Maxian opened his hands, spreading them out and away from him. As he did so, his sight expanded, swelling beyond the immediate confines of the buried chamber and the rings and circles of power. He descended into the universe of forms, and there he beheld the full power of his enemy.
The curse had come against him with all power, a black tide that overtopped the house and filled the whole land around and about him. Maxian shuddered, seeing the enormous malignant strength that arrayed itself against the villa. He felt the bones of the house corrode as the black mist attacked them. He felt the dying of every living thing that did not hew to the Oath for miles around. Inverted lightning rippled along the face of the storm front, black tendrils of corruption lashing at the shields that protected the chamber and those within it. Abdmachus' painstaking work was dying, ground down by the massed will of tens of millions of people, all bound to the Oath and the destruction of this threat.
Maxian's hands blurred into motion, the vortex that roared and raged around him would smash down the barriers in a little time, so he worked quickly. The form and substance of the first Emperor shifted and shuddered on the table before him. He must now find the keystone and invoke it, passing the anchor of the Oath from his brother to this ancient thing. His thought leapt out, burning blue-white through the storm and chaos around the villa.
At a great distance, he could feel the thought and shape of his brother.
– |"Go!" Nikos chopped his hand down, pointing off through the blinding rain in the direction of the villa. The boom and crack of the storm had risen to a pitch that constantly lit the air with a blaze of lightning. Hail and rain were smashing the canopy of the trees to nothing. Men moved in the murk, all around him, running forward down the hill. Nikos held his round shield over his head, trying to keep from being struck down by the fist-sized ice that was falling out of the sky. The temperature had continued to drop, and it was well below freezing.
The Illyrian loped down the face of the hill, feeling the ground sliding and gelatinous under his feet. So much rain had fallen that the ground was beginning to liquefy. Jusuf was hard at his heels, running flat out. Twenty or thirty other men ran at their side-the praetorians had finally managed to reach the hill. Their commander had tried explaining why they were late, but Nikos had been unable to hear him over the thunder. Regardless, the praetorians, bulky in their heavy armor and thick red cloaks, rushed forward with them. The band of men hit the edge of the gardens and scrambled over the brick wall at the bottom of the hill. The wall crumbled under their boots, the bricks shattering and breaking apart at the touch of a hobnail. Two men went down, struggling in the mud. Nikos ignored them and pressed on, bent nearly double in the face of the howling wind.
– |Maxian's thought arrowed out over the broad ocean, his spirit seeing waves and islands and the coastline of southern Italia flash past under him. The sun had set, dropping behind the curve of the world, and the night was dark and moonless. Miniscule lights of cities and towns fell away behind him, and then, sparkling on the surface of the waters, his spirit eye saw the gleam of lanterns. A fleet plunged through the dark sea, great ships cutting through the waves, driven by an eastern wind.
There, in the cabin of the flagship, his brother lay in sleep, dreamless and content in his thoughts of victory. Maxian's will penetrated the walls of the ship, passing guardsmen and sailors on watch, passing unhindered through planks and stays. His brother slept. His thin, narrow face, usually so marked with worry and grim with the concerns of Empire and the state, was peaceful in the light of a single candle. One hand was clasped on his chest, covering an unopened letter.
Maxian hovered over him, looking down on the face of Galen, seeing in him an echo of their gruff father and warm mother. For an instant, memories of old times-in childhood and youth-flooded over him: Galen laughing, holding up a brace of tigery kittens that the barn cat had birthed one summer in Narbo. Galen and Aurelian rolling on the lawn of the summerhouse at Cumae, brambles and twigs in their hair. Maxian reached down, his spirit hand ghostly and indistinct, wavering in the dim light, and brushed back the lock of lank, dark hair that always fell over Galen's forehead.
Pain flashed at the touch, and Maxian froze, feeling the black corruption welling up around him, seeping out of the timbers of the ship, from the close weave of the linen sheets, even from blood and bone of his brother. The Prince felt threat hanging around him, but he steeled his will and made a sign in the air.
The glyph sputtered and flashed, hanging afire in the world of forms. Maxian summoned up a long invocation-carefully memorized and drilled over and over-and let it form in his mind. Despite the lurid descriptions of the popular ballads, the words he summoned did not shape the world. Instead, they served as a mnemonic that described patterns of force that he put into play with his will. Into the shape of his brother as Emperor-a thing that hung like a shroud around the bright golden flame of Galen himself in the world of forms-he sank deep hooks of intent and desire and thought. The curse boiled up around him, black as the pit, and attacked, lashing at him with fangs of deep blue night.
Maxian howled in anguish, feeling the teeth bite into him. But his will did not waver. The shroud of Empire was torn away from the sleeping Emperor, and Maxian fled, all thought focused upon returning to the Egyptian House and the shuddering half-alive corpse of Augustus.
– |A burly praetorian with shoulders like Atlas crashed through the wooden door. It shattered as soon as he put his full body against it, sending the soldier sprawling on the ground amid a cloud of sawdust and broken hinges. Nikos leapt over the man without even pausing and darted down a long hallway. Black mist boiled around his feet, but the dreadful corruption did not touch him. It was a tremendous relief to be out of the storm and under shelter. The hallway was dark, but Nikos had come prepared. He skidded to a halt and unclipped a storm lantern from his belt. Behind him, more praetorians clambered through the doorway, their swords out. Every third man fell aside as they entered and shifted lanterns from their backs. Leather hoods were removed, and flints sparked in the darkness. A flame leapt up, casting a pale yellow glow on the walls and the faces of the men.
Thunder rumbled in the sky, and the crack of fresh lightning sent white bursts of light through the windows. Nikos looked around, finding his squad leaders by the plumes on their helmets. "Break out in groups of five," he rasped in his command voice, "two lanterns with each. Check each room, each hallway, each cupboard. Prisoners are to be taken alive if possible. There is one friendly, a young woman with dark red-brown hair. Go!"
The praetorians clattered off down the hallway, their swords and spears bright in the lantern light. Nikos looked over at Jusuf, who had unslung his bow and had a long dark arrow fitted to the notch. Here, in the darkness, with unknown enemies about, with some undefined conspiracy against the Emperor afoot, the Illyrian wished devoutly for the presence of his old commander, Amazon Thyatis. She never had a queasy stomach on an operation like this. Enough moping, he snarled to himself. He moved forward through the dark house, Jusuf ready at his back with a strung arrow.
Here, in the dim confines of the house, the storm was muted. Trickles of water spilled down out of the ceiling.
– |Maxian fell through clouds boiling with fire. Black flames licked at his spirit form, sending agonizing jolts of pain through his mind. He fell through night sky, curled around the cloak of the Emperor, and was in the buried chamber again. The standing ring of power continued to howl and buzz, rushing around the triangle formed by the three men. Maxian settled again within his body, all concentration focused upon the shifting pattern of forms that he had stolen from his brother. He launched into the next phase of the incantation, all effort at last collapsing upon this one single thing.
At the side of the room, Krista covered her head, flinching aside as rock flakes spalled down out of the ceiling. The house above shuddered like a dying thing, shaking with each new peal of thunder. A fine rain of dirt and rock fell from the roof of the buried chamber.
She had already pulled her cloak over her hair, and crouched at the join between the wall and the floor. The chanting of the Persians and the Nabateans had begun to waver as stone chips pattered down around them. An ominous groaning sound had begun to make itself heard as well, and Krista felt the wall at her back tremble.
Fire rippled in the unseen world, brilliant shapes invoked by the mind of the Prince hovering around the shape of the first Emperor. He felt a gradient growing as he rushed through the invocation; each moment cost him more and more as he bound the shape of the Imperial duty to the corpse. Greedily, the action drew more and more from the old man, the Persian, and the golden youth. Still, Maxian rushed on, heedless, his thought and will stitching the garment of sparkling form to the body of Augustus. In a moment, he knew, he would reach a critical point. He could feel the fury of the Oath raging around him, only bare feet away beyond the shining barrier.
Krista flinched again, feeling wetness along her cheek. One of the Persians cried out as a rock sliver, curved like a scythe, slashed across his eye. The man gobbled in pain, his chanting cut off, and clutched at his eye. As he did so, his hand strayed out of the circle inscribed on the stones of the floor, and he screamed in horrible pain. His hand smoked with dull fire, and as Krista watched, her eyes wide in fear, the man's arm withered and crumbled away. Insane with pain and fear, the Persian leapt up and bolted for the door. His feet went first, corroding to dust in an instant, and then his whole body was consumed. She turned away, keeping her hands and feet inside the circle, curling ever tighter into a tiny ball.
Maxian put forth the totality of his will, grasping the raiment of the Emperor, now bound to the corpse of Augustus, bending his power against the last single silver thread that bound it to the distant, sleeping shape of his brother.
– |Nikos skidded into the dining chamber, his blade up and the lantern flaring in his other hand. Men struggled, crying out, with a fast blur of darkness. A praetorian lunged, his whole weight behind the stroke of his spatha, and missed, cleaving air where a shape had stood only an instant before. A gray-green hand, tendons standing from it like iron bars, snaked out of the darkness and crushed the man's throat. Blood spattered away, soaking fingers that punched into the flesh and tore away the soldier's trachea. Two more praetorians lay dead, scattered on the floor, their arms and legs at odd angles.
Jusuf loosed in the same moment, his bowstring thrumming sharply against his wrist guard. The arrow flickered across the space and sank to the fletching in the chest of the creature.
Nikos stumbled, seeing the thing in the light of the lantern for the first time.
It wore the shape of a man, but its skin was gelid and cold, like the intestine of a snake. It had a man's head, but the yellow eyes that burned in the narrow skull had never been human. It was naked, but its slick, wet body was a confusion of tattoos and scars and long, thin ridges that clung to the curve of muscle and sinew and bone. It blurred into motion, faster than the eye could follow. A lantern was smashed aside, spattering burning oil and broken glass against the far wall. Another praetorian was flung down, bones snapping at the force of the impact, his iron helmet caved in by the blow of a fist.
Nikos cast aside thought and leapt forward, his gladius whispering in the air. He had faced men and beast for twenty years and he could not conceive of an enemy that would not bleed and die at the touch of his sword. The thing whirled to meet him, its claws snapping toward his head and face. The Illyrian twisted, taking the first blow on his shield at an angle. The thick buckler-an oaken roundel covered with a layer of cured hide and then a metal facing bound through with wire-shattered like a cheap amphora. Nikos felt his arm break in two places, and the jolt of pain slashed up into his chest. The claw faded back into darkness and Nikos leapt up, curling his legs under him. A long leg, tipped with claw-like nails, flashed past underneath him. The point of the gladius arrowed at the thing's eyes, smoky yellow in the lamplight. It bobbed away from the blow with effortless ease. It rapped the blade away with a forearm, and Nikos howled in disgust as the blade was torn from his hand. He ducked, feeling the rush of air where his head had been.
Another arrow sprouted from the thing's chest, then another. Jusuf and other men crowded into the room, their bows singing. The thing looked down, seeing the cluster of black fletching dancing in its torso. It looked up, and smiled, its dead mouth stretched into a dreadful grin.
Nikos rolled away, his useless arm blazing with pain. He dragged a long knife from his boot and reversed the point, crouching and circling away. The thing followed him with its eyes. Nikos wheezed in pain, hoping the blood-fire would kick in and elevate him past the crippling damage to his arm. More praetorians, drawn by the sound of battle, rushed in from the other doors.
The homunculus laughed-a long, cruel sound-seeing a feast laid out before it.
– |The entirety of the world collapsed to a single point of glittering white, immensely heavy, and Maxian struggled to contain the power he had summoned. The old man had failed, collapsing into a heap within his triangle of invocation. The golden youth staggered, falling to his knees, his face a rictus of pain as Maxian leached his bones for more power. The raiment of Empire distorted and flexed, slipping away from his will like quicksilver as he tried to fix it to the ancient corpse. Dust spurted up, and the body threatened to dissolve at any moment. Sweat ran in rivers down the Prince's face and soaked his chest. On his forehead the trapezoid of focus burned like a single eye, nearly overcome by the power he had invoked.
Still, the silver thread would not break. Maxian hammered at it with all the strength at his command, trying to sunder the gleaming cord. The Oath raged outside the wards, shattering stone and brick, flooding the upper floors of the house with water and mud, smashing the roof with its fury. The raiment shifted again, sliding away from the face of the old Emperor. Maxian turned his will aside for an instant, fixing the similarity again. The silver cord vibrated like a gong struck by a mallet.
Maxian looked up. At the far, distant end of the silver cord, he saw, for a split second, the face of his brother.
Galen's eyes were open, staring back at him out of a waxy, ashen face.
You murder me, came the thought, speeding across the leagues.
Maxian looked down and saw that the silver cord that ran from the heart of the raiment was the soul of his brother. He flinched away, his will lost for a brief instant.
– |The homunculus howled in joy, its torso slick with the blood of the dead, its claws raising high another praetorian. Entrails spilled from the man's stomach, torn open by a single raking blow. Soldiers surged around it, raining blows from axes, spears, and swords. The thing's dead flesh was hacked and torn, with bright white bones peeking out and half its face carved away. But still it whirled, spilling blood and crushing the faces of its enemies. Manic energy filled it, and shattered flesh reknit itself, bone crawled back to bone. The skin of the creature drank the blood that filled the air.
At the back of the room, Nikos scrambled away, seeing death itself walking in the enclosed space. Jusuf dragged him through the doorway into the hall. The house groaned around him, and tiles and broken timbers clattered from the ceiling.
Khiron closed on the last of the soldiers, a burly youth with a long, iron-headed spear. The man, blinded with fear, charged, screaming in defiance. Khiron turned his body into the blow, catching the point of the spear with his chest. The iron head, tapered and sharp, ground through bone and muscle, scraping across his rib cage. Khiron laughed, his voice ringing from the domed roof, and clawed forward along the shaft. The soldier barely had time to gasp in pain as an iron-tipped thumb punched through his eye socket. Khiron shook its long, lean head in delight and twisted. The man's head tore free from his spine and neck with a sickening pop, and the body fell, twitching spasmodically, to the floor. Khiron bit into the base of the jaw, feeling the flesh part under its white teeth, and tore away the top of the skull with its other hand.
Nikos and Jusuf stumbled away from
the dining chamber, hearing only a little of the gelatinous slurping sound that filled the room. Stone and tile jumped under their feet, shaken by some cataclysm in the earth. The Khazar scooped up his friend and ran, his legs pumping furiously. Nikos tried to protest, but Jusuf just kept running. The door to the garden suddenly appeared out of the murk.
– |The matrices of forms that Maxian had raised shattered in his moment of inattention. The black tide of the Oath stormed in, smashing through the outer wards that ringed the buried room. The Persians and Nabateans wailed in torment and died within a grain, their flesh burned from their bones, souls consumed by the torrent of corruption that flooded into the chamber. Maxian staggered up, whirling around to see the wave of power lash against the innermost shields.
The tide broke, surging up around the final barrier like a sea of acid, but Maxian cried out in horror.
The ward around Krista shattered, crumpling like an eggshell under the foot of an elephant, and she cried out in terrible pain as she was crushed into the wall at her back. Pain burned at her, etching her bones, and she blacked out, falling into a heap on the floor.
The Prince's eyes darkened, and he raised his hand. Words came to his mind, unbidden, and the earth shook. The Shield of Athena that had held to the last suddenly flared bright and expanded, driving back the sea of corruption that surged around him. The shield slid over Krista's body and the Prince knelt, scooping her up in his arms. At his back, Alexandros crawled forward, dragging the still form of the old Roman. The body of the Persian lay behind, unconscious within its triangular ward.
Maxian looked down at the girl in his arms, seeing the deep bruises on the side of her face, feeling the shattered ribs and punctured lung in her chest. Her breathing was thready and bubbled with the sound of liquid spilling into her throat.
"I am a fool," the Prince whispered, seeing his love dying in his arms. He raised his head.
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