“What aboutourhappiness?” she demanded, shooting to her feet. “We were the ones doing all the work!”
I was offering you a great gift,Ishtar said pointedly.It’s not everyone who gets to experience the divine happiness of a goddess firsthand. I could have made you all brainless like Enki did with his forge workers, but purging human sins requires empathy, so I gave you all named souls derived from my own divine power. Those names are the only reason you were able to survive my death. Every demon still in existence is alive because ofme. Again, you should be grateful,not whining about how you’ve suffered in my absence while I’ve been dead.
Bex clenched her fists. “Wanting to be free of slavery is notwhining.”
Then take it up with your slaver!Ishtar snarled.Gilgamesh is the one who did this to you, not me!
“I am going to take it up with him,” Bex promised, sticking out her hand to show her mother the fire that was still blazing like the sun. “This is the power of your people. It might have started with you, but they’re the ones who kept it alive, passing the flame of hope from generation to generation. They never stopped believing that you’d return to save them one day, so if you want their worship, be worthy of it. Take this fire and prove that you’re still the Ishtar from the stories, Goddess of War and Merciful Mother of the Riverlands. If you don’t want them turning to me, then strike down Gilgamesh yourself and end this! Do that, and your people will praise you again with their whole hearts.Iwill kneel and praise you, because I don’t careabout prayers or being worshiped. I just want this to end. I want their suffering, my suffering,all of our sufferingto stop. Do that for us, and I’ll make sure everyone knows you are the greatest goddess who was ever worthy of her people’s praise.”
Bex fell back to her knees as she finished, holding the blazing fire up to her mother like an offering, but the ghost of her goddess stepped back.
No.
“Why not?” Bex demanded. “I thought you wanted—”
I want the worship that’s mine by right,Ishtar snapped, backing away even farther.But I’m not falling for the same trick twice. You think I can’t see what’s happening? The Morrigan, that uncivilized barbarian, arranged this situation specially to lure me out. She even sent you to me knowing that I’ve always had a weakness for your earnestness, but it’s not going to work. You think that fire is something special? It’s nothing, leftovers, not even a fraction of the power I once possessed. If I take that flame and march back into the open like the idiot you’re asking me to be, what do you think is going to happen?
Bex frowned at the wrath burning in her hands. “I don’t—”
I’ll die,the goddess said flatly, crossing her arms over her transparent chest.If I couldn’t beat Gilgamesh at the height of my power, there’s no way I can possibly beat him with that. It’s just common sense.
“Then what was it all for?” Bex cried, shooting back to her feet as the fire spread down her arms. “All my lives and deaths, five thousand years of fighting—what was the point of any of it if you’re not even going to try?”
Oh, darling,Ishtar said, giving her a pitying smile.The fightingwasthe point. I always knew you were never going to win. I only let you go back so you could continue being a thorn in Gilgamesh’s side. That haughty brat was using my demons like they were his property. Just because I knew I couldn’tbeat him didn’t mean I was going to stand aside and let him get away with that, so I threw you under his feet. You’ve been spoiling his plans and costing him stress for eons.It might be petty, but knowing Gilgamesh was suffering has given me much solace during what would otherwise be an extremely depressing afterlife, and it made you happy too.
She reached out to pet Bex’s hair again.You always were such a hopeful little creature, and you worked so hard. That’s why you were my favorite. My other queens grew cynical and resentful, but you always believed the best. Even after Paradise fell, you sincerely thought you could get it back, and I just didn’t have the heart to tell you how foolish that was.
“So you lied to me?”
I let you dream,the goddess replied, brushing Bex’s ashy hair behind her ear.There was no harm to it, especially since I got to dream with you. The Paradise you kept for me inside your heart was beautiful. I almost didn’t want to let the witches burn it down, but you were practically dust by that point, so I thought, why not? You were going to snuff out soon no matter what, so why not let you go out with a bang? I thought it would make you happy and put one last little thorn in Gilgamesh’s boot. I never dreamed you’d take it this far.
“I didn’t ‘take it’ this far,” Bex snarled, yanking out of her mother’s reach. “Wemadeit. Adrian, Lys, Iggs, Nemini, Kirok, Desh, all of us—we fought tooth and nail to get to where we are today, and we’re not stopping. I don’t care if you say winning is impossible. We still have to try, because if we quit, it really will have all been for nothing. If we don’t defeat Gilgamesh, he’ll rebuild the Hells and recapture us one by one. Considering he’s locked in his palace, working on some giant move, it might be even worse. I’m not standing around waiting for that to happen.”
Bex looked down at the flames burning all over her body. Flames that no longer hurt, because she was no longer fightingthem. She was mad at Ishtar too now, and she wasn’t backing down.
“If this is the fire we’ve got, then this is the fire we’ll use,” Bex said, offering her flaming hand to the ghost of her mother one last time. “If you want to keep being worshiped as our goddess, take it and save us. If you’re too afraid to even try, then give me a new name and I’ll fight Gilgamesh for you. I’ll do whatever it takes, but fighting for my people’s right to exist without some warlock’s boot on their necks isn’t a ‘thorn in Gilgamesh’s boot’. It’s the promise I’ve been living and dying five thousand years to achieve. There’s no way I’m giving up now when we’re so close to the finish line, so either you take the power your people have offered, or I’ll take it for you.”
That’s enough, Rebexa,Ishtar warned.I know you’re upset, but the plan you’re proposing is ridiculous. We already fought Gilgamesh with everything we had and failed. The idea that we can beat him now when he’s stronger than ever and we’re little more than echoes is insane. The only thing we can do at this point is bide our time and wait for his mortality to run its course. Once he dies as all humans eventually must, everything will go back to the way it was.
That was the same logic Enki had used, and now as then, it sent Bex into a rage.
“And what about the rest of us?” she roared. “What arewesupposed to do while you wait for Gilgamesh to die? Suffer for another five thousand years?”
It’s not ideal,her mother admitted.But it’s the best we’re going to get, and it’s not as if you have to endure with the common rabble. Despite how you’re acting at the moment, you’re still my favorite daughter, and you’ve brought enough magic in with you to make our afterlives quite comfortable. We could restore this phantom desolation back into a proper Paradise and wait out the remaining years in peace. Thatway, when Gilgamesh does finally succumb, we’ll be in a prime position to rebuild.
She flashed Bex a winning smile.You said you wanted to stop suffering, right? In that case, all you have to do is put the fire down. Let your anger go, and I’ll grow you a fresh bank of grass to sleep on like I did when you were a little girl. Wouldn’t that be lovely?
Her smile was so sweet by the end that it made Bex’s heart ache. For the first time since she’d arrived in this place, Ishtar looked like the mother Bex remembered, but it was all a lie. This wasn’t just a ghost of the brave, loving goddess she’d thought she known. Bex was starting to think that Ishtar had never existed in the first place, because theactualMerciful Mother of the Riverlands would never invite her daughter to sleep on the grass while their people suffered and died.
I can see you’re going to be foolish,Ishtar said with a sigh as Bex clutched the fire tighter against her chest.This is why I made you to be a sword and not an advisor. You never could see the bigger picture.
“I don’t want to see your bigger picture,” Bex spat. “In fact, I don’t understand why Gilgamesh is so terrified of all of you rising again. With the exception of the Morrigan, every god I’ve ever met has been a coward. I don’t think any of you would fight him if you did come back.”
Don’t be stupid,Ishtar scolded.I already explained to you what folly that would be. Only idiots fight battles they can’t win, but our plan was never to fight Gilgamesh when the wheel turned.That would just be repeating the mistakes of the past, which we’re all far too wise to do. Our plan is much cleverer.When the Great Wheel turns again—as it must, since no chain lasts forever—we’re going to reset the world.
Bex went still. “What?”
We’re going to reset the world,Ishtar repeated with the look of someone who’s just played their final card.Why bother fighting when we can just start the whole thing over again from scratch? We would have done it before we lost the first time, but clever Gilgamesh started his coup by killing Anu, and the way Paradise is built, I couldn’t turn the wheel without him. That’s a design flaw I’ll be correcting in the next version, by the way, but what do you think now? Still want to throw yourself at a losing battle?
