Mists of Everness

by John C. Wright

  The shadow whispered, “You have chosen your curse wisely, mortal man. For had you chosen in wrath and haste, you would have destroyed the wife of him who stands next to you for she has drunk your blood no less than these here …”

  By this time, the grove had grown, and they stood on a grassy knoll in a forest. Green vines were already beginning to bury the cracked dome of the torture-city.

  From the region of the sky into which Galen’s arrow had disappeared, Raven now saw a falling star descending.

  “Is just meteor, right?” said Raven. “Didn’t actually shoot star down out of sky?”

  “Raphael’s coming,” said Galen. “Now, one last thing before I summon a dream-colt to carry us home. Don’t look. This is going to be pretty ugly, but I’m not going to wear Dylan’s face any longer than I have to!”

  He shot an arrow straight directly overhead. It paused at the apogee of its flight, turned, fell. By this time Galen had pulled open the hood and cloak of the selkie-coat he wore, so that his disfigured face and mangled chest were exposed to the daylight. The arrow struck him in the chest and turned to a beam of warmth. He shed his old skin and stood beneath sky, naked and whole, newly reborn.

  The sky overhead was beginning to turn blue.

  Galen drew on his white chlamys, and four fair maidens came out from between the trees, bearing silver arms. One buckled on his spurs, telling him to let courage spur him onward; one drew a coat of silver scale across his shoulders, telling him to let moderate desires guard his heart; one placed a peaked helmet on his head, telling him to let prudent thoughts ward his head; the last one knelt and buckled a swordbelt around his waist. This belt had no scabbard, but a quiver of arrows hung from it. She told him to use his weapon justly, not in anger or pride.

  The girls all kissed him, one after another, and walked away through the green wood, swaying with graceful steps, their faces grave.

  Raven was staring in gap-mouthed confusion, “What! Who was this? Who in the world these women were, eh?”

  Galen smiled. “Some parts of this job I really like. See that light behind the mountains there?”

  “Sunrise?”

  “No. Sun’s overhead. That’s the guy I called: Raphael. I want to get out of here before he comes. Talking to Seraphim is kind of scary. Stand back so I can draw a line on the ground for my pretend wall.”

  Galen said a poem, and a shape of winged beauty lightly lit down from the heavens, her silvery hoofs not bending the newborn grass.

  Galen petted the winged fawn’s nose, and little curls of mist and light seemed to caress his fingers.

  Raven looked at the light behind the mountains (which was approaching with the music of trumpet, drum, and cymbal) up at the new blue sky, around him at the newly born forest, and then at the vision eating a newly plucked apple from Galen’s hand. Raven stood with his mouth hanging open in awe.

  Galen looked over his shoulder at Raven and laughed. “Don’t look so surprised! This is only a dream, after all …”

  Raven frowned, for he did not recall falling asleep.

  II

  At that moment, a scrap of darkness fluttered down from overhead in the shape of a bat. The bat clung, upside-down, from a nearby tree branch, and spoke in a high, thin voice: “The deed be done! I call upon ye, Raven, to yield to me the cloak as promised!”

  Galen said, “I know your voice, Dylan! You’ve got a lot of nerve! How come I shouldn’t kill you right now, huhn?” and he lifted the bow, but he could not draw it.

  Raven said, “Evil creature! You run out on me, eh?”

  But the dream-colt spoke in a voice like rippling music, saying, “Raven, son of Raven, you must keep your promised word. Here, in this realm, gold we do not esteem, for it grows like autumnal leaves on trees, nor wine, which flows from generous springs. But a word, once given, may not be taken back; for our great enemy here is called Forgetfulness, and our only weapon against him, is to remember our promises.”

  Raven stooped and picked up the man-skin coat, which he threw to the roots of the tree from which the bat dangled. “Here! Is yours. Take it.”

  The bat dropped down into the mass of leather, and a silver-haired, bearded man stood up. “Don’t ye be so high and mighty with me, boyo!” said Dylan. “Who’s to blame for anything we selkie do to humankind? The first of us was but a seal, ye know. ’Twas human fingers clasped the first coat around our necks; we had no hands to do the deed, back then!”

  Galen, with studied casualness, picked up the wolf-skin he had shed as well, and tossed it to the selkie’s feet, saying nonchalantly, “Oh, I guess this is yours as well. Take it.”

  Dylan picked it up.

  Galen pointed at Dylan with three fingers, saying, “A gift of fairy-land, freely taken!”

  Dylan stiffened. “Aye? What be all this ye say?”

  Galen shouted, “I claim the gift you had from me, the wolf-skin pelt! I claim the hand that took the gift, and the whole body that hand is part of, and the soul that moves that body! Your soul is mine, now, Dylan of Njord, I know, I know, I know your name!”

  “Ar! There be no such spell as that!” snarled Dylan uncertainly.

  “I am of the blood of Azrael de Gray. I call now upon ancestral spirits, bound by him, and beholden to my house, to carry out my …”

  “Wait! Wait!” screamed Dylan in panic.

  “Is there something you can give us in equal value to your soul, lying spirit?” asked Galen with great dignity.

  Dylan’s eyes darted from side to side, frightened. But his voice was controlled, as he said tensely, “What would ye have me tell? Is the fate of the Raven’s little wife worth a soul to ye?”

  “Speak!” shouted Raven.

  “Azrael’s leading ninety hordes of Svartalfar and evil Peri against the land of Neverdale, where she was last. But Mannannan has betrayed him, and speeds ahead, to save the pretty lassy for his own self!”

  “I release you from my curse!” shouted Galen, who had already mounted the dream-colt, who reared and flailed her magnificent wide plumes. “Raven, get up here! Take my hand! Mnemosyne, can you get us there first?”

  The dream-colt said, “Faster than thought and hope am I, destined to carry heroes to final combat and war on the bloody plains of Vigrid and Armageddon. But as fast as swiftest fear would have me fly? Even I must strain. It will be a near chase.”

  With Raven atop her, she had left the ground behind her, and the Moon had dwindled to a sphere before she had finished her sentence.

  Later, Raven sat in front of Galen on the dream-colt, clutching her mane uncomfortably, as stars flowed by to either side, and rearing constellations bowed and parted before their wild flight. Raven, who knew how to ride a horse, was unnerved nonetheless by this dizzying sweep of mystic speed, as they dropped through planetary spheres and epicycles, luminous clouds, and passed strange cometary messengers.

  To cover his nervousness, he said, “Good thinking, getting Dylan Selkie to talk that way, eh? You seem to know much spells and dreaming things.”

  Galen was wreathed in smiles, but tried to speak humbly when he said, “Oh, not really. That was just a trick. He was right, and there wasn’t any such spell as that. Some of these fairy-types are really suckers for a good reputation, you know?”

  But he sounded so pleased.

  11

  Crime Does Not Pay!

  It was dark, past midnight, as they drove, and Washington D.C. had been left far behind. Before the car, two men disguised in the heavy coats and helmets of motorcycle police sped on, blue lights flashing.

  The highway was deserted. Except for government vehicles, no traffic was permitted on the roads past curfew, not while the state of national emergency existed.

  Within the gray sedan, two men sat in the rearmost seat: Wentworth and Van Dam. In the front was a driver, and next to him, a beefy Treasury agent with a submachine gun in his lap and the earplug of a radio in his ear. All of these men, and the two motorcyclists in uniform outside, were
members of the inner circle. None of them had friends or relatives in Los Angeles, or not any that they particularly cared to warn.

  There had been checkpoints at all the major roads leading out of D.C., making each street a series of cages with many gates to pass through, albeit the gates were lines of yellow sawhorses guarded by troops in heavy combat gear.

  But the last checkpoint had been left behind, and blank and barren highway stretched ahead, the tarmac a dark ribbon beneath the bleak glare of infrequent streetlamps.

  Van Dam’s hand rested on the white metal box between them, and his fingers drummed a nervous tattoo. Every now and then, he said, “Are you sure about this?” to Wentworth, who sat stony faced, staring out at empty overpasses and empty crossroads they passed.

  At the fortieth or fiftieth repetition of the question, Wentworth snapped, “Garn! Shut yer trap, ye great fool!” in a strange, archaic accent. Then, in his normal tone of voice, Wentworth said, “Sorry, Van Dam. But we really have no choice. We didn’t think the riots would escalate this far! How could we know that shopkeepers and small businesses would arm themselves like this, and start fighting back? Or the truck drivers? The FCC has to find and shut down those pirate radio stations! We can’t let people know that state militia have opened fire on federal military units! We should have burned those judges and their stupid injunction!”

  Wentworth was clutching the briefcase on his lap. Inside was a folded white leather selkie-coat. The golden bow and quiver of arrows had been missing from the vault in the Pentagon. No one had reported the mysterious loss to Azrael de Gray, who was also missing.

  “I thought the Vice President looked good on TV. People will come around …” Van Dam’s fingers tightened on the box.

  Wentworth said, “The places where our people aren’t being shot at by local citizens are New York and D.C., and parts of California. Urban centers. Thank God for gun control! Only the drug dealers have guns there, and they know where their next welfare check is coming from. But the flyover states, how dare they fight back? Handguns! Har har! Handguns are toys now-a-days! We’ll show them what real firepower means!”

  As Wentworth said this, Van Dam jerked a hand away from the box he was touching, as if the box had stung him. Van Dam stared down at the box wide-eyed, his breathing ragged.

  “Are you sure about this?” he asked yet again.

  “It will break their spirit! They’ll have to give in … !”

  “But we’re not even supposed to have this thing! Only the Vice President and the President can carry the white box!”

  Wentworth said, “We both know the access codes. We can reprogram the missile to its new target and remote-fire it from here, thanks to the computer interlink. The silo personnel have already been told to stand by and assist the launch. NORAD is at DefCon One. The other countries are scared witless and won’t dare interfere. No one wants to get involved in the first nuclear civil war in history.”

  Van Dam said, “Will … will the missile silo crew obey the order?”

  Wentworth laughed a strange laugh. “There’s one that will, and aye, for me shipmates … ahem. We have our men, loyal crews, standing by in at least one location. They have been told to maintain communication blackout. No recall order, no change of command codes will reach them. Only the signal from this box.”

  Van Dam shivered. “Last night I dreamed a hideous beast was loose in the streets. Its fangs were dripping red. And where it went, people turned into mobs, and armed themselves, and burned down their houses …”

  The T-man in the front seat turned around and rapped on the glass. Wentworth opened the partition between the seats.

  The T-man said, “Just lost contact with checkpoint 235-12. Might just be radio problems. Wouldn’t have mentioned it, except we lost contact with checkpoint 235-11 a few minutes ago.”

  Van Dam said, “Could be a coincidence … .”

  Wentworth said, “Eleven, then Twelve went out? Could be someone coming up behind us … .”

  The T-man shook his head doubtfully, saying, “Maybe so, sir, but they’d have to be coming up awfully fast. Ten, fifteen minutes? Checkpoints twenty miles apart? He’d have to be traveling at a hundred miles an hour. And satellite watch would have seen the headlights on the road.”

  Wentworth and Van Dam both turned and looked out the rear window.

  A long, lonely ribbon of highway stretched away behind them, dark, speeding backward in the gloom. There was nothing in sight.

  Wentworth said, “Have one of the escort drop back to see if there is anyone following us.”

  Van Dam said, “That might not be wise, sir. Shouldn’t we call for reinforcements?”

  Wentworth said, “Reinforcements! We’re not even supposed to be heading this direction! Azrael doesn’t want us in Everness! Why do you think we didn’t take Air Force One?”

  The T-man radioed one of the men on the police motorcycles. Van Dam watched with a strange sense of desolation as the motorcycle on the left fell behind, turned, and sped away down the highway, traveling in the wrong lane. The blue flickering lights faded in the distance and were gone.

  A slow minute crawled by.

  The T-man held his hand to his ear. He said, “I’m not getting an answer on the radio, sir. We lost him.” And he lifted his submachine gun and worked the action.

  Wentworth leaned forward. “Step on it! Get us out of here!”

  Van Dam was staring out the rear window. “But there’s nothing back there. It’s just empty road … .”

  The man dressed as a motorcycle cop ahead of them had drawn a shotgun out of a long, leather holster strapped to the bike. He hunched down behind the handlebars, and, steering with one hand, he cast glances back over his shoulders, to the left and right, and the motorcycle weaved slightly.

  “Driver! Top speed!” shouted Wentworth.

  The engine roared. Acceleration pressed them back into their seats. They came even with the motorcycle and began to overtake it.

  The T-man snatched the earplug out of his ear looked at it in horror.

  “What’s wrong?” snapped Wentworth.

  “Uh—we’re being jammed, sir! He—a voice came over our channel—and he said—he called me by name …”

  “What was it? What!” Wentworth leaned forward, shouting.

  “He said we had to surrender … .”

  Wentworth’s face went blank, and he sank back in the seat. Van Dam shouted, “Look! It’s him!”

  Out from the darkness behind them came a black, armored limousine, running without lights. Smoothly accelerating, powerful, swift, the streamlined dark machine surged forward, growing in their view. The body was wide, low to the ground, heavy, and the pavement streamed backward under its tires in a smooth, silent, effortless rush of speed. Its headlamps were folded shut, and the only light came from the single orange line across the blunt prow of the dark vehicle, gleaming just above the streaming pavement. The windowpanes were metal panels cut by thin, black slits.

  “How can he see?”

  “He’s running on infrared,” said Van Dam. Then, half aloud to himself, “Heh, looks like a 1966 Chrystler Imperial. Good car. Modified it to a high-speed fighting vehicle.”

  “Faster!” shouted Wentworth to the driver.

  “We’re maxed out now, sir!” the driver, hunched over the wheel, called out above the laboring whine of the engines. The needle of the speedometer hovered at 150 mph, and the chassis quivered and shook.

  The black car came smoothly forward.

  “He’s using nitrous oxide,” said the T-man.

  The driver said, “He’s using more than that. No car in the world that heavy can be that fast. What the hell has he got under that hood? A rocket?”

  The motorcyclist twisted backward in his saddle, right arm straight, aiming. A flash of flame spat from the bore of his shotgun. Pellets dashed harmlessly against the armored plates of the black machine.

  The headlamps of the black machine unfolded; there was a brief, daz
zling, silent explosion of magnesium light. The motorcyclist put his elbow up before his faceplate, momentarily blinded.

  In that blind moment, the black machine accelerated with a deep-throated hum of mighty engines. The prow of the machine brushed against the rear wheel of the motorcycle. The front wheel bent sideways, and the motorcycle spun away, a twisted tangle, and the rolling body of the gunman slid across the tarmac, over the railing, and out of sight.

  The headlamps folded. The armored machine was behind the sedan.

  “This guy doesn’t fool around,” growled the T-man, rolling down his window. He leaned out. A hammering, thunderous roar erupted from his submachine gun. Sparks flickered across the hull of the black vehicle, and ricochets whined.

  “What the hell’s that stuff made of?” whispered Wentworth in awe. Then: “Shoot the tires!”

  “I’ve shot the tires!” snapped the T-man, his hair tossed by the streaming wind. He slapped his second magazine into place. “They’re solid rubber.”

  The black machine swung away to the left of the sedan, spoiling the T-man’s aim. The T-man unbuckled his safety belt, and climbed up out of the window, his rump on the car door, his arms across the roof of the car.

  Another volley of gunfire rang out. The two cars swerved back and forth across the highway as the armored limosine tried to maneuver out of the line of fire, and the sedan, tires squealing, swerved to block it from passing.

  The T-man reached down through the window, one hand groping. “Hand me up another clip!”

  Van Dam could see through his window the T-man balanced over the top the sedan. He saw the little red dot of an aiming laser appear on the T-man’s forehead, right between the eyes. The T-man was unaware of it. “Give me another clip!”

  There was a slight whisper of noise; the T-man’s head exploded in a mass of blood. His corpse went flying out the window, legs thrashing, into the night, yanked out by hundred-mile-an-hour winds.

  Van Dam looked back.

  He saw a black figure leaning out from the right rear passenger’s compartment of the armored limousine, one hand holding a long, narrow weapon. No features could be glimpsed of the mysterious figure. His cloak and hood and gas mask, his sleeve, the weapon he held, and the vehicle were all the same dull hue of nonreflective black, so that all the shadows blended into one inky mass. Up from his shoulder, the tail of his cape streamed back from the window, slithering and flapping.