CHAPTER 16
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BEX WAS LOSING.
It wasn’t as overwhelmingly obvious as the drubbing the Queen of War had given her over the Holy City, but the tide was definitely against her.
Slowly but inexorably, she was losing ground, and since she’d sent all her demons away to Earth, she had no way of regaining it.
She still didn’t regret her choice—their army would do more good in the Blackwood than they would’ve up here, not to mention they had a much higher chance of surviving that fight than they would’ve storming Gilgamesh’s palace—but it wasn’t looking good.
The nonstop usage of the Queen of Greed’s power had left her exhausted, but Bex still hadn’t managed to put a single scratch on her enemy.
The Crown Prince was simply too good, and his sword was too strong.
A more tactical fighter would’ve given up and retreated ages ago, but the demons of Wrath had always been stubborn, and there was nowhere to go even if she had wanted to run.
The only way any of them lived was if she got through this, so Bex gritted her teeth and kept pushing, methodically testing the prince’s guard for any hint of weakness.
She was still searching when she made the mistake that almost ended her for good.
Like everything in this fight, it was a matter of inches.
She’d been retreating, leading the prince around the giant golden throne in the hope that having something in the way might compromise his perfect guard, when her boot slipped off the edge of the raised dais.
She recovered her balance immediately, but the gap had already opened, allowing Prince Alexander to stab Ishtar’s sword past Drox, under Bex’s arm, and into her stomach.
It was a clean skewering, but Bex had been run through before. She knew how to handle both the wound and the pain. But when she focused Greed’s power on the damaged parts to return them to their original form, all she got was a throbbing shot of pain.
The unexpected agony made her stumble again. She would’ve fallen off the dais had Drox not stabbed his blade into the gold floor, using himself as a lever to throw Bex sideways a split second before the Crown Prince’s sword sliced through the air where she’d been.
“Thanks,” Bex muttered as she caught herself against the wall. “Just let me—”
She stopped there, focusing hard on her wound as she reached for Greed’s power again.
The pain was still there, chewing at her insides like a trapped rat, but Bex had always wanted more than she’d been given.
Unlike Envy, Greed was a sin that came naturally to her, and eventually she made it work, pushing the pain back with her own flames until the wound in her stomach finally reversed itself.
You can’t do that again, Drox warned as she pushed off the wall.
“I know,” Bex muttered, backing away to put distance between herself and the Crown Prince, who was watching her wounded movements like a predator. “But I can’t win this if I do nothing but defend.”
He hits you even when you do defend, her sword scolded. Your footwork is slipping.
Because she was exhausted. She was technically still uninjured thanks to Greed’s power, but every part of Bex was so tired she could barely stand.
That painful push was almost certainly the last one she had in her, but the fight wasn’t close to over.
Alexander didn’t even look winded as he stalked toward her, which sucked because he wasn’t even the last fight.
Bex still had to face Gilgamesh after this, and suddenly, she wasn’t sure she could do it.
None of that, Drox snapped, knocking his hilt against her hand.
If your mind gives up, you’re finished no matter how much strength is left in your body.
You’re the one who said you’d do what Ishtar wouldn’t.
Are you going to let your people die just because some snot-nosed son of Gilgamesh got his hands on your mother’s sword?
Of course not. Bex would fight until she died, but even as she moved back into attack position, part of her was whispering that Ishtar had had that “unbeatable” sword when she faced Gilgamesh, and she’d still been defeated.
Everyone who’d faced Gilgamesh had been defeated, including Bex herself.
He’d smacked the first Rebexa, the infamous Executioning Blade of Ishtar, out of the sky like a buzzing gnat, so what hope did she—
You have every hope, Drox snarled, digging into her palm.
The only way Gilgamesh becomes actually undefeatable is if you believe him to be.
The gods lost because they underestimated him, but you will lose if you overestimate him.
You must see him exactly as he is: a human opponent who is still susceptible to death.
That goes for the prince in front of you as well.
He is also merely a man holding a sword that has already been defeated, but you are different.
You are the queen who rose from her own ashes, and you will be their end.
Bex smiled. Drox had always been good at talking her up, or maybe she was just susceptible to inspiring speeches because she wanted to be inspired.
She wanted to believe that she was the one who could stop this, the one who could finally win.
That was the dream she’d sold to all her demons, the dream Lys and Iggs and everyone else who followed her had laid down their lives for.
Bex could quit on herself, but she would never quit on them, so she planted her boots one last time and made a calculated lunge at the place the prince’s guard looked weakest: his left shoulder.
Just one hit, she told herself as her sword flew.
One good shot was all she needed, because princes couldn’t heal like demons.
If Bex could wound him even once, she’d flip the momentum back to her side, so she poured every bit of fire she had into going faster, closing the distance between them like a flaming comet.
He still saw it coming. The damn prince was the fastest opponent she’d ever faced.
He must’ve estimated her trajectory ahead of time, because his sword was already in position to block hers before Bex’s feet left the floor.
If she’d still been the fighter she was two months ago, that would been all it took, but if there was one thing Bex had learned from all those losses to Havok, it was how to improvise in the air.
The prince had set his blade to stop her current trajectory, but she was the Bonfire Queen, which meant she didn’t have to stay on course.
One quick blast of fire was all she needed to change her direction in mid-flight, flipping her body to transform what had been an overhead chop into a sweeping strike from the ground.
The cocky prince wasn’t expecting that. Bex saw the surprise flash over his one-eyed face a split second before his sword moved.
As fast as they were both going, though, that single moment of shock was all it took for Bex to slide past his guard and drive Drox’s blade straight into his armored armpit.
The resistance of her sword slamming into the prince’s golden armor was the sweetest thing Bex had ever felt.
The angle wasn’t the greatest since she’d flipped herself upside down, but this was the first solid hit she’d landed since the fight began.
She carried it through with everything she had, blasting her fire behind her like a rocket as she pushed up and through, cutting armor, flesh, and bone until her black sword came out the other side.
His left arm hit the golden floor a second later.
It wasn’t as good as cutting off his sword arm, but Bex didn’t care.
His cry of pain was still music to her ears.
Feeling better than she had since the fight started, Bex landed on the golden throne and whirled to keep pressing the attack.
By the time she actually made it all the way around, though, the sight that was waiting for her shocked all the joy straight out of her body.
The Crown Prince’s arm was back. His golden armor was still missing, but his left arm was once again connected to his shoulder like it had never been cut.
That made no sense, though, because Bex could see the arm she’d severed still bleeding on the floor.
How had he grown it back so quickly? How had—
“Don’t look so confused,” the prince chided, flashing her a superior smirk as he held Ishtar’s sword up for her to see.
“This is the personal weapon of the Goddess of Life and Death, the same goddess who blessed your cursed kind with regeneration in the first place. Of course it has the power to heal something as inconsequential as a severed arm.” He shook his head.
“What a terrible daughter you are. You should really have more faith in your—”
His bragging cut off with a choke. Bex backed away, watching for the trap this had to be, but the Crown Prince wasn’t even looking at her.
He was staring at something else, something far in the distance that only he could see.
The prince’s hands opened a second later, dropping Ishtar’s sword as his arms—both his new naked left one and his armored right—shot out like they were trying to catch something.
Whatever it was, he must not have made it.
The Crown Prince was still straining when his body toppled, falling straight forward like a cut tree to land face down at the foot of the throne where Bex was crouching.
She was still staring at him in dumbfounded confusion when Nemini appeared on top of the fallen prince’s back, pulling something black off her head that looked a lot like Adrian’s coat.