Time halted. His heartbeat froze. No blood dripped from his body. The ground vanished, and though he felt a smooth surface beneath him, there was nothing there but a blanket of stars that seemed to stretch out to infinity. Karak took a step, breaking Velixar’s touch, and suddenly he could not move, could not speak. He could only watch. Both gods turned to face the intruder, and to Velixar’s eyes she was a stunningly impossible vision. He felt an ache in the back of his mind as he tried to give form to the light shining before him. There was a face, a feminine form, hair like light, eyes like stars, and in seeing her, Velixar realized how whole she was. This was not the same goddess he had watched descend from the heavens to find comfort in Ashhur’s bed. This was true divinity. The brother gods, compared to her, were incomplete. They were broken, lacking her power, her authority. Right then, Velixar had no doubt that in her realm, the brother gods were mere interlopers.
“This ends,” Celestia said, hovering before them. Her voice was beautiful and terrifying. “No more destruction. No more wasted life. Only the two of you, as it always should have been. Find a victor.”
Karak and Ashhur lifted swords gleaming with energy, light, and fire. If they were upset with the goddess’s intervention, they did not show it. Instead, Ashhur’s brow furrowed, and his gaze narrowed with concentration as Karak grinned wide.
“There is only one possible victor,” said Karak. “We both know who is stronger. Your heart is soft, brother, and it will lead to your downfall.”
Ashhur braced for an attack.
“Too many of my children have died by your hand,” he said. “Come see how little mercy for you is left in my heart.”
Karak lunged, his sword lashing out, and when Ashhur blocked, it seemed all of eternity shook from the impact. The blades pressed harder and harder against each other, until it seemed they intertwined completely, fire and light swirling together. When they pulled back, neither god appeared fazed in the slightest. Up and around went Karak’s sword, swiping wide for Ashhur’s side. He blocked again, and the shock wave was just as strong, the impact fusing the weapons together once more. Mouth hanging open, Velixar watched as they repeated the dance again and again, sometimes Ashhur taking the offensive, most times not.
This wasn’t like Haven. That wasn’t even close to the battle he’d just witnessed. For once, Velixar saw the gods not bound by flesh, but by something different, something more. The strength of their blades was no longer dependent on the strength of their muscles. Both their eyes shone white with power, and as their intensity increased, so too did their visages grow otherworldly. They were men standing on stars, swinging blades amid the heavens, beings of strength and power that made the very cosmos shudder. Force of will drove them on. Time, already an elusive thing, became meaningless, and Velixar was nothing but a spectator, his own heart not beating, his lungs never once drawing in a breath of air.
Strike. Parry. Swing. Block. On and on, a dance unending, neither able to surprise the other, neither able to bring down his brother with either power or strength. If it tired them or gave them pause, neither showed it. A thousand times their blades struck, then a thousand times more. Through it all watched the goddess, her luminous form saying nothing, only silently waiting for the end.
And then, just when it seemed they would endure forever, their battle stretching on as infinite as the field of stars they warred within, Velixar saw Karak’s blade slow. It wasn’t much, just the faintest spark of white across the tip. It was the goddess, Velixar knew. It had to be. His god would not fail. He felt seething rage in his breast as Ashhur’s sword slipped over the block, through Karak’s armor, and into his chest. It plunged in deep, and instead of shadow, shimmering crimson blood poured forth. A symbol of how weak they were when confronted with true power. Karak stood there for an endless moment, mouth open, his fiery blade vanishing into the ether.
And then he fell.
Velixar wanted to scream, to cry out, but he was helpless. There would be no denying the goddess, not then and there, her collected might gathered and furious. Whatever terror he’d known, it only magnified. Karak had lost. Ashhur was victorious.
“I’ve won,” Ashhur said as Karak knelt before him, clutching his bleeding chest. Karak glared at him but said nothing, would not admit defeat even then. Velixar waited for the horrible moment when the final blow would come, wishing he could shut his eyes, but unable to do even that.
“You have,” Celestia said, and it seemed she grew closer, more human. “But what does your victory mean?”
Ashhur seemed perplexed by the question. He looked down at his sword, stained with the blood of his brother, the blood of a god. His fist tightened. The glow of the blade brightened.
“I end it,” he said.
“There is another way,” Celestia said, and she hovered between them, a ghostly presence. “Let him suffer exile to the world you came from. I allowed your entrance, and I can deny it just the same.”
Still Karak said nothing. Velixar wished his god would object, would cry out at the injustice. Celestia had interfered-did they not all see? The whore had broken the dance, tipped it to her lover. Ashhur was not the stronger. He was not!
“Another way,” Ashhur said, gaze boring into Karak, who shuddered and held tight to the oozing wound in his chest.
“Or you can take his life,” Celestia whispered, and it seemed her voice echoed from a thousand directions. “Take his power into your own. All of Dezrel will be yours, if you desire it. Make your choice.”
Up came the sword. Velixar couldn’t imagine the debate raging within Ashhur, but he could see a glimpse of it. He could see the pain, the exhaustion, the indecision, the doubt and fondness. But then he saw it all replaced by a glimmer, a hint of something he’d seen in Darakken, and in himself. A longing for power. When did a god ever resist power?
Down came the sword.
“STOP!”
Ashhur’s sword shattered. Eternity quivered. The goddess stood between them as a flaring nova, and there was no denying the fury that overwhelmed her every word.
“You still seek blood?” she asked as both gods lifted up, helpless in her grip. “You, Ashhur, my lover. . you would seek power over mercy? You, Karak, you would have death and emptiness if it granted you order? You entered my world through my grace, my desire to save you, and you have ruined it with fire, flooded it with beasts, and spilled the blood of your own children. I will not have it, even if I must be the one to pay the cost.”
The heavens ruptured. High above, Velixar glimpsed a world beyond his own understanding. The only thing he could perceive was its vastness. Something-a wall, a light-divided it, and with a sound akin to shattering stone, Celestia cast the gods into either side. They faded, growing farther away. Yet still the goddess spoke.
“The souls that awaited you. . take them. They are yours.”
A chasm then appeared, rising from below him from the black. Next came the murmur of thousands of voices, and then Velixar watched the people ascend from the chasm, which now stretched out into the heavens as if it had no end. They passed through stars as if the distance was but a step, and they sang and cried and danced. The souls of Afram, Velixar realized. Velixar looked to the dividing line, and the sight of it made him wish to weep. The faces were different, the bodies strange, but Velixar saw some he recognized, people Jacob Eveningstar had known; Roland Norsman, Nessa DuTaureau, Crian Crestwell, Vulfram and Soleh Mori, Harlan Howey, Oscar Wellington. Ranks of Wardens streamed past him, Judarius and Ezekai, Loen and Grendel, Bareatus and Jaquiel, and countless others. The spirits of the humans went to the gods who’d created them, and the Wardens to Ashhur, until the stars sealed, and only the twirling void met Velixar’s eyes.