by K T Munson
“Your soul is free now,” a whisper said as Commander Xavier Ode drowned in his own blood.
Chapter 6: Netherworld
The reddish-hued landscape seemed to watch Ki as he moved along the path, uneven cobblestones beneath his feet and decaying shells of a city on both sides of the road. He pretended not to notice the eyes he could feel following his every move, though he knew what watched him in the collapsing buildings. The droning red light of the Netherworld’s sky cast shadows within the ruins, their details edged in varying shades of red. Paying heed to the architecture, he discerned his location by the constructs—broken and battered mirrors of real buildings upon the planet’s surface that housed mortals, not monsters.
Rubble suddenly gave way behind him, forcing him to turn. At the edge of the light, a long sharp tendril-like leg peeked from the shadows of the ruins for a moment but quickly retracted back into the darkness.
From their mechanical clicking from all sides of the road, Ki knew they were Weavers. Though he was safe for now because they didn’t like the light, Ki was grateful it wouldn’t be long before he left their territory. The only thing he feared more than the Weavers was the coming unforgiving darkness that was night in the Netherworld.
All his life he had been told he couldn’t die, but he didn’t wish to put that to the test. He noticed the ruins of what appeared to be a great round building that looked like a corpse from which ravens had picked the eyes—holes gaping where windows used to be. He stepped carefully as he walked down a short hill, the stones more uneven there. In the dull red light, the rocks looked like shiny jewels. He picked up a rock and held it up into the red light. It shimmered, and he felt a strange and dark power pulse against his palm.
Setting it back down, he remembered what the elders had told him about the Nether. It existed off the pieces of souls left behind from items people touched—the ground on which they walked, the beds in which they slept, and everything in between. Every step every person and thing made upon the ground caused the ash to fall and the rocks to form. When a significant event occurred—lots of souls in terror, or in joy—a mark was left in the Netherworld.
The Weavers, spider-like creatures, could feed on those that wandered into the Nether, but their main diet consisted of the stains of the souls that died in terror and produced the dark rocks. Those who could see and speak with spirits, Seers, could sometimes hear a Weaver’s clicking metal legs before a disaster. They were a promise of what was to come. If planet-dwellers were going to die in a horrible way, Weavers weren’t far off, waiting to feed on the terror that would bleed through. If enough souls were lost and died in agony, the Weavers would gather the stones by the hundreds, gorging themselves on the marks the violence left. The only thing more frightening for a Seer to catch a glimpse of on the battlefield than a Weaver was a Soul Collector, a being that knew when death was imminent and took souls of the dead back to the Netherworld.
He paused outside of an old country schoolhouse, one of the few places where the grass could almost pass as green. Very few creatures of the Netherworld trespassed upon this sanctuary because innocents lived here. A flowering tree stood tall in testament to the children and their beautiful imaginings. Ki used it often as a point to cross over from the Netherworld into one of the planets.
Ki pushed open the schoolhouse gate, listening to it creak as he headed toward the building. Gnomes wearing harsh expressions danced around while beautiful butterflies with knife-sharp wings tried to dance away from them and slice at the rainbow of flowers. Pausing to watch the hushed battle, Ki wondered at the gnarly gnomes doing good while the shimmering blue butterflies were destructive. That was the Nether—never what it seemed.
The strange little cottage-sized building would have seemed to him a derelict house if he hadn’t known better. Were it not for the presence of color, someone else would have passed it by. The Black Council had brought him here many times to teach him how to use the naturally occurring gates. Having once been the Guardians of the Gate, they knew its secrets and its weaknesses. He knocked on the door and entered without waiting for a reply.
“Back again?” the old orc asked, peering over his spectacles as he sat by the fire. “It has been nearly a year.”
The orc had tufts of hair on his head and strange bumps across his tawny skin. He was short, a whole head shorter than Ki, with thick limbs. Ki felt sweat bead on his brow, but the orc looked content in the stuffy house.
“I’ve been busy,” Ki said. “Your normal fee.”
Ki took a large coin from his pouch and flipped it toward him. The orc caught it in one hand, three thick fingers curled around the metal, before putting it between his teeth. He had been a builder once—that much Ki had gotten out of him—but otherwise orcs were pretty difficult to converse with. Apparently the old builder had created something great and powerful, but his creation had ended up being his people’s downfall. Once the machine had been built, the king to whom the orcs had sold it decided that he couldn’t risk their selling it to anyone else. So he killed them all…all but this one.
“Have you found him?” he asked. Ki glanced at the orc’s right arm—a sharpened blade that he put across his lap. The blade was decorated along its spine with gold.
“No, the Black King has been gone for a long time,” Ki reminded him. “He was banished and died in exile.”
“The Black King cannot be killed,” the old orc said, turning back to the fire. “He is scattered. He will return.”
“As you say,” Ki said, walking down the hallway.
Ki pushed open a side door. Outside, under an awning, lay rotted benches with flowers growing in clusters around them. Wood didn’t last, but ideas did. He glanced over his shoulder toward the old orc. It was sad that he was all alone. He tried to push the thought aside before he could dwell on it.
Had all orcs had such green skin and ugly complexions? They were a strange race that the world had all but forgotten. Ki had never been willing to risk losing access to the gateway by broaching the subject. The old orc at the end of the hall was likely the last of his kind, having hidden in the Netherworld waiting to exact his revenge on a dead man. Time moved differently in the Nether, so it was impossible to tell how long he had been here.
Ki stepped into the room and let the door close. He began to write on the outside of the door, focusing on the face in his mind as the chalk scraped against the door. His old scribblings were gone. When the symbols were complete, he rested his hand in the middle of the symbols, closed his eyes, and concentrated as he whispered the spell. When he opened his eyes, the chalk glowed with a slight yellow light.
Pushing the door open, he stepped through into a street in Ashlad instead of appearing back in the hallway of the school in the Nether. Closing the doorway quickly, he got his bearings. He was now in a fine school, larger than the cottages they had in Lyreane, with young people walking around. Ki headed toward the metal fence as they streamed out of the front doors to head home.
One youth moved slower than the others, and Ki picked him out immediately. The woman in Ashlad had been hard to find and would be dealt with next, but he had put this boy at the bottom of his list on purpose because of all forty-two, as he was only a child. Regardless of age, Ki knew the faces in the visions must be saved. He had put it off long enough—age should be irrelevant to a savior.
Ki followed the boy, who had a scar on his forehead and walked at a leisurely pace. He didn’t seem in a hurry to return home like the other children. These Ashladians wore smart clothes; it was so different from his home. Ashlad was a place of science, advancement, and egotists. He preferred the Nether sometimes to these other worlds.
The boy paused when a black and purple butterfly flew by his nose and then watched it go without much of a reaction. His target was unexpressive and withdrawn for one so young. For some reason, Ki sensed he’d taken a life. When he entered the brick house, Ki hurried down the edge of the street out of sight. Jumping onto the thick brick wall, he
crouched down as he ran along it before sneaking in through the window. The mother’s room was empty when he dropped into it. Today was the last day of the school week, and the child’s mother always went to the market on this day. It would be at least half an hour before she returned.
The room was the same as he had last seen it. He heard the soft footfalls of the boy as he came up the stairs. Pulling his daggers from their sheath on his waist, he waited behind the door. The boy walked past his room and down the hall. Ki pressed his back tightly against the wall. After a moment, when all was silent, he crept out. Preparing to push the door open to the study, he noticed his hand was shaking. He frowned as he gazed at it. Taking a few steps back into the safety of the adjacent room, which belonged to the boy, he pressed his back against the wall again behind the door.
Ki couldn’t bring himself to release him. His heart was not content with what he had to do. With a frown, he leaned his head back. If he couldn’t kill the boy, he’d do the next best thing—take the boy to the Nether and leave him in a safe place, where Weavers and Shadows couldn’t go. The boy had time to remake himself, to mend his stained soul, while the others he needed to save did not.
He knew of a cave in Tym Resh that was the resting place of a priestess who had sacrificed herself to save her people. In the cave were strange translucent rocks that were gelatinous and could heal wounds when the person slept within the walls. Ki had done that very thing himself. Nothing could get him there, and any injury he sustained had been mended while he slept. At first it had unnerved him to sleep in something that could get up his nose, but the contents had not suffocated him. It was his secret place. Even the Black Council didn’t know about it. Once Ki’s task was done, he’d release the boy back into the world—with a warning and a promise.
He took out a small cloth and a vial from his sack. After dumping the vial on the cloth, he purposely dropped the vial, making it shatter on the ground. After a moment, he heard running feet. When the boy pushed the door open and burst into the room, Ki covered his nose and mouth with the rag. He struggled for a moment, but soon went still.
Ki set him carefully on the ground before closing the door and pulling out the chalk. If he had to, he could rectify his actions later, but for now the boy must have been a mistake. Why else would his hands shake? The others Ki had taken out had been killers, murderers, and monsters, but not this boy. He glanced down at the child and wondered what he could have possibly done to have put a sin on his soul.
Chapter 7: Ashlad
The sea of faces floated below her as she walked the short distance across the stage. The large lecture hall had been set up to accommodate fine dining and even finer decorations. There was something beautiful about the old building and its hundreds-of-years-old architecture. A circular mouthpiece the size of a dessert plate sat atop a thin metal stand that was hooked into a sound projection system at the base of the stage.
“Welcome,” Dr. Elisabeth Avery said into the device with a smile, her voice resonating through the room. “It is my distinct pleasure to be invited to open this year’s gathering of the greatest minds in science. We are here to introduce our newest innovations and share our advancements in all fields on the scientific frontier. My focus on ectoplasm research has been very successful, but I believe the best way to highlight this is by showing you rather than telling you.”
A few chuckled in the audience as she tried to hide the nervous shake in her hands. She admonished herself silently. She was a scientist who could perform complex procedures, after all, but she couldn’t handle a room full of people. Life really did have its ironies.
Beside her was a simple suit made of thick fabric and metal—a deflated containment suit. It was airtight with bronze details. The most noticeable part was a clear circular part for the helmet at the top of it that looked like a cage. The metal strips at the seams had rivets to help keep their shape, but the dark blue fabric was mostly bendable and sat on the stage in a pile next to her. Many people strained their necks to get a look at it.
“May I present A.J. Dennett,” Elisabeth said, holding an arm out.
There was an awkward pause, which was quickly filled with whispers. Elisabeth licked her lips nervously, wishing she had thought to bring a glass of water onto stage. She put on a fake smile and glared down at the suit. Any second, A.J.’s neutrino-based mass would fill the space.
“A.J.!” she snapped through clenched teeth.
Like magic, the suit began to fill with a strange white and sparkly substance until it was completely inflated. Elisabeth had always loved the way A.J.’s incorporeal form looked when he moved around. Without something to contain him, he would eventually return to what he was—stardust.
“My apologies, Miss Avery. I dozed off waiting for this to begin,” A.J. said, expressing his sympathies like a well-aged gentleman in the same accent that Elisabeth possessed. As they’d worked together for months on end, his voice had become as familiar to her as any in Ashlad. “I hope I haven’t caused any distress.”
“It is quite all right,” Elisabeth said, finally lowering her arm. “I believe it still had the desired effect.”
Half the audience was slack jawed. Many held their spectacles up to their eyes, but most were leaning forward to get a better look. Her work in ectoplasm research in the field of Fringe Sciences really should have been called “How to Trap Stardust That is Conscious,” but that didn’t sound quite as distinguished. If Elisabeth had learned anything in her career, it was that most of the people in the room simply valued distinguished-sounding titles.
“Good evening,” A.J. said, slapping his arms to his sides as he bowed. “Miss Avery has turned what should have ended a life into a life with which I can give back.”
Elisabeth could still remember the first time she’d heard about the haunted house. Never had she imagined this moment would come to pass—that after searching dozens of haunted houses, she’d find one with a real spirit and build him a body. If it weren’t for Elisabeth’s unique, inherited ability, A.J. might still have been there.
Someone started clapping and then others joined in, their faces filled with wonder. It was difficult not to let her feeling of victory over them appear on her face. For most of her career, her peers had all thought her unworthy of their attention. Now they would pay closer attention.
“Thank you,” Elisabeth said with a little bow of her head. “Please come to my presentation on Fringe Sciences tomorrow and learn about this process. Any questions can be answered then. For tonight, please enjoy the evening.”
When Elisabeth left the stage, A.J. followed her, his steps heavy because she had weighed the suit down to allow for ease of walking. When she sat down, he stood next to her, still waving to the audience. She glanced up at the swirling stardust though the helmet, hoping A.J.’s face would form. It did every once in a while, which always reminded her that he had been a person once and gave her a strange sense of comfort.
“Thank you, Dr. Avery, for that astounding introduction to our convention,” the moderator said. He continued to introduce additional distinguished members, but Elisabeth stopped listening. She glanced up at A.J. again and wondered if her choice to put him on display had been a mistake. He was a sentient being who had accidently become what he was. Elisabeth was still new to the field of ectoplasm and had primarily focused on building a vessel for him to live in. Yet the laws of their world were specific about what had rights. They did not extend to spirits.
“Elisabeth?” said her protector and friend, Milo, leaning over to touch her arm, “You look troubled. It was an excellent introduction.”
“Thank you, Milo,” Elisabeth said softly with a forced smile. Her conscience was suddenly at war over her hurried decision to show her success with A.J., but the damage had been already done. It was kind of Milo to reassure her, even if he was wrong about what was troubling her.
When the moderator finished, Elisabeth stood, and she and Milo headed for the door with A.J. bringing up the
tail. She’d nearly made it when Dr. Nive Harrid and Professor Jacob Greenly cut her off by standing in her path, wearing smug looks. They were older men with outspoken beliefs about anyone who wasn’t like them—which constantly extended to Elisabeth.
“It is a miracle what you’ve done with the Fringe Science field,” Dr. Harrid said with a half-smile. “And it only took you a few years.”
“Despite your disadvantages, you have overcome everyone’s expectations,” Professor Greenly said with an equally coy half-smile.
“Disadvantage?” Elisabeth said before she could catch herself.
“Why, being half demon, of course,” Professor Greenly clarified.
Milo took a step forward. Being a lesser demon, he could do damage, but that wasn’t how Elisabeth solved things. Elisabeth’s jaw clenched as she raised a hand to stop Milo, and she put on a smile that could melt facial tissue from bones. “I could not have advanced the technology I presented today without my gifts. By that token, it is an advantage. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have an early morning planned.”
She swept around them before they could reply. On this day, she would not let their words dissuade her. It didn’t matter that it was early and that her leaving would be seen as cowardice—there were too many people too close to her. Elisabeth could remember when other children were afraid of her growing up, some even to the point of throwing rocks. Private tutors had kept her well enough away from them. But it hadn’t kept them from hurling curses at her on the streets. She sometimes thought that children were the cruelest beings because the words they spoke were embedded deeply in truth. In some cases, this carried into adulthood.