by Rin Chupeco
“Please do.”
His first instructions were to place the passages we’d found within The Ages of Aeon side by side with the one we had found in Brighthenge. I read through the one he singled out, a passage differing significantly from what we’d read at the temple:
Test your worth; offer
to her, Inanna’s immortality.
She will grieve endlessly for the sister
who slumbers in the house of the dead
but her tears will save her sister;
but her tears will save us all.
“This one sounds like it might be referring to a solution. Was Inanna originally immortal, but gave that up after entering the Cruel Kingdom and failing to save her consort? Or something else? And how does one sister ‘grieving’ save us?” Lord Vanya paced the ground, still talking animatedly, his gestures matching his rising excitement. “How can one sister slumber in the house of the dead, but still be saved? And there’s this final stanza:
‘And until the Gates of Death and Life intertwine,
Love continues to be the toll.
And she will pay.
She will pay.’”
“That doesn’t inspire much confidence,” I said.
“I would disagree. Learning what these Gates of Death and Life are and how to control them could possibly nullify the need for sacrifice. To sacrifice one’s love was the final demand of the galla’s rituals, correct?”
“Who told you that?” Odessa gasped.
He grinned. “I’m cleverer than I look, Your Holiness. I’ve read Lady Haidee’s notes, and secrets are difficult to keep in this camp, I’ve found.” His smile disappeared. “My apologies. I didn’t intend to make light of it.”
“None taken. But I’m not sure what the Gates of Death and Life are, myself.”
“Is it a reference to us Catseye?” I asked. “We can both heal and hasten death—though I imagine the answer isn’t as easy as that. Is it Odessa’s ability to bring back some aspect of the dead?”
Lord Vanya looked helpless. “That’s about as much as I can glean from these texts, Lady Lan. We’re already speculating a great deal as it is.”
I scowled. “Then what good is all this, then?” I wanted to be out somewhere, fighting something. Even if it was that accursed shadow-goddess. I felt useless here.
Odessa was also frowning. “Haidee mentioned something about the Gate of Life after we arrived here. It was in one of our ancestors’ journals.”
I glanced down at the rest of the strange poem. It wasn’t much, but Lord Vanya’s analysis was enough to spark hope.
The Cruel Kingdom, I knew now, referred to the underworld where the dead and other strange things lingered. It was where Inanna had descended, in a bid to find her lost love, though she returned to Aeon without him. The mentions of “two, but one” made me think of the fact that there was always a pair of twin goddesses in every generation.
I looked through the rest of Haidee’s notes; none of the other goddesses’ plaques had talked about them crying for their sisters, although the sacrifices had been successful, as far as their Devoted were concerned. Each pair of goddesses had been sequestered in their own little bubbles, growing up without ever knowing their twin.
“Would the mirages have something to do with this, do you think?” Odessa asked softly. “I—I don’t know what they are, really, or if they’re the same as my—”
Shouting rose from outside, interrupting out conversation. “Galla on the dunes!”
I dashed out of the tent to the roar of engines, spotted Haidee, Arjun, and the others heading to us in their rigs. Something was wrong. They all looked panicked.
Sonfei and Lisette were struggling to lift Faraji’s prone, bloodied body out of the jeep, and I was moving before I knew it, by their side as they lowered him to the ground.
One look told me all I needed to know.
“Arjun,” I said, but the boy was already stomping away, unable to even look at his brother’s still form. With a heart-wrenching cry, unable to fully articulate his grief, he spun, aimed his Howler into the distance—where I saw, much to my horror, a new wave of galla arriving, a swarm almost twice the size of the one we’d faced before—and fired. A mass of moving shadows promptly disappeared as the sand around them exploded, and then burned.
“What happened?” Odessa asked, eyes round with fear. “Did the mirages attack?”
“No,” Haidee said, looking drawn. “They tried to help.”
“Their help did not be coming soon enough.” Sonfei all but snarled; angry, fearful.
A mad scramble ensued as others saw the approaching horde and ran for their nearest weapons. “Bring him to our hut,” I told Sonfei, who was now carrying poor Faraji, and drew out my sword.
There was another loud roar; the sound of a Howler firing. I saw a fireburst arc through the air, disappearing from view.
It was a stream of blue fire, and it wasn’t Arjun’s doing.
And then I heard a new voice rising out of the din. It belonged to no one in camp, but I recognized it all the same.
“Fire at will!”
I looked at Odessa, and we knew.
Janella.
Chapter Fifteen
Odessa and Janella
THERE WAS NO TIME TO demand an explanation. No time to question why Janella had appeared at camp with many of Mother’s Devoted, defending us like she’d never betrayed Lan or me before. The horde of galla that had once more appeared over the horizon was closing fast.
The air-shields were already up. We’d learned from the last fight, and now there were small pockets within the barriers for Lisette and the other gunners to position themselves behind, ready to return fire. Janella and her team were outside the barricade, retreating as the galla drew closer. Her Howler retorted again and again, sending wide swathes of azure flames into the thick of the shadow-army. The galla were most susceptible to blue fire, I remembered, but Janella was the only one of Asteria’s people capable of it.
Sharp icicles stabbed their way through some of the fiends, brutally impaling most and freezing the soil for yards around us. This wasn’t Haidee’s doing, judging from the startled look on her face. It wasn’t mine. No one I knew back in Aranth had been strong enough to do this. Nobody but . . .
My gaze swung to one of the fighters at the back of the pack, standing alone. Ice glittered around her, solidified into more spikes that sprung forward and skewered more of the monsters. I nearly stopped breathing.
“Odessa!” Haidee called, and I snapped to attention. More than enough time later. More than enough time to ask Mother what she was doing here.
My hand brushed Haidee’s, our fingers linking. I willed my thoughts somewhere fierier, hotter, and I felt her do the same.
The area around the neutral grounds exploded into flames, creating a fiery moat that prevented the galla from pushing forward. They slowed down long enough for the others to pick them off with more firebursts. Sonfei and the Liangzhu were summoning heavy gales of wind, channeling air patterns above the creatures and bringing them down with enough force and weight to crush them. We kept up the wall of fire, burning our way through as many of the galla as we could, our minds and thoughts so intertwined that it was difficult to remember we had ever been two people instead of the one that we were now.
“Lower the shields to my left,” Haidee shouted, “and bring them inside.”
“But they’re Asteria’s—” Lars, the Gila clan leader, began to protest.
“Asteria’s or not, they’re helping us, and I’m not going to let them die!”
The shields shimmered briefly, and Janella stumbled inside, gasping and smiling widely. “You have my thanks, Your Holinesses,” she purred, then lifted her Howler to send another barrage of shots through, taking out several galla.
“You and I will have a reckoning after this,” I hissed.
“As you wish, Your Holiness.”
Daughter.
I froze. Haidee had reverted t
o using fire patterns like they were glowfire, tossing balls of flames into the densest part of the army. She showed no signs that she had heard it.
Daughter.
From behind the army of shadows a dark figure unfurled and stood.
Daughter, Inanna repeated a third time, the crown on her forehead blazing brightly, socketless eyes burrowing into my soul. There will be no suffering. You are welcomed here.
I knew what she wanted. I could see them lurking by her side—seven galla in total, all shining with sapphires.
She would retreat if I accepted them all, I knew. She’d take the shadow-swarm with her. Retreat to the Great Abyss and stay there until another day came, with another generation of goddesses. Everyone else in camp would be saved from her wrath. Everyone else in Aeon.
Except Lan.
“No!” I screamed into those shadows, into that grotesque form.
Her reply was fierce, unyielding.
The world went dark for a few brief moments, and when I came back to it I was screaming.
I wasn’t alone. Haidee was on the ground as well, her hands clutching at her head, pain stamped across her features. I dimly realized that the connection between us had been severed, ripped away. Had Inanna done this?
Everywhere hurt. Everywhere was agony.
Inanna struck again, and this time I saw her tear through the surface of the air-dome the way a sharp claw might rend cloth. Our protection wavered, right on the verge of disappearing, and with it our chances of surviving.
With a cry, Haidee held out her hands. The dome turned opaque as hardened earth began to clump against it. I knew the risk she was taking—the added terra patterns would make breaching the shield harder, but the added weight could also cause it to collapse quicker. I tried to reach out to my twin again, intent on reestablishing our connection so I could add my strength to hers, but only encountered a wall of white-hot pain that sent me back to the ground. Haidee collapsed too, as the same bolt of agony hit her.
“Your Holiness!” I heard. I lifted my head and saw Slyp bracing himself underneath the dome’s center, eyes flashing green as he continued what Haidee had started, shaping the terra patterns around the dome to stabilize it. Bergen was beside him, his gates flaring just as brightly as he followed the older man’s lead. “Your Holiness,” Slyp panted. “Please find yourself somewhere safer.”
The demoness continued to slam the full force of its strength against the barrier. Slyp grunted as debris rained down on them with every blow.
I could feel Haidee reaching out to me again, and the both of us staggering back when a fresh bout of hurt rose up between us, making our heads spin.
Several more blows sent cracks forming along the dome’s radius. The men grunted, trying to keep it upright, but the demoness was too strong. She tore a hole through the barrier, and the galla were quick to stream through the opening. “Retreat!” I heard Mother Salla roar out, but the order only sent a chill through me. Retreat to where? We were surrounded on all sides.
A series of high-pitched screams rent the air, and the Hellmakers threw themselves on the invaders, shouting and shooting and hacking their way through, buoyed by a sudden ferocity that stunned me. “Protect Their Holinesses!” their leader roared.
Arjun dropped down to one knee, eyes glowing red and his Howler trained on the demoness. Blue flames shot out from his gun again, aimed at the sparkling jewels across Inanna’s brow. They hit their mark, but did little damage. Still racked with grief, he loaded, fired again, loaded, fired again, without pause.
“There’s more here than there were the last time,” Lan hissed.
“Just means we gotta shoot faster.” Arjun focused again, and the incanta he was sending through his Howler flared brighter. Beside him, Janella did the same, her own eyes burning red as she built up the patterns in her own Howler, the gun steaming with blue-wrapped smoke.
They both fired at once, and both aimed true. Blue fire blazed forth and turned the demoness’s lapis lazuli gems into ashes, and the giantess’s form staggered back. I heard a shout from Mother, who had been biding her time, allowing her ice to warp around the demoness; higher, stronger, thicker. And when she finally attacked, it felt like the whole world shuddered in recoil.
Ice enveloped the creature, freezing it where it stood. Janella shouldered her gun, aimed, and fired one last time.
The demoness shattered, dissolved into tiny, frozen crystals.
Low moans spread among the army of shadows, as if they sensed their mistress’s defeat. In another instant, they too were gone. All that remained was the seventh galla, staring back at me with its lapis lazuli clenched in its palm.
“Never,” I snarled at it, and then it was gone.
A faint cheer rose up in camp, though the sounds were muted, exhausted. We weren’t without casualties. I could count at least six dead, and just as many injured. Arjun exchanged a few swift words with Haidee before heading to the tent that housed his brother’s body, not bothering to hide his anguish. Haidee watched him go, her grief obvious too.
The cannibals were hard at work. One of their own lay dead on the ground, and they were busily kicking as much sand as they could over the prone form.
“What are you doing?” Lan snapped at them.
“Burying him,” the leader said matter-of-factly.
“I’m sorry he’s dead, but—”
“No. Not sorry. He died happy, knowing we do not eat him. You feed us. That is why we can bury him and not feed. Do you know how precious, this gift you offer? We understand the respectability of graves now.” He turned to his men. “Honor her!” he shouted.
The Saiga clan roared in unison, groveling on the ground before me despite my protests, despite the tears that threatened to overwhelm me.
One of them had died for us, and they called it an honor. I didn’t want that. I didn’t. . . .
Lan sighed, resigned. “Tell your men to take your comrade’s body and bury him outside of camp, not within it.”
Noelle sank down to the ground, weariness in every gesture. “We can’t do this every day.”
She was right. A vision rose in my mind again; a fresh new swarm, in even greater numbers approaching camp just as the sun began to set. Inanna would never stop sending her hordes until we were completely overwhelmed. I fought hard not to be sick at the thought.
“You can’t,” Janella agreed calmly, setting the butt of her gun against the ground. “It would have been so much easier, Lady Odessa, if you’d given Lan up to the Abyss like I asked.”
Immediately two dozen Howlers were trained at her face, gates flaring and running the gamut of colors. Janella only laughed, adjusting her robes—robes worn by the Devoted, I saw, with the red piping along the hems that marked her as a Firesmoker. It had not taken long for Mother to invite her spy into the Devoted’s official ranks. More fool I, who’d activated her fire-gate in the first place. How could I ever have thought her meek and unassuming? “You cannot fault me for speaking the truth, Your Holiness.”
The other Devoted gathered around her, careful not to make any sudden movements lest the clans open fire. My stomach twisted at the sight of them—Slyp and Filia, Bergen and Jeenia and Holsett, and so many others.
I couldn’t look at them. I had destroyed Aranth. I was the reason they were in this desert, fighting demons.
“Why are you here?” Haidee demanded. “Why did you help us?”
“Because as far as I’m concerned, we share a common enemy—the demoness of the Abyss. Blue-fired Firesmokers are rare enough as it is. Neither of us on our own will be sufficient to withstand her next time, Haidee. But our chances of survival increase if we work together. Ah, there you are, Lan,” she purred, as my Catseye and Noelle drew closer, both looking exhausted. “I’m delighted to see you looking so well. The fresh sun seems to have invigorated you.”
A growl rose from my throat before I could stop myself.
“Did I say something?” Janella asked, looking over at Noelle.
<
br /> “Drop dead,” the steward responded calmly.
Janella chuckled, then transferred her gaze back to me. “Your mother is worried about you, Your Holiness.”
“She was never my mother,” I shot back, ignoring the brief spasm of pain that gave me.
“And you don’t know how sorry I am for that.”
I went numb. Tamera had already shifted targets from Janella to Mother, and most of her clanmates did the same.
Mother looked terrible. She looked older and grayer, lines around her eyes and mouth that hadn’t been there before. Occasionally a faint tremor would seize her shoulders, and her back was bowed. I was stunned. She was almost a different person, far from the cool, self-possessed woman I’d last seen standing in Aranth’s harbor.
There was a gasp from Mother Salla. “Asteria. Your Holiness . . . I never . . .”
A faint smile graced Mother’s face. “Salla. How wonderful to see you again. I am glad to see you looking well. Of all the Devoted you were the kindest to me.” She looked at me. “We have to talk, Odessa. I understand that your friends might not appreciate my presence in their camp. We can return to ours if you’d like.”
“I’m staying right here,” I said.
Slyp and Bergen looked at each other, shuffling their feet nervously. The other Devoted looked just as uncomfortable.
“Your Holiness,” Slyp said guiltily. “Your mother granted us amnesty. She’s right—we cannot be fighting each other. She—at the Great Abyss, she—”
It hurt to look at them. To see that they didn’t blame me for wiping out Aranth.
“Whatever you think about us, Your Holiness,” Janella interrupted, “you must set it aside for the sake of these people who chose to follow you. The shadow-armies grow stronger with every day cycle that passes. Her Holiness Asteria is offering you all sanctuary with her. Together, we will be strong enough to defend from the next attack.”
“Haidee ought to make the final decision,” I said stiffly.
Janella’s smile grew. “You defer to your sister, then?”
She has none of your strength. She has none of your power. You made her, and you could break her. Strike her down before Mother, prove that you are the one true goddess—