by Paul Barrett
Subdue? An interesting word choice. There was a hint of wicked humor in the whispered voice.
“What do you mean?” Fathen asked.
You have been honest with me, but to know true power, you must be honest with yourself. Did you subdue the guard?
“Yes,” Fathen answered, hesitant.
His thoughts returned to that night, memory blurred with the distance of time. He approached the guard, a youth of no more than eighteen, flush with the excitement of his first position of responsibility. Fathen stood before this youngster—the face of a child dressed in the steel and leather of a warrior—and held the archive key aloft, professing an errand for the archive keeper. The guard, following his orders, would not allow him passage, stating only the archive master and those accompanied by him were allowed after sundown, and only then by special dispensation from the bishop.
Fathen tried pleading, begging, and cajoling, but the young guard took his duty seriously. Fathen grew insistent; the guard remained obstinate. Angry and frightened of rousing others, Fathen drew his heavy-hilted dagger. He would knock this child senseless with a well-aimed blow to his unprotected temple.
He delivered a precise, unexpected blow, but what should have been the rounded pommel had become the pointed blade. Instead of a solid thud, a sickening pop sounded as the dirk pierced the skin, a grating hiss as metal slid between bone, and a hollow rush as the soldier exhaled a dying breath. The splash of warm blood struck Fathen’s hand as he pulled the knife away, stunned and dismayed. He had not wanted this to happen. This-
“-was an accident!” Fathen said, his mind returning to the present. “It was an accident. I only meant to knock him unconscious.”
An accident? You wanted to kill that boy. He made you angry, and you wanted to kill him like you want to kill Erick. Isn’t that the truth?
“No.”
Look deeper.
“It’s not true.”
Look deeper. The darkness lunged from its corner and surrounded Fathen. It swirled about him. Its shadowy bulk blocked the lantern light and blinded him to the room.
In removing the distraction of light, the darkness showed Fathen his genuine self. Stripped of rationalization, bereft of false memory, and shorn of all pretenses, the truth lay bare before Fathen, the reality he had denied to preserve the illusion of his sanctity. The revelation staggered him, and he slumped over.
The shadow returned to its corner. Tell me the truth. Tell yourself the truth.
“I... I wanted to kill him,” Fathen said, his voice choked.
Why?
“He made me angry,” Fathen agreed. “The soldier disobeyed my wishes. He countermanded a direct command from a senior priest. He needed reprimanding. To disobey the righteous is death, so says the Tome of the Father and Mother.”
And the Necromancer has made you angry?
“Yes.”
He has insulted you, burned your book, and turned others in the town against you.
“Yes,” Fathen said, his voice hard.
The Necromancer needs to be reprimanded, doesn’t he? To defy the righteous is death.
“He deserves punishment.” Fathen frowned. “But he has left town, and I don’t know where he’s going.”
I know his destination. I will help you find and punish him if that is your wish.
“It is. But what aid can you be? You’re nothing but a shadow and a voice in my head.”
The whisper took on a menacing tone. Have you not learned the shadow is always stronger than the light? As soon as your blade pierced that boy’s brain, you fell under the shadow. You are denied the light. You have preached the words of your dying god for twenty years, but what have you done? Have you saved anybody?
Fathen tried to speak in his defense, but the relentless voice went on.
Have you ever offered comfort to your fellow believers, or counseled them with words of wisdom? No. You give them rote passages from an ancient book that has lost all meaning to you, and you fill them with blandishments you barely remember. Do you know why?
“Why?” Fathen asked, voice trembling, face flush.
Because your faith abandoned you, and when you killed the youth, your dying god abandoned you.
“That’s not true,” Fathen shrieked. “I am still beloved of Caros, and he guides my heart.”
That is the truth you wish. Here is the truth you know. Once again, the cloud leapt toward him, surrounding his head and body.
He witnessed clearly—as if it happened now and not twenty years ago—his arrival on the island. Bitter and filled with gnawing guilt at his theft of the book, he had no sooner stepped into his new chapel than the townspeople assaulted him with their petty complaints about the lack of rain, or the scarcity of eggs in their henhouses. Their provincial grievances aggravated him, but he struggled to fit in and accept this congregation as his own. He failed and soon found himself dreading every encounter with the people, knowing he would need all his composure to not scream in their faces.
Then Darric visited him, and things turned worse.
Seeking vengeance against both the theft and the violence to his person, Fathen worked to rally the town against the family on the hill. He told them the Necromancers were foul spawn of the dark god Melteth, servants of demons, and the will of Caros demanded they be destroyed. He railed and pleaded and threatened, but could do nothing to overcome the lethargy of the townspeople. As a last plea, he told them of Darric’s threats against the village, but he sorely miscalculated the depth of fear hidden beneath the tranquil surface. Rather than being angered, the villagers grew terrified. They vowed to go nowhere near the manor. Livid but powerless, Fathen hid his anger beneath a placid grin that soon became his fortress, walling off his rage.
Fearful of being interrogated about the theft of the book, he waited six long months before sending word to the Temple in Kalador. Without offering a reason, he asked for permission and a cadre of paladins to rid the island of the death mages.
In the guardhouse, blinded by the darkness that showed him light, Fathen shook with rage as he remembered the responding letter, signed by Perius Oerus, the Prelate of Zakerin himself. A long-winded missive, full of details outlining Fathen’s responsibilities, it boiled down to one sentence which had burned into the cleric’s brain. “The family of Necromancers is sacrosanct to all ten gods, as you should well know, and you are to avert hostility away from them.”
Fathen shredded the letter but obeyed the edicts, his loyalty to Caros still outweighing his hatred of the Temple and Darric. He swallowed his bitterness and hostility and slowly learned to ignore the house on the hill.
As the years passed, his rage faded, replaced by a dull, pervasive resentment toward life and those around him. His sermons turned lifeless, becoming—as the voice said—a bland recitation of words that had lost all meaning. His plans for the subjugation of the other doctrines lay dormant, almost forgotten.
But the dreams began to return, brought to the fore by the swirling miasma. The Temple had sent no communication in over a decade. They had forgotten him, abandoned him. Even Caros had deserted him. There had been a time when the sun god spoke to his heart, Fathen seemed to remember, but it had not happened for untold years.
“It’s all true,” Fathen agreed in a strangled voice, sick at the loss of his salvation and the waste of his life. Twenty years bereft of a god, and he hadn’t known it.
Your dying god has forsaken you, but there is another who will claim you. It is time to deliver your forestalled vengeance. Darric is dead, but his son still lives. I will help you find him.
“What must I do?”
In this form, I can do nothing. I require a talba, a container for my essence.
“Again, what must I do?”
“Kill me.”
Fathen nearly fell from his chair. Speaking to the formless shadow, the priest had forgotten the prisoner. “What?”
“Kill me,” the prisoner repeated, standing at the bars. “I have failed my mas
ter. He will take my body for his talba, but I must die for him to do so.”
“I can’t kill you.”
Your spirit is already damned. There is no hope. There is only revenge. Without me, you will not have it. Perform this deed, and I will help you find the Necromancer. You will leave this island behind forever.
“But I can’t just kill him.”
You will also destroy the Temple that wronged you. Together we will crush it, and you will rise as the leader of a new Order, a cult more potent than any your dying god ever conceived.
The words struck like music on Fathen’s soul. He envisioned himself filled with passion before a congregation, a gathering that flocked to hear his words sound out with fervor, a feeling he had almost forgotten. He would lead, and they would follow. Fathen, leader of the Order of–
“Eligos?” Fathen said to the shadow.
Yes, the shadow answered. I am returned, brought to life by the energy of your book. I offer you power and worship that Caros would never give you. We will crush his followers—those who spit upon you—and bring up a new religion, and you will be there in the beginning. You will become my Eloa Ecrin, my High Priest. All you need do is kill the one who has requested it. As you have killed before. To kill is to kill. It is the same in calm as in anger.
The prisoner stood with his arms spread, his chest pressed against the bars. “I am ready. I give my will the grace of Eligos. Although you kill me, I will still serve my master.”
Fathen hesitated. If he were truly damned, the killing would not matter. But what if his soul were cleansed, his sin forgiven by his loyal service, however perfunctory?
You must decide soon. If the guard returns, I will depart, and I will ensure you remain on this island until you rot.
That decided it. Fathen had no wish to remain chained to this forsaken village any longer. The thought of power after so many years of subjection burned through him and ignited his fervor. The man offered himself as a willing sacrifice. Didn’t true belief always demand sacrifice?
Moving quickly, to complete the deed before he could consider it, he grabbed a dirk from the rack on the wall and stepped to the jail cell.
“No, you must strangle me. The body cannot have a mortal wound.”
“Choke?” Fathen asked. “I can’t—”
The man reached through the cell bars and slapped Fathen. “Be a man and not a cur. Prove you have the courage to do more than run from ghosts.”
Enraged at the man’s audacity, Fathen grabbed him around the throat and squeezed. The man gasped, his eyes going wide, but he did nothing to stop Fathen.
Fathen closed his eyes, not wanting to see the man die. But every wheeze and failed attempt to draw breath drummed on his ears and vibrated through his hands. It took longer than Fathen would have imagined. Tears stung his eyes as he squeezed harder, feeling the spasms of the man’s throat.
At the last, the man’s hands went to Fathen’s arms, too weak to have any effect. They slipped away, and the man grew heavy. Fathen let go, stepped back, and opened his eyes.
The man slid down the door until half his body lay on the floor and half pressed against the bars. Death glazed his open eyes.
A deep scream bounced through Fathen’s mind, a paralyzing sound of agony. Gone in a moment, it left him dizzy, stunned at the realization at what had been lost to him forever. He had sealed his fate, and he would never know the peace of the Heaven of Caros. But if Eligos could live a thousand years, then he could too. Perhaps he could live forever, and never know the torments of hell.
Fathen sensed rather than saw the shadow moving. He turned to face the body. The shape slithered across the floor like a blot of the blackest ink. It slid over the corpse until it covered the body. Then it sluiced into the body, like liquid absorbed by a towel, until none remained. His breath shallow, Fathen moved closer to the motionless body.
The corpse blinked; Fathen fainted.
14
Light has gone, where has it gone?
Grace has gone, where has it gone?
Darkness abides, now my only friend.
Blessings cursed, now my only fate.
-The Apostate’s Lament, Unknown
Fathen regained consciousness on the floor. Sharp pain in his right elbow told him he had landed on his arm. The prisoner stood in the cell with no evidence of his recent death.
Fathen sat up, weak, nauseous, light-headed. “What happened?”
“I have taken over this body, and it is now my talba,” the man said, voice soft but less whispery than the shadow. “Release me, so we can depart before others arrive. With luck, we will reach the Necromancer before he leaves Keyport.”
As Fathen stared at the unimpressive face of the man he had just killed, but who now stood alive as a newborn babe, his stomach roiled in anguish at his irrevocable decision.
He pushed the dread aside. He must be content with his choice. He had served Caros for twenty years, and what did he have? Nothing. Perhaps Eligos could serve him better.
Fathen used the cell bars to pull himself to his feet. The dizziness dissipated as he walked across the room and snagged the key off a nail tacked into the wall.
The key turned in the lock. The door swung open without a sound. The prisoner stepped out.
Fathen tensed, expecting an attack now that Eligos no longer needed him. Instead, the man said, “Thank you, Eloa Ecrin.”
Pleased, Fathen nodded. “Master.”
“Not master yet,” the reborn man said with a cold smile. He walked to a cabinet against the wall, opened it, and fished out five daggers. Thick bands of shiny wax sealed three of the dirks inside their black scabbards.
“What do I call you, if not master? Eligos?”
“I am not truly Eligos yet, and that name would bring undue attention. Call me by the name that belonged to this meat. Andras.”
“Not Eligos yet? I don’t understand.”
“I will explain when there is time.” He walked to the small rack of weapons. After a glance over the armaments, he grabbed one of the standard swords issued by the Royal Armory in Kalador, three feet long, formed from steel smelted by Court blacksmiths.
After a few experimental swings, Andras frowned. “Children forged this toy, but it must do until I find something suitable.” He sheathed the weapon and held it out to Fathen.
Fathen looked at the scabbard. “I haven’t wielded a sword in over fifteen years.”
“The skill returns quickly, and you will have use of this before we are finished.”
Fathen took the sheath from Andras and drew the sword. It felt right, as if a missing part of him had returned. He swung it, recalling his training under the captain of the Temple Guard, a bald man whose name Fathen had long forgotten. His awkward strokes were not as clumsy as he had feared. Fathen sheathed the weapon and buckled the belt around his waist.
“Can we leave town unnoticed?” Andras asked.
“At this late hour? Easily.”
“Do you have any coin?”
“Some,” Fathen said. “I never had much need for it here.” After the briefest hesitation, he added, “There are items in the fane we can sell in Keyport. They’re mine as much as anybody’s.” Just as the book was yours? A voice asked in his mind.
“Retrieve them. I will meet you beyond the posts. Give me your sword, so you don’t arouse suspicion, should you be spotted.” Andras’ voice took on a menacing tone. “Do not betray my confidence, or your death will come quickly—and with great pain.”
Surprised as much as frightened by the unexpected threat, Fathen said, “I have damned myself beyond hope of redemption to see my desires come to pass. Why should I betray you?”
Andras’s muddy brown eyes revealed a sinister spark that had not been there before his death. As those eyes appraised Fathen, a cold wind passed through him, and he caught a scent of rotting onions. He shuddered but never turned away from the assassin’s gaze.
“You are right,” Andras said at last. “You h
ave no reason to betray me, but neither did the Necromancers.”
Fathen broke off the stare and turned to the door. “We’d best leave before Bereman returns.”
As if summoned by the words, the older guard opened the door and walked through, followed by Brannon. Engaged in conversation, they strolled five feet into the building before they saw a stunned Fathen and a free, armed prisoner.
Fathen stood immobile as Brannon reached for his sword. Before it cleared the sheath, a whisk sound flashed past Fathen’s ear, followed by another. Both men dropped to the floor, Bereman with a dagger in his chest and Brannon with one protruding from his unprotected throat.
Fathen ran to the fallen soldiers. Bereman’s eyes glazed over as blood darkened his brown shirt. Brannon struggled, his breathing wet and gurgling. He tried to grip the dagger in his neck, but his hands held no strength. His dimming eyes beseeched Fathen. “Run for help,” he managed through the blood foaming in his mouth.
Fathen placed his hand on the guard captain’s forehead. “May Alakanath see you safely to the heaven of Caro-”
Light flashed before Fathen’s eyes. Searing agony ripped through his head. He fell, hands clasped to his temples. His tongue had grown too large. He gasped for air, swallowing to clear his gummed throat.
Andras bent down and offered his hand, which Fathen grasped like a floundering swimmer reaching for a thrown rope. As soon as their palms touched, Fathen’s vision cleared and his throat opened. He sucked in air as his body convulsed.
Andras gave him a grim smile. “Those gods are no longer yours to hear your prayers. You may wish to refrain from saying their names in reverence.”
With a sharp tug, Andras helped the priest stand. Fathen remained rooted as he waited for his wobbly legs and quaking body to still.
Brannon struggled to move. Andras went to him and knelt. He looked into the captain’s eyes, grabbed the knife, and twisted. With a last spray of blood, Brannon lay still. The reborn man yanked the dagger out and wiped the blood on the captain’s blue tabard. Stepping past the motionless Fathen, he retrieved the other knife from Bereman and cleaned it. “Are you fit to travel?”