by Will Wight
But Urg'naut, the Creeping Shadow, was another story.
One of the Elderspawn shadow overtook its two partners, catching up to the son and his ailing father. The son screamed something, but the father stopped in place.
The shadow circled them once, like a killer isolating her target. The younger man ran, abandoning his dignity, half-crawling up the hill in his haste to get away. The women had already outpaced them, their shoes abandoned and dresses torn.
The old man stayed behind, panting, as a shadow cornered him.
The night was silent except for the wind through the grass, then—utterly without sound or warning—the shadow slipped over the man. Darkness covered him, as though a black curtain had fallen on his head. It was deceptively peaceful.
When the shadow moved on a moment later, there was no trace the old man had ever been.
Urg'naut and his spawn didn't attack you. They didn't even kill you. When you were taken by one of the Creeping Shadows, you simply ceased to exist.
Shera found herself looking forward to whatever the Emperor was doing to drive these Elders away. It would be satisfying, seeing that they could be opposed...even if only by the Emperor himself.
The shadows ran forward, tracking the terrified humans. The man who had abandoned his father was in the lead now, and a young woman in a red dress stumbled in the rear. She had cast one shoe aside but the other remained half-clinging to her ankle, and it caught on the dirt, causing her to fall to one knee. Long black hair veiled her face as she turned to look over one shoulder.
Shadows crept up behind her.
She pulled out a small handbag, hands shaking so badly that she almost failed to unfasten it. She rummaged around inside for a second, no doubt looking for some charm or invested trinket that she could use against the shadows. She threw fistfuls of junk out of the bag as she did: a few bills, a tube of alchemical cosmetics that Shera couldn't identify, a box of matches, a handkerchief, a pocket mirror.
As soon as the mirror landed on the grass, the Reading focused on it. Once again, Shera's head pounded, and it felt as though her eyes were being shoved into the reflective glass.
First, the girl's dress brushed the back of the mirror as she scrambled to her feet, and Shera felt the Emperor focus his Intent.
The mirror stuck to her dress.
As the girl ran, carrying something in her hand that Shera couldn't quite identify, the mirror hopped and swayed behind her, glued to the folds of her dress. The shadows had slowed down now, spreading out like a pack of wolves preparing to take down large prey.
The vision remained locked on the mirror. It seemed that Shera could look at nothing else. As she did, the reflected starlight grew gradually brighter and brighter.
Behind the girl in the red dress, the grass lit up as though by a newborn moon. The shadows hesitated.
The mirror flared to life, spewing blue-white light like a shattered quicklamp.
Darkness vanished, and the shadows began to fizzle as the light ate into them. Shera thought she heard a scream, piercing and inhuman, drilling its way into her mind.
The appearance of the light frightened the girl more than anything so far, and she ran even faster, the mirror bobbing on the back of her dress. The humans kept screaming, sobbing, panting.
Nothing chased them. If she'd had lungs, Shera would have taken a deep breath. It was unexpectedly taxing, watching people fight Elderspawn when she had no control over her body. She would have tried to fight, or at least run away.
The vision changed again.
Over the next few hours, the Reading flicked from scene to scene all over the world. Some took an instant to resolve—an Inquisitor of Ach'magut robbing cupboards to discover what people in the Dylian Basin ate for breakfast—while the Emperor spent long minutes and focused Intent on others, slaying monsters and warning nearby Guild members. Once, he coaxed some bees into stinging a group of Luminian Pilgrims out of bed. They were already alert and in the streets when the first Elderspawn attacked.
And each time, Shera's headache got worse.
By the end of two hours, her head felt like someone was crushing it from the outside while a worm burrowed around inside, trying to get out. Shouted advice from Lucan told her that this was what they often called Reader's burn. It wasn't coming from them, but from the Emperor...and, Shera reasoned on her own, the fact that they were feeling it at all meant that it must be much worse for the Emperor.
The scene blurred out for a few seconds as he relaxed his Intent, and Shera felt her real body more keenly. She even glimpsed the Emperor's chambers.
He focused himself once more, and again the scene shifted.
Once again, it was night, though it seemed to be closer to dawn. Their perspective floated in the sky, looking down on a quiet harbor town of sloped, tiled roofs. It took Shera three or four seconds to place it, but when she spotted the lighthouse outside of town, the memory came back to her: Silverreach. The town where the Emperor had almost given in to Ach'magut.
It had been years since she'd seen the town, but this time she recognized that there was something wrong. No one walked the streets. Not a single chimney belched smoke.
As the Emperor had predicted four years ago, the town of Silverreach was dead.
The vision didn't linger on the streets; it plunged down, diving through the cobblestones as if through water. They passed layers of darkness that she somehow identified as earth and stone, and then into something much, much older.
A room opened up beneath her, and a nightmare waited between towering bookshelves.
The library was incomprehensibly vast, big enough to fit two or three of the town above. Each bookshelf must have been at least six stories tall, and packed with books. The rows stretched back into shadow.
But what caught Shera's attention, and the attention of the Emperor, was the abomination at the center.
It was a twisting mass of limbs, tentacles, and vile protrusions that defied observation and description. If she stared into the core, she was sure she would be sick, so she focused on the ends of the tendrils instead. Some were thin as fingers, though they were dozens of yards long, and they tapered out to filaments no thicker than hairs. Others were thick as a brawny arm, wrapped around nearby bookcases to keep the Elder's main mass supported. Still others ended in ears, or snouts, or bulging organic sacs for which Shera had no name.
But many of them were covered in eyes. And as soon as the vision appeared, all of the Elder's eyes snapped open at once, swiveling to stare—so it seemed—straight at Shera.
“Ach'magut,” the Emperor said, and this time Shera heard the hatred clearly.
FORMER SLAVE, Ach'magut said, and his voice transcended interpretation. Each of his words was less an audible phenomenon and more a direct injection of Intent. In calling the Emperor a “former slave,” he suggested a thousand things: that the Emperor was a singular individual, different from the rest of his race; that the Emperor had once served the Great Elders and might again; that the two have a personal history; that he wasn't so far from a slave, even now.
Shera's mind reacted against the overwhelming “voice” of the Overseer, and she felt her imagination shying away from the reality of the Great Elder. She wished her emotions would freeze away and leave her empty, as they so often did in combat, but it felt as though the Elder's grip kept even her thoughts held tight.
DEVIATION. YOU CHANGED.
Again, the irresistible layers of meaning: the Emperor has changed, has been changed, has changed others. He was one who changed.
Was. And now, the Great Elder's Intent suggested, he would soon be nothing.
“You've pushed me too far, Overseer,” the Emperor said. He spoke with his physical voice this time, and his words rang out clear and confident.
ALL ACCORDING TO PURPOSE.
From the Great Elder, the Emperor's confidence was reflected and magnified a hundredfold. This was absolute certainty, as no human would ever know it. The Emperor's actions were no
t his own; they were part of a script, an intricate dance, planned out by a being for whom a century was nothing more than the space between breaths. Ach'magut willed it, and his game piece moved forward a square.
Shera had never felt so small as she did in that moment. It was like floating on a vast ocean, staring up at the stars. Everything she had ever seen, everything she'd known, was but a fleeting speck in the face of an unknowable universe.
The realization brought with it a special kind of fear. Once again she flinched, tried to withdraw, and once again the Emperor's Intent held her with bands of iron.
Either the Emperor didn't feel the same fear she did, or he had grown used to its presence. “I cannot outsmart you, Ach'magut,” he said. “You play your games, and the whole world is your board.”
As he spoke, Shera received pieces of his thoughts. Fragments of his Intent.
When he said that the Elder's game spanned the whole world, he was almost being literal. Everything that she'd seen tonight, every Elder-related problem that the Emperor had corrected from his throne, they were parts of a plan by Ach'magut. A plan that stretched back centuries, and would continue for centuries more. Each little detail, in its place.
“So I must be stronger than you predicted,” the Emperor said.
The Great Elder vanished, and without any intervening journey, Shera once again stared at the town of Silverreach from hundreds of feet overhead. The vision focused one more time.
It was as though the entire town was pressed against the end of a telescope. Every brick, every tile, every scurrying insect in the town was crammed into Shera's eyes as she somehow took in each minute detail at once. Her head felt like it would split open, and she tried to squeeze her eyes shut, but they did nothing to block out the vision. The images were sharp as shards of glass.
Meia screamed, and it sounded more like an animal than a human being.
Then Silverreach exploded.
The town was covered by a transparent bubble of forceful Intent, as the Emperor had used before. This time, instead of hauling a shark out of the water, it pounded five hundred homes to dust in a single instant. Each tile shattered, every beam in every house torn to splinters, every rock smashed. The town burst, and the sound drowned out the world.
And every pound of it, every ounce of the massive avalanche of debris, collapsed into the ground and flooded the library below.
It was like watching an impossibly huge hourglass drain into the bottom. Fractured houses slammed into bookcases, knocking six-story bookshelves into one another, even breaking them in half.
The Emperor relaxed his Intent, to the great relief of Shera's head, and simply watched the aftermath.
GOOD-BYE, Ach'magut said.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Shera spent a week in Lucan's cell. In all that time, she barely slept. The cold wouldn't relax its grip.
Outside, it was becoming increasingly obvious that the Consultants were preparing for war. Masons and Shepherds ran by her door carrying weapons, leading leashed Kameira, or rolling cannons in carts. She registered them only distantly.
Most of her time she spent in memories.
On the seventh day, footsteps crunched on the grass outside of Shera's cell. This time, she looked up.
“We need to talk,” Yala said, peering through the bars.
“Yes,” Shera agreed. “I believe we do.”
Yala stood outside the barred window of Shera's cell, face set in disapproval. “I'm sure you know that the Guild will shortly be under attack. Again.”
Shera stood to face her on the other side of the door, saying nothing.
“The Masons indicate the attack should arrive later today. It's the entire Navigator's Guild, led by Calder Marten and three Guild Heads. Most notably, Bliss of the Blackwatch and General Teach.”
Shera still didn't react. Frozen inside as she was, this was all just...distant information. Facts, to be observed with clinical interest. The most interesting part of it all would be watching Yala herself.
The High Councilor obviously had no patience to wait for a response. “I've come to see if you're in the condition to fight the man who killed Gardener Lucan.”
“I don't need a reason to kill Calder Marten,” Shera said. “I have no reason to keep him alive, so he may as well die. I have no problem doing it myself. But I have a question for you, first.” Her voice remained cold and dry, even though the ice was on the verge of cracking. “Who sent Lucan to the Capital alone?”
“I did,” Yala said without hesitation. “If you expected me to regret my decisions, girl, you're sadly mistaken. I sent him alone because it was quick and easy, and because one life is cheap.”
Shera had determined all this already. The information wasn't new, and her decision was therefore already made. “I see. I'll have to kill you, then.”
She didn't know how ordinary people dealt with grief, but she knew what was fair. Yala was responsible for Lucan's death, so Shera would kill her. The scales would be balanced. Simple mathematics.
Yala didn't so much as blink. “Lucan didn't mind going alone. He didn't even object. Do you know why?” She slammed her palm against the outside of the door, which might have made someone else jump. “Because he was a Consultant. He followed orders, and he did his job, and he put the good of the Guild before his own life. You want to kill me? Fine, I'll have you executed just for making the threat. But I'll do it after this battle, because you're one of the few Soulbound we have, and the only one good enough to go after a high-priority target. If Gardener Lucan can give his life for the safety of this Guild, surely you can put aside a petty vendetta to make sure we all get out of this alive.”
Harsh words, but Shera evaluated them through a cold lens of ice. It was all logical. Lucan would tell her to do exactly what Yala was saying: survive the fight, then attend to personal matters. If the lives of others were at stake, then it was that much more important.
“You have my word,” Shera said. “I'll defend the Gray Island for the second time this month, and then I'll kill you.”
“Well, praise be to the Emperor,” Yala said in a dry tone. She gestured to someone out of sight, and the door opened.
Shera found herself facing down two more Architects, one a Reader and one an alchemist judging by their gear, two Luminian Pilgrims, and four knights. One of the knights had no face beneath his helmet.
“Pardon me if I don't trust your restraint after recent events,” Yala said, standing between her two Architects.
Darius bowed to Shera. “Speaking of which, it's good to see you under better circumstances.”
“At least nothing's on fire yet,” Shera said. It was half a joke, the sort of reflexive quip she might have tossed Meia or Lucan, but at the same time, there was every possibility that they'd be wading through battle-alchemy and cannonfire soon. The island could be ablaze shortly.
Darius began walking, leaving Yala and the other Consultants to fade away. Shera followed him. She would have no trouble tracking the High Councilor once she had Syphren in hand.
“I have your Vessel back with my things,” Darius said, cheerily waving to a passing Consultant. She didn't react, but he seemed undeterred. “We'll take you straight there and return it to you for the battle.”
All around them, black-clad men and women scurried like children running from a house fire, carrying weapons or rigging traps in the trees. “You don't seem worried,” Shera observed.
“Oh, this isn't my first battle. I've seen action against insurrectionists, Elder worshipers, bandits, even the Blackwatch from time to time. You learn to ignore the jitters.”
“That's not what I meant. You're giving me back my Vessel.”
The last time Shera had held Syphren, she'd been inches from draining his life from his body. Now he was giving the weapon back to her without any sign of unease. He had adapted suspiciously well.
Darius turned his empty helmet back to regard her. “Do you recall what my job is, for the Order?”
“Similar to mine,” Shera said. “But I suspect you don't have to be so quiet.”
“You'd be surprised. When we met, I was coming from an apartment where a mother lived with her three little girls. The girls had been ensnared by a spawn of Urg'naut, and their minds were being slowly devoured by the void. The Pilgrim before me determined no hope of ever restoring them to humanity, so I was called in. When I came to that family’s house that day, I was supposed to have filled three caskets. Instead, I left them empty.”
He kept walking, turning his shadowed face away from her. “I have never once regretted leaving a casket empty.”
Shera's immediate response was a sort of cynical doubt. Never? She could think of a few of her own targets who might have rehabilitated, given time, but for the most part the world was better off without them. Even now, she regretted leaving Calder Marten alive.
Almost against her will, she wondered what Lucan would have thought.
He'd killed his share of people, for the Emperor and for the Guild, but never more than he had to. He went to absurd lengths, sometimes, to make sure those he encountered walked away alive. Would he call that a mistake?
No, he never would have. Regardless of how it turned out, he would say that he'd made the right decision at the time. In the same situation, with the same information, he'd have done it all the same way. The chance to save a life was worth it.
Maybe it was a Reader thing.
“I don't expect I'll lose control this time,” she said.
“Please don't. But if you do, that's why we have our little team here.” He gestured to the three other knights and two Pilgrims around him, all of whom watched Shera like rebels watching an approaching Champion. They looked like they would bolt if she made a sudden move.