by J. F. Lewis
No, Rivvek thought, I need not come here again. I have to get out of here.
In his right hand, as the Vael spoke, he felt the pull of Hasimak’s dimensional magic. He shifted it from one hand to the other unseen. New as it was, Rivvek did not pause to experiment. Doing so would have made him feel like a murderer who stands over his victim trying on a new set of clothes.
“Does anyone have a candle?” he asked, not meaning to speak. “A dragon-tallow candle would be best.”
“I’ll have one in a moment, highness.” Jolsit turned to shout for one, but Rivvek stopped him.
“Never mind,” Rivvek told General Kyland as he opened a connection to the elemental plane of air and used it to take flight. All of the elements answered his call as they had in his youth.
“Old friends,” Rivvek whispered to his elemental magicks more than to any mortal being, “you come too late, but I am glad of your company.”
“Majesty?” General Kyland shifted uncomfortably. “Would you like an escort?”
“If someone wants to kill me, General—” Rivvek allowed the Ghaiattri fire to glow in his eyes. “—they are welcome to do so.”
“Surely you mean they are welcome to try,” Queen Yavi asked.
“I’m going to Fort Sunder to find Sargus,” Rivvek told them, “and to call in a final debt. The First of One Hundred owes my people a new name.”
*
He looked fa . . . Dolvek appeared to search for the word. . . . like a person I knew.
“He is your brother,” Yavi whispered. “He said he loves you and he is proud of you.”
Confusion crossed the specter’s face, then: Can I get you something?
CHAPTER 40
FIRST, LAST, AND ALWAYS
Kholster waited in the tomb-like dark, quiet . . . expectant.
A deep chill had settled in at the back of his eyes, a registered alteration in temperature completely lacking in discomfort, despite the thin layer of frost. Some portion of him processed the stream of information available to him via Vander, but mostly he focused on the still figure of the prototype Aern.
Slaying the dead Zaur that Uled had left behind to tend the body had been a calculated decision, one he was glad he had made. In response, secret panels disguised as pockmarks had opened, releasing the things that now cared for the body’s needs.
Spiderlike automatons no larger than Kholster’s palm scurried about, changing the bags of fluid attached to the larger creature’s arms. Fixtures of steel, brass, and crystal pierced its skin, delivering fluid to its veins. A dim symphony of clicks and the being’s own bellows-like breaths were the only sounds.
Seeing the panels open had allowed Kholster to locate other such portals, one leading out of the hidden chamber to a tunnel that led to a jun outside the former borders of Port Ammond.
Escape route. Reaper, Kholster’s current warpick, rested silent on his back. He reached over his shoulder and held its haft. With his right hand, he turned a small, sharp piece of metal over and over again, careful not to prick himself. He practiced holding his breath, releasing the metal, watching it hang in the air.
Still holding his breath, he walked the circumference of the room, plucked the metal from the air and moved it, released it, moved it again.
This will work, he thought, allowing time and his breath to resume.
Rae’en headed toward him, her symbol a bright spot on his mental map. Uled’s spiritual trek traced a line of gray, Vander indicating as best he could exactly where it was without getting too close.
Kholster wanted to go home. For years he’d thought of Fort Sunder as his true home, the Eldren Plain as his homeland, but standing in the cave-like blackness, surrounded by stone, he knew Helg had made South Number Nine his home. Raising Rae’en there had secured its spot in his heart in a way he did not think could be easily undone.
Where would Wylant want to live? She could, of course, pick anywhere she chose, but if she dwelt amongst the gods, Kholster did not think he could join her. Would Rae’en object to him sleeping in his old berth? Once this was all over again, he thought he would enjoy the mundane routine of sleeping and eating again. Would Vander?
Uled’s coming, Vander thought. He appears to be bypassing Sargus and heading straight for you. Are you sure you don’t want me or Wylant to—
I track your concern, old friend. Kholster took a step forward, resting his right hand against the Proto-Aern’d sternum. But no. I will kholster this.
Have I ever told you how weird it sounds when you use your name as a verb and I don’t see it coming? Amusement painted Vander’s thoughts like sunlight on a grave.
If you require assistance— Harvester began.
I will ask if I require it, but thank you, Kholster thought at the warsuit. How is Torgrimm?
I can connect you, if—
I would prefer that you refrain from doing so, Kholster thought.
Sir, if you would like to resume your post, I would eliminate Torgrimm . . .
That won’t be necessary, Harvester.
Incoming, Vander sent.
Give me a moment to collect my thoughts, Kholster broadcast to the others. Instant compliance left him alone with his musings. Anger did not fill him. Not even anticipation, so much as profound understanding of the immensity of the next few candlemarks. He took a breath and held it, stopping the flow of time, the little automatons nearby frozen in place.
Loves.
Hopes.
Hatreds.
So much time . . .
So much life . . .
. . . and death . . .
. . . had led to this point.
Kholster tallied the exact number of the dead, weighing it in his mind as he knew few other beings could comprehend. . . . The sheer tonnage of those divided forcefully into meat and spirit, not just those lost in the current exchange, but over a span of years measured in millennia, far more of them than Kholster had seen with mortal eyes.
Vander thought he knew the price, but as Kholster saw it, there were only three beings in existence who could understand the ultimate cost of the final Aernese liberation.
He had wanted all of this to be decided by Rae’en, and he’d managed that. Rae’en had taken to her role as First with impressive skill. He had hoped she could deal with Uled as well, to strike the final blow, but as the saying went: Sometimes the kill is yours. Swing your pick or go home hungry.
There could be no later.
Uled had wrought a contingency plan into every single race he’d created. Each stay of execution he granted himself had cost the lives of others, often forever altering whole civilizations in the process. Who knew what the Zaur might have been without Uled’s experiments, what sort of people they might have become? What would the world look like with no Aern or Vael in it? Kholster eyed the gray trail on his mind map. Once he allowed time to resume, Uled’s arrival would be imminent.
Standing there, Kholster let himself relive the entirety of his mortal life. Human and elven memory were malleable, but Kholster’s was not.
It is most distressing when you do this, sir, Harvester said.
“Sorry,” Kholster said aloud.
Time resumed.
“ . . . last one of you will be mine!” the Proto-Aern’s mouth spewed, its eyes snapping open. “You will be mine once more and the planet, no, this dimension shall be mine!”
Kholster held his breath again and pushed the needle into place. It was so sharp he doubted his father would even feel the prick.
If he squinted, he could see in the rough structure of the Proto-Aern’s facial features a shadow of Uled’s own face. Slack and unconscious, it had been serene, but madness flowed into its expression, a frenzied energy to its stare as Uled’s soul found purchase and took up residence. Shifting his vision to the spiritual realm, he examined the whorls, curves, and barbs his mad creator had wrought in his own soul, to match the receptors he’d installed in the eleven-foot-long mass of muscle, bone, and sinew.
Was this what had frightened Yavi when she’d seen the unawakened body? On some level had she perceived the sort of soul that would one day inhabit it, or had her horror truly been at the spiritual residue that had taken root there and tried to grow, the sad, mad thing Kholster had reaped?
Preparing himself, he conjured forth his own Litany of hate against Uled—the death of his children, his wives, the soul slavery, the oaths, the many wrongs the Eldrennai had committed—and one by one, he let them go.
“Hello, Father.”
“I am your master, beast.” Uled, clad in his new massive body jerked free of the tubes pumping fluids into his veins. Kholster took a casual step clear but did not run or unsling Reaper.
Uled stood much taller than Kholster. His snarling mouth held four pairs of canines instead of Kholster’s two. Where Kholster was lithely muscled, Uled’s new body was thick with corded muscle. “Not your father!”
“No.” Kholster smiled sadly. “You are, have always been, will always be, my father. It is not a job you can quit or a title that can be altered. I have but one physical parent, and you are he.”
“All obey!” Uled narrowed his gaze, amber pupils eyes ablaze with light, jade irises pulsing.
“They cannot hear you, Father.” Kholster tapped the side of his head and then a point at the center of Uled’s chest, where the tiny sliver of metal peeked out amid the flesh.
“I am now First,” Uled growled. “Now you obey me and the first thing I will do is—”
“You are afraid of death.” Kholster took a step toward the hulking Aern, unslinging Reaper, letting the warpick hang at his side. “I understand that. So many mortals fight to avoid dying, wanting to cling to life, to avoid the Horned Queen’s judgment, or merely to spend more time with the ones they love, but you crave physical existence like a crystal twist hungers for god rock. You—”
“Kneel!” Uled screeched, spittle flying from his lips.
I don’t think he understands what you did, Vander thought.
He will.
“—have developed plans within plans. Contingency after contingency, and all to extend your life and power at the expense of others.”
“You—” Uled pawed at the metal in his chest, pulling it free with fingers that were significantly thicker than those to which he had been accustomed. “—think this is enough to stop me, Beast?”
“No, Father.” Kholster studied the eyes of Uled . . . Circle of amber, ringed by jade, in a pool of black. Did Uled see the world the way he did with those eyes, so much like a proper Aern’s, or was any difference beneath his notice, the way a “beast” saw the world?
Is he mortal? Kholster thought at Vander.
Secret, Vander growled.
Vax? Kholster thought. Ask Kilke.
My uncle says he is only as mortal as any Aern, Vax responded instantly. He can only die if Torgrimm allows it.
Harvester, Kholster thought, are we still in agreement?
Torgrimm objects, Harvester thought back, but he is the Sower and I am the Harvester, if one is inclined to be technical in such a matter, sir. I assure you, I am so inclined.
As Uled pounced, claws sprouted from beneath his nails, one set of fangs dropping lower, longer. Kholster let his skin become bone-steel, his eyes obsidian. Teeth and claws raked skin of the same material, raising sparks without marring the surface.
“I do not give you permission to fight me.” Kholster swept the Proto-Aern’s legs, following with a two-handed blow from the butt of his warpick, then swung again as he rolled to sit astride the Proto-Aern.
“I command you to—” Uled began.
Unwilling to let Uled finish speaking, Kholster struck Uled in the temple, skull fragmenting beneath his blow. A second strike hit Uled in the throat, a third below the side of his jaw. Uled hurled Kholster into the nearby stone.
“Stop!” Uled shouted. “I order you to—”
Kholster charged him again, and this time Uled was more prepared, striking a martial pose, ready, it seemed, for unarmed combat. But as they clashed, Kholster recognized the counters and attacks Uled used. They were the same set all Aern had come with, but they had not been updated since before the Sundering . . . and Aern practiced every day. Uled rained blows upon Kholster, with massive fists, hitting him whenever he could.
Any compulsion to—? Vander thought.
No.
Seeing that he was outmatched despite the advantage of size, Uled bolted. He touched the table upon which he had lain, jabbing the sliver of the Life Forge at Kholster’s face when he drew near. It slid in deep at the corner of Kholster’s eye. Then Kholster had his hands on Uled’s, pulling, forcing it back and down, trapping it between the stone slab and his own weight.
“Sir!” Harvester’s voice came from inside the room.
Uled’s eyes found the warsuit, and he began to speak in a language Kholster had never heard.
What is that? Kholster demanded.
A secret, Vander thought. I have no . . .
Uncle Kilke says you shouldn’t let him finish, Vax thought. He is relatively certain it will not work, but . . .
Kholster head-butted his father five times in quick succession. The Life Forge needle plunked as it struck the stone floor to Kholster’s right. Bone-steel hands were on Uled’s jaws, one at the top, the other gripping the lower. Kholster pried them apart. Muscle tore. Bone popped. Uled’s lower jaw came free and was discarded. There was no blood. Apparently the Proto-Aern did not bleed now that it was occupied.
Uled tapped out something in Zaurtol, but Kholster did not bother to translate it. The words of the mad elf mattered less now than they had in the whole of recorded history, because Kholster knew what must be done and had resolved to do it.
“I wanted to explain it to you, Father.” Kholster rolled the larger creature away from the slab and down onto the floor trapping the needle beneath the two of them. Straddling Uled, Kholster grabbed for Reaper, bringing the handle down on his father’s throat, holding the implement there with both hands as Uled kicked and tried to roll from under him.
Tongue lolling from his ruined mouth, Uled gurgled and hissed.
“That would not have worked, Father.” Kholster leaned in close, took Uled’s tongue between his teeth, and ripped it free, spitting it out on the cold stone. Now Uled bled, an ichor of orange and black pouring from the wounds. “You may take it as a sign of respect, however, that I decline to allow you to test that theory.”
“Torgrimm,” Kholster snapped. “This is an Aern, subject to the rules governing the souls of the Aern, yes?”
“Kholster.” Torgrimm stepped near, pulling back despite himself when Uled clawed for him, “please, this seems . . . too much.”
Harvester, Kholster thought, if he won’t agree, reap him.
You do not need his acquiescence, sir, Harvester thought, only mine . . . and you have it already. Upon death, the soul of Uled will be treated as all Aern. He may be added back to the Aern to strengthen them or he may remain in his body, to—
His soul, Kholster said, joins the Aern. There is no option for him. Agreed?
Of course, sir.
His soul has overwhelmed beings before, Kholster said. Will he . . . ?
Be a threat? Harvest asked. He will be but one soul among a flow of millions, all working together to strengthen the Aern. He may still manage some small harm at the personal level, but he will never threaten the larger world again.
“So be it.” Kholster kept pressing until Harvester’s dark metal cracked Uled’s neck.
“I did not want to hurt you.” Kholster released his grip on Reaper, gripped either side of Uled’s head, and pulled.
An hour later, the bones of the Proto-Aern had been stripped clean.
He’s still in there, Harvester said. He refuses to come out.
“I will handle that as well,” Kholster whispered. Allowing himself a single sigh, Kholster rose and set his hands to work.
CHAPTER 41
DEBRIEFINGS
>
By the time Rae’en and Alysaundra arrived at Port Ammond, the suns hung low in the sky, lighting the bay with a purple-orange glow. Alysaundra left her at the outskirts, job done, and went running off to do the Ossuary’s business. Rae’en watched her go, Bone Harvest’s long strides carrying them quickly out of view.
Would you be offended, Rae’en began to ask, but Bloodmane was already releasing her. Outside of him, her leg hurt and she limped, but she wanted time alone with her father.
Go, Bloodmane said. I will come if you call.
“Thank you.”
Rae’en found Kholster working shirtless at an open-air smithy. Blood, oil, fire, and metal all melded together with the briny tang of the ocean to form a scent she could taste as strongly as she could smell.
When did he have time to build a forge? Joose asked.
Benefits of being a god, Amber cut in. A sexy god.
I am with Amber on the former and will pretend I did not hear the latter. Rae’en half-expected Glayne to hush them or ask them to move to a level of discussion that excluded her, but they babbled on uninterrupted.
Kholster worked with a metal darker than normal bone-steel, more gray than white. It had a similar ring when he struck it with his hammer, but even the way the metal looked when heated was off, turning shades of blue where red hot and white hot were expected.
Magic, her Overwatches chimed.
“Dad?” Rae’en asked.
His smile lit up the world. Kholster faced her, lifting the smoked lenses Rae’en had bought him in Midian. They caught the light, resting in his newly trimmed hair, so short she could see his scalp. Clean-shaven, eyes sparkling. His jeans, spotted with burn marks and smudges of oil, made her laugh.
“A moment.” He crossed to a rain barrel and washed the grime from himself, toweling off with a ratty-looking cotton cloth that hung on a bone-steel peg mounted to the barrel.