“NOW WOULD BE A GREAT TIME FOR YOU TO BREAK YOUR vow of nonviolence,” I said to Gilgamesh. “Just for an hour or so.”

He shook his head.

“Half an hour? Ten minutes?”

The flies began a strange, repetitive drone, which rose and dropped with a harsh, military rhythm.

I admit I was terrified. Who wouldn’t be? I wanted to go home and hide under the covers until it was all over. Let someone else take care of it.

Home? I didn’t have one anymore.

And that was what this was all about.

I’d seen the pain in my parents’ eyes when they remembered Iraq. They’d talk about the bakery on the corner, the schools they’d gone to, how they’d met at the University of Baghdad.…Then, inevitably, they’d fall quiet and the sadness would creep in. They hadn’t been able to save their original home, and they’d struggled and suffered to build a new one here, in Manhattan. I wasn’t about to let them lose it.

Belet didn’t have a home. She didn’t even have any family. So what was she fighting for? She looked at me sharply, as if she’d sensed my thoughts. It was what she did, simple as that. Ishtar had taught her war like other moms taught their kids cooking or soccer.

The bushes to our left shook, and my heart jumped. Gilgamesh gestured with his shovel. “They’re here.” He walked outside, and we followed.

This was it. I grabbed a garden pick.

We climbed through the broken panes and twisted metal and out into the park itself. The ziggurat wasn’t a haven anymore. We stood among the decaying, rotting vegetation and faced our enemies. Old enemies.

“Well, lookie here, my friends. Our waiting paid off. I told you they’d be back, but all you did was scoff.”

Sidana scurried toward us through the wilted foliage. He’d swollen to grotesque proportions since I’d last seen him, and he was now bigger than a horse. Sharp, venom-coated barbs covered his tail. Other demons bounded alongside him: Idiptu, Tirid, and some I didn’t recognize—all bigger, uglier, more diseased. Behind them came the poxies, row after row, going back as far as I could see.

I glanced at Belet. “Looks like everyone’s here.”

“Except Nergal. The coward just sent his minions.” Belet gave Kasusu a sharp flick. “Well?”

The sword muttered. “Let’s swat some flies.”

But Gilgamesh had other plans. He strode out ahead of us, armed with nothing but his shovel. Even so, all the monsters took a step back. “Leave now, demon! And take your disease-ridden mob with you!”

“Or what, O Gilgamesh the Great?” Sidana said with a sneer. “Step aside before it’s too late.”

“This place, these people, are under my protection.” Gilgamesh flipped the shovel from one hand to another.

The clouds above darkened, and not with flies but a swelling storm. Lightning flashed within the broiling mass, and the sky rumbled. The air filled with static, making my hairs stand on end. The monsters shifted uneasily, snarling and tearing at the trees in frustration. A few edged closer, but none wanted to be first in line. Idiptu pointed an accusing claw at us. “Lord Nergal demands your allegiance!”

Gilgamesh’s shovel crackled. The earth around him shook, and sparks jumped across his skin. “Then tell him to come here and demand it himself. I will not bow to his sniveling lackeys.”

Under the stench of rotting vegetation, I smelled burning ozone as the air filled with ions. The rumbling turned into a tree-shaking thunder.

Gilgamesh twirled the shovel like a baton.

“You try my patience, demon.”

I tightened my grip on my pick. It was vibrating as strange energy radiated from Gilgamesh’s shovel. Yes, really.

Sidana gnashed his crooked teeth. “You laid down your arms to grow plant and flower. Begone, Gilgamesh, for you have no power!”

“Power?” Gilgamesh furrowed his brow, but in the depths of his eyes, something glowed. “I may have relinquished weapons, demon, but do not be foolish enough to think I’ve given up an ounce of my power.”

He slammed his shovel into the earth.

The shock wave hurled us off our feet. As the energy rippled out from the epicenter, it magnified in strength. The demons tumbled and poxies were sent into the air as trees were torn from the earth and the buildings around Central Park lost their windows in a single devastating sonic explosion.

The sky shook with endless thunder and erupted with lightning, the clouds bursting with a billion joules of energy. Jagged bolts struck all around us, trees burst into flames, and deep crevasses appeared in the earth. The ziggurat’s iron frame became supercharged as the bolts hit it again and again.

I grabbed hold of Belet before she was swept away by the hurricane-force wind and pulled her back inside the greenhouse. “Are you okay?” I shouted.

She nodded as the gust whipped loose soil and leaves all around us. “I think my ears popped!”

Gilgamesh stood on the first tier of the ziggurat, surrounded by a crackling cage of electricity. The entire greenhouse hummed with power, amplifying his until he was a one-man climate-change phenomenon. His shovel smoked as he raised it above his head like a lightning rod and used it to direct the bolts. They zigzagged across the park in blinding flashes, illuminating the terrified faces of poxies and demons alike. Some began to flee.

But for every one that ran away, a dozen more poured forward. A few tried to climb the frame of the structure and got electrocuted and fell, stunned and twitching uncontrollably. The whole greenhouse came to life as vines tangled poxies, gigantic Venus flytraps gulped down demons, and trees swatted the waves of flies filling the air.

Even with the help of the weather and vegetation, though, Gilgamesh was struggling to hold the enemy back. The blight was spreading thick and fast; the greenery was withering, and trees fell as their roots died.

I zipped my jacket to my chin and told Belet, “We need to get out of here. Save the you-know-what.”

“I want to fight!” she said, swinging Kasusu overhead.

“Why?” I pointed up to our luminescent demigod. “We’ve got him!”

The storm continued to rage inside and outside the ziggurat. The huge trees trembled and swayed as the park echoed with thunderous booms.

Sidana charged me. He bounded over a fallen oak tree, his long claws churning up the dirt. His beady red eyes were ablaze with rabid fury as he rammed his head into my chest.

I spun a dozen feet through the air and crashed into a tree trunk. I had just enough time to wrap my hands around his snout before he tried to fit my head into his jaws. He clawed the air furiously, trying to gut me.

And then he screamed. He jerked backward, thrashing. His tail flicked uncontrollably as he scuttled away, staring down at an oozing gash across his belly.

Belet rose to her feet and flicked blood off Kasusu. The sword spoke. “One skewered rat coming right up.”

But even in his death throes the rat was lethal. His tail whipped through the air.…

“Belet, watch out!”

She slashed the hideous appendage, and Sidana howled as it flew off. Then he was silent and still.

But Belet stumbled and dropped to her knees.

“Belet!” I was beside her in an instant.

The rat’s barbs had ripped her Kevlar as if it were tissue paper. She winced as I unbuckled the vest and gently spread it open. I could see the venom turning her belly black even as her face turned pale.

“You’ll be okay, you’ll be okay.…” I fumbled with my jacket zipper. “You’ll be okay.…”

“Inshallah?” she hissed through gritted teeth.

While still wearing the big gardening gloves, I pulled out the flower. A single petal would heal everything. We’d still have several left for our magical antidote. The flower’s light spread over Belet, and I watched her sigh, the pain already lifting.

Sidana was dead, but I should have remembered Idiptu.

His tongue wrapped around my arm, from elbow to wrist. One tug and I was whipped across the ground. I plowed through the dirt, rolling over and over. Dazed and gasping for breath, I stared up and there he was, towering over me, grinning.

He ripped the flower out of my hand.