Total pages in book: 126
Estimated words: 123065 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 615(@200wpm)___ 492(@250wpm)___ 410(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 123065 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 615(@200wpm)___ 492(@250wpm)___ 410(@300wpm)
“It’s the last time.” Apep looks over at me, his eyes gleaming, his white-blond hair blowing in the wind. “Are you losing your power? Your touch?”
“Let me do my job so I can ascend while you live out eternity in the dust.” I squeeze my eyes shut and look away, so he doesn’t see the lie within them, the hesitation because of her.
My plan was to terrify her and get it over with.
I never thought she’d just go back into her little warehouse and keep working like things hadn’t happened between us. She ignores the truth better than most.
I lift a shaky hand to my mouth then drop it. “Enough. Is everyone here?”
“Yes.” Kratos sighs. “We’re all here, I mean who knows where Enki’s brain is at but yes.”
“Can I kill him?” Enki looks to me. “Just once, we can bring him back later with some of the nectar.”
“Maim and torture your brother, never kill him,” Apep says before holding his wrist out.
My favorite part.
The storm builds, and then the entire sea quiets and turns to glass. The wails of our ancestors pulse through my body, like a bell in my ears that continues to ring and ring and ring again.
A siren’s sound.
The earth moans with its need.
Apep suddenly jerks away from me.
“What’s wrong?”
His eyes go completely dark before returning to their crystal blue. “Nothing, nothing’s wrong. She’s different, isn’t she?”
“She’s annoying,” I say quickly.
Inti chuckles. “I love it when you lie.”
“It’s time.” I press my palms together over my head and slowly lower them in front of my face, once they pass my chin, I part my hands and like splitting the atmosphere or the air in front of me, everything shifts.
Red hot rocks form across the water then sink down giving us a path as the water splits giving us complete dry access to the island. I take a step onto it and exhale, a bead of sweat runs down my back.
“Home,” I whisper as my golden armor forms around my body starting from my feet all the way up to my head, covering me in the red-hot heat of the sun. The metal and leather feels so comforting I almost shed a tear. If anyone were watching, it would look like soft golden scales covering my body molding into impenetrable armor. I hold out my right hand, my spear slams into it, and as I twist it in my grip I hear them all—the cries of humanity begging for the sun to shine on them once again.
Apep stands next to me wearing black armor, his hair is silver-white and pulled down his back. Since he decided to stay with the humans he lost his crown—his helmet showing all who see him that he decided not to be challenged, not even by the gods, losing a kingship because of it.
My own helmet mirrors the sun, the rays come out in all different directions like both a weapon and headpiece.
Enki sighs and steps onto the rocky pathway. His eyes illuminate white, he has no armor, only tattoos that cover his face and chest in the ancient Sumerian language. His leather pants are tight. Nothing covers his chest, nothing has to, he has spells scratched across his skin, nothing will puncture him from the waist up.
Tyrell and Inti are next.
Tyrell’s armor matches mine, golden to the core with the inscription of the dragon in the middle, etched in red. He wears a mask covering his face to match his armor, nobody asks why it changes every time, but part of me wonders if it’s to mimic the different gods he’s killed before he lost his own trials.
Inti heaves a deep sigh, and his eyes illuminate gold. His head-to-toe red armor covers him completely; his helmet matches his father’s. Lightning streaks across the sky, hitting Kratos’s fingertips and forming his daggers. The smell of smoke fills the air around us as we wait.
The walls of water moan around us, fighting to break free from the separation I created.
Daggon is last, as always.
The sound of his heavy sword dragging across the stone is like thunder before he walks in front of us and turns. His armor is silver, and he wears a white cape that stretches down to the ground from his massive shoulders. His eyes are blood red. He has no helmet, he has no need for one, he has many names, many jobs, and now he feels the weight of the people of the Euphrates on his shoulders yet again.
His golden bow and arrow shine from their place on his back, each spear dipped in poison. “I’ll escort you.”
He bows in front of us and presses a finger below his right eye in honor before he gets up and gives us his back.
And we walk.
The stones moan beneath our weight.
The earth carries the screams of the fallen humans trapped in purgatory, while the deafening songs of the remaining gods fill the skies.