had nothing to do with his injuries collect on his cheeks.

  “Gods, I missed you,” he said again.

  “I never really left,” Jace said. “There is no death, only a change of worlds.”

  Kai pulled back. The sounds of battle still reverberated in the air around them. If Jace was here, that meant his work wasn’t finished. “Tiamat?”

  “We’ll do this together, just like we used to do. The world still has need of the Raiden brothers.” Jace clasped his forearm, and Kai felt Aether flow into his body, strengthening him, healing some of the worst of his injuries.

  “I’ve got something to tell you, bro. Zetian is pregnant with my kid.”

  Jace just nodded. No condemnation like Kai had feared. No disappointment that he had knocked up a goddess and one of their sworn enemies. “You saved a lot of lives. I’m proud of you.”

  Kai swallowed.

  “This job is a ball buster,” Jace said, “but if Tiamat succeeds in taking down the Gates to rule both worlds, there won’t be any place left sacred. The Raven Lord needs our help.”

  Kai turned to see Tiamat standing over Corbette with a blazing ball of Aether over him. “Let’s do this thing.” He steeled himself. Jace stepped into him, becoming one, and his spirit infused Kai with the strength of his love. Kai had to take another breath. He felt like he could move mountains. “Zetian and the baby?” he asked.

  Trust your gut, his brother’s spirit whispered in his head.

  Corbette watched the blue fire ball shimmer over his head and struggled, helplessly, to move from beneath Tiamat, but she had him fast. A second before she could release the ball, he heard someone shout, and Kai came bursting out of nowhere. Kai tackled Tiamat around the waist and knocked her off Corbette just in time. The ball of Aether broke apart, and both Tiamat and Kai went up in flames. He could hear Kai screaming as the residual energy burned the skin from his body.

  Freed, Corbette steeled himself against the nauseating smell of burnt flesh and prepared to move. Every inch of his body hurt, but so much adrenaline rocked his core that he could power past the pain. With a last, desperate burst of energy, he lunged for the spindle with his uninjured arm.

  “Ah, ah, ah!” Tiamat said as she emerged unscathed from the fire and jumped nimbly from the ground. She crushed Corbette’s hand with her foot, and threw the burning Kai a pitying glance. “Such a waste. He could have enjoyed immeasurable power at my side, but he was always loyal to you,” she spat. “What magic is this that men would die for you, Raven? Can’t they see how weak you are? So much potential, yet you squander it. You will never measure up.”

  “And yet, you’re jealous,” Corbette growled. Her face reddened and her nostrils flared. He’d hit the nail on the head. Blood and sweat dripped across his vision. He strained his crushed fingers and brushed the spindle. “Why is that, Tiamat? Power of the gods, and yet you envy poor, weak mortals like us.” She ground her foot into his hand. Corbette grit his teeth as a spasm shook half his body.

  “I have everything I want, worm. My children love me—”

  “Your children fear you. Not the same thing at all.” He tried to pull another blast of Aether, but she only laughed as she soaked it up like a living sponge. Every burst made her grow stronger. A blue light flared around her head until her slit irises reflected it. He was going to lose. She was going to kill him. Would she leave anything left of his soul to journey back to the Land of the Dead?

  Lucia, forgive me, he thought.

  The Crane swooped through the smoke hole of the Palace of the Dead and into the Land of the Living with a host of spectral birds at her tail. They flew in from the west, over the storm-tossed waters of Puget Sound, straight to the heart of the new Babylon Hanging Gardens. The battle raged across the unnatural oasis, brother against brother, Tiamat’s loyal against those who fought for freedom. The centuries of bloodshed of the Kivati-Drekar war were a distant memory; now Drekar, Kivati, and human fought side by side against the forces of Chaos. She’s unified them, Lucia thought.

  Storm demons chased the Behemoth across the black skies. Thunderbolts rained down, fire of heaven to purge the battlefield of souls. The trees and hanging baskets burned merrily. Smoke clouded the air and screams rang
from the distant mountains.

  Lucia followed the currents of Aether to the center of the square. Against a backdrop of flame, Tiamat stood over a prostrate Corbette. Aether wreathed her head. The Scepter lay in two parts at her feet. Nearby, a burned man rolled on the ground. Lucia stretched her neck to the sky, opened her beak and gave the long bugle call of the Crane. The birds at her back took up the call. Together they rushed Tiamat just as the Aether at her head condensed into a ball of fire.

  Her first thought was, This is going to hurt, but it was her old conditioning. The ball was Aether and she was Aether and the threads that held the universe together were Aether. They were the same—connected. Instead of bracing for impact, she welcomed the condensed energy and absorbed it, letting the shock of it reverberate through her wings and out into the current of Aether she rode. It dispersed on the waves of shimmering water.

  Tiamat didn’t have time to retaliate as the flock of souls poured through her chest, knocking her back. She fell. Birds flew out her back and looped in the air to pour through her again. Her body shook with the impact of hundreds of ghosts. Their effort immobilized her.

  Lucia landed next to the spindle and let the Aether flow through her to Change her from Crane to woman. Bending, she picked up the spindle and turned it over between her fingers. She could feel the way it had been made. The Aether was pulled through the carvings on its surface much like the runes on Grace’s knife.