Another shake rumbled beneath our feet, but the approaching figure did not stumble. I placed myself between the door and Khalim. We waited, hardly daring to breathe, as the footsteps echoing in the darkened corridor came nearer and nearer. Beyond the arena’s walls, weapons clashed and barricades were shattered as Reva’s miners confronted the city’s soldiers. I prayed to whatever god might be listening that they would be safe, and keep the Ascendeds’ forces from our backs.
I stood between Jin and Jahan, and each had his sword at the ready. The air hummed and shimmered between their blades. I could almost hear the magic contained within. I felt a lingering fear in the knowledge of the power of these weapons, as much as I was grateful for their presence. If one could kill a god, what would it do to me, should I find myself on the wrong end of it?
The figure stepped into the half-light of the colosseum. I recognized him, from the tournament and from the tower statue beside one of the thrones in the temple. This was Malang, the war god. He was not as large as his effigy, though he stood taller than I, broad-shouldered and strong-jawed. His breastplate and mail skirt glittered with a fiendish light, as though they reflected the fires beyond the walls, and though his steps lifted soft wisps of dust from the sand, his sandals were spotlessly clean. He carried no weapons. His hair was golden filaments, his skin like bronze, and his eyes like cut topaz. He was as beautiful as ever a warrior could be on the eve of battle, and he was far from human.
“So,” he said, and his voice was sharp and cold as the point of a spear. “You are the ones who have been interfering with our work.”
Jahan’s grip on the sword tightened, his knuckles turning white. “Your work is an abomination. You bring about the doom of this city.”
Malang’s stony eyes fell on Jahan, and on the weapon he carried. He hesitated, briefly, before dismissing the group of us with a shake of his head. “I am a god.”
“If that were true,” I said, “you wouldn’t need assassins. If that were true, you could have controlled this worm. If that were true, you wouldn’t need the blood of innocent people to perform your magics. You are just a man who has lived too long.”
“So be it,” Malang growled.
He strode forward. With each step he grew taller, until he was the size of the statue that had towered above us in the temple. A broad, double-edged sword appeared in one hand, and a great round shield in the other, formed of heat and light and terrible magic. They blazed in burning red light.
Aysulu kicked her horse out of Malang’s path, and Hualing ran for the cover of one of the remaining stone pillars. They left my field of vision, but I soon saw arrows flying from either side. Some struck Malang’s shield, turning to burning ash when they hit. One sunk into his unshielded shoulder. He spared it only a glance, not breaking his stride.
Malang met our line and raised his sword. I backed away—I was not about to lose another axe—to look for an opening.
His target, however, was Jahan. The burning sword came down like fire from the heavens. Jahan’s sword went up, and collided with Malang’s in a shower of sparks, but the force of the blow lifted Jahan off his feet and sent him flying across the sand. He landed at the base of the pillar closest to the opposite gate, and lay there unmoving.
Khalim ran to him and knelt down at his side. I could not tell if Jahan still lived.
I heard a hum and felt heat above me. I stepped aside at the last moment, and Malang’s sword came down in the place I had been standing. Jin parried his next blow. There was a sound like thunder as their blades met.
Heishiro darted in for another attack, but the bright shield turned him aside. With one mighty swing, Malang knocked us all back. I stumbled and fell to one knee. Heishiro rolled twice in the dust before he could get back up.
Light shone at the edge of my vision; Khalim was healing Jahan, and his magic was soft sunlight in contrast to Malang’s terrible fire. Malang turned his attention from us toward the back gate. More arrows struck both his arms and fell clattering to the ground, as harmful to him as a spring breeze.
“You!” he snarled.
He raised his sword above his head, almost as high as the Ascendeds’ seats behind him. The weapon shifted and changed, becoming a javelin wreathed in lightning. He threw it across the arena.
There was another thundercrack, and the crackle of sparks. Khalim cried out in surprise and pain.
I did not look. I should have, but rage burned in my blood, hotter than magic fire. My awareness left me, all but a single point of vision—the space under Malang’s shield. I got to my feet, took my axe in both hands, and ran with a wordless cry.
I smelled burning hair, likely mine, as I passed beneath the rim of the shield. With a wordless cry I swung my axe. It struck Malang’s ankle with a metallic ringing. There was no cut, no place where the edge pierced his shining skin.
With all strength anger could give me, I pulled hard on the axe. The head hooked around Malang’s sandaled foot.
He knew my blade would not harm him, so he paid me no heed. But when he tried to advance, he stumbled, his foot caught. He dropped his shield, which dimmed and shivered into nothingness as it touched the ground.
Some reason returned to me, and I realized what I had done. Malang had fallen to his hands and knees. “Now!” I shouted.
It was Jin who acted first. His robe was dirty and singed, and one sleeve had burned through entirely, but his sword was as bright and sharp as ever. He tucked it under one arm and sprinted through the dust. As he reached Malang’s head, he drew the sword again in a swift arc across those cold, jeweled eyes.
Malang screamed, a sound somewhere between a man’s voice and the wail of metal on metal. He brought his hands to his face and cursed us in his unearthly tones.
The axe slipped from my hand, and I fell, the palms of my hands scraping on the ground. I looked back, my rage spent.
Jahan stood up and ran, the Sword of Heaven held aloft. His armor was badly dented, and there was sand in his dark hair. He dashed across the sand and in one swift motion brought the blade down on the bronze neck.
There was a flash of brilliant white light, brighter than the sun. I shielded my eyes with one arm. The ground beneath me shook, unsteady as the deck of a ship in a storm.
I heard wind howling, but did not feel it. I looked up. The towering form of the war god began to collapse, folding in on itself. His limbs buckled, and his flaming sword disappeared. Shining particles of metallic skin and hair fell into the dust. In a moment, all that was left was a withered, decrepit pile of bones, smaller even than the remains of a mortal man, and a small stain of blood.
The earthquake had not stopped. It was with some hardship that I got to my feet and crossed the breadth of the arena to Khalim.
He had healed himself, and the cost of it was evident on his face. His eyes looked bruised and sunken, and his breathing was ragged. The lightning javelin had seared a hole the size of two hands through his coat and tunic. Beneath was a pale spot of new skin.
I pulled him into my arms and held him there for the space of a few breaths, feeling his heart beat against mine. He leaned against me, heavy with exhaustion.
“We should keep going,” he said, voice muffled by my chest. “There isn’t much time.”
I released him from our embrace. “Are you all right?”
Khalim nodded. “You’re bleeding,” he said. He took both my hands in his.
It was just an abrasion of both palms. I must have gotten it when I had fallen and hadn’t noticed. “It’s nothing,” I said. Now that I was aware, it stung, but I had been fortunate not to sustain anything worse.
Khalim’s hands glowed, and I felt warmth flow into mine. “Save your strength,” I said, but he set his jaw stubbornly and shook his head.
We gathered around what remained of Malang. The quaking of the earth was steady now, and with each tremor a little more of the dusty bones crumbled away.
“It is hard to believe I ever worshiped such a thing,” Jahan said.
Heishiro gave a shrug. “I don’t blame you much.”
Khalim healed Jin. When he was done, he was swaying on his feet.
I put an arm around him. “Stay close to me,” I said.
“Come, friends,” said Jin. “Let us be done with this.”
Aysulu left her horse there in the sands. It was perhaps wiser than we were, to refuse to go any farther. Together, the seven of us entered the dark hall under the stands, and walked into the convulsing earth. The tunnel turned around after a short distance, doubling back underneath the center of the arena. The blackness gave way to a sickly, pale light, and we passed through a doorway into a chamber of white marble.
It might have been beautiful, at one time, but now it was a horror. Blood, fresh and scarlet, dripped from the high, domed ceiling and down the walls and collected around a stone altar at the center. The marble was stained a ghastly red.
Around the altar stood the six remaining Ascended. Their shining skin was dull and cracked, and their once radiant eyes were hollow and dark.
Khalim was pale when he stepped around me and into the chamber. “What have you done?” he asked, his voice shaking. “What have you done to this city? There are six of you here, and one above—where are your brothers?”
He sounded like himself, but something was strange. There had only ever been seven Ascended. Had there once been more, now long forgotten, as Khalim’s god had been? I looked, but I saw no sign that the god was speaking through him. There was no light in his eyes but the reflection of the lamps set into the marble walls.
Andam, the emperor, turned to him. “This is your doing!” he cried. “You left us too soon. We have done all of this to preserve the world for you.”
I hefted my axe and placed myself between Khalim and the Ascended. It was difficult to stand. The room shook and swayed, and cracks formed in the bloody ceiling, raining dust down on us. If we did not act soon, we would be buried.
Jahan came forward and leveled the Sword of Heaven at Andam. “Enough!” he said. “Your rule is at an end.”
Andam’s face twisted in wrath and madness. He gestured, and an eldritch green light flashed. Before we could react, Jahan dropped the sword and fell to his knees, and then to the ground. Blood trickled from his body down toward the altar. He was dead.
I reached down and picked up the sword. I was not meant to wield it, but what else was there to do?
The light spread between the Ascended and then flickered out. Whatever they had tried to do, it had not worked. The shaking grew worse. I fell, dropping my axe and bracing myself with one hand. Heishiro cursed as he lost his footing. Aysulu and Hualing cried out in surprise, holding on to each other.
“It’s too late,” wailed Shanzia, the empress.
Andam turned once more to Khalim. “It is as it should be,” he said. “Now you will die with us.”
The room exploded as the great worm burst forth.
I grabbed Khalim and pulled him close to me, one arm protecting his head and the other over mine. Rock fell around us in a deafening thunder. All the light, magical and mundane, went out.
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