by Chris Fox
“What? You're going to trigger a self-destruct in the engines?” The demon shook his head. “That will only work if I pull hellforce for you, and you can be damned sure I won’t wound myself to power your suicide machine.”
I held up one finger and backed away from the binding vessel, unspooling the copper wire as I went. “Strike one. Try again.”
The demon grumbled and shifted uneasily inside its binding vessel. “You’ve finally come to your senses and are going to release me so that I can deal with this problem for you?”
“I’d just as soon not end up on the wrong end of that tentacle spike of yours. No, you're not going anywhere.”
While the demon fumed and fussed inside its vessel and tried to come up with an answer, I flattened the rest of my copper wire into a spiral and pressed it against the stone floor. Then I pulled out my silver marking stylus and drew a short series of glyphs around its circumference.
The demon grunted again. “Why are you even bothering? If you do manage to escape, you’ll have no choice but to return to that shithole of a planet you call home. The Eldwyr will punish you almost as harshly as I’m going to when I finally get out of this cage. All you’ve done is make trouble for yourself by trying to be better than you are, human. Your kind was meant for slavery, and nothing more.”
The demon’s words stung because there was too much truth in them. Humans were the first to claw their way through the shadowpaths, but we’d fallen prey to the Eldwyr’s brutal tricks. They’d wiped out our empire and left us scattered and alone. We’d become slaves and peasants, depending on which world you were unlucky enough to be born on, and there seemed to be no good way to rise above that station.
But, for once, held captive by beastkin while a demon tormented me, I finally felt like my destiny was mine to command. There was no one here to tell me what I could or couldn’t do. No one to command me to bend the knee or be fined into oblivion.
I shoved the demon’s taunts away. I didn’t have time to doubt myself.
“Here’s the answer to my problems, Mr. Peepers. Something you were never going to guess.” I wiggled my eyebrows at the demon, absurdly pleased with my plan. “Pirates.”
The demon closed its eyes, and a shudder passed through its body. Thick beads of ichor oozed from its skin like rotting seeds forced through the rind of a decaying melon. All thirteen of its eyes opened so wide I thought they would roll from their sockets. Its pupils dilated to the size of my thumb, revealing cores of purple threads twisted around one another like a tangle of glowing worms. Mr. Peepers stayed that way for what seemed like an eternity, but it couldn't have been more than a few seconds.
At the same time, my stomach tied itself in an exotic sailor's knot, and my heart skipped so many beats I was sure I had died.
“First time in the shadowpaths?” The demon asked with a lascivious sneer. Mr. Peepers had recovered a lot faster than I’d managed. “You'll get used to it. They all do.”
My makeshift piece of occultech gear hummed like the air just before a lightning strike. The runes I'd carved in it glowed in sequence. “Help! Engine damaged! Help!
It was working. The energy the demon had pushed into the binding vessel to move us through the shadow paths had bled through the binding into my occultech transmitter, which then sent the message through the grounding rod and out into the shadow paths. I hadn’t stolen enough energy to disrupt the Naglfar’s flight, but I had stolen enough to make a hell of a racket on the distress broadcast frequencies.
My trick worked on the same principle as any other emergency beacon, though it was much cruder and less reliable. While the demon was actively powering it, it could be heard loud and clear for at least seven starspans in every direction. If we had traveled to a nice civilized chunk of space populated by decent creatures, then we wouldn't have anything to worry about. A rescue ship would be sent, someone would board, and they'd find out that the nasty Duarg were holding pretty little me hostage in their Infernal Engine room.
But I guessed the Duarg weren’t heading somewhere reputable in a ship like this. Whoever had built it wouldn’t have beastkin deliverymen if they were on the up and up. The barbaric goats were dangerous creatures at the best of times and rarely traveled beyond their homeworlds. Which meant the shadowship’s owner had expected trouble at some point during the delivery process and hired himself some very nasty mercenaries to deal with whatever problems they encountered en route.
The only conclusion that made sense was that we’d be traveling through some treacherous systems on our way to Mr. Moneybags. And those treacherous systems were populated by pirates who would loooove to come across a disabled or damaged ship.
“Do you really believe anyone can hear that?” The demon asked. “Honestly, it can't be that powerful. And what if pirates do take the ship? You’ll still have the same problem you’d have if you’d stolen it yourself.”
“Where did they take us?” I asked, ignoring the question. The demon might have been a powerful denizen of hell, but it didn’t know squat about occultech. He also didn’t know shit about the Duarg or their bosses. When the pirates attacked, the Duarg would fight them. With any luck, both sides would end up dead or dying, and I’d clean up the scraps. I’d worry about the missing ship when the time came. A plan was already forming in my mind.
Nictitating membranes passed across each of the demon’s thirteen eyes in turn. Then it opened its mouth wide and let a word rollout over its blistered tongue. “Cryptspace.”
The name sent a shudder racing through my body. My clever plan suddenly seemed like a terrible idea.
There were dozens of legends about this region of space, none of them good. Some claimed it was home to a sprawling dynasty of vampires who used their eternal lives to enslave mortals and spread terror to their neighbors. Others swore they’d seen the bloated nautilus ships of the Belsemoth cult and their repulsive frog god.
But there was a much more fearsome legend surrounding Cryptspace. A threat that had only risen a decade past, but which had already become synonymous with death and destruction. “The Bloodline.”
The demon grinned so wide its needle-like teeth protruded past its purple lips. “That's right, mortal. Your boogeymen call this place home.”
My mind raced. If the Bloodline heard my distress signal, they would send a ship. But it wouldn’t be a rescue vessel. It would be a harvester come to drain our blood. “Well. Shit.”
The echoes of my message were already spreading through shadowpaths. The Bloodline or someone else would hear it sooner, rather than later. I needed to be ready for when that happened. There wasn't much else in my toolkit, but I still had a few tricks up my sleeve. I shrugged out of my cloak, pulled out my utility knife, and began cutting the heavy wool into long, thin strips.
“There's no time for crafting projects,” the demon snarled. “You need to think about your coming death.”
I shrugged. “There's always time for craft projects when you’re an occultech witch.”
Mr. Peeper’s cracks wore on me as I worked. He kept reminding me that no matter what I said, I wasn't the hero here. I'd broken the rules, trafficked in blood magic and True Name bindings. In the eyes of my family and the Eldwyr, I was almost as much of a monster as the demon I’d caged.
A subtle thud ran through Naglfar. I'd never been on board a shadowship, much less one in deep space. But I had a hunch. “Boarding grapples?”
“I hope you're ready, witch.” The demon’s tongue lashed the air. “When the Bloodline finishes with you, you’ll be sorry you didn’t let me end your pathetic existence more swiftly.”
Dull red emergency lights burst to life inside the Infernal Engine. Words I didn't understand crackled through cleverly hidden vox crystals. I didn't understand the Duarg’s native tongue, but I translated their panicked, pained cries as, “Help! Murder! Death!”
Then the ship’s emergency circuits kicked in, and the door to the engine vault swung open.
“See you late
r, Mr. Peepers,” I said cheerily, waving my newest occultech kitbashed weapon. “I'll be sure to write.”
“I'll kill you,” the demon snarled. “Free me now, and I'll murder you quickly. If I have to hunt you—”
I eased the engine room door closed behind me and crept through the lower deck of the shadowship. The harsh sizzle pop of hexblasters echoed through the vessel, filling me with a combination of pride and dismay. On the one hand, the occultech weapons were one of the crowning achievements of human civilization. They were the one thing that occultech witches had developed that showed Eldwyr, Duarg, and others that we were a force to be reckoned with.
And if we hadn’t sold an assload of the weapons to creeps who’d pretended to be our allies, we’d be the dominant force in the Universe.
Oops.
A flash illuminated the hallway ahead of me with a brilliant, lightning blue radiance that sent me scurrying for the shadows like a cockroach exposed to torchlight. A Duarg shouted something and unleashed a braying warcry that rattled my bones and turned my guts to water. A mechanical hissing sound was the only response to the Duarg’s challenge, and I peed.
Just a little. And it was totally justified because the Bloodline was aboard the Naglfar.
I peeked around the corner and saw a tall, chitinous suit of armor encrusted with glowing red runes clamp its gauntlets onto a Duarg’s horns. The Bloodline pushed its hands together, forcing the horns inward. The Duarg’s skull cracked and then imploded in a gory spray of blood and bones. The Bloodline warrior pulled the shattered head in close, and a long thin spike emerged from a hexagonal panel on its chest. The spike entered the ruined mess of the Duarg’s head, and a greedy gulping noise echoed down the hallway.
My guts heaved themselves up into my throat, and it took a titanic effort to keep from spewing the remnants of the oatmeal I’d had for breakfast. Fortunately, the Bloodline was too engaged in its gory feast to take note of my panicked dry heaves.
The Bloodline was universally feared, but no one I knew had ever seen one. I decided to take my shot at it while it was feeding and might be vulnerable.
I crept up behind the thirsty monstrosity and looped the threaded noose I’d made out of my cloak around its neck. Fine silver threads were woven through the knots I'd made, and that carried the power of my magic through the noose. All that power had to go somewhere, and I directed it right into the neck of the Bloodline’s armor.
There was a surprisingly meaty crack and the helm of the armored suit separated from the body on a geyser of blood. The Bloodline clasped gauntleted hands to the space where its head had once been, but it found nothing but a bloody fountain that stained its metal fingers crimson. I watched in horror as the horrible creature cast the Duarg’s withered body away, discarding the beastkin’s corpse with no more thought than I’d have given to tossing out an old dish rag.
The Bloodline gargled and stumbled, falling to its hands and knees. Blood sprayed out of its ruined neck in a fan-shaped pattern across the floor, reminding me of the time when I was three years old, and my mother had dropped an amphora of wine to the unyielding tiles of our summer home’s kitchen.
Back when we’d had a summer home.
One by one, the runes on the Bloodline’s armor died. The red glow faded to a pale orange, and then an eerie yellow, before fading to black.
I’d killed a Bloodline. I felt proud and powerful, ready to take on the universe. “Take that, motherfuckers,” I snarled.
And then metallic fingers coiled in my hair and ripped me off my feet.
The Bloodline’s face was flat black, with not even a pretense at eyes, a nose, or a mouth. There was nothing there to hold my attention, but the hexagonal compartment in the center of its chest where I knew its feeding tube lay in wait drew my eyes like a mongoose to a cobra’s hood.
My scalp burned from the pressure of supporting my body's weight. The Bloodline held me aloft, eyeballing me as if I were some sort of new bug it had never seen before.
Not far off, another Duarg screamed, and there was a wet sound like a pumpkin hit with a warhammer. Cold terror curled like a fist around my chest, and my heartbeat thundered in my ears. I’d come so far, but this was the end of the road.
Mr. Peepers was right. I’d have been better off staying in Durotan and eating Eldwyr shit for the rest of my life. At least I’d be alive.
Even worse than knowing the demon was right was the stark futility of my situation. Staring death in the face, I knew that even if I'd pulled this off, even if I'd brought home the 500 gold the Duarg promised, it wouldn't have lasted long enough. Eventually, and probably much sooner than I'd expected, we'd be broke again. My family business would get buried under fines, debts, or some other crushing Eldwyr penalty we couldn’t fight or fathom.
That's how my world worked. The big people at the top stood on the little people at the bottom and made sure they never had a chance to climb the ladder.
The realization sucked the life out of me. I wanted to die. Because dying was better than going back and living under those same rules.
I couldn't do it anymore.
And then, as the Bloodline’s feeding needle emerged from its chest, I realized I didn't have to go back, and maybe I didn’t have to die.
“Hey, Mr. Peepers,” I said, “I’ve got a deal for you.”
The demon’s voice echoed in my thoughts. “Ready to die?”
Remember what I said earlier about True Names? I’d used the demon’s name to bind it, and my blood to fix the broken vessel. The combination had tied our souls together on a terrifyingly intimate level. Time slowed, and our thoughts mingled inside the blood bond. “You still want out of that cage?”
“Free me, human,” it rasped. “Do not taunt me.”
“You have to help me kill the Bloodline on this ship, first,” I thought, showing the demon what I wanted. “Swear it, and you're free.”
A howling laugh filled my head, and the Bloodline jerked as if struck by lightning. An eerie, warbling howl roared through the vessel, shaking the Naglfar. The lights aboard the vessel grew dim, as the reserve power kicked in.
Mr. Peepers was free. It had left its containment vessel, and it was headed for one much closer.
Me.
Power rushed into my body like a river being diverted into a party balloon. The demon possessed me with a force I'd never imagined possible. My body twisted and popped, every muscle and bone contorting and tearing itself into a new configuration as it desperately tried to accommodate the demon’s soul.
“Do it,” Mr. Peepers hissed. “Use my power to slaughter them.”
With the demon’s power surging through my body, I understood that this is what I’d wanted. Not just to earn enough money to take the pressure off, but to be free. Free of expectations, free of judging glances from assholes who thought they were better than me, free of the Eldwyr's rules and regulations. Free to revel in the power I was born with and free to use it to do something that at least felt good.
My empowered hands grasped the Bloodline by the wrist and wrenched its arm free of its shoulder. Blood sprayed from the wound as I fell to the floor. The monstrous being’s blank visor flashed red, and yellow, then red again. Its essence was leaving its body in thick, glutinous spurts.
It reached for me, blind and dying, its remaining metal hand opening and closing with blind, deathless hatred.
I cocked its severed arm behind my shoulder and swung as hard as I could. The metal limb smashed the helmet free of its body and sent the armored body soaring back down the hallway. The Bloodline left a trail of slime and red ichor, then fell apart as the crimson fluids binding it together dissipated.
Another Bloodline charged me, slamming into my back with an armored shoulder. The impact lifted me into the air, but the demon’s power blunted the pain. I landed, rolled, and came up facing the vile monster with my hands spread before me like an eagle’s talons.
Raw magic ripped through me. Fire so hot it curled the skin from my
palms erupted from between my fingers as the last word of the spell tore free of my throat like a tangle of fishhooks. The Bloodline staggered as fire warped its metal armor. Joints popped, and blood sprayed, but it didn't die. I directed the fire into its limbs, fusing its arms to its sides, welding its joints together.
The spell ended, and the Bloodline was frozen, its joints immobilized. For all its fearsome power, I’d transformed it into little more than an angry statue.
“Finish it!” The demon snarled at me. “Finish it, so I can be done with you.”
But I had no intentions of killing this Bloodline. As long as it was alive, the demon couldn't leave me. We were trapped together by the deal we’d made before I’d released it.
“No,” it roared, picking up on the trick I’d played on it. “I'll make you kill it.”
The demon tried, I’ll give it that. But it was in my body, and I was calling the shots. “Pipe down, Mr. Peepers. I need to think.”
The demon sulked. “Fine. We'll die out here together.”
“I don't think so,” I said. I walked away from the immobilized Bloodline. “While you’re trapped inside me, I don't think I'll age or get hungry or thirsty or whatever. I’ll use your power to keep this body alive and comfortable.”
It'd been a desperate gamble, but for the moment, it had paid off. But I still had some serious problems. There was a demon stuck inside me, and until I got it back in the binding vessel, the Naglfar was lifeless in the most dangerous space known to mortals.
“That’s right, more of the Bloodline will come,” the demon snapped. “They'll find us and then what? They'll peel me out of you like a vein from a twitching shrimp, and we’ll both suffer for your arrogance.”
“And the alternative is what?” I said. “You'll kill me and go free?”
Mr. Peepers simmered with rage. “I'll make it fast. It won't even hurt.”
“That's nice.” I tapped my fingernails against my chin. “But I have a better idea.”