by F. C. Reed
“What have you done,” Kharius asked in a harsh, breathless whisper.
Janil jammed the black pouch into his hands. “Hold this.” He pulled Kharius behind him and out of the way. The glowing blue pistol illuminated his face in the shadows of the side street.
Kharius shuffled behind his brother, pulling Amalia with him, and looked inside the bag. He shut it just as quickly as he had opened it.
“By the gods, you found it,” Kharius said, staring wide eyed and incredulously at his brother.
“Thank me later,” he shot back. The angry voices grew louder and seemed to be close. “Get ready to run,” Janil cautioned.
Amalia felt lost. She did not understand what was happening. She felt around herself in the darkness for anything that might give her a sense of safety in her anticipation of whatever was about to happen.
Janil gripped the pistols tighter and took a deep breath. He exhaled slowly and pounced back into the open. He fired once, twice, three, four, five times. Blue lances of light leapt from the barrels with a crackling hiss.
“Go now,” he signaled as he turned.
Kharius followed. Amalia entered the major street last and was abruptly halted by a hand that closed around her wrist. She cried out and turned, clawing at the fingers that held onto her.
A grotesque man with skinny limbs and a bulbous, fiercely tattooed head stood nearly motionless before her, save for the wild, angry eyes that flashed about in his head. Behind him, like a row of white marble statues, stood four other figures, nearly frozen in place. The powdery white crystals that spread over their bodies in a volley of crackles and pops slowed their movements to near stillness.
His hand transferred a chill around her wrist and grew colder at every passing moment.
“Come on, girl,” Kharius bellowed. “Peacekeepers are probably on their way. We do not want to be here when they arrive. I can guarantee you that.”
The man’s pale, statuesque form momentarily mesmerized Amalia. His eyes followed her as she scrambled to peel his fingers from her wrist, one by one. Fumbling and frustrated, she yanked at his pinkie, and it came away with a loud snap. She recoiled, horrified.
More voices tumbled into earshot. Sharp commands to fan out and establish a mobile perimeter echoed from the far street.
Amalia reached behind her, grasping for anything. Her hand passed over a loose brick and she hefted it, swinging wildly at his head. The brick exploded against his temple and littered the street, along with frozen chunks of his forehead. She gasped at the broken, bleeding skull and put a hand to her mouth, but she was finally free of him. His eyes grew wider, as wide as they can on a face frozen stiff.
“Come on,” Janil screamed, ripping her away from the scene.
They ran into the ever encroaching darkness of Heilaw. Even during the day, darkness clung to the buildings and obscured vision down the alleys. Amalia followed breathlessly, her lungs burning in her chest.
The buildings that soon surrounded them seemed abandoned. The stench of waste and garbage weighed heavier on the air and seemed much stronger than before. Only a few lights burned in a handful of windows, high above the street. Occasionally, the light escaping the windows broke across the form of a curious bystander, only to disappear just as quickly.
Janil stopped in the street and opened what looked like a pocket watch. Light sprang forth, illuminating his face in the darkened street. He snapped it shut.
“This way,” he pointed farther down the poorly lit street.
Amalia and Janil traversed the maze of alleys and unlit walkways much slower than before. There was no need for them to hurry, as they had lost their pursuers some distance back. Instead of the shouted orders of a peacekeeper watch commander, or the angry yells for them to stop, there were coughs, breaking glass, and the general sounds one might be likely to hear emanating from a dark, stinking alley.
Amalia nearly held each breath for fear it would pierce the intermittent silence, and they would be set upon by who-knows-what. The combination of silence and darkness had her on edge. She held Janil’s hand, but knew she was just short of anxiously gripping it. He didn’t seem to mind.
“Here,” he stopped and turned at a door. The charred, rotted wood looked as if it would crumble under a single knock. Janil took out the watch again and held it to the door. A set of orange runes illuminated, flickered, and shimmered in a brief sequence. Moments later, the door latch clicked, and the door itself rearranged into something resembling more of a door and less of a rotted plank of wood.
Janil led Amalia inside, and the door swung shut behind them. The room ballooned with light in a gradual shift from total darkness to a soft yellow glow. Several bookshelves filled with old books lined the walls. The smell of moldy paper and old leather overpowered the stink of the streets and alleys. A table sat in the middle of the room. In one chair, Zerosa sat casually, her hands behind her head. Amalia’s shoulders slumped in relief at the sight of her.
The door clicked behind them and opened. Kharius walked in clutching the black bag to his chest. His hair was a tangled mess, and his brow glistened with beads of sweat.
“Bro,” Janil sighed with a grin. “You had me worried there.” He took the length of the room in two steps and clapped Kharius on his shoulder.
“I’m all right. I couldn’t shake the Peacekeepers for a while there.”
Zerosa stood. “Looks like we got what we came for.” She held out a hand and Kharius dropped the black bag in it while he took a seat at the table.
Janil sat next to his brother, a look of concern ebbing over his features.
Zerosa turned out the bag, grasping its contents with a corner of the fabric, careful not to touch it. A silver chain spilled out, connected to a dull, gray stone, etched in a silver filament.
“You recognize this?” Zerosa held it up for Amalia to see, who squinted at the smooth stone.
“It’s my keystone,” she said. “But how did it get here?”
“That’s a good question,” Zerosa said, cutting Amalia off mid-sentence. She wrapped the keystone in the bag and funneled in the silver chain. “This leads to a lot of questions,” she said, gesturing to the bag.
“Indeed,” Kharius said. “Like how did it get into this plane?”
“And how did it end up in a run-down gambling den,” Janil added. “Great bit of intel, by the way. Led me right to it. You darkfallen never cease to amaze.”
“Never call us darkfallen,” Zerosa growled over a warning glance. “I am not half dead. I am not one of them. None of the Natai are.”
“Natai it is,” replied Janil, raising his hands in surrender. “Sorry.”
Zerosa nodded and turned her attention back to the keystone. “I fear what all of this may suggest,” she said, rising from her seat. “The Reach tasked me with returning to locate your keystone,” she said, turning toward Amalia. “And suddenly it turns up in a gambling den in Heilaw? That’s only possible if either you brought it here, which we know didn’t happen, or someone rendered it inert, giving them the ability to bring it from that plane to this one.”
Janil ground his teeth together. “The keystone is definitely inert. Not a stitch of aether left in it.”
“There’s only one person we know of right now that has the ability to render aether inert,” Kharius said with an edge of caution.
The room fell silent at their contemplation.
“So it’s a plant? A decoy maybe?” Amalia asked. “Somebody, tell me something.”
“The hells it is a decoy,” Janil snapped. “I had to cheat my way through hells and back to get that thing on my jiraq table. Jiraq is easy to win if you’re the only one cheating. Then I couldn’t beat the damn guy because, big surprise, he was cheating too, so I just grabbed it and ran. After all of that, it better be real.”
“We’ll know soon enough.” Zerosa stuffed the black bag into a pocket inside her shirt. “Someone working with us, is also working with our enemies. The commander general and the prim
us will need to hear about this.”
Chapter Twenty-Eight
“There is a matter of unfinished business. The red lioness and her keystone,” General Strann said, more exasperated than she would have liked. She knew all too well the backlash and criticism that would arise at even the mention of Amalia’s name, and the reminder to the council rang difficult in her own ears.
There was integrity in her actions, and she would see Amalia’s ascension through without cutting corners or skipping steps. That meticulousness in keeping with tradition would all but prove the girl’s legitimacy once the ascension was said and done. Not all believed she would be the next commander general. It had been a constant struggle since Amalia arrived, but still nothing compared to the struggle that lay before them all.
The five convened in the west chambers, as was the custom for them all, unless on assignment. Commander General Strann presided. The primus observed and often deliberated on difficult or conflicting matters, but usually remained silent. Admiral Voss, the taskmaster, Dorran Visig, and Sky Marshal Sesanji sat at the long conference table, each of them either glaring at someone else in attendance, or feigning disinterest.
“What about the keystone?” asked the sky marshal dryly. “It’s a stupid rock filled with aether. Drag your hand through any water filled ditch and you’ll come away with a fist full of them just the same and just as useless as—
Her words trailed away into silence as the taskmaster unveiled a small black bag. He stuffed his hand inside and pulled free the stone on its chain. The once blue keystone, now black and lackluster as a lump of smooth coal, lay clutched between thumb and forefinger. Small tendrils of the black crawled over his fingertips, gripping and grasping feebly at the life contained within his body.
Dorran leaned closer and squinted, determined to feed his skepticism with a small grain of falsehood. The abnormalities in his spotted eyes danced and swirled as he eyed the lifeless stone. He came away relatively convinced by his raised eyebrows and a mild look of surprise. “Artemisia’s keystone, to be sure,” he said. “And tainted with the black. Dead. Void. Gone.”
“What?” the sky marshal blasted, almost coming out of her chair. “Impossible.”
“You seem surprised, honey, like you didn’t expect it to turn up.” Admiral Voss offered. “Anything you’d like to be telling us?”
“Of course I didn’t expect it to turn up, just like the rest of you. And don’t be a fool,” the sky marshal groaned as she settled back into her seat. “What reason would anyone have for bringing it back? It’s a dead stone, useless and apparently tainted.”
“Indeed,” said the taskmaster. “Still, it can be restored.”
“The keystone was recovered in Heilaw from one of the underground gambling establishments run by a group of mercenaries who operate with the Levitus Two Seven.”
“The Levitus Two Seven?” Sky Marshal Sesanji scoffed incredulously. “That mercenary sect disbanded near four years ago after the siege on Aranor Cliff. I sub-commanded that operation.”
“That would be the operation where your predecessor, the indomitable Gabrielle Jordana was killed, or captured, or what the hells ever happened to her, right?” Admiral Voss added, already knowing the answer. “Never got a single report from that campaign that made a damn bit of sense.”
“I drove my lance straight through the heart of the Levitus leader Karra Zendrigoss myself,” Sky Marshal Sesanji snapped, ignoring Voss’ reference. “I watched her die.”
“Well, apparently, you missed,” Admiral Voss said with a grin. “Still, neither Karra, nor the Levitus cartel have shown their faces in years, dead or not. Why now, I’d be asking myself. Copycats, maybe?”
“I doubt that,” the taskmaster said with a shake of his head. “A week ago, operatives in the outer regions happened upon a unique biosignature traversing the sourceway’s back doors, if you will. Before this discovery, we were investigating a biosignature with a strong resemblance to that of Karra Zendrigoss, thinking it was just a resonant echo. And a week ago, Artemisia, whom we believe to be the red lioness, was marked, attacked, and arrived here. And the keystone she was attuned to, the one you see before you, was lost on that same day. I think we can agree that those events make up an inordinate amount of coincidence.”
“Damn the luck,” General Strann swore, slamming one fist into the other. “That infiltrator who attacked Artemisia had the same biosignature as Karra the Beast?”
“And you let her not only mark the girl but also escape,” Sky Marshal Sesanji concluded.
“Let’s focus on what this means,” the primus suggested, stopping the confrontation before it festered. “The keystone has been drained. We can assume for now that the infiltrator recovered it and brought it back to this plane.”
“Perhaps they meant to trap her here, whoever ‘they’ might be,” Dorran suggested. “I place much emphasis on ‘they,’ because if what I remember of Karra is true, she has neither the sensibility nor the patience for spycraft. I am inclined to believe she is not working alone, and certainly not in her own interest, but draining the keystone essentially grounds the red lioness to this plane until it is cleansed of the black and re-attuned. I’d say well played, if only I knew to whom.”
“Well, Karra became a mercenary. And a damn good one. Makes some sense to me,” Admiral Voss said. “But she was also a little unstable, as we all know. I’m surprised at the subtlety, if it is her. Definitely someone else involved. No doubt in my mind.”
“If the Beast is back, then we have many more potential problems to deal with than would be otherwise necessary,” the primus sighed, biting away at his rising anxiety. “First concern should be determining if this mystery person with the ability to walk the planes and place a mark is, in fact, Karra ‘The Beast’ Zendrigoss. Once that has been determined, we will decide our next course of action. I also want this Levitus Two Seven contained, whether it also is a copycat, the real thing, or a group of fanatical loyalists. I don’t want a repeat of the Levitus’ terror tactics. The peacekeepers will investigate within our immediate walls, and the emperor spyder will spin his web outside the stronghold. We must contain this now.”
“As always, primus,” the taskmaster intoned with a bow. He didn’t much like being referred to as the emperor spyder, but hardly protested when called so by the primus.
“And what should we make of the keystone having been drained of its aether?” Dorran asked.
“There are only two people in all the nine planes that we know of with that ability,” Sky Marshal Sesanji remarked. “One of whom is in this very room.”
Every set of eyes locked onto General Strann. She said nothing. The other, they all knew, needed no mention.
“Be that as it may,” General Strann replied, seeking to temper the attention placed on her, “it has to be cleansed and re-attuned, otherwise she won’t have the ability to walk the planes. That is a skill she cannot do without.”
“To what end?” asked Dorran Visig. “She is where we may now need her. There’s no use in traipsing about in the black for an ill cause, although I have little doubt that she can survive. Even with all the aether that gathers in her presence, I still have my doubts.”
“I don’t like it either,” said Admiral Voss with a sniff. “She’d never be able to survive the journey, let alone reach the eye on the tower. It’s too much for the girl. It’s too damn much for just about anybody. I don’t doubt she can stave off the black. It’s the inexperience in the aether’s use that will get her killed.”
“And the alternative? Spend the next fifteen years re-attuning another key to the girl? We don’t have that kind of time,” the primus cautioned. “The last two attempts on this plane by the Legion have been brazen and costly. Were she not of the red lion’s ancestry, I doubt they would make the effort as they have.”
Sky Marshal Sesanji’s frustration finally took over where she had meant to contain it. “This would be a meaningless loss of life for the girl and anyone who i
s stupid enough to accompany her. However, I understand the necessity of her going. She should, at the very least, make the effort of an attempt. Either she succeeds, or the power of the black will cull the senses from her very mind and she’ll end up dead in a ravine at the edge of the world.” Sky Marshal Sesanji shrugged. “Or worse, be made to wander its holes and hells for an eternity. I’ll not waste good soldiers on this. Find someone else to die for her. Or with her. I’ll take her back to her plane myself and bury her when it is all said and done.” The sky marshal paused, frowning. “Where is she from, anyway?”
The primus shot a sideways glance at General Strann. She shifted in her seat.
Sky Marshal Sesanji glared at the general. “Oh, come now. You must know at least that much General, otherwise it would be curious if you did not. So where is she from? It very well can’t be here, because we all would know if and when the aethersphere gave forth its prized red lion.”
General Strann swallowed. “Well, the relevance of—
The door to the hall swung open. In the doorway stood Marchand Gadot. “Yes. Of course,” he began as he walked inside. “Why not let her die a meaningless death? That’s what you want, isn’t it?” Marchand stopped at the end of the table and shrugged at the sky marshal. “Your problems would be solved then. She would be out of the way, and you can proceed as you see fit. Am I right?”
Sky Marshal Sesanji clicked her tongue, irritated. “I have no such intentions. And you should really reign in that sharp tongue of yours, old man.”
“It’s Master Gadot, if you please. Gods all know I’ve earned it. Just because you are no longer my pupil doesn’t mean I still can’t teach you something, despite your possessing that stubborn arrogance you have assaulted us all with for nearly your entire tenure.” He studied her face as it contorted into a mask of anger. “Ah but anyone with half a brain can see your play for power over the last several cycles. No use pretending to care anymore.”