Elise stepped away from her husband, stamping out the emotions warring within her. She loved Makar dearly. When other angels had turned away her requests for aid, protecting a fragile truce with the Kholodym Dominion rather than follow their One-God’s edicts to aid those in suffering and slavery, Makar had led his people by his own example.
Angelic hypocrisy was hardly new to her, yet she required their strength, and their magic, if anyone were to have a chance at survival. He had come to her aid, and in time became instrumental in her people’s greatest victories. She’d placed hard-won faith in him, and in turn he’d placed his, and his Host’s, faith in her. In her intelligence and her abilities.
Gods, but she had never needed that faith more than now.
The winter plagues had made their way through the mortals swiftly enough, decimating their numbers in a handful of weeks. Her Magi were faring only marginally better.
The world was decaying before their very eyes, their food rotting, their homes consumed in inexplicable fires or drowned in torrents of scalding floodwater, locusts swarming through any crops that didn’t burn or boil.
The locusts had spread the plague, and with the plague came the madness. The mad sought the flame and flood, and their burned husks and bloated corpses only hatched more locusts. So much destruction in less than a year, ever since he, since it, had returned from the far North.
She had received no word from her people in the South for months, and while Elise worried for them she had neither the time nor the resources to spare. Gods, she hardly had a thought to spare any longer. Kholod overlords moving in from the South and West, and the Demon wrecking havoc from whatever warren he’d sought out.
Yet, even with the world crashing around her, even with the pestilence and famine, the angels would have been content to remain secluded in their grand Basilica, its great golden doors sealed to the crushing mobs of mortals begging for the mercy and sanctuary promised to them by their faith.
Except for the grace of their Angelus.
As much as Elise hated to admit it, the Demon’s time tormenting the angels had allowed her own people precious time to breathe, time to regroup and push the Kholod west. Time to finish the Dominion War for good. Or so they’d hoped. Even now scouts brought her word that Askryl’s Wall had been breached.
They were coming. The Kholod were coming.
If her trap was sprung prematurely, if the Demon escaped this time, she and everyone she held dear would be crushed between Demon and Dominion. Spread too thin to fend off one, much less prevail against two.
Unless Richter played his part perfectly. Unless Makar was able to perform his own part in her scheme and spring the trap at the right moment. Too soon and Cassian might escape. Too late, and not only would Richter be forfeit, but the very world itself.
No, they all had to be perfect.
The Seraphima had to be perfect.
Makar caught her mood, silvery wings drooping behind him, “I’m sorry, darling.” The words drifted out in a broken whisper, “I know you fear for him.” Elise allowed him to embrace her once more, but refused to betray the pain stabbing through her heart.
His mouth hovered an inch from her ear, “Richter has already lost what he loved most. He has no illusions now.” His voice trembled, “But in this last moment, I want only to hold you and pretend my wings are bright armor and not weak feathered flesh.”
Elise nodded against his shoulder, words beyond her command.
A knock sounded at the door and he lifted her mouth to meet his for the most finite of moments before gently breaking away.
“And now, darling Elise,” Makar said, voice strong once more, his azure eyes clear as a summer sky, “see to Richter.”
“Are you absolutely sure you’re up to this?”
Richter sat in a tight crouch, staring blankly ahead, his golden eyes focusing on nothing and everything at once.
This was the room.
A white room filled with black memories. Once again he found himself in the center of the Voralla, the Apsis so close he could feel the tapestry of the Archanium brush against the rough golden hairs of his beard.
The Magus standing above him tapped her foot impatiently. Richter ignored her. He might address her pointless question when he was ready, but he would not be rushed into something this important. Not now, not after all they’d suffered. All he’d suffered. After everything Cassian had done to his own people.
To Richter.
Elise’s presence above him grew increasingly oppressive and in deliberate defiance he recalled the memories he’d failed to bury one last time. Watching Cassian decay had been agonizing, standing helpless as the man he loved slowly crumbled before him. And Richter had seen it from its genesis.
He had to acknowledge that much to himself now, if never to another soul.
But Richter always had a solution. Always a salve or spell, anything to push back the poison. They’d all paid dearly for his hubris.
It had been years before the Oborin Order began to question him; years for Cassian’s behavior to slowly, insidiously become ever more erratic, for his twisting judgement to lead them to stunning victories, but only ever at greater cost. And yet, ever the stalwart soldier, the clever Hunter, Richter had explained away every misdirection, every misdeed.
Each new perversion.
Until now.
Now, at long last, bereft of tricks or tales to spin, he was here, at the very place he and Cassian first let in the bane. Here, under the solemn shadow of countless lives lost, the world they had both fought to create rotting at his feet. Like Cassian, cracking and flaking away into tatters until all that remained was cancerous corruption gnawing at the scraps. And an incessant buzz in his ears.
Cassian had let the Demonic Presence into this world, into his soul. And yet, as Richter had admitted far too late, it had twisted their love to pierce his own heart just as keenly.
He had offered to bear the full weight of responsibility. To pay for his offenses with the only thing of worth he still possessed. To atone for what he and Cassian had done. Their intentions had been pure, but that mattered little in the aftermath.
Elise knelt next to him and laid her arm gently across his shoulders. The Mantle lifted from his bare skin, its talons caressing her delicate wrist. “Richter, darling,” she said in that voice that always recalled his mother, for good or ill, “we have to begin. Your children are growing restless, and he could Fade at any moment. We can’t lose him, Richter.”
He came to his feet in a liquid motion, offering a hand to the woman who now knelt before him. She hesitantly accepted it, her gray eyes studying him, searching his face. He could smell her uncertainty, her fear. He wondered if she saw pity reflected in his eyes.
Richter turned to the Apsis, to the sprawling mass of creatures that watched him patiently. Many stood stiff and stoic, though a fair number twitched in the torment of displacement, that caustic conflict that pitted their innate desire for the shade of the Seil Wood against their deep and determined obedience.
Obedience to Richter. Obedience to the Hunter.
The sight of them threatened to tug a sad smile from his stony facade. His children, as she had called them. He doubted the Wood would disagree with such an assessment.
Any trace of happiness withered. The spirits and beasts of his Wood were here for him. And in return, he was consigning them to the fate he alone had earned.
But there was no other way.
Cassian was close enough for the plan to work. For the snare to be set with the most appropriate bait. As much as he pushed the idea from his head, it still hurt that Richter’s presence alone wasn’t enough to draw Cassian out into the open. But his Cassian was gone. He had to be.
“He won’t leave.” Richter said with more confidence than he felt, “He’ll be too intrigued by the crumbs I laid out. He’ll be hungry for something more substantial.”
Elise turned from her own evaluatio
n of his devoted army and managed an encouraging smile. Impossibly, Richter thought she was actually attempting sincerity. “It will work, Richter. We’ve worked out every parameter, every axis, every bloody Song.”
Richter recalled hearing a similar sentiment years, a lifetime, ago. A brand burned against his heart with each flash of memory.
He took a deep breath, reaching for a barrier, a buffer against the pressing need of his reality and the ramifications it would have for him; for his world.
For whatever was left of Cassian.
Richter placed a hand firmly on her shoulder and gave a gentle squeeze. “I’m ready, Elise.” It was a lie, but perhaps it comforted her. “Just make sure your flying rats are prepared for what’s coming.”
She pursed her lips, “Makar is waiting for my signal. Once Cassian has entered the chamber, it will be over.” She rested her fingers over his own, “And your debt will have been paid.”
Richter grunted, dropping his hand as he turned back to his little demons. “We both know the truth of that.” He reached into the Archanium, beyond any region he’d accessed in the past, into a region of pure magical creativity. Into the last realm Cassian had touched before they’d let the bane in.
Feeling him embrace the Archanium, Elise retreated from the room, shutting the heavy iron-bound oak door behind her. He allowed himself a sardonic smile. Doors would protect no one, not from what was coming. Nothing would protect them, whatever Elise and her angels claimed.
Still, this had to happen. This moment, this final meeting. It was his debt, and one he embraced. A debt he would atone for.
That had been enough to satisfy the Order and the angels both. And yet atonement was ultimately a minor consideration in the tumble of thoughts and emotions that stormed through him.
No, if this was to be their final meeting, he would look into Cassian’s eyes one last time. He would verify with every remaining shred of his humanity that Cassian was wholly gone from this world or any other.
Thus one more volley, one last charge into the van; at least one last chance to say good-bye.
The spellform snapped into existence and Richter opened himself to the Apsis, to the strength it afforded him.
The watchfire had been lit.
If they wanted the Demon to sniff him out, he would draw a blood meridian across the Great Sphere that could not be ignored.
Plunging ever deeper into the Archanium, Richter reached out and wrapped the key elements of his spellform around his children.
The spell set its hooks into each of them, into the very demonic nature of each being. So different from the demon Cassian had unleashed, but just similar enough to serve Richter’s need.
Across his back, the Mantle writhed as it was drawn towards the net he cast, but Richter held it back, keeping it bound tight to himself with promises of greater feasts to come.
He completed the final axis connections, binding his demons inescapably to the spellform and shushing the Mantle across his shoulder back into its endless black. He hadn’t tendered empty promises of the feasting to come, but neither had he provided the buck tied for slaughter.
The spellform warped, taking on the twilight-colors of the Aftershadow, deep and almost imperceptible shades of gray, green, and aubergine.
Richter pulled in a hasty breath before reaching across the Great Sphere and summoning a swirl from a region that was all too elementary, practically reaching to a far-distant pole for this single spell. It was a spell they taught children just reaching for the Sphere, and it was the spell that would make his trap irresistible to the Demon.
The simple thread warped and whorled around his construct, infusing the shadow-colors with an otherworldly vitality, the shadows gaining new depth and sinking into an inky black that rivaled the Mantle’s hypnotizing, inky darkness.
From the roiling gloom erupted piercing sheets of burning green and yellow. A deep vibration built in the center of his chest as he directed a child’s base illusion spell around the core of his construct, altering its scent, its ripples across the surface of the Great Sphere.
The Demon was powerful and clever, though lacking any of Cassian’s artful subtlety. It would be hunting for something dramatic, something to rival its ability, its connection to this world through Cassian’s corpse. But that connection could be contained, perhaps even severed. Not by any magic Richter could summon, and certainly not with the combined essence of his demonic children of the Wood, but rather by summoning something that didn’t even properly exist.
At least not yet.
The Voralla shuddered and convulsed. Richter readied himself, knowing that there was no way to truly prepare for what he was about to face. He poured yet more of himself into the construct and felt its binding fibers split and weather under the vast energy he was attempting to contain.
It was a fool’s errand.
Any Magus would have known better, but Richter already had a reputation for being foolhardy.
A shadow began to take shape across the room, the surrounding air shimmering and distorting. Richter poured everything into the blazing, roiling whorl of light before him. He was so close. Richter could smell him, the stink of rotten flesh, and worse by far, the unmistakable putrescence of the Demonic Presence forcing itself into his world.
The shape refined into the physical representation of the Demon in Richter’s world. Into what had once been a man. Into Cassian.
Richter.
The voice shook the Voralla.
Not Cassian’s soft treble, but the harsh buzz of the Presence. Every step Cassian took vibrated painfully in Richter’s chest. He held onto the Archanium, wrapping the final threads around his construct.
We want it, Richter. Give in to Us, Richter.
The Demon reached him and thrust its hand into the core of Richter’s construct, the full force of its power pouring corruption into the magic Richter had summoned, its claws grasping for Richter.
Just before the Demon had him, Richter cut his connection to the Apsis, rolling to the side as the resulting release of so much unspent energy exploded, catching Cassian in its center.
Richter was on his feet a moment later, rushing the stunned form of the Demon. He passed the remains of his construct, a small bubble of shadow, binding his children and shielding them from what was about to happen.
Cassian was already rising from the floor, but it no longer mattered. Richter was close enough. He would be satisfied.
The Demon regained his feet the moment Richter’s hand reached him. The Mantle exploded from his wrist, diving into the Demon and pulling, drinking life. Humanity.
Richter screamed.
The Mantle whipped away, bands of golden light rippling across the black, slithering into Richter’s flesh and searing every nerve in his body. He dropped to his knees, the Mantle writhing around him and flailing without focus as it retreated up his nerveless fingers.
And then Cassian was standing over him, staring down with those same, soft brown eyes. “Richter.”
It was Cassian’s voice. Richter felt the tears well up even as he fought them back. He knew it was an illusion. He had his answer. But the lie still carried comfort and pain in equal portion.
“We want it, Richter.”
Richter felt something tear inside him. He felt Cassian’s hand brush his shoulder, and with that touch came indescribable pain. He knew his life was over, but he never broke from Cassian’s brown-eyed gaze.
His muscles gave out under the constant torment and he collapsed to his side, the burning, burrowing pain only intensifying as the edges of his vision began to cloud with a sickly, sulfurous fog.
He heard the door burst apart. He heard screams, even felt some muster the Archanium before their howls terminated sharply. He lay in a world devoid of noise, excepting the Demon’s singular sound. Except for that inescapable droning.
The world jolted and Richter realized he was hearing a new scream. One he had not heard in
so very long. Not since the day he’d pulled a frightened youth from the slave pens on a fool’s errand.
Pristine blue-white light battled the chartreuse miasma for command of his vision. Somehow, the intense cold of the light burned through him keener than Cassian’s touch.
He felt something heavy crash to the ground only inches from his face and something soft come to rest against his cheek. He blinked, even as the Demon’s fires roared to a new intensity. It was suddenly important that he know what had fallen against him.
His vision, what wasn’t lost to the yellow-green fog of the Presence, came into rough focus.
Cassian lay only a handspan away, his eyes fixed on Richter. The same soft brown despite the desiccated flesh of his face. His hand brokenly extended, fingers long-since rotten gently grasping at Richter’s cheek.
The light of the Seraphima built around them, the air regaining the same searing cold, a counter to the Demon’s fire that threatened to overtake him at any moment. Cold that burned deep enough to remind him that he was still alive, if only for just a moment longer.
“Richter.” Cassian’s voice rattled as a piercing wail filled the air, nearly banishing the name from Cassian’s lips.
A tear finally slipped free, burning its way down Richter’s face. He could smell his flesh sear as it dragged across his cheek before finally dripping from the edge of his jaw. One last scar; one he would never begrudge.
His heart seized in his chest, a staggered beat, but Richter never broke from Cassian’s gaze. Demon fire be damned, this would be the last thing he saw, that voice whispering his name the last thing he heard.
The wail suddenly shifted into song. A beautiful, aching song of healing. Peace. Even in death.
Cassian’s fingers brushed his bearded cheek one last time. Those beautiful brown eyes blinked. Cassian fought to open his mouth as the light became blinding, as the yellow-green fog blighted Cassian from his sight forever.
Just before fog and fires consumed him entirely, he heard Cassian’s final whisper.
“We want to feed.”
The Hunter's Gambit Page 2
