by Sean Platt
They had no problem locating Dharma Kold. He was standing beside his black unicorn Cerberus at the main gate to the dormant volcano’s cone, overseeing a marching formation of trolls. Clint walked up behind him, tapped him on the shoulder, and then punched him in the face as hard as he could.
Kold’s eyes flashed as he turned, but his angry look only lasted a second. He realized who he was seeing and his eyes went wide. He reached out to embrace Clint like an old friend, but when his arms came up, Clint kneed him in the gut. Kold crumpled to the ground, moaning.
“You got this?” Cerberus asked, unmoved.
“Yar,” croaked Kold.
Kold stood slowly to face Clint, with his wild bunch of Conspiracists standing well behind him. The two marshals must have made an interesting pair. Clint knew he must look like Kold’s father or possibly even grandfather, but Clint also knew he looked tougher. Clint was in white and blue with his clenched fists and a set jaw. Kold brushed his black shirt free of dust and, once settled, made his posture casual… other than the huge bruise and fresh cut on his cheek.
“You’re not happy to see me,” said Kold.
“Of course I am,” said Clint. “Because now I get to kill you.”
Kold was obviously allowing this to happen (with the now fully-powered Triangulum on his side, he didn’t even need Cerberus to obliterate Clint with a wink), but Clint still felt his ire rise. Even the fact that Kold was allowing Clint to strike didn’t diminish his pleasure. The gunslinger considered doing it again.
Kold’s skin glowed yellow. As it did, his bruise and cut vanished. But of course, Cerberus hadn’t needed to heal him. The dark rider had done it himself.
“You’re angry about me assassinating the monarchs,” said Kold.
“Using my body to kill unarmed people and almost getting me tortured and executed? Yar, a little.”
Kold shook his head. “You were never willing to do what needed to be done, Clint,” he said. “The king and queen were the soul of The Realm. They had to go, to send a message. I thought I’d be able to kill them myself, but I didn’t realize it was only going to let you through. So when I saw that the Triangulum could still talk to you once you were behind the wall, I moved to Plan B. If I’d told you, you would have fought it. You never would have gone along with it.”
“Of course not!” Clint blurted. “I thought the idea was to stop what The Realm was doing — to use your forces to subdue them like an invading army! Shut down their pinching of magic! Destroy the dams, venting the pressure and letting magic flow down the veins and into the Sands!”
“The fractures are everywhere now, Clint!” Kold retorted, returning Clint’s anger. “ ‘Stop what they’re doing’? How will that help? The Realm is the plug in the stream. The Realm is the pinching off of the magic. It’s not enough to stop more damage from being done; you have to remove the blockage.”
“No matter who dies,” said Clint.
“Where is your anger? Where’s your indignation? They threw you out! They doomed you to wander forever as an exile!”
“Revenge nar changes a thing,” the gunslinger said.
“That,” said Kold, jabbing his finger into Clint’s chest, “is where you’re wrong. What’s going to happen in a world filled with fracture and ruin when the magic starts to return, if it ever does? You think everyone will throw up their hands and sing Joelsongs together, sharing magic’s spoils around a crackling fire while gumming their lips with marshmallow? Of course they won’t. They’ll fight over it. Kill for it. The Sands is a pack of starving dogs, and we’re talking about throwing a plate of meat into the center of their pack. You think they’ll hold tally and assign each person his due of magic? Of course they won’t. They’ll pounce, like animals. What we do here must make a statement. It must be a decisive strike of power that will chill the hearts of all who will think to defy us. We must control the magic — and the balance of power — so that we can distribute it proper. Those who would hoard must know that we will come at them. They must watch what we do to The Realm now and know later that if they do the same, they will fall beneath our boot. The first strike had to be against the royalty. We had to say, ‘This is what happens when you defy us. This is what happens when you take what does not belong to you.’ ”
But Clint was thinking of the citizens he’d seen in The Realm. The king and queen had just been assassinated, and no one seemed to care… or possibly even know. He thought of the Hill Street he’d seen, drawing smiling faces and sticking them to vehicles. He thought of PermaBliss, and tried to remember if it had existed when he and Kold had ridden white steeds down yellow brick streets.
“You’ve forced them to come after you with everything they have,” said Clint.
Kold spread his arms, gesturing at the army in front of him. “Let them.”
“This isn’t what I signed on for.”
“Sure it is,” said Kold, exhaling as if tired of having the same argument over and over. “You are the white. You have your purpose. You brought me the Orb — twice. You got them to open the first door. You were their prodigal son, welcomed into Castle Spires whereas I would have had to storm my way in. You can pretend Cerberus and I aren’t what make your ‘good actions’ meaningful, but deep down you know that without us, you’d just be one more old man with a pair of guns. If we did everything my way, we’d never get in or we’d be thwarted when we did. If we did everything your way, we’d be overrun once we were inside. We are both required. We need each other if either of us are to matter. You are the gentle touch, and I am the hammer of war.”
Kold beckoned to a passing unicorn. The unicorn looked over. The dark rider jerked his head and said, “Celeste. Thirty minutes.”
Clint expected the unicorn (proud, non-subservient creatures that they were) to tell Kold where he could put those thirty minutes, but instead she trotted off into the open crater of the dormant volcano. Clint heard her yelling. Though the gunslinger couldn’t tell what the unicorn was saying, every group she passed began to stir, mobilize, prepare.
“Now,” said Kold. “Where is the door?”
Clint feigned ignorance. “What door?”
Kold rolled his eyes. “I don’t have time for this.”
He held a hand toward Clint’s head. Fine tendrils of blue smoke bled from his fingers, moving slowly, like tiny snakes, crawling over the gunslinger’s scalp and down under his hair. Clint’s skin crawled wherever the things touched, as if they were serpents. Clint tried flinching away, but something was holding him as still as a statue. The gunslinger could only stand helplessly as the blue snakes slithered into his ears, nose, mouth, eyes, and then seemingly into his skull itself. He felt Kold’s essence climbing into his soul, as if he were donning Clint like a jacket. But something was already inside Clint, and Kold couldn’t displace it in order to settle all the way down. There wasn’t enough room.
And then Clint realized: Mai was still inside him. She hadn’t spoken since those first few words inside The Realm, as Kold searched Clint for what he needed, he saw true that she was still there. She’d said that she couldn’t stay long — but she hadn’t left yet.
Clint tried to fight the fingers he felt in his brain, but it was like an ant pushing against a boulder. Kold had been powerful before, but now with the Triangulum complete, he was hundreds of times stronger. There was no standing against the Triangulum. There was no attempting to stand against it. Clint tried hiding his knowledge about the location of the door, but it was no use. Kold found it instantly.
“Perfect,” Kold said as his essence withdrew. “But of course, that placement won’t do.”
He yanked at the empty air with his hands. As he did, his palms glowed white and a brilliant light filled the chamber. The milling army, now starting to power up their machines, looked over. A moment later, Churchill was standing before them. Behind Churchill was the door that had moments earlier been in the belly of the mountain.
“Churchill, close the door!” Oliver blurted from
behind Clint.
But Kold was already there, already reaching an invisible hand out to hold the door open. He gestured with his head for the thinking machine to walk away. With a glance at the others, Churchill did. Then he walked over and stood beside Morph, beside Z, beside the others who’d receded when Clint had punched the man in black.
“I’m on your side,” Kold said, looking at Clint with what had to be disappointment.
“Nar, you’re not.”
“We’re a team.”
“We are not a team.”
“But you want to end what The Realm is doing, Clint, and so do I. And Edward? Edward and the unicorns want to end it most of all.”
Clint’s face fell. In the heat of his fight with Kold, he’d almost forgotten about Edward — about why he’d come back to the Sands in the first place. When he’d come through from the path of AllWorlds, he’d wanted Kold’s help. A moment ago, he’d wanted to shut the door and keep Kold’s help at bay. Which was the right choice — The Realm or Dharma Kold? Neither option felt any good. Both were tipped with a thousand poisoned spikes.
“I saw what was in your head,” said Kold. “Unicorns in captivity. A black pool. You want to rescue them. To rescue Edward. You came here to find me and get my help. And so you see, we are a team. It’s why you came looking for us.”
Clint closed his eyes. Yar, he wanted to rescue Edward. But there was more to it than that. In a way he didn’t fully understand, he needed to rescue Edward. The gunslinger knew in the way he’d known he could find the Red Room — nar, the Read Room — that Edward was important to more than just Clint. The story wasn’t close to over.
Kold stood in front of him, eyebrows raised.
He’ll go in anyway, Clint thought. He has an open door. He has the Triangulum. He has an army. Nobody will be able to stand against him. I can’t prevent it, even if preventing it were the right choice — which it may not be.
And with the thought, Clint felt a pang of self-loathing, suddenly sure the Kold had been right all along. Maybe the two marshals did have the same goals. Maybe Clint wasn’t willing to get his hands dirty, but was more than happy to let someone else do it.
Reluctantly, Clint nodded.
“See?” said Kold, smiling. “Teamwork.” He extended a hand. Clint ignored it. He turned, not wanting the wild bunch standing behind him to see his face.
“You will use restraint with your army,” he said.
Kold pretended to think, then said, “Nar.”
“And we will go for Edward first. For the unicorns. For whatever is holding them.”
Kold actually laughed. “Of course,” he said. “This all begins and ends with Edward. Did you not know that?”
CHAPTER TEN:
THE WILD BUNCH
Clint didn’t bother to ask Kold what he meant about things beginning and ending with Edward. It was probably something stupid involving magic, and Clint was tired of feeling like he was at magic’s mercy. All that mattered was that Kold thought Edward was important enough to save first.
Kold shouted a command that ran through the Army of the Triangulum’s ranks like wildfire. Unicorns rushed from the crater, away from Clint and the Conspiracists, presumably through a door at its far end. Zeppelins lifted off. Burners were fired and balloons started to rise. The enormous black tripod devices — three zeppelins tall at the legs and one zeppelin wide at the carapace — lumbered off in the same direction as the unicorns, but instead of heading through a door, they climbed the mountain’s upper rim. They looked like long-legged spiders as they summited the crater’s edge, bellowing their hollow, echoing cries that chilled the gunslinger’s blood.
The two-wheeled vehicles (he’d heard them called steamcycles) fired their engines and turned. Wave after wave of Teedawge archetypes, most wearing bi-colored goggles and holding high-pressure steam rifles with magic packs like Sly Stone’s, filed by. What Clint had mistaken for giant rocks turned out to be crouching giants who stood and turned, unsheathing their enormous hammers. Behind the giants were green-cloaked elves with bows, all of them appearing especially small by comparison. Flying machines lifted off — some straight up, some speeding down long strips of rock flooring until they found flight. Ordinary human soldiers tested their scimitars. A troupe of counterfeit gunslingers checked their weapons — each with only six shots per pistol. The large green vehicles with treads instead of wheels turned their huge guns and lurched forward, belching steam. Ropers filed in front of morlocks, trolls, and more Teedawges. The air was positively thick with magic. Clint could feel it like sweat on his brow.
At the thought of magic, Clint’s gaze turned inward, listening for Mai’s voice amidst the chaos. He could almost feel her becoming more present, as if stirred up during Kold’s invasion of Clint’s mind. He couldn’t feel her as he had before, but that probably had to do with the Triangulum. Mai had been born a woman with the seeds of magic inside her, then was struck down so her magic could grow. Finally, through Clint, she’d surrendered that magic to the Triangulum Enchantem. Whatever was left of her was diminished and struggling, but that might be a good thing. She was no longer the Orb of Benevolence. Now, whatever bit of her remained was at least all Mai.
Kold stepped toward the doorway to The Realm and stuck his arm through it. An intense expression of concentration crossed his features, and the door shrunk until it was only a small black circle hovering in space around the dark rider’s arm. Then he used his other hand to grab the hole and pull it down over his wrist and to his fingers. The aperture grew smaller, finally circling just his pinky. He wrapped his hand around the hole — which not long ago had been a full-sized door — and squeezed. When he pulled his hand away, the thing had become an opaque black ring that Kold seemed to be wearing like jewelry. The only way to tell it wasn’t jewelry was the fact that beyond the ring, Kold had no digit. The rest of his finger, presumably, was sticking out of a similar hole on the other side, into the strange trans-world station that Ron House had called the path of AllWorlds.
“Thank you for opening the door,” Kold said, wiggling his ring and missing finger. “And thank you for giving me the Orb that will allow me to hold it open.”
“You’re going to drive this entire army through that door?” Clint asked. He imagined the tripod machines, tanks, and the rest navigating the tunnels back to the Read Room. Ron House would be quite surprised at what came up from his basement.
“He’ll transform it,” said Oliver, who Clint had almost forgotten was standing behind him. The gunslinger’s eyes took in the rest of his new crew — the broad-shouldered leader, the shape-shifter, the gravel-voiced folk singer, the uptight thinking machine, the man with the knife and wild eyes, and the blank-visored mystery man who was still as mute as when the gunslinger had met him. All of them looked worried and confused, despite their faith in their Chosen One.
Kold pointed at Oliver as if he’d guessed a correct answer and was now owed a prize.
“Listen to that one,” Kold said, climbing onto Cerberus’s back. “You’re about to see a neat trick.” He laughed, then reached down to slap Clint affectionately on the shoulder. “Come on, partner. Have you ever wanted to ride a unicorn of a different color? Hop on up.”
Clint looked at Cerberus. Cerberus looked at Clint. It was obvious by both of their expressions that the proposition of Clint riding Cerberus behind Kold was appealing to neither of them.
“I think I’ll walk.”
Kold shrugged. “Suit yourself.”
Cerberus bolted forward. His dark shape blurred into a long, winding, serpentine smear of black and vanished through a tunnel in the distant rock wall. A moment later, Clint and his small bunch of renegades stood at the end of the crater more or less alone, watching the last of Kold’s army exit and prepare to lay siege.
“I guess we should go,” Clint said. He’d never been less certain of anything. He wished Mai’s presence inside of him was strong enough to encourage him, but he could still barely sense her.
/> “Okay,” said Oliver, looking even less certain than Clint.
“I guess?” said Morph.
“Hang on,” said Churchill. Then, “Okay, I’ve turned off my sense of fear.”
Clint didn’t know if the thinking machine was kidding or speaking true. Beside him, Boricio was playing with his knife, eyes full of murder. Beside Boricio was Z, who could have been raring to go or well beyond scared. It was impossible to know.
For the thousandth time, Clint’s hands reached for his belt, eager to feel the reassuring weight of iron, but he hadn’t been armed since he’d stepped through that first shimmer and found himself on the lawn outside of Castle Spires. He wasn’t wearing his garb, or his hat. He didn’t have his unicorn partner. He was an old man wearing stupid paladin clown pants. Just one man — tough and battle-hardened though he was — on the eve of the apocalypse.
Edward, he reminded himself. The single word resonated in his mind like an icon, like the one solid thing he could hold onto while the walls fell down around him.
The hope of freeing Edward was all he had left. It was the only thing he might still be able to do. He couldn’t heal the worlds. He couldn’t stop whatever The Realm was doing. He couldn’t keep Kold on the dusty side of the wall, and he couldn’t keep Kold from laying waste to all those in the city in the sky. Worse, he didn’t know if he wanted to. The gunslinger had flip-flopped scores of times since leaving Solace. He wanted to enter The Realm. He wanted to keep Kold out of The Realm. He needed to stop The Realm. He needed to help The Realm. He needed to escort a prisoner to The Realm. He needed to free the prisoner, then join him on his quest to destroy The Realm. He needed to help Kold bring down the wall. He needed to close the door, to keep Kold from bringing down the wall.