The Ravens of Death (Tsun-Tsun TzimTzum Book 4)

by Mike Truk

  “What is the matter, Savior? Losing your appetite? But I’m just getting started…”

  I opened my eyes and flew to the side, falling into the gravity well of a new shard, pulling me toward my new down, which moments ago had been the wall. The whole cavern shifted around me, with Khalistria now moving along… a wall?

  I kept flying, entered a new gravity well, and Khalistria was now upside down above me; Valeria on my plane, everything madness, flames rising in every direction from scattered sconces. My mind was bursting trying to keep track.

  So I thought, Fuck it. Fuck understanding this new world. I just needed a bead on the naga bitch.

  “Appetizers,” I said, and hurled an arc of golden light at her from Shard’s edge.

  She brought up her ward, a luminous purple, and my attack failed to cut through.

  “That’s it?” She looked almost comically disappointed. “You’d best do better, Savior, or I shall grow irate.”

  Valeria squeezed off another shot.

  Khalistria didn’t even turn. Her ward deflected it easily. “Cease your interruptions, harlot,” said the nagathronessa. “Or I will give you cause to regret it.”

  “I’m here,” said Imogen, stepping into view at last at the bottom of the stairwell. “What did I miss? Oh. Oh, no. I don’t think so.”

  She went down onto one knee, planting her hand on the ground.

  Khalistria narrowed her crimson eyes, and a moment later, the cavern righted itself. Pieces slotted back into place, up becoming up once more, down becoming down.

  “There,” said Imogen, standing upright and dusting off her gloved hands. “Much better. Now, what were you saying, cunt?”

  Khalistria licked her lips with a disturbingly long tongue and chuckled. “So, you are not all without merit. I applaud your audacity. In fact -”

  Valeria squeezed off another shot.

  A sliver of purple ward appeared, deflecting the bolt.

  “I warned you,” hissed the nagathronessa, and made a cutting motion with one hand.

  A serrated blade of crimson light appeared before Valeria and scythed down.

  I raised a hand and began to scream, but it was too late.

  The burning blade cut through both of Valeria’s wrists with impossible speed, butchering flesh and shattering bone. The crossbow and her hands fell to the ground.

  Blood fountained from her twin stumps.

  “Valeria!” I screamed.

  Emma burst forward without hesitation, sprinting wide around the naga. “Cover me!”

  My Vam Mantra shattered. I roared in horror and fury and unleashed everything I had at Khalistria. Levenbolts erupted from my body, each as thick as my leg, endless and without rhyme or reason, just as Imogen gritted her teeth and did the same, her own strike as thick as a tree. Brielle rose enough to pour flame at the naga, as Little Meow continued to heal the wound done to the back of her head.

  Khalistria laughed as she was engulfed, her ward burning brighter and brighter as we assaulted its integrity.

  Valeria screamed and went down.

  Emma nearly slipped as she leaned into the run, curving around the dais, just outside the conflagration consuming the nagathronessa.

  I leaned into the attack, ditching Manipura for complete Muladhara, wanting nothing more than to reduce the naga to a stain on the stone floor.

  The cavern was all sound and fury, a lurid light show that played endlessly about the purple ward. But even in the depths of my rage and horror, two things became apparent:

  One, we weren’t getting through to the naga.

  Second, Emma wasn’t equipped to deal with such a terrible wound.

  Little Meow, no doubt thinking the same thing, broke away from Brielle to run after Emma.

  The purple ward imploded, but Khalistria was gone. Our attacks surged through where she’d been a second before, slashing and scoring deep tracks against the far wall, before we all cut them out.

  I searched, unable to find her.

  Imogen slammed down to a knee and planted a hand on the ground. “Can’t find her - she’s - over there, left side of the cavern!”

  I turned just in time to take a faceful of balefire. My ward cracked, distorting beneath the assault, but held. In so doing, however, it lifted me off the ground, hurling me back against the cavern wall. My ward caused the rock to crack behind me, and I engaged Manipura just before I would have fallen to the ground.

  “We need help!” shouted Little Meow, reaching where Valeria lay. “Noah! She’s not going to make it!”

  No words had ever made my blood run colder.

  Khalistria’s laughter echoed off the walls. “I did warn the little whore, did I not?” And then there she was, no - there were three of her, no - five.

  Mirror images moving forth, confident and at ease, each untouched by our attacks.

  “Noah!” Emma’s cry was heartbreaking. “She’s losing too much blood!”

  “An offer,” said all five Khalistrias as one. “I’ll save your fallen warrior if you give me Shard.”

  My mind was spinning. I hovered in mid-air, my ward shrinking around me. Imogen was panting for breath, her hair disheveled, while Brielle clawed her way to standing up the wall.

  The sound of shouts came from down the stairwell.

  Reinforcements.

  “You had best choose quickly,” said the nagathronessa. “The way your kind bleeds, the little warrior will be dead in moments.”

  Another futile attack? I knew I could summon reserves, could burn brightly like a dying sun one last time - but even if I killed Khalistria, how would that help Valeria?

  Imogen and Brielle were looking to me for direction.

  I took a deep breath.

  All creation in a drop of water, I thought. All creation before me.

  “Get to Valeria,” I said, voice cold and steady. “Now.”

  Both women nodded, running out wide along the cavern walls.

  I floated forth, moving toward the Khalistrias, which had all climbed the steps to turn and face me from their dais. How regal she seemed, how cold, how inhuman.

  “Swear that you will honor your promise,” I said. “Swear that you’ll heal her if I give you Shard.”

  Khalistria laughed, delighted, and her five images collapsed into one, which turned out to be the second from the right. “I do so swear, by all that I hold holy. May the Source itself burn out my soul and sever my bond to the Nevernight if I do break this vow.”

  I could see Emma and Little Meow feverishly working on Valeria, and cursed how little power they must have left at their disposal. Brielle and Imogen were nearly there.

  “Then take this blade,” I said, reversing my grip so I extended it hilt first toward her. “It’s brought me nothing but trouble and heartache since it was given to me.”

  Khalistria extended her clawed hand, then hesitated. Her crimson eyes narrowed as she studied me.

  And in that moment, words came unbidden to my mind, words taught to me by the Wandering Magus deep within Brielle’s manifold trial. I heard them in his voice, austere and authoritative, calm and emotionless:

  White is the color of death, and into it bleeds all feeling, all hope, all terror, everything that is, until all that remains is the self, quiescent, alone, and without wonder or pain.

  The Carnivorous Winter mantra.

  Khalistria studied me, and I felt her will press upon my mind, probing at my thoughts.

  But within me, all rage, all hatred, all terror were sucked into a white void.

  Snow falls across the world, light as a lover’s caress, but where it touches all sensation fades, like flowers losing their bloom. Silence. Stillness. Solitude.

  The nagathronessa nodded and closed her clawed hand about Shard’s hilt.

  I grinned at her.

  She paused, suddenly unsure.

  Then I lit her up.

  Diving into my reservoir, deep down to where the golden filament was centered, I took hold of it with both
spirit hands.

  I felt it resonate like some vast violin string, one end attached to my soul, the other? Who the fuck knew where.

  But wherever it went, that place had power without reserve.

  I drew on that vast reservoir, channeling that terrible magic through the filament, through my spirit, and into Shard.

  The blade went veritably supernova with golden light.

  Khalistria screeched, hand locked on the hilt, the light scalding away her flesh, charring her snake hair. Her lips pulled back from her fangs, and still I poured more power into Shard, willing myself to burn to a crisp, willing to sacrifice everything so I could dump as much of the Source’s might into this one, single blast.

  Then it was over. The light dimmed and Khalistria was gone, the floor scorched where she’d been, her screams echoing still about the cavern.

  Dazed, reeling from what I’d done, I flipped Shard about so that its hilt smacked down into my palm, then flew straight to where my companions were gathered.

  Valeria lay between them all, pale and vulnerable, her lips tinged blue, her eyes sunken. I could see her pulse in the flutter at her neck; it was fast and erratic.

  Little Meow and Emma each clasped a stump in their hands, eyes closed, faces drawn into masks of concentration and pain. Valeria’s blood had washed over them, painting them in gore, so their robes were sopping and heavy. They’d tied cruel tourniquets about each elbow, but those were clearly insufficient to stem the flow of blood.

  The wounds were no clean slice. It was as if her hands had been chopped off with a chainsaw. The flesh was lacerated, the bone extending in broken shards from just below where her wrists had been.

  The sight nearly made me vomit. For a moment I couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think.

  “Noah!” Imogen had pressed her hand to the ground. “She’s retreated but she’s not dead!”

  For a moment, I thought she meant Valeria, then understanding kicked in.

  “We need to act,” said Imogen. “Before she comes back!”

  I tried to think, to imagine another alternative. To find the portal to the next realm and plunge through while Khalistria was gone? To try and find a healer in Argossy? To - to what?

  Nothing made sense.

  “She’s fading fast,” said Little Meow, pushing up her cat mask to turn and stare up at me. Blood was caked across her chin, and her eyes were wild with despair and panic. “We can’t save her.”

  I drew forth a thorny circle from my belt pouch and bit my lower lip as I considered it. I stared at that emblem of hate and horror that I’d sworn I’d never use, had almost cast into the void to avoid this very moment, this very temptation.

  But it’d been Valeria who’d stayed my hand.

  “So be it,” I said, and snapped a thorn off. I plunged it into a crack in the ground, then clutched the emblem so tightly it pricked my palm and drew blood.

  “Morgana,” I said, voice thick with hatred. “Open your damn portal. Allow us to return. Morgana!”

  A swirling portal of green and black magic did opened before us, its center opaque like black ink.

  I stared furiously into its roiling core, and my shoulders slumped in defeat. Bending low, I scooped Valeria into my arms. Then, bitterness and terror waging war in my heart, I flew through and back into Ur-Gharab.

  Chapter 12

  I emerged into a dour room, all high obsidian walls and black draperies, a few braziers burning with pale blue flames. The black floor was polished to a high gloss as if covered by a sheen of water, and the ceiling and corners were lost to shadow. Alusz Iphigenia sat before a desk on which a tall, oval mirror was positioned, brushing her long hair, while Morgana stood to one side, looking testy and displeased.

  A bedchamber, I realized, moving forward with Valeria in my arms. The drapes at the rear of the room were those of a four-poster bed; here and there, I saw other amenities suggesting the room's purpose. A chest, a slender bookcase on which uniform tomes sheathed in gray were fitted, a tall wardrobe whose doors no doubt hid dresses.

  My arrival shattered the stillness. Alusz froze, silver brush raised in one hand, her reflection staring at me in shock. Morgana snapped her fingers, summoning a ward of the palest lavender about the young queen.

  Despite the fear and horror that was coursing through me, part of my mind filed that away for later: You can summon wards to protect others.

  “Savior,” began Morgana, but I was in no mood for speeches.

  “Help her,” I said, floating forward with Valeria in my arms. “Please.”

  The regent glanced at Valeria’s terrible wounds with little emotion. “Run into some trouble, have you?”

  “Morgana,” said Alusz, her voice at once quiet but pressing.

  “Very well, very well. I shall tend to these wounds.” She reached out to press her fingers against the side of Valeria’s neck, and I had to restrain the urge to tear my companion away. “She’s not too far gone. Though perilously close. Hold still.”

  My other companions were stepping through the portal as she spoke. Morgana ignored them with exquisite assurance, extending a hand over Valeria’s face. She whispered something in a tongue I couldn’t understand, and a pale green light filtered down from her palm, insinuating itself into Valeria’s nostrils and through her parted lips.

  “There,” said Morgana. “That should buy me enough time to move her to where she can be properly seen to. Give her to me, Noah.”

  “I’ll carry her,” I said.

  “You shall not. I shall take her to be healed. If you refuse me this, I will remove my blessing and she will die in your arms.”

  I ground my teeth in frustration and glanced at the others. They were equally harrowed by the experience we’d just been through, looking battered and exhausted.

  “What choice do you have?” asked Morgana. “You already know the price I will exact for this favor. All has been calculated beforehand.”

  Still, I hesitated, holding tightly to Valeria, studying her wan and sunken features with desperation. Was handing her to Morgana a fate worse than death?

  “You made your choice when you activated the portal,” said the regent. “Why cavil now?”

  “Allow him to go with her,” said Alusz.

  Irritation flashed across the regent’s face, then she sighed melodramatically. “Very well. You may come with me to ensure I do nothing untoward to your fallen warrior. Is that satisfactory?”

  “Yes,” I said, looking at Alusz in consideration. The young queen’s expression was stony and indifferent; she turned away to continue brushing her hair.

  An act?

  “Then let us be about it. Come.” Morgana made another gesture, and the ward that surrounded Alusz faded away as a second portal came into being before me. “Through there. And hurry. I will not take the blame if your friend dies while you hesitate.”

  I stepped into the swirling darkness and emerged into a tower room, its tall windows gave us sweeping views of Ur-Gharab. The stone floors and walls were of pale gray, and the room was devoid of furnishings beyond a large, black stone that stood dead center.

  An altar, it seemed to me. Where had I seen it or its like before?

  “Lay her on the stone,” said Morgana. “It shall amplify my healing powers as a magnifying glass does the rays of the sun.”

  “No corruption,” I said, holding Valeria closer to my chest.

  “By Lilith and her beloved betheliim, are you serious?” Morgana glared at me. “Your friend is minutes from death, and she only has that long due to my intercession. And still you have demands?”

  “She dies before I let you pervert her,” I said. “I know she’d want that as well. Swear to me that your healing with no corrupt her or I shall turn away.”

  “How very noble. And stupid. Tell me, Noah Kilmartin, what manner of oath would you find serviceable for this occasion? Is there anything I could swear by that would allow you to trust a Morathi?”

  A memory came to me. Peruthros
back in Ghogiel, with Imogen near death under the sway of her parasite, as I swore an oath to Salathis.

  An oath that near crippled me when I broke it.

  “Swear it by the Source.”

  “I hold the Source in less regard than I do sack full of drowned rats.”

  “Doesn’t matter. The oath will still hold.” Intuition guided my next words. “Swear it with your hand upon Shard’s blade, and I will believe you.”

  Morgana’s eyes narrowed.

  Blood dripped from Valeria’s ruined arms to the floor.

  “Very well,” said Morgana. “What care I? You are the prize, not this woman. Draw your blade, Noah, and let us proceed before your friend’s death renders this all moot.”

  I set Valeria down on the black stone and drew Shard from my belt. Morgana set her palm upon its blade, staring me straight in the eyes. “By your Source, I swear to strip my healing of all corruption. I shall endeavor to heal what was and change nothing more.”

  I glanced at Imogen, who took a step forward. “Swear that the altar won’t corrupt her either.”

  Morgana all but rolled her eyes. “I do hereby swear that the healing process in its entirety shall be without any element of corruption or perversity. Satisfied?”

  “Yes,” I said, sheathing Shard and feeling suddenly exhausted. My knees felt like they were about to give way. “Thank you.”

  “Now be silent. She is very near death. To draw her back will take great effort.”

  All I could do was stand there and stare at Valeria’s still form. I saw how shallow her breathing was, how pale her skin, the shadows that had appeared around her eyes. A bluish tint had crept across her lips and fingernails.

  And those wounds, those horrific, terrible wounds…

  I had to ask the question, the one eating away at me, driving me near mad. “Can you bring back her hands?”

  Morgana had extended her own hands over Valeria’s form, and now was channeling purple light up from the black stone, gathering it in each palm.

  “I don’t know,” she said, voice little more than a whisper. “Probably not.”