Journey Into Nyx

by Jenna Helland

  “Who’s there?” he cried.

  “We are fellow travelers,” Brimaz replied. “We’re horrified by what’s happened here. Who did this?”

  “Heliod has turned his back on us,” the man said. “He has forsaken us.”

  Ajani came and knelt beside the man. “I am a healer,” he said. “May I help you?”

  The man swiped at the air with his bloody hands as if to ward Ajani away. “No, leave me to my fate.”

  “Why do you believe this is your fate?” Ajani asked. His voice was a low rumble of reassurance.

  “Heliod and Nylea have joined together,” Stelanos said. “They intend to destroy everyone who once loved them. I was a priest at Heliod’s temple, and we were forced to flee with just our lives.”

  “What is the state of Meletis?” Brimaz asked.

  The man made a choking sound. “Ephara protected the polis from utter destruction, but she didn’t care about saving Heliod’s priests. To her, it was good riddance for the wayward children of the furious god.”

  “Have you other news of the pantheon?” Ajani asked. Stelanos seemed to deteriorate in front of their eyes. His mouth was dry, and he was having a hard time formulating words.

  “Mogis and Iroas are fighting in the deepest corner of Nyx, and they haven’t been seen since the satyr ascended,” Stelanos whispered. “Nothing is known of Pharika and Phenax.”

  “May I get you water, brother?” Ajani said. “Is your flask empty?”

  Stelanos cradled the ceramic flask against his chest. A picture of Heliod’s winged horse was painted on the long neck, and words of his teachings ran around the base. WHAT IS, IS, AND EVER SHALL BE.

  “No, I have what I need right here,” Stelanos said.

  “Who blinded you?” Ajani asked. “Was it Heliod?”

  “When he purged his temple he accused us of working with the murderer Elspeth and her lover, the satyr,” Stelanos said. Elspeth covered her mouth with her hand to keep from protesting. “He blinded me as we fled the gates of the city. Once we neared the forest, Nylea’s minions trailed us. So we turned toward Oreskos, thinking we might beg the leonin for help. But her beasts overtook us and mauled my friends, but they let me live.”

  “Why do you think they let you live?” Ajani asked gently.

  Stelanos turned his head away so his blind eyes stared at the horizon. “Perhaps to tell you, whoever you are,” he said. “They will not stop until they recover the sword from Elspeth the Betrayer.”

  “Please let us help you,” Ajani said. “You could travel with us. We’re seeking the army of humans and centaurs to aid them in this fight. Heliod is misinformed. Perhaps there is a way to set things right.”

  Stelanos shook his head. “No, I must accept my fate. Leave me here. Let me find my end in my own way.”

  “Let us at least bury your dead,” Brimaz said.

  “Leave us as a warning to others,” Stelanos said. “The gods have forsaken us.”

  Ajani stood up, and Brimaz signaled his men to move around the crossroads and continue toward the gate. Even after they’d left him behind, Elspeth kept glancing back. Finally, Stelanos lifted the flask and drank. Then he crumpled to the ground and didn’t move again.

  “Nightshade,” Ajani told Elspeth as the scene faded in the hazy air behind them.

  Brimaz nodded gravely. “Erebos had offered him his cup of resignation, and he could see no option but to drink it. Humans cleave to destiny when they should embrace the unknown instead.”

  Brimaz’s warriors crossed into the long shadow of the Cypress Gates. The sun was just about to sink behind the mountains, and the temperature was dropping quickly. As Nyx began to emerge above them, the ring of blackness still dominated the sky. For the first time since Xenagos had ascended, Elspeth could see the faint forms of animals in the stars. They seemed to be in motion, scattering in all directions away from Xenagos’s black ring. There were no god-forms, and mostly the heavens were just a mass of astral clouds and chaotic points of lights.

  The Cypress Gates framed an opening in the sawlike ridge of mountains. The highest point of the ridge was almost seven thousand feet, but far to the north. The Gates themselves were each about five hundred feet high.

  No one spoke in the gathering twilight. Ajani’s ears twitched as he tried to decipher any sound that might reveal hidden enemies. They entered the throatlike passage between the mountains where the rocks on either side had erosion patterns that formed chasms—arched tunnels deep into the mountains themselves. They were well inside the pass when a small slide of pebbles trickled down the mountainside.

  “Ambush,” Brimaz yelled.

  Immediately, the leonins grouped into a defensive circle. A row of kneeling leonins held their shields edge to edge while a second line of leonins standing behind them readied their spears against any onslaught. Ajani and Elspeth stood in the middle of the formation. Their eyes scanned the towering cliffs above them. Black-clad figures emerged from the darkness of the warren of eroded rock at the base of the surrounding mountains. They surrounded the leonins but didn’t attack them. There was a moment of silence, and it felt like everyone was holding their breath.

  “No stars,” Elspeth whispered to Ajani. “They’re not Nyxborn creatures.”

  “Why do you wish to enter the Nessian?” a woman demanded from above them. She was perched on a ledge about ten feet above them. They couldn’t see her features in the darkness, but they could see her bow outlined against the starry sky. Light flashed in the heavens and revealed the woman’s face. But Elspeth had already recognized the voice: Anthousa.

  “I know her,” Elspeth told Brimaz. “Should I call out to her?”

  Brimaz seemed to consider this idea while Anthousa spoke again: “Answer me or I will cut you down.”

  Brimaz nodded his approval to Elspeth, who shouted: “Anthousa! It’s Elspeth. We mean to join your cause.”

  There was a moment of surprised silence, and then the woman disappeared from the ledge. The dark-clad figures didn’t alter their aggressive postures. If anything, they circled the leonins more tightly. There was the sound of hurried footsteps, and a torchbearer approached them from inside the mountain. Elspeth glimpsed Anthousa talking to several Setessan warriors just outside the entrance. Finally, she strode toward the wary leonins.

  “Let me see the woman who calls herself Elspeth,” Anthousa demanded.

  The leonins moved aside, and Elspeth crossed over to her. Anthousa took the torch and shone it directly on Elspeth’s face. When she saw it was really her friend from Meletis, she reached forward and embraced Elspeth. Her soldiers lowered their weapons, and the leonins followed their example.

  “I thought you were dead,” Anthousa said. “We found Daxos … but no trace of you. I heard Nikka joined the Nyxborn, but I don’t know what to believe anymore. Let’s get inside where we can talk away from the eyes of Nyx.”

  Later, after Brimaz’s warriors had been fed and given places to rest for the night, Anthousa led Ajani, Brimaz, and Elspeth up through the mountain, which was a maze of passages and chambers both natural and crafted by mages. Throughout the ages, the armies who had held the gates had transformed it into a natural fortress. But despite the thick rock and deep chambers, Elspeth doubted it would be enough to withstand the forces of the gods. She had already told Anthousa her plan to travel to Nyx and kill Xenagos, but Anthousa didn’t respond. Instead, she led them toward the rocky pinnacle of the Cypress Gates.

  Finally, they stopped at a ladder underneath a wooden trapdoor built into the roof of the passage. Anthousa muscled open the door, and they all climbed into the open night air on the bare rock of the mountaintop. Xenagos’s wheel of darkness churned in the sky above them, and the few visible stars seemed to be at its mercy, like sparks thrown from a grindstone. Elspeth thought of Stelanos’s body lying at the crossroads, somewhere in the pitch black of the valley below them. If Erebos was the lord of the Underworld, it must be a wretched place, but maybe there was a tranquil
corner. If so, she prayed that Stelanos would find it.

  “Soldiers from Meletis, Akros, and Setessa are all sheltering here,” Anthousa explained. “We’re amassing supplies. We can make it a long time, if necessary. We just have to hold this line of mountains.”

  Anthousa pointed at the ridge on the other side of the valley. It looked like a vast field of stars glittered on the ground. Elspeth had the impression that the old Nyx had fallen like a blanket and come to rest in the mortal realm.

  “What is that?” Brimaz asked.

  “That’s the shining essence of the Nyxborn army,” Anthousa said. “They’re preparing an all-out assault. We must defeat them here, or the gods will have triumphed in their misguided war. If they cross this line, then Setessa will fall. Meletis would be next.”

  “If Ephara and Karametra join the rest of the gods …” Ajani began.

  “Then the mortal world is finished, no matter what happens here,” Anthousa said grimly.

  “I offer you my warriors,” Brimaz said. “We will force the Nyxborn to slink back to the silence of the sky.”

  “You are very welcome to fight beside us,” Anthousa said. “But my hopes are with you, Elspeth. Killing the satyr will restore the pantheon. I have faith that when he is gone, Nylea will come to her senses and stop this war.”

  “We must get to the coast and Siren’s Shipyard,” Ajani said. “What is the fastest way?”

  “It’s too dangerous for Elspeth to enter Nylea’s forest,” Anthousa said. “We will give you a boat, and the currents of the Sperche River will carry you to the sea by morning.”

  Elspeth and Ajani spent a restless night drifting down the river in a rustic fishing boat that was barely big enough for the both of them. The starry eyes of god-spies peered from the inky darkness, and Elspeth huddled low in the boat with her hood obscuring her face. With the craggy ridge of limestone mountains on their left, they traveled swiftly down the currents of the Sperche. Soaring seagulls marked the spot where the brownish river emptied into a sparkling blue bay. Flanked by bone-white cliffs, the bay would have been picturesque except for the dozens of ships that lay broken and humbled in the pounding surf.

  “We found Siren’s Shipyard,” Ajani said.

  Elspeth tried to stretch the stiffness out of her neck. “I think that’s a safe guess,” she agreed.

  As they drifted into the bay, she counted no fewer than fifteen triremes breaching out of the water or shattered against the rocks. The mouth of the bay was a treacherous combination of strong currents and submerged rocks. Giant obsidian boulders blown from Mt. Velus littered the shallows, and the rocky cliffs formed a perimeter around the water. Caves pockmarked the cliffs and housed a colony of sirens who considered this coastline to be their rightful domain. With its access to the Sperche River, the bay might have been an ideal trade route inland. But no sane-minded captain chose to navigate these waters. And those lured by the sirens were doomed to never leave.

  Ajani and Elspeth managed to land the fishing boat on a narrow beach at the foot of a navigable path leading up to the top of the cliffs. As soon as her boots hit the shore, Elspeth had the sense of being watched. Ajani felt it, too, but he motioned for Elspeth to lower her blade as they trudged up the steep slope. A shrieking siren careened out of a hollow in the rock and soared to the top of a splintered mast where it could watch them ascend the rock. The siren had the form of a woman but with indigo wings and feathered legs. It bared its sharp teeth and shrieked with malice.

  “The sirens mean to lure us to our death,” Elspeth reminded Ajani. “I don’t feel like dying today.”

  “They only have power to lure things in Thassa’s domain—so a ship upon the water is in extreme danger,” Ajani said. “But since we may find ourselves sailing shortly, a little protection is in order.”

  Ajani made no outward signs that he was casting a spell. But it was just seconds before Elspeth felt his magic sweeping over her like a beam of sunshine on a winter’s day. The siren perched on the mast screamed in annoyance. Sirens could sense the casting of magic, though not the specific nature of a spell.

  “That was as easy for you as snapping your fingers,” Elspeth said appreciatively. “Were little spells always so easy. So does that come with being an elder?”

  “An elder?” Ajani asked with mock offense. “Among my people, I’m considered in the prime of life.”

  More sirens had joined their sisters on the broken ships. They lined the edges of the ruined boats like vultures waiting impatiently for a feast. Ignoring their watchers, Elspeth and Ajani scrambled up a prowlike rock that jutted out over the ocean waves.

  “I believe we’re standing on Weeping Rock,” Ajani said.

  “What are the inscriptions?” Elspeth asked.

  Near the edge, countless names were scratched into the rock. There were also symbols of the gods etched into the stone, and some of those glowed faintly against the dark gray rock. When she knelt down to get a better look at the inscriptions, she was startled to see dozens of figures below her on the narrow slip of land beneath the overhang of Weeping Rock. They wore golden masks, like the centaur she and Daxos had seen that day in the Despair Lands. They milled aimlessly in what little space they had along the ledge above the water. They took no notice of each other or the crashing surf.

  “Of those who died here, some have returned,” Ajani said sadly, looking down at the strange congregation on the rocks below them.

  “Can’t we help them?” Elspeth asked.

  “They have no human needs,” Ajani said. “We can’t heal them or take away the pain. They don’t care about food or comfort.”

  “Who are they? The sailors of these ships?”

  “Many, yes. But Weeping Rock is where the heartbroken come to write the names of the lost,” Ajani said. “Their grief is so profound that many Returned are called to revisit. Although they have lost their memories, the Returned are drawn to places that had great importance in their lives.”

  “How do you know this?” Elspeth asked.

  “I’ve been here before,” Ajani said. “Even before you told me where you got your sword, I was familiar with Theros. The Returned are tragic. Although I have tried, I have found no way to help them.”

  Above the crashing of the waves, they heard the sirens begin their song. It was hauntingly beautiful, and despite Ajani’s spell, Elspeth could feel a tug of desire to draw closer to them. But Ajani placed his hand on her back, and she was overcome with a sense of well-being. Unaffected by the alluring melody, they stood on the very tip of Weeping Rock and gazed out at the tumultuous sea and the endless horizon.

  “We need to find a mariner,” Ajani mused.

  “You don’t happen to have a seashell?” Elspeth asked. “Lanathos said you had to throw in a shell with the likeness of a kraken into the water.”

  “No, I don’t,” Ajani muttered, lost in thought. Elspeth scanned the ground in case there was an obvious solution. Maybe certain shells naturally bore a likeness of the kraken on them. But there were no seashells this high up on Weeping Rock. Even down on the beach where they had landed their boat, the beach had been covered with pebbles but not shells.

  “Why can’t we just sail a boat straight for the horizon and hit the edge of the world?” Elspeth asked.

  “The world isn’t linear, and Kruphix doesn’t like strangers,” Ajani said cryptically.

  Over the water, the sirens screamed with fury when their song failed to affect the interlopers. Dozens of them took to the skies, wheeling and screeching above them.

  “What happened to your friend, Daxos?” Ajani asked unexpectedly. “The one who was killed at Akros?”

  “You ask me that now?” Elspeth said, incredulous. “This doesn’t feel like the right time.”

  “It feels like a good time to me,” Ajani said.

  “Why?” Elspeth demanded. “Should I scrawl his name on Weeping Rock like some heartbroken widow?”

  “People grieve in different ways,” Ajani sai
d as the wind picked up. The waves crashed beneath them, drowning out the frantic cries of the sirens. “I just want to understand what happened.”

  “I lost a friend,” Elspeth said quietly. Ajani tipped his head as if he couldn’t hear her. So she shouted the words again. And then she said more quietly, “And unless you can make it hurt less, I don’t want to talk about it.”

  “That’s your right,” he agreed. Beneath them, spray soaked the Returned, and Elspeth despised their pitifulness. In life, they had visited Weeping Rock, sick with grief, at one time or another in their abbreviated lives. What a useless fate.

  “So are we just going to stand here?” Elspeth asked. “Or are we going to find a way into Nyx?”

  The sirens soared in choppy little circles and made precarious dives stopping just short of the rough waves. Annoyed by Ajani’s silence, Elspeth began to repeat her question. But when she glanced at Ajani, she realized he was deep in concentration. His eyes were glazed over with light, and his muscles were rigid with concentration. It occurred to her that he’d been casting this spell for a while, maybe since they stepped on Weeping Rock. His spine was curved by the effort of whatever he was trying to do.

  An eerie light shone under the waves. Then a large dark object began rising under the gray-green water near the surface. When it first broke through the water, it was surrounded by a shimmering golden mist, and Elspeth couldn’t tell what it was. But as the mist dissipated, she saw a ship. It looked ancient and more raptorial than the sleek ships she’d seen in the harbor in Meletis. It was a simple galley with a beaklike bow and a single row of oars along each side. The oars were narrow and starkly white against the dark wood of the hull. There was a single mast with a dark green sail that was undamaged by its time under the water. The sail was stretched tight in a white frame, and threads of white branched through the membranous material.

  By the time the ship had fully emerged, the sirens had spiraled away back to their caves, frightened by the magnitude of Ajani’s abilities and the mystical emergence of the ship.