CHAPTER 4 #2
“Because they’re the only ones who could be doing it,” Bex said, talking faster as her brain began to whirl.
“Every time I speak a demon’s true name, it takes effort.
Back when my fire was super low, I could barely do it at all.
Even after Adrian and the Blackwood rebuilt my bonfire, though, I could only name large groups if I got really fired up.
I thought I was having trouble because my rebirths had ground me down, but that was never the problem.
It always takes power to speak a demon’s name because our names have power in and of themselves. ”
Now that she’d said it out loud, the truth felt face-smackingly obvious. She’d actually witnessed this exact phenomenon in action just a few hours ago with the Queen of War. Even though she’d surrendered her horns to Gilgamesh, Dalanea still had her name.
If being queen was truly a divine right tied to being Ishtar’s daughter, then War should’ve been able to stomp her rebelling demons into submission, horns or no horns.
That hadn’t happened, though, because War didn’t have enough power to name them on her own.
Bex wasn’t sure if she could have quelled an entire tower full of rebelling demons who hated her guts even with her horns and her fire blazing.
There simply wasn’t enough power now that Ishtar was no longer around to back her daughters up.
But when those same demons had acknowledged Bex and offered their wrath to her of their own free will, she’d blazed brighter than ever before.
Bex had always assumed her ability to consume her demons’ fury was due to her nature as the Bonfire of Wrath, but what if turning into a sky-filling storm of fire every time the kick demons bowed to her in Limbo didn’t happen only because of their anger?
What if Bex’s people—her loyal demons who’d never bowed to anyone else and never stopped believing that their queen would return to save them—had actually been empowering her the same way drinking vials of deathly water used to?
“Now you’re starting to get it,” the Morrigan said, nodding down at the crowd.
“I can’t give you a name because you don’t belong to me, but you do belong to them.
As an extension of Ishtar’s power, you should have withered and died with your goddess five thousand years ago, but your people’s need for a champion kept you alive.
Ishtar wasn’t the one who brought you back when you died.
All she did was catch your soul. I’m sure she would’ve kept it if she could, but you were always born again because your people still needed a rescuer.
You were their sword, not Ishtar’s. That is what makes you Queen of Wrath, so if you need a new royal name, I suggest starting there. ”
The Morrigan dipped her beak toward the throngs of demons watching below, and Bex swallowed.
“How?” she asked around the lump in her throat. “We’re talking about meddling with the magic of Ishtar herself. Even if you’re right, how do I get them to—”
“The same way you get anything,” the Morrigan interrupted. “You ask.”
“But—”
“Good luck,” the goddess said as she opened her talons, dropping the hornless queen like a discarded kill.
Bex fell with a scream. She tumbled in free fall for several seconds, too shocked to do anything except windmill her arms. Then her survival instincts kicked in and she blasted her fire, catching herself seconds before she crashed into the canopy of Adrian’s huge new forest.
The moment she was certain she wouldn’t plummet to her death, Bex changed the fire’s direction, rocketing over the crowd like a comet to land on top of the giant black cube of the Hells’ Gate, the only building left in this part of the city that hadn’t been swallowed by forest. She kept her fire blazing even after she set down, covering her body in the brilliant flames of Wrath as she straightened up to face her people.
And realized her mistake.
The plaza surrounding the entrance to the Hells was so packed with demons that she couldn’t see the end of them.
The crowd surrounded her on all sides like a sea.
A silent, terrified sea of faces all looking at her in desperation.
No one cheered. No one yelled. They didn’t even bow.
They all just stood there, holding their breath as they waited for Ishtar’s last queen to work a miracle, but Bex didn’t know what to say.
Even if she had known, she couldn’t possibly yell loud enough to reach so many people with the mortal voice she had now.
That realization hurt even more than she’d expected.
This was the moment when she most needed to be a queen, but Bex wasn’t larger than life anymore.
Other than the fire burning on her skin, she was exactly as she appeared: a short, hornless, scrawny girl who didn’t even have a sword.
Even if Drox had been in her hand, Bex had no idea how to explain what she needed.
How in the world did you ask a crowd of hundreds of thousands of starving, terrified refugees to give you a new name?
She was still struggling to think of where to start when the Morrigan suddenly landed beside her.
The goddess came down like a feathered meteor, blowing the demons standing in the front rows to the ground.
The moment her talons settled on the black gate, though, she changed her shape, transforming from an aircraft-sized raven into a tall, pale woman wearing bloody leather armor, a cape of black wings, and a crown of human bones.
She looked absolutely terrifying, but that was nothing compared to the feel of her.
Even Bex had to fight the urge to flee before the force of nature the Morrigan had revealed herself to be.
She was forcing herself to stay still and not make a fool of herself in front of everyone when the great and terrible goddess turned and spoke in a voice pitched for her ears alone.
“Good show, eh?”
Bex blinked in surprise, and the Morrigan’s blood-red lips curled into a smirk.
“I didn’t break my rule about never entering Paradise just to be informative,” she whispered as her eyes, which were still beady and black like a crow’s, darted over the terrified crowd.
“My three favorite witchlings cut off their fingers to bring me here. A half-hearted display would shame their offering, so I expect you to do your part as well. Follow my lead, daughter of Ishtar, and together we shall see what your people really think of you.”
She spoke those words like a threat, but Bex just nodded and pushed her fear-dampened flames back to their normal roaring height. When she was burning bright again, the goddess lifted her arms and spoke in a ringing voice that thundered to every corner of Gilgamesh’s Heaven.
“Hear me, creations of my foolish sister!” she boomed.
“I am the Morrigan, Triple-Faced Goddess of Prophecy, the Phantom Queen and the Battle Crow. I was the only god who did not join in the folly that was the creation of Paradise and thus was the only god who escaped its fall when Gilgamesh arrived to slay the rest of my kind. I swore ages ago that I would never set foot in the graveyard of my kin’s mistakes, but I have broken that oath and come here today to bear witness to the birth of a new age. ”
She extended one sharp-taloned hand toward Bex.
“This is the Bonfire of Wrath,” she announced.
“Ishtar’s Sword. For five thousand years, she has fought to free the children of Paradise from their enslavement.
Many thought such a thing was impossible.
I thought it was impossible, but even after her treacherous sister tore the horns from her head, the Queen of Wrath did not abandon her fight.
Together with her loyal retainers, she outwitted the Eternal King and tore down the Nine Hells of Gilgamesh.
Because of her, the people of the Riverlands walk free upon the face of Paradise for the first time in fifty centuries! ”
Her hand came down like an axe to clap Bex on the shoulder. “Such actions have made her worthy in my divine sight!” the Morrigan cried. “In honor of this victory, I have decided to grant her a boon. Speak, daughter of Ishtar, and if it is within my divine power, it shall be so.”
The promise cracked like lightning over the dead-silent square.
Every demon in Paradise seemed to be holding their breath, including Bex herself.
She hadn’t expected any of that, but the Morrigan was scowling at her like she was flubbing her line.
That sent Bex into a panic for a second because she didn’t know her line.
Then the goddess flicked her black eyes pointedly toward the watching crowd, and suddenly, Bex understood.
“Great Morrigan,” she said in a voice she hoped was loud enough to carry to the buildings at the edge of the square, “I humbly ask that you restore my name.”
“Your name?” the goddess repeated in theatrical surprise. “How did you lose it?”
“It was stolen,” Bex replied, getting into the swing of things.
“Gilgamesh took it when the traitorous Queen of War ripped my horns from my head. He has stolen all the queens’ names because he knows that we are his defeat.
If I had my name, I could call the Blade of Wrath to cut open Heaven’s defenses.
I could cut the slave bands from every demon’s neck and set Ishtar’s children truly free!
Gilgamesh stole my name precisely to keep me from doing these things.
I cannot defeat him without it, so for my boon, this is what I ask.
” She bowed her hornless head. “Please, great Morrigan, sister of my sacred mother, make me whole again.”