Reign of Gods (Sorcery and Sin Book 2)

by Justin DePaoli

  “He’ll sell the people a promise of hope, but… well, you know Craw. He’s quite the snake oil merchant. Trust me, we’ve a way of culling the people of Avestas. From there, it’s only a small war with giants and demons, and then we win. Gods always win. It’s a shame you’re no longer among our council, Valterik.”

  Valterik bowed his head again, chin in his chest. “If I was…”

  “I know, I know. You’d do something terrible to me. As it is, it’s time for you to go. How would you like to depart? By fire? Or shall I choke the life out of you?”

  “I rather enjoy living.” He snapped his head up, and the ice surrounding Lusilia shattered. Now thawed, the flames hissed as they consumed the hem of her dress.

  She shrieked and froze them again. She flashed a seething grin at Valterik. A shard of ice plunged from the vaulted ceiling, its serrated point aimed at Valterik’s chest.

  It burst into crushed cubes midway down, raining hail onto Elaya and the others.

  Valterik scrambled to his feet. He and Lusilia matched one another’s step, the dance between predator and prey.

  Elaya glanced toward Adom. He tapped a finger on the hilt of his sword, and she nodded.

  Lusilia advanced toward Valterik, slowly. “Here I thought you were desperate to shed your godliness. Even you, the bastion of morals among the Children, finally came to terms with how great our power is, hmm?”

  The marble squares under Valterik’s feet quavered. The edges began sinking under one another, tilting, crumbling. Valterik swallowed and held a breath. The marble flooring steadied, and the squares met with one another, perfectly flush again.

  “Novice sorcery cancels out novice sorcery,” Lusilia said, licking her lips. “I wonder, Valterik. Are you still the god you used to be? The one who could snap my wrist, crush my throat, suck out my eyes—all with a flick of your mind?”

  Elaya climbed over the iced flames, cautiously lifting her feet and setting them down silently. She white-knuckled the leather-wrapped hilt of her drawn sword. Adom joined her, and together they walked in a wide arc, putting them directly behind Lusilia but a good distance away.

  Paya and Kaun knelt behind the frozen fire pit, bows readied, arrows nocked. Tig crouched nearby on the tips of his toes, sword in hand.

  “What’s the use?” Valterik said. He saw Elaya and Adom behind Lusilia but focused determinedly on her face, keeping her attention on him. “You command the future. You always said that; you were so proud of it.”

  Lusilia smiled, and she closed the gap. “It’s the most difficult sorcery to master. Imagine having your hand in a realm at all times, even while you’re sleeping. It takes a great deal of discipline.”

  “Years of practice,” Valterik agreed. He allowed her to come closer. “How many, exactly? A few hundred?”

  She chuckled. “Something like that. So I’ll ask you again. How would you prefer to depart this world?”

  Valterik shrugged. “I’ve already told you. I enjoy living.”

  Elaya crept closer. She drew in a slow, long breath through her nose and held it in her chest. Her fingers, coiled around the haft of her sword, had turned a sickly shade of purple. They throbbed, but with each quiet step she took, her grip tightened still.

  Six, she thought. Another step. Five. Four. Three.

  She stopped at three, and she lunged. The floor under Elaya’s feet heaved, vaulting her into the air. She landed on shoulder, her ribs taking the brunt of the fall. Groaning, she rolled onto her belly. Each breath felt like it would be her last.

  Lusilia spun around, clicking her tongue. “Tsk-tsk. I command the future. There’s nothing you can do, I’m afraid.”

  Two arrows fwhipped through the air, passing over the fallen Elaya. The very air itself appeared to bend and ripple, bowing the arrow shafts and veering them off course.

  “Adom!” Valterik cried. “Move!”

  Adom didn’t question the order. He knew by the tone in Valterik’s voice that hesitation would spell his death. He somersaulted forward, narrowly missing being impaled by a fallen triangular chunk of ice from the ceiling.

  He lay close to Tig, who’d been upended as well. Their eyes met. “Balls,” he said before gingerly getting to his feet.

  Elaya heard something shatter. She touched her head, felt a wet splotch of blood. On her feet now, she swayed uneasily. She felt dizzy.

  “Goodbye, girl,” Lusilia said.

  Elaya didn’t see her, but she heard the voice immediately behind her. She reached for her hilt, but it wasn’t there. It’d fallen from her grasp and skidded across the marble floor.

  “No!” Kaun cried.

  Elaya turned, wobbled and almost fell. Footsteps raced toward her, heavy and unrelenting. She blinked her bleary eyes, attempted to turn once more.

  The sounds of huffs and groans approached. The slapping of footsteps grew louder.

  Elaya finally faced the horror that stood behind her. Lusilia held a spike of ice. Her eyes grinned devilishly, and she pulled the spike back. Elaya stood there, defenseless. Hopeless.

  Lusilia lunged forward. She twisted her body at the last second, readjusting the spike and shoving it through the belly of a sprinting Kaun.

  He fell onto his face, clutching at his stomach. Elaya witnessed a blue, icy tip protruding from his spine.

  “I’m sorry,” Lusilia said. “It slipped.”

  Elaya chucked a fist at Lusilia’s face, but the woman sidestepped it with ease. Another punch, and another dodge. Seething with hatred, Elaya unleashed a flurry of fists, drool slinging from her mouth. She trembled and she shook and her whole face turned red.

  “I’ll kill you!” Elaya screamed, socking the air and tripping over her own feet. She and Lusilia traded positions, putting Lusilia closer to Valterik, who lay on the floor still, eyes closed. He looked like he was meditating.

  “I think,” Lusilia said, “we should say our goodbyes.”

  Elaya huffed. She wiped the spit from her mouth. Her weight shifted to her front as she prepared to lunge for Lusilia. But before she could mount her charge, half of the ceiling collapsed.

  Huge glaciers of ice fell onto the floor, crushing the marble slabs. The rubble formed a nearly perfect straight wall—thirty feet in height—that separated Elaya from Lusilia.

  “Go!” Valterik barked.

  “Elaya,” Adom said, grabbing her by the arm. “C’mon!”

  Elaya ran along the wall, searching for a way in. “Paya, Tig!”

  “Tig’s right here,” Adom said, standing beside the laboring big man. “We don’t have time, come on.”

  “Just go!” squeaked a voice from inside the ice barrier. “Thank you for everything, Elaya, and I love you, but please—please, go.”

  Elaya touched the wall. She reared back and slammed her head into the ice, sobbing. “Paya, no…”

  Adom yanked her by the wrist. She allowed herself to be whisked away, though she made little effort to move her feet.

  “Do you want to die?” he asked. “Pick your feet up and move.”

  “Yes!” she screamed. “I do want to die. So let me.”

  “I’m not doing that. Tig, pick—”

  Tig didn’t wait for Adom to finish his thought. He picked Elaya up and threw her over his shoulder. He and Adom jogged to and through the open doors of the palace.

  They didn’t stop until they were off the plateau, onto the smooth, descending path of the mountainside. And only then because they were out of breath.

  “Keep walking,” Adom said, pounding his chest. “We don’t stop until our legs give out.”

  “We let her die,” Elaya said, voice muffled by Tig’s shoulder.

  “It was either Paya,” Adom said, “or Paya and all of us.” He looked back to the City of Ice. “I damn well hope that remains true.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  Lavery expected to find himself in the shadowy past, where the world was a thick haze and a gray film. Instead, he found only the color of blackness surroundi
ng him. Total, obliterating darkness.

  He quickly discovered he was in what seemed to be a cave. He’d walked the parameter several times and found no passage that led out of the small, circular room he was currently in. He got down onto his knees, feeling around on the lumpy, jagged floor of rock. He hoped there was a trapdoor or maybe a tunnel leading away, but no. Nothing.

  Had Lusilia tricked him? Had he put his trust in the wrong person again? Maybe it was a mistake. People made mistakes; Lavery had made plenty. Fortunately, this one was easily rectified. He’d simply return to the present, tell Lusilia what had happened, and she’d take him to the appropriate time and place in the past.

  Easy as that.

  Except it wasn’t. Lavery couldn’t Walk back into the present. It felt like something was hovering over him, an invisible cloud that prevented him from Walking. How could this be? He’d never before failed to Walk, even when he was tired and near the point of exhaustion—maybe his Walks were short and miserable then, but they were never impossible.

  A loud thump startled him. It sounded like it came from just beyond the wall.

  “Hello?” called a man. He sounded somewhat familiar, but Lavery couldn’t put a face to the voice.

  “Help me,” Lavery called out. “I think I’m stuck.”

  “Bah!”

  Lavery waited, but he heard nothing more. “Hello? Are you still there? My name is Lavery Opsillian. Um, I’m twelve years of age, and… um… I think I’m lost. Hello?”

  Another bout of silence. Lavery slumped against the rear wall of the cave, sliding down to his butt. He should have never let Lusilia take him into the past; that was where everything had gone wrong. Probably since he himself hadn’t performed his Walk into the past, he couldn’t return to the present.

  A faint buzz electrified the air, and Lavery thought he saw a weak, insignificant flash of light pop like a spark before him. Something moved, shuffling along the floor. Lavery crawled away from it, along the curvature of the wall.

  “All right,” said a man. He had the same voice as the man who had called out to Lavery moments ago, but he was much closer now. In fact, it seemed he stood over Lavery.

  “Lavery,” he said, “this was a gigantic pain in my ass, procuring all this nonsense. But I’m happy you’re not hurt.”

  “Haren?”

  “Long story,” Haren said. “Stay put.”

  Lavery heard Haren stumble across the way, muttering to himself as he went.

  “All right. Now, you pour this into this, I believe. That into this, this into that. Oh, my… was it the other way around? No, no, couldn’t have been. Right. Shake it like so until it becomes a paste, which I can’t bloody see because it’s bloody black as bloody tar in here.” He cleared his throat. “Spread it out like such. Good. Now, straw. Where’s my straw?”

  Lavery heard him rummaging frantically through pockets.

  “Ah, there it is. Right. Make a path here, nice and tight. Nice and long. And then we come back here, far away.” Another clear of his throat. “Lavery, face the wall, will you? And close your eyes.” He paused. “Also, your ears. Good. Now a quick flick of the wrist like so.”

  Lavery plugged his ears but could still hear the grinding of steel on steel. His hearing, however, painted an inaccurate picture, for the sound was actually iron flicking against a solid chunk of flint.

  The next sound he heard was that of panicked footsteps thumping closer and closer and—

  “Here we go!” Haren said, hugging and shielding Lavery with his body.

  A great explosion rocked the cave. Dust and rock shards rained down from the ceiling, and Lavery thought for a moment that the entire structure might come crashing down.

  “Come, come,” Haren urged, getting Lavery to his feet. The two of them hurried through a newly created opening into a mountainous terrain of knee-high snow. The sky above was ashy.

  “How did you know I was here?” Lavery asked, squinting. His eyes weren’t accustomed to the light yet, and the brilliant white snow burned them.

  “Only five unused Obviators in these lands. Figured you’d be in one of them.”

  “What’s an Obviator?”

  “The Children built them during their war against one another. It blunts sorcery, makes it entirely useless. I’ve no idea how they work. But—”

  “Did you lie to me?” Lavery asked.

  Haren lifted his brow. “What?”

  “The Wraith Walker Order. Does it exist?”

  Haren washed a hand down his face. “I felt the Ancient Lands would keep you safe. I couldn’t have—”

  “Safe!” Lavery shouted, beside himself. “There’s no food here. It’s so cold. How is that safe?”

  “You’re a Wraith Walker, Lavery. And you’re smart. I had faith if you were hungry or thirsty enough, you’d Walk deeply enough into the past, when this was a lush land and filled with life.

  “The City of Ice was supposed to be empty, and I intended on meeting you there after I investigated several matters. I couldn’t have known Lusilia would be there. Do you know why that woman didn’t kill you?”

  Lavery shook his head. “Kill me? What? She—”

  “She thought you might have some of your mother in you. Or rather, all of her in you. She thought you too powerful, frankly. Not worth the risk.”

  “My mother… it’s true, then? And you’re my uncle?”

  Haren took Lavery by the hands. “Yes, and I am sorry I lied to you. But listen, Lavery—this is very important. We’re going for a Walk, and you must come with me.”

  “Where am I right now? I thought I was in the past, but it doesn’t feel like I am.”

  “You’re in the present.”

  “That’s not possible. You can’t Walk from one location in the present to another.” He paused. “Can you?”

  Haren smiled. “Do you remember when I first met you, and I told you there was much about Wraith Walking you did not know?”

  Lavery nodded.

  “This is one of those things. Walking through the present allows you to cover great distances, and—most vitally, I think—it doesn’t leave your physical self behind like Walking to the past or future does. Now, hold my hand. We’re—”

  Lavery yanked his hand back. “Wait! I can’t go with you. My mother… she… well, she’s imprisoned in the past.”

  Haren squared himself to Lavery. He crouched, his eyes level with Lavery’s. “Listen to me. Your mother is not in the past.”

  Lavery’s mouth formed a little o. “She’s in the present, then? Where? I must—”

  “No!” Haren growled, grasping Lavery tightly by the arms. He bowed his head, sighing. “Your mother’s fate has already been decided. She has left you her legacy. If we don’t hurry, I promise you that you will tarnish it.”

  Be strong, Lavery told himself. Be firm. “Everything will be okay if I do as you say?”

  Haren looked away for a moment, returning to Lavery with creased eyes. “At least we’ll have a chance. Valios,” he said in a low voice, smoothing out a patch of snow under his foot. “Your mother left you a gift there, in your quarters. What used to be your quarters.”

  “What kind of gift?”

  “You’ll see. Grab onto me. I can take us there before you can snap your fingers.”

  “I’m a good snapper,” Lavery said, smiling.

  Haren looked hard into the distance, a hand in his thick black mane. His hair reminded Lavery of a raven’s plumage. Minus the quills, of course.

  “Uncle Haren? What is it?” Lavery squinted at the snow-gray horizon, but no matter how much he focused and in which he direction he looked, he could see nothing. Certainly he did not see the shape of a calcified dragon wing slicing through the air as his uncle had.

  Haren regarded Lavery with a reassuring smile. “I thought a caravan, but no. Nothing. Now, your hand, please.”

  Lavery fitted his hand inside his uncle’s. “Ho—” How. That was the word Lavery had intended to utter, but the An
cient Lands before him were sucked away. A sleek blackness gobbled them up. Lavery felt neither scared nor comforted by the abyss. It wasn’t particularly threatening. It lay there rather limply, like a sheet pulled over a cot.

  Then the abyss vomited the world back up, throwing forth all its pieces and parts like a ribbon being pulled from the sleeve of a magician. The layout was different, though. Clover replaced the snow, and rolling rock-hewn hills chewed up the landscape. Familiar walls stood a few hundred paces away. Lavery remembered them fondly, but there was something wrong with them. Something not quite right.

  Lavery emerged from behind a crop of rock. He began a mindless walk straight to the Valiosian walls, as if seduced by a voice he could not reject.

  “Lavery!” Haren barked, chasing after his nephew.

  “It’s been attacked,” Lavery said, his mouth agape. “Look! The walls, they’re broken. And I see smoke coming from the rooftops. The parapets—” He shook his head, eyes welling with tears. “There’s no one up there.” He looked to Haren for reassurance. “War?”

  “More or less. I don’t believe anyone is here, not from the cursory search I did before I freed you from the Obviator. Still, stay close to me.” Lavery tried pulling ahead, but his uncle yanked him back. “I mean it, Lavery.”

  The two walked cautiously to where the Valiosian gate had once stood. The portcullis was bent and mangled, driven partway into the soil as if struck with a celestial hammer. Most sections of wall stood valiantly, but others had crumbled—very clearly crumbled, not fallen, not toppled over, not smashed into pieces by a rock-slinging trebuchet. Crumbled. Collapsed, as if an immense weight had borne down on them, buckling the sections of wall at their knees.

  Lavery and Haren stepped over chiseled blocks of rock and made their way into the heart of Valios. It was a heart that they soon discovered had turned black and dead.

  The cobbles lay crushed, many having been sunk deep into their sandy base beneath. Doors had been torn off shops, and charred wood flaked off support beams, tossed along in the wind.