Queen of the Dark Things

by C. Robert Cargill

  “And that is?”

  “Perspective.”

  “That’s not exactly news.”

  “Oh, but it is. You see, Bertrand explains goodness as if it is a single point on a line. Black on one end, white on the other. In the middle are the things you paint gray.”

  “You’re not wowing me here, demon. Come to your point or—”

  “There is no gray, Colby. That’s the point. It’s a flawed model. The idea that ethics and morality can be summed up two dimensionally, as a binary system riddled with aberrations, is primitive. The aberrations are the proof that the model doesn’t work. Morality isn’t a line; it is a series of spheres, beginning first at a point in the center. That point is the singular person against whom any action is made. You have to ask yourself what is best for that person. That decision is binary.”

  Colby shook his head, pursing his lips. “No. There’s not always a right and a wrong.”

  “There is!” Bune spoke excitedly now, eyes a searing blue flame, the passion of his point bubbling into froth. His lecture was in full swing and Colby was playing right along, ever the eager student. “The gray areas you’re thinking of only happen when you flatten the spheres to a line. We leave the point now for the first sphere—the actors. Those performing the action. We have to ask now what is best for them? If the action against the person in the center is not in the center’s best interest, it is wrong . . . from the point of view of the center. But from the sphere outside it, that decision may be what’s best for them. In this case, it could be right.”

  “Yeah, yeah. What’s right for one—”

  “There’s more than one sphere, Colby. There are several. The next sphere is the community. Then the state. Then the world. And just beyond that is civilization. History itself. Is an action right or wrong for the state of history? For the human race? And finally, the universe?”

  “You want me to ask myself whether something is right or wrong for the universe?”

  “No. The question is never whether or not something is right or wrong. It can be both right and wrong, alternating between the spheres. Something that could be inarguably just in all of the lower spheres—like caring for the sick—can be morally wrong in the wider spheres as history becomes replete with the descendants of the weak and sickly, dooming mankind to extinction for its inability to cope with its own poor selection. The question must never be about right and wrong but whose perspective we are choosing to value most. This is how so many people argue with one another with absolute certainty. It is not always because one is ignorant; it is most often because they both are. They refuse to argue and form a consensus on the perspective while they babble about the minutiae of their own.

  “Bertrand was wrong because he believes that doing a thing wrong in one sphere because it is right in another can damn a man. Because Bertrand has already chosen his point in the spheres and judges them all from there. And that point is in the center. He’s caught up in the idea of the individual and his pride makes that point of view unshakable. That pride has rubbed off on you. You think yourself in some sort of gray area, that your choices are somehow nebulous and murky. You weren’t damned because you let in the Wild Hunt. You were damned because the point you chose to defend, which seems so right, is so wrong in all the others.” Bune paused for a moment, as if choosing his next words very carefully. “Colby, why did you save Ewan? The first time, when you were children.”

  “Because he was my friend.”

  “So you did it for yourself?”

  “I did it for him.”

  “Did you?”

  “Yes.”

  “Because killing an innocent child was wrong.”

  “Yes.”

  “Despite all the death and violence that surround that rescue and the subsequent massacre it led to?”

  “Those things had it coming.”

  “They were a menace? They were going to cause more harm?”

  “Exactly.”

  “To the community. The children of Austin. The third sphere.” Bune leaned forward as far as he could without coming into contact with the barrier of the triangle. His eyes narrowed, flames glinting, a self-satisfied smile on his face, baring his fangs once more. “Colby, you’re not lost because you find yourself in the gray area; you’re lost because you can’t reconcile your priorities. You’re scared to ask yourself who is more important because you might not like the answer. Your ethics are arbitrary. You want to be good and just. You just don’t know for whom.”

  “And what do you know about the good? What, exactly, would happen if I scuffed away that triangle and let you out? Could I expect you to be good then?”

  “I wouldn’t kill you, Colby. I can’t. We need you. However, since I have to be honest, I probably would hurt you a bit. Scare you. Get inside that head of yours and dig out some true terror just so you know who you’re dealing with.”

  “And that’s good?”

  “No. But is it really bad? I have outlived empires, Colby. I watched man crawl out of the caves and erect temples to gods who were dead and forgotten before the days of Babylon. I judge my actions based on the good of the farthest spheres. I play a long game. That means, in the short run, little that I do for my own amusement has any real impact. Who cares if I consume the soul of someone who was never going to amount to anything?” He leaned back and stroked his dark fur with his long, clawed fingers, delighting in memories. “Only others who don’t matter. I can’t kill you because, in the long run, that might actually be bad. At least until you’ve served your purpose. So I stay my more loathsome desires for the Seventy-two, because we, ultimately, serve a purpose of our own. One far greater than yours. And what’s good for me, and good for my fellow fallen angels, is that you see this night through. No matter how much I would enjoy tearing you apart and feasting on your innards.”

  “Do you feel better? Getting that off your chest?”

  “Hardly. You’re not listening. You’re just waiting for me to spin myself out so you can ask me what we both know you’re going to ask me, without caring that I might be preparing you for the weight of your decision.”

  “Is that right?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then what am I going to ask you?”

  “The same thing every sorcerer of your ilk asks for. The one reason to summon me over all the other demons you could have asked for. You want my one great boon. You want my rain of fire.”

  “I don’t.”

  “Oh, but you do. I can do it. Just say the words and fire will rain from the heavens upon those who have wronged you, those who stand against you now. I may not be able to bring my holocaust upon the girl making her way here, but the shadows she brings with her? The beasts in her legion? All gone in a single gout of flame. But why stop there? The Limestone Kingdom is full of those who deserve to roast alive.”

  “No. That’s not why you’re here.”

  “You can smell it, can’t you? The scent of their immolation. You can hear the sound of their wings popping as they curl into ash. The sound of their terrified, confused screams. That’s my favorite part. Make no mistake. What you ask me to do, I do willingly. Have me collect their souls, Colby. Say the words.”

  “No,” said Colby, shaking his head defiantly.

  “Say the words. Tell me what to do.”

  “Okay. Great Duke Bune, master of thirty-six legions, bearer of the rain of fire. I ask of you a boon, your offering in exchange for one of the souls of the five dukes.”

  “I agree to this bargain. What is it you would have me do?”

  “Bestow upon me the gift of an iron will, that I may see through the lies and temptations of spirits and be not by them corrupted.”

  Bune’s smile disappeared, the flames in his eyes smoldering with contempt. “That’s not the bargain.”

  “But it is. We have a deal. And you, as I understand it, have more than one boon to bestow. Do you not?”

  “I do,” he growled.

  “Then please, spi
rit, grant me the boon.”

  Bune took a step back, unballing his fists, the slow, deliberate smile of understanding creeping back into place. “Ahhhh. You are indeed craftier than anyone has given you credit for, boy. I see what you’re doing. You face five spirits, and you hope a protection from their lies and temptations will see you through to their more powerful gifts. Clever.”

  “Sometimes it’s wiser to pick up a shield before bothering with the sword.”

  “Yes. Yes it is! Then I grant you this boon. It will do little to help you against some of my brothers. I might be among the most frightening of them, but some of them don’t need lies or temptations to twist you apart.”

  Bune held his right hand open, brought it to his lips, kissing his fingers lightly. Then he held out his hand and spoke with bone-rattling tones in a language far older than civilization, sharp consonants like the wet hiss of a knife going into a stomach. Colby’s skin prickled, a blistering cold washing over him, his heart pounding, his blood thickening to ice. His head grew cloudy, vision fuzzy, every muscle in his body trembling. He doubled over, shivering on the ground, grunting against a sudden flu, his whole body rejecting the magic at once.

  Colby threw up, chest heaving, blood vessels in his eyes bursting. He screamed and the ground shook.

  And then it passed.

  Everything became clearer, the intentions of the demon before him crystallizing in his thoughts. This was the boon Bune was most frightened he would ask for. Had he chosen the fire, that meant Colby was as weak and easily manipulated as most. But if he chose an immunity from deceit, it meant he was much more of a wild card.

  But the demon hadn’t lied. He couldn’t. Not in the triangle. He honestly believed Colby to be weak-willed, filled with anger, and absolutely out of control. With that one decision, everything changed. Colby, it would appear, was something else entirely. And now Bune would tell his brothers what was coming for them.

  Colby rose to his feet, his blood pumping again, heart no longer struggling in his chest. The air had returned to normal, the boon’s only lingering remnants a cold layer of sweat pooling on Colby’s brow.

  “Thank you, demon. Our deal is struck. I will release your friend.”

  Bune nodded, the flames in his eyes fading. “You know what happens if you don’t?”

  “I do.”

  “Then, for your sake, I hope you keep your end of the bargain.” Then he winked away with a puff of smoke and the bitter stench of brimstone, leaving Colby alone in the dark, terrible jungle.

  CHAPTER 46

  MEATPUPPET

  Wade Looes was no more, but the kutji that was the shadow of Wade Looes very much still was. And while it didn’t remember all the details of Wade’s sad and unfulfilled life, it remembered very well how much he loved his daughter, which was very much indeed. It also remembered that he had done something very, very bad to her. Wade couldn’t remember what, exactly, but it felt an overwhelming sense of guilt about it. Self-loathing. Despair. Anger. And it knew that, above all, it had to set things right.

  So when Wade’s daughter came and asked it to make the long journey alone, across Arnhem Land, to bring something back to her, it did not question; it simply did as she asked. For some reason it didn’t quite understand, all of the other kutji had promised never to go there. But Wade hadn’t. So it fell upon it and it alone to trek across the untamed wilderness to bring back the barely breathing corpse of Kaycee Looes.

  The forest was still, dead quiet despite the life teeming throughout. No insects chirped, no cane toads croaked, everything dug well into their holes and hollows or instead wallowed in the mud. It was as if the swamps had been cleared of every living thing, the eerie calm unsettling, dreamlike. Mist rose up off the billabongs like a ghostly militia setting the charge, the forest beginning to take on the night’s chill. The kutji Wade Looes had no idea that it was him they were afraid of.

  Having flown most of the way, it now crept through the muck and mud, staying in the shadows cast by trees in the moonlight, darting out only long enough to find another. As he drew closer to the outskirts of the small village, he crept slower and slower. There was a Clever Man here, possibly even a powerful one, and if Clever Man saw it, it was cooked. It had to get the body. It could not let its daughter down. Not again. Not ever again.

  At the outskirts of the tree line, it saw what it was looking for. The house, just as she had described it, silhouetted by the moon, towering three stories above the fresh mud. The windows were dark and the porch light off. Easy pickings. In. Out. Quick and easy.

  Be like the shadow, it thought. Be like the shadow. Flattening itself, wafer thin, it slipped in through the crack between the door and the floor. Inside it was pitch-black and silent as the grave, the only sound the soft, distant beeping of a heart monitor. It followed the sound, slinking soundlessly through the hallway, eyes peeled for any signs of life.

  The door to the room was shut, but unlocked, and the handle squeaked ever so slightly as it turned, the creaking hinges whining only that much more. The loudest sound was the heart monitor that, while set to its lowest volume, still pulsed like a sonar ping against the dead of night. Beep. Beep. Beep. That sound rung in its head like a hangover, fragmented memories bubbling to the surface at each one. Pounding. Aching. Scratching to get out.

  The shadow crept forward, and for the first time in ten years, laid eyes upon its daughter.

  Kaycee didn’t look anything like it remembered. She was taller now, gaunt, frail, so much skin draped over too small a skeleton. Her eyes were open and lifeless, a feeding tube running in through her mouth, an IV dripping water into her drop by drop. A thin blue bedsheet covered her from breast to toe, and as the kutji tugged it away, it saw that it was Wade’s daughter for sure.

  The shadow stroked the nubs along her clubfoot, then moved up and ran its wispy claws along the trace of her cleft palate. Though older and sickly, she was still every bit as beautiful as he remembered. Memories a decade old loosed themselves from piles of misery and angst, set free to run barefoot across the tracks of its mind. Flashes of a little girl tugging his arm awake. Of holding her in his arms, eyes warm with tears, as his wife lay lifeless beside them. Of a tiny hand grasping his thumb as they walked because she was not yet big enough to slip her fingers between his.

  The shadow that was Wade Looes had no heart, but its insides broke as if it had. It had to set things right. This little girl had to go home. Once and for all. It wouldn’t let her down. Not again. Not ever again.

  Reaching down, it pulled the feeding tube out from her mouth, pulling her jaw back as wide as it would go, then squeezed itself inside. It pulled itself as tight and as thin as it could, forcing itself, headfirst, down her throat and into her belly.

  Eyes blinked. Limbs twitched. She was possessed.

  The shadow of Wade Looes stared at the ceiling, skin prickling with discomfort, trying to move against years of disused muscles. The legs didn’t work, the arms didn’t work, the neck couldn’t so much as swivel the head connected to it. Everything had atrophied. It was going to have to carry her out.

  Focus. Harder. HARDER.

  It spread itself thinner, worked its way into every cell of her body, lifted with all the force it could muster.

  A toe twitched. Then a hand. A fist clenched. An arm jumped.

  Wade dug deeper. He saw his daughter on the floor, in a puddle of her own blood, already drying in her hair and clothes. It was like electricity, a live wire of anguish.

  Kaycee Looes shot upright in bed like a marionette whose strings had been suddenly jerked. Her eyes were wide but still lifeless. Her jaw dangled limply, open. She spun in the bed, legs hanging over the side, slumping out onto wobbly legs. The shadow worked each limb, pulling and tugging with the power of its own soul. Keep thinking about her, it thought. Think about her. It plumbed the depths of its own memories, birthdays and bedtimes, smiles and tears. Whatever was left. Anything it could remember it threw into the furnace of its own sou
l, chugging forward like a lumbering steam engine.

  It worked the body across the room, missing the door entirely, slamming headfirst into the wall. Kaycee backed up. Turned. Moved forward again. The shadow was pushing the body forward as if it was working levers from the inside—every move disconnected from what it actually had to do to make it happen. Each step was a chore, painful, agonizing.

  But worth it.

  Into the hallway. Step. Step. Step.

  It thumped into another wall.

  “Oy! What the bloody—” called a voice from farther down the hall.

  A tall, limber man in his early thirties appeared, a tangled mop of black hair in a T-shirt and boxers. It was Jirra, who had years before taken a blade to the arm to secure the very body now standing in the hallway before him. He was older now, rugged, wise wrinkles setting in where his youthful vigor and good looks had once been.

  He looked at Kaycee, confused for a moment. Then he smiled. “Oh, you’re awake.”

  The shadow panicked. Shit! “Yeah,” it forced out, working the jaw and tongue as best as it could manage while managing to remain upright.

  “Well, where are you off to?”

  “Out.”

  “Well, careful out there. It’s a long walk, wherever you’re goin’.”

  The shadow gave a clumsy, instinctive wave, stomping as quickly as it could toward the door.

  The man rushed past, quickly unlocked the door, held it open, a beaming smile on his lips.

  This had to be a trap. Run, it thought. It barreled out the door, uneasy feet barely able to keep it standing. I’m coming, darlin’. Dad’s coming. I’m gonna make this right. I’m gonna make this right. He couldn’t let her down. Not again. Not ever again.

  CHAPTER 47

  THE SECOND PRESSED INTO SERVICE

  Yashar was right, you know,” said Seere, still sitting atop his horse. “You won’t make it through this. Not as you were.”