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“This is Immortal Two,” Sadik said. “Do you copy?”

Besides his armor, he typically only wore a pleated skirt with sandals. The heat of the desert prevented much else. Now, there was a scarf on his head and a bandana over his nose, with a collection of racing leathers and torn clothing wrapped around his arms and legs. Only his eyes were exposed.

He knew it would not be enough.

Outside, the sandstorm continued to rage—throbbing with wind, lashing with grit, the haze so thick and vicious that the sun seemed a distant dream. In the distance, a broken branch tumbled across the plaza, thrashed by the wind. Above their heads, sand poured down from the archways, falling in streams, collecting against the walls and columns.

If anything, the night seemed to have worsened the storm. Aldunya was not pleased.

“—ay again.” His radio crackled to life. Xaeyr’s voice. “Sa—ik, I—peat, say again.”

“This is Immortal Two,” Amira said, brushing the dust from her wings. “We’re headin’ in. Do you copy?”

There was a burst of static. The wind continued to shriek. Whatever Xaeyr said, it was lost beneath the storm.

Sadik glanced behind him. Isaac and Zaria were wearing their Kesunae lamellar armor, supplemented with cloth bindings across the face and neck. Beneath the rags, Zaria’s left eye was as brown and healthy as the other. No more scars.

They shook their heads. Nothing.

“Yasmin,” Sadik said. “Can you clean the signal?”

The rat tapped on her glass device, using the tip of her finger to sift through various lights and numbers. Her whiskers twitched in the dusty air. “The storm’s too strong. Transmission just keeps bouncing back to the receiver, like the particles are ionizing. Maybe Aldunya’s leaves are electrically charged, or—um—maybe the sand itself is laced with Glimmer, or, actually, I could even suspect—”

“Hoi,” Amira said. “Fix it.”

Yasmin looked out at the storm. “Fix what? The wrath of god?”

More static erupted from the radio. It sounded like a different voice. Kavaia.

“There’s nothing we can do,” Sadik said, frustrated. “It’s by design. Aldunya is trying to stop the war.”

Yasmin continued to work on her device. Around them, the hippodrome gateway was drenched in an ochre shadow, offering little protection from the wind. Torrents of sand sprayed across the vaulted ceiling. The air shrieked and gnashed.

Just as he was considering a retreat, Sadik felt a pressure on his mind. From the other side of the stadium, Lanir spoke directly into his thoughts, as if she stood right at his side. Her voice was deep and clear.

This is Immortal One. We did not receive your message. I will facilitate one-way communication.

Sadik nodded. Amira and Zaria focused their attention. Isaac looked confused.

There was a pause from Lanir.

It is assumed that you are venturing forth, unable to answer. We will commence the assault. For now, if you are in danger, have Sadik fire his sword into the sky. All effort will be made to assist. On my honor, I will find you through the storm.

“What are you listening to?” Isaac asked.

“You can’t hear the flamin’ cunt?” Zaria replied.

“What? You can?”

We will watch for Thimera’s demise. Aldunya willing, all souls will stay within our flesh. Until then, I wish you the best of luck.

There was a longer pause.

Sadik, Amira. Your . . . bedfellows have instructed me to relay a message. Quote: ‘don’t get squashed, you little shits.’

Amira grinned. Sadik cleared his throat.

The pressure left his skull. Lanir was continuing the mission. Sadik imagined dozens of gods following at the dragon’s heels, bracing their powers for war. Once they arrived at the feasting hall, the melee would be devastating. An all-out assault from every deity.

With Lanir’s forces outnumbering Rushan’s, the battle would likely prove decisive.

Hopefully.

Faustine was still a threat. Even now, she would be lurking in the storm, rallying the dissident gods to her command. More importantly, there was no telling what Rushan himself would do, once his back was pressed to the wall. He had refused to join the heavenly war—now, it was being brought to his doorstep. Even injured, the god of war would have to respond.

And what was the plague doing, all the way down in Aldunya’s trunk? Why did it speak with Rushan?

Kavaia and Xaeyr were in danger. As long as the battle raged, any of the gods could die. Sadik would have to be swift and vicious in assassinating Thimera, lest any more curses infect the land.

“Good luck,” Yasmin said, apologetic. “I’ll be here, checking the radio and threshing Glimmer from sap.”

“Try to reach Haakon,” Sadik said. “Let him know what’s happening. I hope there’s nothing calamitous on his end, but I don’t trust my luck, these days.”

The rat nodded, gave a thumbs up, and scurried deeper into the stadium.

Sadik faced the gloomy dawn. He checked the cloth on his face and limbs. Beneath the mask, his throat was as dry as the sand.

There was no way to see where the plaza ended. The haze was too thick. For a moment, it seemed as if all the world had fallen into dust and fury.

He leaped into the storm.

Instant chaos. Once exposed, the wind was as sharp as a knife, the sand slicing like a thousand raining arrows, so strong that he was nearly knocked from his feet. He pushed on, struggling to right himself. His armor hissed with raining sand, his skirt flying sideways. A piece of cloth, tied to his arm, immediately came undone and whipped into the storm, gone in an instant.

He broke into a run. Fast as he could. Every step was stumbling, trying to balance against the constant slam of the wind. Sand twisted his steps. Grit lashed his eyes. He blinked, sputtering, gasping through the mask, pushing with all his might, struggling to glimpse a single building through the haze. He didn’t even dare to look at the squad behind him, lest he lose all sense of direction.

Through it all, Dusksong continued to glow. He held it high above his head, so all might see its light. A beacon through the storm.

Shrieking wind. Aching muscle. Sharp, searing sand.

Eventually, after many stumbles, Sadik saw the shadowed outline of a building, its broken doorway as dark as a cave. With a desperate lurch, he threw himself inside, landing on a thin dune of sand. The wind licked at his heels, like a jackal digging at a rabbit’s burrow.

Blood wept through his arm. Skin bristled with sand. He sat up, breathing deep.

He was in the wrong building. Instead of going straight, as he intended, the wind had pushed him to the far corner of the plaza, almost sending him to the edge of the pantheon entirely. None of his squad had managed to follow.

“Gamó,” Sadik said.

He leaned back into the storm, raising Dusksong into the gloom. The sword was nearly ripped from his arm, and the scarf on his head went flapping into the dusk, leaving his long hair exposed.

After a few moments, Amira dashed from the cover of a xylem vein. In a separate direction, Isaac and Zaria stumbled through the open plaza, letting the wind push them ahead. It seemed like Zaria’s paw was the only thing keeping him from flying away.

“Sound off!” Amira shouted, her voice barely breaking the wind. “Who’s hurt?”

Isaac and Zaria shook their heads. Amira used her insect limbs to clear pockets of sand. Sadik examined the flayed skin on his arm, finding it a minor wound.

They had been lucky. They might not be again.

“Stay close,” he said. “We’re off-course, but I know the path.” He gestured into the hall, letting Dusksong’s light scatter the shadows. “Follow me.”

Everyone nodded.

They continued on. Sadik did his best to navigate through the corridors, but the pantheon had been designed as a place of beauty and repose, and this had left it woefully exposed to the elements. Archways belched with sand. Dunes collected against the promenades and columned porticoes. Often, Sadik’s only relief from the storm was a diversion through the homes of the gods—even then, many had been destroyed in the fighting, leaving gaps in the recessed walls and domed ceilings.

Through it all, he was able to make progress. Over the previous day, he had spent hours learning the layout of the pantheon, planning secondary routes and fallback positions. He remained confident in his path.

Of course, he had no idea how Lanir’s assault was faring. It was impossible to find any sign of battle through the storm, and all attempts to use his radio ended in failure. For now, he would simply have to hope that the plan was succeeding.

Sadik paused behind a marble column, gazing into the storm. He thought of Kavaia. The way she had cried. The promise he had made.

He had spilled his seed inside her.

Fatherhood. Once again.

He closed his eyes, trying to calm himself.

“Sir,” Amira said.

She pointed toward a garden. Through the foliage, beneath the husk of a phloem vein, a figure stood in the dark. Its shape was vaguely human—tall and black, like a shadow without a body. Sparks of light weaved through the sandy air.

An Exalted.

“Been watchin’ us,” Amira whispered. “Thought I kept seeing shadows.”

It stood in the storm, human features drifting, losing and regaining limbs. It made no movement. Only watched. An eyeless, churning face.

Zaria braced herself against an adjacent column, raising a sunspear.

“Don’t shoot,” Sadik said. “It won’t do anything.”

Around the Exalted, the garden flailed in the wind. A husk of phloem, dry and withered, drooled sand from its empty holes. Beyond the garden, Sadik caught a hint of movement. A heavy shadow. Something massive, looming just beyond the light, shambling through the hall.

The Exalted began to shimmer. Around the garden, sheets of sand crawled through the grass, frothing back and forth. Slowly, dusk grey particles rose up from the foliage, tinged with sparks of light. They swirled into a person.

More Exalted.

What had Yasmin said? Maybe the sand is laced with Glimmer?

“Sir,” Amira said. “We’re fucked.”

The first Exalted exploded into a cloud of dust, racing toward the creature in the distance. The second remained. Above, yellow lights crawled through the sky. Mezlat. A formation of drones.

Aldunya was gathering an army.

“Immortal One,” Sadik said, pressing a finger to his ear. “Do you copy?”

Nothing but static. He lowered his hand, glaring at the thin wisp of the Exalted. Its eyeless face remained steady through the gales.

Enough of this.

“Aldunya!”

The Exalted did not answer. It could not speak.

“I am trying to save your people!” Sadik shouted. “Is that not what you want?”

No answer. Sand boiled at its feet, glowing like the stars. Above, a field of Mezlat swarmed through the leaves, their undercarriage bristling with a sunbeam.

Sadik exposed himself to the storm, pacing toward the Exalted. “You have blessed me! You saved my life!” He waved his sword at the shadowy figure. “Is your peace so fragile that it cannot withstand a question? Are you so eager to quash dissent that you cannot—”

The ground shifted. Branches pulsed. Sadik felt something enormous beneath his feet, slithering at the edge of the stone. At the same time, a shape began to crawl from the phloem vein. From the depths of Aldunya’s sap, there came a tentacled creature, bristled with teeth, gushing a dozen fingers, screaming in many voices. Flesh writhed in the dark.

“Gamó,” Sadik said.

The Exalted swarmed around the intruder, its particles surging with light, burying thousands of motes into a heap of sickly flesh. The creature screamed. As more of its mass slithered from the depths of the tree, it exploded a dozen pustules, releasing a noxious stream of spores. Glimmer collided in the air. Bright and dark, twisted and pure.

Around them, the storm began to surge. Before he could react, a gust of wind screamed through the garden, lifted Sadik off his feet, and slammed him back into the corridor.

Somewhere in the storm, there was an angry voice. The will of the tree.

A warning.

He gasped, spitting sand from his mouth. Isaac helped him to his feet. Beside him, Zaria was firing her sunspear down the length of the corridor, aiming at a shambling mound of flesh. Amira loosed a wyrmkiller into a shadowed doorway. A chorus of moans filled the air.

The plague was breaking through.

“Move!” Sadik yelled.

They ran through the hall. With the sandstorm blowing above, there was little light by which to see. Darkness held sway. Heaps of sand collected against the marble fixtures, and statues of gods loomed above, their faces twisted with shadow.

In the distance, ragged voices began to scream. Bodies surged through the plants and leaves—twisting, gnashing, falling from the branches, clawing through the shoots of xylem and phloem. An ecstasy of rotten birth. From the sky, a swarm of Mezlat fired their sunbeams.

The storm had given the plague cover. The perfect diversion. Now, most of the gods were out in the open, wasting their strength in an all-out assault. While they fought, a sickness spread through the cracks.

The worst possible time. Obviously, the plague had planned for this.

Sadik cursed.

Half a dozen infected emerged from the end of the corridor, drawn by the noise. Sadik braced Dusksong at his hip and fired a wide lance, sweeping across. Limbs burned and flew. A marble column melted at the base. As the roof began to collapse, Sadik took an alternate passageway, trying to remember his training.

A left. Two rights. Skirt the amphitheater. Watch the gardens. The feasting hall should be at the center of a series of bronze domes. If he got lost, Kavaia had told him, watch the friezes on the walls.

He could make it. Even in the darkness, he remembered his path.

Behind him, his squad continued to fight as they went—Zaria fired her spear while Amira loosed a string of arrows, all while Isaac kept a hurricane between his palms, firing a wall of wind at any who dared approach. There were squelches of flesh. Darkness boiled with motion.

Something massive slithered beneath their feet, trembling the stone. Sadik imagined an arctic explorer, crossing a thin layer of ice, knowing an ancient sea predator lurked in the depths below. Watching. Hungry.

He had to kill Thimera. If she died, a curse of immortality would bestow them all.

Of course, in the split second of combat, he had to ask himself—did the victims of the plague truly die? Or did they become something more?

“Immortal One!” Sadik shouted, pressing his ear with a palm. “Do you copy?”

Nothing but static. The storm shrieked and blew.

“The plague is here! I repeat—the plague is here! Break off the assault!”

There was a reply. Completely garbled. He thought it was Kavaia’s voice.

It didn’t matter. Nothing was heard.

In the distance, a swarm of Mezlat drifted through the air, raining a dozen sunbeams across the length of a plaza. Exalted shimmered through the shadows, visible only by the glint of their dust. As he passed one of the godly homes, Sadik heard the sound of a hundred vines leaching through the stone. After a moment, the entire building sunk through the floor, beginning to crumble into the open sky below.

It was all chaos. Surging lights, hideous shadows. Violence bled through the dark.

Sadik quickened his pace, moving at something below a sprint. His knowledge of the pantheon was slowly lost in the maze of halls and gardens, and the light of his sword could not break the shadows. Eventually, he was navigating on pure instinct.

To his left, a massive amalgamation crashed through a wall, composed of interlinked bodies, using torsos for legs. To his right, Amira impaled four of the infected with a single arrow. Behind him, a mob of angry flesh began to pour, spilling from the doorways, bulging from the leaves, fighting three separate Exalted in a cloud of blackened spores.

The storm continued to rage. Sand filled his eyes. Every step was a fight against the wind.

Then, above, through the ochre haze, he saw a stream of fire erupting from the sky. There was a dim shape of wings.

Lanir.

“Try me, ya pus-eatin’ cunts!” Zaria shouted.

She fired her spear into the pupil of a giant eye, popping it open. Isaac shredded a mob with a flurry of ice. Amira broke into a run.

“Move!” she yelled.

They dashed through the last of the corridor. Lanir’s flames grew brighter in the sky, constantly circling over the feasting hall. Lightning arced from the roof. The dragon weaved and dodged.

Below, the feasting hall loomed through the dusk—a large, rectangular structure, designed as a nexus for the flow of Aldunya’s sap. Phloem veins strangled the marble walls, while wreathes of xylem belched a steady stream of water, creating ponds and rivers. An oasis amongst the stone.

On the other side of the building, flashes of light erupted through the sand. The battle of the gods continued to rage. There were shouts, screams, clangs of metal, hints of flame, explosions of sound. The wind shuddered around it.

A small plaza separated Sadik from the feasting hall. There was a single fountain in the open ground, like a nipple upon a breast. Thimera stood in the center.

Immediately, he knew something was wrong.

The bovine goddess was squirming against the fountainhead. Even through the blinding grit of the storm, he could see her legs kicking through the brackish water, desperately struggling for leverage. Blood mixed with the lashing sand.

His squad entered the plaza. The infected moaned at their heels. In the distance, gods continued to rage.

And, in a split second, Sadik knew that his fate was sealed.

Thimera, the goddess of pleasure and beauty, now the goddess of death, had been beaten without mercy, leaving her face a ruin of blood and fur. It could’ve been punishment for being captured in the palace, or a personal vengeance from Rushan. It didn’t matter. She had been thrashed, dragged into the plaza, tied to its fountainhead, and left to suffer in the searing wind of the storm.

Now, she was moaning into the air, trying to raise her voice above the wind. Based on the sound, Sadik guessed that her tongue had been severed. The only noise she was able to make was a blunted scream for help.

It was too easy. It had to be a trap.

Somewhere, through the dark, Faustine was waiting for him, likely shadowed by a number of gods. She might’ve predicted his plan. Maybe she thought he would be too honorable to leave Thimera to die.

It didn’t matter.

At the moment, he was racing into the open plaza, chased by a horde of plague, his mind already filling with Thimera’s voice. Danger on every side. Even if he was not being seduced by the bovine goddess, he would have no choice but to walk straight into Faustine’s jaws.

He knew this all in an instant. Without any thought, he made a decision.

“Kill her!” Sadik shouted.

Upon hearing someone’s voice, Thimera stopped struggling against the fountain. Her horns twirled to life. She raised her head into the storm, trying to search through the gloom and grit. There was a blind, hopeful expression.

Amira sprinted forward. Thimera spotted the human women just as she anchored her bow into the plaza tiles. Relief turned to terror.

The arrow flew. Thimera’s head jerked back. When it fell forward, her eye was impaled, her neck partially severed from the strength of the missile. Slowly, her beauty was lost beneath the blood.

The darkness exploded.

A hail of sunbeams seared through the opposite end of the plaza, coming in a semicircle. Sand boiled like water. Isaac and Zaria barely dodged to the side. Behind them all, the infected chittered in fury, still closing in. Sadik ducked low, sliding to a stop at the edge of the fountain, trying to use the low stone wall as cover while he braced Dusksong toward the sky.

Lanir had promised to come. He only had to give a signal. The sword trembled in his grasp, its broken mouth gorged with power, aimed right for the canopy above.

Suddenly, there was a glint of steel, rushing from the storm.

Sadik fired Dusksong just as Faustine slashed from the side. His arm fell from his body, and his sword fell from its grasp, tumbling on the tiles, discharging all its energy in a wild, dancing line. The sky was cut. Leaves caught aflame. Sadik had only a second to marvel at his severed limb before Faustine bashed him with her shoulder, sending him reeling across the floor.

The world came in waves.

A row of gods, Volion, god of craftsmen, at its head. Chittering plague. Exalted, Mezlat.

Fire in the sky.

Sadik hit the ground. Faustine leaped, snarling, bracing her khopesh. He twisted, kicking out. His sandal met her gut, and the curve of her blade chipped off his armor, cracking several scales. She stumbled back. He flopped to his belly, racing toward Dusksong, instinctively trying to use the arm that was no longer there.

Ahead, the ambushing gods were shifting their sunspears toward the approaching plague, crying out in shock. Black flesh sizzled in the dark. Some of the spears were lost. Overrun.

To the side, Isaac was focusing on a cast of fire, watching a mass of tentacles curl through an archway. He did not see Volion sprinting toward him. The human god kicked, and Isaac went flying away, bouncing into the air, falling limp across the stone.

“Isaac!” Zaria screamed.

Sadik reached Dusksong. With one hand, the sword was heavy, its handle impossibly long. He barely managed to jump back to his feet before Faustine was upon him again, slashing fast. He held Dusksong like a shield, hoping to cover his torso, but Faustine harried him from the side, slashing his thighs, opening every inch of skin that she could find. It was a slow, miserable defeat.

Seconds later, a meteor fell from the sky.

You will CEASE!

Lanir slammed into the ground, spraying a cloud of sand. Everyone recoiled. She whirled in place, lashing her tail, slamming several gods into the walls of the feasting hall, all while unleashing a breath of fire toward the mass of plague. Her ruby eyes glimmered through the storm.

Sadik tried to slash his sword. The result was a fumbling, awkward lurch. Faustine easily dodged away, stabbing her khopesh into his thigh. The hooked blade tore a hole. Steel met bone.

His other leg buckled. She bashed his face with a knee, sending him into a fall.

As he flew, he caught a glimpse of Zaria, straddling Volion on the floor, his leg broken, her fists caving in his face. She was killing a god with her bare hands.

Sadik hit the floor, again. He knew he would not rise.

Somewhere, Amira attempted to drag Isaac’s limp body. Lanir fought the plague. Gods scrambled and ran.

Faustine stood above him, burgundy robes swaying in the wind. Above her, a part of Aldunya’s canopy had caught aflame, and, for just a moment, her head was perfectly encased by the fire, like all the tattoos of the Luminous Path had come alight across her face.

Then, she stomped on his head, and the light was gone.