“Your associate?” Delilah said, looking at Sal.
“Jesus Christ, lady, stop looking at me like that,” Sal said.
“You do understand that this one is to be sacrificed to the Spider for his acts of disobedience, do you not?” Alec asked.
“That’s news to me,” Kurt said.
“It must be done according to our traditions,” Alec said.
Kurt laughed—cackled—and he could tell by the way these cultists recoiled, almost to the point of cowering, that they were not expecting it. “What the hell do I care about your pallid traditions, Masku? Servants of it or not, I will determine the fate of this one, and I’ve decided that he’s of use to me. If any of you lay a hand on him, I’ll have no choice but to start removing body parts.”
Alec’s brow creased, sweat beading on his skin. “Of course, as you command.”
“Now, where are these answers I’ve so been looking forward to?”
“You’ve had a long journey,” Alec said, gesturing to both of them. “Surely you’ll want to rest before we get into things?”
“I don’t trust you.” Kurt grinned. “I’m a lot of things, but I’m not a fool. I don’t want to chance waking up in the middle of the night to find my associate burned at the stake, or whatever you savages had planned for him. So, if it’s all the same to you, let’s just get this over with so we can be on our way. I’ve been away from my world for far longer than I’d like as it is.”
Alec nodded grimly. “As you wish.” He eyed Delilah. “My child, bring me the relic and the book.”
Delilah nodded and bowed, then promptly exited the room.
“The artifact?” Sal said it like a curse.
“What is it?” Kurt said.
“The reason why this place is hidden to us weak-minded folk, as you put it. It’s a metallic slab with the Spider’s symbol etched into it.” Sal grimaced. “Makes my fucking skin crawl.”
“The relic is one of three identical slabs of unknown material that you will need to return to complete the bargain and receive that which has been promised to you,” Alec said to Kurt.
“What happens when I collect them?” he asked.
“The end of the fucking world?” Sal spat. “Screw that. Don’t do it, man.”
“Shut it,” Kurt said.
“These relics are from a time before man,” Alec said. “They are both here and not here at the same time. You might say that they are the keys to a gate, a passage into a world beyond this, one where the Spider now waits.”
“The Astral Lands.” Kurt smiled deeply, a smile that upset Alec’s composure even further. “So, it is imprisoned somewhere. It hasn’t just made a bargain with me. It needs me as much as I need it. Now, that is amusing.”
“Doubtless, there is some truth in your words,” Alec said. “But do not think that you can simply skip out on your bargain. The Spider has ways of getting to individuals even such as yourself.”
“I’m sure it does,” Sal said, scratching his arms.
Delilah returned holding a large metal disk about an inch thick with a tattered book resting on top of it. She stopped and reluctantly presented them to Kurt.
He felt the weight of the disk in his hands and regarded the grotesque symbol on the front. It was not a spider, as these Masku so ignorantly proclaimed it to be, but something older and far more terrifying. Their personification of it as a spider, a small creature that they were familiar with, was only a way for them to cope with the impossibility of its existence.
The book caught his eye as well. The cover was very old, and appeared to be leather-bound, with the words MESSAGES FROM THE ABYSS embossed and fading in red letters. “What’s with the book?”
“It will aid you in your journey,” Alec said. “Its creator paid a terrible price for the knowledge he wrote in that grimoire. It is the only one of its kind, and yet there are two in existence now. And we spent a great many years trying to get a copy so that we could pass it on to you.”
“If there’s only one, how are there two?” Kurt asked.
“The flow of time is a strange thing,” Alec said, grinning. “It is said that it neither moves forward, nor backward, but in a circle.”
“Fucking hell,” Sal said. “I’d sooner burn it if I were you.”
“You aren’t,” Kurt said.
“Be careful, though,” Alec said. “We kept the book isolated here for a reason. A beast stalks it from the Astral Lands. It may come for you too.”
Kurt smiled. “If it does, it will regret it.”
“Of course,” Alec said.
Kurt placed the book in his jacket. “We’re leaving now.”
“There is one more thing you need to know,” Alec said.
“Oh, joy, there’s more,” Sal said.
Alec glared through Sal. “We know the location of the second artifact. We tried to retrieve it along with the book you now possess, but, sadly, we were stopped by the military of this country.”
“Where?” Kurt said.
“Alaska,” Alec said. “One of my children will give you the exact latitude and longitude. Beneath the ice in that region, there is a dark pyramid that contains the second artifact, and a military and scientific base that surrounds it.”
“And the third?”
“We do not know where it is, but we know who does. Our people have been watching her for some time after I saw her in a dream. She runs an occult shop in New York City called The Crimson Skull Boutique. I’ll have my children get you her address as well.”
It took Alec’s “children” far longer than Kurt would have liked to get him the rest of the information that he needed, but when they finally handed it over, Kurt and Sal left the warehouse in a hurry.
“Why did you stick up for me back there?” Sal asked, climbing back into the passenger seat with a panicked urgency accompanying each of his movements.
“It’s what you said about my Sulen earlier.” Kurt turned the key and started the engine. “That insight may be quite valuable to me in the future, so I made sure to spare your life as repayment.”
“Thanks,” Sal said, grimacing.
“Don’t think that we’re friends, though,” Kurt said.
“Wouldn’t dream of it.”
Kurt took the car back toward the highway and headed to the closest town to gas the truck up and find a place to eat. It was going to be a long trip to this New York City.
CHAPTER TWELVE
TAKARUS
The bells for first moon hadn’t yet gone off. Yet here they were, far away from Yce Ralakar, standing in the middle of a frozen subterranean lake. The mountain range that made up Paronis paralleled the Northern Seas, and there were many tunnels that led to the beaches. This place was on the path that most exiles would be forced to take.
It was strange, standing in a place that so many dead Sulekiel had gazed upon before being sent off into the middle of the ocean to die.
Kirana rubbed the sleep from her eyes. “What are we learning today, Father?”
Father had been silent for a time, his eyes closed. “It’s time to test your skills.”
“What?” Takarus said. “But it’s only been a few months since—”
“Silence!” Father shouted, his face twisting into a scowl. “The Trials are set to begin next long night. That leaves us a very short time to finish your training.”
“Yes, Father,” Takarus said.
Kirana grinned at him.
Of course she was grinning, this whole thing was her idea.
“Kirana,” Father said.
“Yes, Father?”
“When you came to me several months ago, begging me to teach the son of Kyrties a lesson for moving so far ahead of the rest of your class, I was disappointed in you.”
“Y-you were?” Kirana said.
Takarus’s fists clenched. That’s why Father did that to Sage?
“Yes.” Father’s eyes were very grave. “Yet, I still punished him. Do you know why?”
Kir
ana shook her head.
“One of the healers broke taboo and came directly to me,” Father said. “She seemed startled, dark circles hanging beneath her eyes as though she hadn’t slept in many second moons. Her name is Argis, and she’s the headmaster of the Urdys Quarter, instructor for those that practice Sulen Ara’ka. And she had been tasked with healing the son of Kyrties after his punishment.
“The boy who had healed him previously had refused to leave his bed, refused to show up at the Temple of Ara’ka for his duties. When Argis laid hands on the son of Kyrties, she experienced a terrible vision. She saw him on a throne, his eyes aglow with evil crimson light, before hardened Sulekiel warriors and beings made of pure light.
“Argis believes that the boy harbors a great evil inside of him and may threaten our survival in the future.”
“I knew it!” Kirana shouted. “Like father, like son.”
“Perhaps,” Father said.
“You’re not certain?” Takarus asked.
Father shook his head. “I hold little faith in visions from attention-seeking healers. But...I felt it was better to err on the side of caution.”
“A wise choice, Father,” Kirana said.
“What I did may have stifled the boy’s drive to train himself, but you two are still going to be facing a lot of fierce competition in the Trials. After the ever-burning fires, you will have to complete the crusher, and the trial of the bells, but after that, you move on to facing your peers in one-on-one combat.”
“Am I to face Takarus to test my skills?” Kirana asked. “I’m ready, Father. I really am.”
Of course she thinks she’s ready, Takarus thought.
“No,” Father said. “You will not be facing one another. You will be facing me.”
“W-what?” Kirana stumbled on the ice. “We’re not ready for that!”
“My father used to say that sometimes it is necessary to see the mountain’s peak before you are fit to ascend it,” Father said.
“So, by facing you, we might grow even stronger?” Takarus said.
Father nodded. “You will face me at full power.”
“I’m ready,” Takarus said, lying through his teeth. The thought of facing Father at his full power made his legs feel weak.
Father tossed his crimson cloak off. He was wearing a black and red silk tunic with silver stripes running through it, leather bracers, a belt with his rank of Commander etched into the buckle, black trousers, and black boots. The garb he typically wore on official missions.
The ice shook with great tremors, testing Takarus’s balance, and Father’s coal skin began to shimmer as a brilliant white aura came to coat his body like the mist that rises from the river at first moon.
Feeling his Sulen...it was unlike anything Takarus had ever sensed before in his life. It gave him a vague sensation of falling, like he was being swallowed by it.
Father’s eyes focused on him. He did not bother shifting into Sulen Tukar. “Well, if you’re ready. Prove it.”
Takarus swallowed his own saliva. “Y-yes.”
Kirana was first to attack, however. Takarus winced as she leapt at Father, attempting to hit him with barrier punches. Father dodged these attacks as though she were moving slower than the crabs that sometimes wandered into the bathing pools. He was like water, and next to him her movements were rigid, stiff, like stone.
There was a bright flash of light, and then Kirana was lying on her back, groaning.
I didn’t even see him move! Takarus thought, shaking in his boots. How am I to contend with that if Kirana couldn’t even touch him?
Father’s eyes fell on him, and it was like staring into a raging inferno. So much anger. So much pride. “Well? Are you going to come at me or not?”
Takarus summoned his Sulen, as much as his fear would allow for, and concentrated on firing lightning at Father.
Father sighed.
“You are not ready,” he said.
And before Takarus could open his eyes, he felt his stomach explode with pain. Father had hit him so hard that once his back hit the ice, he kept sliding, tearing the back of his tunic to shreds.
The pain. It cascaded out from his gut in waves, paralyzing him.
I wasn’t even able to put up a barrier, Takarus thought. He was too fast...
“Remember that pain,” Father said, his voice echoing across the frozen lake and bouncing off the rock walls of the cavern. “Use it as motivation to climb higher.”
“Y-yes, Father,” he said, coughing, unable to move.
“I blame myself for your weakness,” Father said. “I should not have allowed you to fraternize with the son of Kyrties for so long. It’s clear to me now that your lack of discipline is due to his influence.”
What?
Takarus couldn’t help but think of all the games he and Sage had played as children. The time Sage had convinced Takarus to steal all of Father’s candles and melt them with their Sulen. He’d gotten whipped for that one. Or the time Kirana caught them drawing faces on the statues of the cathedral with coal. He’d been forced to balance on the Pillars of Thought for three hours for that one.
He’d thought of their adventures as exciting, even when those adventures landed them both in trouble.
“The boy has been a poison in your life,” Father said. “The sooner you realize that, the sooner you’ll be able to ascend beyond the meager power he has trained himself to wield.”
Maybe it’s true, Takarus thought. I...I don’t want to be weak anymore. I want to be like Father!
“F-father!” Kirana shouted.
Takarus struggled to look.
She’d rolled over on her stomach and was attempting to stand. Her body seemed as though it wasn’t obeying her. Her Sulen felt weak. If she tried summoning it now...
“Give up, sister,” Takarus said quietly. “He’s won.”
“N-no!” Kirana shouted, forcing herself to her feet. Her breath streamed through the air as she turned back to Father’s brilliant aura. She was hunched over, barely able to move. But she shifted into a weak stance anyway. Left palm down, right palm up, right foot forward, left foot back. “If I give up, then I will never be able to reach Father at the peak.”
“Take heed,” Father said coldly. “If you channel more than your body can handle, you will kill yourself. Just as your mother did.”
Kirana screamed, forming a ball of white light in her palms that Takarus thought might have been pure Sulen, and tossed it at Father.
The ball exploded on Father’s barrier and dispersed like a cloud of plasma.
Kirana fainted before she could even see that her attack had been meaningless. Father’s barrier was impenetrable.
And how could they have hoped to beat him? He had taken on armies of Shar and survived.
Father’s Sulen faded, and the light left the cavern.
Takarus was a failure.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
REYSHA
Months had passed, and the Trials were just around the corner. Reysha had taken to training on her own, going out to the Hall of Trials when others were busy drinking milk and slumbering, so that she could hone her craft and her skill.
In some ways, she missed punishment. Dirkus had been a more effective teacher than Padros. She had even thought of asking him to help train her for the Trials, but never got up the nerve to do so.
On the last day of punishment, he’d made them face him once more. This time, Kirana demanded to go first. Dirkus had seemed unimpressed by the meager progress she’d made in her training. She had learned a few new tricks. But her barrier punches never landed. She had been too slow to even land a blow on Dirkus’s barrier. In the end, she wore herself out.
Sage had been next to challenge Dirkus. Something had changed in him. When he faced Dirkus, there was a strange leer in his stare, like he was hiding something. Rumor was that Commander Kiel had made an example out of him during one of his training sessions for pulling too far ahead of the rest of his peers. And now i
t had seemed that his spirit had been crushed.
It saddened her to see that.
But, as Sage had charged at Dirkus, she noticed something. He’d gone in with barrier punches, something that Kirana had scoffed at. Probably because she’d failed with that tactic already. But after that he’d stuck to lightning and fire in attacking Dirkus.
He never landed a single blow, and he never used the pure Sulen he’d shown on the first day of punishment.
In fact, as Dirkus retaliated, breaking his barrier, Reysha felt something in his emotions...a deep sense of satisfaction.
Kirana had called him weak and laughed at his defeat. The spoiled brat couldn’t see it. Sage had been holding back on purpose.
When it was finally Reysha’s turn to face Dirkus, she’d let him see everything she was capable of. Padros had pushed them to learning barrier punches as well, but he’d also encouraged them to learn on their own, because they would be on their own in the Trials. Padros believed that their survival would come down to an individual’s ability to diversify their abilities. If they all fought the same, it would open them up to defeat, and... Extinction.
Reysha had taken that to heart and practiced every second moon, hoping to get one more chance to fight Dirkus. When she had summoned her Sulen, he’d actually smiled and moved into a defensive position.
She’d wished she could have seen Kirana’s expression when she charged in and slammed Dirkus with a wave of pure Sulen, or when she’d unleashed a barrier sword on him, attempting to cut him when his barrier was down for attack.
Reysha breathed deep, savoring how it had felt to trade blows with a warrior of Dirkus’s level. Even as her barrier had been broken, she had felt the most satisfaction in her entire life.
“You’ve shown real progress,” Dirkus had said, offering her his hand. “But do not slack off here. You must train harder from this point on. You’ve gone through the ever-burning fires, but the crusher and the trial of the bells will not be so easy. Then, you’ll face your peers in one-on-one combat. Win or lose, your performance in combat will determine whether Commander Kiel and the Council of Elders award you the rank of Valier.”
The Man Without Hands Page 13