by Joe Ducie
In case all else failed, I carried a book to Ascension in my waistcoat holster, but I would’ve rather not had to use it. And Myth, I’d secured back in the cutlery drawer. ’Ware to anyone who stumbled upon that tainted menace.
I strolled through the heavy oak door of McSorley’s, trying to stand tall and ignore my various aches and pains. As soon as I stopped to rest for more than an hour, I was going to be as stiff as a bruised board.
The scents of strong wood polish and stale beer hung in the air, a scent that felt like coming home. A row of mahogany stools lined the bar, which held about twenty taps of various specialty beers. Tables and chairs, as worn and old as I felt, were scattered about the dim room, and sawdust coated the floor, to soak up any spills. A grand piano gathered dust in a corner against the back wall. All the light in the place came from a half dozen flickering torches in brass brackets on the wall.
McSorley’s was sparsely populated, given the late hour on a weeknight, but one old drunk sat on the stools in front of the polished bar, and the old man himself stood at ease against the liquor shelves, polishing pint glasses with a white rag.
I stepped across the hardwood floors and tapped the bar twice with the tip of my ring finger—a universal signal for the barkeep to pour me a damned drink.
“Thought you’d given it up,” Albert McSorley said, as if battered and knackered Knights strolled into his pub all the time, as if he had been expecting me. Chances were good they probably did, that he probably had been. “And put half the bars and liquor stores in Perth out of business.”
“I am off the wagon,” I said slowly. McSorley shrugged, poured, and I raised a shot glass full of amber liquid. “To your health!”
I knocked the shot back and grimaced, favoring the familiar burn. The drunk at the bar—the other drunk—shuffled on his stool, and I got a good look at his wrinkled face under a thin mop of salt-and-pepper hair. Aloysius Jade, my old teacher from the Infernal Academy, a man sent to kill me not too long ago—after he spent half a decade in Starhold, the orbital prison above Ascension City—and the man who had instead saved my life, after a fashion.
“Hale,” Jade said, once-sharp eyes a little murky. “You look like shit.”
“I lost a fight today.” I tapped the bar again. I lost a son today.
McSorley grunted and poured me another scotch.
“On the tab?” I asked.
“On the house,” he said.
Some years before, I’d burned down the bar when fighting an incursion of demonic imps. My ‘tab’ was somewhere in the region of half a million dollars. I inclined my head in thanks and drank.
I slammed the glass down on the bar. The glass cracked, slicing my ring finger. Blood, hot and red, ran down the back of my hand. “The Immortal Queen is dead.”
Jade choked on a sip of his beer, and McSorley sighed, as if he’d been expecting a blow to fall hard and instead it fell cruel. I used a few bar napkins to dab at my bloody finger, already wanting another sip. Perhaps I could just stay here tonight and get drunk with old Knights and old enemies and forget about Forget.
Thing about addiction—and I knew this from long years on the sauce—was that I never just wanted one hit. It was either none or ten. If I stayed much longer, I’d be no good to anyone, especially myself.
And the game wasn’t over yet.
“That’s some sad news,” McSorley said. “I saw her once, a century ago. She was… lovely.”
“Kind,” Jade said. “I remember her as kind. We once spent an afternoon in the Outer Territories, talking peace and signing accords that ensured neutral ground for the war’s refugees. How... how did she die?” Jade’s voice was like gravel scraped against a chalkboard—ragged.
“The Everlasting Oblivion plunged a weapon of celestial illusion into her heart in the ruins of Old Voraskel.” I choked back a bitter laugh. “Oh, and Oblivion has the Roseblade. Won’t be long before that fucker tears aside the protective veils around this planet and claims True Earth for the Elder Gods.”
McSorley lined up three glasses and, his hand shaking, poured us all another shot of delicious, numbing morning’s regret—as if I didn’t have enough of those to fill a lifetime. “Last orders, then.”
“What’s the state of the Lexicon?” I asked, holding the shot but not quite ready to toss it back. Jade dropped his shot into his beer with a dull clink and chugged his impromptu depth charge in four quick swallows.
McSorley took a sip and licked his lips, as if savoring the taste. “Few lines operating. I get a bit of foot traffic every day. Not like it was a few months back, of course. People not quite ready to trust the place again just yet.”
“It’ll get me to Ascension?”
Jade grunted hard laughter. “Heard you were wanted for kidnapping the Historian. You sure that’s the best place to be heading?”
“Wasn’t me,” I said.
Jade had spent the better part of the last six years in Starhold, the orbital prison above Ascension City. He had been let out, pardoned as a favour to Morpheus Renegade, in order to hunt me down and, well, slit my throat. In the end, he’d done just the opposite and saved my life. Jade had brought me back from the dead. “No? Then who was it?”
“Some shadowy figure in the night,” I muttered. “Heard he looks just like me.”
“Aye, well, if you go down for it, ask for one of the cells on the outer rings of Starhold. Nice view of the planet at sunset.”
“I’ll keep that in mind.” I raised the shot to my lips, hesitated, ran my tongue along the rim of the glass, and then set it back down on the bar. “Key?” I asked McSorley.
He dug around in his pocket and tossed me a heavy golden key inscribed with sharp-angled Infernal runes—the pass code for the gateway in his wine cellar.
“Cheers.” I strolled along the bar and around to the steps leading down to the cellar. I swayed a touch on the first step and gave a quick wave to the barkeep and his lonely patron. “Gentlemen, don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.”
“Good luck, Hale,” McSorley said. “Chin up, lad, and give them hell.”
“And tell that brother of yours to stop keeping your seat warm,” Jade called as I disappeared down into the cellar—a little drunk, a little tired, a little lost.
Chapter Twenty
Stolen
The Atlas Lexicon stood as a testament to the ingenuity and resolve of just one man: Thomas Lucien Atkinson, the original dreamer. He had envisioned a network of rail lines spanning the rough and varied pathways through the Void. They had called him mad at the time, but one by one, he linked the worlds and opened up universal travel to the masses.
The Lexicon was a lifetime’s work, a feat of engineering on par with the greatest works ever undertaken by humanity, and I’d managed to destroy most of it in the space of about twenty minutes.
Well, to be fair, Emissary had done most of the damage in dragon form, but he’d only gone there to face me and steal the Creation Knife. Still, entropy was a dark and terrible thing. Everything could die far more easily than it could be born.
I didn’t bother to mask or disguise my appearance as I strolled through the somewhat functional stations of the Lexicon. I wasn’t hiding or exiled any longer. My grim face as dark and terrible as entropy itself, I was a Knight Infernal—a member of the most revered and feared order in all creation. With a single look, I could wither my enemies. A raised eyebrow could turn fierce negotiations into groveling placations, and a grunt of displeasure could avert wars spanning entire universes.
“No trains until six,” the guard in the ticket booth said. “By order of the Knights, you ken. They’ve got some trouble in Ascension and are only running three services a day.”
“I am a Knight,” I said, trying not to slur my words on the tail end of that last shot at McSorley’s. “And I’m saying I need to get to Ascension. My name is Declan Hale.”
The old guard looked up from behind his newspaper at that, gave me a once-over, and chuckled. “You had a few too many, lad
?”
“Yes, but that doesn’t change who I am or what I need.”
He rolled his eyes and slapped his paper against his desk, fixing me with a two-fingered point. “Well, if you’re a Knight, then you’ve got other means of reaching Ascension, don’t ya? Don’t need our trains.”
Entire worlds are spinning into the Void, and I’m delayed by one old man with crumbs in his moustache… “I’d rather not take the easy road. Got a feeling I’ll need to pop in and out of a few more worlds before the day is done.” I took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. “So that train over there? It’s on the track for Ascension?”
He nodded. “Tickets are fourteen gems, and the service will depart at six.” He glanced at a timepiece on his desk in the booth. “Three hours and twelve minutes from now. We’ve got the food court up and running again, if you want to sober up and grab a pint of honeyberry juice.”
I thanked the man for his time and wandered off through the sparse, late night–early morning traffic seen in airports and train stations the world over. People sleeping on benches, plugged into earphones and video screens, one old cleaner on his motorized cart sweeping the floors, and a half dozen chain retailers with one token staff member just in case someone wanted a triple-decker deluxe cheeseburger with extra onion at three in the morning. Actually, that doesn’t sound half bad…
A shame I had somewhere to be.
I ran my hand along the outer carriage of the train, moving down the platform until I reached the driver’s compartment. The handle was locked—good security, I thought sarcastically—so I melted it with a palm full of hot light and let myself in. A few onlookers stared as I powered up the console. The readings and instruments were not what I was used to, flying cruisers and battleships, but they were close enough that I could puzzle them out.
“Aux power and… navigation.” I flicked a switch on the console, and a crystal platform came to life on the dashboard. A codex pod full of sunlight, linking the Lexicon to that jewel—that radiant gem of the Story Thread—Ascension City. “Reality beacons, Tia, remember those?” I muttered.
The track ahead disappeared down a dark tunnel. I knew from past use of the Lexicon that about a half mile down the tunnel was a net, a portal arch, into the Void. So long as the reality beacon onboard was shiny and bright, we’d travel through the Void to the mirror station beneath Ascension City.
“All aboard!” I called, offered the guard just emerging from his booth a wink and a quick salute, and released the brake. The train shuddered forward, quickly picking up speed, and I stole my way across universes, tired and fearing the morning’s hangover.
*~*~*~*
A warship hung in the twilit sky above Ascension City. It was a massive, sleek silver vessel fitted with dual-core cycling fusion engines, enough heavy cannons and firepower to take a sizeable chunk out of the moon, and—unless I missed my guess—a reality matrix, which was kind of like a versatile reality beacon that could latch onto waypoints on a thousand different worlds. I couldn’t be sure from just a glance, but I’d be willing to bet the farm I was looking at the next generation of military cruisers—and the flagship of the Cascade Fleet.
Blimey, if I hadn’t been exiled… As commander of the fleet during the final months of the Tome Wars, I would’ve ended up with that ship.
After abandoning my stolen train in the underground, I’d found the station relatively unmanned and empty, given that the next scheduled arrival wasn’t for a few hours. No doubt I’d be reprimanded appropriately in the days to come, if I survived, for breaches of the code of conduct—namely, stealing an interdimensional train—but I’d take it on the chin, grin, and do it all again next week.
The air in the city was tense and stank of crystal fuel, like hot electricity or strikes of ionic lightning. Dozens of smaller craft flew in the air around the mighty ship. Cruisers and troop-movers, a few battleships—and their size in comparison to the big sumabitch reminded me of pilot fish swimming around a shark for protection.
Only the smaller craft were not in any sort of defensive formation. No, those ships were arrayed offensively against the flagship. As if...
“It’s not friendly,” I said.
And as if to emphasize my point, a burst of red light crackled from the flagship’s starboard cannons and obliterated one of the smaller craft, dissolving the craft and the dozens of Knights and support staff onboard to less than ash. Nothing remained of the ship, sparing the city a deadly rain of fire and burning metal—for now—but the heat and shockwave from the blast shattered windows and rocked the ground beneath my feet. A collective scream arose from the streets of Ascension City.
I began to run for the palace.
An unhappy surety gripped me and laughed in the back of my mind as I raced through the streets of my old stomping ground, pushing through crowds and throngs of scared people pointing at the sky and screaming of hellfire and doom. The person in command of the flagship, the captain of the Hellfire, was no person at all.
Shadowman.
The pieces fit too well and too unfairly for it to be anyone else. He’d used the Historian to predict the future and seized control of one of the Knights’ greatest assets. But to what end?
I’d know soon enough. It was the only outcome that made even a vague kind of sense, so I was sure I had the right of it.
He said he wanted to kill Everlasting… and he can see everything through her. Everything except me. The very reason for his existence was also the reason the Historian’s unique and dreadful Sight was blind to me. An advantage, of sorts, but he would be expecting me, nevertheless. What had the Historian said, last time we met in the forests surrounding this marvelous city?
“As you are now—without shadow—my Sight passes over you.”
She could see future events around me, but not the actions I would take to either bring those events about or thwart them and remap the future toward one of the millions of other outcomes burning through her mind. Broken quill, I’d go mad…
The crowds grew sparser the closer I jogged to the Fae Palace—and for good reason. A concerted bombardment from that flagship could, conceivably, overwhelm the Infernal defense enchantments and bring the monumental tower crashing down. I could scarcely conceive the effect upon Forget and the Story Thread if that linchpin came undone. Taking out the Fae Palace would be like knocking the first domino down… Entire universes would be cut off, and millions would be left adrift on cold and lonely worlds.
Was Shadowman insane enough to do such a thing?
Did it matter? He was here, and the threat existed. That meant I had to stop him—or die trying.
*~*~*~*
The Fae Palace was on lockdown and high alert.
I was still four blocks away when I hit the first manned checkpoint restricting access to the palace and grounds. A hastily constructed barrier of stone had been hewn from the cobblestones using Willful enchantment. Sloppy but effective, right, Clare?
“Declan Hale,” I said, panting hard, to a low-level Guardian Knight who looked about three minutes fresh out of the Academy and probably had to shave once every six months. His too-big gilded armor looked as if it had been slapped together from half a dozen spare chest pieces. More ceremonial than actually combat-ready.
Technically, we were the same rank, given that my reinstatement had been grudging at best. But that was only on paper. I was still the Shadowless Arbiter—and very nearly King Hale of the Knights Infernal. My reputation was a noose around my neck, but a somewhat multipurpose noose. “Looks like you chaps have a bit of a problem. I can fix that.”
The young guard gaped, slack-jawed. “You… you’re Declan Hale?”
“That’s what it says on my Subway Club Card.” Back in Perth, I was three subs away from a free six-inch. Would’ve been closer, but an Emissary-dragon had eaten my wallet not too long back. “What? They tell you I had three heads, mad eyes, and devil horns?”
“No. But yesterday they were telling us it was you who kidnapped th
e Historian and took control of the Blade of Spring. Now it’s a skinwalker that looks like you or… something. A double.” He shrugged. “Thought you’d be taller.”
Sophie and Ethan must have had some good fortune when spreading the word about Shadowman. I clapped the guard on his shoulder and grinned. “It’s always about perception, kid. Remember that. Now let me pass or I’m blasting my way through.”
The guard wiggled his fingers and muttered a string of Willful invocations. Six feet of stone rippled as if jelly and melted back into the ground, clearing a path through to the palace. “Am I going to be disciplined for letting you through?”
“Not if that ship blows up the palace,” I quipped, and his face fell. “Chin up, mate. We’re on the same side here.”
“Yeah, but the stories they tell about you at the Academy… broken quill! You’re Declan Hale.”
“And I’ve eaten the sandwiches to prove it. Stay out of trouble, kid.”
I hit two more barriers before reaching the palace, but with a busy, determined look on my face and a skip in my step, I was waved through without so much as a stern glance. On any other day, that might have been worrying, but with the better part of at least two hundred live cannons held to the palace’s throat, flaws in security and guard laziness was small potatoes. I would surely be stopped before I actually entered the palace proper. Or maybe not… if I’m expected. Had Sophie and Ethan been that convincing?
The main thoroughfare leading down to the palace was often a pleasant walk on mosaic marble, lined with fountains and wildflowers, bordered by grass as green as emeralds and as fragrant as spring air—a wide-open space for Knightly passage, scholarly enlightenment, and even romantic picnics.
All that beauty had been trampled by troop supplies, field command tents, and the heavy boots of hundreds of Knights Infernal, ready to march to war.
I was just one face amongst the somewhat organized rabble, and though I caught one or two startled looks from the corner of my good eye from folk who recognized me, I was left alone.