Artemisia was dead.
It was over. I had defeated her.
I had protected Ilion from her, had done what the goddess had created me to do.
And I had kept my husband safe as well.
There was a small sense of relief, and then I was glad that she wouldn’t be able to hurt anyone else ever again. I waited a heartbeat to make certain that she was dead before I ran over to Xander. I lit my sword back up and half the soldiers fled.
The ones foolish enough to stay would meet their ends. I stood back-to-back with my husband, and together we fought as one, hacking and slicing and stabbing everyone who dared to oppose us.
We didn’t have to speak, didn’t have to warn one another. We moved in tandem, knowing what we needed to do. Keeping each other safe.
When it was over and the last Carian had fallen, Xander was breathing heavily and covered in blood. “Are you all right?” I demanded, trying to check him for injuries.
“It’s not mine,” he said. And I let him pull me into a sticky hug because I was so relieved that we had both survived.
The guards on the wall above us cheered, and the cheer carried through the city. The tide had turned. Artemisia had briefly rallied her troops, but with her gone, they were fleeing as quickly as they could.
“Do we chase after them?” I asked.
“We’ll settle this diplomatically,” Xander said. “There doesn’t need to be any more bloodshed.”
His gaze shifted over to Artemisia’s body. “I thought you didn’t want to strike her down in anger.”
“I didn’t. She was going to kill you. I struck her down out of love.” The oracle in the Carian camp had told me that love could be a tool or a weapon. And I had used it here as a weapon to protect the man I loved more than my own life. I would never feel bad about or regret that choice.
I would make the same one again a thousand times over.
“That’s two hands cut off,” he pointed out. “You’re never going to live that down now.”
“Technically, it was almost her whole arm, so Thrax can be quiet.”
He grinned at me.
There was a rumbling noise behind us, and we turned to see the hammer of Arion sinking into the earth.
As if Arion were reclaiming it.
“No!” I ran toward it, desperate to grab hold. The eye was still embedded in it!
But I wasn’t fast enough.
It was gone, swallowed whole.
I started to dig, not knowing what else to do. Xander knelt next to me, helping me to scoop out piles of dirt.
“I can’t save Locris without it,” I said, trying not to cry. I had done all this with that goal in mind. Restoring my nation.
This couldn’t be it.
This couldn’t be how this ended. I whispered a prayer, asking for help.
A few seconds later Luna appeared next to me.
With the eye of the goddess in her paws.
This belongs to you.
