by Rachel Aaron
“Josef!” Eli shouted. But it was too late. The ground collapsed beneath the swordsman, sending him falling into the abyss.
“Josef!”
As Eli screamed Josef’s name, the demon moved. With horrifying speed, it caught the falling swordsman between its claws. The demon climbed out of the collapsing fissure, carrying Josef and the Heart, which Josef still held clutched against his chest, in its palm. When it reached a stretch of unbroken ground, the demon gently laid the swordsman down. It hovered over him a moment, staring at him with its hundreds of yellow, glowing eyes. Then, with a horrible scream, it turned and began to attack the forest more violently than ever.
Eli ran to Josef and pressed his fingers against the swordsman’s neck. He heaved a huge sigh of relief when he felt his friend’s strong, steady heartbeat. Despite what the demon had done to everything else it touched, Josef was unharmed.
“She’s still in there,” he said, looking up at the rampaging demon with a sort of wonder.
His thoughts were interrupted by Alric as the League man yanked him around.
“Now do you get it?” Alric shouted, shaking him. “There’s nothing we can do, humans or spirits, to stop that thing. We need the Shepherdess, and you’re going to get her.” He swung his ruined sword up, the broken gold glinting in the dusty sunlight. “Last chance, favorite. I’m ready to die to do what I have to do, and I have absolutely no qualms about taking you with me. Call her down or die for your pride. Either way, this ends now.”
Eli flinched away, his brain madly trying to think of a way out. But before he could even open his mouth, a deep, deep voice he’d never heard before spoke over the roar.
“Leave him, League man. Even if she does come down, we will suffer for it.”
Alric and Eli both turned. On Josef’s chest, the battered blade of the Heart of War began to glow.
“If you call down the Shepherdess, she will deal with this one as she did the last,” the Heart said. “She will bury it under a mountain, and we will have twice the problems we have now.”
“No,” Alric said. “The Daughter of the Dead Mountain is still not a hundredth the size of the original. All we need is—”
“Demonseeds are shards of the great demon,” the Heart said. “Fractures small enough to escape its prison and move freely through the world. Yet each tiny piece has the same attributes of the whole. Think. The League, the Shepherdess’s arm in this world, can’t even destroy those small seeds, only cut them off from their human hosts and store them in starvation. What, then, can the Shepherdess do with a demon this size except what she did with the original? Mark me, Alric, she will do what she did before. She will seal it beneath a mountain. But this time there is only one remaining mountain spirit strong enough to hold a shard of the demon that large in check, and I very much doubt the Shaper Mountain would be willing to spend the rest of eternity as a sword.”
“Wait,” Eli said. “You mean you…”
“Yes,” the Heart answered. “At the beginning of this world, I willingly gave my body as a prison for the demon. In return, the Shepherdess let me choose my new form. I chose to be a sword. It has been a hard, lonely journey, but I have never regretted my choice. However, I will not let another be forced to it, least of all my brother, who has dedicated his life to guiding his Shapers.”
“Wait,” Eli said. “The Shaper Mountain is your brother?”
“All mountains are my brothers,” the Heart said. “But the Shaper Mountain, Durain, is my twin. We two were birthed from the will of the Creator at the dawn of the world to stand as guard and guide to the lesser mountains. We were the greatest of the Great Spirits of stone, and we can never be replaced. The Shepherdess is not the Creator. She can only guide and order the spirits, not form new ones. When the demon first came, I gave up my body to serve as a prison because I knew my brother would watch in my stead. But now, history repeats itself. My brother is the only mountain strong enough to hold the creature Nico has become. If you call the Shepherdess down now, she will have no choice but to use the only tool she has left, and the last of the great mountains will be gone.”
“That’s a fine sentiment,” Alric said through gritted teeth. “But we have no choice. I cannot sit here and watch that thing eat the world.”
“But we do have a choice,” the Heart said. “The thief saw it himself. Inside that monster is one of our own.”
“The girl is gone,” Alric said. “Don’t kid yourself. Human spirits are the first consumed on awakening.”
“Then why did it save Josef?” Eli asked.
Alric’s eyes narrowed. “How should I know?”
“Nico is still alive,” the Heart said. “She is a survivor. I had my doubts as well at first. Since the morning Josef took her naked from the crater, I have come close to killing her myself on several occasions. Every time, I thought the demon had won, but every time she fought back. I think that this time will be no different. That thing may not look like Nico, but it is still her body. So long as there is some shred of her soul left, so long as she still has will, she is still a wizard. So long as she has will, she has the weight of a mountain, and there is still hope.”
Alric shook his head, but Eli stared past him, watching the demon with an uncharacteristically serious expression on his face.
“Alric,” he said quietly, “I’ll make you a deal.”
Alric sneered. “This isn’t the time for tricks.”
“No,” Eli said. “No tricks, just a clean proposition. We may not have always gotten along, but Nico is still my companion. I take only the best into my line of work, and she’s no exception. The sword is right. The demon never beat her before, and I’m willing to bet my life and my pride that it hasn’t beaten her now.” He held up his hand, fingers splayed wide. “Five minutes. If she doesn’t beat her seed in five minutes, then I’ll do anything you want. I’ll call Benehime down here to dance with you, if you like. Do we have a deal?”
Alric considered for a moment, and then released his death grip on Eli’s shirt. “You do realize that in five minutes there may not be anything left to save.” He looked at the demon, then at the Heart, and then at Eli. “All right,” he said, sheathing his sword. “Five minutes.”
Eli nodded and stepped over Josef’s splayed body. He ran to the edge of the ruined fissure, parts of which were still collapsing and, cupping his hands to his mouth, shouted as loud as he could.
“Nico!” he cried, layering just enough power into the words to make sure they would cut through everything else. “Listen! Me, Josef, the Heart of War, we’re betting it all on you! You’ve got five minutes to turn this around before Alric and the League get their way, but I think you can do it. I’m sorry about before. I was stupid. I admit it. Come back to us, Nico, and everything will be like it was, only better. Just you, me, Josef, and anything in the world we want to steal. All you have to do is kick that demon out and come home. Five minutes. We’ll be here waiting for you.”
His voice echoed through the hills, and the spirit panic dimmed to listen. On the other side of the fissure, the demon paused its eating. It stood there, listening for one long moment. Then, with an angry scream, it began to eat again.
Panting, Eli sat down on the crumbling stone, rubbing his hands over his dusty face and hoping on whatever luck he still had that he’d made the right choice.
CHAPTER
21
Nico raised her head. She could have sworn she’d heard someone calling her, but now, no matter how she strained her ears, all she heard was silence. She was alone, sitting on a cold floor of smooth black stone. It went on forever in all directions, an endless, endless darkness of the kind she’d seen only once before.
“Yes,” a deep, smooth voice whispered behind her. “When you were with me.”
Nico spun around, sliding back on the stone. A man was standing behind her where there had been no one a second before. He was tall and broad shouldered, dressed in a simple black shirt and dark trousers tucked into ta
ll boots, just like Josef’s. He looked a lot like Josef too, and a little bit like Eli, but the cruel look in his golden eyes belonged to only one person.
“Master.” Her whisper was little more than a breath.
“At last you remember.” The man smiled.
Nico did remember. She remembered the slave pens. How she’d been taken from them. How the cult members had held her down, their dead white faces leering beneath their cowls. She remembered the hideous feeling of the seed, then barely larger than a grape pit, being shoved down her choking throat. But more than that, she remembered the unadulterated joy of the Master’s good opinion. The absolute pleasure that came from being a good child who pleased her father. The warmth, the understanding, the acceptance that no one outside could give her.
The Master opened his arms, and she ran to him, flinging herself against his chest with a sob. Joy and belonging like she’d never felt washed over her, but even as she savored the feelings, there was something wrong about them. Something alien, almost sticky in her mind. Slowly, painfully, she released her grip and stepped back.
“You’re making me feel this, aren’t you?” she whispered.
“Of course,” the Master said, stroking her hair. “You’re home now. It’s only right you should share in my happiness.” He ran his hand under her chin, tilting her head up until their eyes met. “You are mine again, every bit of you. My greatest weapon is back in my command, and she’ll never escape again. Is that not cause for joy?”
Nico ducked out of his grasp, or tried to, but her body would not move. The Master just smiled and kept petting her, stroking her hair like a huntsman petting his prize hound.
“Now, now,” he tsked. “You lost, Nico. You don’t get to play keep-away anymore. It’s over; take it gracefully. If this works out the way I expect, a new Dead Mountain will be born. I’ll be twice as powerful as I am now, and it’s all thanks to you. That’s why I’m being so generous, despite everything you’ve done. If you were any other seed, I would have crushed you and left you to die the moment you disobeyed me, but I didn’t. I stayed with you, despite your defiance. I never abandoned you.”
He slid his hand up to cup her cheek before stepping back.
“You should be grateful,” he said. “I have given you everything. Made you the ground for my greatest creation. Yet even now you stand there staring at me like you’re some kind of victim.” His smile grew impossibly cruel. “I have done nothing to you that you did not deserve. It is I who have suffered the most, suffered as you denied me over and over again, despite everything I’ve done for you. Have you nothing to say?”
“No, Master.” Nico lowered her head. “I am sorry, Master.”
The Master’s arms slid around her shoulders, pulling her against him as the sticky, alien joy flooded her mind. “There, there,” he said. “I forgive you. It’s over now. You’ve lost. You don’t have to think anymore. You don’t have to try. I’ll take care of everything. Just let it go. There’s a good girl.”
Nico let herself slump into his arms. She couldn’t even remember why she’d been fighting, only that she’d been trying so hard for so long. But the Master was here now, and he would take care of everything. All she had to do was be good, do as he said, and nothing would ever hurt again.
But as that thought circled round and round in her mind, a tiny, lingering doubt nagged at her. She felt like she was forgetting something terribly important.
“Wait,” she said. “Where’s Josef?”
“Gone,” the Master said. “Abandoned you, along with that no-account thief. Everyone has abandoned you, except me. They see you as a monster. They’re probably trying to kill you right now.”
“No!” Nico said, looking up at him. “Josef would never abandon me.”
The Master slapped her hard across the face. Nico stumbled and fell without a cry, landing hard on the cold stone floor.
“Never speak back to me,” he said, his voice colder than the stone. He walked to where she had fallen, his steps fading off into the endless nothing. Nico gasped as he grabbed her hair, yanking her up until her feet were a foot off the ground. He grabbed her chin with his other hand, pressing so hard she thought her jaw would break as he turned her face to his.
“Your body is my body now,” he said slowly. “Your soul, your power, everything. It is all mine. You are only here because I wish it.” He dropped her, and she crumpled. The moment she was down, he kicked her in the ribs, sending her tumbling across the floor. She slid to a stop several feet away, panting against the cold stone. When she looked up again, the Master was standing over her, looking down on her like she was a piece of trash in his way.
“Never defy me again,” he said. “I am your Master. You live by my generosity alone. Never, ever forget that.”
Nico pressed her head down onto the stone. Desperate, sobbing apologies and promises of obedience filled her mind. She wanted to shout that she would never disobey again, that she had no master but him, but for some reason her mouth would not open. She could not speak the words.
Pain exploded through her as the Master kicked her again, and she flew across the endless chamber, landing so hard she saw stars.
“Do you think you’re too good for this?” he shouted. “Or do you not understand the very simple words I am speaking? Has being a weak, pathetic, stupid creature for so long also made you mute?”
Nico began to hyperventilate. She moved her mouth desperately, but no sound came out. She could hear the Master coming toward her, and her body seized up in preparation for the kick she knew was coming. Why couldn’t she say it? Why couldn’t she swear that his will was the only will she knew?
Because it’s not true.
Nico stopped cold. The voice spoke in her head like the Master’s had so many times, but it was not his. It sounded like Nivel, like Eli, like Josef, like Miranda, like Tesset. Like everyone who’d ever said, in one way or another, what the voice said next.
The only human soul a wizard can control is their own.
At last, her lips parted, but the whispered word that slipped out was not what she had meant to say.
“Why?”
The answer came a heartbeat later. Because a wizard has no master but herself.
As the last word faded, Nico recognized the voice. It was her own. All at once, she understood. She understood everything, and she knew what she had to do.
She caught the Master’s kick right before it landed in her side. He stumbled and nearly fell. He caught his balance at once and stomped down as hard as he could on her fingers, but Nico did not let go.
“I know what you’re doing,” she said, turning her bruised face to stare at him. “You’re trying to intimidate me. To get me to surrender.”
“Get you to…” The Master thew back his head and laughed. “Why would I waste my time on someone so stupid? You need power to surrender. You have nothing.”
“No,” Nico said. “You forced me to awaken, but you didn’t beat me. I never surrendered my will. This is still my body.”
“So what?” the Master sneered. “You’re too far gone to go back now. You’ve eaten thousands of spirits. You nearly ate Josef and that horrible sword of his. Everyone’s seen what you are. There’s nothing for you out there. You belong here, with me. You’ve always belonged here. That life out there was a joke, a dream. Even if I’d done nothing, the end would have been the same.”
“No,” Nico said again. “Only if I’d let it. This is still my body, my soul.” Her crushed fingers tightened on the Master’s boot. “I am king here.”
She stood up in a fluid motion, throwing the Master back. He flickered in the air, landing perfectly several feet away, but the look on his face, the mix of rage and disbelief, was as good as if he’d stumbled. Nico pushed herself up, wincing as her muscles protested. She ran her hands over her body, wishing she had enough light to see the damage.
The moment she wished it, light appeared. A beautiful shaft of yellow sunlight shot down from the air
above her head, creating a wide circle around her. Nico looked at herself in the sudden brightness, examining her broken fingers and the bruises on her ribs and knees. She closed her eyes. When she opened them again, the bruises were gone. Her fingers were straight again, and the pain had vanished. She realized with a shock that it had never really been there to begin with. This was her soul, her world; everything that happened here, including pain, only happened because she allowed it.
She looked up at the Master. No, she scowled. Not Master, not anymore. The demon was looking at her cautiously now, circling just on the edge of the sunlight. Now that she had light on her side, she could see the thing behind his human form. A great, black shape lurking in the dark with a mouthful of jagged, glistening teeth.
Fear began to creep in and Nico tore her eyes away from the demon’s true self, forcing herself to focus on his human face as she said the two words she’d wanted to say her whole life.
“Get out.”
“Ah.” The demon chuckled. “You think that now that you’ve had a little revelation about the nature of the soul you can do the impossible? Sorry, princess, it doesn’t go that way. This might be your soul, but you’re still a demonseed. So long as there’s a piece of me in your body, you can’t kick me out.”
Nico narrowed her eyes. “You always lie. Why should I trust you now?”
The demon crossed his arms and gave her a sly smile. “If it were that easy, Nivel would have been free of me her first year. She was much smarter than you, and more determined. She had something to go home to. What have you got? Eli? Josef? You think they’ll take you back after what you did?”
“I don’t know,” Nico said. “But I’m going to let them decide that. You don’t get to say anything anymore.”
“Don’t I?” the demon said with a smirk. “Just because you know the rules of the fight doesn’t mean it gets any easier. You’re still the Daughter of the Dead Mountain. My mountain, my daughter. Your powers are my powers, and the more you use them, the stronger my presence becomes. You may have retaken control today, but you will never, ever be free of me.”