by Joe Ducie
“It was you, your promises, your damned prophecies in Atlantis-that-was, which convinced my sister to give up her grace. You are responsible for her death, as sure as if you wrapped your hands around her throat and squeezed, Declan Hale.”
‘You stabbed her in the heart!’
“An inconvenience, as you know, to the Everlasting. But without her grace…” Oblivion sighed, which surprised me. I’d never known the god to falter, to be anything other than focused hate and direction, desire, in his quest to conquer the Story Thread.
‘What will mummy and daddy say, I wonder?’
Oblivion laughed as we approached an arch of grand black-glass stone, some sort of translucent obsidian crystal, arching overhead and designed to intimidate. Spiked, golden gates stood open within the archway. There were no guards on duty.
“None can breach this holy place save the Everlasting,” Oblivion said. “And our vessels—or servants in our thrall. You stand on ground only a handful have trodden since the birth of this existence.”
Drops of Ethan Reilly’s blood still fell from my hands and the crystal bridge seemed to drink the blood, absorb the liquid and glow all the brighter. I took a deep breath and exhaled slowly, worrying on Sophie Levy—she had loved Ethan, had a rough sort of love for me, too. What would she do when she learnt of what happened? Further, what would Ascension City and the Knights Infernal, my brother the king, do when they learnt that Arbiter Declan Hale, infamous and one of their own, had been seized by the Everlasting Oblivion?
The romantic, idealistic part of my soul pictured the entire Cascade Fleet mobilising, the thousands of Knights across thousands of worlds being called to arms, a grand war and campaign led against the Everlasting—basically, what I’d been pissin’ into the wind for since this mess began in the ruins of Atlantis at the end of the Tome Wars.
The bitter alcoholic in me knew better. I was on my own.
Tal and Annie had escaped, as Ethan died, to spread the foul word. So perhaps I could count on them, but Tal was meant to be dead and Annie lacked Will, and thus authority, in Ascension City.
By the Everlasting, I wanted a drink. But I was over a year sober now, my last drink ten thousand years ago in Atlantis before it had been taken by the Void. I’d sobered up for Tal, which wasn’t the best reason, but in the end, I’d done it for myself. If I’d known it would lead to all this, even with the death of Dread Ash as salve, I would have hit the whisky twice as often.
‘What should I expect here?’ I asked Oblivion.
Oblivion ignored me and strolled through the mighty gates. Here he took a set of clear marble steps up through the citadel, rock faces covered in outlandish blooms and trickling with clear water on either side.
I should probably expect pain—torture, at the very least, if being slave to Oblivion wasn’t torture enough. I had no friends in the Citadel of the Everlasting. Far from it, I had nothing but enemies. Ageless, immortal, powerful enemies. The Elder Gods with a grudge against the uppity mortal who had made them look foolish more than once.
Lord Oblivion took a set of stairs to the left, winding around the outside of the floating space island, heading into the understory beneath a canopy of leafy blue trees. The air was warm, cloistered, almost refreshing. Butterflies and small forest critters, of all things, darted along the marbled path ahead of us.
Oblivion sensed my surprise. “Not what you expected, is it? So little you understand, mortal.”
‘Whenever I think of you lot kicking back, putting your feet up in whatever poor human you’ve raped with possession, this is not where I pictured it, no.’
“You placed yourself against us, Declan Hale, based on stories and rumour, on fear and myth. Granted, you have been more than an annoyance in recent years—even a threat, which makes your subjugation now the sweetest fruit—but you understand nothing. Of who we are, of the Everlasting’s purpose. You think us villains in some poorly written book. We are… not.”
I shrugged and leaned back against the wall of the ship’s brig in my mind. ‘I know enough to stand against you. You want to rule, humanity and the Story Thread under your heel. I won’t allow it. It doesn’t belong to you. And it’s that simple.’
“Even now, your defiance is admirable,” Oblivion said. He entered a two-storey white marble building, overlooking the sheer cliffs falling away into the galaxy below. I glanced out at the stars, those near and those distant pinpricks against the black canvas of the universe, and wondered which way was home. “Declan Hale, the Story Thread was ours before it was yours.”
‘There are more of us than there are of you.’
“Meat for the grinder, grist for the mill,” Oblivion said, waving away humanity in one gesture of my hand. “Despite your… victories… do you know of any power in creation that can stand against me, let alone the might of my family?”
I thought on his words carefully, and I was doing my best to keep him talking. I would find a way out of this snare, I would find a way to turn this abuse and possession to my advantage. Already Lord Oblivion had made a mistake—another, since possessing me—in bringing me to the seat of the Everlasting’s power. I was their greatest enemy, by design and choice, I stood against the blight.
And I did it well. Had seen off two of the immortal Elder Gods. Oblivion’s mistake was thinking me subjugated, as he put it, and then bringing me here to the citadel—a place I never could have found on my own.
I recalled the age-old nursery rhyme from my childhood, taught to every kid in Ascension City, about the Everlasting:
’Ware the Nine Forgetful Tomes
Storied names carved of old bone.
For the Nine see you as clear rose-light
Etched to stand against their blight.
Bitter Child craves his father’s throne,
Yet Younger Scion sits all alone.
Dark travesty surrounds the Age Flood,
Lord Oblivion drowned in fire and blood.
The Sleeping Goddess can never forget
Fair Astoria, lost in time’s tangled net.
Mind the snare of the Nightmare Sea—
Madness, the realm of Iced Banshee.
Distant threads tie the Ancient Bane
Pained Hail and his forever game.
Hear the wrath of the Marked Fear—
Harbinger Chronos is drawn near.
Starless paths through the Lost Sight
Dread Ash turns cold day to night.
Watch Fated Legion be destroyed
Scarred Axis fears the rampant Void.
The World-Eater, last in shadow’s husk
The Never-Was King—Lord Hallowed Dusk.
So ‘ware the Nine Forgetful Tomes
’Ware the Elder Gods from your home
Ageless, hateful, dull blight-flame—
The Everlasting know your name.
Did I know of any power in creation that could stand against the Everlasting?
Yes, I surely did.
Mine.
*~*~*~*
The mansion we had entered on the western face of the citadel, if north was walking in along the crystal bridge, though any direction was rendered meaningless this far into deep space, was, I realised, Lord Oblivion’s chambers—the home within his home.
It didn’t feel right, seeing the Everlasting at home. I’d never thought them to be so domestic, so… relaxed. They were boogeymen, nightmares. They didn’t shit, shower, and shave like the rest of us.
Oblivion bathed my body in a pool of cool spring water overlooking the cosmos, cleaned away the grime and blood from both Dread Ash’s and Ethan’s demise. I was in a lot better shape since giving up the drink, toned, muscled, a year’s worth of training in Atlantis, but my body was a roadmap of scars. Barely an inch of my chest, shoulders, and back had escaped some sort of injury. I’d long since forgotten half of the damage, the healers in Ascension City and during the Tome Wars had patched me up a thousand times, often hurried, often leaving marks, but enough to get me back o
ut on the battlefields and doing what I did best.
Most recently, I had four deep furrows—scratches like claw marks—scarred over my heart.
Oblivion, taking account of his latest motor, my body, ran my fingers over those scars, matching my fingernails to each of the tracks.
I sensed his curiosity, which was another surprise—again, the Everlasting were far more… human than I expected. Emily Grace, Fair Astoria that was, had loved me, and I her, and Dread Ash had claimed to admire me, even care for me (the good it did her, another broken promise), but being this melded with one of the Elder Gods… I grew careful, wary, less I began to empathise with the enemy.
‘Dread Ash made those marks,’ I said, unprompted. ‘Yesterday, though it feels a lot longer.’
Oblivion chuckled softly. He swam lazy laps in the bubbling pool now, taking his ease. From somewhere, a pitcher of ale and a platter of fruit had appeared—magic, invisible servants, it didn’t matter—and he swam that way, pouring himself a drink and knocking back the ale as if it were tap water.
Technically, that broke my sobriety. Fresh, sordid alcohol about to hit my sorry, scarred liver, but I reckon if I went to a meeting they’d give me a pass on this one.
Though some of the bastards in those meetings were gospel-strict. Elder God possession or no, I’d have to reset my chip.
“That’s better,” Oblivion said with a sigh.
Too human, I thought from within my prison cell.
After he had bathed, Lord Oblivion dressed us in a suit of fine clothes—midnight black, of course, silks and threads as alien as the rest of the citadel. I could feel the fabric against my skin, alone in that cold cell, rubbing at my bare arms. To the simple if not stylish pressed button suit he added a cloak, which even for me was a touch arrogant. Funeral garb. He slipped my feet into a pair of black leather shoes, ran his hands over my scruffy brown hair and muttered an enchantment—my oft unruly and rarely cared for mane settled into a neat short back and sides.
Oblivion stared at me—at us—in the mirror. We looked good, sharp. He tsked over the mess of scar and the bloated, boiled egg of my left eye, which I usually kept hidden under a charming pirate’s eye patch, and then held my hand over the orb.
“You’ve enough injury to have put you in the grave a thousand times over,” he muttered.
‘It did, once,’ I said, thinking on the petal of the Infernal Clock that had brought me back to life. Emily’s doing, Emily’s grace. All part of the plan. That petal had killed Dread Ash, and now sat in Tal’s lovely heart, where I hoped it would stay forever.
Tal had been host to Oblivion for six years before me, and Dread Ash within a celestial illusion prison for ten thousand years after that. If anyone deserved protection from their influence, it was Tal Levy. Though I hoped I wasn’t at the start of a ten millennia run as host to Oblivion. As far as breaking that record went, I wasn’t going for gold.
I was hoping for disqualification.
Within my mind prison, my left eye began to tingle, then grew hot, and then something wonderful happened. My vision in that eye, which over the last year had been blind, my knightly powers doing their best to heal the damaged cells, my sight growing white and hazy and then stalling, failing, returned. The sight returned.
I blinked—both in my head and out in the citadel. The scar tissue remained around the eye, but the vision was restored.
“Better,” Oblivion grunted. He straightened the black tie, adding a silver-blue mythril pin to hold it in place against the shirt, which of course matched the clasp of our dark and forbidding cloak. “Fitting. This is a fine vessel, despite the scars.”
‘Don’t get used to it, buddy,’ I said, though I was amazed how simply Oblivion had healed my eye. The best healers in the Story Thread had only been able to give me false-hope of the sight ever returning. That healing, along with the capsule-less Void travel, added an element of respect to the fear and fury fuelling my escape.
I had not for a moment considered this contest would be easy, but I was so far out of my league skill-wise that I didn’t even register on the scale. But that was OK—skill wasn’t everything. I could be clever, use the Everlasting’s expectations against them. Be that old thorn in their side.
Lord Oblivion poured himself another ale from another magical pitcher on the dresser and savoured the foamy beer, smacking his lips—my lips—as if the taste of such things was new to him. Perhaps, in my body, it was.
“The host body often takes some adjustment, yes,” Oblivion said.
I reminded myself that I wasn’t alone at any time. My unguarded thoughts—any of those thoughts—seemed audible to Lord Oblivion. I imagined it was like having the radio on in the background. He could listen on in any so time he chose.
“Tastes, scents, a few other senses are different, dependant on the vessel,” the Everlasting continued. “This ale, a delicacy brewed in cosmic vats, is a favourite of mine. I’m glad your palate enjoys it. Otherwise I would have to replace your tongue, which would be a bother.”
I blinked and held my tongue between my teeth, and then chuckled. ‘Well, if it’s got booze in it then we’re probably fine.’ A thought occurred to me. ‘Why do they call you the Age Flood?’ I asked. ‘I’ve spent years dissecting what little information there is about you Everlasting. What does that mean?’
“I haven’t the faintest,” Oblivion said and enjoyed a third pour of ale. I sensed he was lying.
No, not lying—I sensed he was obstructing. I didn’t think the Everlasting could lie. I felt it as sure as the wind in my hair, the rain against my skin. I didn’t know the truth, I couldn’t see that, but I knew he was mincing his words, bending the truth. We were one and the same, after all, in this body. He could hide the truth, but not the deceit.
I placed that little tid-bit of information in the vault, in my guarded thoughts, where I hoped he could not pry—a dangerous assumption, but one that felt true.
‘Tell me something,’ I said.
“Be silent now, or I will silence you.”
‘One little thing,’ I continued and waited for the slap, the door to slam closed and leave me alone in the back of my mind, in the dark, unable to do anything but gasp for breath. It didn’t come.
“Well?” Oblivion said.
‘Can the Everlasting lie?’
“What?”
‘You heard me. I’ve had a sneaking suspicion for some time now that you are… bound? Is that the right word? Sworn, perhaps. You can deceive, bend the truth into myriad pieces, but outright lie?’
Oblivion waved my question away. He finished his ale, slammed the goblet on the dresser, and strode from the opulent room and down the stairs. We headed back out into the starlit citadel, the heavens bathing us in cerulean blues and emerald greens.
Despite myself, and my split body and mind, I felt better for the bathing and, I assumed, the cosmic ale. A small, warm buzz had settled in my chest—a familiar buzz, lost to time and last felt over a year ago.
I was tipsy, heading toward drunk. Whatever was in that ale could have fuelled a small nation, if I was feeling any of it within my mind prison, severed from my actual body. Or, and here was another guarded thought, perhaps the connection to my true form, my vessel, wasn’t as severed as Oblivion would like me to believe.
“We are late,” Oblivion said, scaling a set of winding, lazy white marble steps, rising above the trees toward the mighty central dome atop of the citadel. The dome looked like St Paul’s Cathedral in London, to me, though far larger, sprinkled with Roman influences.
‘By design?’ I asked, thinking on Oblivion’s promise to cause a sensation at his sisters’ funerals.
I felt him grin as we climbed ever higher.
As the steps reached a plateau, I caught my first glimpse of someone other than myself and Oblivion in this impressive mausoleum. The summit of the climb was a great, stretching courtyard that held the domed citadel, and within that courtyard stood nine statues of such amazing height and cl
arity that I knew I could only be looking at one thing.
Here were the Everlasting.
All of the Elder Gods cut in stark, fine marble relief.
“Behold, my family,” Lord Oblivion said, as we strode across the courtyard toward the central dome.
The statues rose a hundred feet or more on either side, lining the clear white walkway. I realised, with a nervous start, that one of them - the first on the left, looked exactly like me. Right down to the funeral garb and cloak I was wearing right now, at Oblivion’s command. Even the new haircut, on top of which sat a crown of thorns. My statue’s face was my face, though far too severe, the eyes chips of hard diamond. I didn’t look like that, did I? That… angry? No.
The other statues on the left, three handsome faces, I did not recognise. At all. They were all dressed appropriately, finely, and like my statue all wore a type of crown—marking them as royalty, or higher than royalty, I suppose… divinity. One of the four male statues had a scar over his eye, a ruined eye socket, and I wagered a guess that was the Everlasting Scion, who I had blinded with Myth, the Creation Dagger, nearly two years ago.
A wound like that couldn’t be healed, not when it was created by celestial illusion. I grinned. The scar had followed Scion into his newest vessel, it seemed. Good.
The statues on the right were another matter.
All of them were women. Four statues, four women, impossibly beautiful and distant. Two of them were of the same white, resplendent marble as their brothers on the left. Two of them, however, were black stone. A sort of obsidian glass, like translucent flint—the same material the grand intimidating archway into the citadel had been cast from.
Shrouds hung over the heads of these statues, of a stone so fine it looked like cloth, carved in a way to almost be shifting in the galactic breeze. Magic at work. An air of incredible sadness, of ancient loss, hung over these statues.
I realised that I was looking at the statues in real-time—which is to say, these statues somehow updated as the Everlasting did. As they changed vessels and even clothes, which is why one of the statues looked like me, and—though it had never happened before—why the two female statues had faded as they died.