The Infernal city es-1

by Gregory Keyes

  East of Rimmen the land rose from the dust in a series of rolling ridges covered in brush and scrub oak, and eventually—as they ascended higher—timber.

  The hills were swarming with Khajiit renegades organized around rough hill forts, but they kept their distance, which they certainly had Lesspa and her companions to thank for.

  By noon the next day they were descending into the lower Niben Valley, and he was back in the Empire. It was like walking down into a cloud, so much wetter was the air of County Bravil than the Elsweyr steppes. Thick mats of fern and moss muffled their footsteps and a canopy of ash, oak, and cypress kept the sun from them.

  It seemed to make Lesspa’s people nervous.

  They reached the Green Road near sundown and made camp there.

  “What now?” Sul asked.

  Attrebus considered the road. Dusk was settling and the frogs in the marshes below were singing to Masser as it rose above the trees. Willows rustled in the evening breeze, and the jars and whills tested their voice against a forlorn owl. Fireflies winked up from the ferns.

  “North takes me back home,” he said. “My father might listen to me now, give me troops.”

  “Do you really think so?”

  “No. The only thing that’s changed is that I lost the men and women he did trust me with. He’ll still think Umbriel is no immediate threat. He’ll put me in an extremely comfortable prison to make sure I don’t run off again, at least not until I’ve supplied an heir.”

  “What then? You said Umbriel was traveling north, toward Morrowind. I think it’s going to Vivec City, or what’s left of it. If that’s true, we need to beat Vuhon there.”

  “You said that before. You didn’t explain it.”

  He saw the muscles clench in Sul’s jaw. “Where is it now?” the Dunmer demanded. “How fast is it moving?”

  “I’m not sure of either of those things. It’s moving slowly, or it was. It took the better part of a day to cover the distance from the south coast of Black Marsh to Lilmoth, which Annaïg said is around fifteen miles.”

  “Thirty miles in a day and a night, then. That only gives us a few days.”

  “To get to Vivec City? Through the Valus Mountains? We can’t do that in twenty days. What if we went to Leyawiin, got a ship there—”

  “No, not unless you know someone with a flying ship. We’d have to sail all the way up to the top of the world and come back down, or else land and go overland through wasteland.”

  “Walk back, then. Why do we have to beat it to Vivec City?”

  “Because I believe there is a thing there, something the master of Umbriel needs. Something he fears.”

  “You seem to know everything about Umbriel except where to find it—and now I’ve told you that. I think it’s time you told me what you know.”

  Sul snorted. “Don’t let your success with the regulators go to your head. You’re not my prince, boy.”

  “I never said I was. But I’ve told you everything I know. You can return the favor.”

  Sul’s eyes flamed silently for a moment, then he scratched his chin.

  “I don’t know much about this flying city of yours—not specifically. I believe its master is a man named Vuhon. He vanished into Oblivion forty-three years ago, and now I think he’s come back.”

  “This is the man who killed your woman.”

  Sul went rigid. “We will not speak of her,” he said in a low, dangerous tone. “There was once a place in Vivec City—the Ministry of Truth.”

  “I’ve heard of it,” Attrebus said. “It was considered a wonder of the world. A moon from Oblivion, floating above the Temple District.”

  “Yes. Held there by the power of our god, Vivec. But Vivec left, or was destroyed, and his power began to fade, and with it the spells that kept the velocity of the ministry in check.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “It fell from the sky, you understand? It was traveling quickly, more quickly than you can imagine. Vivec stopped it with the power of his will. But the velocity was still there, ready to be unleashed. Do you see what that meant?”

  “You’re saying it would complete its fall as if it had never been interrupted.”

  “That’s what our best feared, yes. And one of our best was Vuhon. Along with others, he built an ingenium, a machine that continued to hold the ministry aloft. But there was a … cost.”

  “What cost?”

  “The ingenium required souls to function.”

  Attrebus felt pinpricks along his spine.

  “Umbriel—Annaïg says it takes the souls of the living …”

  “You see?”

  “But what happened?”

  Sul was silent for so long this time that Attrebus thought he wouldn’t speak again, but he finally sighed.

  “The ingenium exploded. It hurled Vuhon into Oblivion. Then the ministry crashed into the city, and Vvardenfell exploded.”

  “The Red Year,” Attrebus gasped. “He caused that?”

  “He was responsible. He and others. And now he has returned.”

  “For what?”

  “I don’t know what designs he has on Tamriel, but I’m sure he has them, and I’m sure they aren’t pleasant ones,” Sul responded. “But I think his immediate objective is a sword, an ancient and dangerous weapon. It’s tied somehow to Umbriel and Vuhon.”

  “You’ve been hunting Vuhon all of these years?”

  “I spent many of them merely surviving.”

  “You were in Morrowind when all of this happened?”

  Sul made an ugly sound that Attrebus later would realize was the man’s bitterest chuckle.

  “I was in the ministry,” he answered, “I was also thrown into Oblivion. For thirty-eight years.”

  “With Vuhon?”

  Sul rubbed his forehead. “The ingenium used souls to keep a sort of vent into Oblivion open, specifically into the realm of the daedra prince, Clavicus Vile. You know of him, I assume?”

  “Of course. He has a shrine not far from the Imperial City. They say you can make a pact with him, given the right cantations.”

  “That’s true,” Sul agreed. “Although a pact with Vile is one you’re likely to regret. He’s not the most amiable of Oblivion princes.”

  “And yet he allowed Vuhon to draw energies from his realm?”

  Sul cracked his neck. “Vile has a thing for souls,” he said, “and if he noticed the rift at all, he probably enjoyed what was coming through more than he missed the energies going out. It’s even possible that Vuhon made a formal bargain with the prince. I just don’t know.” He gestured at a log and sat on it. Attrebus followed suit.

  “When we arrived, there was someone—or something—waiting for us. But it wasn’t Vile. It was shaped like a man, but dark, with eyes like holes into nothing. He had a sword, and as we lay there, it laughed and tossed it through the rift we’d come through. I tried to follow it, but it was too late.”

  “Waiting for you? How did it know you were coming?”

  “He called himself Umbra, and like Vile, he had a thing for souls. He’d been attracted to the rift by the ingenium and had even tried to enlarge it, with no success. So he’d cast a fortune and learned that a day was coming when it would briefly widen, and so there he was.”

  “Just to throw a sword through it?”

  “Apparently. Umbra took us captive—he was powerful, almost as powerful as a daedra prince. In fact, it was the power of a daedra prince—he’d somehow managed to cut a piece from Clavicus Vile himself.”

  “Cut a piece? Of a daedra prince?”

  “Not a physical piece, like an arm or a heart,” Sul clarified. “Daedra aren’t physical beings like you and me. But the effect was similar—Vile was, in a sense, injured. Badly so. And Umbra became stronger, though still not so strong as Vile. Not strong enough to escape his realm once Vile circumscribed it against him.

  “Circumscribed?”

  “Changed the nature of the ‘walls’ of his realm, made them ab
solutely impermeable to Umbra and the power he had stolen. Understand, at all costs the prince didn’t want Umbra to escape. The circumscription was so strong he couldn’t even go through the rift himself—but the sword could.”

  “Again, why the sword?” Attrebus wondered.

  “Umbra claimed to have once been captive in the weapon. He feared that if Vile got his hands on it, he would return him to it.”

  “This is making me dizzy,” Attrebus said.

  “But you wanted to hear everything, remember?” Sul snapped. “Well, let’s keep it simple then, shall we? Clavicus Vile was nursing his wounds and hunting for Umbra. Umbra used his stolen power to conceal himself in one of the cities at the fringe of Vile’s realm. But he still couldn’t escape. Vuhon promised him that if Umbra spared his life, he would build a new ingenium, capable of escaping even Vile’s circumscription. Umbra agreed, and I suppose that’s what they did.”

  “They brought the city with them?”

  Sul shrugged. “I don’t know about that part. I never saw much of the city. Vuhon wasn’t very happy with me. He only kept me alive to torture. After a few years he forgot about me and I escaped. I had some arts, and since the forbidding wasn’t on me, I managed to leave Vile’s realm, albeit into another part of Oblivion.”

  “So it’s Umbra that wants the sword, not Vuhon?”

  “It might be either. Maybe Vuhon has turned against Umbra and seeks to imprison him. Whatever the case, we can’t let them have it.”

  Attrebus opened his mouth, but Sul jerked his head from side to side. “Enough. You know what you need to know for now.”

  “I—So I allow all this—we still can’t get there in time.”

  “No,” Sul said. “As I said, there is a way. If we survive it.”

  “What way would that be?”

  “We’ll take a shortcut. Through Oblivion.”

  And he left Attrebus there with the willows and soft, gliding voices of the night birds.

  FOUR

  “Perfect,” Toel opined, his mysterious little grin turning into something a bit larger. He dipped his finger in the little bowl of viscous mist and brought the bit that clung to it up to his lips for another taste. With his other hand he stroked the back of her neck lightly, familiarly, and she felt her cheeks warm.

  “I’ve come to expect the very best from you,” he said. “Come around this afternoon so we can discuss your progress here.”

  He gave a perfunctory nod to the rest of the staff and then left.

  Still embarrassed, Annaïg studied her vapor another moment. When she looked up, the rest of the cooks had returned silently to their jobs. All except Slyr.

  “Another evening with Toel,” she said softly. “How he must enjoy your conversation.”

  Annaïg felt a bit of sting from that. “I hope you don’t think anything else is going on.”

  “What would I know?” she replied. “I’ve never been invited to Lord Toel’s quarters. How can I imagine what might go on there?”

  “It sounds like you’ve been imagining it quite a lot,” Annaïg returned. “But if you’re fantasizing about anything improper, that’s nothing to do with me.”

  “Him having you there at all is improper,” Slyr countered. “It’s bad for morale.”

  “Well, maybe you ought to tell him that.”

  Slyr looked back down at the powders she was sifting.

  “I’m sorry,” she said after a moment. “You know I worry.”

  “You’re still here, aren’t you?”

  “It’s only been a few days,” she said. “He never even speaks to me.”

  Annaïg snorted a little laugh. “Now you’re talking like he’s your lover.”

  Slyr looked back up. “I just worry, that’s all.”

  “Well, worry over this for a bit, then,” she replied, rising to her feet. “I need to go check on the root wine vats.”

  Toel’s kitchen was very different from Qijne’s inferno. There was only one pit of hot stone and one oven, and neither was of particular size. In their place were long tables of polished red granite. Some supported brass steaming chambers, centrifuges, a hundred kinds of alchemical apparatuses. Others were entirely for the preparation of raw ingredients. While the production of distillations, infusions, and precipitations of soul-stuff had been a minor part of Qijne’s kitchen, here more than half the cooking space was dedicated to the coquinaria spiritualia. The rest of the cavernous kitchen was devoted to one thing—feeding trees.

  She remembered the strange collar of the vegetation that depended from the edge and rocky sides of Umbriel. She didn’t know much about trees, so it hadn’t occurred to her to wonder how they survived. As it turned out, plants—like people and animals—needed more than sunlight and water to live. They also needed food of a sort, and Toel’s kitchen made that food. Huge siphons drew water and detritus from the bottom of the sump and brought it into holding vats, where it was redirected into parsers that separated out the matter most useful to the trees. What wasn’t used was returned to the sump. What remained was fortified by the addition of certain formulae before being pumped to the roots through a vast ring beneath Umbriel’s rim. Toel wanted her to learn all of the processes in his kitchen, so she spent an hour or so each day with the vats, and ostensibly she was experimenting with some of the formulae to try and improve upon them.

  In fact, the vats were very far from everything else, and very quiet. And, in a large cabinet in the work area, was the most complete collection of materials she had ever seen.

  Dimple, her new hob, was already there when she arrived, and had found four substances for her to examine. None of them smelled right, so she sent him away and went back to her experiment with the tree-wine. She wondered if trees tasted anything, if they knew one “flavor” of tree-wine from another. She stirred a reagent of calprine into her flask wand and watched it turn yellow.

  After a moment she saw Dimple return with more containers.

  Absorbed in what she was doing, she didn’t actually look at what he’d brought, but when she took a break, she rubbed her eyes and turned her attention there.

  One of the jars was half filled with a black liquid. She blinked and hesitated, not wanting to get her hopes up too high, not wanting to be disappointed again.

  She knew it by its smell.

  “That’s it, then,” she whispered. “Everything I need.”

  But she felt oddly empty, because that wasn’t really true.

  She didn’t have Mere-Glim and the knowledge she needed to destroy Umbriel. Or her locket, so Attrebus would know where she was.

  If Attrebus was still alive. The last time they’d spoken, there was something about him, vulnerability. And the way he talked to her, as if he cared, as if he was risking his life just for her …

  She shook that thought off and read the label on the jar.

  ICHOR OF WINGED TWILIGHT.

  Well, that made sense. She put it in the little cabinet that was for her private use, along with the other ingredients she needed, and a great many she did not. Then she finished out the hour and went back to help with dinner.

  Slyr watched her dress in yet another new outfit that Dulg had appeared with, a simple green gossamer slip of a gown. The other woman was halfway through a bottle of wine already.

  “Don’t forget me,” she said as Annaïg left.

  As usual, she met him on his balcony. They sipped a red slurry that—despite being cold—burned her throat gently as it went down.

  “Lord Irrel sent his compliments,” Toel said.

  “He enjoyed your meal, then.”

  Toel nodded. “The meal was not uninspired,” he said. “I am an artist. But you have added so much to my palette, and the special touches you invent—Lord Irrel is usually pleased with what I make him, but lately his compliments have come more frequently and sincerely.”

  “I’m happy to have helped, then.”

  She felt a little giddy, and realized that whatever was in her drink was alrea
dy having an effect.

  “With me you will become great,” he said. “But there is more to being great than being an artist. You must also have vision, and the strength to do the thing that must be done. Do you understand?”

  “I think so, Chef.”

  “And you must learn to make choices uncolored by any sort of passion.”

  Annaïg took another drink, not liking the direction the conversation was going.

  “When I took you from Qijne, I spared Slyr as well. But since she has been here, I haven’t felt justified in that decision. I rather think she should go.”

  “Without her, I would never have come to your attention,” Annaïg said. “Without her, I would never have learned so much in so little time.”

  “And yet how far you have outstripped her, and how slowly she is learning the ways of my kitchen. Do you really believe she has any business being here?”

  “She saved my life,” Annaïg said. “Qijne would have killed me.”

  “Yes, I know that,” he replied. “In that moment she was very useful to me, and to you. But that moment is gone.”

  “I pray you,” she said.

  “Don’t pray to me,” he said. “I give this decision to you. You could have Sarha or Loy for assistants—with them you would learn quickly, rise quickly. You could work directly for me, as my understudy. But so long as Slyr is here, she will be your only assistant. But if you ask me to rid you of her, I will do it in an instant.”

  “Let her stay, please.”

  “As I said,” he went on, disappointment evident in his voice, “it’s your choice, and remains your choice. I hope you will try to consider that decision without passion or sympathy. I hope you will be great.”

  “I will try to be great,” Annaïg said. “But I hope to do it without betraying my friends.”

  “Does this work, where you are from?”

  “I … I don’t know. Sometimes, I hope.”

  He nodded and his gaze found hers, and in his eyes she saw something both frightening and compelling. She felt again the caress on the back of her neck, and her belly tingled.

  “There is another decision I give you to make,” he said, very softly. “Like the first, you are free to make it on any evening I have you here.”