Ghost in the Winds (Ghost Exile #9)

by Jonathan Moeller

Callatas’s scream of rage echoed through the Court of Justice.

  Chapter 28: Broken Pact

  Morgant killed another winged creature, taking off its head with a swing of his scimitar. His dagger had almost stored up enough heat to unleash another fireball, and he thought he might try to use it against the Grand Master. Once Callatas brought his spells to bear, he would mow them all down like a scythe through the grass. He would probably be warded against the power of Morgant’s dagger, but it was still worth the effort.

  He looked for another foe and then stopped in surprise.

  The creatures upon the ground had stopped attacking. More of the creatures fell from the sky and landed in crouches upon the balconies and the ground, shivering as they landed. Soon hundreds of them had landed, all of them trembling.

  “Are they giving up?” Morgant said.

  “No,” said Annarah, blinking as she cast a spell with her left hand. “No, that’s not it. I think it’s the wraithblood, I think the wraithblood is…”

  Someone let out a startled scream. Morgant turned and saw Nerina Strake shuddering. She stood with her husband Malcolm and the other Ghosts near the Imperial Guards. Morgant hadn’t realized the Ghosts had been carried along in their mad charge to the Golden Palace, but he had been a little distracted.

  Nerina shuddered again, bowing her head, Malcolm gripping her arms. Morgant feared that Claudia’s spell had failed, the one of the nagataaru was about to enter her flesh and transform her.

  If that happened, Morgant would have to kill her.

  “Nerina?” said Malcolm.

  Morgant lifted his weapons.

  “No,” said Annarah. “No, it’s something else.”

  Nerina shuddered, took in a deep breath, and lifted her face, opening her eyes.

  They had changed color.

  A few moments ago they had been the pale, eerie blue of a wraithblood addict. Now they were a bright shade of green, like the color of expensive jade.

  “What happened?” said Malcolm.

  “It is…gone,” said Nerina, as bewildered as Morgant had ever heard her. “The desire for wraithblood. My urge to employ it has…it is just gone. I cannot account for it mathematically.”

  All the winged creatures in the Court of Justice began shuddering at once, and the vast plume of shadow rising from the Mirror of Worlds began to writhe and twist.

  ###

  Caina drew the valikon free, the Padishah’s eyes falling closed as he did.

  “Who was that?” said Kylon, still looking at Callatas. She had expected the Grand Master to attack in a fury, but Callatas seemed frozen with shock, staring at the dead Padishah with chagrin.

  “The Padishah,” said Caina in a soft voice. “Nahas Tarshahzon.”

  Through the Court blazed the vast network of spells that Callatas had worked to power the Apotheosis. The spells still thrummed with power, but now they were shivering, like taut ropes bearing too much weight.

  “Why did you kill him?” said Kylon, holding the valikon in guard position. Around them stood a dozen of the winged creatures, but they had gone motionless, the purple fire in their eyes and veins sputtering.

  “Because he asked me to do it,” said Caina. “Because Callatas used his blood as the base for wraithblood. Because I think the wraithblood doesn’t work without a living base to…”

  As one every single creature in the Court of Justice fell to their knees, threw back their heads, and screamed.

  Nagataaru erupted from their mouths, hundreds of them, and shot into the air, hurtling towards the plume of shadow. As the nagataaru left their hosts, they shrank back into human form, and suddenly hundreds of bewildered-looking wraithblood addicts knelt in the Court. The lines of power along the spells started to snap and unravel, and the huge plume of shadow began shrinking, pulling itself back into the Mirror of Worlds.

  “You banished them?” said Kylon.

  “No,” said Caina. “No. It was the wraithblood. The wraithblood allowed them to possess the addicts. Without the wraithblood, their defenses returned, and…”

  The Mirror of Worlds shuddered, letting out a high-pitched keening sound. The spells upon it were disintegrating, shattering apart, and Caina feared the explosion would kill everyone in the Court of Justice.

  She drew breath to shout a warning, and then more power burned before the vision of the valikarion.

  Callatas stalked towards her, his face twisted with rage, enough power gathered in his left hand to kill both her and Kylon and everyone else around them.

  ###

  The fury screamed through Callatas.

  It was ruined. A century and a half of work, and that wretched woman had ruined it!

  He had been on the verge of saving mankind, of finally replacing the old humanity with the new humanity. A glorious new world had been about to dawn…and somehow Caina had learned the truth, had realized that killing the Padishah would negate the power of the wraithblood.

  Had there been time, he could have captured Sulaman and used his blood to restore the potency of the wraithblood, but it was too late. It was far too late. A century and a half of work had been undone.

  It had been undone…but Callatas himself was not yet defeated.

  He still had the regalia of Iramis. He still had the knowledge he had acquired during his century and a half of labor. With that knowledge, he could leave Iramis and start over again in some other land. Perhaps he could seize control of one of the disputed provinces on the border between the Empire and the insurgent Umbarian Order. One of the Ulkaari provinces, perhaps. Or maybe he could travel to one of the free cities and take control of its rulers, using its population to prepare the Apotheosis again.

  The Apotheosis had failed, but he would work it once more.

  After he killed everyone who had knowledge of it. Most of his principal enemies had gathered here, and he would kill them all. A few Hellfire explosions here and there would throw the rest of Istarinmul into chaos, and he could depart the city. Grand Master Callatas would disappear, leaving ruin in his wake and he would take up the work in a new land with a new identity.

  He would start by killing Caina Amalas.

  She had brought this disaster upon his head. His other enemies had done him great harm, true, Nasser and Annarah and Prince Kutal Sulaman, but Caina had been the one who had catalyzed them, and he would start his vengeance by killing her.

  That, and she and her Kyracian lover both carried valikons, which were the only weapons capable of penetrating his wards. Once they were dead, he could slaughter the rest of his enemies with perfect safety.

  He raised his hand, golden fire flickering around his fingers, and suddenly agony filled him.

  CALLATAS.

  He had heard the voice of Kotuluk Iblis many times before. He thought he had grown used to the horror of it, the malicious and alien contempt, the bottomless fury and rage.

  Never before, though, had the full rage of that terrible voice been directed at him.

  Callatas fell to his knees, in too much pain to continue his spell, too much pain even to stand.

  OUR PACT IS BROKEN.

  Blood poured from his nose and mouth, and he struggled to stand, struggled to work a spell, but the voice came from inside of his head and was beyond all his defenses.

  YOU PROMISED ME THIS WORLD. YOU PROMISED HOSTS TO HOUSE MY VASSALS.

  His vision was turning black, blood leaking from his ears.

  YOU HAVE FAILED!

  “No!” said Callatas. “This is just a setback, only a setback, I will begin the Apotheosis anew in…”

  YOU HAVE FAILED, AND OUR PACT IS BROKEN! YOU PROMISED ME YOUR WORLD, AND YOU HAVE FAILED! NOW I SHALL EXACT MY PRICE FOR YOUR FAILURE.

  “I have not failed!” said Callatas. “I shall work the Apotheosis, I…”

  Ribbons of shadow burst from the plume of darkness, wrapping around him and lifting him off his feet as they dragged him towards the Mirror of Worlds.

  YOUR WORLD IS LOST TO ME, BUT
YOUR UNENDING TORMENT SHALL BE AN AMUSING DISTRACTION.

  The chains of shadow wrapped around him, dragging him to the gate, and Callatas screamed.

  ###

  Caina stumbled back as the nagataaru dragged the screaming Callatas towards the Mirror of Worlds.

  The plume of shadow collapsed, the nagataaru pouring through the gate and into the netherworld. Without any wraithblood addicts to possess, the nagataaru were being pulled back into the netherworld, and the gate was the easiest way back. Callatas vanished into the swirling darkness, and Caina heard him screaming and pleading and shouting empty threats. She didn’t know what would happen when he passed through the gate and into the netherworld. Perhaps she should pursue him and kill him there.

  “No!” said Samnirdamnus. “He has broken his pact with Kotuluk Iblis, and the lord of the nagataaru does not forgive failure. I suspect the Grand Master will rather wish you had killed him. Brace yourself!”

  Callatas’s voice rose in a terrified scream, and then the nagataaru, all of the nagataaru, vanished into the shimmering gate of gray light.

  An instant later the Mirror of Worlds shattered with a thunderous cracking noise, and a gale of hot air howled through the Court of Justice. The wind knocked Caina from her feet, but Kylon caught her, and she shielded her face from the wind and the debris. For a moment the howling wind continued, and then died away.

  Silence fell over the Court of Justice, shocking after the sounds of combat.

  Hundreds of wraithblood addicts looked around in confusion. The Kaltari warriors and the Imperial Guards regained their feet, watching for new foes, but there were none. The Mirror of Worlds was a twisted wreck, the frame broken, shards of glass piled upon the ground. All trace of Callatas’s spells had vanished.

  The Apotheosis was over.

  Caina turned and saw Sulaman and Mazyan approaching, Morgant and Annarah and Nasser following. Sulaman looked at his father in his chair, and then at Caina, his face pained.

  “I’m sorry,” said Caina.

  She seemed to hear something inside of her head, a dull throbbing sound. Perhaps it was her own pulse.

  “He asked it of you, I know,” said Sulaman. “You did what he could not, for he knew that his sacrifice would save our people.”

  “Yes,” said Caina, blinking.

  The throbbing sound seemed to get louder and louder, like a beating heart.

  “The shadow,” said Samnirdamnus. “I did not lie to you. The shadow was your choice to accept me, cast backward through time. But shadows can merge. There is another choice, and the moment is upon you.”

  Sulaman was saying something, and so was Kylon, but Caina didn’t hear it.

  The heartbeat seemed to get louder and louder.

  Caina walked across the Court of Justice, towards the shattered mirror, and a glint of metal caught her eye even as the vision of the valikarion saw the waiting arcane force.

  The Staff, Seal, and Star of Iramis lay discarded upon the ground, the broken glass glittering around them. Callatas had not taken them with him to his torment at Kotuluk Iblis’s hands. Both the Staff and the Seal shone with power to her eyes.

  The sound of the heartbeat was coming from the Star.

  “Caina?” said Kylon.

  She stopped next to the relics, lifting her hands. As she did, she saw the veins of smokeless fire in her flesh…veins that now pulsed in time to the heartbeat coming from the Star. She glimpsed her reflection in a shattered piece of the Mirror of Worlds and was shocked by how gaunt and drawn she looked, how the smokeless fire filled her eyes.

  Smokeless fire that now pulsed in time to the heartbeat coming from the Star of Iramis.

  The Star of Iramis. What was it? The Staff was a relic to summon spirits from the netherworld. The Seal was a relic to bind and command those spirits. But what was the Star? A source of power?

  Or was it something else?

  It was calling to her, both to her and to Samnirdamnus.

  Caina knelt and put the Seal upon her left hand, gripping the Staff with the same hand.

  With her right hand, she gripped the Star and stood up.

  “The star,” she whispered, remembering the prophecy she had heard on the day of the golden dead. “The star is the key to the crystal.”

  It was this Star, she knew. This was the Star that she had been told about.

  And the crystal…

  Caina stared into the glowing depths of the crystal, and the cosmos seemed to explode through her mind.

  Chapter 29: Key

  The Star wasn’t a crystal.

  It was alive. It had a will and a mind, and as she stared into it, that mind reached out and touched hers.

  The touch almost killed her.

  The power howled through Caina, and she gasped, leaning upon the Staff for balance.

  The raw power exploded through her, filling her mind and threatening to overflow her. She leaned upon the Staff, trembling, and felt Kylon grab her arms. The Star blazed in her hand, and she felt something within it answering to something within her.

  No. Not something within her. Something within Samnirdamnus.

  “What are you doing?” said Caina.

  “You were the one I sought,” said Samnirdamnus. “The one I have been looking for, the one who could wield my power without corruption. Have you not already done so? There is one more task for you to do with my power. Behold!”

  The Star seemed to explode inside of her mind, power beyond imagination welling up from the thing.

  In that awful instant, Caina understood.

  The Star could speak to her because of Samnirdamnus because it was kin to him. Callatas had carried the Star for a century and a half, but he hadn’t been able to control it properly, and the one time he had used it, he had almost burned himself alongside Iramis. But even Callatas with all of his dark wisdom had failed to understand what the Star really was, what it had been all along.

  It wasn’t a crystal.

  It wasn’t a source of power.

  It was alive.

  Specifically, it was the Azure Sovereign himself, hibernating in material form.

  Caina had learned long ago that sometimes powerful elemental lords came to the material world to hibernate, to rest from their labors. The city of Cyrioch was built over one such slumbering elemental, while the destruction of Old Kyrace had been caused by the premature awakening of another elemental lord.

  The history of it burned through her mind, drawn in an instant from the Star. Long ago, the Azure Sovereign had gone into hibernation, entrusting his material form to the first loremasters of Iramis. The loremasters had executed their charge faithfully, guarding the Azure Sovereign until Callatas had stolen the Star.

  Now the Azure Sovereign rested in Caina’s fingers, awakening at last in answer to the touch of his vassal in Caina’s flesh. The lord of the djinn began to stir in response to the Knight of Wind and Air, his power flooding towards his faithful vassal.

  Which meant the power flooded into Caina.

  Which meant, in that instant, she held the power of a god in her hands.

  Maglarion and Kalastus and the Moroaica and Ranarius and Cassander and Callatas and so many others had been willing to murder uncounted thousands for this kind of power, and it had fallen into Caina’s hand.

  She would have laughed if she had not wanted to scream.

  Her vision expanded, as it had when Samnirdamnus had shown her the eternal war between the djinn and the nagataaru, and Caina saw the maze of destiny threads rising from the lives around her, weaving into the tapestry of fate. She saw the entire tapestry of the world unfolding before her and knew, at that moment, that she could do anything.

  Anything she wanted.

  She could have lifted the Star and commanded it to kill every living sorcerer in the world.

  The Star could have destroyed the Umbarian Order, shattering them with a thought.

  It could have healed Caina, letting her bear children as she had always wanted.<
br />
  She could have raised Old Kyrace from the depths of the sea.

  Or she could have listened to the darkness that sometimes shadowed her thoughts when she was exhausted and depressed, the darkness that whispered that Morgant had been wrong, and the world did indeed deserve to die for its cruelties and wickedness, and she could have turned the entire world to a lifeless cinder in that instant.

  Only her sheer revulsion at the thought of wielding that kind of power, of anyone wielding that kind of power, saved her in that awful moment. That kind of power would destroy her. And as she looked at the spiraling maze of destiny threads, she realized that if she used the power of the Star in any form, it would destroy her and cause untold suffering.

  One path shone before her like a star in the darkness, one road through the tangled maze of destiny and time and fate.

  She saw Callatas’s destiny thread, terminated when Kotuluk Iblis had claimed his soul. Caina looked back along that dark, blood-drenched thread, back to where it crossed hundreds of thousands of other threads on the day he had burned Iramis, the day this had all started.

  And at that moment, she understood at last.

  “Yes,” said Samnirdamnus. “This is what I sought. This is what I have worked towards since Callatas stole the Star.”

  Caina nodded, lifting her eyes from the burning Star at last. She saw everyone else in the courtyard staring at her, Kylon still gripping her arms. A wave of fierce emotion went through her at the sight of him, and she saw his destiny thread, saw all the pain he had endured to find him again, and she wanted to kiss him then and there.

  She also saw Nasser and Annarah staring at her, Nasser calm as ever, but she saw the dawning hope on Annarah’s face and saw the tangled path her destiny thread had taken to bring her here.

  “The star is the key to the crystal,” said Caina.

  “I don’t understand,” said Kylon.

  “I will show you,” said Caina, and she asked for the Star’s help.

  Smokeless fire exploded around them, and the Golden Palace vanished.