Gates of the Dead

by James A. Moore

  Without hesitation Beron walked to the next of the severed heads and repeated the action with the same results. The charge of energies poured into him and the vile head of the thing lost its color and motion.

  The power was delicious. The hammering of his heart was a song.

  Soon enough the last of the creatures was treated to the same kiss from his sword. When he looked around, none of the bodies moved at all, and the flesh on all of them had gone a dusty gray.

  Parrish looked at him, a puzzled expression on his face. “What have you done?”

  “What my god asked of me.”

  Parrish stared at the ruins on the ground for a long time without speaking.

  Finally the king said, “It’s time for us to move on, I think.”

  Beron smiled. Every part of his body sang with the power he’d taken in which, he knew, was only a small fraction of what had passed through him on the way to Ariah.

  “Lord Ariah will provide us the passage we need.” He looked at the king and smiled. “He will guide us to where we need to go.”

  To make that point, Beron walked over to the horse he’d been given and climbed into the saddle. A moment later Parrish nodded and did the same. Within minutes his followers joined them. The fires were still burning and in their light Beron could see the decomposing remains of the He-Kisshi. Even immortality did not mean much when the gods readied themselves for war, it seemed.

  He did not need to think about where to go. Ariah provided that information. Beron rode to the north, moving at a steady pace. When the time was right, the world around him shifted.

  The land he walked on was frozen, and the ice was a thick impediment to moving quickly, but the horse continued on and the Marked Men followed after him, led by their king.

  The Gateway rose above his head. He had heard of the landmark, of course, but had never seen it. Why in his life would he have ever had a reason to go that far north, or to stand on so small an island?

  The strip of land was enough to hold all the horses and then some. Above him a thick bridge of stone rose in an arc, and from that stone lightning reached for the clouds and did its best to cut the skies into shreds. The lightning did not move downward, for which he was grateful.

  In the center of that archway the air was warped. It did not clearly show what was on the other side, but instead rippled and flexed into distortions that hurt Beron’s eyes. The wind in the area seemed to come solely from that distortion and the air coming from it smelled of summer.

  In the waters around them he could see the pale faces of creatures unlike any he had ever seen before. They seemed part-human and part-fish, with dark, dead eyes that stared dispassionately. He knew them for what they were, creatures gifted him by Ariah. They were not the same as the pale females he had been given before. These were not the Iron Mothers. But they were something similar and he had no doubt that they had a connection to his god.

  This, then, was his army.

  The creatures stayed in the waters, but they sang to him. The words did not matter. He did not understand them, but he knew they were his to command and that they were loyal to him and to Lord Ariah.

  Beron looked upon the waterbound creatures and knew that they were good. When the time came, they would serve and they would help him reshape the world in Ariah’s image.

  Amen.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Preparing for War

  Daivem

  Daivem and Jahda spoke a great deal. She found him utterly fascinating. He had spent over half of his life on this world and had immersed himself in understanding the politics of the kingdoms, the customs of the people and the ways of the gods here. She had traveled to this place only because the dead called to her. When she said as much to the man who was as powerful as a king, he had laughed and said the same was true for him. The dead had called and he had listened, which was often the way with the Louron, wherever they traveled.

  “I don’t know why the dead called me. There are dead everywhere, but the ones here? Theirs are the voices I heard.”

  Jahda nodded and smiled. “You hear the dead because you want to hear them. That is the way with our people. You can claim that they call out to you but if you do not listen the voices fade in time. They become a whisper no stronger than the sound of the tides.”

  Daivem frowned. That was not the way of the world to her reckoning.

  “I know that look. I have seen it many times. You are trained as an Inquisitor. That means you have not ignored the calls of the dead. You have chosen to listen. Some inquisitors choose who they will listen to. They train themselves not to hear that whisper. And that is all it is, Daivem. As long as you ignore it, it will never be more than a whisper. You said your brother is an Inquisitor, too, yes?”

  She nodded her head.

  “Yet he is not here. He is not running after the sounds of the dead’s whispers. He is, instead, listening to the sounds of the dead only when he wants to hear them. He uses necromancy to listen. He has decided that the whispers are too confusing.” He smiled. “You should learn from him. If you follow this path too long, you wander off to a dozen worlds and maybe you forget how to wander back. I followed those whispers when I started here and then I shut them away and concentrated on what I thought was more important.”

  “What was more important than the voices of the dead?”

  “The voices of the living, of course.” He shrugged. “The dead have moved on. They have lived their lives. The living are still trying to find their way. None of us ever has an easy time of that quest, child.”

  Daivem frowned a bit but considered his words.

  “You have listened to the dead here. You have been drawn to them and I can feel them in your Inquisitor’s staff. You hold the power of entire cities. Of armies. Holding onto that is not dangerous yet, but it will be if you are not very careful.”

  She nodded her head. She had already thought the very same thing.

  “The He-Kisshi say that the dead belong to the gods.”

  Jahda nodded. “They would. They have delivered the living for sacrifice for as long as they have existed. They take the living to be given to the gods. Those living are sacrificed and the gods do whatever it is that they do with those souls.” He smiled warmly at her. She smiled back, because he had that effect on her and most people. He was kind and that kindness was infectious.

  “So you disagree?”

  “I think the dead belong to the dead. I think we have a long tradition of trying to help them. They get caught sometimes, as you know. The dead get lost in details. ‘Why did I die? Who killed me? Have I done all that I could?’ They ask these questions and then they fade away. They become nothing but echoes if they are not helped.”

  “I haven’t helped them. I’m merely moving them.”

  Jahda smiled. “Help is not always easy to see. You have taken them from the places where they were lost. You are moving them, yes, but you have to ask them or yourself, where do they want to go? What do they want to do? When you find that answer, you will know how to handle the masses you have taken on as a burden.”

  What he told her was not something she did not know. Rather it was something she had forgotten that she knew. The dead did not choose to linger in the world. They were confused by it.

  Daivem smiled and nodded.

  “Thank you, Jahda. You are wise.”

  “Well, I suppose that is why they told me to act like a king for the Kaer-ru.” He smiled.

  “Did you not ask to rule?”

  “No.” He frowned. “I was just foolish enough to say that I would.”

  “What would you do with the dead, Jahda?”

  The man stood up and stretched. He was astonishingly tall. His eyes looked out toward the Gateway, which was now only a short distance away. The lightning caressed the skies and almost everyone was looking toward the place where, if he had his way, Brogan would be fighting the gods.

  “The de
ad are dead. I would ask them to serve the living and help fight the gods.”

  Daivem stared long and hard into Jahda’s eyes, trying to solve the mystery of his words. He smiled in return.

  “How?” She whispered the word.

  “That I cannot tell you.” He stared once again at the growing arch of the Gateway. “Perhaps,” he said, “you should ask the dead.”

  She listened carefully to his words and then she did exactly what he suggested.

  Niall Leraby

  In his dreams he had a body. He walked along the shade-touched forests of Edinrun and sampled fruit from the orchards. Sometimes, when he was blissfully lucky, the girl, Tully, walked with him and offered him a smile.

  In his dreams they even held hands, and he was fairly certain that if he risked a kiss, she would kiss him back.

  Life had left him a coward, and he knew that. But he had done his best to be a good person.

  Death was different. He had no idea where he was. There was no contact. No touch, no taste, no sight, no sound. Nothing but his memories and his imagination, which, to be kind, was not currently his friend. He knew there were others around him, all around him, but few of them could be seen or touched and the few he could hear sounded mad with grief.

  Really, death was not at all what he’d expected.

  When he thought for too long he forgot all about the small pleasures of life and focused far too much on the last moments of his existence.

  He felt the claws of the He-Kisshi sinking into his flesh as the thing soared high into the air, dragging him along for the ride, an unwilling participant in a nightmare flight.

  And then it released him to fall, fall, fall.

  The anger surged through him again at that notion. When he was alive there was only the fear. Now, after the end of his world, that fear grew hot and glowed like the sun.

  The woman who’d spoken to him before spoke to him again now. She said, “Do you want revenge?”

  There was only one answer, really. The gods and their servants had ruined his home, killed his family, made him suffer through several personal hells, driven his people insane and tormented him before casting him down to the frozen earth.

  “Yes.” It was only one word, but it echoed.

  No. No echoes. There were other voices added to his and they all seemed to agree. Yes. Revenge. That would taste sweet indeed, after an endless span of being lost in his own thoughts. Had anyone told him he’d died only a handful of days earlier, Niall would surely have laughed bitterly at the jest. Time had long lost all meaning.

  Yes. Revenge. It was a lovely notion.

  Faceless

  There were many questions that Faceless could have answered, had anyone considered asking him. Where did he come from? There was a place to the south of Stennis Brae, and north of Mentath, where, if one waited patiently, a city sometimes rose from the lifeless soil. Once, not all that long ago in the grander scheme of things, a man named Garien and his troupe of performers got lost there. Some of them came away unharmed, the rest were taken by shadows.

  It was from that place that Faceless came. He walked away from the area days after Garien and his people trod across the sands, and he followed a call to find and enter the crystalline prison that held the body of a dead god.

  The vast cavern held no mysteries for him by the time Brogan McTyre showed up. He had been there for well over a year, moving in the silence and shadows and studying the vast corpse that filled the entire mountain.

  During that time, he seldom thought. He was never created for deep considerations. He was designed to wait for Brogan and to assist him if needed. He did both in short order and joined the man in his quest.

  Many creatures remain uncertain of their purpose, but Faceless knew his from the moment he was dropped into the world.

  His purpose was to serve Brogan McTyre, first as a comrade and then as a weapon.

  He felt the change starting before any visible signs showed. He could not have explained those sensations, not really. He lacked the skills.

  Had anyone asked him why he was chosen he could have explained that he was literally created to serve as a weapon for Brogan McTyre. He had been drawn from the blood of Druwan, who walked in darkness and who cried shadows. He existed solely because Druwan wanted to help the Godslayer and thus help free herself from the prison where the gods had so long ago locked her away.

  Druwan was his creator and he was faithful to her. He was also created for Brogan and thus was faithful to him.

  No one asked him. Though in some cases he was simply not asked in the right way. Druwan loved riddles. No riddles were asked, nor were any solved. He simply did as he was told.

  The boat of Darwa crunched along the shoreline of the Gateway and several of the people onboard staggered a bit as the vessel slowed to a stop against solid land. Faceless knew it was time. His very sentience would be an offense to the gods but his body was a different matter.

  “Brogan.”

  The man looked his way with a small grin of curiosity. He had learned much by observing the red-haired man. He had learned facial expressions and what they meant. He had not learned all of them, of course. That might well take lifetimes that he simply did not have.

  “Yeah. Faceless? What can I do for you?”

  “It is time for me to go.”

  Brogan frowned. “What do you mean?”

  Before he could speak an answer, Faceless reached out and caught hold of Brogan’s arm. His fingers gripped the forearm of the man, as he had seen the man do when meeting with a friend. The fingers gripped lightly.

  “I will miss you, I think.”

  Brogan frowned again, confused.

  And Faceless changed.

  He lost his consciousness.

  His body transformed.

  Brogan cried out in pain and surprise.

  And Faceless died.

  Just as he was meant to.

  Brogan

  Brogan felt the pain lash through him like a bullwhip cutting through his body from the inside. It started at his hand and expanded from there, growing through his flesh in seconds and fading almost as quickly.

  He’d been looking right into Faceless’s eyes, noting that there was more in those hollowed spots than mere darkness. The creature had grasped his forearm and given a proper shake and then changed.

  Had the creature once looked like wood? Yes. But he had changed and grown smoother as time went on, losing his rough, nearly barklike texture.

  Several of the others, Anna and Harper among them, moved toward him with worried expressions, but he waved them back. Whatever was happening, he didn’t want to risk anyone else getting hurt if this was truly an attack. And he did not think it was.

  What had been the flesh of the oddest companion he had known moved, flowed, rippled across the distance between them. The change made him think of molten wax as it just starts to grow firm again. There was heat and there was movement and then the figure he’d grown accustomed to moved up his arm in a wave of tingles that changed from mildly ticklish to feeling like he was being stung a thousand times wherever the mass touched him.

  It only lasted long enough to elicit a gasp. Then Brogan saw the odd fluid wash up his arm and across his chest. Not all of it, only a thin layer. The rest stayed in his grip and warped and shifted, the weight changing several times as it stuck to him.

  The stuff flowed under his shirt and across bare flesh. It seared its way across his entire chest and torso, over his back. It flowed up to his neck and stopped short of his jaw.

  His knees grew weak, but Brogan held himself up. The weight of the stuff was obvious, but spread out as it was, he did not feel crushed by it. Instead he stood and compensated.

  When the sensations stopped, Brogan let out a second gasp and did his best to recover.

  And then he considered what had just been done to him.

  His flesh was still there, of course. It was merely h
idden beneath a sheath of armor that fit across his chest and stomach like a second skin. One arm was covered in the stuff as well. It snuggled close to him and didn’t seem to have the sort of joints he would have expected from armor. It fit like a glove. And where there should have been bulky spots, there was instead a series of seams that moved together over elbow, and shoulder, and wrist. The stuff was scaled like a snake’s hide.

  More of the same substance – what had been Faceless and now decidedly was not – was gripped in his hand. The shape was slightly off, but familiar. His hand held an axe. It was large, and it had two blades and the balance of the piece was spectacular. The haft and the blade alike were of a dully-gleaming dark metal.

  He did not think as he tested the weapon. He merely let his body work through a few exercises. The balance was as perfect as he suspected. The armor did not hold him back at all.

  Darwa stared at the armor. Her finger poked it several times.

  He asked a question with his eyes and she scoffed. “I’ve no answers for you here, Brogan McTyre. This is nothing covered by Galea in her many writings.”

  Brogan studied the blade. It was very sharp. It looked capable of carving through a man with ease.

  Perhaps then, it might even cut a god. That was, of course, the purpose of the stuff. He had no doubt at all of that.

  Harper looked at the armor and frowned. “Are you hurt, Brogan?”

  “No.” He shook his head and frowned. “I don’t think I am.”

  Anna studied the stuff with the same sort of curiosity Darwa showed, only she was more direct. She pulled the shirt away from his arm and moved her hands over the hard surface coating his skin. He did not feel her touch, of course. She touched the armor. Part of him, no matter how hard he tried to suppress it, wished that he could feel her hand on his arm.

  She was not his. She never would be. He was not hers. He never would be. He reminded himself of those facts and looked away, toward Desmond. The man was looking back at him, a worried expression on his face.