by JM Guillen
“Shatter and break him!” The man stepped closer and laid his hand against my bare chest.
Thorned fire crept into my body, and I screamed.
“Fool.” The man held some kind of clay bauble which he shattered against the floor. The moment he did, a diadem of darkling wails burst onto his brow, a violet paean of shadowed wrath.
I roared with fury and gnawed my own lip against the pain. I lunged at him, snarling even through my agony. My teeth found the softness of his throat, and the man began to scream as I drank deeply of him.
I turned to catch a naked, emaciated man mid-lunge. He wore a copper mask upon his face, and gibbered at me.
I broke his neck and took satisfaction in the wet crunch of his bones.
Another came up behind him, and I carved into it with the silver sickle of my blade.
Another slain.
Another.
A man who wore a midnight robe, chanted words I did not understand.
A topless woman, whose flesh was covered with brands.
One who attempted to flee, yet died screaming.
The entire scene played out in a cataclysmical frenzy of blood and the cries of my prey.
Michael Bishop stalked amongst them, a shadow within the darkness. Even so, a lupine horror crept behind the world, slipping through the nightmares of its prey. It growled, low and fierce. It lapped their blood with two long and slender tongues. Their blood was saffron and sweetness, rarified wine.
I tasted it, tasted each of them. I knew their secret fears, and the horrible blasphemies they had committed.
This was my feast. I preyed upon the fear that ran like quicksilver through their veins.
I slaughtered a mostly nude woman who leapt upon my back. She clawed me with fingers shrouded in darkness, and I opened her chest with my teeth and claws.
A large man shot me, again and again. The bullets sliced fire into my body. I stumbled backward, but drank from the well of another, gaining strength again.
Born anew.
I tore a large man’s legs off, before I slit his belly open.
My entire world was a thunderstorm of passion and blood. There was only the fury of my heart, the melody of my breath, and the passion of blood. Only—
“Well, Michael.” I turned to see the heretic behind me, next to the Grizzled One. A sharpened smile sliced across his face.
I snarled. The man smelled like foulness and rot. I took a step toward him and wondered if I should simply slaughter him or if I should also drink of his heart’s well.
“You surprise me, I’ll admit.” He chuckled, even as he kept his eyes upon me. “Yet I’m afraid even this cannot stop the lamentation that comes.”
He gestured toward me, a savage claw. Beneath his breath he chanted, mumbled. He spoke things I did not wish to know.
Pain gathered around him, sorrow became shadows. His lip curled into a sneer as he hissed incantations at me, barbed words older than the world we stood upon.
I leapt at him, bestial and savage with not one of the sickle-curved blades, but two. I had no memory where I picked up the second one, but two blades felt right in my hands.
Natural.
His foul enchantment beat against me, a furious burst of eldritch savagery. Wet filth oozed against my skin. Forces collided, ones that had never been meant to exist.
It felt like living darkness, like the infinite shadows that dwelt behind the stars. That murky gloom ensnared me, caught me in mid-air.
I hung, helpless.
Somewhere, I heard furious howls.
“I am a pawn of the Binder, Asset.” The heretic shook his head, almost saddened. “I’ve told you I know a little of such things. Much of my lore was wrested from misshapen beasts such as these. You have seen the beings I beckon; you yourself have been summoned by my art.”
I snarled and struggled against the bonds. They burned against me, glass shards coated in venom.
“This beast you have mastered is powerful, yes.” He studied me, as if I were an insect beneath glass. “Yet in my studies, I have enslaved things far more deadly.” He gestured, a viscous, brutish slash and cried a single word, a syllable that seared and scorched.
I heard something like the shearing of metal into flesh, infinitely far away.
The aberration screamed, lupine and bestial terror.
“Honestly, Asset.” Amir’s lips quirked into a cruel smile. “It’s as if you don’t know me at all.” He gestured again, the same fierce slash. This time, he cried a litany, a primordial quatrain to the Binder of Light and Heaven.
The wolf screamed again as if its flesh were ripped from its body.
I heard a distant sound, like the shatter of glass. My muscles grew weak, exhausted.
Alone. I shuddered at the thought, the solid truth of it. I hadn’t realized the comfort the creature brought, the knowledge I had a secret ace in my pocket.
A wind buffeted against me, something unnaturally cold.
I fell, boneless, a rag doll.
“You’re a child, Micha—”
3
For an infinite moment, Amir Cadavas didn’t exist.
I tumbled into timeless warmth, into solid strength.
Some things can only be learned by experience. A fire burns, an edge cuts. These are lessons all children learn, to their dismay.
I hadn’t understood the nature of the shining aura that burned around Gideon DuMarque, not truly. Yet the moment I touched the golden nimbus, I felt its truth, understood its nature on an experiential level.
On a visceral, elemental level, I felt him.
The light didn’t consume Gideon; it was Gideon, in some fundamental way. The essence of the man, drawn away by some horrific rite I couldn’t comprehend.
The rite that pulled it away from him called the darkness of the Unfathomable.
As I touched that radiance, I could feel him, feel the solidity of those cobalt eyes.
He was. Right. There.
I put my hand on him, touched his leg. I felt what lay within his pocket, but I didn’t care. I just had to see if he would wake.
The moment I touched him, time stopped.
Memory became truth.
***
I stood in the vast and empty city of Dhire Lith. Around me, an endless vista of alien sky loomed, threatened.
“Michael?” Gideon’s voice was soft.
I turned to him—
Wait.
No. I wasn’t in Dhire Lith, even though I remembered that clearly. I was in the lost city of M’elphodor, chasing fucking Amir Cadavas. Dhire Lith was only a memory. This was re—
I stared at that awful city, overwhelmed by the immensity of it all.
I hadn’t even known I’d been kidnapped, and now I was found again.
Found, but castaway in an alien world.
After a moment, Gideon walked over to me, opening his small pack. He held out a cigarette.
“Last ones.” He shook his head, as if it was the worst thing imaginab—
I shook my head. The sticky cobwebs of memory fell away.
“Not real,” I muttered. “None of it.
What’s happened, Bishop? Gideon’s link was serious but not stern. I knew he worried about me, out here alone in this alien city—
“I—” My eyes grew wide, “Gideon?”
It felt like a dam burst in my chest, and I sobbed. Could it really be him?
“It’s wrong.” I shook my head. “All wrong. The cadre is all separated, and Delacruz might be dead…”
There, lying on the ground, was the broken corpse of Liam Hunter, our Gatekeeper. Around us, an infinity of alien city loomed.
“Fuck.” Gideon swore, not quite to himself. “Looks like we have some business to attend to.”
“We do,” I choked on a laugh. “Alpha, I don’t think I’m going to get us home—”
“Well?” As the Seraph sang softly, Gideon looked around at us. “Are we ready for this?”
The question was larger than
it seemed.
At that moment, my cadre was tech adrift in a horrific, alien realm. Every single step took us deeper into hostile territory, and it was imminently possible that, like Liam, we were about to die beneath strange and drifting stars.
“Ready, Alpha.” Rachel nodded, adjusting the stinger.
“Ready.” Wyatt and Anya spoke at the same time.
“Let’s go, Gideon.” I nodded at him. “Whenever you say.”
That was the strength of Gideon DuMarque. We knew absolutely that the man would crawl through Irrational Hell for any one of us.
Here we were, about to assault a Vyriim Broodwell with little to no plan.
Still, it felt impossible that we could fail. It seemed as if Gideon could lead us anywhere, and he would always get us home.
“You did!” I thought I might break, right there. “You always got us home. But everything I’ve done, I’ve fucked up.”
We stood around Liam Hunter, awkward. The Primary Protocol demanded that we dispose of the body.
“Yes, yes.” Gideon did not look up as the wheels turned in his head. “Christ, give a man a minute.”
The memory blurred then, as if a fanned deck of cards. Then, it resolved into a different scene.
I sat in the Spire, with Gideon DuMarque. He sat across from me, his chair flipped around backward.
“This is where things get dicey.” Gideon steepled his fingers.
“Just now it does?” I shook my head. “I’m outta answers, man. I don’t know what to do, and… they made me Alpha!”
“Come on.” I stepped over to him and extended a hand. “We should form up.”
“Making the calls now, are you?” Gideon gave me a rueful grin but took my hand. “Arrogant ass.”
“I have no idea where the rest of my cadre is, Gideon. I need to get you off this thing. Tell me how to get you out of here, and we can extract.”
I stood in the briefing room at the Spire, and Gideon looked grim.
“I’m Alpha-on-site, but I doubt I’ll be leaving this room.” He leveled his cobalt eyes at me.
“No.” I shook my head, burning tears in my eyes. I understood exactly what he meant, and the idea broke my heart.
I just couldn’t do this again.
“I doubt I’ll be leaving this room.” The memory came again, slowly, specifically.
Another shuffled into my mind.
You’re going to have to handle things, Gideon linked me. I stood in an alleyway in Dhire Lith, looking at a horrific trained aberration of the Drażeri. I can’t do anything, Bishop. Not now.
“That doesn’t fucking work.” I shook my head, broken. “Everything is a complete mess without you.”
I stood in the Spire, watching Gideon laugh.
“Oh, yes.” Gideon leaned back in his seat. “You’re a wreck, Asset.” He chuckled. “For a man who has only been active for a little over two hours, you’ve certainly gotten torn up.”
“Hey.” I sat up a touch, as if affronted. “I take pride in what I do, thank you.”
Memory shifted, changed.
I stood in the vast city of Dhire Lith, scouting for my cadre.
Hold your position, Bishop. Gideon was firm, resolute.
“Why don’t I know what to do?” I shook my head. “You always seemed to.”
The memory of my Crown initiation protocols drifted into my mind, I heard Gideon DuMarque’s voice, explaining the moment an Asset comes online.
“That’s because you’re stupid. You can’t get it; that’s the point. W exists outside your regular frame. But when it happens, all kinds of tiny mysteries will click; everything will make sense.”
“Ha!” I actually laughed, even though I freely cried now. “Asshole.”
The caverns of the cenote loomed around me. In the distance, I could hear the laughter of the damned.
“You’ve gotta be with me on this.” Gideon caught my eye and held it. “We don’t know where Max or Katarina are, but we’re going to find them.”
“Yeah.” I nodded, nervously. “I know we probably will.”
“No, Michael.” He squeezed my shoulder. “We’re getting them out of here. And if something happens to me, you’ll get them out of here.”
“If something happens to you, I’m probably already dead,” I muttered.
“No.” His voice was stern. “You’re going to make a wonderful leader, Bishop. You’ve got some things to learn, but being the man you are, you’ll inspire loyalty. You’ll be the kind of leader your cadre will follow into hell.”
That…
That was where the statement had come from. Gideon had said it to me, all those years ago, but I’d turned it around. As the years passed, I’d started to say it about him.
“You think I can do this,” I breathed. “You always did.”
“Take point, Bishop.” Gideon nodded through the archway. “We’ll follow.
Memory blurred.
“This is going to get dicey.” We crept within the caverns beneath the Yucatán. “If I can’t take of things, you will.” He paused. “It may be hard, but you’ll know exactly what to do.”
Memory blurred again.
I stood in that God-forsaken cistern in Istanbul, gazing at him. Behind me, I heard the gibbering of the mad.
Good, Gideon nodded at me. Make me proud.
“Yes, sir.” I paused, trembling. “It was an honor and a privilege knowing you, Gideon Du Marque.”
We all packed into the Drażeri realmship, and Wyatt had us somersaulting through space.
“Cadre,” Gideon wheezed when Wyatt returned. “I wanted you to know how proud I am to have served with you—”
A Name of Lamentation
“You’re a child, Michael Bishop.” Amir strode forward and the light of madness shone through his wide eyes. “You think I haven’t foreseen this, all this? You think I haven’t planned?”
I took one backward step closer to the awful table where Gideon lay.
“No.” I held one blade up between us. It felt heavier than I thought it should. My hand trembled as the smallest bit as I gaped at Amir.
“No?” That smirk sounded sharp through the mask.
“You’ve planned. You planned all of this.”
“Then you know what must happen.”
“I know you haven’t left me any choice.”
I spun toward Gideon.
I leapt.
In the eternal instant that followed, a dozen things whispered through my mind.
Memories, thoughts of Gideon. Things I’d known.
“Seventy-nine of these chairs are filled, Asset,” another Zealator said, a stocky bald man whose tattoos wrapped around his head. “Only two remain.”
“You’ll have your throne, never fear,” another whispered. “Yes. Your blood shall be the last. You shall be the last.”
We were the final two sacrifices. I needed to throw a wrench in their plans…
The next memory came again, slowly, specifically.
“I doubt I’ll be leaving this room.”
Another shuffled into my mind.
“You’re going to have to handle things.”
I came down upon Gideon with all my body weight.
I did not look him in the face.
I pushed the curved blade through his chest, wincing at the sensation as I sliced through bone and muscle.
For an instant, Gideon tensed. His eyes flew open wide and every muscle tightened.
“Bishop.” He gazed off into nothingness.
He smiled.
His body fell lax.
The golden radiance that had burned around him burst into a brilliant shine. It reached upward one last time, and then crashed back upon Gideon’s body, like a tide of shimmering sunlight.
It coursed into him, through me. It pulled away from that darkness, and proceeded into him.
The shadowy flame surrounded Gideon, the unnamed darkness that had no true shape, and went absolutely berserk. It burst away from him, and loomed
over me with a terrible, unknowable fury.
It burned with elemental darkness that boiled over the world.
It screamed the truth of a star, scarlet in the sky.
It cackled the fates of shambling humanity and broken minds.
“But you know what happens now?” Amir slipped up next to me where I still held the blade I’d buried in Gideon’s chest. Upon his brow, a diadem of violet discord burned, a sigil of his power. Even though that terrible silver mask covered his face, that Sign overlay it.
Around us, the darkness positively seethed. Madness and despair battered at my mind, a tide of terrible, forsaken shadows.
“What do you think happens now?” I glared up at Amir, and the starkness of what I’d done burned in my eyes.
“Now, the Scion takes you.” Amir glanced up and the flickering darkness cast mottled shadows across his face. “You have earned its wrath.”
“I have, have I?” I glanced up into the rotten, unknowable shadows.
“Death is but a doorway, Michael Bishop. I’m afraid it’s one you will never pass through.” He paused. “Although you shall greatly wish it.”
“I have another idea.” I glanced down and showed him the hand that didn’t rest on the blade.
On my palm, I held the dampening grenade I’d wrested from Gideon’s pocket, one he’d held onto since the cistern.
“What?” The sheer confusion in Amir’s single word was delicious. “Where did you—?”
I didn’t answer. I pushed the button.
Ripples burst around me, like a stone cast into a pond.