The desert had gone quiet.
The heat still shimmered over the dunes, glass still cracked underfoot, but the battle was finished. Ra's fire had been buried in the sand, Khonsu's silver glow snuffed out, and the corpses of Egypt's Primordials lay heavy as mountains. The Olympians did not cheer. There was no victory in it, only silence and the sound of their breathing.
Zeus sat apart from them, his back resting against the melted bones of a broken pyramid. His storm had dimmed down to faint sparks rolling lazily across his arms, more like restless embers than fury. His fists, cracked and raw, finally lay still at his sides. For the first time since this war began, he let himself close his eyes.
