Of Darkness and Dawn

by Wight, Will

  “I will make an effort in good faith. If I can...secure the Optasia...it might be possible to destroy it from the inside.” He'd have to sit in it to do so, but there was no reason for Yala to know that.

  “That's your assignment, Consultant Lucan. Examine and disable the Emperor's throne, otherwise known as the Optasia, before it can be acquired by either the Imperialists or the Elder cultists.”

  Yala stood up as well, the meeting over.

  Lucan's heart hammered in his chest, and his breath came a little faster. Here was the opportunity he'd been waiting for: a chance to get back into the Guild legitimately, to work beside Shera again, to press for change in the Architect Council and in the Consultants as a whole.

  Besides which, there could be no better cause than this. Standing against the Guilds who supported a new Emperor was one thing, but facing down the Sleepless should be the duty of all humanity. He was ready.

  Except he was missing some critical information.

  “The Imperialists should have another Emperor candidate by now, don't they?”

  Yala snorted. “They certainly do. See for yourself.”

  She handed him another folded piece of paper—a proclamation with the seal of four Guilds on the top. He scanned past the flowery introductory text to get to the meat of the announcement.

  ...we are hereby proud to announce the man who will lead us forward into the future, the Imperial Steward of the Aurelian Empire, Lord Calder Marten.

  Under his Intent, the paper crumbled to dust.

  ~~~

  Lucan hadn't returned to the Imperial Palace in five years, since the night the Emperor died. He'd like to think it was out of respect and a desire to preserve the memories of a man he'd respected, but the truth was, he'd been too busy. After the Emperor's death, the world had entered a period of three years now known as the Long Mourning. Riots tore some cities apart, Guilds had to institute martial law, Elders and bandits ran rampant, and people generally lost themselves in panic.

  He found it surprisingly nostalgic now, as he crawled over the rooftops of the palace complexes, passing from one building to another as he constructed a mental picture of the layout in his head. Even the Intent felt familiar, as he gathered glimpses from each roof tile: ancient servants had baked the tiles in their ovens, consumed by awe as they realized that some of their handiwork might shelter the Emperor himself. Here was a wisp of frigid terror as an apprentice worried that his work might contain some tiny flaw that the Emperor would sense at a distance. There was a spot of almost pure admiration as a roof-worker fell from a ladder and was caught in the arms of Jarelys Teach.

  The memories were not his, but they contained enough nostalgia that they might as well have been. Even infiltrating the Imperial Palace now, under cover of night, felt like coming home.

  Ordinarily, it would not have been so easy. This was actually the phase of the process he was most worried about, because the borders of the Palace were secured by the Imperial Guard. Some of the other Guilds looked down on the Guard, as—with the exception of their famously powerful Guild Head—most Guardsmen were better suited for such mundane tasks as settling riots and patrolling storehouses than fighting Kameira or subduing Soulbound. While the other Guilds liked to think of themselves as elites, the Guard required greater numbers, and therefore had lower entry requirements.

  But whatever you believed about the Imperial Guard, no one doubted their ability to sense intruders.

  Some Guards had the snouts of Bloodtrackers, and could detect a would-be thief hiding underwater a half-mile away. Others had the eyes of Flamewakers, or the ears of Blackfield Sentries. Seeing heat or hearing heartbeats would only be a distraction in combat, but it served their functions as guards perfectly well.

  And, of course, the Guard had its share of Readers. Any one of a dozen gifts could have allowed an Imperial Guard to detect Lucan's presence...but all he saw were distracted. Either they were focused on the cracked sky or were riding away in wagons and carriages to a new deployment, but none of them looked up. Even those on duty felt tense, nervous, their Intent shaky.

  There was something going on here beyond the normal disruptions of the Capital. And judging by the wisps of hostile alien Intent drifting through the air from the center of the Palace, he had a hunch he knew what was causing it.

  The Sleepless.

  As he got closer, he became more and more certain that he was right. He crawled over a rooftop and put his gloved hand in something wet. He froze, assuming that it was a puddle and the splash might alert a guard, but upon closer inspection he saw that a roof tile had turned into pinkish, pulsating flesh. The light of the moon revealed a square chunk of meat that might have been torn from a cow, except that it was growing out of the roof, attached by tendons.

  He looked ahead and saw that this tile was by no means alone; it seemed as though patches of the roof had been transformed at random, growing thicker as he progressed toward his destination.

  Elders were always unnecessarily disgusting.

  So long as they don't give me away, he thought, and pushed his way forward. Mentally, he thanked the Emperor for this pair of gloves, which even now kept Elder Intent from seeping into his mind.

  Finally he reached the building that contained the Emperor's chambers, and what he saw provided another piece toward explaining the chaos. Chunks of flesh surrounded the building, like the building had been swallowed by a gigantic beast which had then exploded outward. The courtyard was covered in unidentifiable bits of skin and meat, and the air was filled with a revolting stench. This time, he was thankful more for the shroud over his mouth and nose, which went a short ways towards blocking out the odor.

  Judging by the moisture, whatever had happened here seemed fresh. Which explained the mess that was the Imperial Guard; they were still dealing with the aftermath.

  Lucan crouched on the rooftop adjacent to the Emperor's chambers, waiting.

  It didn't take long before his patience was rewarded: three men and a woman walked out of the hall. One was a tall young man, maybe Lucan's age, with bright red hair and a blue jacket. He carried a pistol on his right hip and a cutlass on his left, and even at this distance, Lucan could feel strange Intent radiating from the sword.

  Calder Marten, a Captain in the Navigator's Guild. The man who had helped unearth the second Heart of Nakothi, and who had led the recent attack on the Gray Island. His limp, and the thick bandages wrapped around his shoulder and left leg, showed that he hadn't recovered from the events of that day. At least not as well as Shera had, with her Soulbound-assisted recovery.

  Good. Calder was tied up with the Imperialist Guilds at the deepest possible level, and Lucan wanted to either talk with the man or to kill him. It looked like he would get a chance for one or the other tonight.

  One of his companions was older and taller, wearing a pristine white suit and rounded hat. He also wore a pistol, as well as a silver Luminian Sun on a chain hanging against his shirt.

  Andel Petronus, Lucan remembered. Marten's Quartermaster and second-in-command.

  Calder’s second companion looked old enough to be Marten's grandfather, a crusty-looking old man with a shaggy gray beard spreading across his chest. Two pairs of glasses hung against the beard, and his collection of pistols put the other two to shame. He had a gun on his left hip, on his right, one in each boot, and one shoved down the back of his belt. Lucan was surprised his pants stayed up with all that weight.

  Dalton Foster, the gunner for Marten's ship. A famous gunsmith, and a confirmed Soulbound. Rumor had it he was the only one in the Empire who could Awaken a firearm, and all ten of the Guilds had attempted to recruit him at one point or another over the last thirty years. Lucan didn't know what had finally tempted him to join the Navigators.

  But in the event of a fight, he would take Foster out first.

  At first, he thought the woman with them was Meia. She had short blond hair and bright orange eyes that gleamed even in the faint light, which
made Lucan take a second glance. The second look revealed that she was wearing the uniform of the Imperial Guard, and was several years older than Meia.

  Of course. It was ridiculous, in hindsight: what would Meia be doing with Calder Marten, of all people? But the mind played strange tricks sometimes, even on Readers. Especially on Readers, because other people's minds could play tricks on them.

  In all, Lucan wasn't sure whether he'd been dealt a winning hand or a losing one. The distraction of the Imperial Guards was surely a stroke of luck, but Calder Marten's presence could potentially pose a problem. Then again, he was leaving the Emperor's quarters right now, which meant the room should be empty...

  Shera would never have hesitated at the opportunity, and Meia would have had other options available to someone with her athleticism and strength, but Lucan had to take a deep breath and brace himself as he leaped from one building to the other, over the heads of the Navigator crew and their guard, catching himself with his fingertips on the edge of the roof. For a second his feet dangled loose over the head of the Imperial Guard before he pulled them up, swinging inside the door.

  Lucan landed in a crouch just as the heavy door shut. His elbows throbbed with pain, his fingers felt as though he'd torn them off, and his knees reminded him that he hadn't gotten nearly enough exercise in the last two years as a prisoner. He panted through his shroud, but inwardly celebrated.

  I can't believe I got away with that.

  He lifted his eyes to stare straight into the face of the shortest Imperial Guard he'd ever seen. The man had his legs replaced with what seemed to be the hooved, reverse-jointed legs of a goat, and he was carrying a sheaf of paper in his hands. His eyes went completely round when he saw Lucan vault in, and he drew in breath to scream.

  Lucan's first reaction embarrassed him immediately: he hugged the man close, clapping a hand over his mouth. The Guard struggled uselessly, spilling papers everywhere, for a good ten seconds before Lucan remembered the pack of paralyzing needles at his side. He pulled one out, shoving it into the side of the man’s neck.

  Good thing Shera isn’t here. She would have never spoken to him again.

  He scanned the hallway, both with his eyes and with the extended awareness of his Reader senses. Other than the lingering stain of a recent Elder presence, he sensed nothing.

  Still, he ran to the doors of the Emperor's chambers. He left the Imperial Guard's unconscious body where it was; he didn't intend to be long, and if anyone entered the hallway before he'd finished, he would be dead whether there was a Guard lying on the floor or not.

  Part of him had expected the Emperor's rooms to be exactly as he'd last seen them, but he supposed—considering the events of that night—that it would be stranger if the place had remained intact. Even so, he was surprised at the differences.

  It had been ruined. Some of the damage was old: the floor had been torn up, nail-studded floorboards covered by a tarp laid down for workers, and the walls had been stripped of polish and decoration. All the furniture was gone, the pictures he remembered no longer hung on scarred walls, and the quicklamps had died down for lack of fluid. In total, it looked like a tenement that had been stripped by desperate, drug-crazed looters.

  Most alarming of all, the boards of the far wall had been pried out and away, like a rib cage splayed to expose the heart. The Emperor's armor and weapons were missing, of course, as was the rack that had once held them. But something else had been kept within that hidden chamber, and it was still there: a framework of steel bars and wires that looked more like a chrome cage than anything else.

  If you looked closely, there was something to its shape that suggested the outline of a chair.

  The Emperor's true throne. The Optasia. The centerpiece from which the Emperor controlled the world.

  Lucan almost didn't dare to Read the device, but if he didn't, his mission would take far too long. With heavy steps he crossed the room, and he extended gloved, trembling fingers toward one of the arms of steel.

  A thousand eyes watch you. Eternal, hungry beings feel you, want you, seek to devour you...

  He tore his hand away, stumbling back across the room. It took long, uncountable minutes before his mind was back under control, and when he finally had all his senses in working order again, he could feel a sheen of sweat on his skin.

  The Emperor had said that when he used the Optasia, he exposed himself to the attention of the Great Elders. But this...this was like the Great Elders were here, their attention focused solely on this room.

  He had been interested more in uncovering information this time, but he was now convinced: the throne had to be destroyed. On first instinct, he wanted to tear it apart with the power of his Intent, using the active Reading the Emperor had taught him to warp the steel and break its connection to the relays all around the world.

  But active Reading required a deep, thorough understanding of the target. If even a casual brush of his fingers could drag him to the brink of sanity, trying to destroy the throne directly would leave him good for nothing more than gibbering in terror. He needed help.

  Lucan strode out into the hallway with a plan forming, only to stop as he noticed a new detail. The short, goat-legged Imperial Guard was gone. His papers remained, sitting on the carpet, but the guard himself was missing.

  So his plan, which hadn’t included violence, changed.

  He ran over to the door, tugging off his glove and placing his palm against the door. Most Readers couldn’t do this, but he'd been trained by the Emperor himself. It gave him one advantage in particular: he could think outside most of the usual boxes.

  Instead of Reading the door, he extended his Intent past it, seeking a brief impression of the outside.

  Passion, ambition, satisfaction, the itch of still-healing wounds, the enjoyment of a man sitting at a gaming-table against an unexpected opponent. Calder Marten.

  Irritation, focus, mild frustration. Dalton Foster.

  Curiosity, anticipation of danger, dry amusement. Andel Petronus.

  Diligence, alertness, the dedication of a hound set to its course. The Imperial Guard with the orange eyes. She was running away, already shouting orders that Lucan could almost hear through the bronze of the doors.

  She seemed to be running around to the side, gathering men, so Lucan cast his Intent down the building in that direction. As he'd expected, there were traps set in the walls. He could feel the lethal Intent of those who'd designed and built this room, as a death-trap for any who got this far trying to harm the Emperor.

  He wasn't sure any enemy capable of threatening the Emperor would be slowed by a handful of traps, but it wouldn't matter to him. In minutes, this hall would be filled with flying arrows or poison or both.

  Fortunately for him, and unfortunately for them, they'd given him a few minutes. He put his hand back against the door and concentrated. This time, on the door itself.

  Two minutes later, as the Imperial Guards had begun leveling hidden crossbows at his back, he triggered his Intent in the door.

  It crumpled like a sheet of tin, bending over with a shriek of metal as though it was being crushed by an invisible hand.

  Keeping the simple image of a ball in his head, pouring his Intent into the door, Lucan gave the enormous mass of bronze a simple push. It rolled forward, a loosely wrinkled ball like a rolled-up handkerchief, straight toward Dalton Foster.

  All three men of the Navigator's Guild dove out of the way, but Lucan was running close behind the bronze. He leaped out of the door's shadow just as Foster looked up, his gray hair standing out in all directions, eyes wide. The old man had just started to bring a gun up when Lucan brought his own hand down, clutching a poisoned needle.

  He ducked out of the way as the gun fired. It missed, tearing a chunk out of the wood at the edge of a nearby building, but Lucan had already drawn his shears and leaped at Calder Marten. Foster was down and out.

  He'd seen Marten fight Shera blade-to-blade, so he wasn't about to test h
is martial skill against the Navigator's. Instead, he slashed at the man's waist, intending to sever his gun-belt. If he could disable the captain and talk with him, so much the better. If he accidentally disemboweled the man...certain sacrifices had to be made. He was an assassin by trade, after all. He'd killed his fair share, both reluctantly and otherwise.

  But the man in white, Andel Petronus, reacted first. He ran at Lucan, hitting him in the ribs with his shoulder, sending the Gardener rolling over the tiles. The impact felt like a hammer-blow in Lucan's side, the floor beneath him scarcely better. His own belt dug at his sides, and he released his shears as his training had taught him—better than falling on his own blades and accidentally slicing open his throat. Only when he raised up to his knees did he realize that, in this instance, the training misled him. He was now facing two opponents unarmed.

  Well, not entirely unarmed.

  His fingers dipped into his belt again, withdrawing spades, whipping the triangles of steel one at each man. His throw toward Andel Petronus went completely wide, but fortunately the quartermaster still hadn't regained his feet. His other spade was still heading to Calder Marten on target, but the captain had pulled his cutlass from its sheath. He slapped the knife out of the air, wincing at the burden on his wounded shoulder, his blade glowing with orange spots like a dying fire.

  It was all the opening Lucan needed. Kneeling, he placed both palms against the stones of the courtyard.

  Active Reading took time and understanding, and it typically only worked on creations that had a certain amount of Intent invested in them to begin with. Items that were crafted and used for a specific purpose. Tiles and paving-stones rarely held any intent, because they were mass-produced, harvested, and planted by people with no vision or attachment to them.

  These tiles, however, were in the Imperial Palace. Some had been replaced in the past five years, but many had not. And Lucan had spent a significant chunk of his childhood learning and working in these halls.

  He knew them. He knew their Intent.