The Rise of the Goddess

49 | ONLY YOU ARE STRONG ENOUGH

Akara's calm infuriated Marduk. With Ishev in ruins, the sages dead and the pegagi gone, the Deep's most powerful shrine would fall, and this time Marduk was certain there would be no being of light to prevent what was contained within its elaborate, blistering white prison from breaking free.

He followed Akara, sour. Right to the bitter end, sages always had to find purpose and meaning, even when faced with obliteration. Not him. Not this time. Where had his meditations led him, or his ambition to save his people? To this. To nothing. He had barely even begun to live. Anu had been almost five-hundred-thousand sars when he ascended to the light. With his father's aggressive demands fulfilled to achieve greater longevity from the regeneration devices, Marduk had expected to live to a million. His existence amounted to just over five thousand sars. A mere heartbeat.

Akara slipped into a narrow crevice in the edifice. Marduk left the crates behind and followed, cautious, realizing the sage had led him into a great rent in a massive ashlar, presumably made by one of the many earthquakes. Apart from the beam from his lamp, utter darkness surrounded them, yet Akara's steps were certain as he made his way past various openings, leading Marduk through a maze of cuts and angles, his progress slow, yet steady, confident.

Akara turned and vanished into the rock wall. Marduk hastened to catch up, uneasy. Another crevice opened before him, recessed into the rock at a ninety-degree angle. Marduk pressed on, claustrophobic, as the way narrowed and he had to shuffle after the sage, sidewise, his armor scraping against the rock face, longing to escape the oppressive weight of the stone bearing down on them. By degrees, the crevice widened and a faint glow of light breached the shadows beyond the reach of the lamp.

Akara took another turn. Marduk followed. Brilliance slammed into him. He fell back, stunned by the abrupt presence of light after so much dark. Lifting his arm to shield his eyes from the glare, he hunched down and edged his way forward, feeling his way along the wall, cautious, waiting for his vision to adapt. The passage ended. Ahead, in the center of a circular chamber, just before the fabled prison, Akara's frail silhouette stood, stark, against the unforgiving onslaught of a rotating sphere, shot with flames of light. Marduk eyed it, his instincts crawling, as it pulsed and churned, alive, a cold, dying star. Between the filaments, glimpses of unutterable darkness—of a formless, shifting entity slamming itself against its weakening barrier, determined to free itself after a near-eternity of confinement.

Akara turned, his face lost in shadow, and gestured for Marduk to join him. Marduk hesitated. When he had last been here, none but the pegagi were permitted to enter this chamber, not even his mother could go in. A viewing gallery, high above, and behind a thick barrier of pure crystal had been satisfactory enough for him to witness the existence of the prison of light. He had looked, because his mother had wished him to, but he had been glad to leave. Even then with the shrine fully protected by the pegagi, he could sense the evil contained within the light's brilliance. It had called to him, touching his dreams, subtle, offering a future beyond his childish understanding, frightening him. It was what had driven him to turn to the teachings of the sages, to contain the dark thoughts which plagued him when he was alone, or when saturated in the blood of the dead, that his conquests for Uribi were only the beginning—that a destiny of absolute power, and eternal rule awaited him, for a price. Now, here he was again. And soon, it would be free.

Akara gestured again, gentle, reassuring, as though coaxing a wild animal to him. Marduk eased his way across the chamber, the sphere growing until it consumed his vision. Gaps opened and closed, allowing longer glimpses past the net of light. Silence saturated the chamber.

At last. I knew you would return.

He stopped. His blood ran cold. That voice. He knew it. The same one which had haunted his dreams as a child.