Chain of Shadows (Blood Skies, Book 6)

by Montano, Steven

  Famous last words.

  Cross’s heart hammered as he made his way down to the plaza. The dark citadel loomed overhead. He was exposed out there in the open, and he was positive he felt eyes on him. The lack of people was unnerving – if he didn’t know better he could have swore the entire city was deserted.

  Steps inlaid with jet and pewter led down to the road. Green lights shone through grills in the street. He smelled furnace heat and burned flowers.

  Cross was nearly to the front of the temple when he saw motion from the corner of his eye. He pressed himself flat against a wall. His breath caught in his chest as he froze, one hand on his HK, and waited to see if he’d been detected.

  The silence of the ghost city pressed down on him. All he heard was the shrill hiss of the wind and the spatter of sparks from the fires.

  Two small and cloaked figures moved off in the distance, heading towards a dim shine near the northern plaza. He couldn’t tell if they were children or Gol, but whoever they were they tried to stay hidden, and they traveled with some haste.

  He hesitated, then followed them.

  It was difficult to keep them in sight. The night sky was a slate of darkness, and though specks of stars floated far overhead they gave off little light. Stone walls pushed in, forming an urban canyon. Cross kept his eyes on the ground so he wouldn’t stumble and fall on something in the alleys while at the same time trying not to lose the cloaked figures. On a couple of occasions they slipped away but then suddenly reappeared, revealed by burning lights that pushed up through the grills in the street or the flashing pillars of distant industrial flames.

  What the hell are you doing? he asked himself. Get out of here. Go find Dani.

  And yet he followed.

  The shadows eventually led him to another plaza, but not the one he expected – this was a sunken courtyard, a lowered recess of granite which stood utterly dark within a perimeter of flickering and icy flames. A series of shaved pillars stood around the central pit, which had been tucked away from the main roads and was accessible only by using a complicated network of side streets and back alleys. Sound echoed harder in those crooked lanes, and everything Cross saw was blurred, like it had been mirrored. The strange illumination stripped the scene of color.

  By the time Cross came to the edge of the pit the small figures were gone. He stared into the shadows. Bulky forms lumbered through the darkness, vague shapes pushing against one another like ships in a harbor. He saw a triumvirate of shadow masses, twisted forms made of ebon vapors and black steam. Cross tried to fix them in his gaze but couldn’t.

  Shadows. The Maloj.

  His heart went cold. Had they followed them there? Or had they been waiting all along?

  The sword was ice against his skin, alerted by the presence of those monsters. Cross watched the shadows as closely as he could, tried to see what was happening. His breath caught in his chest, and something pulled at him like gravity.

  He looked away, and saw that the figures he’d followed were children. They stood just at the edge of the pit, a boy and a girl.

  A boy and a girl. Wait.

  They stood quiet, and pulled back their hoods. He knew them.

  Not the Maloj. An Eidolos.

  The children weren’t children at all, but extensions of a massive and grotesque form hiding down in the pit. He’d encountered an Eidolos in the Whisperlands – this was the same one, for all he knew, a bulwark of darkness. It had sent him to kill the Shadow Lords, the cadre of mages who’d controlled the dismal and timeless realm. Cross had always suspected its true motivations, had always wondered if the reason it had sent him was out of loyalty to Azradayne. Maybe it had known all along that Cross was playing into the spider’s web and leading Danica into a trap from which she couldn’t escape.

  He looked into the pit and saw a mass of columnar dark flesh. No eyes, no orifices, just ebon skin scaled with sharp edges, its unfathomable form anchored to the floor like a dismal tentacle.

  Ribboned columns of black clay reached up and took hold of the children and sucked them into its shadowy bulk. Their bodies dissolved. They weren’t real, had never been real, just extensions of this monstrous telepathic being. It was an ancient marauder, incapable of motion, relying on enthralled underlings and flesh puppets to do its bidding.

  How many of the people in Raijin are under its control? Cross wondered. He felt the creature’s corrupted breath. Reality warped in its proximity. Everything seemed to bleed and twist.

  Cross turned to flee and came to face-to-face with Hakim and a host of warriors. The Magister opened his mouth wide, and a tide of shadows rushed out and enveloped Cross.

  FOURTEEN

  STRANGERS

  It was a hard day’s travel. Danica was in great physical condition, but she had her limits, and dragging Ronan’s unconscious body across the desert was testing them. The makeshift sled grew heavier by the hour, and even though Danica used her spirit to lighten the load she didn’t want to put too much strain on him in case she ran into trouble out there in the wastes.

  And I will. There’s no doubt about it.

  Her metal arm was supernaturally strong when it came to crushing things with her fist, but since lifting strength depended on the rest of her body the bloodsteel limb didn’t help much with hauling Ronan beyond the ability to maintain an unerring grip. Her skin ached where the metal joined with the scapula, and the entire area around her shoulder was puffy and raw, since it had never properly healed in spite of her spirit’s best efforts.

  Danica pulled the sled behind her and sent her spirit out to make sure nothing approached. The world dragged by, grey and red littered with sharp debris and crumbling asphalt. The seldom-used rails provided an easy marker for her to follow when the road was occasionally swallowed back into the desert.

  Nothing stirred. They were alone.

  For most of the day the wind remained calm and the air was clear of sandstorms, giving her a clear view of the dry wastes. Dark rocks sat like islands on the sand sea, and empty box-cars from discarded trains littered the iron rails like refugees. The station had faded into the distance behind her, but she saw the shadow of the city ahead, a dark cluster of towers on the horizon.

  Ronan never stirred. She checked to make sure he was breathing every now and again, and she forced some water into his mouth, which he seemed to drink without really responding or waking.

  “God damn it.”

  The air was unbearably hot, and while the heavy cobalt clouds did an adequate job of blocking out the sun they did little to assuage the savage temperature. Sweat pasted her hair to her scalp, and her metal arm burned against her skin. She kept her armor coat donned for protection and wore a wide-brimmed hat she’d retrieved from the wrecked Skyhawk, a strange neo-Western accoutrement Kane doubtlessly would have approved of, especially if she’d still had her Winchester.

  She realized she’d been thinking a lot about Kane. He used to give her shit about not going running with him, used to see how far he could push her before she lost her temper. The hurt between them had taken some time to heal, and just as they were starting to figure things out Rake had killed him. Sometimes it didn’t seem real, him being gone.

  Danica’s mind wandered as she dragged Ronan across the blasted landscape. She tried not to think about Eric too much, but it was difficult, and it was going to stay difficult. The thought of leaving the team filled her stomach with lead.

  It’s for the best, she told herself. You and him…it will just complicate things. Like they weren’t complicated enough already. She cared for him deeply, maybe even loved him, if that was something she was still capable of. She still saw Lara’s face in her dreams sometimes, still felt her touch. She remembered the time they spent in Ath, those few days when Danica had been on leave from Black Scar and Lara had left her plans open so they could spend the week together. Warm nights and sticky sheets, wine and song. Danica would have given anything to go back to that time, before everything had gone bad
between them.

  She isn’t coming back, she told herself, but that hardly mattered. Somewhere in her mind she was still holding out for Lara. It didn’t have to make sense. People rarely made sense when it came to love and relationships. They knew what they wanted, or didn’t want, and that was all that mattered.

  Eric deserves better, she thought, but she wasn’t sure if she thought he deserved to be treated better than having her spurn him or if he deserved better than her. Probably both.

  She tasted thaumaturgic flow, arcane backwash from that cursed landscape. The sky turned a darker shade of red, and in the distance she saw drifts of twisted black sand held in the grip of another phantom storm. Now and again she heard whispers in the wind, and she wondered if something was actually making those sounds or if she was just losing her mind.

  Danica saw signs of passage from the Skyhawk’s other party – bits of food, spent shells, footsteps in the dust, though many of the tracks had been blasted away. Her hands were caked with grit and chalk. She tasted the desert on her teeth and under her tongue, and a layer of grime cleaved to her skin with such force she felt certain she’d need napalm to get herself clean.

  She walked. She rested often, but not too often. There was no sign of Creasy, no sound or signal from those distant and broken hills. Her chest tightened at the realization that he might not be coming back.

  I’m tired, she thought. So tired. Soldiers didn’t tend to live long in the Southern Claw, and mercenary’s lives were even shorter. For all of the fighting, little ground had been gained in the war. Both the humans and vampires had held their ground, but there was no way that could last.

  It won’t, she reminded herself. Not with Fane on the move. Not with the Maloj involved. For all she knew the Southern Claw was already embroiled in conflict with the shadow wolves. Not knowing what was happening was driving her crazy, even if she wouldn’t admit it out loud.

  She thought about her decision to leave the team. She wasn’t sure what she’d do but there had to be something else, something beyond the fighting and the war.

  There has to be some place where I don’t have to watch people I care about die.

  She glimpsed back at Ronan. He lay there unmoving.

  Danica shook her head. She felt stuck, and she hated that more than anything. There was no way she’d leave Ronan like this, no way she’d walk away from Cross and the team, not while things were this way, what with the team in shambles, with everything in such flux. She couldn’t leave.

  Maybe that’s why I’m trying to push Eric away, she thought. Maybe it’s the situation I’m really angry about, and he’s just a convenient punching bag. It didn’t make much sense, but it wouldn’t have been the first time.

  Danica trudged on, dragging Ronan behind her, moving as fast as she could through the thick and bitter heat.

  She spied them about a quarter-mile out – two figures at the edge of a rocky field. From a distance she thought they appeared primitive, bare from the waist up, with skin paler even than that of a Lith. Their long hair streamed in the wind, and both held simple weapons, bows or spears, maybe short blades.

  She watched them warily, one hand near the grip of her G36C where it was slung over her shoulder. Claw was strapped across her back and her spirit swirled against her bloodsteel arm, ready to lash out at a moment’s notice. She tasted the dryness of the plains, and there was a tang of ozone and electrical current in the air, the promise of a storm.

  The two figures remained motionless. She was too distant to read their expressions, but she knew with some certainty the only reason she’d seen them was because they’d allowed her to. They hadn’t moved against her when clearly they could have, so they might have been letting her know they were there in order to warn her away from the area, or to declare their intent to approach.

  Or as a diversion while more of their buddies move in to outflank me. That would be just my luck.

  She hesitated to move closer, not knowing what a native people would think of her intrusion, but after a moment she decided to send out her spirit to scout the area and learn more about her mysterious visitors. He swept away in a cloud of ice-blue fog.

  Her spirit enveloped them and she sensed they were human, or something like humans, with trace amounts of magic in their tools and on their skin. They’d covered themselves with some thaumaturgic unguent culled from the landscape.

  They were familiar with being subjected to arcane scrying. Most creatures she’d encountered who weren’t used to magic often panicked at the touch of a spirit, the oily and spectral sensation that crept up the spine and washed across the senses. These natives stood their ground, watching, waiting for her to be done.

  Danica learned little. She wasn’t sure if she had much to gain by approaching, and in the end decided that their revealing their presence was a warning, letting her know she was being watched and that she should tread lightly. In a way Danica saw it is as something of a generous move, for before she’d been traveling blind, and now she at least knew where she stood.

  She wondered what sort of a relationship these pale and painted people had with the Nezzek’duulians who lived in the city she was traveling towards, Raijin.

  Danica nodded to them, called her spirit back after she had him do a quick reconnoiter of the area to make sure there were no more surprises, and moved on.

  And then it was night. Danica had completely lost track of time. She occasionally used her spirit to lighten her load and hummed to herself now and again, songs from her childhood she didn’t remember the words to. The city of Raijin was still a speck in the distance, but that speck was growing larger. With any luck she could reach it within another day.

  She had to make camp – there was no light along the unfinished highway, and she had little desire to walk by torch or spirit flame so she found a shelter of angled rock. She’d hoped Creasy would have caught up with her by now, and she didn’t want to think about what his continued absence likely meant. He was a good man, but something about the way he’d behaved ever since they’d arrived in Nezzek’duul had unnerved her. There was something more, something he wasn’t telling her.

  Danica started a campfire near the base of the sloped rock, and soon thick smoke curled into the open sky. The stars were cold blue and bright, and the wind scattered dust across the cracked ground. The rock shielded them from the wind, but night had also brought the bone-numbing chill. She wrapped Ronan up as best she could with a blanket, gave him water and tried to wake him, but that wasn’t going to happen. She angled him close to the inset of the stone, so far in it almost seemed the makeshift sled was holding the rock in place. Danica used her spirit to keep the fire high so the two of them wouldn’t have to spend another night freezing to death. Even with her spirit warming her body Danica’s skin stung from the chill. Her lips were so chapped they’d started to bleed, so she rubbed them with beeswax and drank as much water as she could spare.

  It would be nice if magic could let us make useful things instead of just blowing shit up, she thought. Spirits could do many things – healing, reconnaissance, lending warmth or even strength, and of course their ubiquitous ability to conjure harmful effects for combat purposes – but creating food didn’t seem to be in their repertoire of abilities. So Danica had to do things the old fashioned way and ration their food and drink; they had enough for at least another two days, and she felt sure they’d reach Raijin well before that. She half hoped their blazing campfire would attract the attention of Raijin’s scouts, and that someone would be sent to collect her and Ronan, but at the same time she didn’t want the fire to draw any desert creatures. Like another one of those giant gorilla things. That would suck.

  Without anyone to stand watch with her it fell on Danica to maintain vigil all through the night, something she wasn’t very happy about. She’d pulled all-nighters before, but not after she’d been hiking through the desert for a day while dragging an unconscious companion along behind her. Every muscle ached like she’d bee
n pelted with hammers. She had trouble keeping her eyes open, so she brewed some instant coffee in a small pot over the fire while she ate MREs and stared out into the night.

  As a kid she’d camped all of the time with Cradden and her father, and as she’d grown older she’d gotten accustomed to doing it on her own; the trick was to keep a weapon nearby and to sleep light. Her spirit had been little more than a voice the last time she’d done it, just an incessant whisper she’d only had a faint connection with, almost to the point where she’d thought he was a figment of her imagination.

  Suck it up, girl, she told herself. You don’t have much choice now. She stared off towards Raijin. The thought of how close it was filled her with anxiety. She knew better than to expect that once she got there everything would be okay. They were far from home, and far from safe. God I’m sick of this shit.

  Danica imagined Cross sitting there with her. Even with how she’d treated him, even though what existed between them frightened her, the thought was still comforting. She looked at Ronan, still dead asleep, and she suppressed a shudder as the chill wind whipped at her back. The shadows of dead trees swayed in the dark. Every crunch of stone and snapping twig seemed far too loud and far too close. Danica sat watch, drinking coffee and cleaning her weapon, waiting for eyes and teeth to come spiraling out of the night. Worry clawed at her gut even as sleep tugged at her eyes.

  It was going to be a long night.

  She dreams of the spider.

  Oozing flesh presses against her skin. She lies in a field of corpses, their milky eyes locked on the sky. An old man sits at the edge of the bodies, whittling away on a piece of wood. Danica watches his hands, moving far too fast to be real, a blur of motion. She realizes he’s carving a person. His eyes are wide with madness, and his grin lacks several teeth. Lanky white hair dangles and catches in the dismal breeze.