Yllithian felt icy claws clutching at his legs and whipped out his sword to split the skull of a mandrake unfolding from the shadows beneath his feet. Xelian was instantly at his side, chopping at others with her scavenged blade. She drove the pitch-skinned wretches back into the darkness with savage blows. The two archons stood back to back against the deluge of mandrakes flooding into the corridor.
A quick glance showed Yllithian what he’d most feared was occurring. For all their superior firepower his trueborn were being overwhelmed at close quarters. Their fearsome shredders and blasters were useless against foes that could simply manifest within claw’s-reach and attack. The trueborn were still seasoned warriors and they fought back bitterly against the nightmarish horde with blade and pistol. One by one, however, they were being dragged down.
Yllithian made a lightning-fast calculation in his mind and baulked at the distasteful results. There was only one possible solution to the situation – to surrender before they were wiped out. The battle was being fought in an awful, eerie silence marred only by the clash of weapons and the curses of the trueborn. Yllithian lowered his blade and shouted out at the top of his voice.
‘Wait! We are all enemies of Vect and the Black Descent. We should join our forces! Let me speak with your leader!’
It was a long shot. Other Commorrites might be relied on to at least consider such a proposition. This was how kabals were made stronger, more often than not, with an acknowledgement of superiority on the battlefield. But mandrakes were feral creatures and there was no guessing how they might react.
Yllithian’s trueborn responded by breaking off from combat as best they could, backing warily together in clumps within the tight confines of the passageway. The mandrakes swirled among the shadows uncertainly, the walls seeming to ripple with stealthy shapes as they also paused in their attacks. A mandrake swirled into being directly in front of Yllithian with its featureless face only centimetres from his own. Invisible lips peeled apart to display blood-red fangs as it hissed at him.
‘Take me to your leader,’ Yllithian repeated calmly, ‘and remember that if you kill me all of you and this entire labyrinth will be destroyed. I’m sure you overheard that much before you killed the master elect. It is no empty boast.’
‘Are you mad, Yllithian?’ Xelian snapped. ‘I’ll not sully my hands with the scum of the shadow-realm. You can’t trust them for a moment.’
‘Anyone can see that they’ve got bigger plans afoot, Xelian,’ Yllithian replied smoothly. ‘I can see, and I would speak with the one behind them. As I said before – our enemies are the same, it’s foolhardy for us to waste our energies fighting each other.’
The mandrake struck suddenly at Yllithian’s lowered sword. He allowed the weapon to slip out of his grasp and raised his hands to show that they were empty.
‘No reason for us to fight at all,’ Yllithian said soothingly. ‘Powerful kabals obey me in the city. Now take me to your master so that we can plan how to rule it… together.’
The mandrake raised its sickle and bared its fangs again in response, but Yllithian could tell it was an empty gesture, sheer bluster. He stood calmly and dared it to strike him. After a second the shadow creature lowered its crude weapon almost thoughtfully and then turned, beckoning for Yllithian to follow it.
Chapter 21
THE CHILDREN OF AELINDRACH
In the spaces between worlds Kheradruakh lurked and waited for his chance to come. For the first time in as long as he could remember the Decapitator felt impatience. The desire to kill was building in him as it had seldom done before. The dark symmetry had to be completed and the pattern made whole; he fancied he could hear the heart of Aelindrach calling out to him for justice and vengeance. He had to fight back his eagerness to obey. There were always too many present, almost as if the shadow-king knew that he was marked for death.
The surviving brother had broken with the ancient pacts. He had used the font of ascension to vomit a great clot of deepest night into the roots of the Old City where he now held court. The Decapitator had felt relief at Xhakoruakh’s passage out of Aelindrach, but he also felt rage at his treatment of the shadow-skein. The corrupted king used the children and the realm as nothing more than tools for his ambition. For Kheradruakh the quintessence of Aelindrach was the lone hunter pitting itself against a hostile universe. Xhakoruakh acted like a bloated farmer tending a crop.
Kheradruakh gripped his long, straight blade and waited. An opportunity would come as it always did – vigilance would slip, watching eyes would tire. A day, a month, a year, the Decapitator would be ready and waiting when it did. Even now he could sense the approach of newcomers, more outsiders crashing into the pattern without subtlety or understanding. They formed a conflicting snarl of desires and motivations that held promise of distraction.
The Decapitator hovered close and watched their progress with sightless eyes.
Xhakoruakh’s new court was being held in what had once been the grand library of the coven of the Black Descent. It contained knowledge gathered from every corner of the known universe. Close-packed shelves stepped vertiginously upwards on walls that formed a teardrop-shaped space dominated by an ornate central cupola set with enormous lamps at its upper tip. Among all the dark places within the Black Descent’s labyrinth the grand library was a unique point of brilliance. Clear, white light had bathed it continuously for centuries – not for the convenience of its users, but in the hopes it would hold back the children of Aelindrach.
Thousands of different forms of data storage were ranged on the steep shelves in the body of the library, everything from clay tablets, scrolls of flayed skin and engraved bone steles to optiotronic pearls and crystalline wafers that could store more than the sum total of a hundred physical libraries. The subjects painstakingly collected by the coven ranged widely across arcane science and eldritch sorcery: hybridisation, eugenics, surgery, anatomy, bodily modification, dissection, vivisection, torture, the healing arts, biomechanics, toxins, pathogens…
The library represented a vast treasure trove of dusty learning that, for the most part, was left unread and forgotten about by the Black Descent. A pit at the base of the teardrop-shaped chamber acted as a direct gate to Aelindrach, a curiosity created by a haemonculus named Mhenthak millennia ago during a prior Dysjunction. Mhenthak was cast into the pit he’d made as punishment for his presumption, yet in later centuries the coven made frequent use of the access it granted to the denizens of Aelindrach. Agreements were made, slaves were traded and for untold thousands the brightly lit library became the last place in Commorragh they ever saw.
Xhakoruakh’s arrival had cracked the grand library like an egg. The great lamps mounted in the overhead cupola were all shattered, the splintered pieces of their lenses forming knee-deep drifts of broken crystal. The eyeless guardian creatures of the Black Descent were torn and scattered across the library stacks. Dense, black ganglia had erupted from the central pit like a monstrous fungus. Jagged strips of undulating shadow radiated from it in all directions to pierce the walls like bolts of dark lightning, thrusting deep into the guts of the city.
On every side beings of the shadow-realm lurked and cackled. They pawed through the forbidden knowledge without understanding, tore priceless volumes to shreds and flung illuminated leaves into the air like confetti. Tumbling books and scattered pages hung motionless overhead, caught in the radiant of dark channels like insects frozen in amber.
Bellathonis found the shadow-king enthroned on a mountainous pile of mouldering manuscripts, the charnel smell of his body mingling with the dusty scent of mildew. The rune-etched banners had been brought forth from his palace and planted around him like a forest of fast-growing weeds. The long silk banners rustled with otherworldly breezes and faint whispers as the haemonculus made his way through them with Xagor and the nightfiend at his side.
At times Bellathonis fancied he could hear not wh
ispers, but faint, sibilant laughter from the fluttering silk. He could not shake the sensation of scrutiny, a feeling of being watched that had begun on the approach to his lab in the foundation strata and persisted ever since they had turned back. The haemonculus attempted to put it from his mind. He had returned to present bad news to the shadow-king so a sensation of paranoia was inevitable. Xhakoruakh appeared deep in thought with his chin resting moodily on one fist, but as Bellathonis drew closer the shadow-king’s featureless face turned towards him.
‘Bellathonis,’ Xhakoruakh rumbled. ‘Back so soon? Where are the others I sent with you?’
‘Destroyed, along with my grotesques. We could not reach my laboratory,’ Bellathonis began before Xhakoruakh cut him off.
‘A failure then. Another failure,’ Xhakoruakh said grimly before resting his chin back on his hulking fist once more.
‘What’s important is what destroyed them,’ Bellathonis insisted. ‘There were Castigators in the tunnels, Vect’s creations – ghost warriors!’
‘This is known to me,’ the shadow-king grumbled morosely. ‘Reports flutter in with unwelcome candour to form a growing chorus. My followers are chased back into the deepest shadows, they are pursued like prey through the upper fastness…’
‘The Castigators’ perceptions can’t be easily blinded like a mortal’s,’ Bellathonis agreed hesitantly. ‘Their reputation of old depicts them as indefatigable hunters with sight so keen that they can see through lies and falsehoods.’
‘Then how can they be defeated,’ Xhakoruakh rumbled speculatively, ‘when their gaze pierces every shadow?’ Bellathonis decided to take the plunge and assume it wasn’t intended as a rhetorical question.
‘They are physical entities – heavily armed and armoured, certainly, but they can be defeated with conventional weaponry of the right sort – blasters, dark lances, disintegrators… I begin to see your problem, these are weapons you simply do not have. Perhaps we have to face up to the fact that your ambition exceeds your grasp at this time, Xhakoruakh, and concentrate on consolidating your gains. Let the kabalites worry about Vect’s Castigators–’
They were interrupted by the arrival of a mandrake. It slipped to the shadow-king’s side without so much as a sideways glance at Bellathonis, which came as an irritating but pertinent reminder of his status among Xhakoruakh’s followers. As the shadow-king listened to his minion’s whispers his lips peeled back to display a broad grin.
‘Good, bring them now,’ Xhakoruakh ordered andthe mandrake retreated from his presence. The shadow-king rose from his rotting throne and flexed his corded arms so that the emerald runes inscribed on them seemed to crawl across his flesh.
‘You see?’ Xhakoruakh rumbled and pointed. ‘The all-father of the carved ones sends an answer to me in my time of need as he always does. Stay with me, haemonculus, and witness a dark miracle unfolding.’
Bellathonis and Xagor looked up expectantly and saw a small group of kabalites descending the ladders to the floor of the library. Bellathonis was shocked to recognise several of the individuals in the group, not least of all himself.
Hello again, Bellathonis,+ Angevere whispered in his mind. +I am looking forward to hearing you try to worm your way out of this.+
Kharbyr had a bad feeling the moment they got to the library. The corridor they were following turned a corner and suddenly they were on the edge of a vast, dark chasm. The mandrakes wouldn’t allow White Flames warriors or the incubi to go any further so it was just the two archons and him feeling their way forwards. He could hear stealthy movement all about him but he could barely see his hand in front of his face. There seemed to be racks or shelves to either side and a sloping ramp beneath their feet, but what lay beyond only the Dark Muses knew. He shuffled along, trying to keep the vague smudge that he knew was Yllithian in sight. What made it especially difficult was that he was also trying to stay as far away from Xelian as possible.
The unmistakable taint of daemons hung about Xelian – a coppery taste of blood and gore, the electric sense of a caged beast ready to burst forth and wreak red ruin on everything around it. He wanted to warn Yllithian but he was too frightened to reveal what he knew. She would tear him apart just like the haemonculus she’d consumed at the sixty-fourth interstice.
Don’t think about that – keep your wits about you,+ Angevere whispered. +All our efforts are about to bear fruit, and for some it will be a bitter harvest.+
They climbed down ladders of twisted ironwork until they came to a floor that sloped very gently downwards. As they set foot on it the sense of dread that had been growing in Kharbyr’s breast blossomed into cold certainty. They were in the presence of something otherworldly, a vast, monstrous entity that was alien and invisible but as real as the foetid breezes rippling against his cheek.
Forward, child, your destiny awaits,+ Angevere whispered.
There was a sickly greenish glow nearby, a nest of pallid corpse-light that the mandrakes were leading them towards. As Kharbyr got closer he could see the luminescence came from long, tattered banners that seemed to have sprouted from the ground. Eye-twisting runes were emblazoned on them in strokes of emerald fire. A wash of fever-heat brushed Kharbyr’s skin at the sight of them so that he quickly looked away again.
In the middle of the field of fluttering banners stood the biggest mandrake Kharbyr had ever seen. Mandrakes were normally waif-thin creatures with narrow shoulders and stooped backs, but this one was a hulking monstrosity on a par with the haemonculi’s grotesques. It held a giant, rusty scythe and its skin writhed with the same twisted runes as were on the banners. The stink of daemons was everywhere; they were damned to die in that pit, Kharbyr was sure of it.
‘I should have known,’ Yllithian murmured to himself.
‘Known what?’ the shadowy giant boomed in a voice that seemed to roll up from unfathomable depths. ‘That you would come beneath my heel? Kneel before Xhakoruakh, the true and only king of Aelindrach!’
‘I think not,’ Yllithian replied with breathtaking arrogance. ‘You only give us audience because you need my help. Let’s not waste our time playing games when we have a powerful mutual enemy – Asdrubael Vect – to contend with.’
‘Bold words for a leader with so few followers,’ Xhakoruakh grumbled.
‘I am Archon Yllithian of the White Flames, and those few outside represent only a fraction of the numbers that pledge allegiance to me. Soon, with Archon Xelian’s help, another one of the most powerful kabals in the city will be joining our fight against Vect. The days of Vect’s tyranny are coming to an end, and all those who help to bring about his downfall will make their mark on this city as none have done in six thousand years!’
Even Kharbyr had to admit it was an impressive speech. Xhakoruakh, however, still seemed sceptical. ‘I have heard of the White Flames, but Commorrites are notorious for their lies and boasts,’ the shadow-king grumbled. ‘I’m fortunate to be blessed with minions who can tell me if you lie now. Bellathonis, do you know this individual to be Archon Yllithian?’
Kharbyr blinked in surprise at the giant mandrake addressing him. Then he realised that he wasn’t the object of the shadow-king’s query, the giant was addressing a shadowy figure standing half hidden behind the banners. Kharbyr recognised the silhouette immediately – it was his own.
‘Bellathonis!’ Kharbyr screamed, his legs already driving him forwards without conscious thought. ‘Bellathonis, you bastard! Give me my body back!’
Angevere’s insane laughter was echoing in his mind. The shadow-king turned and raised his scythe threateningly as Kharbyr dashed forwards. Xelian did nothing and Yllithian, after looking nonplussed for a second, simply watched him with hard, black eyes. Their faces and their actions were only a blur, a backdrop to the flapping banner and what was standing behind it. Kharbyr thrust the rotting silk aside and saw his own face – a visage that was pallid and strange yet still the same
face he had seen every time he looked into a mirror.
Kharbyr reached out to grab his doppelgänger so that he could somehow pull himself back inside it where he belonged. He understood on some level that his mind was fracturing; the sight of his mirror-self was shattering him into a million shards of memory that tore at his soul. He screamed incoherently at the real Bellathonis, but the creature wearing his face slipped easily out of his grasp and pushed him away.
Suddenly there was a tearing sound in the air that evoked a frightful shard of memory in Kharbyr’s tortured mind. From the corner of one eye he saw a blurred shape rushing towards him out of the dark, a smooth metallic form with a curving, scorpion-like tail. Flames jetted in front of Kharbyr’s face, he spun and screamed again as he finally recognised the doom that was swooping down upon him.
The assassin-machine named ‘Vhi’ set its impellers to maximum for the final run in towards its target. The psychic traces had converged, they were strong and clear – almost boosted given the way that they resounded so firmly in Vhi’s detection arrays. As it slid forwards Vhi experienced a rush of conflicting data that a mortal creature would have described as ‘excitement’.
The prey had certainly been evasive, more tricky than anything contained in Vhi’s memory engrams. The specialised Talos unit had used all of its patience and cunning to bring a positive conclusion to its primary directive. It had allowed a false-positive decoy to go free after the initial disappointment of first contact. It had waited at the target’s primary habitat to reacquire it. Now that decision had been vindicated as it tracked a new trace through to a region of twisted extradimensional spaces where the paired psychic signals, false and true, were occupying virtually the same volume.
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