In the ensuing chaos unfolding across the palace, Horus got as far as the inner courtyard leading to the queen's apartments before a pair of royal guards prevented him from going any further. They crossed their spears before him, and glared at him from under their vermillion-plumed golden helmets.

"My woman, the healer Baalat, is in the queen's presence," Horus said, struggling to catch his breath. "I must see her."

"The healer cannot leave the queen's presence without Queen Welyn's permission," the taller of the guards said.

"Then," Horus retorted, bridling at the guard's condescending tone, "I would ask Baalat be advised Horus is waiting without, and carries a message of great importance for her."

"We cannot leave our post," the shorter guard replied, bland. "If you wish to send a message, you must write it down and give it to a palace messenger. It is protocol."

"Protocol? Now?" Horus cried, his patience shot. "I am not going to fetch a messenger. I am right here! Have you no idea what is unfolding? How much danger Baalat is—"

From behind, a shout. "Make way by order of the king."

The guards snapped their spears back and stood to attention, their eyes fixed straight ahead, blank. A shove, and Horus stumbled, shouldered aside by a phalanx of soldiers wearing full armor, their hips bristling with daggers and short swords.

One strode ahead of the group, the plume of his helmet higher and fuller than the rest. He pulled it off and rested it in the crook of his arm before pushing open the double doors to the queen's apartment.

"My lady queen," he called as he entered, "I come by the order of the king. You are to remain in your residence, but your companions and serving women are commanded to come with me to join the other women assembled on the west garden's terrace." He moved deeper into the apartment, followed by the soldiers, his words becoming indistinct, harsh, impatient, lost to the thuds of their footfalls.

From further within the apartment feminine cries of distress rippled out, crescendoing, sharp, pungent with terror. Their fear slithered into the courtyard and wrapped itself around Horus. He stood staring at the open door, panting, furious. Baalat was in there, alone, defenseless. With a roar, he balled up his fists and threw himself at the guards, enduring the retaliations of the two men, cursing the loss of his once-superior strength and enhancements, determined not to fall. Caught in a choking grip of one of the guards, his shoved his knee once, twice, deep into the groin of the other guard. The guard staggered and fell to his knees, retching. One down. Throwing his head back, a shear of blunted pain scoured his vision, and from behind, the satisfying crunch of bone breaking. Freed by the bloodied, bellowing guard, he spun around and rammed his elbow into his oppressor's throat. Not waiting to see if the guards stayed down, he threw himself past the double doors and lunged into the pandemonium of the queen's reception hall, his eyes raking over the bedlam, searching, frantic, for the one who possessed his heart.

More than a two dozen scantily-clad women fled from the soldiers, exotic creatures draped in gold, jewels, feathers, and silk. The queen had risen from her golden seat and cried her resistance, her refusal to obey, demanding the soldiers leave her and her women in peace at once. None heeded her.

A raven-haired woman in a near-transparent gown of violet draped over a golden undergarment collided with Horus. She stumbled away and clung to one of the gold and white pillars. A soldier lunged after her and caught her around her waist. He tugged on her and pulled her free, her shrieks of panic clawing into Horus's ears.

"Baalat!" Horus shouted, his voice barely rising over the screams of the women and bellows of the soldiers.

Horus.

He spun around, cut between hope and dread he had imagined her voice. Desperate, he pushed through the melee, toward where he sensed she had called to him. There. Behind a screen, deeper in the apartment, a door, concealed to those who didn't know where to look. He cast a quick look around to check if any regarded him. No one did. Before the queen's seat, several soldiers had pinned the queen's women to the floor, where they struggled, helpless against the soldiers' implacable, unforgiving grips. Numb, the queen surveyed the wreckage of what remained of her once-beautiful reception hall—the toppled divans and overturned tables; the spilled wine; strewn cups; shattered plant pots, and ruined cushions, their feathers drifting, innocent, through the air—her eyes bright with tears, and her fists clenched at her sides.

Keeping his head down, Horus worked his way around a cluster of soldiers struggling to restrain their captives, who clawed and kicked, wailing, begging, desperate to escape their fate, and slid behind the screen and through the narrow door into a room, fresh with the scent of jasmine and echoing with the burble of running water. Within, from the curtained shadows of the queen's marble toilet, Baalat stepped out clutching the knife she used for surgical procedures. It fell from her fingers and hit the rug with a dull thud. He saw his name on her lips; the tears of relief, burning, hot in her eyes.

He crossed the space in two strides and caught her face in his hands, his mouth going to hers, savage, fierce.

"My love," he cried as he pulled free, stroking her cheeks with his thumbs, reverent, "oh my love, I thought I had lost you."

She clung to him, her fingers digging into his shoulders. "We saw it all," she shuddered against his chest, "from the terrace. He's you. But not you. He's an abomination of everything you once were."

"He belongs to Marduk," Horus muttered, bitter. "He can be nothing else." He bent to press a kiss against the crown of Baalat's head. A dense pulse of guilt slammed into him. It should be him enslaved to Marduk, not Sethi. "I underestimated how far Marduk would go to avenge Zarpanitu."

Out in the hall, the desperate cries of the women ebbed. The heavy tread of the soldiers retreated, fading into the distance. A dull thud reverberated in their wake as the outer doors closed. Silence fell. A heartbeat later, the soft sound of weeping. Slipping out from Horus's embrace, Baalat crept to the door and went to the screen. He followed, wary, aware the guards would have roused by now and would be looking for him. From behind the screen he eyed the hall. It lay in ruins, as though ransacked by looters. Apart from the queen's chair, almost everything else had been broken, overturned, or stained. The emptiness of the vast, pillared hall bore down on him, oppressive. A space like this was meant to be filled with society, laughter, music, and poetry. Now, there was nothing, only a yawning, barren cavern tainted by the darkness of what had just unfolded.

Alone, her face in her hands, the young queen huddled into herself, weeping hard. Baalat slipped through the hall's wreckage and knelt before the queen, who lifted her head, startled, her fine, even features blotchy and red. She stared at Baalat, astonished.

"How are you still here?" she asked, her voice still regal through her tears.

"I hid in your water closet," Baalat answered. She gestured to Horus. "My husband, Horus. He came to protect me."

Queen Welyn nodded, vague. She looked over the hall, her hollow gaze pausing on the fragile silver links of a trampled waist-chain, lost in the fracas by one of her companions. "My husband the king knows the prophecy as well as any of us, and yet he has knelt to the one who will destroy Elati. How could he betray his people? How could he betray me? Why did he not stand against the invader and fight?"

"My lady," Horus said, bowing his head, "the king has bought Serde time, and saved countless lives. The enemy is not the one who has come today, but another, the one who controls him. The one called Marduk. It is he whom all of Elati must stand against."

The queen blinked. She cut a sharp look at Horus. "And who is this Marduk?"

"A very dangerous, very patient and persistent enemy," Horus answered, folding his arms over his chest. His gaze moved to the terrace, from where, below, the weeping of the captured women rose and fell, a susurration of fear and desolation.

"And how could you possibly know this?" Queen Welyn demanded, her tone hardening. "The mere husband of a healer?"

"I was not always thus," Horus snapped, his eyes sliding back to the queen's, daring her to challenge him. "Once, I was more powerful than all the kings of the world. To save my consort, I sacrificed my immortal light to another. While I was weak, Marduk defeated me. Baalat followed me soon after."

The queen paled. She rose and took a step toward him, eyeing him, suspicious. "Though what you say challenges everything I know, let us assume you speak the truth. Tell me, if you have been defeated by Marduk, how is it you are now alive in Elati?"

"The Creator granted us another chance to live," Horus replied, glancing at Baalat, who met his look, tense, "though no longer as gods, but as mortals. The Creator said those who would stand against Marduk would need all the help they could get."

Queen Welyn said nothing for a long time. She folded her hands over her waist, her fingers laden with jewels and gold.

"And you were gods of what?" she asked, low.

"I, of war," Horus said, holding her gaze, "and Baalat of healing."

When the queen fell silent again. He continued, "The one who has come today was once a mortal, the commander of an army. He was good, honorable, just, and willing to sacrifice everything for the woman he loved. Whatever he has been twisted into by Marduk is the opposite of the man I returned to life."

The queen's eyes moved to Baalat, examining her, then returned to him. Her gaze drifted once more to the ruins of her apartment. "Although what you say stretches the limits of what I am willing to believe, if the Creator has sent you to us, who am I to stand in his way? If you have already faced the one called Marduk, you will know things. Many things. Therefore, you must aid us."

"I would be honored," Horus said, and meant it. Anticipation rippled through him. Baalat's fingers touched his arm. He caught her look, her acceptance their reprieve was at its end, the fight begun once more. He covered her fingers with his hand, and gave them a gentle squeeze. Purpose surged through him. This time Marduk would fall. He would not fail a second time. "If I may," he said, "I would like to send one of the falcons with the tribute."

Queen Welyn's eyebrows folded together, though her gaze lingered on the fragments of a shattered mirror spread over a rug, its jagged pieces glittering in the light of the sun. "Why?"

"Because if one of Ikalur's captives learns where they have been taken, they can send the bird back to me with a message. From them we will know where Marduk is hiding."

The queen nodded. "You may send Tyrn. She is the fastest." She met his eyes, hers veiled. "Do not fail us, Horus, once-god of war."