Light of the Outsider

by Matthew Wayne Selznick

  Hatul held his hand out and waved it toward his chest. Kug understood. The door opened out.

  Kug tilted his head at the latch, then stood with his back next to the frame.

  Hatul tried the latch.

  It was unlocked. A gift from the Plain One's magn?

  Hatul yanked the door open.

  Kug stepped into the small entryway and immediately saw a lone, wide-eyed acolyte.

  Wordlessly, Kug swung his ax. Blood fountained from the deep gash in the acolyte's throat. He crumpled almost silently onto the thick rug. Blood flooded faster than the heavy fibers could absorb.

  Kug's companions crowded in. He allowed himself a wink or two to watch the tension and the life flee the magn's features before he turned to face them.

  "Quiet, so far," he said.

  Talen

  Talen heard Rajen's whisper through a buzzing whine coming from somewhere deep inside his skull.

  "Stop gaping."

  He closed his mouth. It filled with saliva and his stomach clenched.

  The dead magn at their feet went on being dead. The wet, gleaming slit across his neck teased the secret complexities beneath everyone's skin.

  Talen swallowed carefully.

  His mind presented images that typically haunted him just before achieving the unreliable sanctuary of sleep.

  He'd never actually seen the slaughtered bodies of Ragan and the rest of the troupe on that horrible day years ago. He'd only heard their screams through the woods. Over time, his gifted imagination and guilt provided in experience's stead.

  Just last night, though, he had seen Lama and the other magn’s insides spread all over their split, broken, offended flesh.

  "You'd assume," he croaked, "I would grow accustomed to this."

  Hatul stepped past him and over the body. His boots squished on the soaked carpet.

  "One door," he said in a low voice. "Rajen?"

  Rajen nodded.

  Hatul sheathed his sword, crouched, lifted his trouser leg, and pulled a small, thin stone knife from a sheath strapped at his shin.

  Talen didn't understand why the magn would opt for such a comparatively ineffective weapon. It must have been obvious on his face.

  Hatul stood up and shrugged. "Close quarters."

  "This is the only weapon I have," Talen protested.

  Kug joined Hatul at the door. "Don't get sloppy with it, then." He gave Hatul a nod.

  They reversed their roles. Kug opened the door and Hatul slipped through.

  Kug followed. Rajen moved too fast for Talen to get ahead of her, so he took up the rear.

  The thick carpet did not extend into the hallway, but no matter; stone or wood, Talen had been well trained to step silently. He noticed once-stumblefooted Hatul shared the skill. Rajen appeared instinctually light of foot, unless it was her Science telling her where and how to place her steps.

  Kug, defiantly careless, made more than enough noise to announce them all.

  They passed three doors, but Rajen gave no sign they should stop until just before the fourth.

  "Hold," she breathed urgently.

  Everyone stopped and froze.

  The fourth door opened. A female magn, clad in now-familiar mottled white and grey emerged.

  She opened her mouth, inhaled, and Hatul was on her. One hand covered her mouth; with the other, he pushed his knife easily between her ribs and twisted his wrist rapidly back and forth.

  Her eyes bulged. Her robe bloomed red.

  A delicate latchkey slipped from her hand and clattered cacophonously on the wide wooden planks of the floor. Talen flinched from the sudden violence as much as from the racket. If Kug's stomping hadn't revealed them, this surely would.

  Hatul eased the magn down to the floor and gestured with a nod for Talen to retrieve the latchkey.

  Talen didn't see the point. She'd had no opportunity to lock the door.

  Also, he could not look away from her.

  He regretted his stunned fascination when her eyes met his. As he watched, her last breath softly bubbled past her lips and she left her flesh.

  Hatul breathed through clenched teeth. "Someone. Pick up. The key!"

  Rajen bent and got it.

  Finally, Talen's training resurfaced. Of course. Leave no sign, coming or going.

  Hatul got behind the corpse and lifted under her arms. "Back where she came from," he whispered.

  Kug opened the door.

  With its simple table, chair, and plainly appointed sleeping pad, the room may have been the dead magn's quarters.

  The male magn on the bed, bound ankles and wrists, heavy gag in his mouth, lent credence to the room being, at least of late, an ersatz cell.

  Fagahg

  Although Fagahg, by deliberate and dedicated design, was rarely in situations conducive to surprise, his composure and existential indifference were nearly overcome when the door opened and he recognized the magn dragging the body as Dennick, with Kug, the sellsong, and the seer clustered beyond.

  If not for the heavy twist of fabric gagging his mouth, he might even have grunted.

  Everyone crowded into the room. The sellsong—Talen—closed the door.

  Dennick crouched down, eye to eye with Fagahg. He put the tip of a bloody stone knife to Fagahg's throat.

  "I am going to remove your gag," Dennick said. "You will remain silent."

  Fagahg acknowledged this with an appropriately shallow dip of his head.

  Rajen said, "This magn should not be part of this. We don't have time—"

  Talen said, "Does his thread join our… braid?"

  Dennick slid the gag from Fagahg's mouth and let it slap to the floor. Fagahg worked his jaw and bit down on the insides of his cheeks to generate saliva. He swished it around in his mouth, turned his head to one side, and spat.

  Dennick said, "I've seen you. I know you."

  Fagahg made a bit more of a show of his discomfort in order to have time to consider this. The spy wore remnants of his Hatul identity. Did these others know him as the Shadow District drunk, or as the celebrated Court District sellsword?

  He settled on a reply that depended on neither.

  "I was once part of the city guard. I've been retired."

  "Your name."

  "Fagahg." He flexed against his bonds. "If you untie me…"

  Dennick stood up and loomed over him. "How did you come to be in this place?'

  "Last night, I came to the Steadfast Capful," Fagahg acknowledged Kug with a nod, "and found it closed. Before I continued on my way, I heard the cries of a child, and saw several magn making an escape. It was you, I think, I saw engage them on the rooftops."

  Dennick was impassive. "Tell your story."

  "I followed them. They took to a boat. I gave them distance, swam after them, until I reached this island, where I was overcome."

  Talen said, "You… swam."

  Kug said, "You gleaned they had Ranith. What did you think you would accomplish here, alone? Greed take your sense?"

  "I saw an opportunity."

  Rajen said, "Replace the gag and leave him."

  Kug said, "Or untie him, and give him another 'opportunity.'"

  The seer glanced at the door. "We risk discovery. Or worse, we dawdle while Taghesh proceeds with…" The way she censored herself just then made Fagahg wonder what knowledge she was hiding. "… with whatever he plans with to do with Ranith."

  Dennick said, "This magn assumed he could face the Plain One's assassins, and a house full of magickers. Whether that's arrogance or idiocy, I don't know, but he doesn't carry my faith."

  The sellsong's head pivoted from Kug to Dennick and back again, indecisive and… yes. Afraid.

  Fagahg could work with that.

  "I assure you," Fagahg said, "you are headed for a fight." He looked at Talen, and then to Dennick. "I can fight."

  The emphasis on "I" was subtle enough to be polite, and clear enough to be otherwise.

  Talen darkened.

  Ra
jen seethed. "Make a decision."

  Fagahg watched something wordless pass between Dennick and Kug.

  Dennick knelt and slashed the bindings on his wrists and ankles.

  Necessary though it was, Fagahg felt some resentment as feeling raged painfully back to his extremities. As soon as he could, and before he was entirely ready, he stood up.

  Dennick handed him the knife. "You will heed my word."

  Fagahg nodded.

  Talen sneered, "A shame we don't have a better weapon for you."

  Fagahg studied the sticky blood on the blade with unbidden awe. Not long ago, that stain sustained life. Now it was no more and no less than a cold reminder that Nzaav always honors his one promise, and always prevails.

  As he would prevail today.

  "This will do," he said.

  Kug

  The seer guided them deeper into the manor. Kug took point, keeping the "opportunist" between him and Hatul.

  Kug did think there was something off-the-path about Fagahg, but if that singular zeal could be pointed violently at the magickers responsible for all of this, Kug was willing to accept the magn into their party. After Hatul's actions at White Eye's lair, Kug had confidence that no matter who the magn truly was, he'd put a quick end to any mischief Fagahg might direct against them.

  Unless the two of them shared some deeper scheme between them.

  It didn't matter to Kug. The palace guard waited for him in Aenikantag, no matter what transpired here. So long as Kug put an end to Taghesh and the rest before his own path sent him to oblivion.

  Talen, bringing up the rear, whispered, "Where is everyone?"

  Kug would never have included the sellsong on the list of magn he imagined at his side in the last marks of his life. The kit was something of a fool, if an earnest one, and even though they'd begun in opposition, Kug no longer held him responsible for Lama's death.

  Also, with Talen came the magicker, and it was Rajen's handy Science that got them this far.

  Kug expected her to have a scolding reply for Talen.

  Rather, as they all came to the end of the hallway and its terminating door, she simply said, "Below."

  Kug looked back at her. She raised her eyebrows and tilted her head forward.

  Hatul said, "Listen."

  Kug could hear it. Chanting voices muffled enough by door and, apparently, floor, that he could not make out words.

  He shivered, as much from the sinister chorus as from an undefinable, but undeniably troubling, change in the air. The hairs on his neck and arms stiffened.

  Talen said, "You all feel it..?"

  Rajen said, "It's happening. Now. We need to disrupt the concerted magick. Break their focus."

  Kug knew exactly how to do that.

  He kicked open the door and, ignoring the shock of pain that traveled up his leg, raised his ax and flew down the stairs beyond, screaming rage and grief and death into the miasmic, sickly glowing darkness below.

  Chapter Twenty Nine

  Rajen

  Rajen drew her knife as Fagahg and Hatul raced after Kug.

  She took several rapid, deep breaths through gritted teeth. The braid of four pulled on her as sure as if she had a rope around her waist.

  Or, considering what waited below, a hook in her lip.

  Her feet took her down the stairs.

  Behind her, Talen called, "Wait!"

  The basement chamber was broad and circular. The floor sloped like a shallow bowl toward a wide pit in the center. She saw Kug, Fagahg, and Hatul engaging with five or six magn in mottled robes: magickers armed with knives and clubs and… yes, a glimmer in her vision and in her mind showed some had offensive Science to offer, as well.

  Save a few guttering torches on the walls, to Rajen's eyes the room was mainly illuminated by an ugly smear of swirling multicolored light snapping and twisting up from the pit like some formless thing spasming its way out of the darkness. It was similar to the probability streams, but… corrupted. Made foul by whatever it was that could somehow contaminate possibility itself.

  That light flicked at her mind's eye like a rapist's sour, heavy tongue.

  Awful.

  Offensive.

  Unreal, in the sense that the glow embodied an absence of everything real, as if it seeped in from…

  From Outside.

  This was Amang-huru.

  The understanding slammed into her sanity.

  This was the thing the Plain One… feared? Slipping through bleeding gashes in reality.

  Talen was next to her.

  "What… is that?"

  "You can see it?"

  He nodded, wide-eyed.

  Rajen hadn't noticed at first, but the diseased glow reflected in his eyes, and on the faces of her other companions. On the other magickers. On the walls, and the floor.

  The phlegmy, tumorous glow was more than an artifact of her enhanced perception.

  It was of the world.

  Even as it was not.

  "This… is very bad."

  Two silhouettes swayed in the center of the pit, awash in the undulating light, seemingly oblivious to the melee and desperate shouts of the magn fighting for their lives all around them, or to the full-throated wail of the baby that cut through it all.

  One of the figures in the pit was Taghesh. The deformity of his stunted right arm marked him plainly.

  Rajen knew who the other would be.

  Of course.

  "Talen," she cried. "You have to get Ranith out of the pit! Away from Taghesh!"

  "Which one—"

  "Child arm!"

  Talen gave her a too-long look heavy with loyal determination. He raised mothersfather Kranlen's sword and made for Taghesh.

  Rajen's hands were damp with sweat. She tightened her grip on her knife.

  The Plain One had known exactly what to say to her.

  Fail today, and all choices would cease.

  For Rajen to surrender her fate to anything other than blind, insensate fate itself was unacceptable.

  If she failed today, let it be in action.

  Let her steal choice from the vile skink of a magn who had sought to rob same from her.

  Knife high and ready, a snarl on her lips, she ran for Ulthus.

  Talen

  It wasn't any more than five or six stride from the base of the stairs to the ghastly strobing pit at the center of the cellar, but the closer Talen got, the more he felt buffeted by the undulating light, as if he were plodding through a storm of many fronts. Kranlen's sword vibrated and shook in his sweaty hands.

  Peripherally, he saw or sensed Rajen racing for Ulthus, slashing her blade so viciously the magicker had no choice but to give ground and flinch back and away from the pit.

  Through the diseased kaleidoscope glow of feathered, smearing light, Talen got his first look at Taghesh. Even illuminated by the snapping, writhing luminescence, the feared magicker looked like every pale-skinned puffy bureaucrat he'd ever seen, save his disconcertingly underdeveloped and tiny right arm.

  They were barely two stride apart when Taghesh locked eyes with Talen, and the sellsong quickly reassessed his impression.

  Taghesh was afire with obsessive, fanatical conviction. Any sensible magn would cringe from so obvious a madness, for anyone so utterly dedicated was usually very dangerous.

  Talen's hesitation was barely a breath, but that was long enough for Taghesh to raise his appropriately proportioned left arm and point at Talen. The sleeve of the magicker's robe slid back from his wrist, where some kind of contraption was strapped.

  A twang; a surprising sting in Talen's raised forearm, more shocking than painful. He had time to register a dart as the source of the prick of discomfort before it fell away from him. Thankfully, the thing had barely broken the skin.

  His skin.

  The welt on his arm; the drop of blood; it was on fire.

  Then, the spot was dead as stone, and the numbness spread in pulsing ripples, weaker as it spread, but disori
enting and terrifying still.

  What was happening?

  Poison?

  His fingers were cold twigs. Kranlen's sword slipped from his grip and clanged against the cobblestone floor.

  The senses-battering light swirled around him, pulling at limbs that no longer felt entirely his own. Panic throttled his throat and exploded around his heart.

  Taghesh laughed at him.

  Talen answered with an anguished noise between despair and rage.

  He did what he could with his uncertain, flailing, failing limbs.

  He fell into the magicker, and sent them both tumbling hard into the pit.

  The awful light crackled silently all around Talen, obscuring anything beyond the low stone rim of the pit.

  Did the wormy glow seem to cling to him?

  Was it gathering around his nose? His gaping mouth? The angry, spreading bruise where Taghesh's cowardly dart had struck?

  Fear boiled up his spine until he forced himself to trust that he was simply drugged; that most of this was not real.

  His arms and legs were like ancient tree limbs, long-dead but still attached to his trunk, not quite ready to snap off, barely holding him off the ground.

  His heart raced. His temples pounded in time.

  The baby.

  Talen could almost make him out, there at the center of the pit, nearly lost in the bright… thick… glow. It was like looking at Tah at the middle of the day, if Tah had ever been a chromatic swirl that burned the eyes even as it grasped and twisted at the mind.

  Ranith's hoarse cries were ragged with terror and animal panic. How could something with such little time in the world know enough to be so afraid?

  Everything wants to live, from the start, until the end.

  Talen had to reach him.

  He had to get him out of that hungry, purulent, bleeding light.

  Taghesh came in and out of view the same as if the cloying light were a thick, billowing fog. He got to his feet; lurching toward the center of the pit, to Ranith.

  Talen cried, "Nah!"

  His knees and ankles were as good as locked, but he could pivot his hips with great effort and aim himself for Taghesh like an amateur stilt-walker on their first day with the troupe.