by Scott Hale
“Hrothas has been hard at work, ensuring this continent will finally expand technologically,” Edgar said, “but progress was a struggle, and slow. While Hex didn’t go to the Dead City herself, many of her finest cabalists did; escorted by a Mr. Haemo…”
Oh, damn. Felix swallowed hard. Oh, damn, oh damn.
“The blood well Mr. Haemo had used to get them there from Cathedra hadn’t been strong enough to bring them back through. They had to walk, instead, with their loot.” Edgar smiled. “We intercepted them near the Dires. The cabalists had murdered a significant number of Scavengers and taken their horses and wagons for their haul. Hundreds of weapons from the Dead City. Those you see right there, are rifles. Old World weapons. Lotus and I had rediscovered their designs in the Nameless Forest, but actually having our hands on them? It made things go a lot faster.”
Lotus ran her hand over her bald head, pretended to blush, as if she’d been complimented.
“Mr. Haemo wasn’t there,” Edgar said, “but the odd thing was, he did leave a note for my men.”
Felix said, “Oh?”
“It said, ‘Finders keepers, Felix’s a weeper.’”
The mosquito was serious. He actually was going to bring us weapons. He was going to arm the Marrow Cabal.
“It’s good you turned Mr. Haemo’s offer down. It’s good you look as if you have no idea what I’m talking about.” Edgar fell back in his seat. “We have God, and now we have guns. It’s all good.”
Hex and Sloane were marched to the stakes. Screaming in their ears, jerking their limbs as if they meant to pull them from their sockets, the soldiers pushed them against the stakes and manacled their hands behind their backs. Sloane, probably as old as the wood she’d soon die on, didn’t fight back; rather, she fell forward, held back and in midair by her bindings, and stared at the ground, beseeching the Deep. Hex didn’t fight either, but Felix could tell she wanted to. It was in the way her eyes followed the soldiers, sizing them up, looking for weakness. She was drooling, she was concentrating so hard. Or was it because they’d knocked some of her teeth out?
“In our New World,” Lotus cried, surprising everyone, even Edgar, “Death comes swiftly. We will not cheat God your souls any longer, for though It has eternity, eternity isn’t enough to answer for your crimes!” Lotus clapped her hands together—“Ready!”—pointed with both hands at Hex and Sloane—“Aim!” and—
Felix jumped to his feet. He didn’t know why he did it, but he did it. Sweating through his robes, the eyes of everyone on him, burning right through him, he stuttered, “W-Wait… Wait.”
Lotus’ jaw went sideways. “Hold!” she said.
“What is it?” Edgar said, annoyed. Then, trying to be nicer: “Hey, is everything okay?”
“Let me speak to them… one last time.” Felix put his hands together, holy-like. “To pray for their souls. To hear their last confessions.”
“Well,” Lotus said, “good luck with that.”
Edgar put up his hand. “Yes, yes, of course, your Holiness.”
Felix hurried off the stage, nearly tripping down the steps. He sprinted across the courtyard, a wave of surprise and whispers building from the crowd behind him. The riflemen didn’t know how to act, so even when he slipped in front of them, in their line of fire, they kept their guns pointed at his back. All it would take was one itchy finger or one silent order and he’d be dead before he knew what hit him.
I’m the Speaker. I’m the Speaker. He stared God in the eyes. I’m the Speaker.
He went to Sloane first, because, of everyone involved in this mess, she was the one he’d spoken to the least. But when he got closer, her bruised and puffy face split apart as she opened her mouth. Her tongue had been cut out, sloppily. She laughed at his disgust. She wouldn’t have given him anything, anyway.
Hex was laughing, too. Her curly blue hair dripped beads of sweat. Her face was untouched, unlike Sloane’s, but her body wasn’t. Felix knew it just by looking at her. He could tell that about a person now, having seen such a thing so often in the mirror. Her clothes, maybe even the same she’d worn the day she was arrested, were tattered, darkly stained. Her legs weren’t right. She winced when she moved her arms. And she wasn’t really standing but crouching. Standing hurt too badly.
“Going to pardon me?” Hex said, her voice grating to his ears.
Felix glanced past her. Inches away, a fifty-foot plummet into the screaming masses of Eldrus. He hadn’t heard them before. It wasn’t until they saw him that they broke their silence. Now, they’d think this was his idea. Now, it’d be his name beside Edgar’s on the death certificate.
“Come to pray for my soul?” Hex laughed. “No, you haven’t. You want some truth.”
Felix stepped closer, close enough for her to grab him; that is, if her hands weren’t chained up on the other side of the stake. She could chew an ear off, though. He wouldn’t put something like that past her.
“All things considered, you had a good run, Kid.”
“I want some truth,” Felix said.
Hex’s eyes locked onto the White Worm’s sealing stone.
He held the stone in his hand and nodded.
“Why now?”
“Tell me.”
“Why believe me?”
He squeezed the sealing stone, until his Corruption glowed redder.
Hex sniffled her nose. She reared her head back, cracking it against the stake. Widening her eyes, clearing her throat—clearly struggling more than she let on—she said, “She put me in that old chapel in Cenotaph. She put the Bloodless in the catacombs, right underneath that chapel. I don’t think Justine’s got some master plan. I think she wants everyone to think that, but she’s an opportunist. Whatever designs she had, when she realized she could have me torture Ichor, have his veins break out the Bloodless… blame it all on the Marrow Cabal, say she had no idea…” She snorted, shook her head. “She was going to let that plant out, one way or another, Felix.”
He asked, “It was all just to make the blood well?”
“No, Mr. Haemo is just a fan of sloppy seconds. I got wind of her plans before Ichor broke the Bloodless out and called Haemo in. Figured we’d make the most of the situation. We tried to recruit you, but you were even more out of the loop than we thought. After you turned Mr. Haemo down, we paid Justine a visit.
“She laid it out clear. I was stupid for buying it. The Bloodless would get out, get fat on Cathedra blood. Mr. Haemo would open a blood well inside the plant before it got too big, to kill it. Mr. Haemo would take a handful of the Cabal’s finest into the well, into the Dead City; get some gear for the big fight to come. I’d pretend to go, but hang behind, instead.” Hex coughed; her eyes went two separate ways. “She sent me and Sloane into the Heartland. We trailed your caravan. She wanted us to ‘sow chaos.’ Suicide bombers from both sides, on all sides. See, I thought it was to throw off the Disciples, until the weapons came back from the Dead City. But the weapons never came back. She never sent anyone to retrieve them. Then your caravan kept shedding soldiers. Nothing was making sense. Not until I realized it wasn’t making sense on purpose.” She paused, caught her breath. “She wanted to fail. This whole time. That’s all it’s been about.”
Felix took a step back.
“Months into a war, and the largest and oldest religion in this world is surrendering to the new kid on the block? You’re perfectly safe, and you go to Cathedra? Then Eldrus? You got a seasoned Commander in Millicent, and she’s so checked-out, we’ll be paying dues on her till the day she dies.” She smiled. “I thought you were in on it. I felt bad when I realized you weren’t. Mr. Haemo… He’s not all that convincing. But I thought maybe Clementine and Will might’ve been able sway you. Gemma, if nothing else. You… really don’t know what’s going on?”
Felix shook his head.
“Why don’t you take that stone you’ve got there and go get your answers? Can’t be the first time Justine hasn’t made sense. The fact you’re here tal
king to me about it says it isn’t. Says you’re having doubts.” Taking a deep breath, Hex dropped her head. “That’s all I got to say.”
Felix, fuming, started back, but not before asking, “What happened to Ichor?”
“He and Mr. Haemo are going on vacation together.” She looked northward into the sky. “Was hoping to see them off.” She spat. “Guess he won after all.”
Felix made it back to the stage in a blur. He had so many thoughts racing through his head, it hurt to think. It wasn’t until he was sitting back down beside Edgar and Commander Millicent, and Lotus shouted, “Fire!”—
The firing squad unloaded into Hex and Sloane. The bullets tore through their bodies. Flesh exploded across the courtyard in sticky chunks. Blood spurted from their wounds. It came hot, and steaming, and blackened. They were dead before they could scream. Not that women like them ever would.
—that he remembered where he was. That he remembered who he was. That he remembered, that he knew, what he’d always known. What he had to do.
The riflemen lowered their weapons. They went to the stakes, took off Sloane’s and Hex’s manacles, and flung their bullet-riddled corpses over the edge of Ghostgrave. The shouting below escalated to something of a storm of riotous screaming. Felix didn’t need to see what was going on to know what would happen next.
The deaths of Sloane and Hex were still looping through Felix’s mind when Warren, James, and Gemma were shoved into the courtyard. Felix’s heart skipped a beat, and was out of rhythm from there on out. The soldiers fixed them to their stakes. None of them tried to fight back. They couldn’t, really, even if they wanted to. Warren’s arms had been badly broken. James’ eyes were both too swollen to see out of. And Gemma, pale and glistening, weakened by the sun, looked as if she were doing her best to die right here, right now, just to get the inevitable over with.
Everyone was waiting for Felix to go back down there, to talk to them, too, but he couldn’t do it. Thoughts like thorns were ripping through his brain. They hurt too much to consider, hurt too much to ignore. Besides, if he went down there, he’d start crying. He’d try to pardon them all.
They betrayed me. They knew. They’re just as bad as Hex, he told himself. Just as bad as Justine.
“Get it over with,” he said through his teeth.
Lotus cried, “Ready!”
The riflemen raised their weapons.
“Aim!”
They pressed their eyes to the iron sights, rested their fingers against the triggers.
“Fire!”
Felix looked away. He shoved his fingers into his ears. Agonizing second after agonizing second passed, but the guns didn’t go off. He told himself time had stopped, that he’d stopped time; that if he turned around, it would start again. This way, if he stayed this way, he could buy himself a few days to think, a few years to plan. That’s all he needed. That’s all he wanted. He’d done so much. There was so much to do.
A thunderous explosion rocked Ghostgrave. Had time started again? No, that wasn’t the riflemen. He stared into the sky, but it couldn’t have been a clearer day. Again, a blast of thunder; not from above, but beside… near; on the other side of… somewhere.
An ear-piercing screech split the air, rattling the tiles off Ghostgrave’s roof. The thunder returned, grew louder and closer, until Felix realized it wasn’t thunder, but flapping. Heavy wings, flapping. He turned in his seat. Warren, James, and Gemma were still there, and so was the bat.
The bat. The gigantic bat. Camazotz. She flew wide around the courtyard, the pressure of her passing nearly knocking everyone out of their seats. Wings outstretched, blood weeping from her maw, Camazotz landed in front of the prisoners with an earth-shattering force. Shielding Warren, James, and Gemma with her body, she leaned over the stakes and bit through the chains as if they were butter.
The audience cried out, and cried out to King Edgar to “Do something!” They should’ve run. They wanted to run. But here, they were in the sight of God. It was as good a time as any for martyrdom.
Camazotz spun around. She flashed her ragged, snarling face at the riflemen. She knew guns. She knew them well.
Holy shit.
Warren, James, and now, Gemma, had crawled onto Camazotz’s back. Clouds of what appeared to be sand were coughed into the air as they scurried to her neck. Gemma climbed higher and farther than the men, though. She reached the bat’s head, nestled her face against it, and breathed in her old master’s pungent stench.
Sitting up, rejuvenated—blood passing from Camazotz’s fur to her pale flesh—she turned to everyone watching and threw two middle fingers in the air.
Camazotz kicked off the ground, high into the sky.
“Fire!” Lotus screamed, her voice going out.
The riflemen fired round after round at the bat, but it was too high, too fast, and their aim, too poor. Not a single bullet hit her before she was nothing more than a black speck in God’s red sky.
Felix was gone before the dust had settled. No one stopped him. There was no stopping him. As he left, he heard King Edgar screaming for the rest of the cabalists and Compellers to be brought out and executed. Felix passed forty to fifty of them in the halls, before their paths went a separate way. Whether they were actually cabalists or Compellers, he couldn’t say.
Felix forbade his guards, living statues included, from following him into his quarters. He barricaded the entrance with whatever was around and went to Justine’s door. Instead of knocking, he shoved it open. It wasn’t locked. Chances were, it never had been, in all her life. That’s just how Justine had managed to get by all these years. Assumption. The benefit of the doubt.
Justine was waiting for him. She was crumpled at the foot of the bed. Her arms and legs were limp at her side. Her mouth stretched open, like a snake about to feed. Her torso was caving in upon itself. It was like someone had taken all the bones of out of her body.
“Will Audra speak to God soon?” she asked, reforming her mouth. “Lillian is fighting harder than ever.”
Holding the sealing stone—God, he’d been holding it since talking with Hex—he said, “Isn’t that a good thing?”
Justine’s eyes rolled lazily in her skull, patterns printed on the back of them.
“You’re the White Worm of the Earth.”
“Yes.”
“You’re the… You’re religion. You represent religion. Your purpose is to serve God.”
“Yes, but…”
“You wanted to go against God.”
She nodded.
“But you never did.”
“No, I did.” She closed her eyes for a while. “I tried.”
“No,” Felix said, laughing in disbelief, “you didn’t. You didn’t! You never did! It was so obvious. You didn’t. You’re a liar. Do you know even know how much of a liar you are?!”
“I love you,” she said, hand melting into the ground.
“You’re a Worm! You only know one thing!”
Justine’s flesh began to bubble. The smell of burning wood and lilac filled the room.
“I’m going to ask you questions.”
She said, “I did this for you.”
“If you don’t tell me the truth…”
He shoved the sealing stone at her. Her skin immediately began blackening. Hundreds of abstract forms exploded in a panic inside her body. They threw themselves against her flesh, trying to get out.
“Okay,” she cried. Her head tipped back. Out of her neck, another head emerged. “Yes, Felix,” it said.
“You knew Ichor would let the Bloodless out.”
She hesitated.
He threatened her with the sealing stone.
“Yes.”
“You told the Marrow Cabal and Compellers to turn people into suicide bombers. Innocent people.”
“Yes. They didn’t have the Skeleton. It was the only way to make them useful.”
Felix said, “We never came here to pretend to form an alliance with the Disciples.”
“No.”
“We were never going to gain their trust and take over from the inside.”
“No.”
“You wanted the Holy Order to be taken over.”
“Yes…” she whispered.
“Because it is a false religion.”
“Yes.”
“We only fought Edgar to look more desperate, to look less suspicious. You were… going through the motions. It was the only way to get you. Right. Here.”
Justine nodded.
“Everything had been for God.”
Justine sat there for several minutes, in a constant state of transformation. With her head propped up against the bed’s footrest, and a tongue and some teeth back in her mouth, she pushed infant-like, barnacle-covered hands out of her stomach and folded them in her constantly churning lap.
“Yes,” she started, finding her voice again. “Yes. If I tell you everything, I know you’ll understand. I know you will.” Her leg detached, slithered away. “Yes, you will.”
He didn’t say anything.
“I knew Edgar had made contact with God in the Nameless Forest years ago. Before that, though, I was already beginning to suspect Audra was the Speaker. I had heard stories of her abilities. And Archivist Amon had spent decades on the royal family’s council. He wouldn’t have done that had there not been potential.
“I sent Alexander Blodworth as an envoy to Eldrus to establish a relationship between the city-states, and to monitor Audra, and eventually, bring her to Penance. We waited for the right moment. When Edgar killed his family, I told myself to be patient. When Edgar emerged from the Forest, changed, I stayed my hand. But when Edgar began cultivating vermillion veins, when the Skeleton led the rebellion against Eldrus, I was glad I had waited. That was the moment. Being challenged by the so-called “people” he meant to save was too much. It did not take much to discover Geharra had funded rebellion, so, learning that, I sent Blodworth back to Eldrus. Edgar is still a child, in some ways. He thinks he is above revenge, but I assure you, he is not.
“I gave Blodworth the Red Worm’s necklace. For his information, Edgar gave Blodworth safe passage to Geharra and Audra’s Crossbreed she’d been growing. He took that necklace to Geharra to summon the Worm on my orders.”