Jess laughed bitterly. “As if I ever had a choice.”
“You always have a choice," Twilight softly reproved. "Not that I ever had a doubt as to what your choice would be, from the very first time an incredibly foolish child braved the very depths of the Void to save a pair of doomed Ancients, to whom she owed nothing."
Jess turned around.
She beheld the frightened gaze of a boy, no more than ten, shivering and naked, standing beside the blossom covered remains of an enemy recently defeated.
Jess shook, struck with the sudden realization that she knew this boy. Somehow. Her imagination was caught by the strangest flight of fancy, imagining the two of them dancing around a sacred tree, along with countless other children, like fae spirits innocent of worry or care, singing the song of lives loved and lost, racing across a wondrous garden of endless beauty, endless possibility, before a brilliant bridge of starlight and rainbow would call them to their next grand adventure in their eternal journey.
She imagined them safely ensconced within a perpetually blooming shelter, an island surrounded by stormy seas awash with the shrieks and wails of countless damned souls drowned within its endless depths. Yet utterly safe they were within their sacred garden, even as uncountable Hells gnashed and roared in all directions, ever hungry for any unwary soul to slip and fall away from the garden's gentle shores.
Ever ready to consume them.
Ever ready to pull them free of the comforting shade of the eternal tree, torn broken and bleeding back under the pitiless sun of the burning Hells below.
The child looked at her in mounting terror, even as Jess approached.
Jess felt her gut clench, understanding the source of the child’s horror.
She saw the rusted chain, trailing off in directions hideous and strange, the final link burrowed into the boy's suppurating flesh, dooming him to the nightmares that awaited him below.
His helpless eyes tore into her heart. "Jess, Jess, what's happening? What did I do?" He shook his head in bitter futility, sickened as what seemed the final play of his existence flickered before his eyes. "Oh by Heavens, why did I do those things?" His young face clenched in an expression awful to see, so bitter was his regret.
Jessica’s heart swelled with pity. She knew his tales. All of them. The daring young rogue who had laughed at his tormentors even as they had striven to rob him and his young wife in their carriage centuries ago, dying to their wicked blades even as he protected his beloved sufficient for their waylaid guard to at last arrive.
The tale of an old man, bent with time but eyes graced with warm memories and a gentle smile ever ready to turn to laughter, sharing a cup of mead with a crimson haired woman who would one day become a queen of such dread renown the world would remember her reign of terror a thousand years hence. And most profoundly, she remembered the tale of a brave guardsman rescuing children caught in a burning barn, saving three before collapsing in exhaustion, renowned as a hero throughout that ancient holding.
All those lives this young boy had lived, all those roles he had played, some lives corrupt and desperate, many noble and true. And now he was being pulled into the Hells below, bound by a contract that would claim his very soul, bind him into eternal torment, to return to the garden of life and rebirth nevermore.
“Jezabelle, please! Help me! You are the only one who ever cared about any of us!” The young soul began to cry out in terror, hand desperately reaching out, even as he began to fade from sight.
“Jess?” Twilight’s calm query cut through her sudden shock, unable to bear the hideous weight suddenly placed upon her soul.
“It's true, then. All of it." Jess collapsed to her knees, shuddering violently, mind spinning with the horror of darkest dreams grinning back at her, real as day. "Whenever I'd wake up, at the tail end of sleep, overwhelmed by nightmares I could not name… it wasn't just a dream, was it kitty?"
Twilight's piercing gaze, denying nothing, left her breathless. "I think you already know the answer to that, Jezabelle. It is your move. What will you do?"
Jess felt herself shake with a bitterness so profound she wanted to howl her fury. "I am going to claim that which is mine, and if anyone or anything tries to stop me, I will devour them!"
Her hound of shadow howled in seeming approval of her words, even as Twilight flashed a bemused grin. "I expected no less, my queen. Come. Sense with your mind the path through Shadow leading to the outskirts of your garden. It is not too late to follow, should you choose to do so.”
Jess forced herself to focus, seeing the glimmering trail winding through Shadow, skirting upon the very edges of the Abyss beyond. Wielding her crimson blade of thorns, feeling the strength of the forest entire envelop and embrace her, Jess raced to follow, and she too faded from sight, and the dark woods were quiet once more, save for the odd rustle amongst the leaves, for all that the night air had gone utterly still.
21
The narrow path they followed seemed to stretch endlessly forward, winding through both wood and Shadow, yet oddly Jess felt neither rushed nor impatient. For all that the journey was unfathomable, she sensed somehow as well that it stood outside of time. She focused her will on the one thing that mattered, the brilliant flame of dream and possibility resonating within the fragile soul she would reclaim.
Jess could feel changes occurring to the endlessly stretching realm of leaden skies, shadowy trees perpetually sensed yet never seen overarching the endless road she strode upon. The path forward became jagged, then cobbled, even as the shadowy canopy overhead became overarching rooftops. The sudden stink of open sewers, exotic spices and a myriad other scents and sounds confirmed that the path through endless wood and vast empty spaces had somehow transformed into a cobbled alleyway lost in shadows spilling into a busy thoroughfare just ahead. A thoroughfare alive with the sounds of whistles, criers, the steady clop of carriage horses and a myriad other sounds and smells characteristic of a great city.
Jess blinked, finding herself in petticoats of finest silk under an ivory white dress of flowing cotton, wearing glossy boots far smaller than she remembered, and tiny white gloves to match her hands. Within her gloved right hand she felt the firmly clenched hilt of a smallsword, the swept hilt pommel graced with rubies and sapphires, blade securely fastened by a silk and silver buckled sword belt snugly cinched just over her hips.
"Angels above, Twilight, what's going on?" Jess whispered in a strangely high-pitched voice.
The sight of her familiar wearing bell and ribbons sitting comfortably upon the shoulders of her exquisitely groomed wolfhound was enough to make her chuckle with a child’s mirth.
She gasped in alarm, blinking, realizing her familiars weren’t the only ones who had changed. “Bloody hells.” She took to Malek’s expression with relish.
“Close enough,” Twilight smirked. “It would be more accurate to say we are on the edge of such, in the great metropolis of Discordia, where so very many mundane capitals of commerce and trade intersect. Crooked alleys and graceful boulevards alike leading those desperate and foolhardy enough to wager their very souls for the chance of making their fortunes.” Her familiar’s smile turned cold. “So many promised a chance to win back all they had risked, yet so very few find their wagers ending quite as expected, no matter how brilliant the venture they had thought to embrace.”
Jess’s brows furrowed, her soft lips tightening in disapproval. “'Tis a wicked place then.”
Her exquisitely manicured wolfhound growled in agreement, even as he pressed his warm flank against her dress, as if to reassure her. Her left hand began to gently stroke his silken fur, finding comfort in his fierce, loyal presence.
Her familiar nodded. “To say the least, beloved one.” He then turned his head to gaze plaintively into her own. “Any realm that would affect our anthropomorphic resonance sufficiently so as to result in our necessitating these absurd outfits is nothing less than utterly evil. And worse, tasteless.
Jess furrowed her brows. “Is it a
lways like this?”
Twilight’s grin turned wicked. “Only when we are attempting to blend in. As the head of a conquering army, it is a quite different affair, I assure you. We wear no cloaks of pretense when reality itself is screaming to expel your legions before submitting at last to your will, even as the very land trembles and tears itself asunder under the horrific strain of it all.” Twilight sighed. “Ah, memories.”
Jess had tuned out her familiar's commentary, sensing a presence that sent her heart racing, even as she heard a desperate cry, hauntingly familiar. "I feel him. He's just ahead!"
With that Jess dashed out of the cobblestone alleyway and into the seething mass of finely dressed ladies and gentlemen striding purposefully along the main boulevard, her hound and familiar gamely keeping pace by her side.
Jess shook with the wonder of it all. Buildings of stone, wood, and in some cases even steel and glass, all arching high overhead as if they would claw open the very skies above, perpetually roiling with racing clouds of leaden hue that Jess sensed were always on the verge of erupting in a storm of ash and blood, yet never quite spilling over. Ever brooding rains held endlessly at bay, until the ancient horns of entropy at last rang their terrible notes of discord, a dark destiny doomed to manifest at a time and place Jess could only guess at. And even in those dizzying moments she sensed the tormented underpinnings stabilizing those massive edifices, keeping them from crashing down upon the seething thoroughfare below.
A press of a thousand souls surrounded her. Souls and those who smiled hungrily through fire darkened spectacles, lenses of tinted glass, quartz or precious stones, like exotic artifacts depicted, she was sure, in one of master Rens's arcane tomes. And for all that she knew she had never seen their like before, she understood their purpose intuitively. So too the strange top hats and oddly tailed jackets worn by so many self-important gentlemen striding along at their leisure. Men who hid their desperation under expressions of jaded ennui, tapping the ground with sword canes as they passed Jess by, favoring her with looks alternately puzzled, calculating, or avaricious.
Gazes cast by men plagued by desperate vice, or creatures who cloaked their inhuman hungers and amber tinted eyes between those smoky spectacles that hid so much. More than one favored Jess with a certain sharp toothed grin. That was, until she smiled back.
“Move, please," Jess would whisper, her voice cold as death, even as her gloved hand caressed the hilt of her smallsword. A request that caused more than one of the oddly dressed gentlemen who attempted to accost the seemingly vulnerable little waif in their midst to smirk in contempt before suddenly paling, bowing low with a sweep of hat or cape, and crying pardon before darting away.
Twilight grinned. “Pathetic excuses for Fallen. They sense the faintest touch of your power and they’re off scurrying, tales between their legs.” He turned to Jess then. “And bravo to you for keeping your head. We must tread softly here, so please don’t let these fools incite your ire overly much, pathetic trifles that most of them are.”
The wolfhound abruptly barked his approval, even as Jess did her best to dodge around the multitude of oddly accoutered men who towered above her, forced into the shape of a child as she was, in that realm she danced so lightly upon, knowing somehow that she dare not force her own form, as only gently could she maintain the connection between this realm and her own.
It was then she heard the bitter weeping of a child bereft of all hope. But one voice among many softly sobbing souls.
Jess shuddered, sickened, feeling her anxious uncertainty in this strange realm being slowly replaced with a mounting rage.
She heard a low guttural growl and turned toward her wolfhound, only then realizing that the sound had emanated from her own throat. More than one passerby looked at her curiously. Some, the more human among them, appeared discomfited. Others looked amused, their eyes glowing like twin coals even from behind the smoke tinted spectacles they wore.
Jess ignored all of them, darting between their slow-moving forms, dress and petticoats of ivory white and crimson serving as odd counterpoint to the dark gray, maroon, and black favored by so many of the denizens of this realm. At last she broke through the press, dashing down a convenient side alley, larger than most, the end blocked by several bulky figures wielding poleaxes of ancient design, garbed in scaled armor of darkest ebony.
Jess tensed, ready to draw her blade. “Move, please,” was all she said.
Amazingly enough, after a single measuring glance, they bowed low and did just that.
Jess blinked.
Twilight grinned. “Fear not, my mistress. Only those mortals foolish enough to bargain their very souls in this twisted realm open to mortal and Fallen alike are barred entrance here.”
“Makes sense, I suppose,” Jess noted as she warily darted past the two sentinels, on her guard for the unexpected, though she passed them without incident. “If those fools saw the fate that awaited most of them, they would no doubt flee from this city screaming, warning off anyone else who might find the crooked paths leading here.”
“Exactly,” Twilight purred his approval, even as Jess blinked in sudden understanding.
“But wait, Twilight, they let me through! So that means…” And then her mind was wiped clear of all thought as she beheld a scene of twisted nightmare.
In the very heart of the ancient city, behind the fine veneer of stately buildings and majestic boulevards lay the true source of the Discordia’s wealth and power.
Slaves.
A massive market filled with endless rows of lost souls.
Many were chained, others were mounted on great slabs of ice, whimpering in perpetual agony as they writhed against the cruel spikes driven into their flesh, stacked atop one another like so many plates of glass. Others, Jess sensed though could not see, had been transmuted by darkest magic into shimmering coins, the head of each being the face of the captured soul, the back a single line of verse relating to their fall from grace.
Yet one thing they all had in common was the terrible weight of despair emanating from every pore of their being, vacantly staring with the defeated gazes of those who had been tormented and degraded through endless millennia, with absolutely nothing to look forward to, save endless torment for all the centuries to come, until the end of all things eventually brought them the welcome relief of total oblivion.
Jess shuddered at the loathsome horror of it all. She fought desperately not to scream.
Her familiar gently purred, leaping to his favorite perch, gently rubbing his cheek against hers, as if he could read her very mind. “And this is why creatures such as you and I exist, my mistress. For ultimately such discord as you sense here rips apart the very fabric of reality, existence itself screaming for its chosen catalyst to set it all asunder once more. For all things must eventually come to an end. All things. So that the multiverse may one day be reborn anew.” He laughed softly. “But fear not, my mistress. We have millennia, if not a billion turnings of the sun before we need overly trouble ourselves with such concerns. For now, let us focus on what we’ve come for.”
Nodding, Jess bit her lip to focus her furious terror, such that she could taste the hot coppery tang of her own blood, the scent wafting through the air.
Instantly, any number of the soberly dressed gentlemen bargaining with each other while laughing jovially at shared jests even as their merchandise wept and begged, turned around as one, eyes glaring like coals behind their spectacles, dark fangs bursting forth as they gazed her way. It was suddenly obvious what the top hats were hiding so very well as more than one appeared ready to burst under the strain of concealing that which lay hidden, here where they no longer had to play quite so hard at being human.
Suddenly the vast collusion of seeming gentlemen had grown utterly quiet, utterly still, even the occasional woman dressed in petticoats, twirling silken parasols tipped with deadly blades turned to face Jess, all staring at her with a dark sort of hunger, as if they were a flock of vult
ures, eyes locked upon a hobbled doe.
22
Jess could only imagine the terror she should feel, a hundred twisted smiles inexorably cracking open as they gazed upon her; dark hungers and vile appetites slowly revealing themselves, smiles stretching inhumanly wide, showing the twisted black fangs buried just beneath the glistening bone-white grins that had led so many foolish mortals to naïve arrogance and utter folly.
The terror she should feel. When all she felt with the mad pounding of her heart was a curious exhilaration. A dark, terrible hunger.
Jess matched them grin for grin, hungry gaze just as fierce, for all that her countenance was but that of a girl caught just before the first blush of womanhood. With terrible slowness she unsheathed her smallsword, feeling a hot pulse of her blood infuse the thorny hilt, her blade blossoming with crimson thorns. She could feel her clothing transform in odd waves, a suit of leaf and bark that she had no doubt was as strong as steel itself.
She felt the power of the forest roar through her even as she laughed at the assembled army of demons revealing themselves in all their dread glory, knowing she should be overcome by mindless horror, yet unable to feel anything save the darkest of passions, reveling in the fury and savagery to come. Who, after all, was she to these strange people, save a girl whose blood was clearly human, wielding a blade made of nothing but vine and thorn?
With twisted smiles the mass of spectators and merchants at the auction of souls slowly moved forward, even as Jess held her blade in terce, point aimed squarely at the milling mass approaching at their indulgent, mocking pace. A quick glance to her rear showed the two guardsmen focused solely on their task, guarding the passageway from the eyes of mortals who might realize their folly and flee, before they doomed themselves for eternity.
“And what mortal child is this, who has stumbled upon our little gathering? Pray tell us your name, little thing." A twisted mocking smile from the fiery-eyed creature serving as their spokesman slowly approached, looking at her curiously. Hungrily. Eyeing her smallsword with amused contempt, his gnarled hand almost sensually stroking the hilt of his own sword cane.
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