When True Night Falls

by C. S. Friedman

  He chose a spot on one of the growths and brought the butt of the weapon down hard on the crystal, in the place where he judged it most likely to be weak. Chips flew as the steel pommel struck, but the formation held. He struck again. On the second blow a chunk of the arch broke loose and went flying, leaving a space just big enough for Tarrant’s bare arm to be dragged through. In the east the stars were disappearing, swallowed up by the sun’s early light. He moved quickly to another of the growths and struck at it, hard and fast. This one was a thick arch, and it took three blows for it to begin to shatter and five more before there was enough space to pull Tarrant’s leg free. Katassah was helping now, pulling the man’s limbs out of the way as soon as Damien made such action possible, and it was a damned good thing; the arches were growing back almost as fast as he could destroy them, and if Tarrant lay in one place for too long he might well have to do this all over again.

  At last Tarrant was freed, and together they dragged his limp, death-cold body to the exit. Spears of white light crowned the eastern mountains in fire as they forced him into the narrow passageway, and as they fought to maneuver Tarrant’s limp form down the stairs Damien imagined he could hear the solar fae striking the crystal spires behind them. They completed two turns down the staircase, then three, and Damien allowed himself a sigh of relief; the sunlight was behind them now, and while the conjured light inside the palace might cause Tarrant pain, he doubted it had the power to kill him.

  The Healing Damien had Worked on himself might have helped ease the pain of his injuries somewhat, but it couldn’t negate the strain of carrying a grown man across so much space; by the time they reached the stairs leading down to Damien’s prison cell he could barely walk, and he had to lean against the wall for a long time gasping for breath. The rakh looked little better. But Damien was afraid that if Tarrant stayed in the light too long it might prove too much for him, and so he forced himself to move again, to drag the man’s body downward, downward....

  They stopped after the third turn, when the light in the stairwell was dim enough that a lamp’s illumination would have been welcome. “This is it,” Damien gasped. “This is good enough.”

  “Wouldn’t he be better off at the bottom? It’s darker there.”

  Damien shook his head, “He needs the earth-fae to heal himself. I think. And there isn’t enough of it much farther down than this.”

  He hoped he was right. He hoped the faint light which remained wasn’t enough to cause further injury, or to keep the Hunter from healing. For now there was nothing more he could do for him, other than wait. The rest was in Tarrant’s hands.

  They set the body down on the wider part of a step; there was just enough room for it to lie securely. Kneeling down beside the Hunter, Damien studied his traveling companion with a practiced eye. The tremors had ceased; that was one good sign. And it seemed to him that the strain on Tarrant’s face had eased somewhat; that was another. No, there was nothing more he could do here. Nothing more anyone could do.

  He looked up at the rakh. How worn Katassah looked, how tired! In another time and place the captain might have tried to hide his infirmity, but here there was no point in dissembling. Damien knew what had happened to him. Damien understood. And more than any other man on the planet, Damien comprehended that the most damaging part of his experience was not the horror of bodily possession, or his sense of betrayal at his ruler’s callousness, but the utter degradation of having a human soul inside his flesh. A wound like that would not heal easily, nor quickly. Damien understood.

  “Is there anything I can do?” the rakh asked.

  “Yeah.” He stood. The ache in his back was duller now, a mere vestige of pain; with a muttered key he Worked enough earth-fae to make sure that dragging Tarrant here hadn’t damaged it anew. It was partly a safety precaution and partly a test of sorts; if he could Work the fae this far underground, it was a good bet that Tarrant could also. Given that power, the Hunter could heal himself.

  He turned to the rakh and said softly, “I’d like to see Jenseny.”

  She lay on the couch where Katassah had placed her, one arm draped down so that its slender fingers brushed the floor, her eyes shut. There was blood all over the room, red and wet, and trickles of it had coursed down from the gash in her neck to stain the white couch crimson. Her coloring had gone from pale brown to an ashen gray, and the look on her face should have been one of fear and anguish. It wasn’t. It was a look of utter contentment, such as men might dream of but never know. Of perfect and absolute peace.

  Damien knelt down by her side, taking up her tiny hand in his own. It wasn’t cold yet, not completely; he could still feel the echo of life beneath his fingertips, and it brought new tears to his eyes.

  God, take care of her. She was gentle and loving and so very brave, and in the end she served you better than most would have the courage to do. Give her peace, I pray you, and reunite her with her loved ones. As he wiped his eyes he added, And let her play with the rakh children now and then, if that’s possible. She would like that.

  “How did it happen?” he asked.

  Katassah had hung back at the door, unwilling to intrude upon the privacy of Damien’s mourning; now that he had been addressed, he approached. “He moved into her body and meant to take over. She held him there and took her life.”

  “I wouldn’t have thought she had that kind of power.”

  The rakh’s voice was full of awe. “She called on those who did.”

  He shut his eyes for a moment and drew in a slow breath; the fact of her death was finally sinking in. “All right. At least it’s over.”

  “It isn’t, I regret.” The new voice came from behind him. “Not by a long shot.”

  Katassah whipped about with the reflexes of a trained guard; Damien followed suit. The man leaning against the far wall was familiar to him, but for a moment he couldn’t place the memory. A stout, bearded figure draped in black velvet and black fur, perhaps in deference to their mourning. Oddly decorated for this time and place, Damien thought. In the end it was the tastelessness of the man’s jewelry, its utter inappropriateness for the occasion, that prompted him to remember.

  “Karril,” he whispered. This was Tarrant’s lezu: the one who had healed Ciani, the one whom Senzei had consulted. Damien discovered to his surprise that the abhorrence he should feel for such a creature was absent. Had his recent experiences inured him to the concept of demonkind? Even the faeborn who did good deeds were still dangerous parasites.

  “I came to warn you,” the demon said. As he stepped forward into the center of the room, the crystal walls lost their light, dimming to a comfortable glow. “You need to go home, Damien Vryce, and you need to do it fast.”

  He ignored the advice for the moment, focusing on a more important message. “What did you mean, it isn’t over?”

  The demon seemed to hesitate, and looked around the room as if he expected to find someone listening. “You’ll find out when you go north,” he said finally. “So I’m not telling you anything, really. Only what you would discover yourselves.”

  “What is it?” Katassah demanded. His hand was on the brass grip of his pistol, a warning sign. “What’s happening?”

  The demon turned to him. “Your Prince was a pawn, Captain, nothing more. And now Calesta’s game is played out. You forced his hand a hundred years early, but in the end that’ll make little difference. You won the battle, but the war has just begun.”

  Something cold tightened around Damien’s heart. He had known that the death of the Prince was only the first step in healing this land, but something in the demon’s tone warned him that the issue went far beyond that. “Tell us what you mean,” he said sharply.

  The demon looked pained. “I can’t. Not in detail. If I interfere in his affairs by helping you....” He drew in a deep breath and slowly exhaled it, trembling; the gesture was oddly melodramatic coming from a creature that didn’t have to breathe. “It’s forbidden,” he said at last. “
But so is what he’s done. To tamper with mankind’s development ... that’s strictly forbidden. So which is the worse crime? Which is more likely to be punished?”

  “Tamper how?” Katassah demanded, and Damien snapped, “What the hell are you talking about?”

  “Go north,” the demon said. “You’ll see. He used the Prince, he used the rakh, and now ... I’m sorry,” he said to Katassah. “Genuinely sorry. But you see, he can’t feed on your people. So it really doesn’t matter to him whether they live or die.” He looked at Damien and then quickly away, as though he feared to meet his gaze. “Twelve centuries ago your ancestors came to this planet. There were only a few hundred of them then, few enough that when Casca made his grand sacrifice it shook this planet to its very roots. Now, with millions of humans on Erna, with thousands of them Working the fae, no one man can have that kind of influence. No single act can impress the fae so that its basic nature alters again. But a thousand men—a hundred thousand—might. A plan of action carried down through the centuries could.”

  “That’s Church philosophy,” Damien said sharply.

  “Yes. And Calesta watched your Church develop. He learned from it, and from its founder. He took the lessons your Prophet taught him and applied them here, as a sort of grand experiment.” He shook his head, his expression somber. “All too effectively, I’m afraid.”

  “What is it he wants?” Katassah asked sharply. “What’s the goal?”

  “A world that will respond to his hunger. A world with such an outpouring of the emotional energy he covets that the fae will absorb it, focus it, magnify it—until that in turn alters the very nature of humanity.”

  “What does he feed on?” the priest demanded. He was trying to remember what Gerald Tarrant had told him about the Iezu. “What aspect of mankind? Tell us.”

  The demon stiffened, and for a moment Damien thought he would refuse to answer. But at last he said, very quietly, “Calesta feeds on that spark of human life which delights in the pain of others. A universal sentiment, I’m afraid. Calesta grows stronger every time that spark is expressed.”

  “It’s far from universal,” Damien objected.

  “Is it? Can you show me one man or woman who has never, never wished hurt upon another? Not as a child fleeing from bullies, not as a lover wronged by his or her companion, not even as a righteous crusader setting out to save the world from those who would corrupt it? Have you never longed to see an enemy hurt, Reverend Vryce? Not the Prince, not Gerald Tarrant, not anyone?”

  His lips tightened. He said nothing.

  “Go home, the demon urged. ”As soon as you can. You can’t do anything to save this place—no one man can—but you can still save the people you love. Because he’ll strike at them, I’m sure of that. He knows it’ll be a year or more before you can get back to the west, and in that time he can do a lot to change things. If you stay away longer, if you give him that much more to work with ... then the world you return to may not be the same as the one you left. Trust me.“

  “Vengeance,” Katassah muttered. “For interfering with his plans here.”

  The demon nodded. “I’m afraid so.”

  “Why are you telling us this?” Damien asked suddenly. “If you’re not allowed to interfere with him, then why come here at all? What’s in it for you?”

  “I like humanity,” the demon told him. Smiling slightly. “With all its quirks and its foibles and its insecurities intact. I enjoy them. Oh, I’d survive the change if Calesta had his way. Sadism is a form of pleasure, after all. But it wouldn’t be nearly the same. Food without entertainment is nearly as bad as no food at all.” His expression darkened slightly, though the smile remained. “Of course, I may yet pay for this indulgence. Who knows which transgressions the mother of the Iezu will tolerate, and which she’ll punish? No one’s ever dared to test her before now.” He shrugged, somewhat stiffly. “I expect we’ll know soon enough.”

  With a formal bow he said to the rakh. “I’m afraid your people have a long, hard battle ahead of them, Mer Captain. The Prince used his power to evolve your species to suit Calesta’s need, and it will be a long time before those weaknesses breed out. But they will in time, if no human interferes. I’m sorry I can’t help you more.”

  “You’ve done enough by explaining things,” Katassah said tightly. “Thank you.”

  The demon turned back to Damien. His flesh was starting to fade, solid cells giving way to a more shadowy substance. The flicker of a lamp behind him could be seen through his black-robed torso. “My family are symbiotes, not parasites,” he told the priest. “And some of us are proud of that distinction. Be careful, Reverend Vryce. Be wary. Travel fast.” He was little more than than a veil of color now, fading out around the edges. “—And take care of Gerald Tarrant, will you? He seems to be getting himself into a lot of trouble these days.”

  “I’ll try,” the priest promised. A tight smile softened the lines of his face.

  As they watched, the demon dissolved completely, his color and form fading into the very air that surrounded him. When he was finally gone, the illusion of darkness faded also, and the room was restored to its former painful brightness. Damien stared at the spot where he had been for a long time in silence, the demon’s words echoing in his brain.

  “Well, shit,” he said at last. “That’s just great.”

  Forty-nine

  They left from Freeshore, on a merchant ship bribed to ply the northern seas for their purpose. It was Katassah who had paid for the journey, dispensing royal gold as if it was his own. Which it was, in a way. His men had seen the Prince take over his body, and until he informed them of the new state of things—or until he made some vital mistake that caused them to guess at it—the throne and the power were his for the asking. It would cost him dearly in the end, Damien knew. As the lights of Freeshore faded behind them and the gentle swells of the Novatlantic drew them northward, he remembered the rakhene captain as he had been at their departure: studiously proud, carefully arrogant, imitating with perfection the man whom he had served for half a lifetime. It was a masquerade that couldn’t last, of course, no matter how well he played at it; in time his lack of sorcery would give him away, and the game would disintegrate from there. They would turn on him then, all the men and women who had served the Prince. He knew it would happen. And yet he wore the royal robes over his rakhene uniform and placed the Prince’s crown on his head, risking that fate. Because—he explained—with Calesta’s dark plan coming to fruition, he dared not leave his people leaderless.

  There’s the soul of a born ruler, Damien thought. If only it could have been expressed under happier circumstances.

  They had taken a case of homing birds with them, and Damien released the first after a day at sea. Found passage with the Silver Siren, it said. Proceeding as planned. The rest of the birds would be saved for when they reached the northern kingdom, when they learned what havoc Calesta had wreaked there.

  How isolated Katassah must feel, how very helpless, now that the Prince’s power no longer served as a link between his people and their northern contacts! The crystalline palace was no longer the nerve center of an empire, but a tiny island of hope and fear nearly lost in the vastness of the black lava desert. Damien wished him well with all his heart, and prayed feverishly that his self-sacrifice would serve its intended purpose: to stabilize his divided nation against the threat of war, so that when the truth was at last made known the country might adapt and thrive, rather than dissolving into chaos.

  The girl Sisa had come with them. When she had first shown up with her few belongings as the boats were loading, Damien had been aghast—no, furious—and he raged at Tarrant, declaring in no uncertain terms that he would not permit the man to bring her along for the sole purpose of feeding on her terror. To which the Hunter had replied, quite calmly, “I must have food, Vryce, and you can’t supply it any more. We’ve discussed that. As for the woman’s motives ... I suggest that you ask her yourself.”

>   He did. And though she had claimed that she wanted to come with them, that Tarrant had in no way coerced her to make the trip, he found it hard to believe. Each time she glanced at the Hunter she trembled; each time conversation turned toward the Hunter and his needs she grew visibly paler. Had Tarrant found himself the perfect masochist, a woman who delighted in suffering? Damien doubted it. Not because such people couldn’t exist—he had no doubt that they did—but because he couldn’t imagine Tarrant taking any real pleasure in torturing one of them.

  Why are you here? he asked her later that night, when chance left them alone together. Why do you want to be with him?

  He thought for a moment that she wouldn’t answer him. But though her eyes were cast low, there was fear in her voice, it was clear when she spoke that she trusted him. Slowly, hesitantly, she told him of the night that Tarrant had hunted her in the Black Lands, the night she had run like an animal in the desert night, fully expecting to die. But instead of killing her when he finally ran her down, the monster had offered her an alternative fate: Survive my hunger, he said, and I will free you. Keep me alive for the months it will take us to reach my homeland, and I’ll set you up as a rich woman in a land with no princes, no religious wars, no slavery. And she had accepted. The challenge was all that was keeping her sane now, and the dream of success kept her going. So that she might suffer all the more, Damien thought. So that she might feed him. Like the women who ran from him in the Forest, convinced that three days of successful flight would buy them a lifetime of safety. How utterly consistent Tarrant was in his sadism, how perfectly ordered! Damien wondered if this woman would survive the test that so many had failed. He prayed for her sake that she would.