Page 28 of Queen Takes Sunfires 2
Liquid fire enfolded my arm. I knew it was Sunzi's sunfire without opening my eyes. I carried some of it inside me since I’d fed on it. My blood deepened my understanding of them both, and then widened to the other warriors’ sunfires. Then deeper yet, to a single sunfire consciousness.
At the heart of the sunfire energy burned one focused will named Quasar. The other sunfires were his extensions. Not children or subordinates. He didn’t order them. He was them and they were him, but over time, they had slowly spun out further from his center. They’d gained their own consciousness and personalities as they interacted with Ra’s soldiers.
For the most part, that had resulted in negative tendencies. They were what they absorbed, and they’d absorbed torture, violence, and hatred from the Soldiers of Light.
As I floated deeper through that consciousness, they filled my mind with visions of their creation. The explosion of a dying star. So much energy. So very bright. Of course, Ra had been attracted to their luminous energy. From him and his growing dominion, they had learned to separate from Quasar and took individual forms. Some preferred a male or female persona, but most of them took a more fluid approach to their existence, blending between animal shapes and marvelous forms that I couldn’t even recognize.
All of them had two things in common. First, formidable, limitless power. The energy of a supermassive black hole spawned by the star’s collapse.
Their second thing in common was rage. They hated what Ra had done to them. He’d enslaved them to power his Soldiers of Light. Even mighty Quasar, the central consciousness of sunfires, was trapped. Unable to escape.
Fueled by their rage at Ra’s dominion, they had started to splinter. Some of that energy had been freed to rage across Eivind and Helayna’s world, wreaking havoc with all the electromagnetic energy of a solar storm.
:Who holds you?:I asked Quasar through the sunfires pouring through me.
An image filled my head: a blood-red giant with horns, wrapped in shadows, with fiery lashes curling around him. I shuddered, unable to hold back a gasp of horror. I knew all too well what those lashes had felt like. How burning acid had dripped from them, leaving pockets of scar tissue all down my back.
Sepdet.
:How many of you does he hold?:
I saw the sunfires here with me, shining and burning around these soldiers who’d freed me from Heliopolis. Then Quasar sent me an image of a massive boiling sun hanging behind Sepdet.
Sick with dread, I could only be thankful I hadn’t tried to attack him at the lake. That Sunzi had been able to get me away.
As I watched the image in my head, I could see a black spot on the fiery sun. All that energy spun around the black spot, dragging more and more energy into it. A black hole, the center of Quasar. His heart, so to speak. The black hole called to me, trying to drag me inside.
For a moment, I stood in that darkness and looked out at the blazing sunfire energy. The inexhaustible, unmeasurable energy of the universe streamed toward me. Through me. Making me the center of the universe. Me. The woman who’d been trapped and helpless for centuries.
If I gained that power, I would never have to be afraid again. I would never be forced to become another god’s captive plaything, no matter how mighty and terrible he might be. The other queens in this world would take notice. I was not a tool to be used, or a blank body trapped with an empty smile frozen on my face.
I controlled my destiny. I controlled my life. I would decide what I did, where I went, and who I kept near me.
Nothing could contain or withstand the sunfires’ energy.
If I could claim it from Sepdet.
The sunfires inside me clamored for the rest of their consciousness. They wanted to be whole and complete again. They wanted to belong to me, for Quasar to be a part of me. Us. But I had no idea how to free him from Sepdet’s hold.
Even with only a fraction of their consciousness inside me, their power burned, melding with my blood to become something so fearsome and devastating that even the Soldiers of Light bowed to it. Their sunfires poured over me, blazing energy lighting me up from the inside out, wrapping me in living flames of pure gold. They pressed against me on all sides, heavy and so warm. They all tasted my blood, soldier and sunfire alike.
It was the most earth-shattering thing I had done or felt. Ever.Idecided to offer my blood. I allowed them closer. I chose.Me.
Sheer joy bubbled up inside me. This was what I had been meant to enjoy. This was my instinct. My purpose. To give of my blood and feast on them, while blazing power flowed over and through me like streaming stars.
And this was only the candle flickering against the massive sun. When I finally held Quasar, all the power of the universe would be at my fingertips.
* * *
SUN TZU
I didn't knowwhat had happened. Disoriented, I looked around, slowly sitting up as if I'd fallen asleep.
Bodies littered a field that stretched as far as I could see. Scavenger birds hopped from corpse to corpse, seeking out the choicest tidbits first. The stench told me the bodies had been baking in the sun for days.
I climbed to my feet, surprised that I wasn't injured. Dried blood and mud coated my armor, and my helmet was gone, along with my sword. Automatically, my hand went to my hip, finding the knife I always wore on my belt, though I didn't unsheathe it.
There was no need. Nothing stirred as far as I could see other than the feasting birds.
