The Twilight Empire (Swords and Saints Book 2)

by J A Hutson

  “The Pale Man,” Bright Eyes breathes beside me, still holding the child protectively. I slip in front of them, getting between them and this creature.

  It continues to emerge from the abyss below, glistening with moisture. When it finally stands, the thing is taller than any man, and so thin its muscles and bones are clearly etched beneath its fish-belly-white skin. It wears no clothes, yet it has no sex that I can see, just a smooth white absence.

  The creature cocks its head and regards us, as if intrigued. Nictitating membranes slide across its bulbous eyes and it brings its hands together, black fingertips tapping excitedly.

  welcome, welcome the spider says

  it’s been too long since I have fed

  The words are coming from the Pale Man, issuing out of its strange mouth like a voice floating up from the bottom of a well.

  “Stay back,” I say as the creature shuffles closer. It moves with mincing little steps, almost awkwardly, seemingly unconcerned by the length of tapering steel extended towards its sunken chest.

  Whatever this thing is, I think I’m supposed to kill it. I lunge forward, thrusting with my sword, but the creature twists away with unnatural quickness and my blade strikes nothing. The shock of my surprise hasn’t even registered before something hard hits me and I’m sent sprawling, lines of fiery agony opening on my side. My head strikes the stone floor with jarring force and I desperately roll.

  But the expected blow never comes, and when my vision clears the Pale Man is crouched where I stood a few moments before, watching me calmly. It raises its spidery hand in front of its face and licks at the blood dripping from its black-tipped fingers. My head is reeling – wait, where’s the hole? I glance behind me and see that I’m only a few span from the edge; if I’d scrambled a little farther I would have sent myself plummeting into the void. My sword’s blade is extended out over the emptiness.

  With the Pale Man’s attention focused on me, Bright Eyes takes this chance to charge the creature, her ax held high. She’s set the child down, and the small boy is pressed against the base of the king’s statue – it must be a king, from its bearing and crown – watching the monster in horror. I can’t hear the kvah’s footsteps over the child’s hitching cries and the sound of water, but the creature moves again with blinding speed as Bright Eyes brings her ax crashing down. The Pale Man slides through space, flickering and appearing a few paces to the left as the ax-blade passes through where he was only an eyeblink before.

  Then Bright Eyes is stumbling back, holding her face as blood wells between her fingers. I snatch up my sword and stagger to my feet, screaming in wordless rage at the creature. But despite appearances, I’m reaching for the cold precision I’ve grasped before in battle, and even though I no longer have my green-glass sword the world seems to slow around me. The Pale Man whirls again at my approach, and though he’s still lightning quick I can at least see his movements now. My sword lashes out, and as he ripples, I change the direction of my thrust, grazing his arm. A line of red blood – very human-looking blood – appears on his flesh as the Pale Man reels away. I follow, but this time my steel finds only air and another blow strikes me in the chest, sending me stumbling backwards again. My back foot comes down on nothing, and then my sword flies from my fingers as I flail helplessly. I’m falling.

  I throw all my weight forward, my arms crashing into stone as I scrabble desperately for purchase on the edge of the hole. But the ancient and slick rocks give way beneath my scrabbling fingers, crumbling away.

  I’m swallowed by the darkness.

  Something is stabbing into my back.

  I swim back towards consciousness, forcing my eyes open with a groan. Far away from me, at the end of a long black corridor, a pale blotch of spectral light shimmers.

  Everything hurts. My side is matted with blood, and I can’t begin to catalogue how many of my bones ache. There’s a roaring in my ears, and droplets of water spatter my face.

  I’m lying on a rocky ledge, only a few span from where a black waterfall tumbles past me to vanish into the abyss. With some effort I reach beneath me and pull out what has been jabbing into my spine. I can’t be sure because of the darkness, but it feels like a bone.

  I sit up, moaning, trying to order my scattered thoughts. What happened? The huge chamber . . . the crying child . . . Bright Eyes swinging her ax at the Pale Man, who moved like nothing I’ve seen before. Falling backwards into the hole. Striking the walls, clawing at the stone, desperately trying to find purchase. My fingernails hurt – I probe them gingerly, and find that several are missing.

  How long have I been down here? I was unconscious for a while, I think. I gaze up again at the cold white light above. There’s a hollowness in my chest that’s threatening to overwhelm me. The Pale Man, that demon-thing, must still be there. Bright Eyes and the child must be dead. And Shalloch. And Vesivia.

  I failed. I wipe grime away from my brow with a shuddering hand. What should I do?

  To start, climb out of here. I get unsteadily to my feet, fighting back a surge of dizziness. The deeper blackness beside me yawns – the waterfall seems to fall forever, plunging down into whatever hell this undercity is connected to. I run my hands over the wall – uneven, and perhaps I can scale it, but it is also extremely slick and in places covered with slime. If I fall again, there’s a good chance I’ll miss the ledge I’m standing on and plummet to my death.

  I carefully prod my body. Everything pulses with pain, but to my immense relief nothing seems to be broken.

  Taking a deep breath, I find a handhold in the pitted rock and pull myself up a little ways. My boot scrabbles for a moment, and then I’m able to jab my toe into a cleft. I stay like that for a long moment as an intense bout of vertigo swirls through my skull, and then I reach up a little higher and find a new hold.

  I can do this.

  Painfully, slowly, clinging to the stone as the cascading water behind me wets my back, I edge my way up. The corpse-light from the chamber above swells larger, bit by tiny bit. My arms and legs ache, but driving me on is the tiny shred of hope that I can still save my companions from the Pale Man, that somehow they survived.

  But they did not. I can’t hold back a moan of despair as my head finally crests the lip of the hole. Several dozen paces away Bright Eyes lies crumpled at the base of the statue that’s draped in ragged finery. Fighting through my shaking weakness, I haul myself up and flop onto the stone. Tears prickle my eyes as I roll onto my back, staring at the shattered mosaics that once adorned the ceiling, now mostly swallowed by the glowing white moss.

  There’s no sign of the Pale Man, at least – he must have taken the child and crept away to devour him. I half expected to see that demon looming over the hole when I finally crawled out, and I’m certain that would have been my death. Right now I feel as helpless as a babe.

  Grunting, I climb to my feet and stagger towards where Bright Eyes is sprawled. A leaden weight fills my chest as I approach the kvah and I see how she’s been eviscerated. The Pale Man has shredded her, slicing open her chest and stomach. My jaw hardens. I think back to the first time I saw her, huddled in the corner of the slaver’s wagon. How I thought she was just an animal, a brute like the others of her kind. And it wasn’t just me – almost everyone treated her like a piece of offal, barely worthy of being enslaved by the glorious Zimani. And yet she was the first to insist we try and rescue the stolen child. She’d shielded the boy with her body when his parents would have sneered or spat at her on the streets. She protected him in her final moments, I see now as I get closer. The child’s corpse is curled against her.

  A shock of surprise goes through me as the child stirs, wriggling closer against the kvah. His large dark eyes open as he hears my approach, though he says nothing as he watches me solemnly. He reaches up and touches Bright Eyes’ waxy cheek lightly.

  Her eyes flicker open. I gasp, rushing over to crouch beside her. Her chest is rising and falling, though her breathing is shallow.
r />   “Bright Eyes,” I murmur, taking her limp hand. I look again at her wounds and my hope vanishes.

  Her fingers twitch in my grip as she watches me. With obvious effort she swallows and tries to speak. “The child,” she rasps. “Where is he?”

  “He’s with you,” I reply, glancing around for anything to staunch her bleeding. I could tear my clothes into strips, wrap her up as much as possible, but I already know the cuts are too deep and severe for such measures.

  She turns her head slightly in the direction of the boy, whose tiny fingers are still touching her cheek. “So this is him,” she says, and I can hear the relief in her voice. “I thought . . . I thought he was a dream.”

  “Where is the Pale Man?”

  A pained smile curves the edge of her lips as she lifts a trembling hand and points. I turn, half expecting to see the demon creeping up on me, and it takes me a moment to see what she is indicating.

  Among a few chunks of shattered stone lies a severed white hand, its black-tipped fingers curled like a spider in death. It has been sliced away with great force, in a single cut that had sheared the flesh and bone cleanly. One of the fingers has an ornate silver ring encrusted with purple gemstones. Blood is splashed across the rocks, and now that I’m looking for it I can see a trail leading away from the hand and towards the leering stone face.

  “You did that?” I whisper, turning back to Bright Eyes.

  Her smile deepens, and despite her obvious agony I can sense her satisfaction. “I’m a better ax-maiden than I thought,” she whispers, and then a shiver goes through her and her face spasms. She grunts, her eyes fluttering as she fights to stay conscious.

  “Your clan would be proud,” I tell her, giving her hand a small squeeze.

  “They are coming for me,” she says softly, and it seems like she’s staring at something past my shoulder. “They are here,” she breathes, her voice fading.

  Her eyes close as her hand goes limp.

  “Bright Eyes?” I try, but I know she’s gone. Huddled against her body, the child watches me silently. I fight back my rising grief and slip my hands under the boy’s shoulders, pulling him to me. He’s perhaps three years old, his skin dark even for a Zimani, and though filthy from the undercity I can see his clothes are of exceedingly fine make. He does not cry, and his small face is serious, as if he understands the sacrifice that was made for him to live.

  My own sword has vanished, probably at the bottom of whatever underground lake the water here tumbles into, so I pick up Bright Eyes’ ax from where it has fallen. There’s gore crusting its edge: the blood of the Pale Man. Is he dead? My gaze travels to the demonic face carved of stone and the rivulets flowing from its eyes and mouth. Yes, there would be enough space for the creature to squeeze inside. Is he there, even now, watching me from the darkness as he cradles the stump of his wrist?

  “Mama,” the child murmurs into my neck. “Mama.”

  Noise comes from the entranceway, and I tear my gaze from the grotesque stone head. I tense, preparing myself for whatever other horrors the undercity might throw at us, but soon relax when I hear voices and the tramp of boots.

  Spears of white light from chemical lanterns shred the gloom, and then muckers are streaming into the chamber. I nearly collapse in relief as I see Cassus among them, the burly sergeant bellowing as he gestures at me. Dizzy, I gently lay the child down on the stone, and then sit down heavily, letting the darkness carry me away.

  12

  “Talin.”

  My name, spoken in a drawl I know, pulls me away from the darkness.

  But is it my name? Or does it belong to another?

  I surface, coming awake on my familiar pallet in the muckers’ cell. Late-afternoon light the color of honey pools in the room, which is empty except for Shalloch and myself. Using my elbows, I push myself into a sitting position, wincing at the shards of pain in my side and arms.

  The swashbuckler is hovering beside my pallet, perched on the edge of a stool. The relief on his face as I turn to him is evident.

  “Saints, Talin, you look like shit.”

  I rub at my face, which is covered by a very tender, very lumpy bruise. I try to speak but my throat is too dry and I can’t manage more than a raspy grunt. Shalloch hurriedly scoops a clay pitcher from a small table beside him and pours water into a cup, then passes that to me. I gulp it down in three swallows. I can’t remember the last time I felt such sweet relief.

  “What happened?” I manage, handing the cup back to him.

  “You collapsed not long after Cassus and the rest of ‘em found you. You’d lost a lot of blood.”

  I prod at my midsection, feeling the bandages beneath my shift. “The child?”

  “Unharmed, incredibly enough. I’d have thought the little bugger would be in shock, but by the time we were topside again he’d started babbling.”

  I sag back on the pallet. So it wasn’t in vain.

  Shalloch must see something in my face, as he quickly adds: “Bright Eyes is dead.”

  “I know. I was there when she died. She was the one who saved the boy and drove away the Pale Man.”

  Shalloch shakes his head slowly. “An unbelievable tale, to be honest. To think a kvah – a kvah! – would sacrifice herself to rescue a Zimani child.”

  “She was less an animal than most I’ve met in this world,” I say defensively, and Shalloch holds up his hands.

  “Agreed, agreed. I came to like her very much – she was a true mucker, and a good companion. But as you’re the only survivor, and they found you with the child in your arms, you’ve been getting much of the glory.”

  “Glory?”

  Shalloch flashes me a crooked smile. “That boy wasn’t just some street urchin or merchant’s git. He’s an Orthanos, a favored spawn of one of the greatest families in Zim. In fact” – Shalloch glances at the door, and for the first time, I can see his nervousness – “I’ve been told we may get a visit from a representative of the family soon. That’s why I woke you.”

  Glory. That’s something I care absolutely nothing about. But the idea has clearly excited Shalloch.

  “Vesivia?”

  “She’s fine. She’s been dealing with some guilt over what happened to you and Bright Eyes, but that’s to be expected.”

  “And the Pale Man? Is he dead?”

  The swashbuckler shrugs. “We never found a body. The trail of blood vanished into the mouth of that big ugly face – there was a tunnel inside, mostly filled with water, which wiped away the tracks. And although Cassus raged, he wasn’t able to bludgeon anyone into braving the darkness.” A shiver goes through Shalloch at the thought. “And I don’t blame them.”

  “Then he might still be alive.”

  “If he is, he’s a bit less than he used to be.”

  I remember the severed hand, its black-tipped fingers stained with blood.

  Shalloch glances again at the door and leans in closer, as if afraid of being overheard. “There’s some strange rumors swirling about,” he whispers. “The ring that was found on the Pale Man’s finger . . . one of the boys got a good look at it, and he swore up and down it looked like it bore the crest of the emperor’s house. We had a visit from some high muckity-mucks not long after, exarchs who serve in the royal palace. They told us not to mention the ring, or we’d find ourselves slogging through the mines soon after.”

  A ring with the royal seal. Tattered finery draped over a statue of what looked like some ancient ruler. What had Shalloch told me once? That the emperor who oversaw the construction of the undercity disappeared into its depths?

  Shalloch must see the pieces sliding into place in my mind because he lays a finger alongside his nose and raises his eyebrows meaningfully. “We’re not supposed to think so hard about it all, and in the interest of avoiding having to cut obsidian from the walls for the rest of a very abbreviated life, I’m trying not to. But I thought you should know.”

  I nod, my thoughts churning. Shalloch looks like he ha
s more to say, but as he opens his mouth, the door to our sleeping room scrapes wide. Cassus stomps into the space beyond our cell, dressed in a uniform I’ve never seen him wear before. It looks like an officer’s garb, complete with colorful tassels and gold trim.

  “Muckers, prepare yourselves,” he barks, standing outside the cell. “We have visitors coming to see you. I expect flawless behavior, or by all the saints I’ll put you both on latrine duty, heroes or not.”

  Heroes. I’m beginning to understand that what happened in the undercity has caused some ripples outside the Department.

  “Can he stand?” Cassus asks Shalloch, as if I’m not right here.

  “I don’t think so,” answers the swashbuckler, eyeing me uncertainly.

  The sergeant grumbles something under his breath, then sighs. “Well, at the very least – oh, by all the shit-stained saints. They’re here.”

  He stands taller, smoothing down his uniform just as a pair of Zimani warriors in ornate bronze armor wearing cloaks of iridescent feathers troop through the door. Without looking at us they take up position flanking the entrance, angling their long black spears so that the points touch and form an archway for whoever follows. I’m expecting someone impressive, but the first to pass beneath the spears is a short, bald man dressed in the simple robes of a scholar. He’s so short, in fact, that he’s barely half the size of the warriors who preceded him. He looks utterly unremarkable . . . except that his skin is a deep, vibrant blue.

  He pauses, gazing around the mucker barracks in what looks like mild surprise, as if he doesn’t know how he has ended up here. His gaze alights on us and he blinks his watery eyes, then gives a small wave.

  I can see the confusion I’m feeling in Shalloch’s face.

  The blue man peers at us for a moment longer, fingering what looks like a conch shell which dangles on a strap around his neck. Finally, as if satisfied with what he sees, he lifts the shell to his lips and blows an oddly clear note.