The Rise of the Goddess

92 | A BEACON OF LIGHT

His ship still disabled from cloaking, Urhi-Teshub swerved to avoid the glittering annihilation of a cerulean star. He rolled the ship toward the pillar, hit the reverse thrusters and deprived another star of its quarry. He dropped low and cut a burning trail over the boiling wreckage of Marduk's warship.

It took time for the ship-obliterating weapons to recharge and from what he could tell, there were only three of them. He bit back a sour smile. Only. Strapped into the seat beside his, Sekhmet eyed the symbols calculating when the next charge would be ready.

"You have the count of thirty left," she said, her slim fingers swiping at the restored readings on the screen. "Get in there and get dirty. At ten, it's time to get out. I'll call it."

He nodded, and cut lower until his ship screamed over the glowing shreds of the shield, their heat lapping against the ship, setting off alarms. He ignored them, his gaze fixed on the heave of oncoming Imarians. Bathed in the pure light of the pillar's white brilliance, Sethi's endless army surged out of the inflamed city up the vast tiers to the plaza, its edge bristling with those who remained of the gods' allies—a wall of mortals, thousands deep—determined to stand with the gods against the greatest manifestation of evil, willing to sacrifice their lives, their souls.

Thousands of dark-armored Imarians beetled the tiers, a swarming, seething onslaught of enhanced power and weaponry. The gods tore back and forth in their ships, raining fire, gouging out bloody swathes, pushing them back. Within heartbeats, hundreds more clambered over the fallen, swarmed in to fill the gaps. A relentless tide.

"I imagine this must have been how Ramesses felt at Kadesh," Urhi-Teshub muttered.

"Who?" Sekhmet asked, not taking her eyes from the screen. Another swipe. "Twenty."

"No one," Urhi-Teshub said, and realized he meant it.

From the center of the Imarian front lines, Sethi strode ahead, undaunted by the resilience of the gods and their allies. An aura of victory sheathed him as he gestured out commands. The jihn's blades streamed with blue-white fire, slavering, relishing the slaughter. Its dark coil skirled through Urhi-Teshub, poisoning his mind with the sting of defeat—of the light within the pillar dying forever and the jihn claiming him, his final fall into the darkness rank with the horror of having failed both Istara and Sekhmet.

Sekhmet's shoulders slumped. Misery drenched her profile.

"Ten," she said, dull.

He released a barrage of golden fire against the deeper lines of the Imarians, far enough from their allies to leave them unscathed and threw full power to the thrusters, cutting a sidewise path away from the tier and the hated jihn toward the bulk of the largest pyramid. The weight of its twin bore down on him, heavy, oppressive, ominous.

They peeled away from the pyramid's wedge. Ahead, the pillar rotated, brilliant, beautiful, its core slivered with a delicate thread of obsidian, its darkness a blight against the light. He eyed it, sensing whatever had changed it had been because of Istara. His heart clenched. She was gone. He was certain of it. He rolled to the side of it, readying for the onslaught of the cerulean stars.

"Incoming," Sekhmet said. "Forty degrees incline, ascending at half a degree per tick." She flashed him a dark smile, her spirit restored. "That's the third shot directed at you in the last six fired. They like you."

He shot her a roguish smile, killed the power and they tumbled down, straight toward the gutted, molten ashlars. The cerulean star skimmed over them, its detonation within the pillar blinding.

In its white heat, his eyes found Sekhmet's. "I love you, too."

Her smile tore through him, radiant, devastating. It carved a blazing path through his heart, blistered it to life. He punched the thrusters and the ship screamed up the face of the pillar toward the inverted, dark city, clad in defiance. They could not fall. Not now. Not when they had only just begun.