“Oh, is that all?”
“It’s useless to us,” she decided brusquely. “That world doesn’t exist anymore . . . it doesn’t help with the Quota or with curing Anima Madness. Neither does your Geo Realm really. Even if these Black Elves aren’t to be feared, what will we do, bring them back one at a time? Let all the walls break? The Earth can barely support seven billion humans, nevermind twelve new species arriving at once.”
Felt like an asshole as Ceinwyn’s shoulders slumped and her whole demeanor grew worn. Sure, I took her fears away, but I also gave her false hope. I had successfully stolen a piece of the truth, alright . . . but it didn’t do the world much good or fix any of its problems. The complete answer or a way out of the approaching Anima Armageddon was still out of our grasp.
Do know the name of a bunch of the different Realm-dwellers though . . .
“Let’s put everything back and go home,” I decided to call the night shorter than I had so far this week. “You’ll feel better tomorrow when we’re kicking Massey’s ass in court.”
“You still haven’t told me how we’ll be doing that,” she pointed out. “We don’t even know who the witnesses are.”
“Might not matter, right? About ready to call it with the Vault . . . then I testify, you tell Massey I’m a Maximus and we work out a deal that keeps me free from the Guild, but let’s them save face . . . I guess, cuz that’s the right thing to do and all that shit. You’re always telling me I should be more diplomatic after all.”
“Perhaps . . . it would still be better to win a few points in court as well, so Alexander is truly without any leverage, but . . . what a mess you’ve made, King Henry.” Ceinwyn met my dirt eyes, absolutely no humor in her expression. “Promise me that will be the last of this. No more world-breaking or realm-jumping or whatever you’re calling it, not for the foreseeable future.”
“Not even to bring Poug back for your date?”
“Not a joking matter, King Henry,” she scolded me about as well as Miranda Daniels ever had.
“Even so, you’re smiling,” I tried to tease her, but got no reaction.
“I always smile,” Ceinwyn said, whole face dead serious, “especially when I’m murdering someone.”
“Uh . . .”
She broke, actually laughing for once, not just her usual bark. Her whole body shook.
“Not funny!” I complained. “At all!”
“Next time you’ll promise sooner and tease me less, won’t you, you little shit?”
Maybe. One, don’t know if I can promise that. Two . . . it’s really good to see you laugh, Auntie Badass.
Leverage.
All a game of leverage now.
One more night of thievery?
Sure, what could go wrong?
[CLICK]
And I took Ceinwyn to Val’s apartment and all was well.
Had a nice sleep. Woke up. Beat Massey in court with my brilliant wit and, of course, luck was on my side just like it always was. Broke open his safe that night; had a dildo collection in it. Weird. Next day I told Ceinwyn about Paine and she completely forgave me. Finally called T-Bone, got Paine’s address and had ESLED arrest him. Paine had already cured Anima Madness, but hadn’t told anyone, how about that? Massey let me off the hook and I agreed to support him as Guild Master for eternity . . . cuz he’s really a swell guy deep down. Moved into a house at the Asylum with Val. Ceinwyn taught us everything about being a Maximus, even the Lady supported us and gave us lessons on occasion. We got married within a year, had a kid. Poug knocked Ceinwyn up. Together they saved the whole universe.
Happily ever after.
Oh yeah . . .
That was the good, bright timeline . . . not the darkest timeline I got to live through.
Shit.
How’d it all start going wrong again?
Oh yeah.
Fucking bear cavalry.
[CLICK]
But first . . . a note from little unfair me, the old gentrified version of your not-so-hero. He was too busy to think about that translation, but I remember it well. Know quite a bit more about the peoples it mentioned even . . . though that’s more than even unfair.
That’s cheating.
That’s jumping more than Realms.
Jumping through time, just like these sessions. Letting me be him, on the cusp of insanity like he never could have expected. There are mistakes I’ve made in my life. One of the greatest was that week. Yet, it also contains some of the best choices I’ve ever made. That is what’s the hardest about this, this looking backwards. Makes me tumble the puzzle around in my mind: Where would you time travel to if you wanted to fix it all? Or: Would you even fix it all?
Don’t worry, no actual time travel will be occurring.
What makes those time travel stories so horrible, after all, is that in real life we have to live with our choices, even the bad ones, even the ones that see millions dead.
I also spend time wondering if everyone has these thoughts or if the mundanes just . . . go about their days watching PBS or . . . I don’t know, mancerball? Yes, many things have changed since then, but never PBS. PBS is eternal and so is Big Bird. Just like the politics they report, even if they’ve never been more complicated . . .
Realms and Realm-dwellers.
Less complicated.
But now he had names for these strange and mysterious creatures. He knew they were out there and one day he might be brave—or stupid—enough to attempt to reach them.
Stupid, definitely stupidity . . .
Sawaephim, selling their crafted wares beyond the skill of human hand, beyond the strength of human steel.
Fyretaez, on guard, at the ready, towering above with flaming hands and shouting down at any who dare stare.
Maerwiphs, filling the canals by the hundreds, more than just the ones made for water, never a seashell could compare.
Aetherim, floating through the sky on wings like lace, always in haste, and never late.
Albaephim, ever proud and enemies of laughter, but in Atlas whole, fairer a judge never found.
Rimetaez, by winter come to skate our lake, cold unneeded to freeze water under those large feet.
Saeclophs, at the peaks of towers most tall, showy and gaudy, a sight to see every night of the week.
Waesiphs, whispering helpful and harmful advice in many a traveler’s ear, walking from shadow to shadow without a way between.
Stokkrolls, ever waiting to seize lost flock or errant merchant’s wares, hollering from the outskirts and never welcome beyond the gate.
Varrurolls, riding in by the hundreds, a terror down any avenue, a prize for any brewer who could keep them long sated.
Musaelins, at the books, in your head, they know your very dread. Ask a question, get a sneer. Give an answer, get an argument.
Chaelins, never found unless willing, but for a coin what desires can be filled or what loved one can return for but a night.
There you go, the translation.
I’m told it sounds better in Sumerian.
As twenty-four-year-old me would say: doesn’t matter the species, they’re all people. And people? They’re all fucktards.
[CLICK]
Maybe it wasn’t the darkest timeline. It could’ve been worse.
I mean, I was the God-King of the Geo Realm . . . so I had that going for me.
And my dick is a respectable six inches.
I got Irish blood in my system. It could’ve been way worse, is all I’m saying. Mean little three-inch, drunk thing, red around the collar.
Outside of that . . . pretty fucking bad.
Wasn’t the sweet, little, quiet valley I’d left behind a couple hours ago. Before, you occasionally picked out the black figure of a Sawaephim farmer or farmer’s child going about the shag goat pens or tending to the fields of whatever their version of potatoes were. Really wanted a good look at them and you need to use the binoculars anyway, and who had time to watch Billy Black Ears fuck his shag goat?<
br />
But now . . .
The valley was covered with ant-like dots that swarmed over the land. Up came my binoculars to see clearly that some of those dots rode atop large bears. Both bear and rider were covered in chains of metal armor, the shiny surface at odds with the black of their skin or with the bears’ thick furs. Other dots only traversed on their own two feet, clad in leathers, armed with axes and spears like all good barbarians at the gates.
They were burninating the fuck out of the place.
Farmhouses and the waterwheel were all in flames. Fences had been torn down as goats ran wild. It was easy to imagine how their bleating only added to the sounds of screams, especially with all of it overridden by tribal battle chants. Could see a few dead bodies crumbled on the ground, one group in a concentrated area. No sign of dead children, but I soon picked them and some adults being corralled near the bear riders. Chieftains and honor guard, I decided, rest are the common clansmen.
On my first journey through the Geo Realm, Poug had spit at these types when we happened across their path. The clansmen of the north went feral after our fall. They turned against artifice and creation and instead make violence for violence’s sake, and menace craftsmen for their goods, I remembered.
More clansmen than just those around Seattle then. The mountainside drew them here. It was still up there, Meteyos’ declaration of ownership. Poug had mentioned actual villages near the valley, who else would be coming? Or would these clansmen ransack those villages too after they finished here?
Ceinwyn stood beside me, mute. Had her head cocked like a bird, trying to process what she saw far down below us. After she took a turn at the binoculars, she finally said, “The night got stranger, King Henry . . . it really needs to stop doing that.”
I said nothing, watching the destruction.
God-King of the Earth, I thought. Never has been honor or the Right Thing to Do or justice that drew me to a fight. Was mostly just selfishness. To crack bones and exalt in striking back at people bigger than me. Was the rage at how unfair the world can be. Bullies, don’t like bullies. People with more power or bigger bodies hurting those who were weaker or smaller. Well . . . what do you call five or so hundred barbarian Black Elves killing the shit out of a bunch of poor farmers?
Bullies.
Some would’ve taken responsibility for it all. Would’ve been guilt that drove them to do something about this. Wasn’t that for me. Was that selfishness, was that joy of hurting people thought they were completely untouchable, completely in control of their lives.
“Think of the consequences,” Ceinwyn warned me, reading my mind.
“Consequences be damned,” I spat more at the Bitch-Queen wherever she listened from than at Ceinwyn, “ain’t that the motto for this week? Pit of No Return . . . just fucking jump and pay the price. Find a way to survive it. Shit . . . and it was going so well . . .”
“Said every gambler before he lost his entire fortune,” Ceinwyn pointed out.
I hesitated for just a moment. She was right about the consequences. Human appearing out of nowhere to wreck up shit and save the farmers? Story would spread. The Lords and Ladies of Sawapann would hear of it, so would every other Black Elf in the Realm. Dropping a nuclear bomb on their heads. Ain’t alone, walls are breaking down, ready yourself.
For what?
I don’t know.
The minute I walked down this path it all became inevitable, one crash and consequence after another. Thought I was in control of it, but I wondered if even a Maximus could control an avalanche. Looking down on it all, all that death and destruction carried out in my name, or the name of the Great One, or against the name of the Great One, I hesitated on the edge.
Hector Vega.
Sebastian Rojas.
Conan Sapa.
Three men I’d killed. Did this and it wouldn’t be three, wouldn’t just be men. Tribes like that carried all their people with them. Unless there’s more coming behind this band of warriors. In which case I’d really need to do something to dissuade them from their course of action . . .
Wasn’t fear for my health that made me hesitate. Was fear for what I accepted about myself by doing it. Shit about to get monstrous up in here. Three men . . . easy to count. After this? It would all be a guess.
Guess that’s who I am now.
Don’t number the dead.
Number the living.
Number me and mine.
Brought up the binoculars again, hoping to find a reason not to obliterate all those people.
A few of the clansmen were building a pyre next to the living farmwomen and children. Don’t think any of the fathers or the other hands made it out. I blinked studying that group, glancing next to them. Next to them was a post and tied tightly to it a Black Elf clad in pristine armor. They have Poug . . .
The templar struggled against his bonds, head shaking about as he yelled at the clansmen in the Sawaephim language. Language that sounds like metal plates breaking, don’t think most would like it, but to me it’s a special kind of beautiful. Handed the binoculars off again and pointed where Ceinwyn should look.
Her face set in a grim acknowledgment of the situation. It was no longer about choice. “I wish I wasn’t helpless here.”
“Me too, Auntie Badass,” I told her, “one day you can show me what you really got, but tonight it’s my turn.”
“You might be powerful, but you aren’t invincible,” she still tried to caution me. “Please remember you still need to dodge arrows. Don’t try to catch them with your chest.”
“Spoil-sport,” I teased her, trying to add some levity where there was none.
“No joking!” she yelled through a sharp smile. “Get down there before they kill him!”
[CLICK]
I’ve always said I’m the part of the Earth that represents an earthquake. I’ve touched it before during those rare moments when I needed something extra to keep me alive. In that cage with Sapa, bringing the building down on Eresha and the Constructs killing her, the two times I’ve used the World-Breaker to actually cause that type of destruction.
But this . . . for the first time I accepted the mantle on my shoulders.
For the first time it settled upon me.
Maximus.
Greatest Power.
Glassbreaker.
King of the Dirt.
I’ve called Val an avenging angel.
I’m not that.
Nothing holy about me.
Me, I was a herald of the apocalypse. My steed was the earth itself, my body crackled with geo-anima, I held a rod of glowing jade in my off-hand and kept the other in a fist of iron. I needed no more weapons here. No artifacts, no blades, no guns. Only me. My name was Break and Ruin and an End to the Way Things Are.
The hill disintegrated underneath me as I geo-surfed forward at speeds I’ve never reached before. Had to get to Poug, fast. Had to deal with the clansmen between us too. He was three farmhouses deep into the valley and I lost sight of him and the bear cavalry as I descended from the heights. Maybe the consequences of this is my story spreading, but these fuckers ain’t gonna be the ones alive to spread it.
To this day, the most deadly conjuration I’ve ever seen is still Paine’s geo-mine. That building of force at a person’s feet and then an explosion. Anima IED. Maybe you live, but you ain’t walking until you get some military-grade prosthetics. I used it on the first group of clansmen I came across. Ransacking through a forage bin, throwing potatoes on the ground looking for hidden valuables.
Twenty minutes of anima at their feet, coiling on itself, tighter and tighter.
The explosion ripped their bodies apart and took half the forage bin with them, chunks of flesh and potatoes mixing as they floated in the air. Nice to know they’re as red on the inside as a human is, I thought harshly, zipping past them without another thought.
Past the bin, down a country lane bracketed with two-foot high stone walls.
More of the clansmen appea
red from a farmhouse, loaded down with items and pointing at the smoke from the explosion. The front door was solid steel, neither lock nor bolt having done any good, but it was all I needed to work with. My dirtboard flew apart in front of me as I kicked it forward, slashing pebbles all over the group and causing them to shout in surprise. Geo-anima dripped down into my ankles and knees, absorbing the blow of my landing.
With the rest of my pool I reached out for that steel door.
To the clansman I did nothing.
They stared, surprised by pale skin as much as my use of anima. When they saw my dirt eyes they flinched at the violence within them. You cannot escape this. Nothing you do will save you. You pillaged the wrong place, assholes.
Everything the Asylum taught me said that geomancers can’t do the whole floating earth trick. They’re right, but only because it’s Anima Quota bullshit weighed down by bad math. Need enough anima to touch from ground to how high you want the object to move. Done it before, thousands of times maybe, just never thought about it. Else, what am I doing when I use anima to manipulate a door lock? What did I do when I flipped on over Annie B’s car that first time with an hour of anima?
Same principle with that steel door. Took the whole hour I had left and pulled. Flung the steel door sideways across the yard, straight on through the four clansmen staring at me in horror. None of them even registered the problem before it killed them with four consecutive wet splats as their skulks cracked open.
Behind me there was a scream, same metal crashing words of the Sawaephim language, only driven up to eleven. A clansman dropped what he carried and took off running down the lane. I watched him for a second before repooling up to thirty minutes and sending the anima immediately after him. Stones in those short walls sprayed him like shrapnel and he crumbled to the ground instantly.
The Pit of No Return (The King Henry Tapes Book 6) Page 46