The Nemesis

by S. J. Kincaid

  I held tight to Anguish, covering him with my body, and closed my eyes to await the end. I had faced worse deaths than this, in my past. I would be glad to go while shielding the last soul in this universe who meant anything to me.

  But after a moment, as the bots continued to buzz overhead and I continued to breathe, puzzlement forced my eyes open. I peered up at the metal phalanx of dozens of machines humming overhead, their dark-mouthed barrels fixed on me, poised to discharge a murderous volley.

  Still they did not fire.

  Movement drew my gaze to the hole torn in the wall. Through it stepped a woman wearing robes blacker than night. Several men followed hard on her heels.

  They wore the Inquisitor garb, called the Dark Star, dress for the ruthless sect of vicars who did violence in the name of the divine Cosmos. The robes’ material absorbed all light, rendering it blacker than black. Within sheaths strapped high on their backs, an array of blades jutted out, like the rays of a sun.

  And yet, though the machines pointed weapons at me and the Inquisitors assembled themselves like vicious shadows, only two drew their blades in readiness.

  The first of them stepped toward me and took the lead.

  “I come with a gift,” she said in a low, deep voice. From her pocket, she withdrew a glinting black screenlet. With a flick of her finger, a tiny holographic image bloomed to life over the screenlet’s gleaming surface.

  Tyrus, in full imperial regalia, his hair formally arranged in a halo, his eyes like ice. “This is a message for the imposter.”

  His voice was as cold as his face. I felt the Inquisitor’s eyes, intent and malevolent.

  “I demand your presence in person. You are ordered to accompany these Inquisitors. They will escort you to me. Resist, and there will be consequences.”

  “Consequences?” I said to the Inquisitors.

  The female Inquisitor merely dropped her gaze to Anguish on the ground. “We take you by force. And leave your companion behind.”

  I clenched my fists.

  “Or,” she said, “we preserve his life.”

  “If I go with you, you’ll treat him.”

  “If the Divine Emperor wills it,” she said.

  “You will treat him or I will not go.”

  “His life will be preserved. His fate belongs to the Divine Emperor. As does yours.”

  “You would obey the Divine Emperor in everything,” I sneered, “you servant of the Living Cosmos. Are you a true vicar, or one of the mercenaries he used to mutilate them into granting him his scepter?”

  Her face was like stone, not even a flinch of recognition at the odious way Tyrus had forced the vicars of the Empire to at last give him the Domitrian power over machines. He’d hunted them down one-by-one, and the mercenaries had taken either their hands—with the diode of a vicar’s authority in them—or their heads.

  “I am a subject of this Empire,” she answered simply, “and my fate belongs to the Divine Emperor as well.”

  In other words, she knew he could choose to kill her if she did not secure me. There was only one person with power, and he was nowhere near this planet. The fight died away from me.

  I sat up cautiously, never moving away from Anguish, who lay limply, breathing in ragged, choking gasps.

  “I’ll go with you,” I said. “Just keep my friend breathing.”

  7

  THE JAUNT through hyperspace was mere days, but it felt like weeks. I remained by Anguish’s side, where the medical bots on the ship had placed him into stasis to put a halt to his degeneration.

  I was sitting next to Anguish, dozing, when the Inquisitor’s ship jostled and roused me awake. Out the window, I could see the Alexandria had arrived. It was Tyrus’s own vessel, a jutting tip of a spear looming vast and sleek against the starscape, dwarfing the Inquisitor’s vessel.

  In mere minutes, the doors to the medical bay slid open to admit a half-dozen machines. I’d expected the star-shaped security machines, but in poured a mass of spherical beauty bots.

  Following in their wake came Shaezar nan Domitrian, the lavishly self-decorated royal servant whose sole job was to beautify public figures for state occasions.

  “I am to prepare you to meet the Divine—”

  Shaezar jerked to a startled stop at the sight of me. His amazed survey cataloged each aspect of my altered appearance: the scars twisting over my face, the pink patches of scalp where my hair had been permanently burned away, the defined and bulging musculature that had replaced my once lean and wiry arms. He obviously had not been warned about the immensity of the task at hand.

  I folded my arms and leaned back in my seat. “You intend to beautify me? I fear you’ll be kept busy today.”

  “Stars, I see you’ve… been living roughly.”

  I just gazed at him flatly. “Get on with it, then.”

  Shaezar began to work on me. The medical bots swept over my scarring with lasers, stripping away the damaged skin with a stinging precision, and then running green, tingling beams over my face to stimulate the growth of pristine skin cells that would replace the scar tissue. Feeling prickled back into regenerated nerve endings.

  I opened and closed my jaw, over and over, rubbing my fingers over my cheeks as Shaezar’s bots turned their attention to the burn scars down my shoulders, arms, and back. Everything felt like it was tingling. It was strange to recover sensation where I’d grown used to the masklike numbness of scars.

  Questions raged in the back of my mind about the intention behind restoring me to a pristine appearance. Did the Divine Emperor simply require everything that met his eyes to be beautiful? Or was this a signal that he did not intend to summarily execute me? He’d brought me here for some purpose. The Inquisitors could have swarmed me with bots and taken me by force, but instead they’d been specifically tasked with ensuring my cooperation. Why?

  Tyrus wished to behold me, so security bots came not to escort me, but to array themselves with their lasers aimed at Anguish… Eight bots for a comatose Diabolic.

  A pair of Domitrian servants, lavishly dressed in golden liquisilk, were there to bring me to him. They led me in silence to the boarding artery leading to the Alexandria.

  “I know the way from here,” I told them, but they tailed me all the way to the Emperor’s private chambers.

  I stepped through those familiar doors into Tyrus’s private study onboard the Alexandria, with its crackling fireplace and blooms of vegetation. The smell struck me first, heady and intoxicating, a blend of fire-flowers and burning cedar, so intimately familiar that my treacherous heart flipped in my chest. This was the scent of memories I had tried to forget, the days and nights on this vessel when Tyrus and I had first discovered our feelings for each other, had first touched each other, had kissed as we lifted away from the vivid purple atmosphere of Lumina.…

  I could not afford these memories.

  I forced them down, away, to some hard, cold place deep inside me, where I hoped they would be crushed into dust.

  As I surveyed the chamber, I could see signs of vandalism, only partially mended. After capturing Tyrus, Pasus had handed this vessel to supporters, who had scrawled lewd artworks across the walls that laser repair had not managed to fully efface. Elsewhere, the wall had been violently slashed and gouged.

  This chamber had once been Tyrus’s pride and joy, his retreat from a murderous family whose conspiracies imprisoned him as thoroughly as he now imprisoned me. It sank into me again, that temptation not to hate him, but to feel profound sadness for what he might have been.

  I passed Tyrus’s fireplace and indulged in the desperate thought of seizing a burning log and setting fire to this haunted place.

  When I stepped into the adjoining chamber, the hush that met my ears was deceptive. At first my senses were fooled into believing the chamber empty.

  And then my eyes adjusted to the sudden dimness and I made out his starlight-shrouded form, his back to me, where he stood before the window, utterly still but for a
ring he turned in his finger over and over again.

  My every muscle tensed, grew tight.

  He did not turn.

  Even as I stepped fully into the chamber and the air split with the hiss of the door sliding shut behind me, he did not stir. Instead he remained there, a tall, tense form, seemingly oblivious to me.

  My awareness widened. Beside me gleamed an array of sharpened blades magnetically fixed to the wall.

  No security bots hovered. No guards lurked to protect him.

  He knew precisely what temptation he offered me here. I stood five meters away, within easy reach of weaponry, while he steadfastly ignored my presence, his vulnerable back exposed.

  This had to be a test of some sort. There must be a force field between us, shielding him.

  With my eyes locked on his back, I reached out and slid one of the blades out of its holster. The glinting metal threw shards of starlight across the walls.

  Tyrus drew an audible breath, then tipped his head back to look at the ceiling. Had he caught sight of the blade’s reflection?

  In a low, husky voice, he said, “Go ahead.”

  My eyes narrowed. I raised the blade in readiness.

  He turned as gracefully as a large cat, light on his feet, unhurried. His eyes were inscrutable. “Well? Why hesitate?”

  I whipped the blade forward. He didn’t flinch. It embedded itself in the wall between the windows, the handle vibrating musically. A few inches over, and I would have driven it through his skull.

  Tyrus ripped it from the wall, considering it impassively. “You used to have better aim.”

  “There’s no force field.” I was stunned by the realization.

  His lips twisted. He held the blade familiarly, casually, like an old friend. “I was certain I wouldn’t need it.”

  Two years since I’d seen him last. The passage of time had left its mark on my husband’s face. He looked hardened, older, in a way that no beauty bot could repair. He was dressed with meticulous elegance: a long oiled-leather coat over a liquisilk tunic, high boots, trousers tailored expertly to his narrow hips and muscular thighs.

  “So,” he said. “Nemesis lives.”

  I had once been able to read his moods, but now, even his voice sounded strange to me. Lower, rougher. A man’s voice, a man’s body. And a madman’s mind.

  “Don’t blame yourself,” I said. “You did your best to kill me.”

  “Your wounds are all healed, then. I am pleased I could do that for you.” He scanned my face a long moment. “Though I miss your nose as it was. You straightened it.”

  “Why would you care?”

  His slight smile either mocked me or pitied me. “Should a husband not care for his wife?”

  “And here I thought I was an imposter.”

  “You’re in my blood. We could be parted for centuries and I’ll always recognize you. You were on Corcyra, of course. And since then… where else, besides Devil’s Shade?”

  “Nowhere notable.” I spoke warily, unwilling to offer more information than necessary. If I were wise, I would not look at him at all. But a terrible curiosity had seized hold of me. Those shadows beneath his eyes—I had not imagined them. His jaw was squarer, sharper. He’d continued to subtly alter himself with beauty bots, lending his reddish hair more of a golden tint, smoothing his skin to a flawless mask.

  But from the way he moved, I could verify that his musculature was genuine. He moved with a grace that spoke of intense physical discipline.

  He’d resumed his rigorous physical training, then. My memories unwillingly rushed back to those many mornings we’d passed in sparring together. His enthusiasm had outstripped his skill in those days; it had been quite impossible for him to physically match me. But he’d laughed so good-naturedly when I bested him. He’d even seemed to admire my physical superiority.

  A pang struck me. How had we come to this?

  “It matters not where I’ve been,” I said, shaking off the memories. “All that matters is that I am alive despite your best efforts. Unless you brought me here to change that.”

  “If I wanted you dead, you would already be dead. But you did not try to kill me on Corcyra, and after that happened, I began to… miss you. That’s why you’re here now. With me once more.”

  “I am not with you in anything but the purest physical sense.”

  “Would you like to be?” he said, arching his brows.

  I sputtered incredulously, unable to muster a syllable.

  “I have warranted your vengeance time and again, yet still you have not attempted to kill me when you’ve have the perfect opportunity. Just now—once again, you refrained. I think you still love me, Nemesis. Tell me I’m wrong.”

  “You’re wrong.”

  He’d drawn close enough that I felt the heat of him, became unwillingly aware of the new breadth and muscled density of his body. There was nowhere safe to look. I lifted my eyes to his and found myself pinned by the intensity of his gaze.

  “Hand me back the blade,” I challenged him softly, “if you are so confident.”

  Tyrus smiled slowly, but did not take me up on the challenge. “It’s touching. Whatever misdeeds I commit, what foul atrocities are put at my feet, you still feel a need to protect me. You speak to me right now as though you feel naught but hatred for me—but you only show me the sweetest devotion.”

  Heat burned through my face. How could I argue with him, how could I deny it?

  “And now you blush,” he said very softly, his hand reaching up—a calloused finger tracing down my cheek. I hated myself for the shudder it sent down my spine. “Just as a bashful lover might.”

  “I blush for shame.” The words scraped out of me, the more painful for their truth. I loved him still, and it appalled me. I could hate him even as I loved him, for he was in my bones, in my soul. “I am ashamed that I cannot do the right thing and end your life.”

  He shrugged negligently. “You’ll have other opportunities.” Then he withdrew from me. “It’s gratifying that you love me still. I see opportunities in this situation.”

  I fought the urge to step back from him, for my skin was crawling from his nearness. “Opportunities,” I echoed flatly.

  “Life without you is most tedious. It seems Gladdic von Aton did me a favor without realizing it, when he saved you.…”

  Gladdic. He’d found out. My heart clenched. “Did you kill him for that?”

  “On the contrary,” said Tyrus. “I’ve given him a chance to win my favor back. Most lucrative chances.”

  “He serves you willingly after you tried to execute him?”

  “He doesn’t remember that. I gave him but a small dose of Scorpion’s Breath after the ball dome. I could not abide him gibbering and quaking at the very sight of me.”

  He’d wiped Gladdic’s memory of his near execution, then.

  Of his own feat of heroism, saving me.

  Tyrus caught the expression on my face. He missed nothing. “How concerned you are for your friends. Anguish as well.” He tilted his head, his eyes growing very narrow and cold. “If he is your friend. Tell me, are you lovers?”

  “Lovers? Are you asking if I love Anguish?” I forced out a laugh. “Yes, of course, two Diabolics in love—what could be more beautiful? Long romantic dinners after fighting each other bloody.”

  His eyes glinted. “I know you. That would be a riveting time.”

  “Don’t be absurd. If you wanted him dead, you would not preserve him.”

  “Attachments are most inconvenient, are they not? Weaknesses so easily exploited. Misfolded proteins is a complicated, progressive ailment. There are a handful of medical bots in the Empire that could cure him, but…” He spread his hands.

  My teeth ground together. “But the Divine Emperor does not have these bots.”

  “Oh, no,” he said. “I have them securely in my possession. But I won’t use them for free.”

  “What. Do. You. Want?”

  All expression dropped from h
is face. “It’s simple. I want you. You, Nemesis. Join me at my side once more. As my wife. As my Empress. Zeus needed Hera, and Caligula his Drusilla. I am now the God of this Empire. You will be its goddess.”

  “I would sooner die,” I said with a harsh laugh.

  “Naturally, but would you sooner Anguish died?”

  That silenced me.

  He studied me with a calculating glitter in his eyes. “Yes, I know you. A Diabolic to the marrow of your bones. You’ll preserve what you love—at all costs. Even to dignity. Even to one’s very soul.”

  “This is vengeance on me, isn’t this?” I murmured darkly. “For the Tigris. You will never forgive me for that. Now you demand my integrity.”

  “More than that, my love. I want your soul. I’ve already lost mine. Join me in a beautiful, shared damnation—and this entire galaxy will fall prostrate at our feet.”

  8

  THE FIRST TIME Tyrus and I kissed, it had awakened something in me, a sign that there was more humanity within me than I’d realized. No technician would have thought to engineer passion into a Diabolic. But it had swept me like a fever.

  I had been ill ever since, to this very day.

  At the time, it had seemed more miracle than sickness. Finding something in myself that was born of nature, not engineering, seemed a sign that the vicars were wrong and Sidonia was correct: I was not some soulless creature but a person like any other.

  I walked ahead of the servants and made a hasty retreat from the Alexandria, mindless steps aimed clumsily back toward Anguish. A despair the likes of which I had never felt seemed to be gripping me.

  For he was truly lost. He was lost. There was some monster wearing Tyrus’s face, speaking with his voice, existing in his body, and what he now demanded of me was intolerable.

  And I had to obey him.

  It felt as though a great abyss was yawning open below me, for I could see no choices before me. There was no escape. To refuse meant destroying Anguish.

  To agree…

  To agree meant destroying everything I valued in myself.

  My throat felt like it was squeezing tighter and tighter, my chest constricting, my eyes beginning to sting.…