Mists of Everness

by John C. Wright

  Pendrake seemed to recognize the civilian officer in charge. “I think I can be of some help here, Van Dam,” said Pendrake, and he nodded to Raven.

  Raven held up his hand. The thunderstorms and screaming winds around the towers rising from the sea died away and fell silent. In the distance, through the windows, Raven saw the clouds shrouding the towers of night thin away; the bat-winged horrors were strafed by passing jets, able to maneuver more freely as the turbulence calmed. A tinny-sounding cheer rang out from some of the microphones, and little whoops of triumph.

  Pendrake said, “I have a partial understanding of the oneiric phenomena involved. Observe.” And when he held up his hand, rainbows of gold and silver sparkled into existence in his palm, intertwined, became solid, and the mystic sword materialized in his hand.

  “I … I believe you …,” said Van Dam. “Uh. Sir.”

  “What’s the tactical situation?”

  “Uh … We’re facing sea-monsters and, well, dragons. The dragons have no long-range weapons to hinder our forward air group, and we have reinforcement squadrons coming from the SS Liberty.”

  “Raven, see if you can give those guys a tailwind. What else, Van Dam?”

  “Well, sir, our ships are shelling the enemy, uh, structure, but are being attacked by sea-serpents and huge, uh, things. Some of our destroyers and missile cruisers have been pulled under by the sea-monsters, but our submarine support can keep the sea-monsters away from our major-class vessels. Right now most of our casualties are from suicides. Pilots and officers go suddenly berserk.”

  Pendrake gravely listened to several more reports; and Raven was impressed how the radarmen and officers who spoke with him, unlike the gunmen who had attacked them at the house, hid whatever fear they felt behind expressions of stoic professionalism. Raven realized that, unlike the men who had attacked the house, these were true military men, not merely goons in borrowed uniforms.

  Pendrake turned to Raven: “They’re having trouble with their long-range satellite phototelemetry. See if you can clear up the cloud cover.”

  To Peter: “These sea-monsters may be similar to the two giant creatures killed at Everness. Find out if your hammer has underwater capability. Also, does it have an outside range? Can you throw it a mile? Twenty miles? If so, you can launch strikes against specific targets on the towers, like a sharpshooter.”

  To Lemuel: “The rash of suicides sound like demonic possession. Can that Chalice protect us in any way?”

  Lemuel said, “Mr. Pendrake, the absence of any selkie or kelpie, or of any of the races of darkness with which I am familiar, troubles me. We should assume that the Emperor of Night knows we have the talismans, and is not putting into the fray those creatures we can banish with the magic at our command.”

  Pendrake nodded brusquely. He asked Van Dam: “I assume there are no ships of any other navies in the area?”

  Van Dam said, “Azrael didn’t control their governments. There are only American ships here, except for foreign nuclear submarines that they have tracking our nuclear submarines.”

  Pendrake said to Van Dam, “I should tell you, Van Dam, that three thermonuclear multiple-warhead missiles have been launched from a silo in Nevada and Oregon, a primary and two backups, which we can abort if the primary is successful. The nuclear strike will hit here within twelve minutes. All our forces must be clear of the blast radius before that time, and be operating under radiation-environment protocols. Vessels not equipped to operate in a high-roentgen scenario must withdraw immediately; those that are radiation-worthy should lay down a suppressing fire to guard their withdrawal. I suggest you maintain your carpet bombing. Use incendiaries where possible. Many of these magical creatures, even if they are not hurt by bullets, are hurt by flames and fire. As soon as Carrier Air Wing Eight arrives from the Roosevelt Carrier Battle Group, have them drop their full payloads.”

  There was a silence on the bridge for a moment. All the officers within earshot had stopped in the middle of whatever they were doing to turn and look.

  One officer muttered, “This is the big one …”

  Another said to himself, “My God. It’s World War Three.”

  A younger officer, staring out at the flame-crowned towers of darkness thrusting cloudward through icy tidal waves, murmured, “Oh, man! We’re going to toast those freak-show fuckers good!”

  Van Dam turned to the captain. “Mr. Pendrake is here in an advisory capacity, but I urge you to follow his advice to the letter. The nuclear strike he has warned us of has already been cleared at the highest levels.”

  The captain said briefly, “Gentlemen! To your stations!”

  Raven whispered to Pendrake. “Am very glad Wendy used unicorn horn key to make you visible to awake people again. Look at faces; they remember you. Remember your famous work. Am glad they trust you.”

  “Trust is earned by deeds,” said Pendrake, not turning his head. “Isn’t that right, Mr. de Gray?”

  Lemuel, Peter, and Raven all turned their heads in surprise, looking back and forth. It was not until he spoke that they saw him, as if a mist had been hiding him from their eyes. There he stood in his now-tattered star-woven robes, his peaked cap missing. His black hair, streaked with white, lay in disarray to his shoulders. His face was pale and drawn, his eyes bright, as if fierce emotion pained him. Near his foot stood a small, fierce bird of prey. Azrael did not take his eyes from the bird as he spoke.

  “Pendragon, in vain do these brave men shed life’s blood. For what comes against you now is not the armed might of Acheron; these are but playthings, the hunting dogs and falcons of the dark lord. When the final towers invade the realm of air, first shall come forth his heralds and squires; and only then will he let sound the dire call, and let his damned angelic knighthood take the field, armed and ready to oppose the soldiery, not of man, but of Heaven’s wide empire.”

  The captain said sharply, “Sailor: Get back to your duty!” to the one or two bridge officers who were watching this scene.

  Pendrake pointed the magic sword at Azrael. “Mr. de Gray, why are you here?”

  Now the wizard looked up from the pigeonhawk at his feet, and he looked into Pendrake’s stern, alert eyes with eyes that were haunted by a strange emotion.

  Slowly, the wizard sank to his knees. “For justice, do I come, my Liege, and to pay you fealty. I am a traitor; I confess this freely and with my own mouth. I give my life to your justice. Strike! My blood has properties which may be useful to your cause.”

  Pendrake said, “Until we can hold a proper hearing, and until all evidence is presented and weighed, I can make no determination. But we will take this favorably into account and might mitigate what sentence, if any, you receive if you will voluntarily submit yourself to a probation before judgment, binding yourself to accept the verdict of this court, and accepting a period of community service.”

  “My lord, I vow I shall accept what doom you decree, and shall fully perform your each command. I swear this by my name,” said the wizard.

  Lemuel squinted and pursed his lips when he heard that last phrase. But he swallowed whatever he was about to say, and waited.

  Pendrake said, “Rise. Advise us.”

  Azrael stood. “My Liege, the Silver Key could have kept Acheron beneath the waves before the tower called Infidelity arose. Now it is too late. No weapon of man can harm an angel, even fallen. Nothing but the power of the Sun himself can drive them off, and even the Shining One is unequal to the sovereign of angels, the lordly Morningstar. The lesser creatures in the dark Lord’s service can be slain however. But if Fate should take the field, her mere command can turn all chances against us. Should she come and decree our defeat, then our defeat is assured, for no man can escape fate.”

  Raven looked out the high windows of the conning tower. Even as far away as they were from the main action, his sharp eyes could still see, lit by explosions, the vast waves radiating out from where seven black towers rose on the horizon.

 
; Even as he watched, he saw the dark goddess rise from the waves as a walled courtyard and temple before the main gates, surrounded by carven statues of demigods and chimerae, opened its doors and released a flood of ice. There she sat, throned in the midst of the waters, and raised her flail.

  II

  The battle group was made up of twelve surface ships and submarines, including a fighter squadron and two fighter attack squadrons attached to the Third Air Wing. Fighter attack Squadron 105, “The Gunslingers,” had engaged the great dragon Crommcruach high above the sea while there were still only two towers showing above the waves. The dragon-worm rose in flame, his wings a hurricane, but the deadly fire and poison of his breath could not reach but a few hundred yards.

  The squadron lost two men when the pilot of one FA-18B Hornet saw the eyes of Crommcruach too clearly through his canopy, the monsters’ face lit with the hell-fire it vomited from terrible jaws. They all heard his insane shrieks as he dove his craft into the sea. The rest of the fighter attack squadron, flying by instruments or night-vision goggles, were not so affected; they launched their Sidewinder air-to-air missiles from several miles away. Their warheads could not penetrate Crommcruach’s age-crusted armored hide; but the vast wings of membrane were tattered at once by flak, and the mighty dragon toppled from the sky.

  The children spawned of Crommcruach rose on wings of flame in their thousands when they saw their great patriarch fall in defeat.

  The fighter jets engaged them with air-to-air cannon, slaying the younger dragons whose armor had not hardened fully; nor could the monsters accelerate past Mach One, which allowed the jets easily to escape. Radar-directed fire of Sparrow missiles carrying heavy warheads shot down the elder dragons with harder armor.

  The path was cleared for the dive bombers, who flew low over the maelstrom-boiling ocean, and unleashed column after column of concentrated explosive across the surface of the sinister black towers. The winged beings atop the towers were not disturbed, but the cataphracts and janissaries of Acheron were slain in droves, helpless where they stood among the bridges and boulevards of the upper citadel. Wireguided missiles flew in through open window casements and archer slits, and sent shrapnel and jellied gasoline ricocheting along the somber basalt maze of corridors and naves within. The soldiery of the Dark Tower, those who were human or nearly so, stood in their gleaming armor, fraught with ancient magic, drew their rune-crusted swords, and died without ever seeing the foe that slew them. One or two squads from the nearer arches were pulled by the suction of the fire-storms out from windows and flung, bullet-ridden, onto their comrades on the walls below.

  However, when the fourth tower, the one called Cowering Dread, rose up, two destroyers and an AEGIS Cruiser from the carrier battle group were swamped in the resulting tidal wave, and the winged being opened the upper gates of her tower, and displayed the Medusa to the fighter bombers.

  The SS Mitscher, the SS Donald Cook, and the SS San Jacinto shattered and capsized, sank beneath the flood, and their brave crew perished to a man. High above, those pilots and bombardiers who were relying on visual targeting were turned to stone, and their aircraft plunged into the sea, to the songs and delight of the black naiades who sported in those icy waves. The rest of the attack wing released instrument-guided missiles.

  Meanwhile, a kraken had risen from the bottom, larger than an island, and engulfed the frigate USS Hawes and the destroyer USS Oscar Austin, but took major damage to its beak and to the roof of its mouth from the guided missiles launched point-blank from the decks of those ships. Because of the damage to its beak, it was unable to swallow the cruiser Yorktown, but gnawed at and bit off the prow of that ship, until the concentrated fire power of her 20-mm Phalanx guns, three thousand rounds per minute of depleted uranium shells, drove the monster from the surface. There, the attack submarine USS Virginia fired twelve tactical nuclear warhead-tipped torpedoes into the great beast’s hide as it chased her. One of the torpedoes found the kraken’s mighty heart, and the immense hulk of the monster floated to the surface, dead. Unfortunately, the fleet oiler USNS Kanawha was not able to maneuver clear, and ran aground on the carcass. The fuel supplies of a dozen heavy ships now spread over carcass and sea-wave, and a stray missile lit the oil slick afire.

  The crews of the submarines gave a great cheer when the kraken died, until look-down sonar showed the hundreds of krakens and leviathans rising from the deep, some with towers and armies carried among the crusted plates of their backs.

  III

  The walls of the outer citadel rose up above the waves, vast sheer slabs of admantium brick, like a range of mountains, rising up, and threw down gigantic wings and sprays of froth. Along the wall were salt-crusted minarets and plates of titanic citadels, never before exposed to air.

  Streaming like a hundred waterfalls, dark water gushed from the teeth of the machicolations, and here and there, flopping misshapen limbs, choking, lay blind, pale monsters of the deep, caught unawares. Along the bastions stood the nightmare-legions of a race of giants, water sluicing from their helmets and spears, and, with a roar, they turned and saluted the four vast and hideous towers which loomed at the corners of the square outer walls.

  When the tower called Madness, sixth to rise, came shining darkly above the waves, the first of the angels of darkness came from the windows, coming aloft in song, foretelling the coming of Morningstar. No jet was swift enough to outpace the beat of his immortal wings, and whichever way he turned his deadly glance, shrieking men committed suicide with what weapon came first to hand.

  When the final tower, called Blindness, rose up, the gates of darkness were opened, and all the stars above were blotted and smothered up with storm-clouds, except for one bright, pale planet in the East, now rising to the zenith.

  Taller than the other servants of Morningstar, the dread goddess Fate sat in the courtyard of the risen palace, outside the great gates of darkness, raising her scepter and pronouncing the defeat of the forces of man.

  All the gates and windows of Acheron now opened, and a pale light which cast no shadows poured forth in mighty beams, creating glaciers where it brushed the raging sea. Thrones, Dominions, Seraphim, and Cherubim rose up in their hosts, and sang what music as made men die if they chanced to hear it.

  The Angels of Acheron swept through the air, shining beings, whose wings drew cloaks of snow behind them.

  In a great circle around their master’s throne, uttering hymns, the seraphim of evil passed, destroying all life in the sea where their shadows fell, friend and foe alike; and they were robed in constellations which do not appear in earthly skies, and their triple sets of wings clothed their legs, girdled their waists, and shaded their haloed heads from the sight of the imperial gates of Acheron.

  “Glory, glory, glory,” they sang, but the imperial gates did not yet open. A great voice spoke from the darkness, saying, “The way has not yet been made ready! Let Earth prepare to greet her master!”

  At this, the Archangels of Acheron passed back and forth across the waves, and their wings stirred up tidal waves taller than any mountain. The archangels, like shepherds, led these tidal waves to the great fleet and gathered armament that mankind had placed against them. The waves came against the ships.

  All but one of the ships foundered and sank; sailors who were dashed from the decks were eaten by naiades and sea-serpents.

  IV

  The helmsman turned the prow of the aircraft carrier toward the waters as they began to rise and rise. Raven saw, through the windows of the bridge, a rushing slope of water like a mountain, trembling with streaks of foam, coming toward them, swelling, growing—a wall of water whose top he could not see.

  A sound of alarms beat through the bridge. Quickly, without much fuss or wasted motion, the bridge crew abandoned their stations and fled below decks. Raven was carried along in the orderly rush. He found himself thrown into a compartment with a dozen other sailors; hands strapped him into a padded chair that folded out from the bulkhead.<
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  The chamber was long but not wide, and the oval watertight hatches at each end were chocked shut.

  Raven turned to ask the sailor next to him a question when a hammer blow shook the room; Raven’s breath was knocked out of him by the jar of the straps cutting into his chest and waist.

  The lights went out; orange emergency lights came on.

  The deck was heeling over at a forty-five-degree angle, then at a ninety-degree angle. Raven was now dangling as if from a wall.

  A horrifying sound, a sound Raven had heard once and prayed never to hear again, shrieked through the chamber. It was the sound of metal in agony, the sound of steel beams being twisted and torn. Screams and snaps of metal rang out, like the cries of dying beasts, and the gunshot noise of rivets popping. It was the sound of hull plates being breached.

  An earsplitting crash thundered, and the chamber shook.

  Then, Raven was suddenly hanging head downward.

  The sailor next to him said, “Well. There goes the hangar space. Ocean’s in the whole compartment.”

  Another sailor said, “Listen. Hear those crashes? Aircraft falling up into the upper deck space. We just lost them all.”

  “Hope the reactor core hasn’t been breached …” Raven said, “We’re capsized!” He could not keep the fear and astonishment from his voice. He could not even imagine the force necessary to capsize a vessel the size of this one.

  The sailor next to him said, “Actually, I think we’re under. Hear how quiet it’s become?”