Kataida wrapped her arms around her little brother and hugged him, fiercely, before she put him on the floor, returning his stuffed dragon and blanket and trying her best to smile. She didn’t want him near her when she felt like this. “Thank you, Malik. I’m all right.”
“Come on over here,” Theron said, sliding from his knees to the floor, patting it. “You can sit with me.”
Malik must have been too tired to ask why they were all there, simply moving to sit by his big brother and curling up with his head in Theron’s lap. Theron patted his back, and Kataida looked at her family, and then out of the window. The sky was beginning to lighten, and somewhere the god of war was walkingwith their sibling Death through the desert, and war would break with the dawn over Arktos.
Gods help me, but I have to get out of here,she thought, as the realization rose within her just as the sun rose in the east. She might welcome combat, war, even bloodshed, but she would not bring that down on her family. Azaiah had once told her she was fit for what called to her–and maybe she was. Maybe it made her a monster, but that didn’t mean it wasn’ttrue.
Her family talked to each other, making plans, speculating, in the few quiet moments before the Arkoudai machine readied itself for whatever came with the dawn. But all she could see was the memory of a god’s burning smile, eyes bright with feverish adoration, and all she could hear were the war drums, loud and familiar in her head, like the only song she’d ever known.
Azaiah liked to walk. It was his nature to take things slow, to stop and appreciate the way a tree angled toward the sun or an interesting rock formation. Small, slow things fascinated him, and Ares used to find him pausing to watch an insect crawl over a flower as though it were the loveliest phenomenon in nature. It was partly why, despite the fact that he was much younger than them, Ares saw him as a stately older brother.
Ares walked too quickly for comfort, stopping every few feet and waiting anxiously for Azaiah to catch up. They couldn’t keep still now that they were awake, knowing that the spirit of Atreus Akti had been drawn to them like a moth to a flame.
“I knew he was meant to be my companion,” Ares said for the fifth time, as Azaiah frowned in that slight look of concern he always wore when Ares mentioned Atreus. “It was a mistakewhen he died. The blood loss, it does things to your mind. He did love me,” they added, whipping around to look at Azaiah.
Azaiah rubbed his lower lip with a thumb. “There are many kinds of love,” he said.
“He wielded me,” Ares said. “Mortals don’t go about wielding War without loving me in their heart. Now he’s back, and we can do it properly. He had his rest, I had mine, I did everything as he said.”
“You always were eager to obey him,” Azaiah said, in a slow, cautious voice.
“Weren’t you, with your man?” Ares kicked up a plume of sand with their boot. “And Astra, and Leviathan. All of you found your companions while I slept, but I’d found mine already. He just—He just wasn’t prepared for it yet.”
They could still feel the weight of Atreus’ body in their arms after that last battle. They’d been so certain they could save him if only he agreed to be Ares’ companion, and why wouldn’t he? How many times had he lowered Ares onto soft pillows or fucked them in the aftermath of a battle, the taste of blood still on his fingers? How many times had he asked Ares to become a sword for him so that they could cleave a path through the enemy together? But in the end, Atreus chose rest, and Ares still didn’t know why.
“What did he do to show his love for you?” Azaiah asked, still in that slow tone. Ares shrugged.
“You saw. You were there when the battles were won. He bore me through them, let me taste battle as mortals did, dragged me through the flesh and sinew of his enemies until I was bathing in blood. But you know what love feels like, Azaiah. Your Nyx came around to it.”
“Yes.” Azaiah scratched the back of his neck. “We both took pains to learn much about one another these past centuries. It hasn’t been the same without you.”
“That does concern me, you know.” Ares hopped, frowned, and snapped their fingers at Azaiah. “Let me up. I want to look over that dune.” Azaiah wordlessly held out a hand, and Ares climbed up him like one would a tree, just as they had hundreds of times before. “There. That used to be where a temple to me stood back in Atreus’ time, but it’s gone now. I can barely feel it. This land doesn’t feel like mine anymore, and my power…it’s dim, if I can’t even call to you.”
“You slept too long, sibling. But there will always be a place for you,” Azaiah said, as Ares balanced themself with an elbow on his shoulder, “even in my river.”
“I don’t need your river when I have a companion,” Ares said, and Azaiah made a soft, disapproving noise. “What?”
“You know that souls that return become new people,” he said. “This Kataida, she won’t love you just because you adore her—or adore who her spirit used to be.”
“All she has to do is wield me,” Ares said. “When she uses me as Atreus did, she’ll know.”
“And that’s love?” Azaiah asked.
Ares blinked at Azaiah. That was how it always was, for War. Perhaps because Azaiah’s role was to take souls beyond the river, he didn’t know. Humanity had always shaped them, defined them, begged for the same boons and favors century after century.
“I would have given more, if it had meant sparing Atreus.” Ares dropped to the ground, turning back toward Axon. “But this new soul, she has a fire, I think. It reminds me of the soldiers I used to bless with battle frenzy. I looked at her and I knew she was one of mine.”
“Just as Atreus was?”
Ares frowned. They remembered the first time they’d met Atreus on the battlefield. He’d been like a cold wind blowing through a wildfire, stoking it, directing it—but he hadn’t beenlike Kataida. They hadn’t felt likethissince they’d been standing in their temple in the empire during the height of its conquest. A slight unease worked through them then, wondering at the difference.
“Maybe her soul needed the rest,” Ares said.
“Perhaps.” Azaiah lay a hand on Ares’ shoulder, and Ares pulled it so he wrapped an arm around their shoulders instead. They always felt closest to Azaiah, and missed his nearness. “If this doesn’t go the way you wish, walk with me and Nyx for a time.”
“I can’t. Something is calling me here. War is coming to Arktos, which means you may be following me this time, brother.” Ares smiled, but Azaiah’s wasn’t quite so bright. He loved the mortals he took across the river. Even after so long, he still had a gentle heart.
“Fight well, then,” Azaiah said, and leaned down to kiss Ares’ temple. “I will be close, should you need me, as ever I was.”
