by Will Wight
And there was only one way to delay a Champion: to give him a good fight.
So she attacked, because if she only dodged and defended, he would get bored. His fist flashed, too fast for even her to catch, and she almost fell for it. But she had anticipated the attack and ducked, driving her left-hand shear at his stomach.
He jerked out of the way, catching her shoulder with his elbow and slamming her aside.
“Good!” he shouted. His voice was sized for the arena, and he held both hatchets up as though calling for applause from his invisible audience. “Very good! There are not only cowards and thieves in your guild, I see.”
The Nightwyrm raged and rampaged, and for a moment she had to endure a spasm under her skin as her flesh tried to attack Urzaia without her.
She was playing a strategic game, but the alchemists had given her a body meant for open combat. Like any weapon, it could be used against her as well as by her.
“What are you doing here?” Meia asked, taking advantage of the lull in the combat. “What do you want out of this?”
He pointed his hatchet at her head, though he didn’t stop moving, even for an instant. He was constantly taking slow, smooth steps as if he meant to circle around her. Even as she listened for his answer, she forced herself to match him.
“To fight you,” he declared. “On the ship, that first night, your friend ran away. Then, on the cursed island, you ran away. You will not run this time.”
And he leaped at her. No matter how strong he was, he shouldn’t have been able to leap that distance, over the stalagmite obstacle in his way...but he did, sailing over it as though he meant to fly.
So his Vessel does come from the Sandborn Hydra, she thought. It has to. Most Kameira had at least one miraculous ability, which Greenwardens claimed derived from their inhuman Intent. The Sandborn Hydra was one of the Kameira that the alchemists had used in enhancing her, but only as far as improving her strength and durability. She had no extra power.
But in the wild, Sandborn Hydras were said to have developed the ability to control their weight. They could creep over dunes of sand without leaving a footprint or disturbing a single grain, or they could strike from the air with the force of a collapsing temple.
That was the rumor. She wasn’t sure how much was based in fact.
However, as Urzaia Woodsman fell toward her, she thought it would be prudent to get out of the way.
~~~
Your power is mine, the blade whispered.
“I will give it to you,” Lucan muttered back. “You will need as much power as you can get, to protect Shera.”
To take lives, the knife countered.
“You must take lives to protect Shera.”
To feed.
“In Shera’s service.”
From the knife’s history, he pulled out images of Shera, brightening each picture as though refreshing a coat of paint. Shera receiving the blade as a girl, determined to become a Consultant. Shera focusing herself before a kill. Shera encountering invested armor, pushing the blade deeper, begging it to break through the defenses.
...to break down barriers.
“Any that stand in her way.”
To turn power against the powerful.
“Against any that threaten her.”
His head began to throb painfully, as though he had taken a big bite of snow. Reader burn, he could feel it. It happened when he overused his powers, and he’d been pushing himself to the limit today. The pain could overwhelm him, knock him flat on its back, if he kept Reading.
But he only had a little farther to go.
As long as he wasn’t distracted.
“Lucan?” Jyrine called, from the cell next door. “Is there someone else there?”
Lucan remained silent, trying to stay in his trance, trying not to lose the thread of the Reading. If he ended an Awakening halfway through, it would be worse than simply having to start over; the blade might Awaken on its own, without his guidance, and no one could predict what it would become then.
“Lucan, can you hear me?”
She slapped her palm against the stone separating them, trying to get his attention.
“No!” he shouted back. “No one’s here! Please, I’m trying to concentrate!”
His vision of the knife’s history wavered, cut with an image of his actual cell, and he focused all his attention on the Reading. His head felt as though it would split in half, but the vision stabilized.
“But I heard voices,” Jyrine shouted.
“It’s me! I’m talking to myself! Now will you please be quiet!”
The image shook again, and he almost lost it, the knife’s memories flashing by one by one as though he had been hurled through a vast gallery of paintings. He froze at the sight of one in particular, a memory that should have been significant beyond all others, but that he had failed to find until now.
The bronze blade, piercing a gray-green heart. Sludge pumped out of the organ’s exposed flesh, and somewhere an Elder let out a harsh scream.
Just next to this image was another, as though they were two halves of the same event. The blade piercing another heart, this one red, and human, and inside layers of skin and muscle.
Two kills, two different times, inextricably linked.
Lucan seized on those images, pouring all his Intent into them, focusing their significance and giving them purpose.
In his lap, the bronze weapon floated into the air. After a few seconds, it hung in front of his eyes, slowly revolving.
This is you, he said, shining a beacon of light onto those two related images. This is what you are.
Two powerful kills, both at Shera’s hand, greatly increasing the blade’s power.
I am... the knife whispered.
To Lucan’s senses, the whole room shuddered with power, and the bronze blade flickered green.
Sweat rolled down his temples, and he felt like a Watchman had pounded seven iron nails into the back of his skull. But he persevered.
He couldn’t stop now. He’d prepared for this moment for years.
Everything I’ve done for Shera, everything she’s done for me, everything we’ve shared...that’s the only way I could do this. He shared a connection to this weapon as deep as to his own shears, maybe deeper.
Through his connection to Shera, he was bound to this blade.
Everything was prepared. His Intent was gathered, the blade’s history waiting at the surface. He’d stacked the wood, soaking it in alchemist’s fire-oil.
Now he only needed to provide a spark.
He drew on his desire, his need, his Intent to make Shera as powerful as possible. He forced it all into the blade—even the pain of Reader burn simply forged his will, making him shout with effort. Wisps of pale green light sprung into being, floating around the knife like disembodied spirits.
He felt the spark take, the fire begin to kindle.
And the blade began to whisper to him once again.
“You are the taker of lives, the thief of secrets,” Lucan declared. His words bound the blade once spoken, fusing with its significance, defining its purpose. “You are that which turns power against power. You are the death of the powerful.”
As the Awakening came to its end, the cell filling with green light, the ancient weapon said one more word to him.
Its name.
He reached up, seizing the floating blade by its hilt, reversing it point-down. “You will be called Syphren, the Whispering Death!”
And with one final surge of Intent, he slammed the weapon down into the ground.
It sunk easily into the stone, filling the cracks with green light.
The room shook, and he could swear he heard Jyrine shouting next door. He even thought he felt the power of the Awakened weapon echo over there, but his Reader’s senses were so burned out, it could have been nothing more than his imagination.
He collapsed, falling onto his cot, panting. He barely had the strength to pull on his gloves, but once h
e did, he felt much better. The gloves were invested to keep his Reading under control, to prevent him from sensing anything he didn’t want to, and pulling them on felt like shutting his eyes after staring directly into the sun.
Now, he understood why most Readers took days to Awaken an object, even after they spent months or years getting to know the subject. Doing it this quickly risked more than a mistake; he could have killed himself.
For the first time, he rolled over to look at the weapon he had helped create.
Syphren had changed shape slightly—it looked longer and sleeker, for one thing, though it was hard to tell when all he could see was the hilt and the inch or so of bare blade sticking out of the floor.
And the blade was what really caught his attention.
What had once been ancient, battered bronze now looked like a glass window. A window looking into some strange netherworld.
At first glance, the blade seemed to be filled with solid green light, but closer inspection revealed that they weren’t lights, but hands. Dozens and dozens of shining green hands, pressing against the weapon as though trying to push their way through into the world.
It was a busy crowd, as some hands got shoved away and others shoved forward to press their palms against what looked like glass. But every inch of the hands, where they touched the blade, glowed bright green.
Well, that’s disturbing.
His Reader’s senses were so closed that he couldn’t hear the blade whispering, though he was sure it wasn’t quiet. He glanced around the cell for a moment before he spotted them: the rags he had used to bind Nakothi’s Heart before he had finished that box. They were invested to restrain power, especially that of the Elders, and they would do nicely to keep this knife from killing anyone until Shera wanted it too.
Gingerly, careful not to let any of his bare skin touch the weapon, Lucan wound the strips of cloth around the knife from hilt to tip. When it was fully covered, he tossed it onto his blanket, and then wrapped that around it too. He didn’t want it to cause any accidents when he took it to Shera.
Then he turned and regarded the bars on his cell. If he used the knife himself, he wouldn’t be able to hold himself back from Reading it, and then the pain of the Reader burn would likely have him screaming on the ground. Besides, he had Awakened the blade specifically for Shera to use, and it might turn on him.
So how am I supposed to get out of here?
CHAPTER TWENTY
Ten Years Ago
The knife’s first memories had faded over the years, like rumors of a dream.
The totem-man is the only one in the refugee tunnels trusted to make bronze. Once he worked the forges of Kthanikahr, blending the alloys that became the chains, cages, and muzzles keeping human slaves in check. He has little knowledge of his own—something less than an alchemist, in an age before alchemy.
When he pours this batch of bronze into its mold, he adds a splash of his own special concoction. A potion, he believes, that will allow the metal to steal souls.
The bronze cools into ingots, making their way to a smith. He knows the totem-man is a little crazy, but crazy or not, he still delivers good material. Maybe the metal will steal souls, and maybe not, but the smith knows what matters: the skill of the craftsman.
It’s up to him to make blades that will kill anything. He’s heard all the tales of the liberator, going around murdering the Great Elders and their servants, so the smith is determined to do his part. His blades will free mankind. His blades will cut through even the immortality of the Elders.
Every beat of his hammer carries that Intent.
In Lucan’s mind, the scene shifts.
The Reader kneels inside a trench, pouring her Intent into these fresh-forged weapons. Now that she’s about to die, her mind is even sharper and more focused than ever.
The forces of Kthanikahr surround the trench, squirming over the ground like mobile nests of tentacles. She can hear them on the approach, a sound like a thousand slurping tongues. No one captured by the Worm Lord returns with their sanity intact, so she has no intention of being taken alive.
But before she dies, she invests all of her hopes, her dreams, and her wishes into these newborn blades. She urges them to leech power from their targets, to destroy the enemy with its own defenses.
She believes that’s the only way to defeat an Elder creature: to turn its power in on itself.
The knives survived that battle. The Reader did not.
Some time later, on a land Lucan will know as the Gray Island, an assassin kneels. For years, she has served the Mistress of the Mists as one of the Am’haranai: an order of killers for hire in this long war. Now, the whole order has been hired by the man they call the Liberator. The one who, it is whispered, will one day lead mankind.
As a symbol of their new contract, the Mistress’ twelve most capable servants each receive a pair of bronze knives.
The assassin’s focus bleeds into the shiny, new weapons. With these blades, she will cut down the Liberator’s enemies. She will deliver death with one strike, and she will never need a second.
Then the blade draws blood.
Again and again and again and again.
Conflicting purposes, powerful Intent, crossed and compounded and reinforced one another for a thousand years, building a matrix of significance so complex and powerful that the single pound of bronze feels like a living thing. Layers of hopes and dreams and beliefs and emotions were stacked one upon the other, forming strata that stretch down to the core of what this weapon was.
And in that core was a common thread, a seed of inspiration.
If only he could seize it.
With enough time, Lucan could Awaken the knife, but that process would lock the object in a single form. It would never absorb Intent again. And he got the feeling that Shera would add to the story of this blade, such that when it finally was Awakened, it would rival any weapon the Empire had ever produced.
One day, Elders will tremble before this blade. But not today.
This is just one step forward.
With all the force of his will, with everything the Emperor had ever taught him, Lucan dragged out a piece of the knife’s potential. Then he added his own power to it, feeding it, like slipping twigs one by one into a fire.
When he’d finished, the blade seemed to hum in his grip. Curls of the carpet pushed away slightly, as though pressed down by a phantom wind.
One down. One to go.
~~~
Shera found that she liked sleeping aboard a ship. Once she got used to the motion, it was actually quite soothing, and the lapping of the waves against the hull could form a lullaby to the right ears. Most important of all, she was surrounded by water. No one would show up and bother her, at least until they reached their destination.
Which, in a ship propelled by the Emperor, did not take long. Scarcely had they boarded this abandoned ship when a shadow seized it from beneath and carried it off into the Aion with the speed of a musket-ball.
The vessel itself was fully stocked and ready to sail, but the sailors had abandoned it only minutes before the three Gardeners and their Emperor had arrived.
Even at those unnatural speeds, it would still take several hours to reach the island. The Emperor stood motionless at the bow, navigating. Even the other two Consultants slept; Meia to recover from whatever the alchemists had done to her body, Lucan to restore himself after his efforts investing Shera’s shears.
Now the twin blades hung from a tack on the opposite wall of her cabin. They all but quivered with eagerness to be used.
Shera, meanwhile, had taken this opportunity to sleep. She’d curled up on a bunk and let the spray of the waves and the occasional hiss of the sea monster sing her to sleep.
When the ship crashed, she awoke in midair.
There was no time to react. Her left shoulder slammed into one of the beams on the overhead, narrowly missing the quicklamp that shook at the end of its chain like a bull trying to break
free.
She tried to get her feet underneath her before she landed, but she only succeeded in landing—hard and painfully—on her knees.
The ship continued to buck as she scrambled to her feet, the Kameira and the ocean both roaring around her. She grabbed her knife-belt, but the ship pitched forward, bruising her knuckles. Her pouch was full of spades, but when the ship rocked back, she cracked the back of her head and almost spilled the throwing-knives all over the cabin.
Whatever’s happening on deck, it’s got to be better than this.
She finished scooping up her gear and scrambled up the ladder, running headfirst into a spray of water so thick that she saw nothing else.
The ship jerked to port so hard that she pulled one of her shears, driving the blade deep into nearby railing. By the time the ship finally steadied, her eyes burned from the salt water, and her knuckles ached from keeping a grip on the blade.
Then the spray subsided, and she could see again.
The Emperor stood on the railing at the very prow of the ship, as rock-solid on the slippery wood as if he’d been nailed there. He had his arms raised as though to embrace the oncoming waves, a bronze-bladed sword in his right hand and pale armor gleaming in the moonlight.
Meia stood behind him, seeming just as comfortable on the pitching deck as the Emperor. Lucan, Shera was pleased to see, had tied himself into the rigging.
Ahead of them, the ocean writhed with the dead.
At first, she could only see a pale mound of bones, like an island made entirely of human skulls. Then something pushed its way through the cave at the front: the long, pale, neck of a giant slug, with a human head as big across as any ship’s sail. The disturbing face turned to the ship, its expression full of mourning, and let out a howl.
Shera staggered her way over to the outer railing for a closer look. All around the skull-tortoise, the surf frothed with a thousand other monstrosities. Human corpses, still wearing tattered clothing, with the snapping claws of crabs. Sharks clad in exoskeletons of yellowed bone. Colorless worms with rows of gnashing teeth. Hundreds upon hundreds of horrors.