by Will Wight
Calder’s unease leaked into his voice. “It’s too late, Andel. If I look through, all I’ll see is…him.”
“HIM.” Shuffles hopped on Calder’s shoulder.
Petal curled up and looked to the sky, which was slowly growing darker and darker. She looked to Calder with pleading in her eyes.
“The boy’s right,” Foster said. “First thing they teach you as a Reader: don’t look at the Elders. Especially not with a looking-glass pressed right against them.”
Andel stepped closer to Calder. “Say what you want about the Emperor, but he did everything to protect people from the Elders.”
“And even he stopped using this thing,” Foster pointed out. “Give it up, Andel. Let’s run.”
Calder’s heart was racing, and he stared into the blank gray eyes of the Emperor. He had earned his fame by facing the Great Elders down directly. That was courage, no doubt about it.
But that didn’t mean Calder had to be stupid about it.
“Foster…I’m going in.”
The gunner’s eyes widened. “Captain, no.”
“I don’t plan to reach straight for the Elder. I’m going to amplify the White Sun at Hightower and any other protections I can find in the Capital.”
“It was a gamble before, but now it’s suicide.”
“Not necessarily. I have one more trick to try.” Ozriel was still up there, waiting beyond the world. One Optasia statue might not be enough to reach him, but Calder could try. He might have an ally.
Although he sounded more confident than he really was. His fingers trembled and his eyes sought out anything but the spreading darkness overhead.
“Good luck, Captain,” Andel said softly.
Foster continued protesting, but Calder had to act before his courage failed.
He placed his hand on the Emperor’s forehead.
Emptiness.
Death.
Cold.
The end.
The rush of sensation that crashed over him was nothing compared to the full Optasia, but he still felt himself drowning in an endless shadow. He wasn’t focused on Urg’naut, but the Great Elder’s presence infected everything, choking the life from the entire Capital.
Calder struggled to reach the surface of an icy black ocean. He strained to reach beyond the world, to drag his awareness up and through the crack.
Ozriel was waiting there, and though he had threatened to destroy the entire world, he was still human. Still infinitely preferable to Urg’naut.
Calder’s vision soared up toward the crack in the sky…and stopped. Like he’d reached the end of an invisible tether.
Despair tightened his throat. He felt the presence of death looming behind him, as though Urg’naut lurked over his shoulder. A presence of nightmares waiting for a child to turn around before it would pounce.
Even worse, he could rationally understand that the Great Elder hadn’t even noticed him yet. This was just the passive feeling of his Intent, a distant and alien malice. Every bone in Calder’s body cried out to break his connection to the statue, to flee before the predator caught him.
But he still had work to do. He would have to be quick.
He needed to strike against the Great Elder, maybe get a sense of the situation in the Capital, and then leave. Nothing more.
While searching for Hightower’s power, he noticed something odd. Another source of that same bright, hopeful Intent drifted around the Aion Sea. It was a smaller source than Hightower should be, and it clearly wasn’t a stationary location, but a person.
Loreli, the founder of the Luminian Order. She was close.
Calder forced himself back to the search because he couldn’t afford distractions, but he was actually glad to feel the Regent’s approach. Loreli was well-known as the one who had struck Urg’naut down originally. If he could stall long enough, perhaps she could take over the battle.
He located Hightower quickly. The headquarters of the Luminian Order was in the greater Capital area, well within the reach of the statue, and centuries of faith and dedication had left a protective aura around the place.
The huge white diamond that sat at the top of the central tower still held Loreli’s Intent, a direct opposite of Urg’naut’s. The Creeping Shadow would not have an easy time encroaching on these grounds.
Calder needed it to do more.
He couldn’t Awaken the giant jewel; even Loreli hadn’t been able to do so, and she had a far greater connection to Hightower than Calder ever would. But if he understood the function of the Optasia correctly, he should be able to increase and direct the diamond’s Intent.
Unlike a steady and stable investment, this effect wouldn’t last long, but Calder wouldn’t need it to. He just wanted to save as much of the Capital as he could.
His vision shot toward the gemstone, which shone like a white sun. That light swallowed his vision.
To protect. To illuminate. To bring peace.
The Intent inside the White Sun of Hightower came from too many thousands of different sources for Calder to pick out specific visions, but the whole Intent was spectacularly unified. Its light was cleansing and penetrating.
The diamond yearned to protect people, so Calder helped it achieve that goal. It didn’t even take much energy; Calder felt as though he was merely directing a wave, controlling the Optasia’s power rather than providing any of his own.
Protect the Capital, he commanded, and the White Sun did so eagerly.
A ray of light shot from the top of Hightower over to the city, a sunbeam cutting through the pall of Urg’naut’s darkness. The black clouds flinched back, and Calder heard a distant sound that suggested one scream coming from a thousand throats.
Suddenly he could feel the Capital through the Great Elder’s concealment, and two things caught his attention.
First, the entire city was filled with wards against the Elders. From emblems of the White Sun carved into doorposts to rings of silver to complex glyphs with forgotten histories, they had all been invested by ordinary people that begged these objects to protect them from Elderspawn.
Perhaps they hadn’t even believed in the Elders—at least, not before recent years, when proof had become more and more obvious—but their desperation had focused their Intent. A baker melted her mother’s jewelry down into a chain and hung it over her child’s crib, hoping the residual Intent would protect against harmful influence. An accountant painted images of the Emperor, hanging them on each wall so that nothing could slip through and take his spirit in the night.
Individually, these objects had almost no effect. An Elderspawn might feel a little uncomfortable in their presence, but it was nothing that would save anyone’s life.
But collectively, they could be something truly powerful. A host of candles that could ward off the darkness.
And the Emperor had not left them undefended.
Beneath the city, the Emperor had left seven giant spikes of iron. Calder was reminded immediately of the nails carried by Watchmen…but these were thousands of times larger and thousands of times more powerful.
They were all Awakened, so he couldn’t add to their power, but he found himself surprised that Urg’naut could even approach the Capital. The spikes were not intended to destroy lesser Elderspawn but were aimed straight at the Great Elders themselves.
While Urg’naut was here, perhaps he could be defeated without the great sacrifices that the battle against him had taken in the past.
Which brought Calder’s attention to the second major thing he’d noticed in the Capital.
Jorin Curse-breaker.
A pair of paper wings spread from the Regent’s back, supported on a wooden frame and decorated with Windwatcher feathers. Thanks to the remaining Intent of the Kameira, Jorin could use those wings to float.
He hovered in the air, his black shadeglasses missing. His eyes were silvery pale, and he stared up at the black clouds. His long coat billowed in the wind, alchemy bottles and invested items clinkin
g against one another and his sword—
Calder had to intentionally blind himself to the sword. If he looked at it under the magnification of the Optasia, he would break his connection and vomit.
Tentacles of shadow the breadth of the entire city fell on Jorin, but he met the Great Elder blow for blow, striking back with darkness of his own. The deadly corruption of his sword sliced through the powers of Urg’naut, turning each hit before it could reach the buildings below him.
The Regent was covered in sweat, his every breath a gasp, but his eyes were firm and his Intent solid. When the light from Hightower struck, he did not miss the opportunity to swing on Urg’naut, and now—though he kept deflecting the tendrils of shadow—he occasionally got in a hit of his own.
He hovered alone, a single speck shielding the city below from a sky full of darkness.
Calder may have resented Jorin on a personal level, as the Regent had worked against him at every turn, but he felt nothing but admiration at this sight. Panic emanated from every house in the city like a fog, reflecting the thousands of terrified citizens below, but Jorin faced down a Great Elder as their protector.
The White Sun continued to glare at Urg’naut, and at any second the Great Elder could notice the attention from the Optasia.
So Calder wasted no more time. He dove down into the city, into the ocean of frightened Intent, and began reinforcing those bright points.
Every lucky amulet that warded off bad luck, every silver circle that protected a home from Elderspawn, Calder magnified its Intent a thousandfold. He had to work one at a time, but each object only took an instant, and after about a dozen he started to notice an effect.
A vague light, a hint of heat like a warm breeze, began to press against Urg’naut.
Encouraged, he pushed on, jumping from holy symbol to blessed coin.
Then, like tripping on flat ground, he stumbled across something much more powerful. An Awakened weapon that hungered after Urg’naut. A weapon he recognized. A green dagger.
The city block was covered in a silver fog that clouded even Calder’s vision through the Optasia statue. The same fog she had used to conceal herself when she had stabbed him in the chest.
Intent hung so heavy in the mist that Calder had to resist Reading it. But within, he saw Shera.
Wearing a hooded gray outfit that matched the fog around her, she was kneeling on the ground and driving her emerald dagger into a thick shadow on the street. The spawn of Urg’naut let out a silent scream that resonated with Intent.
The very air rippled with the force of the shadow’s despair, but her expression above her half-mask remained cold. He could almost see the murderous aura around her.
When she had reduced the shadow to nothing more than a shining green ball of power, she hurried off to find another victim. At the moment, they were Elderspawn, but her Soulbound Vessel didn’t appreciate the difference between Elders and humanity.
Did Shera?
It was only at this point that he realized there were other Gardeners around, and their presence was incomparable to anything he’d felt before. He recognized Meia, the woman with the Intent of a dozen Kameira packed inside her body.
She was even more now, her shears shining orange that matched her eyes. In fact…through the senses of the Optasia, they even felt like eyes. They were invested to see through enemies and tear them apart.
Meia had become a Soulbound.
Though it disturbed him that the Consultants would be getting another powerful combatant, he was glad for Meia. As much as he distrusted her Guild, he wished her the best.
There were other Soulbound, but every stray thought brought him too much information to swallow.
He focused on Shera.
He could have his revenge right here, in this moment. She was no Reader; she wouldn’t even feel it coming.
He had tried to make peace with her before. Now he could show her that he wasn’t a victim. He wasn’t a pushover. He was—
The darkness in the sky tightened to one point.
Urg’naut was staring.
Calder froze. It was too late. He’d stayed too long.
…but the Elder wasn’t looking at him.
Suddenly the ink that had covered the horizon slithered down into someone. A person. Calder couldn’t even tell who; the endless Intent of the Creeping Shadow blocked out their identity.
Urg’naut was taking a host.
Jorin’s power surged, and a blade of death descended onto the Great Elder. Chunks of shadow were torn away, and Urg’naut gave a scream that echoed through the minds of everyone in the Capital, but he didn’t stop.
The light from Hightower shone, burning shadow with every second, but the sky-spanning Great Elder continued cramming itself into human skin like a worm burrowing into the ground.
The sky grew lighter and lighter, and Calder roused himself. He had to do something to help. Even Shera was focusing her mist to weaken the Elder, lunging toward him with her daggers at the ready.
Calder tightened his Intent around her like a noose. He had to break his connection to the Optasia very soon, so this was his last chance to execute someone who had rebelled against him.
As though he was Reading his own memory, he saw Jarelys Teach touching Rojric Marten.
The Emperor would not have let a rebel live.
His Intent from his armor and his crown, both of which Calder carried on his person, agreed. Anyone who defied the Emperor was defying the Empire, civilization, humanity itself. They were traitors who deserved no mercy.
Calder would not become him.
He released his grip on Shera and flew back through the Capital, investing more and more into the protective talismans. Now wasn’t the time. If he could reclaim the Steward’s position, or even any other position of influence similar to a Guild Head, he could pursue his grudge against Shera later.
Now was the time to join hands and fight their real enemy.
He turned his focus back to Urg’naut, the
Creeping
Shadow
All is darkness.
There is only the void.
Existence is suffering.
Death is mercy.
Calder drifted on a black sea.
There was no light. He could hardly remember what light was.
Urg’naut had already won. He’d won from the very beginning. He had won before the game began.
How could you avoid the end itself?
Someone lit a match in front of Calder’s eyes, and he screamed.
“You in there, boy?” Foster’s voice.
Calder shuddered and threw up a hand between him and the light. It was too wrong, too out of place, he would see it, he would know…
“Will he recover?” Andel asked.
“That’s up to him. I’ve seen some come out of it in hours. Still had nightmares for the rest of their lives, but they had lives. Seen others…that never did.”
“What’s wrong with him?” Petal whispered.
Foster gave a heavy sigh. “He Read an Elder, girl.”
Chapter Twenty-One
present day
Calder could see nothing, hear nothing, feel nothing, smell nothing, taste nothing.
Nothing tasted like ice.
Death pressed in against him, inside him, infecting his mind. He couldn’t close his eyes for fear of the endless darkness, but opening them was worse; he could see the shadows lying over the world. The shadows were Urg’naut, and Urg’naut was the end.
As his crew discussed him, their words were just noise, noise that could attract the Great Elder. His thoughts dashed away from him, handfuls of stars cast into the endless void beyond the world. His mind sought anything that could relieve the darkness.
He still wore the Emperor’s armor. The crown was tucked away inside.
The Emperor’s Intent had pressed in on him for so long now that he had grown used to resisting it as a matter of habit. He longed to Read something, to open himself to exi
stence, but he still hesitated.
He was afraid of the Emperor’s Intent. Giving in to it meant submerging himself in a man he hated.
But on the other hand…
He couldn’t escape Urg’naut. With every breath that passed, the emptiness around him seemed to grow deeper. He was losing himself.
And deep inside, a part of him that had not yet given into the fear refused to go quietly.
The Emperor had Read Elders before.
If Calder could learn something from the Intent the man had left behind, he had to try. There was nothing left to lose.
So Calder threw aside his barriers, opening his Reader’s senses wide. The Emperor’s Intent, which had tried to force its way into his consciousness for so long, now found nothing stopping it.
How do I resist Elder Intent? Calder focused on this question, searching for an answer.
But he got more.
Too much.
The metal warps under his touch. It’s white-hot, and he uses his powers to cause it to hold that color, to be stained white for all time. This armor will be the ultimate shield, and he has seen beyond the heavens. The guardians above this world armor themselves in white.
To him, white is the color of protection.
The Emperor wears the crown and looks down from his public throne.
“I am the first Reader. The Guild of Magisters has no authority over my teachings.”
The Guild Head shivers and bows before him.
The hordes of Othaghor pass over him like waves, claws that can rend iron and pierce minds scratching at his armor.
Bound by his Intent, the white steel remains strong.
He strides through, unharmed.
Sitting alone with his oldest belongings—his armor, his swords, his crown—he layers his memories into the objects. He molds his Intent, kneading it like dough.
If Nakothi intends to corrupt his mind, then he will leave behind a copy of himself to bolster his thoughts. He will be surrounded by his own unstained Intent.
Alone, the Emperor crafts his own ghost.