Cities of the Gods (The Unbreakable Sword Series Book 2)

by S. M. Schmitz

  She pulled her legs closer to her chest and swallowed, only then realizing just how dry her mouth was. “I must have fallen asleep,” she whispered. “How long…”

  “Almost eight hours, which means we have exactly one day left until Samhain Eve. Come. If you don’t trust my food and water, we’ll get you some on the way.”

  “On the way… to the Otherworld?”

  Ninurta scoffed and rolled his eyes. “We aren’t staying in one place too long. I’m not underestimating this friend of yours. I know about Quetzalcoatl, Thor, and Nyyrikki.”

  “Oh,” she breathed.

  She slowly rose from the floor and grimaced as her legs ached from having spent eight hours in the corner. She grimaced again when she stepped on her right foot and the sharp pinpricks told her the damn thing had fallen asleep. She shot Ninurta an irate glare and pointed to her foot. “Don’t guess you can do something about this?”

  He snickered and shook his head. “You’re supposed to be some sort of powerful healing goddess. You do something about it.”

  Selena threw her hands in the air and complained, “I can’t! Why does everyone think I can heal myself just because I can heal others?”

  “Because that would be logical,” Ninurta answered. He waved his hand toward the table of food and wine and it disappeared.

  Selena stepped into the hallway where several other gods she didn’t recognize waited, each one looking at her like she was some sort of mythological curiosity. She felt like some sort of mythological curiosity.

  “Don’t guess one of you can make the pain in my foot go away?” she asked.

  One of the gods snickered and wondered aloud, “How did the Tuatha Dé ever become so powerful?”

  Ninurta shrugged and put his hand on Selena’s back to keep her walking. She tried to move away from him, but he had no intention of allowing her to get far. “I am far less concerned with how they ended up controlling all of the Otherworld than I am with how I am going to take it from them.”

  One of the other gods looked Selena over quickly and smiled. “They will have no choice. They are doomed to failure either way.”

  “Not necessarily,” Selena insisted. “You could let me live, and they’d have a chance to win it back.”

  All of the gods laughed at her for that.

  They led her outside where a van that reminded her of the New Pantheon’s idled. She stopped walking and refused to budge. She had the naïve hope that Ukko was inside that van because he’d already made it clear he had no intention of killing her, but when the doors opened, she only saw another unfamiliar god behind the steering wheel.

  For once, she wondered if she could possibly figure out how to get Ukko’s attention and alert him to her location. Ninurta clicked his tongue at her and shook his head. “Don’t count on the New Pantheon saving you, Daughter of Danu. For once, they’re outnumbered.”

  Selena crossed her arms over her chest and set her jaw. “Stop calling me that. My mother’s name was Cynthia.”

  Ninurta smiled and leaned down so that his lips were next to her ear. She could feel his hot breath against her cheek and she suddenly wanted to get inside that van or anywhere else that he couldn’t be so close to her. “But your mother,” he whispered, “is dead. Because you didn’t save her.”

  Selena caught her breath as Ninurta stood straight again and nodded toward the other gods. One of them pushed her toward the van and she stumbled but somehow didn’t fall. It felt like someone else’s body that climbed inside the back of the van and fell onto a seat, and when Ninurta sat in front of her and told her they would stop soon for gas and she’d better eat and drink what she was given, it must have been someone else’s voice that agreed.

  Because Selena felt eviscerated, emptied, hollow. She had never told anyone, not even Cameron, this darkest secret, her most shameful truth. Her mother had died from a disease she could have healed; she should still be alive. It didn’t matter that she’d only been three. She had let her mother die.

  And with those few words, Ninurta didn’t need to kill her body. He’d already murdered her soul.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Selena found herself in a mansion located in a foreign country. She could only guess she must be in Iraq, the former heart of the Sumerian and Akkadian Empires. When Ninurta brought her a bottle of water from inside the gas station when they’d stopped, she’d taken it from him and drank it obligingly. When he handed her a chocolate bar, she nibbled at it even though she tasted nothing.

  She sat alone in a spacious room again, only this time, it was opulently furnished. Heavily polished bookshelves lined two of the walls, but she couldn’t read most of the titles since they weren’t in English. Two leather sofas and six matching armchairs were scattered throughout the room, where the dark hardwood floors were covered with exquisitely woven rugs. Selena thought not one of them could compare to Lugh’s tapestries though.

  Floor to ceiling windows offered her a view of a well-irrigated yard that reminded her of paintings of the Hanging Gardens of Babylon. She wondered how many people nearby were getting sick drinking contaminated water since so much of this country was still a war zone, or maybe they didn’t have enough water to drink or cook with at all, and yet, these gods had their lush palace gardens to remind them of their power and importance over humans.

  Selena shook her head at the beautiful garden outside and turned her back to the window. Cameron was right, as usual. Why should they want to emulate the gods? Why should they want to become one? There were few gods she’d ever read about who put others’ needs before their own, and she still didn’t know what to believe about one of them. If he existed, she thought there must be an obvious reason he kept his distance from the ancient gods of dead religions: who would want to be associated with deities like these?

  Selena collapsed onto a sofa and decided to try to reach the Otherworld on her own again. It was a risky decision since Ninurta could catch her and discover that she and Cameron had the ability to travel there, although it seemed like it required both of them in order to work. She didn’t want to endanger Cameron by alerting Ninurta to this potential ability, but she had no other choices, no other chances for escape.

  She lay on the sofa, covering her eyes with an arm as she tried a different memory from the Otherworld. She conjured the feel of the warm sunshine on her face and the soft grass beneath her feet, walking with Cameron beside the stream that defied the laws of Earth’s physics and whose bed was lined with colorful stones like gems. She remembered the way Cameron had stopped walking to reach into the stream and retrieved a red stone for her that reflected the sun’s light just like an expertly cut ruby.

  Onward they walked to the top of the hill where the stream flowed upward and where she saw the glass castle in the distance for the first time: its breathtaking beauty against the backdrop of the cerulean sea, the crashing of the waves against the cliff, and the castle standing so tall in the distance like a crystal sculpture.

  As she reached the part of this memory where she and Cameron looked inside the glass castle, she didn’t want to remember the creature inside, but she couldn’t risk not reliving every moment: so far, this memory hadn’t worked at transporting her to Murias either. She could still feel the leather sofa beneath her body and the cool, dry air from the A/C’s vent. She kept her arm draped across her face and imagined shielding her eyes from the sun and pressing her face to the glass.

  A knock on the door startled her and she moved her arm and sat up. Ninurta entered again and looked her over quickly then sighed, “Were you sleeping again?”

  “I… guess so. What time is it?” she asked, but surely, he could sense her disappointment this time.

  “We’re leaving in a few hours. This is how you’ve chosen to spend your last day on Earth? Asleep?”

  Selena shook her head and swung her legs off the side of the couch. “I didn’t mean to fall asleep. I was actually just…” Selena bit her cheek but the physical pain didn’t distra
ct her enough to prevent the tears. “I wanted to remember those I love most. That’s all.”

  “Those?” Ninurta chuckled. “Seems like you’re only concentrating on one person.”

  Selena shrugged and sank back on the sofa. “Sometimes, one is enough,” she said quietly.

  “You demigods,” Ninurta said. “You’re too human for your own good.”

  Selena shrugged again then glanced in his direction, but she wouldn’t meet his eyes. “Have you ever known a demigod who became a god? Did it change him? I mean, besides the power, did it change his personality?”

  “Power itself changes anyone, Selena. I know you were destined to become a goddess, but you don’t need to worry about how it would change you. You aren’t going to live to find out.”

  “You don’t think it’s possible then? That I could have become the next goddess of healing but still remained me?” She had no idea why she was asking Ninurta of all gods. Perhaps because he had no reason to lie to her. It didn’t matter anyway. In a few hours, Samhain Eve would begin and he and his army could cross over into the Otherworld. And she would die.

  “No,” he answered. “It’s not possible. You give up what makes you part-human. I can’t imagine why you would miss it anyway.”

  “You’ve never been part-human,” she answered. “That’s why you can’t imagine it. But for me, it would mean surrendering everything I love most about being alive.”

  “Strange things to miss, Selena. But I suppose you’re right. I’ve never been part-human, so I’ve had no chance to miss anything.”

  Selena looked through the window where night had already fallen. “What are we waiting for?” she asked. With her hope exhausted, these last few hours just seemed like torture. “Halloween has begun already in some parts of the world.”

  “But who controls the Otherworld?” he asked. “And whose festival was Samhain to begin with?”

  Selena sat up straighter and blinked at her captor, this merciless god of agriculture and war who could easily pass for a wealthy businessman on the streets of Baghdad. Unlike Thor or Tyr, he wasn’t large and frightening in size, only in demeanor. Ninurta was tall and slim, somewhat handsome even though his eyes lacked any emotion, any depth or feeling. “It’s Irish,” she breathed.

  Ninurta opened his hands and held them palm up as if that answered all of her questions, when really, it had only created hundreds more.

  “The Otherworld… it’s just the island cities now… it’s all the Tuatha Dé’s,” she murmured.

  Ninurta leaned against the wall and crossed his feet as if waiting for her to make a point.

  “What…” she faltered, searched for the right words as her mind raced with the realization that this is why the Tuatha Dé had so much power there and why they’d led their allies for hundreds of years. But why were the other gods there in the first place? “Where are the other… heavens? Your homes? Why do you want the Tuatha Dé’s so badly?”

  “Not all of us had our own Otherworld to begin with, Selena. You know what animism is?”

  Selena nodded. “The belief that gods lived in everything around us. They were supposed to be the river and the rain and the earth.”

  “My religion believed that. And human beliefs have power, Selena. When Islam displaced the tribal religions that had survived here for thousands of years, some of us died out, and those who didn’t had nowhere to go. We were unwelcome here, so Morfessa allowed us to live in Falias.”

  “They welcomed you into their home, and you repaid them by waging war against them?” Selena asked. She found herself wishing she were a war goddess like Badb so she could fight this asshole right now.

  Ninurta laughed and shrugged. “The Tuatha Dé had to have known it was coming. They expected our allegiance, and what god is going to tolerate that for long?”

  Selena folded her arms across her chest and scowled at him. The Greeks and Egyptians had been tolerating it for a long time, actually, and even though she hadn’t met any Egyptian god, none of the Greeks seemed bitter about it. She had the impression they’d been given their own place to live and were happy and just wanted to be left alone. Since Badb still considered the Egyptians allies, Selena imagined the same must be true for them.

  “What about those who did have another world, like the Norse and Asgard? What happened to it?”

  Ninurta opened his hands again as if to say he didn’t know, but she didn’t believe him. They had been allies once. How could he not know?

  She scowled at him and told him he was about to kill her anyway. What difference did it make if she knew one of their damn secrets?

  “Some of the gods had their paradises on Earth, like the Greeks and Mount Olympus,” Ninurta said. “But Asgard was destroyed.”

  “By whom?” Selena breathed, even though she could already guess his answer.

  “There have been many wars among the gods, Selena, not just one. And the Norse haven’t always lost those wars. The Tuatha Dé first arrived in Ireland because the Norse pushed them off the continent. They had been fighting for control of the northern Germanic lands, and we both know who won that war.”

  “But the Tuatha Dé allowed them into the Otherworld when they’re such bitter enemies. Why?”

  Ninurta shrugged. “Perhaps because they destroyed Asgard and the Norse threatened to stir up constant war between them if they didn’t offer them some place to go.”

  “But how could the Tuatha Dé have trusted them not to wage all these wars anyway?” Selena persisted.

  Ninurta sighed, apparently growing annoyed by her constant questions, and folded his arms stubbornly to indicate he wasn’t playing along anymore.

  “Fine,” she hissed, “how much longer do I have to sit around in your mansion waiting to die then? When will it be Halloween in Ireland?”

  Ninurta flipped his wrist and checked his wristwatch, and Selena rolled her eyes. He had the ability to abduct and transport demigoddesses halfway across the world, but he needed a watch to know the time? “Another hour and a half. Is my mansion so disagreeable, Selena? What would you like?”

  He waved his hand toward a mahogany desk by the window and it filled with chocolates and pastries. She scowled at him again and shook her head. “I’d like not to be murdered.”

  “Demigoddesses can be so impossible to please,” he sighed again. “Although… I am curious.”

  He stood upright and walked toward her, and Selena’s heart thundered in her ears. She shrank back against the sofa as he sat next to her, but he didn’t touch her. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a knife, and her stomach dropped. Don’t stab me don’t stab me don’t stab me.

  He glanced up at her, seemingly both perplexed and a little amused, then turned his attention back to the blade of his knife. He extended his fingers and sliced open his palm. Selena gasped, but Ninurta didn’t even flinch. He set the knife on the sofa behind him and held his bloody hand out to her. “Heal it. Every healer I’ve known requires potions and herbs. You supposedly have this power within you.”

  “What if I can’t?” she asked. “That was incredibly risky right before waging a war against a bunch of powerful gods.”

  He smiled, but there seemed to be something sinister about his smile. “I’m not left handed.”

  She wondered if he was trying to make a joke. She decided not to find out. She touched his fingertips and Ninurta’s dark eyes immediately fell on his palm and watched intently as the cut healed. He pulled a handkerchief from a breast pocket in his suit and wiped the blood away, opening and closing his hand as if the deep cut would reappear if he flexed it enough.

  “Remarkable,” he murmured. “It really is a shame I’ll have to kill you, Selena.”

  “You don’t have to,” she protested.

  Ninurta snickered and wiped the blood from the blade of his knife then folded it and put it away. She couldn’t help thinking it was strange that a god of war would carry around a pocketknife. “I can’t risk you surviving, not when the fate
of the Tuatha Dé rests on your shoulders.”

  It was Selena’s turn to sigh in exasperation. “Why does everyone keep saying that?”

  Ninurta smiled at her again and held up his healed palm.

  Voices from the hallway, speaking an unfamiliar language or maybe a dozen unfamiliar languages, prevented her from asking Ninurta what the hell her ability to heal had to do with the fate of the Tuatha Dé. Was she supposed to heal everyone who fell on the battlefield in the upcoming war? And how? How would she have not gotten killed herself as she tried to keep the Irish and their allies alive? She wasn’t a fighter.

  Cameron.

  He was supposed to become the next sun god, the greatest warrior the Tuatha Dé had ever known. And it was his fate to keep me alive while I healed the others.

  Ninurta looked away from the hallway and tilted his head at her, studying her, one thin dark eyebrow raised.

  “Come on,” he said. “Since you’re so bored in here, you can see how we are preparing to enter the Otherworld to wage war.”

  Goose bumps broke out across her arms, but she was intrigued by his offer. He motioned for her to enter the hallway first and the voices fell silent, even though she couldn’t understand them. They probably hadn’t fallen silent out of fear she’d overhear something important anyway; it probably had far more to do with Ninurta being in their presence because they lowered their eyes as he passed.

  Ninurta didn’t acknowledge them.

  Of the many men and women she passed on the way to Ninurta’s staging area, she sensed a fairly even mixture of gods and demigods. Some had familiar signatures and she recognized them as Norse or Slavic demigods. There were surprisingly few Mesopotamian gods or demigods who had agreed to wage this war under Ninurta’s leadership. She wondered how many were still alive or if they just knew him well enough not to trust him.

  Ninurta still followed behind her and he must have found that thought amusing because he chuckled but didn’t bother telling her which guess was correct. They walked through the garden she’d admired from the windows and into another building, this one a singular room with high ceilings and table after table filled with instruments of war.