Heroes Die

by Matthew Woodring Stover

  He reached back over his shoulder and touched Kosall’s broad quillions as though he caressed a lover’s thigh. “If I can catch him, I can solve all our problems with a single stroke.”

  “Time grows short,” Toa-Sytell said with a nod toward the rising sun, now high above the rooftops. “Waste none of it.”

  Berne held out his blood-soaked hand. “Good luck with Ma’elKoth.”

  Toa-Sytell shook it without hesitation. “Luck to you, Berne. And good hunting.”

  6

  KIERENDAL COULD FEEL each blink as though the leading edges of her eyelids were dusted with broken glass. Cautiously, extending her Shell wide and deep so that the pull would be difficult to detect, she allowed fatigue-suppressing energy to trickle in from the Flow. She’d have plenty of time to rest once this show was over.

  Beside her, the King of Cant stared out the window at the crowds below. His Shell swirled with silver that glittered with rosy, dawn-colored highlights. Some of those highlights, no doubt, sprang from his appreciation for the face and form she presented to him. Over the past night and day, she had tuned the illusion of her appearance in careful, gradual increments—shading her hair toward curls in richer shades of chestnut, her eyes toward hazel, layering her skeletal flanks with the look and feel of lean tawny muscle, to capture just that hue in his Shell.

  Any man is easier to control when you can lead him by his dick.

  “Those guys, there, they’re ours, aren’t they?” Majesty’s voice thickened with excitement. “Gods, those too, they could be ours. See them? Didn’t you do a couple with the plumed cap and tights look?”

  Kierendal twisted to glance lazily out the window, not really interested in the thronging crowds massing to file into Victory Stadium. For her, the real action was taking place right here in this room with Majesty.

  “I don’t know,” she said. “They could be. I did so many, really, that I can’t remember them all.”

  “And you can’t tell, right? You can’t look down there and tell which are ours? Even though you did the spells yourself?”

  Kierendal shrugged. “The griffinstones power the illusions; they draw no Flow. Undetectable.”

  “Good thing, too. Fucking body searches—without your magick I don’t think we’d get a toothpick in there.” When he looked at her, the thrill in his eyes made him almost attractive. “You sure you don’t want to join me? Gonna be a fucking spectacular show.”

  Kierendal smiled like a cat. “I’m a lover, not a fighter.”

  She had no intention of being anywhere near the stadium at noon.

  If she could help it, she never wanted to be that close to Caine again.

  The energy that surrounded him, that oceanic, tidal current of Flow that somehow followed him—she couldn’t tell what it was, or how he did it. She was fairly certain that he had no idea of the power that rolled through his life. Perhaps it was a human thing; perhaps, as a species, they had more power below the surface of their consciousness than did any primal mage, and she had only become aware of it through her close study of Caine’s oddly black Shell. That power seemed to grow on him, to gather into itself, doubling and redoubling like a river piling up behind a weakening dam. She had some clue what effect it might have when released: she had seen the hints of it during the standoff with Majesty at Alien Games.

  It would be chaos. Pure destruction.

  She suspected that it was that dark current in the Flow that had so nearly escalated the situation at AG out of anyone’s control; she suspected that Caine, by his very existence, piled up potential forces like snow and rock in the Gods’ Teeth. Where peace had reigned for years, one shout from Caine might bring down an avalanche.

  She had no intention of being downslope from him. Not this time.

  No point in trying to explain this to Majesty. He’d never believe her. Besides, if he died today, she’d have a fair chance at gathering whatever survived of the Kingdom of Cant under her hand. On balance, of course, she’d prefer that he lived, and that Caine’s plan went perfectly; she was well on her way to permanently cementing her relationship with Majesty.

  Speaking of that, she thought, glancing at the entourage of mingled Subjects and Faces that littered the rest of the room. “I think,” she said slowly, “that we should empty this room, so that we can, mmm, negotiate some more.”

  The hand that she laid on Majesty’s arm was warmer than a human’s, and it sparked some answering heat in his smile.

  “I’m not sure we have time,” he answered.

  Three minutes at most, she thought, but kept that thought off her face. “Mmm, if you say so.” She sighed as though disappointed; his attention had already been drawn away by the scene outside. “Where are your Dukes?”

  “Deofad’s already inside the stadium. Paslava . . . well . . .” He turned to her again, and his grin got wide and slightly malicious. “Paslava’ll be here later. Right now, he’s got some business in the caverns.”

  7

  ARTURO KOLLBERG MOPPED sweat from his upper lip and leaned close to the chairscreen’s mike to half whisper hoarsely, “No, dammit! No feed, not now.”

  The VP for Marketing frowned a Businessman disapproval through the screen at him. “They’re all over me on this, Art. They want another feed, just like the other day.” He lowered his voice to a whisper. “I’ve just heard from the Board . . .”

  Kollberg twitched involuntarily—that ants-on-the-skin feeling was back again. He glanced over his shoulder at the two soapies. Their face shields seemed to be directed at the phosphene kaleidoscope of the POV screen, but he had no way to know for sure.

  “You’ll just have to wait,” he insisted. “All of you, you’ll have to wait. Nothing’s happening right now, for Christ’s sake!” His eyes bulged and he spoke through teeth clenched so hard his jaw hurt. “Nothing’s happened for hours! He’s asleep, all right?”

  “Jesus, Art, calm down. Okay, he’s asleep. No problem. But I want an assurance that we’ll get a feed for the big blow-off, yeah? This thing he’s supposed to be pulling on Ma’elKoth—we want this live on the net. That Clearlake guy, the Board’s very up on him right now. They want him hosting.”

  Kollberg’s hand trembled as he wiped perspiration back into the thin strands of hair that were already pasted down with his sweat. “You’ll kill our cube sales. You know that, don’t you? That’s the climax of the whole damned Adventure! Caine’s the best at this—you know he is. I’ve been running Caine’s Adventures for fifteen years. This is his trademark. He’s pulling everything together for this show at the stadium. It’s all going to happen at once. Put it out live and everyone in the world will know how it comes out!”

  “We’re okay with this. The Board’s okay with this, Art. The fees for the feed will cover any drop in the cubes—and we’re projecting that any drop will be minimal. This is a collectible, Art. Especially if he dies.”

  8

  IT WAS HEARING distant voices speak the name Caine that brought Pallas drifting upward like a bubble through the layers of Chambaraya’s song. There was no knowing how long she had let the currents of song carry her gently away from the awareness of her body; her last clear memory was of speaking to Caine, here from the body that was tied upon the altar.

  He shone like a star, she thought. There was some power within him, something not Flow-based—but perhaps Flow-related—some dynamic energy of life that had called to her within her river dreams. It hadn’t come from the Flow or from any outside source; the very room had heated up at his entrance as though he carried a furnace within his chest. How could she never have seen this before?

  Had it never been there?

  All of their struggles, all the wounds inflicted and taken on both sides, his endlessly simmering anger, her tangled envy, all seemed so distant, so trivial. She couldn’t comprehend, from this perspective, how they could have made each other so unhappy.

  There is nothing easier than happiness; it’s the feeling that comes when you’re open to t
he life that flows through you, when you know that you are the river and the river is you. She and Caine, they had somehow never found that. Cut off from each other, cut off from themselves, they had clutched at their lives, had scrabbled for them like misers hugging gold, pretending that life itself could be hoarded, or spent.

  Ridiculous.

  No wonder they couldn’t live together.

  If only she could tell him that, somehow get through to him, tell him how easy it is to be happy.

  She knew that she didn’t have much time, that this body was dying, that the life she had borrowed through thirty-three years was leaking out through the hole in her lung. This prospect didn’t distress her. It was nothing more than the little rivulet called Shanna Leighton, called Pallas Ril, slowly drying as its water returned to the river. She only worried about Caine; she hoped that she could hold life inside this body long enough to speak with him one last time.

  She wished she could ask the river how much time she had left, but that way was blocked for her. She could still hear its song, could still let the mingled melodies float her away. No wall of stone or steel or magick itself could sever this link, which was as much a part of her as her heart and her spine, but some immaterial barrier prevented her from adding her own voice to the song, from drawing its power through herself.

  She knew from whence that barrier came: from the same source as the voice that now said, You cannot ask Me to accept this without proof.

  Him, she could see without opening her eyes: a gigantic foaming Kharybdis of Flow, sucking energy in from every direction, draining it to power his massive body and to light his extraordinary mind. The Iron Room rang with its echoes, and every stone of the Colhari Palace resonated with the beat of the Emperor’s heart.

  She knew, vaguely, of the fires and turmoil, of the riots and the fighting in the city outside. From her vantage it seemed that Ma’elKoth’s distress was not the product of the chaos, but was its source. His internal furies had somehow broken out, spilled over, sparked the disorder as though the city itself was an extension of his body.

  She would need her eyes to see the others, but she wasn’t up to that level yet—still rising, registering now the beats of her heart and the pain that came of struggling to breathe. They continued to speak of Caine, though—spoke in voices that she knew.

  And they named him as an Actor.

  She knew in a disconnected way that this was a bad thing, that it would be a problem. As her attention gradually sharpened she heard more of some plan of his they’d discovered, of a silver net and griffinstones, some plan to paint Ma’elKoth in the colors of the Aktiri before thousands of his subjects.

  Ma’elKoth’s voice now came to her in tones of weakness, of self-doubt and inner pain unlike any she’d heard from him.

  Is it possible? I cannot comprehend the depths of . . . No, no, it cannot be! This is impossible! My entire career . . . My rise to the throne, all planned, all the work of an Aktir . . .

  I cannot believe it. I do not believe it.

  As Pallas’ consciousness rose to the surface, she recognized the voice of Toa-Sytell, every bit as neutral as it had been that night she’d overheard him with Majesty.

  “It is an unconscionable risk. You must cancel the ceremony.”

  “Cancel? Now? My Children enter the stadium already; to cancel the ceremony would be an admission of guilt; the result would be the same in the end.”

  His voice became thready with unaccustomed self-pity. “To be tumbled with one swift stroke from the mountaintop unto the depths of a dung heap. Had the other gods hated Me from birth they could hardly have used Me worse. To believe that it could have been planned from the very beginning, that seven years ago Caine brought Me the crown of Dal’kannith to start Me along a path to bring me here, where with one stroke he can shatter the Empire itself . . . Can he be that brilliant? Can he be so far beyond even Me? You—you know him. You are his companion; you have brought Me this news. Speak, now. Tell Me the truth of this man.”

  Pallas wondered fuzzily, Is he talking to me? Does he think I’ll start talking now just for asking? He can’t force my voice by torture or magick, and so he’s decided to be polite?

  A rustle of footsteps, the half-tearing sound of stressed cloth, and she opened her eyes.

  Ma’elKoth faced three-quarters away from her. The oiled muscles in his bare back were rigid as stone. His fist held the tunic of a man, held this man high in the air. Pallas had a vague flash of memory, of Ma’elKoth holding Caine in precisely this fashion—but this wasn’t Caine.

  This man had a broken leg tied to splints with dirty linen, had manacles on his wrists and a bloody bandage tied around one hand, had knotted linen tying shut a painfully swollen, purple-black jaw, his nose equally swollen and spreading blackened rings of bruise around his eyes.

  Not until he spoke did she recognize him.

  “I don’ . . . I can’ . . . All I know I already tol’ you . . .” Lamorak said miserably, his eyes wet and blinking.

  I held this man in my arms, she thought, marveling. Kissed him, made love with him. And now I can’t remember why. . .

  But her Olympian perspective made everything clear. Looking back, the answer became obvious: She’d turned to him because he wasn’t Caine, because he was Caine’s opposite in every way. Tall, and blond, beautiful to look upon and clearly heroic, a good man in every sense of the word, caring and compassionate, romantic and brave.

  And hollow inside. A beautiful shell, fragile as a blown egg.

  This was the final opposite: Caine, at least, was all of a piece. What you saw was what you got. That’s why Caine would never break the way Lamorak had so clearly broken: he was solid, through and through.

  “This, then, is what shall be done,” Ma’elKoth said, turning once again to Toa-Sytell, who stood with respectful stillness nearby. Lamorak dangled trembling from his fist, forgotten. “I am Ma’elKoth. I do not run. I do not hide. If Berne cannot recover the net, I will meet Caine face-to-face upon the arena floor.”

  Toa-Sytell looked alarmed. “Ma’elKoth—”

  “No. If I cower within My palace, Caine’s plan succeeds. I shall reverse this with a single stroke of my own: I will truly be there.”

  He opened his fist, and Lamorak dropped clattering to the floor. “I have never been comfortable with the idea of employing a Fantasy. It would be a fake, a pretense, and I do not lie to My Children. I shall do this ritual in truth. I shall take these lives upon the arena floor. I shall have the memories of Pallas Ril, and of you, Lamorak, however distasteful it may be to absorb such revolting worthlessness.”

  He stepped close to Toa-Sytell and looked down upon his Duke. “Continue the search for Caine. If he can be taken before the ritual, do so. If he must be killed, so be it. I suspect, however, that you will not find him. He’s too resourceful; too ruthless. But I am more than he is. I am Ma’elKoth. Whatever happens, I shall be ready.”

  He clasped his mighty hands together and twisted them against each other, popping his knuckles like a string of firecrackers.

  “I shall be ready, and I shall kill him with My own hand. And then I shall have his memories, as well.”

  All the rich and boundless energy that had drained from his voice before had now rushed back; the maelstrom of Flow that fed him gathered unimaginable power.

  “Then all questions shall, at last, be put to rest.”

  Oh, Hari, Shanna thought, as her eyes drifted closed. The death of this body she could accept with a certain equanimity, but the new star that had shone within Caine was so unexpectedly lovely, a surprise of beauty: a perfect rose in a wasteland.

  I’ll hold on. I’ll find a way. To warn you. To help you. Somehow.

  I can live that long, I think.

  9

  BERNE CLENCHED HIS teeth and resisted the urge to cut his way through the surging crowds.

  The curfew had lifted at midmorning, and it seemed that the whole city had streamed onto the streets. More than one cit
izen received a bone-crushing kick from Berne’s horse, a spirited animal that disliked breasting through the crowds. It rolled its eyes toward anyone approaching its flanks or rear, and Berne let it have its head a little—a few bleeding townsfolk flat in the street behind him went a long way toward clearing a path before him.

  Finally he struggled through to the pissoir closest to the shaft where he’d left his Cats to watch the net. He loose-tied the horse at the post outside, looping the reins through the topmost hook. The lock on the mucker-shaft door squealed and snapped with a simple twist of his wrist. A moment’s work with flint and steel lit the lamp that he took from a peg just inside the door; he strapped the grip to the outside of his hand and went down the ladder into the darkness. He curled his lip against the smell as he sloshed through the puddled urine across the pissoir’s shaft base; he ducked through the cavern entrance and moved at a fast crouch until he could stand upright again.

  Soon he edged along a ledge midway up the curving wall of a gallery that disappeared into darkness below him and fought off the temptation to take the shortcuts that seemed to offer themselves. He kept exactly to the route he’d marked on his way down here before—he well knew that the easiest thing to do in these caverns was to get irretrievably lost and wander until the oil in the lamp died. He clambered down a narrow shaft to a lower cavern. For a moment, he thought he glimpsed lamplight reflecting from rock somewhere ahead. Tiny stalagmites broke away under his boots and skittered loudly across the stone, and the light went out before he could be sure it had ever been there.

  He shook his head. He’d told those idiots No lights. They had each other for company in the darkness, and any lamplight would warn off Caine.

  He arrived at the spot, the broad bowl-shaped depression with the well to one side, and looked around. No sign of his boys; he nodded approval to himself—they were properly remaining covert until sure of his identity. “All right, boys. It’s me. Come on out; there’s a change in our plans.”

  And he stood there, listening to the fading echoes of his voice and the lonely plash of millennial water seeping through the limestone.