The Call of Kerberos

by Jonathan Oliver

  "You'd give your lives for her?"

  "Gladly, it is the most holy duty one can perform."

  "Then I'm afraid," Kelos said, "that your colleagues have died in vain. The Chadassa citadel does not lie below you. It is the Calma who reside here and they are peaceful, no threat to Twilight. The Chadassa have tricked you, sold you a lie. As you have been destroying the Calma's home a new breed of the Chadassa are marching on Twilight."

  "Lord of All, what have we done?"

  "Is there any way of getting a message back to Makennon?" Kelos said. "If Twilight is pre-warned then they may be able to defeat the remaining Land Walkers."

  "Spalding, our mage, should be able to help you reach her. Spalding?" The man with the tattooed face stepped forwards. "Take this man below. He wishes to converse with the Anointed Lord."

  Spalding sketched the symbol of the Faith in the air, before nodding to Kelos to follow him.

  An intense chemical smell emanating from the gun decks- a marriage of bad eggs and burning hair - hit Kelos as he followed the mage down a short flight of narrow steps. Compared to the Llothriall, the Faith ship was squalid and cramped. Kelos's shoulders brushed the sides of the narrow corridor, and twice he stumbled in the candlelit gloom, falling over ropes and thudding into crates. Eventually they reached a box room, the walls of which had been daubed with the symbol of the Faith. In the centre stood a pedestal supporting a bowl of water.

  Kelos shuffled in beside Spalding and looked up at him expectantly.

  "So, are we going to talk to her, or did you just want to get close to me?"

  Spalding looked down at Kelos with something like contempt before waving his hand over the bowl.

  A soft glow suffused the room and Makennon's face came into focus upon the water.

  "Spalding, is it done?" Katherine Makennon said. "If so you have my blessings. May the Lord of All take you into his arms."

  Spalding nodded at Kelos and the mage leaned over the bowl.

  "Hello Katherine."

  Shock briefly crossed Makennon's features only to be quickly replaced by her usual cold expression.

  "Kelos. You're not dead."

  "No, I'm not. Although your fanatics have been doing their best to rectify that."

  "Do you still have my ship?"

  "Yes, and we'd like to keep it if it's all the same to you. Anyway, this isn't a social chat Katherine. You have sent your suicide squad on a wild fish chase. The Chadassa aren't here, they've tricked you. Your boys have been killing the wrong creatures."

  "Kelos, if you're trying to sell me on some- "

  "No, listen to me for once! The Chadassa are going to launch another attack against Twilight, but this time with a new breed of creature. We managed to destroy the majority of them, but some got away. Now, if you prepare your best Swords you have a chance of defeating them, but you have to mobilise now. Drag Pontaine into this if you have to. The Land Walkers must not be allowed to reach the World's Ridge Mountains."

  "How do I know that you're not spinning me lies?"

  "Tell her Spalding, you've seen the Calma."

  For a moment he thought that the fanatic wasn't going to say anything - was perhaps mute - but after staring at Kelos as though he were going to kill him, he leaned over the bowl and said, "It's true. The Chadassa are not here. There are... other creatures."

  "Makennon - Anointed One - we can use the Llothriall to fight the Chadassa," Kelos said. "After all, wasn't that what the ship was intended for all along, to be a holy weapon? And we have some of your most fanatical followers to fight beside us."

  Katherine Makennon's head turned to one side and Kelos could hear her speaking to someone out of view. After a moment she turned back to them.

  "When you have defeated the remaining Chadassa forces you will return the Llothriall to us."

  "Like f -" Kelos caught himself in time. "Of course Anointed Lord. We shall return directly to Turnitia once the battle is won. We shall, of course, be treated with leniency?"

  "Goodbye Kelos."

  The image in the bowl dissolved.

  They were going to need a bigger boat, Kelos considered, as he ushered the remaining Final Faith fanatics on board the Llothriall. At this rate, if they picked up any more refugees they would have to sleep three to a bunk. He had no idea what they were going to do with them once the battle was over. Makennnon had demanded that he return the Llothriall to Turnitia, but Kelos had absolutely no intention of doing so. He had only warned her of the impending assault by the Land Walkers because he had dreaded the consequences otherwise.

  As they descended in the Llothriall to the Calma city the last of the fires were dying out. Kelos almost wished that the shroud of smoke had remained, because now that he could see the extent of the devastation he realised what little hope they had against the Chadassa. All but a handful of the glass domes had been shattered - though Kelos's horror was somewhat alleviated when he saw that the dome Dunsany had been recuperating in still stood - while the rest of the city seemed to have melted into the seabed. Within the soot stained ruins he could just make out the few surviving Calma, pulling the dead and dying from the rubble. Silus was out there already, doing what he could to help. Kelos would have offered his own assistance but, as he pulled on an underwater exploration suit, he had thoughts for only one man.

  Dunsany.

  Once out of the ship he headed for the glass dome. There Kelos could see several Calma working on sealing a crack in the structure's side, a stream of bubbles steadily rising from the fissure.

  He stepped through the entrance membrane to find himself ankle deep in water.

  "Dunsany!"

  There was no reply. The only sound was the steady trickle of the sea as it poured into the dome. Ahead of him the water was tinted with swirls of blood, washing from the entrance to a room. Kelos felt his stomach tighten as he splashed towards the doorway, but inside the room there was no sign of Dunsany, only five Calma corpses lying neatly side by side. Each room he passed held more corpses and he was beginning to lose all hope of ever finding his friend when he heard the splash of footsteps from up ahead.

  "Dunsany?"

  Dunsany was pale and his long hair was plastered wetly to his scalp. When he looked up at Kelos it seemed he didn't recognise him for a moment, but then a smile crept into his features.

  "Kelos? You know, all through my dreams you were there. Every step of the way, even to the edge of death. But you led me away from that dark vale and here I am. Though I can't quite remember where here is."

  Kelos wanted nothing so much as to hold Dunsany, but as he approached his friend there was a bang and a crack zigzagged up the wall of the dome. Beads of moisture began to leak through.

  He held out the spare underwater suit he had brought from the Llothriall.

  "I hope that you're not too weak to swim."

  The drip had become a trickle by the time Dunsany suited up and the dome had begun to sing as more cracks raced across its surface.

  "Thank you for coming for me, old friend," Dunsany said before sealing the suit's hood.

  And then, as the dome came down around them, their arms found each other.

  Katya stood in the Calma ship, watching Silus help with the rescue operation outside, feeling as though she were losing him all over again.

  This man who flitted through the water as quickly as the Calma - more quickly in fact - and who breathed the sea as easily as air, surely this man wasn't her husband? In fact, he was barely human. Katya still loved him, but the part she loved was the fisherman from Nürn, not the strange creature he had become.

  If Zac had lived would he have grown into this, she wondered. Would father and son have spent their time together exploring the world beneath the waves, returning to her with treasures from ancient wrecks and tales of mermaids, sunken cities and forgotten islands; things she could never experience, never share?

  The thought of Zac sent a new shard of grief through her. Katya tried to hold it in, only for it to
erupt as a high-pitched sob. The Calma looked up from where they worked, but made no move to offer comfort or sympathy. A few even stood staring at her, as though wondering what she would do next. In her embarrassment, Katya tried to hide her grief, but it was too big to contain.

  When Silus stepped back onto the ship, naked and dripping, he went to her but she pushed him away.

  "Katya, what is it? What have I done?"

  But she couldn't tell him, couldn't explain to Silus why she was so repelled by his touch.

  This was what it came down to. This was the place to which all of Dunsany's visions of adventure and discovery had led them; a ship full of disparate refugees arguing about the best way to fight a losing battle.

  Dunsany thought that the fanatics of the Faith looked the most lost. Not only had they discovered that their holy mission had been for naught, but now they found themselves having to incorporate the existence of the Calma and the theology of the Moratians into their blinkered world view. Dunsany watched Bestion calmly explaining about the Allfather to Spalding, who was becoming increasingly agitated by the dissonance between their beliefs.

  The Calma, of course, must be feeling the most acute sense of loss, though it was hard to read the creatures. The few that stood with them on deck silently looked out at their diminished fleet.

  "Do you think I should say something before our friends from the Faith start executing heretics?" Kelos said.

  "I think that may be a good idea."

  "People, your attention please." Nobody was listening, so Kelos lit up the deck with a spell that made them turn and stare. "Thank you. Now, I understand that this isn't where we want to be, but we owe it to ourselves not to run."

  "We should consider it a great honour to give our lives in the service of the Lord of All," Spalding said.

  "Thank you for your thoughts brother, but I'm hoping that won't be necessary. No, this is something we can win. Already we have weakened the Chadassa and all but defeated the Land Walkers. We can do this."

  "To die will be glorious."

  "Yes, thank you again brother. It may be best if you didn't keep reminding us of that."

  "I'm sorry Kelos, but we can't win this." It was one of the Calma. Kelos thought that it was Seras, the creature who had helped Dunsany recuperate. "When we still had a city we may have been able to help you, but now that we have nothing, no defences... I'm afraid that this is the end."

  "Ah, but you have yet to see what the Llothriall is fully capable of," Dunsany said. "She has, at her disposal, a devastating array of magical weapons."

  "It won't be enough," Seras said. "What we have faced so far is but a small part of the Chadassa's army and now, led by their dark god incarnate, they will fight with a conviction and ferocity that will ensure their success in wiping us out. I'm sorry Kelos, but the Calma can no longer offer their aid. We have to flee before the Chadassa once more."

  "There must be somewhere we can make a stand," Jacquinto insisted. "Is there no land nearby? If we can fight the Chadassa out of water then they will soon tire."

  "I'm sorry, but there's nowhere you can run to," Seras said.

  "That's not true," Bestion said.

  "Morat is gone, Bestion," said Kelos.

  "Not Morat. The Isle of the Allfather."

  "Do you even know how to get there? We have no charts for this area," Dunsany said.

  "We don't need charts. We simply follow the call of the Allfather." Bestion raised a finger to Kerberos.

  Spalding had had enough and he pushed his face into Bestion's before spitting his venom: "The only place that your blasphemies are going to lead us is the bottom of the sea."

  "Which is exactly where you'll be going if you don't keep a lid on those convictions of yours," Dunsany said, steering the acolyte into the capable and firm hands of Jacquinto and Ignacio.

  "Bestion, no offence, but how exactly do you expect us to follow this call?" Kelos said. "I hate to say it, but I can't hear it and I'm not sure that anybody else on board can either."

  "There is somebody here who heeds the call quite clearly," Bestion said. "In fact, I'm almost certain that he has been hearing it all along."

  "Is it... is it me?" Emuel said, stepping forwards. "Ever since I was taught to re-discover the song I have felt... something."

  "No Emuel. The one who hears the call is the one who brought us all here."

  Seras understood. "Silus."

  "What is he talking about?" Katya said. "Is this what has been leading you away from me, Silus?"

  Silus chose not to answer, instead he turned to Bestion. "It's Kerberos, isn't it?"

  "Ever since I led you in communion with the Allfather I have sensed your unique bond with Him," Bestion said. "You still hear Him, don't you?"

  "Yes."

  "Guide us to the Isle of the Allfather, Silus. If the Chadassa mean to fight us with their god, then we shall simply have to call on our own."

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Silus heard the island before he saw it.

  The music rose and fell with the warm breeze that moved across the deck, sounding as though it were being played on a thousand discordant pipes.

  Above him, Kerberos sat so large in the sky that the rim of the great disk touched the horizon. If he were to step from the Llothriall, Silus could almost believe that he would fall straight towards those endless azure clouds.

  "How much longer?" Kelos said. "At this rate the Chadassa are going to overtake us before we even reach the island."

  "We're almost there, listen."

  "According to Bestion you are the only one who can hear the call."

  "No, not the call. The music. Can't you hear it?"

  For a moment the only sound was the crack of the sails and the creak of rope, but when the wind strengthened the ethereal piping surrounded them.

  "What on earth is it?" Kelos said.

  "I think that it's the Isle of the Allfather."

  A low dark shape could now be seen on the horizon, crowned with what looked like a host of crooked towers. As they rapidly closed the distance to the shore, the music grew in volume.

  There was the thud of feet on the deck and Silus and Kelos turned to see Bestion racing towards them. "It's the Isle isn't it? I heard the music."

  More people were coming up from below now, drawn by the strange melody.

  Once they were close enough to drop anchor, Silus could see that what he had taken to be towers were in fact irregular pinnacles of stone rising from the bedrock of the island. These structures were not manmade; rather they appeared to have been sculpted by the wind which fluted through the many holes in the rock, producing the weird cacophony.

  "Jacquinto, Ignacio - prepare the launches," Kelos said. "The rest of you, prepare to disembark."

  Silus didn't wait for the boats; instead he dived over the side and into the blood-warm water.

  The sand here was so white and the water such a pure sapphire blue that he was reminded of the paradise of the Sarcre Islands. However, it wasn't only the sea that reminded him of Sarcre, for as Silus surfaced and began to wade towards shore, a low incessant buzzing filled his head.

  Ahead of him, the dazzling sands suddenly ended in a line of dark rock and there stood the monoliths, marching away along the coast as far as the eye could see. They were half as tall as a man and encrusted in lichens and salt. On their surface were etched runes.

  Silus tried to fight against the nausea that seemed to emanate from the stones, but a sudden dizzy spell put him on his knees. As the darkness crowded his vision, he only vaguely registered that someone was standing beside him.

  "They're the same as the stones on Maladrak's Cauldron," Kelos said.

  "That... that's nice," Silus managed. "Just help me get past the bloody things."

  He felt a hand under each armpit and then he was being carried forwards. As he drew level with the stones there was a second of intense pain before he blacked out.

  When he came to he was lying on the ground an
d the sun was just beginning to edge into Kerberos's shadow.

  "Well that is good news," he heard Kelos say.

  "What is?" Silus said, getting to his elbows.

  "The monoliths. They'll make the island a lot easier to defend against the Chadassa."

  "More importantly," Bestion said, offering Silus a hand up. "They'll buy us time as we call on the Allfather."

  Once the last of the Llothriall's passengers had reached the shore, Dunsany set about forming them into groups, which he then sent to scout out the island. It didn't take long for them to return, as they discovered that the island wasn't much bigger than the smallest of those in the Sarcre archipelago. The monoliths surrounded the Isle on all sides - even topping the sheer cliffs on the southern edge - and everywhere were the twisted stone spires, channelling the wind into the ethereal music that they had first heard on the ship.

  In all, Silus considered, there wasn't a lot of land to defend, but then there weren't that many of them to defend it.

  As Dunsany set about allocating tasks and forming up their defences, Bestion led Silus and Katya to the temple.

  The low round building stood in a grove of trees whose perfume was almost as powerful as the incense sticks Bestion lit once they entered the cool interior. An anteroom opened into the main chamber where a bridge crossed to the island that sat in the centre of a wide, shallow pool. There, flanked by metal censers, stood a simple stone altar. Above them a wide circular hole in the roof let in the light of Kerberos, the azure planet entirely filling the aperture.

  As soon as Silus stepped up to the altar silence fell on the temple. Not even the music of the wind reached them. He noticed that Bestion was looking at him with a kind of awed reverence. For a moment he thought that the priest was about to sink to his knees, but when he turned his full gaze on him, Bestion was frozen where he stood.

  "What's happened to your eyes, Silus?" Katya said.

  "What do you mean?"

  "Truly He has touched you," Bestion said. "Truly you are His avatar on our world."