Suchah didn’t even look at the Daemon Device. He lowered his head. “No. No can do it. Too big. Too powerful.”
“Very well. Since you are of no further use to me at the moment, you may go. But when next I need you I need only touch this mark upon my wrist to summon you. Do you understand?”
“Suchah knows.”
“Then go, you vile pustule.”
In a flash of light, Suchah was gone.
They were alone…except for the golems. Leopold tested them. He stepped out of the circle, and one approached, reaching for him…until he took a step back to where he was before. “Strange, aren’t they?”
“Yes.” She was staring at the one behind them. “I’ve only heard tales of Jews creating them, not those who were the enemy of Jews. Were they not designed to protect your people from their persecutors?”
“They have no minds of their own. It doesn’t matter to them. They are only tools. With feet of clay.” He studied the one directly in front of him. “Clay.” An idea. He closed his eyes and reached for his magic. Yes. It was growing stronger. “Miss Zhao, when I tell you to duck, I want you close your eyes and do it.”
“Why? What for?”
“Dash it, woman. Can you not obey one single order from me without questioning it?”
“Very well. On your order.”
He gathered his magic. It was still weak but this he could do. “All right. Ready? Duck!”
She dropped to the ground, arms over her head. Leopold’s gathered magic shot forth from his chest in great waves of fire. The blast encompassed the three golems surrounding them. They glowed red within the flames until Leopold couldn’t hold the magic any longer and the flames ceased, leaving only a black curl of smoke. The golems still glowed until they cooled to gray again. But cracks formed on their baked surfaces as the steam rose from their heads and shoulders. Leopold licked his lips, reached out experimentally with his arm, and pushed on the golem in front of him. Stiffly and without resistance, it tilted backwards, more, more…until it tipped to the ground and shattered.
Mingli didn’t wait. She shoved her golem over and it, too, fell to fragmented sherds. They both shoved the third one, and it followed suit, looking like broken crockery.
“You are a clever man,” she said.
“They were made of clay. They needed only to be fired like any clay pot.”
Leopold kicked the sherds away and raced to the Device. “Can we destroy that control panel at least?”
“No. I don’t think so. It is now more than the sum of its parts, I’m afraid.”
“Meaning?”
She raised a finger and gently probed near it and a spark flashed, encompassing her finger in blue light before releasing her. “It is not merely steel, iron, or rivets any longer. It has taken on the properties of the Otherworld. It is not man-made anymore. Your erstwhile ‘Lock’ and this control panel are now beyond reach.”
He took a shaky breath. “That’s damnable.”
“Yes.” She seemed perplexed. It wasn’t a good look on her.
“But now what? How do we destroy this thing?” He stepped up to the porthole and gazed at Eurynomos, still yanking at his fiery bonds. “And what of him?” He turned suddenly to Mingli. “The bomb. You have a bomb. Can we use it to destroy it?”
She reached into her jacket and pulled out a compact object, a metal orb with a turning gear atop it. She looked at it and slowly nodded. “It was made with the help of supernatural means. I am certain it can disable the Daemon Device. But it will also most certainly kill your friend.”
Leopold stared at the bomb with an ache in his gut. He pressed his hands to the hot metal and stared through the crystal. “Eurynomos! Can you hear me?”
The beast slowly turned his head and with eyes dulled by pain gradually focused on his. “Leo,” he groaned.
“Old friend!”
Eurynomos heaved a breath and though Leopold could tell he struggled through the pain, his eyes shone with a kind of relief. “And so…we are still friends?”
“I’ve been a fool, Eurynomos. Yes, of course we are. Please forgive me.”
The daemon smiled. “Forgive you? It is you who must forgive me. Please know that I did it to protect you. Always to protect you. That’s what Ákos wanted.”
“I know that now.” The metal was becoming too hot to bear but it seemed so little a thing compared to what his friend was suffering. “We need to destroy the device.”
The daemon nodded. “I tried to control it from within but with these magical bonds I cannot. Sorry, old man.”
“We…we have a bomb that I believe will work. But…”
“I’ll blow up with it. Well, c'est la vie.”
“Eurynomos…”
“Look, Leo old man, it must be done. I’ve had a very good five thousand years. Nothing lasts forever.”
“But…” He rested his forehead against the crystal. His own burning flesh made his nostrils flare. Mingli grabbed him by the shoulders and pulled him away. His hands smoldered and his forehead burned.
“Leo,” she said softly. “You mustn’t hurt yourself.”
He scarcely took notice.
The daemon bowed his head to her. “Miss Zhao. You’ll take care of him, won’t you? He’s useless on his own.” His gaze slid toward Leopold. “Use the bomb, Leo. You know you must.”
“I can’t.” When had tears blurred his eyes? “There must be another way.”
“You know there isn’t. You’ve got to use that bomb and you’ve got to do it quickly. There’s no more time to waste.”
He stared again at the apple-sized bomb in Mingli’s hand. He inhaled a shaky breath and reached out to grab it. His sleeve slid back revealing the Eye of Providence glaring from his flesh, and he froze, gaze now fixed on the mark. The wretched mark. The Unholy Hosts had set it there, had bound him to the Otherworld in ways he was yet to discover. There were debts to be paid and though he was paying them he knew that a man sometimes had to sue for more debtors in order to secure a future, if not for himself then for others. His father had made a sacrifice. Why not him?
He withdrew his hand and left the bomb in Mingli’s palm. She looked at him with imploring eyes, but instead of answering, he pushed up his sleeve and fully exposed the mark. He held his arm up, aiming the eye toward the Device.
“I call upon the Unholy Hosts!” he cried in his loudest voice. “I call upon you dread gods of the Otherworld who marked me with your flaming eyes.”
Eurynomos struggled toward the crystal window. “Leo, what are you doing? No! Don’t do it! Not for me.”
Leopold turned away so that he would not see the pleas on the daemon’s face. “I call upon you to come to me now. Open the gate and listen to me. Hear my plea!”
Chapter Twenty-Eight
A DEEP BOOM beneath their feet rocked the earth and Mingli and Leopold tumbled to the ground. A sudden swirling wind surrounded them, howling with the sounds of countless souls. Leopold could feel each one of them as they strafed over his skin, like the raking of thorns over his flesh. He writhed and cried out. Mingli screamed beside him but there was nothing he could do to protect her. They were caught in the vortex of spinning light and dread, flashing over them, and they wanted nothing more than to curl onto the ground in helpless weeping.
Eurynomos’ howl sounded above the cries of the Otherworld but his voice was soon drowned out by the cacophony as the floor cracked open and a bright green light shot upward like a pillar of fire.
Leopold, barely holding on to his senses, grabbed Mingli and thrust her behind him. By summoning his last ounce of strength, he got up onto his knees and stayed there. He lifted his arm against the tide and held the mark forth until the light and sound coalesced into vague hulking shapes. They might have been tentacles. They might have been robes flowing with an unearthly current of ether, it was difficult to tell. Leopold held his eyes wide open against the blast of heat when all of his senses were telling him to close them, to run, to hide. Even to te
ar his own skin from his limbs.
Mingli whimpered behind him. He wished he could curl up beside her and do the same.
“yOU hAVE sUMMONED uS.”
The voice was like the slapping of offal upon the ground. Like the cracking of a limb from its joint. Leopold shuddered, felt nauseated, but stayed steadfast and upheld his arm with his other hand.
“Yes. I have summoned you.”
“aND WHO ARE YOU, lEOPOLD kAzsMER, TO DARE UTTER oUR NAmE?”
“I would close the gateway. Prevent more golems from coming through. Save Eurynomos and destroy the Device.”
The sound could have been laughter. It was too much. It rumbled deeply in his gut. He had no choice but to lean over and wretch. Emptying himself, he managed to stop by will alone, wiped his mouth with his sleeve, and resumed holding up his exposed left arm, steadying it with his right.
“YOu DON’T aSK FOR MUCH, dO YOU? SUCH SIMPLE CREatuRES YOU ARE. sO NAÏVE AND DuLL. bUT YOU MAkE EXCELleNT SERVaNTS.”
He took a deep breath. “And I would serve you.” The words left his lips and terror filled the hollowness. Now he’d done it. He couldn’t take it back now. Eurynomos howled behind him.
The shapes of the figures before him seemed to mill together, commiserating. The air around him tingled with electricity, and the harsh sounds of the Otherworld through the crack in the earth died back as if sound itself was sucking away, leaving behind a void that drew him closer to the abyss. He even edged toward it before he shook himself free of the mesmerizing siren song. His fingers gripped his naked elbow and raised his arm higher, defiant of his own good sense that told him to flee instead of stand there, waiting for whatever horror to leap out of the deep and consume him.
Their chorus of voices pierced the odd silence. “wE WILL DESTROY thIS DAEmON dEVICE BUT THe PRINce OF dEATH IS OuRS.”
Leopold fought against the primitive panic trying to gain control of him. “No. I will not bargain with him. He is free or we don’t have a covenant.”
“YoU dARe!”
He fell back. But he righted himself, leaned into the wind, and slowly got to his feet. He held out his left arm without bracing it. “Yes. I dare. Release him or there is no bargain.”
“aND WHAT WilL YOU give US IN ReTURn?”
“Noooo!” cried Eurynomos. It seemed his voice came from very far away.
Leopold wanted to look back at him, look through the crystal window, but he dared not turn his back on the Unholy Hosts.
He screwed up courage that was quickly fading under what his eyes were only now beginning to discern. The figures became more distinct as he stood there. He didn’t want them to come into full focus. Nightmares must never be recalled this distinctly.
“Anything,” he breathed.
“Leo!” Mingli cried, but he ignored her.
The laughter again, a horrible sticky squelching noise. “dONE!”
He suddenly collapsed to his knees.
“yOU HAVE pROVED YOUrSELF VERY INTereSTING TO US, LEOpOLD kAzSMER. YOU wiLL BE OUR SErvANT AND WHEN wE CALL UPON yOU, THERE wILL BE oBEDIENCE. dO YOU AGREE?”
“Yes. I agree.”
“ThEN…BEHOLD! oUR COVENANT WIth YOU.”
Searing heat wrapped around his wrist and Leopold screamed from the agony. He was certain his hand was being burned off, but when he looked at it, it looked the same as ever. But the mark…
It glowed. And with each pulse a renewal of the pain of a hot poker burned into his flesh. He grit his teeth, and panted, watching, as the knotted band writhed and roiled on his wrist. One of the knotted bands split in two and moved slowly up his arm. The Eye, now animated, watched it move, until it twisted and made its own triple band and settled above the first. Only the new band glowed with a white-hot flame and suddenly ceased. His arm smoldered and a dull ache was still there. And now there was an addition to the original tattoo. A spiky knotted band, wider than the first. Marked again.
He dreaded asking. But he needed to know. Needed to reconcile as quickly as possible what he was to become. He’d be worse than the imp Suchah. He was merely a tool of the gods now. “What…what would you have me do?”
Silence again, but this time it was unbearable.
“What would you have me do! I need to know.”
“PATIENcE, LEOPOLD kAZsMER. wE HAVE NO NEEd OF YOU foR NOW. oNE DAY WE wILL CALL upON YOU. ONE DAY yOU Will BE OUr SLAVE.”
He wanted to wretch again but swallowed down the bile. “Then…free Eurynomos.”
A clap of thunder deafened and he raised his hands to his ears. He looked back at the Device. A wide crack had formed on its metal surface and a light followed the jagged line of that crack. The metal began to vibrate and soon it was at such a frequency as to appear blurred. Leopold leapt toward Mingli, gathered her in his arms, and turned his back to the Device, protecting her just as it exploded outward.
Shards of white-hot metal soared by him. A piece singed his hair, whistling as it went. But no pieces touched him. He was protected by his mark. It was little comfort.
He turned to look. The metal had been bent wide open, like a tin of beef peeled back with a rusty opener.
Eurynomos stood in the center of the smoldering debris. Shoulders sagging, head down, he panted hard, blowing smoke through his nostrils. All at once he looked up. His eyes were wide burning coals. And he rushed over the broken metal to scoop up Leopold into his arms, pushing Mingli back.
“You stupid, stubborn, wonderful man,” he muttered, rubbing his cheek against the side of Leopold’s head. “You fool, you fool.”
Leopold would have pushed the beast back but he had no strength. He hung limply in the daemon’s embrace, exhaustion dragging on him.
“reMEMBER OUR COVEnANT, lEOpOLD kAzSMER. aND OUR GIFT.”
“Gift’?” he said weakly. But even as he sagged in Eurynomos’ arms, he felt the sudden warmth of magic enveloping him. The new mark stung even as he filled with power and he put his feet to the ground and stood on his own.
The crack in the floor slowly closed itself and the light and the sounds receded back to where nightmares generally reside.
The sharp smell of sulfur was strong in the air and he looked down at his wrist again. Tentatively, he touched the still stinging new mark. The shadow of a horned beast fell upon it but it was only Eurynomos leaning forward.
“Hmm,” said the beast, touching it gently with a talon. “Interesting.”
“Is that all you can say?”
“For now,” he whispered. “Mostly I’d like to say…thank you.” His friend smiled his sharpened teeth.
“God, you’re truly an ugly creature,” said Leopold.
“I was going to say the same about you.”
Mingli moved between them. She had lost her hat, her hair had untangled from its careful ringlets and fell alluringly over her shoulder where the sleeve was ripped. A smudge of dirt ran across her nose. “This is all very touching indeed, but now what? Is it destroyed?”
They all looked back at the machine, at its sheared metal. A light deep within it was dimming. Above it, the tent roof had torn open, leaving the sky visible. Several dirigibles, their lanterns hanging just beneath their gondolas, moved sluggishly over the countryside. All at once, one by one, they shuddered violently and holes suddenly shot through the membranes of their hulls. Bits of somethings were falling from the ships. Leopold grabbed his spectacles from his coat pocket, flipped the lenses till he got the binoculars, and stared hard into the distance. Bodies. But not of men.
“The golems are disintegrating. Exploding.”
The nearest airship was going down. Too many holes had torn through the envelope. The golems were bursting apart and shooting through the fabric like buckshot. And then, like a whale sounding, the airship rose up and then tilted downward. It hit a copse of trees before final descent and something ignited the hydrogen. It burst into spectacular flames, lighting up the countryside. The soft booms rumbled like distant thunder. For a moment, Leopold could see in bright
relief a remote farmhouse, the hedgerows that separated the fields, and the tops of other copses along the open plains.
Another airship further away was also headed downward. The crew seemed to have more control and were setting it down near the railway station in an albeit bumpy landing. A third was suffering the same fate.
But where was Waldhar?
Mingli ran outside and Leopold and Eurynomos followed. She pointed up in the sky in the opposite direction. “Look! He’s headed toward London.”
“He’s escaping. He’ll cross the channel before we ever get near London.”
“Another dirigible!” she cried.
Leopold looked where she pointed. Tethered to a distant tent was a lone dirigible, much smaller than the others that had taken to the skies. And it looked to be abandoned.
Leopold nodded. “Let’s take it. Eurynomos, will you be coming with us?”
“Judging by the current strength of your magic, I would say that you little need my help. But I will be happy to give it, only…”
“Only?”
“I think I have more matters to repair in Gehenna. Trouble has been brewing for a long while, and during the brief time I was away there may have been more mischief afoot. I must find out, for instance, who is allowing the likes of Waldhar to commandeer the denizens of the Otherworld. True, it only takes the right incantations, but surely someone shouldn’t be asleep at the wheel. Heads will roll, I assure you.”
When he turned to Mingli, she had her gun in her hand. She smiled and winked. “I think we can take it from here, Master Eurynomos.”
“Master? Oh, I like her, Leo.”
Leopold cleared his throat. “What of the golems?”
Eurynomos looked to the skies again. “I would say that they are disintegrating. Without the gateway to keep them alive, well. They are nothing but clay, after all. We’ve already seen what they did to that one airship. The others must be filled with spatters of wet clay.”
“Even so we may have stopped this plot but we must stop Waldhar himself, or he will only try again.”
“Then go, Leo. Go, and I will be near. I am only a summoning away. And with that little addition to your arm, you may not need to cut as deep. I’d hate for you to start hewing off limbs, after all.”
The Daemon Device Page 25
