by Leigh, J.
“No!” Jathen twisted away and moved back.
Mikkal followed, looking terrified. “It’s our only chance!”
A voice came out of the wind. “It’s your only chance, Mikkal. Leave the boy out of this now. As you’ve lip-serviced may times, he has been through enough.”
Mikkal stiffened. Cradling the Artifact tighter to his chest, Jathen scooped up Hatori’s sword and backed farther away from him. He glanced about but, seeing no speaker, raised the sword and pointed the black steel at the Gray’s sangcordis.
Mikkal called out, “How long have you been following us?”
“Long enough to see you thwarted by a moot with a steel sword.”
Mikkal turned back to Jathen. “I know you are angry with me now, but I swear to you I can explain. I’ll explain all of it later. Right now, just know that I am the far, far lesser of two evils. I swear to you.”
A cold chuckle came across the air. “That is entirely dependent upon your definition of evil.” The voice seemed to flow all around them, bouncing off of snowdrifts, trees, and the ancient rubble, making it impossible to pinpoint. “Did you mention to him, Mikkal, that you have turned into a mere thief? That you have become a rogue who has broken faith with his master and decided to make a god’s choices over life and death?”
“What faith have I broken?” Mikkal shrieked. “What possible mockery is this, to claim I’ve broken some ridiculous faith? To oblivion with things like faith and gods and Children. I have stolen nothing! What I want to restore, I mean to give back to those you took it from. The faith in man, the faith in mortals. A man made this world, shaped it, and defined it as his own! I will give that power back to the world, to the people, and let them decide what to do with it, not some silent watcher who claims to know better than the very hands that first birthed this world.”
“So you’ve taken to the Red’s madness as well, then.” The speaker sounded lightly intrigued. “Interesting.”
“No.” Mikkal let out a bitter laugh. The snow fell stronger, whipping around him in a wintry cloud. “I am not a sheep to follow to the slaughter like Little Sister, claiming some nonsensical faith. And as much as I admire Prothidian the man, I weep for Prothidian the prophet and the follower, the genius misdirected. No, I am something wholly new, and I think I shall let you chew on that awhile, to wonder and ponder how long and how deep my quest is to restore what is rightfully ours to the world.”
“You are nothing new, Mikkal. You are what happens when a mortal tries to take Spirit out of the spiritual.” The voice turned malicious. “Such maneuvers have always failed, and I have always put such dogs down.”
Hoping he’d been forgotten, Jathen had been silently edging his way out of the clearing and back toward their campsite. But Mikkal suddenly dove for him, Clan-quick across the snow. The Grand Artifact came alive and reentered Jathen with a buzz just as Mikkal grasped the blade of the sword with his gloved hand. For a moment, Jathen felt as if the furious Clansman might rip his arm from its socket.
Darkness incarnate suddenly closed in upon them. Seemingly alive, the galvanic current emitted sheer power as it sparked across the ground. Frozen, Jathen gaped in fear, fingers locked around the hilt of the cane. Mikkal yanked on the sword, flinging Jathen directly into the path of the flow.
An explosion of pure energy detonated all around them. It throbbed though Jathen, so painful that death would have seemed a pleasant respite. He was thrown across the clearing, where he landed on his back.
A familiar roar filled the world, so loud he couldn’t identify what element was responsible. Wind, fire, water, earth… they all sound the same when they are raging and angry. But I’ve heard this sound before... in the river, when Mikkal’s wave hit me. Gradually, the clatter and crashing ebbed, and he began to feel his body again. Sore and cold, Jathen realized the sword was still in his hand, and he felt the familiar edge of Ass’shiri’s crossbow digging into his hip. I heard the same roaring with Charmed Wind, too. But how? The Artifact… I hadn’t assembled it until afterward. Hausmannith said there could be jumps in Ability, but this… could this somehow be… me?
Turning his head, he saw that the skin on his arms and hands seemed to have a golden sheen to it. Then the phenomenon faded, and he assumed it a trick of light or his dazed eyes. Directly in front of his face, the Artifact lay with its rings halted and the star dull, no longer glowing. Jathen struggled to his knees and snatched up the Artifact. He looked around and saw that he’d been thrown past the camp to the opposite tree line. Before him, a monstrous cylindrical mass of black metal towered into the sky. Some sort of underground structure, a bunker, maybe…brought to the surface somehow…
Rising, Jathen surveyed the changed landscape. Dirt and rocks had been shifted and moved, but in an oddly neat sort of way.
Not far away, Mikkal sat on the ground, muttering. “Spirit in heaven… the way it feels, it must have been anchored. Spaces within spaces… the Artifact combined with such a Talent… it must draw out the rooms between—” He raised his head and saw Jathen. A twisted mass of hate solidified on his face.
Thinking to flee from such fury, Jathen was stopped by a gentle hand on his shoulder. When he turned, he saw a figure shrouded in a tangle of musty and tattered robes. The beggar. “You,” Jathen murmured.
Mikkal called out, “You have been drawn into a war, Jathen! A thing far greater and far deeper than you can possibly conceive of. There are giants on all sides of this battle. Blows have already been exchanged, and this will have nothing less than a very bloody end.”
The beggar asked, “Is that a promise, Mikkal?”
“It is,” Mikkal said, and then he was gone, swallowed by the night and falling snow.
Jathen sagged in relief, but that morphed into alarm when the strange beggar began strolling away. “Hey!”
The man didn’t acknowledge the call as he headed for the metal structure. Jathen picked up Hatori’s sword, sheathed it, and barreled after the rather spry mystery man. “Who are you? Are you going to explain any of what happened up there?”
“Who are you to know?”
Jathen skidded to a halt. “Excuse me?”
The man stopped and faced Jathen. “You asked if I would explain. I asked you, who are you to know the answers?”
Getting a better look at the building, Jathen could see it wasn’t actually cylindrical but a long, domed shape wedged out of the ground at an angle. The flat foundation stuck out in the open air like a sharp overhang. “I have no idea who I am to you.” Jathen stared at the raggedy man, who reminded him of the Drannic he had met. “Beyond the fact that I am the one with the ruddy Grand Artifact.”
Jathen got the distinct impression his reply amused the hooded man. “Very well, ask your questions.” He turned again and continued toward the edifice. “I won’t guarantee I’ll answer all of them to your liking, however.”
“Fair enough. Who are you?”
“You cannot guess?” The beggar removed one fingerless glove to reveal a pale palm with a round, multicolored tattoo emblazoned upon the skin. When he placed his hand on the side of the massive structure, Jathen saw that the back of his hand was also tattooed. The design was a straight black line with an arc over it. Shorter black lines radiated from the arc down toward the wrist. The image looked like an upside-down sun peeking over the horizon. The man put his glove back on, covering the markings, before Jathen could get a better look.
Jathen knew less about the ragged man than he’d known of Mikkal, but he felt the man was his ally. “You are the one Mikkal was so afraid of, the one the Drannic was waiting for—the Interpreter.”
The man began to stroll along the perimeter of the metal monster. “That is one of my names, though a slightly lesser-known one, to be truthful. It was unsurprising Mikkal was so unnerved when you mentioned it. Only a privileged few know to call
me that.”
“And what was Mikkal to you?”
“Ah, you are a clever boy. He was a protégé of mine, once. No longer, obviously.”
Following the man around the structure, Jathen wondered if the beggar was working some sort of magic he couldn’t detect. “Obviously. Were you the shadow from my dream, the one who warned me?”
“Warned you, did it? No, that was not I.”
“Then why were you up here? Why did you wait for me to stop Mikkal? Why not do it yourself? For that matter, who sent you, and why was a Drannic waiting for you?”
“Now that would be telling too much.”
“All right. If you are the master Mikkal mentioned, then you’re part of Nosalia’s little group. How did you know where to find us?”
“A mix of things. A bit of precognition, a dash of common sense, a flicker of luck, a skill at interpreting Drannic riddles… but mostly your friend Nosalia, who through certain connections and a general distrust of Grays, put in a word or two that reached my ears.”
“Ah.” Jathen nodded, thinking if he ever saw her again, he owed Nosalia a bit of thanks. Perhaps that’s why he feels safe. Nosalia sent him. He stared up at the structure. “What are you going to do with it?”
“My intention had been to use the very thing that uncovered it to recover it.” The man nodded at the Grand Artifact in Jathen’s hand. “But as you seem to have taken possession of it.”
“Too many people have died,” Jathen said, clutching the Artifact tighter. Worry rumbled in his stomach at thoughts of the tiny village below. He was uncertain how much the quaking to bring that dark thing to the surface had affected them already. “I will not allow more.”
“I can see that.” The Interpreter shrugged. “But one cannot just leave such things lying about, so I suppose something must be done.”
“Will you destroy it, then?”
“I must get inside first.”
“Why? Why not just blow it back to the ruddy Pit, along with the rest of Prothidian’s demented dreams? You seem to have the Ability for it, after what I saw you throw at Mikkal.”
“Because I first need to see if ‘blowing it back to the ruddy Pit’ would result in more death than you can possibly imagine.” He tilted his wrapped head, and though Jathen still could not see his face, he got a sense of being addressed as an equal. “Would you like to enter with me? To ensure I’m not up to anything sordid?”
“You’d allow that?”
The Interpreter waved a hand. “You really are incapable of stopping me, and I doubt you could recognize anything disreputable I would be doing, anyway. However, it seems only fair, given what you’ve gone through to this point, to let you see it to the end.”
Jathen laughed. “All right.”
“Good. Come. The door seems to be on the end that’s sticking the farthest out and up.”
“Of course it is.” Jathen snorted, tucking the Grand Artifact into his coat.
The snow had stopped by the time they made their way up a tree and then jumped over onto the strange building’s front. They landed on a metal ridge next to a pair of beat-up metal doors. The structure was bigger than Jathen had realized, easily over a dozen dragon-lengths wide and twice as high.
“I don’t know how deep it goes, but from what I can see, we’re looking at over twenty thousand square heads inside,” Jathen said. “I certainly hope you know what you’re looking for. I’m not really keen on wandering around a place that could hold a few dozen of my bedrooms for hours on end.”
“I do.” The Interpreter pried open one of the doors.
The interior was a black maw so deep it seemed almost like a physical barrier.
“I don’t suppose you have a light?” Jathen asked.
A light bloomed in front of the Interpreter. Though obviously magical, it reminded Jathen of the electrical charm lights back home. The glow bobbed along with the shrouded man as he slipped into the narrow opening.
Jathen tentatively followed him inside. The ceilings and walls lay beyond the reach of their little orb of illumination. Dozens of long metal tables were bolted to the floor in front of them. Twisted shapes of metal and wire in various sizes were on the tables and standing about the room, but Jathen couldn’t discern their use, if they even had any. Broken glass and clumps of dirt littered the floor. The closest comparison to modern day he could make was to a charm engineer’s shop, but he saw no crystals or other accouterments of that office. The place reeked of dust, rust, and stale air, but he also caught an underlying scent of chemicals.
Jathen inched along the sharply inclined floor. “What exactly is this place?”
“A place of mass production.” The Interpreter picked his way across the mess. He seemed interested in getting to one of the long metal tables. The surface was covered in several layers of dust and dirt, as well as a few flat objects Jathen couldn’t discern.
“Mass production of what?”
“Those.” The Interpreter pointed ahead, and a new light bloomed, illuminating the far wall.
Taking up a huge section of the corner were several huge triangular creatures with glassy black eyes. They were easily a hundred fifty heads across from tip to tip. As Jathen stared, he realized they were actually structures made of smooth, discolored metal. Some stood on little wheeled feet, but most lay on their sides, reminding him of the thief Hatori had killed, wings shattered and flightless upon the ground.
“Are they some sort of vehicles?” Jathen asked, thinking of the bolt train in Fauve.
“I believe so.” The Interpreter reached the table and began brushing at the dust. “Made for flight, if I’m not mistaken.”
Intrigued, Jathen studied them anew. Yes, with some imagination, I could say those metal protrusions look like wings. He started to move closer.
The Interpreter stopped him with a bony hand pinching into his shoulder. “I’m not familiar with this type, but a good portion of these Old World flyers were made to cause death and destruction on a gargantuan scale. Do not wander. And do not touch.”
Jathen’s visions of fire came to mind, and he swallowed, nervously sobered. “Is that why you were hesitant to destroy this place outright?”
The hooded head bobbed, and the Interpreter released him.
Another thought hit Jathen. “If those are from the Old World, then we’re standing in a place no one has treaded in for nine thousand years.”
“Correct.”
“It’s in really good shape, considering,” Jathen said, thinking of the sad scraps sitting in Nosalia’s display cases. “I wonder if perhaps it’s in too pristine a condition.”
“Never let anyone say you are not a bright and observant boy, Jathen Monortith,” the Interpreter said, pulling at one of the flat objects he’d picked up from the table. “It is too well preserved, which is why I imagine its presence triggered the Artifact-device in the first place.”
“So there’s some kind of protective ward at play as well.” Prothidian. So Mikkal and Sister were after this place, a room full of things capable of dealing fiery death.
The thing in the Interpreter’s hands suddenly broke with an angry snap.
Jathen stared at it. “What are you doing?”
“Seeking the truth.” His pale fingers glided across the exposed belly of the object. Metal and wires glinted in the light. Then he tugged out something Jathen did recognize from amid the tangle—a crystal.
“A storage quartz?” Jathen asked, as fascinated as he was skeptical. “That thing’s not going to actually work, is it?”
“The information stored is still present. And a Talent’s Ability to comprehend the limited information on one of these ancient ones is more efficient than a crystal reader.”
“So you can just absorb all of what’s recorded on that directly into yo
ur mind?”
“I already have.” He put the tiny bauble into his robes. “Come. This place is safe to destroy.”
“Good,” Jathen said. “I want to help.”
“As I assumed you would. We must gather the parts from the flyers that are capable of destruction. We must do this carefully and place them throughout the facility. We shall then leave, and then I will trigger the chain reaction to set them off. The building is strong and still far enough underground that the resulting fire should be contained.”
“So no one else will get hurt?”
“Not as long as you don’t drop anything volatile.”
“Fair warning… with my luck, I’m likely to.” Jathen sniffed, following the Interpreter over to the flyers.
“I would say your luck is resoundingly sound, Jathen Monortith, considering how many times you’ve been snatched back from death. In my experience—and I assure you it’s extensive—such persons as you are nothing short of Spirit touched.”
“Special?” Jathen smirked in grim humor.
“One can only debate the terminology of a Drannic.”
They went about the task in silence. Jathen held a certain sober reverence for the act of desecrating with the intent of destroying a portion of ancient history. Getting the parts from the flyers involved a bit of pulling and prying at the rusted undersides. Moving with a skill and strength that evoked the image of a Clan body under all those rags, the Interpreter gutted the flyers like fish. He handed the long tubular parts to Jathen, who put them about the room as directed, taking extreme care while handling the torso-sized cylinders.
“They smell like fireworks rockets,” Jathen said after the first round was set.
“You aren’t far off. Though these are thousands of times more potent.”
Jathen was not certain as to the morality of what he was doing, but he justified the plan by reminding himself of a simple set of truths. Mikkal was wrong. Sister and Ishane were wrong. They had killed the people Jathen loved just to get to those flyers. The place must be destroyed.