Mortal

by Ted Dekker

  Roland would not fail his race.

  Knuckles tapped the door’s wooden frame.

  Finally.

  “Come.”

  The door swung wide and the Keeper stepped in wearing the same robe he’d worn last night, hood over his head. It was easy enough to guess by the circles under his eyes and the sagging at the corner of his mouth that he had slept far less than Roland—if at all. But it wasn’t so much the fatigue in his eyes as the tortured questions in them that told Roland all he needed to know.

  He closed the door, threw off his hood, and regarded Roland for a long moment without offering any greeting.

  Roland nodded at a chair by the trunk. “Please, sit.”

  The Book looked at the chair but shook his head.

  “I can’t stay. I have to get back,” he said.

  “To what? More testing? To be certain that our world is crumbling as we speak?”

  The man said nothing.

  “Did you?”

  “Did I what?”

  “Test his blood again with your magic vials.”

  “It’s not magic. The darker the blood turns the solution, the more potent the life within it. But yes.”

  “And?”

  “The color grows lighter every day.”

  But of course. The Keeper was meticulous and sober—more so as of late, only rarely venturing out to join the celebrations around the fires at night as he used to. He had laughed often when he had first become Mortal, but that mirth had since been replaced by the growing burden of securing the same Mortal destiny Roland was committed to. Roland had always respected the old man; as with Nomads, the Keepers had clung to their own way of preserving the promise of life through the centuries. Two orders, Keepers and Nomads, now one: Mortal.

  “Nothing else?” Roland asked.

  “I tested my own blood as well.”

  “And?”

  “It hasn’t deteriorated.”

  Roland stepped to the trunk and picked up a plum, offered it to him. When the old man refused, he bit deeply into it himself. The tart juice pricked his taste buds, firing awareness of the new life in his veins. It never failed. He closed his eyes. The senses had always been celebrated among Nomads, even without emotion, but Jonathan’s blood had turned sensory experience into a wildly extravagant and life-affirming affair. Next to the pale sensory comforts they had known as Corpses, these vibrant pleasures threatened at times to be almost too much. A sensory experience speculated to be far greater than any known even in the Age of Chaos, before death came to the world.

  The first time Roland made love after coming to life it had so fired his nerves that he’d begun to panic, sure that he was in the throes of death rather than quaking pleasure. But he hadn’t died. He’d lived and been pulled into the hot sun of raw, living bliss. When his wife had welcomed new life into the world nine months later, he’d named the boy Johnny in honor of the life that had facilitated his conception.

  “Tell me something, old man,” Roland said. “What would your founder, Talus, the one who first predicted that life would come again in the blood of one child, say your chief charge is?”

  The man replied with marked hesitation. “To ensure that life is not suppressed.”

  “And where is that life now?”

  “In Jonathan. But you know this as well as I do.”

  “Humor me. I’m a Nomad, not a Keeper. We may share the same resolve and blood, but our roles in this world are different.”

  The aged eyes beneath the Keeper’s wrinkled brow did not offer agreement or disapproval. Roland pressed.

  “There are twelve hundred Mortals now. Would Talus demand we preserve life in all twelve hundred, or would he suggest we sacrifice some to ensure Jonathan comes to power?”

  “Both.”

  “I agree. And I remain fully committed to this end. But now my question is this: how many should we be willing to sacrifice to ensure Jonathan’s ascension to power?”

  The Book’s response came slower than the last. “That isn’t for me to say.”

  “Yet you recognize the question that falls on my shoulders. And so I’m seeking your advice. How much bloodshed is acceptable to this end? Ten of my men? A hundred? A thousand? Tell me.”

  “As you said, this falls on your—”

  “Please don’t patronize me.” Roland realized he was squeezing the plum in his hand; juice dripped from his fingers onto the floor. “I want to know how you feel about the shedding of this precious blood that now flows through our veins. How much should be spilled?”

  “As much as necessary.”

  “To the last man if necessary?”

  The Keeper’s left eyelid twitched. “I don’t think—”

  “Just answer. Please.”

  The Keeper’s frown deepened. “As much as is needed.”

  “So you disagree with Rom on this matter?”

  “No. Rom would agree, I’m sure.”

  Rom might indeed agree. But not to the same extent as many Nomads. The zealots, he knew, would go to any measure to protect that life—including a preemptive strike of any magnitude that best facilitated victory. He let the matter slide.

  “Then tell me this: the life foretold by Talus… In whom does it now reside?”

  “In Jonathan.”

  “Not in you?”

  The old man stared him down for several long moments. Then he began to turn, as if intending to leave.

  “My loyalty to Jonathan is unshakable, Keeper. I would cut any throat to save him—don’t mistake me. He must come to power for the sake of all Mortals. But I need to understand that path.”

  A slight tremor shook the Keeper’s old fingers. He was sleep deprived, but there was more here.

  “Please. Where does that life reside?”

  The old man glanced back at him. “In all of us. To be protected at all costs. How is not my concern. I’m a Keeper of truth, not a maker of history. That responsibility rests on other shoulders, as you said.”

  “But the rest of what you said is also true, no? That your blood—my blood—is now stronger than Jonathan’s. And as such you are a maker, if not of history then of life. As am I. A maker of life perhaps more powerful today than Jonathan. Is this not now a part of the truth you keep?”

  “There’s more to the boy than his blood,” the Keeper said, warning in his voice.

  “I’m no longer talking about Jonathan. I’m talking about a race of Mortal makers full of life-giving blood. Is this not the blood that will save the world?”

  The Keeper was silent.

  “And if it is, then we must take whatever steps necessary to protect not only Jonathan, but the Mortals who will become the makers of the world.”

  “Perhaps.”

  “And if it comes down to a choice between Jonathan’s blood and your blood? His blood and mine?”

  “Pray it doesn’t.”

  “I do. I will.”

  The Keeper turned to go.

  “Does Jonathan know?”

  “No,” the Book said, his back to the Nomad.

  “You took another sample this morning.”

  “I did.”

  “How fast is his blood reverting? I need to know how much time we have.”

  The Keeper’s voice held a tremor. “At this rate, his blood may be that of a common Corpse by the time he ascends to power.”

  Roland blinked, mind vacant. So fast! He had no idea. Still reeling, he spoke the first words that rushed to fill it.

  “What power? How can that happen now?”

  “He has already given us his power,” he said. “Use it wisely.”

  Without another word, the old man left the yurt, shaking his head like a prophet who has lost the voice of his god.

  Roland stared at the door after it had fallen back into place. So then the matter became clear. He would do as Rom asked and make the play to acquire Feyn. But he wouldn’t trust the fate of all Mortals to a single course of action.

  They had to dispatch fi
ghters far beyond the perimeter immediately with orders to take captive any Dark Blood they encountered. They had to find Saric’s stronghold.

  They had to prepare for the worst.

  Roland strode to the door, threw it open where Maland waited outside.

  “Get me Michael. Now!”

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  DOMINIC STRODE DOWN the grand hallway of the palace, boot heels clacking against the marble floor in time with the cudgeling of his heart.

  A day had passed since the senate leader had witnessed the most horrific, profane act of his life in the slaughter of the Regent. And he’d heard the most unfathomable profanity from the man who had committed the act, right there on the senate dais, where Saric had effectively revived and then installed his sister as Sovereign.

  That first night, he’d suffered nightmares. Nightmares of the Regent’s neck opening in that yawning gash. Of the naked Sovereign screaming from the great table, as if it were an altar and she the sacrifice. Nightmares of blood flowing from the stent in Saric’s arm into hers. Of the unmistakable scar that cut across her torso, clear evidence of the savage slash that had ended her life nine years earlier on the cusp of her own inauguration.

  Of Feyn standing and speaking, not with her own voice, but with Saric’s.

  You are dead. All of you. Dead.

  He’d woken in a sweat. Paced his Citadel apartments. Come to stand at the window and look out at the dark night in the direction of the palace and the apartment of the Sovereign. Candlelight had burned there throughout the evening.

  And then, the most terrible voice of all seeped into his mind.

  His own.

  You are dead.

  Was it possible?

  Chills had crept across his nape, had prickled the tips of his fingers and set his ears ringing. Fear, at its most visceral.

  He’d passed the next day in sleep-deprived vigilance, his hands cold and numb, already anticipating more nightmares in the night to come. He had gone to evening basilica to settle his spirit. It wasn’t the customary day, but such services were performed throughout the week to allay the fears of those needing comfort, and to stave off dread of the eternal with one more proper act in deference to the only thing that would be reckoned at the end of one’s life.

  Order.

  We know the Maker exists within his Order.

  It helped. That night he’d gone to sleep knowing two things: First, that the Maker was still the Maker, known within Order. To question Order was to question the Maker himself. This truth remained steadfast, a lone anchor in this sudden storm of events.

  Second, that Feyn claimed the seat of office legitimately as Sovereign, no matter how stunning her resurrection from stasis or the blasphemous guardianship that she had been reborn under like a bloody moon.

  There were no nightmares the second night. And Dominic had risen today newly collected. Newly resolved.

  As he made his way to the outer atrium of the Office in the last hour of late afternoon, he glanced up, ignoring the dark cracks that snaked up the vaulted ceiling, focusing instead on the sheen of light reflected off its gilded surface. These ancient halls were hallowed since the days of Chaos, dedicated to the Maker when he had gone by a more arcane name: God.

  He had only one objective now. He had to secure Feyn’s assurance that she would work to destroy her brother, who clearly stood against Order. Surely she saw that her own seat was in grave danger. Perhaps, even, her eternal destiny. They had to work together.

  He nodded at the secretary whom he’d known so many years as Rowan’s man, Savore. How different, to see him keeping the desk of the office from which Saric held court, no doubt turning the resources of the world to his own dark purposes. Dominic all but imagined he could see shadows creeping from the great chamber beyond.

  All of you… dead.

  Savore rose to gesture him to the twelve-foot doors of the Office. The secretary wouldn’t touch them himself—it was for each man to bring his own weight into this space, to labor even in this way to attain an audience with the Sovereign, strong hand of the Maker on earth.

  Dominic laid his palms against the intricately etched bronze door. It was usual for any prelate to pause and consider the symbols of each continental office: the alchemists of Russe, the educators of Asiana, the architects of Qin, the environmentalists of Nova Albion, the bankers of Abyssinia, the priests of Greater Europa and the artisans of Sumeria. Dominic himself had often done the same, going so far as to trace the Book of Orders beside the emblem of Europa, his own continent, with a fingertip.

  But today he saw only the symbol presiding over them all: the great compass, the graded points of Sirin’s halo, by which they must all live and by which they would all be judged.

  He pushed the doors open.

  Inside, the heavy velvet curtains had been drawn shut against the obscure light of the waning day as a dozen candelabras sent shadows flitting and luring throughout the room.

  That was the first thing he noticed.

  The second was the two Dark Bloods on either side of his peripheral vision as the doors fell shut behind him with the ominous thud of a vault.

  The third was the figure sitting at the desk. She was richly attired in velvet so dark blue as to appear the color of midnight. She was studying a report of some kind, as she sipped from a pewter goblet. Her nails were perfectly manicured.

  She lifted her eyes with feline languor. They were dark and fathomless in the shadows.

  Dominic went to a knee on the thick carpet, but for the first time in his life, he stared rather than lowered his gaze.

  The figure behind the desk was indeed the Sovereign herself—fortunately, Saric was nowhere to be seen. But she was drastically changed.

  She released the report with a flick of her fingers.

  “My lord Dominic,” Feyn said, voice as smooth as a purr. It was the first time he had heard her since that first blood-chilling scream, and he found he could not reconcile the two sounds at all.

  She rose from her chair, candlelight catching the obsidian of her chandelier earrings. Her hair was swept up completely off her neck and onto her head. The high, open collar of her dress accentuated her neck and her pale skin in a neckline that plunged to her sternum.

  Again, he railed at the thought that this could possibly be the same woman. And yet there she was—Feyn as all had ever known her. And as she had never been known.

  She came around the side of the desk, moving with unhurried grace. The light of the nearest candelabra swept up her face, revealing a shadow on one cheek, just discernable enough for him to wonder if it was a play of light.

  No. A bruise, then?

  She paused before him and he found himself dropping his gaze down to her booted foot. An open palm extended into the field of his vision. He took it and kissed the ring of office along the inside of her delicate fingers. They smelled like wine and musk and salt.

  The hand withdrew, but not before he noted the mark on the inside of her elbow. A small puncture wound visible within the high split of her sleeve.

  He started to lean forward with both hands on his knee but then he realized she hadn’t told him to rise. He blinked and shifted back, ignoring the pop of his kneecap in the carpet.

  “Why do you come?” she said, moving back toward her desk and reclaiming the goblet.

  He lifted his gaze, struck again by the regal tilt of her jaw, the very straightness of her nose, the set of her lips, moist after a sip from the wine. “To speak with you. I have concerns.”

  “Everyone has concerns about something, Dominic.”

  He glanced toward the doors and back. “May we speak in private, my lady?”

  “We are in private.” The tone, though dispassionate, was strange, and again he thought that she reminded him less like the startled colt shaking on its own legs of just a day ago than a great panther.

  “Please.”

  She slid her gaze away in the direction of the guards. With a meaningful glance the two
muscled forms dipped their heads and filed out through the great double doors, which fell heavily back into place.

  And then they were alone.

  Feyn moved toward a wingbacked chair off to the side of the curtained window. “Come, Dominic.”

  He rose stiffly and then stood before her, uncertain. Rowan had always invited him to sit beside him in the chair’s companion seat. But Feyn only sat back and merely waited for him to speak.

  He folded his hands. “Please understand the nature of my concern. You came back to us in… a most unusual manner. And while I’m certain you could not know the nature of the things your brother said before that moment, I must inform you that they were entirely disturbing.”

  “Were they?” Her forearm extended along the arm of the chair, fingers holding the rim of her goblet.

  “Yes. And I feel compelled to inquire as to your own… beliefs in these matters. Your loyalties.”

  “You ask the Sovereign where her loyalties lay?”

  “Indeed, my lady. I fear your brother has hinted at thoughts that no good man of Order should ever think. He has spoken highest blasphemy. And this is saying nothing of the fact that he murdered the Regent in cold blood before our very eyes.”

  She glanced down, cradled her cup on her lap, and slowly traced the rim of it with a fingertip. Her eyes lifted. “And your point?”

  “I must ask you, my lady, with all respect. Do you follow the Order? Will you serve it? Would you die for it?”

  A strange turn of a smile formed at the corners of her mouth. “It would not be the first time I have died for this office, would it?”