Passing Through Darkness- The Complete Cycle

by Malcolm McKenzie

  Dee preceded our group with a huge white flag, which seemed entirely appropriate. He still embodied the strangest combination of foolhardy courage and abject cowardice I had ever encountered. Prophetess, Hake, and I followed. Tolf was there too as Prophetess’ protector. The guardsman from Our Lady had done no more than nod at me when I’d greeted him. He looked like he expected me to eat Prophetess at any moment. That hurt. He’d been a friend.

  We crossed the no man’s land between the Rockwall and Monolith lines and approached the four story building the enemy had selected for the negotiations. I could see apprehensive faces and drawn bows in the windows. Thin tendrils of the Darkness showed me more soldiers behind and above. As we neared the door, a grizzled veteran with the shield and rank marks of a Paladin threw it open.

  “Get in, then,” he growled.

  Dee struggled awkwardly to navigate the doorway with the flag of truce.

  “Just leave that,” snapped the Paladin. “We get the point. And it is not as if we trust your hellspawn any more because you have a bedsheet on a stick.”

  The Darkness growled within me, and I silenced it with an effort of will.

  They had set torches in the stairwell inside, and the Darkness didn’t like that either. Nor did it care for the soldiers aiming pistols at us on each landing. I can’t say I liked that much myself.

  It’s funny how suspicious some people get when you come in the night and murder their friends.

  We emerged onto the roof, returning to daylight. I relaxed fractionally. Our archers and gunmen couldn’t really support us adequately here, at this range, but the ideal place for an ambush would have been inside. Maybe the Monolith intended to play this straight. Or maybe they’d been afraid of what I could do to them inside a dark, enclosed space. They hadn’t been wrong on that score. I wouldn’t have survived if they’d attacked, but their losses would have been the stuff of horrific legend.

  I swallowed and throttled back the Darkness as it tried to rise up, buoyed by a rush of adrenaline. That was not something we could afford.

  On the roof we found ourselves in a wide circle of gunmen, all aiming at us. Inside the circle stood Tarc and a half dozen Paladins.

  Dee pointed to the one in the center, a big man with gray hair and beard. His tabard was black with a white cross, and he leaned on a huge metal shield with the same colors.

  “A BlackShield,” Dee said enthusiastically. “There aren’t more than a dozen of them in the Monolith. They must really not like you, Minos.”

  The Paladin cleared his throat. His voice was deep and husky. The eyes that met mine were as gray as his hair. “I am aware that I will not make it off this roof alive if you decide to kill me, Select. Maybe no one will. But I have men on every rooftop around us, and trust me, they have your in their sights. If I do not walk away from this, neither will you.”

  “I wouldn’t have it any other way… General? What do I call you?”

  “I am BlackShield Jarl Lago. If you must address me, you may call me that.”

  “Seems a little unwieldy.” I smiled as I said it. He did not return the gesture.

  “A Monolith soldier would refer to him as ‘Black,’” Dee added helpfully.

  “You will not call me that.”

  I sent tiny strands of Darkness crawling over him. He was harder to read than Prince Jeral’s envoy back in Steel City. If he was afraid of me, he did an admirable job of concealing it.

  “What’s your proposal, Minos?” growled Tarc. The big Select was an open book. He was looking for an excuse to order the gunmen to open fire. “Say something worthwhile, or get the hell off my roof.”

  The BlackShield shot him a warning glance. Tarc was overstepping his authority. It wasn’t his roof.

  But I didn’t need to further antagonize the other Select. “Let me introduce my companions, and they’ll explain. General Hake you’ll know, at least by reputation.”

  “I had heard you were a colonel,” the BlackShield said.

  “The campaign’s been good for me.” That was a bold move by Hake, but I admired him for it. He was reminding the other side that even though we were in a bad position now, we’d been chalking up victories against the Monolith for the last couple of months.

  “Until now,” Lago grated.

  The general smiled. “Unless you count casualties differently than I do, I’m still liking it. Let’s not play games here, BlackShield. You’ve got us pinned here, and the smart money says your reinforcements arrive before ours do. But we’ll bleed you bad before you take us down. We’ve won every single engagement we’ve fought against you. Every one. Unless you count the time your Select friend here hit our unarmed supply train in the middle of the night to slaughter a bunch of cooks and laundresses, and I don’t think you enjoyed the aftermath of that one either.”

  Tarc growled and took a step forward. The look the BlackShield fixed on him would have reduced a lesser man to tears.

  “Very well, General. As you say, enough games. Let us come to a point. Continue with your introductions, abomination. I do not think we enjoy each other’s company enough to prolong this more than necessary.”

  I couldn’t have said why, but the word “abomination” didn’t bother me from the BlackShield. Maybe it was because I actually found myself just a little bit impressed by him. I hoped I wouldn’t have to kill him in the next few minutes.

  I nodded. “So, continuing. Doctor John Dee, herald of the Order of Thorns.”

  A short man, robed and hooded, pushed between two Paladins. I hadn’t even noticed him. A prominent nose and wisps of beard protruded from beneath the hood. “Doctor John Dee? The Doctor John Dee?”

  Dee swelled up like a rooster. “Indeed, sir. And you are?”

  “I am Aharon, son of Malak.”

  “Not the same Aharon son of Malak who wrote the treatise on paleo ritual sorcery?”

  The hooded man gave a little bow. “The same.”

  “Oh, a pleasure, sir, a pleasure.”

  “Enough,” the BlackShield snapped. “This is a war parley, not a convention of witch finders. Save your mutual admiration for later, if you both live.”

  “I didn’t think your people held with the occult, BlackShield,” Hake sneered. He was going to push the enemy commander too far, but couldn’t seem to help himself.

  Lago scowled. “A Josephite does not study such things. The son of Malak is a Descendant. They have their uses, as do the Select. I did not think your people embraced the Darkness, General, but you seem to have found a use for that thing.” He glared at me.

  Dee’s intervention was, for a wonder, timely. “Ah, well, that brings us close to the subject at hand, BlackShield Jarl Lago. Allow me to present Prophetess, principal of the Order of Thorns, representative of Our Lady, upon whom rests the hand of the Lord God.”

  One of the Paladins spat at Dee’s feet. “This is too much! Bad enough you bring your filthy murdering sorcerer - we will not hear your heathen witch called a prophet of God!”

  Tolf took three long steps and stuck his finger in the man’s face. “Call her a witch again and you’ll be eating that shield, you ignorant, sheep-loving hill savage.”

  With a quarterstaff, I would give Tolf decent odds against most men. He was unarmed. The Paladin would have him for lunch and use his bones for toothpicks. Guns swung around to fix on Tolf. The Darkness boiled inside me. This was going to end in disaster, but we weren’t going to die alone.

  “Stop that!” Prophetess’ voice cracked like a whip. “This is what we cannot do! We can’t fight each other while Yoshana plans to enslave us all.”

  Tolf ducked his head and slunk back to her side like a whipped dog.

  “And do you speak for all those with you, little girl?” Lago demanded. “Do you command the armies of Rockwall?”

  “I command this one.”

  The BlackShield snorted in surprise.

  Hake nodded. “She speaks for me and my brigade. We’ve pledged ourselves to her. Listen to wha
t she has to say.”

  But instead the hooded man interrupted. “You say this is a prophet, John Dee. You know of these things, but I am a Descendant of the Prophets. Where are her mighty deeds? Is the Word of God in her mouth? I see only a girl.”

  “Deborah was a woman and a prophet, Aharon son of Malak,” Dee said.

  “Deborah led the armies of Israel and crushed the king of the Canaanites. What has this one done?”

  “I’ve seen her cast out the Darkness.”

  “You have seen,” sneered the Paladin who had spat before. “All I have seen her cast out are words, and those not very impressive.”

  “Would you like to see the Darkness cast out, then?” I asked. I tried to keep my voice from shaking, but I don’t think I quite managed it.

  The Paladin opened his mouth, but Lago silenced him with a gesture. “Enough, Stonn. What are you offering, Select?”

  “Do you know what I am? I was trained by Grigg of the Monolith and Yoshana herself. I’ve crossed the Sorrows and spoken with demons. I’ve killed Paladins in single combat and breached every defense you could erect. I am the Shadowed Hand.”

  I glanced at Prophetess. “She will end that.”

  The BlackShield looked from me to Hake, incredulous. “You would give that up? You can give that up?”

  The general shrugged. “You said it yourself. It’s a bargain with the devil, and for what? So we can kill some more of you before you drag us down? I can’t ask my captain to sell his soul for that.”

  “That kind has no soul,” said Stonn. I’d already decided that if things went badly, he was dying first. Tarc cleared his throat noisily. The Paladin had the decency to look just a bit embarrassed. It’s not really polite to say out loud that your allies are soulless monsters, even if everyone knows you think it.

  “No exorcism of that order has ever been performed,” the Descendant protested.

  At least not by anyone who didn’t command the Darkness themselves. I had no doubt that Yoshana or Seven could pull the Darkness out of me, quite possibly even against my will. I kept that to myself.

  I was worried enough about whether Prophetess could do it. And although she didn’t show it, I knew she was too.

  “Prophetess can cast it out of him,” Dee said confidently. It was hard to know whether he was as sure as he sounded. He was a facile liar.

  “A trick,” Stonn muttered. “Just because the cloud departs him, does not mean it is banished…”

  I nodded. “So bring torches. Burn it when it leaves. It’s not a bad idea. It’s going to be pissed off when it comes out.” I managed to say “when” rather than “if.”

  It was getting pretty riled up already. It was intelligent enough, in its own way, to understand what was coming. The only reason it wasn’t angrier was because it didn’t believe Prophetess could do it.

  A couple of the gunmen had scrambled to the door to demand torches from below. The tension in the air had a different character now.

  Tarc stepped up to me and hissed, “If somehow your pretend prophet does this, you and I will have a reckoning, boy. For Lalos.”

  I nodded. Prophetess said to him, “We ask the Lord to forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us.”

  “You don’t know what he’s done,” the older Select snapped.

  “The one to whom little is forgiven, loves little,” she replied. “Perhaps too little has been forgiven you.”

  Tarc backed away. There was a new authority in Prophetess that I hadn’t seen before. Maybe she could do this after all. As she turned to me, she seemed taller.

  “You know the time,” she intoned. “It is the hour now for you to awake from sleep. For our salvation is nearer now than when we first believed; the night is advanced, the day is at hand. Let us then throw off the works of darkness and put on the armor of the light; let us conduct ourselves properly as in the day, not in orgies and drunkenness, not in promiscuity and lust, not in rivalry and jealousy. But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the desires of the flesh.”

  The Darkness rose in my throat like bile. I swallowed, afraid at any moment I would vomit it up.

  “For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Live as a child of light. Take no part in the fruitless works of darkness.”

  Fruitless, were they? Were the victories upon victories of the Shadowed Hand fruitless? That weakling Tarc dared to threaten me only because he thought I would give up my strength. He would run like a rabbit from my true form.

  “Minos,” Prophetess’ voice cut across my thoughts like a knife. “Minos, do you reject the Enemy, and all his works of darkness?”

  I shook my head. What enemy? Whose works? Mine?

  The creature in front of me set its hand on my physical core and spoke again. “Do you reject the Enemy? Do you believe in God the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth?”

  I burst out into my full form and roared, “There is no god but me, and I am my own prophet!”

  How the little things feared me! Except for the one, so close, touching me. I reached out to tear it apart -

  A cloud that had shadowed the sky moved aside in the wind. I felt something flood from Prophetess in waves, cutting through me like a radiant tide of light. The Darkness parted around her, and her tunic shone white in the sunlight. I staggered as the Darkness recoiled from her.

  “A woman clothed in the sun,” Dee breathed.

  “Do you reject the Enemy and all his works?”

  The Darkness was stunned. I stared into Prophetess’ eyes and with my own voice whispered, “I do.”

  “Do you believe in the Father Almighty, Our Lord Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit, the Universal Eucharistic Church, and life everlasting?”

  I wasn’t sure, but I gasped out, “I do” before the Darkness could seize me again.

  “Then the power of the Enemy has no hold on you. Cast it out!”

  We are one! the Darkness shrieked in my head.

  I closed my eyes and let peace wash over my body from the woman in front of me. A wolf, bright as the sun on snow, howled triumphantly, and a dark one fled. No we’re not.

  I opened my eyes to see a vast cloud streaming away into the sunlight. The edge of its thoughts tasted of fear and despair.

  The Descendant was the first to his knees. “Prophetess,” he breathed. His hood had fallen back, and his blue eyes were full of tears.

  All around, the Paladins and other Monolith troops laid down their weapons and knelt. Lago was the last, lowering himself stiffly.

  “What is it you want from us?” he asked.

  “The Darkness Radiant is far stronger and darker than what God has cast out of Minos,” Prophetess said. “Yoshana’s legions will engulf the world if we don’t stop them, and all that is good and decent will fall. Will you help me stand against them, BlackShield Jarl Lago?”

  The old warrior drew himself up and brought his fist to his heart. “As God is my witness, I will.”

  Tarc, who had not knelt, stepped closer to me and sneered softly, “Parlor tricks. Effective, though. The Josephites are a superstitious lot in the end.”

  I shook my head, still trembling with reaction. Out of the corner of my eye, I watched the Darkness spread thin and vanish as it fled. “It didn’t feel like a parlor trick from where I was standing.”

  I had feared peace might not be so easily made between the Monolith and Rockwall troops, but I needn’t have worried. After a week of facing each other across our lines, no one was eager to keep fighting until we were all dead.

  Lago and Hake had each sent couriers to their respective headquarters, announcing their armies were now under Tess’ command and would be accompanying her back to Our Lady. They’d both claimed to be acting in their nations’ best interests, preempting invasion by Yoshana.

  Hake had said to me, “Anyway, without her, we’d have wiped each other out. She saved us from that, so I figure we’re hers now.”

  Lago seemed to
have decided much the same thing.

  The news that both armies were now following a prophet spread like wildfire, and the troops crowded around to stare at Prophetess. At first Tolf and the Order of Thorns had tried to form a protective cordon around her, but they quickly gave up. Especially when she kept slipping through to shake hands and give blessings.

  I trailed along in her wake, still a bit stunned. Tolf came up and slapped me on the shoulder. “Doing okay, buddy?”

  I raised my eyebrows. “So we’re back to being buddies now?”

  He gave me a wounded look. “Hey. Come on. It’s not like you were the same person when you had that thing in you.”

  I thought about it for a moment, then said, “The worst part is, I was the same person. Just all the darkest parts of me kept bubbling to the top. But I don’t think the Darkness put anything in me that wasn’t there before.”

  “Scary stuff, Minos.”

  “That we can agree on. Speaking of scary stuff, why don’t I introduce you to the Shadowed Hand?”

  Prophetess had found Kafer. I preferred to give them some privacy, so I took Tolf to meet Sesk. I found the hunter huddled up with Luco. They both gave me guilty looks when I approached.

  “I only just gave up the powers of hell and you’re already conspiring against me?” I smiled.

  “It’s not like that, Minos,” Luco said. “But… after this past week… after this past month… I’m not cut out for this. I’ve seen things I never would have seen back on the Flow, and I don’t regret any of it, but… I figure I’m lucky to be making it out alive. I’m going home.”

  “I’ll make sure he gets there,” Sesk added.

  “You too? We’ve finally got a cause you could feel good about, and this is when you leave?”

  The hunter nodded. “I reckon I can head out now and not feel like I’m abandoning anybody. But I’ve been thinking ever since you asked me what I was doing here. I don’t figure I ever did have a good answer to that.”

  He touched the four gouges I had clawed in his face. “I guess I might stop in and see that girl you mentioned. What town did you say it was? Brambledge?”