by R S Penney
A blazing stream of it.
Desa threw herself off the raised floor to land in the narrow space between it and the wall. No time for standing still. She ran for cover.
Lost in the task Adele focused. The world around her was a sea of particles all colliding and jostling each other. She ignored them. This deep in the Ether's embrace, she was barely aware of her own body.
She did feel it, however, when something pulled her downward and sideways, leaving her sprawled out on the pyramid's rooftop. Would that fool woman never tire of her trinkets? Manipulating gravity with all the subtlety of a charging bull. Desa Kincaid had a pretty face and hands that could work magic on any woman, but damn it, she could be a trial. Adele put that aside.
Just a little longer.
She felt the Ether quivering.
Just a little longer.
Bendarian stood on the edge of the raised floor with a fireball in each hand, his face now hideously twisted with snake-like features, his eyes red with a single slit. A forked tongue lashed out from his mouth.
Standing with the pistol held in her extended hand, its barrel pointed straight at her enemy, Desa squinted at him. “How it must frustrate you,” she said. “All your power, and you still can't kill one woman.”
Bendarian spread his arms, throwing his head back to howl in impotent rage. Dust rose off the floor and swirled around him in a cyclone, a pillar of sand that stretched all the way up to the ceiling. And suddenly, the pillar was coming for Desa.
She fired.
An instant later – less than a fraction of a second – she triggered the Force-Sink that she had Infused into the bullet and watched the swirling winds of that cyclone come to a sudden stop, every particle frozen in place. It was still close enough to Bendarian that he might have been frozen as well.
Pacing to the corner of the raised floor, Desa saw that her suspicions were indeed correct. Bendarian was a statue with scaly hands stretched toward the cyclone, a look of murderous glee on his serpentine face.
“Didn't think I'd put one in a bullet, did you?”
Twirling her gun around her index finger, Desa caught the grip and then extended her hand to take aim. She lined up the perfect shot, waited just a moment and then ordered her bullet to stop draining kinetic energy.
The cyclone lurched forward.
Desa fired.
A hole appeared in the side of Bendarian's head. The man dropped to his knees and then fell flat on his face. His cyclone collapsed into a pile of dust that spread throughout the room.
Pressing a fist to her mouth, Desa coughed several times before the wave of dust finally settled. “By the eyes of Vengeance,” she squeaked. “Let that be the end of it.”
She holstered her weapon.
Approaching Bendarian took a little more courage than she would have expected. A part of her was still expecting him to leap back to his feet and start hurling death at her all over again. But Bendarian remained still.
He was stretched out on his belly, black blood pooling around his body. Maybe it really was over. Maybe Adele was wrong. Perhaps death had taken him before he could use his dark magics to restore himself.
Any hope she had of that died when the whole world changed. It was the change that she experienced every time she communed with the Ether – she didn't see solid objects as collections of particles – but it was a change.
Everything looked red, as if the sun itself had dimmed. When Desa examined the crystal above her, she saw that the light passing through it had a distinctly crimson tint. It was unnerving, to say the least.
Kneeling down next to Bendarian's corpse, Desa hugged herself and then shook her head. “What is it now?” she wondered aloud. “Vengeance carve me up for dog meat, can't a woman get any peace?”
She drew her revolver and watched aghast as the barrel melted. Well-forged steel just dissolved into a metallic goop that made a sickening sound as it dribbled to the floor. Desa patted her body to make sure she was still whole. Everything seemed in order. Still, she was frightened.
“My, word...What did you do to Benny?”
Desa was on her feet in an instant.
The speaker's voice had a distinct twang that was unfamiliar to her, but when she turned around, she saw Adele emerging from the tunnel that led to the surface. Or rather an apparition that looked like Adele.
Instead of a tattered dress, this woman wore a flowing white gown of impeccable cut. Her long hair was still braided, but there were no more flyaway strands. Instead, it was silky smooth, and it seemed to catch the light somehow.
And her eyes.
Her eyes were pure white from corner to corner, and the smile that blossomed on her lovely face was nothing short of bone-chilling. “I simply abhor wasted potential,” she said. “On your feet, Benny.”
Adele snapped her fingers
The wound in Bendarian's head closed itself, and he groaned as life returned to his twisted body. He stood up slowly, rubbing his face with a scaly hand. “What happened? Where am I?”
He turned his red-eyed stare upon Desa, and his lips parted to show two monstrous fangs. “You!” he hissed. “Will I never be rid of you?”
He thrust a hand toward Desa.
She jumped back instinctively, reaching for a pistol that wasn't there, but nothing happened. In fact, Bendarian seemed to be as confused as she was. He flung his hand out several more times, but when the gesture failed to produce a fireball or lightning bolt or whatever it was he had intended, he threw his head back and wailed.
“Now, now,” Adele said. “Ain't no cause for cryin'.”
She vanished from sight and then suddenly reappeared atop the raised floor, never breaking. “You always did have a penchant for theatrics, didn't you, Benny?” she cooed. “It does get a might wearisome, I'm afraid.”
Gaping at the other woman, Desa blinked several times and then gave her head a shake. “Adele...What did you do?” She was fairly certain that she knew the answer, but a part of her still clung to hope.
Adele twirled on the spot, the skirt of her gown flaring, and then faced Desa with her hands on her hips. “Oh, honey,” she said. “Do I really gotta spell it out for y'all? I do prefer a woman with brains, but if you insist.”
Adele puffed up her chest as she drew in a breath, and when she spoke again, her voice changed. It wasn't the voice that Desa remembered, the clipped speech patterns that were common to the people of Ofalla. Nor was it the twangy accent that she had adopted for some reason. No, it was a voice Desa had heard only once before.
The voice of the entity that had been controlling those people on the farm. “Adele is no more,” it said. “We are one now.”
Adele sat primly on nothing at all, folding her hands in her lap and tilting her head to one side as she examined Desa. “Of course, we aren't exactly the Nether either.” The twangy accent had returned. “Suppose we'll have to take a new name.”
“What did you do to her?” Desa growled.
“Do to her?” the other woman exclaimed. “Oh, Sweetie, you mean you still don't understand?” She vanished, and when she reappeared, she was lying face-down on a bed of nothing but air.
With her chin balanced on the backs of folded hands, she floated at eye-level with Desa. “She welcomed this,” the twangy voice purred. Rolling onto her back, the entity giggled and kicked her feet. “Oh, Benny, you look so crestfallen.”
The serpent-man that had once been Radharal Bendarian scowled and looked down at the floor. “You promised yourself to me,” he mumbled. It was just a statement of fact, delivered without anger or venom.
Adele sat up, drumming her fingers on the invisible surface that supported her as she studied him. “Yes,” she agreed. “But honestly, hon, you bore me. All those grandiose speeches...And how do I put this?”
She hopped down off her invisible ledge and glided to Bendarian, her hips swaying with every step. She reached up to lay a hand on his scaly cheek, and he tried to turn his face away. “You're...Well, I d
on't want to say 'used up.'”
Bendarian flinched at her words.
“And this one,” Adele went on. “Such a clever girl. Did you know she watched you with her talents, deduced your plans and then...Well, she was just a little quicker on the draw, now wasn't she? And you!”
The other woman spun around to face Desa, grinning from ear to ear as she strode forward. “The sweet little things she whispered in your ear.” A fit of giggles made Adele double over. “You...You actually believed she was your soulmate!”
Desa felt her jaw drop, then grimaced and forced herself to put aside the pain of that barbed comment. “The light,” she said. “What did you do? Why is everything red? Why did my gun melt?”
“Oh that,” Adele scoffed. “Ain't nothing to worry about, sweetheart. You see, my presence distorts what you might call the natural order, creating...Well,you might call it a glitch in the rules that govern this universe.”
Adele stood under the crystal with fists on her hips, craning her neck to stare up at the red light coming in front above. “In this case, a slight red shift in the local light waves and a loss of molecular cohesion among metals. You might want to have a gander at your pants, my love.”
Desa did as she was bid and found that her belt buckle had melted, creating a stain of brassy goo on her pants. All metals? Even her bullets? Her ring? The clips that secured Midnight's saddle and bridle?
She touched her earlobes and found that her earrings had indeed melted. And when she pulled the ring off her finger, it left a sticky residue behind and then squished in the palm of her hand. “By the eyes of Vengeance!”
Curiosity got the better of her, and she triggered the Light-Source that had been Infused into that ring. The puddle in her hand began to glow with a somber yellow light. An Infused object was still an Infused object even if you broke it into a hundred pieces.
“Be glad the effects were mostly harmless,” Adele said. “If my arrival had altered the cosmic speed limit, for instance.”
“Cosmic speed limit?” Desa mumbled.
Adele gave her a sympathetic look. “Right, of course,” she said. “Your people are right on the verge of discovering that little nugget. My sisters did create an interesting little playground for y'all.”
Desa's mouth worked silently, and she shook her head in disbelief. “Your sisters,” she mumbled at last. “Mercy and Vengeance.”
“My my, the girl does have some brains!” Adele covered her mouth with one hand as she giggled. “Yes, I do suppose that is what you would call them, though neither term encapsulates the totality of them.”
As Desa took in the horror of it all, the enormity of what she faced, Adele sauntered over to Bendarian and patted him gently on the cheek. “Come on then, Benny,” she said. “I do believe it's time we were on our way.”
A god.
This creature was a god, and Desa had facilitated its arrival by allowing Adele to travel with her party. By trusting her heart over the instincts that told her Adele Delarac was no good. She had been so fixated on Bendarian, so single-minded in her pursuit of him that she had turned a blind eye to the treachery right under her nose.
Rage lit a fire in her belly, turned her blood to acid and set her mind racing. Maybe there was still away. The creature was dependent on Adele's body. If Desa could destroy it, maybe the entity would lose its hold on this world.
But how?
Her weapons were gone.
Except...An Infused object was still Infused even if you shattered it into a thousand pieces. The leather pouch that carried her melted bullets. Some of them were Sources and Sinks.
She pulled the pouch of her belt – it wasn't hard with the buckle gone – opened it and tried to splash some of the goo onto Adele.
The other woman had her back turned, but she raised a hand dismissively, and the goo stopped in midair. “Now, I like you, Desa,” she began. “I wasn't lyin' all those times I said so. But so help me, you start chasin' me, houndin' me or tryin' to stick me with pointy objects, and I swear on my sweet mama's grave, I will slap the taste outta your mouth. Come, Benny.”
Adele snapped her fingers.
And they were both gone.
Chapter 27
At the end of the tunnel that led out of the pyramid, Desa saw a crimson landscape and a cloudless pink sky. The sight of it filled her with despair. This was the cost of her arrogance. By the eyes of Vengeance, she should never have let Adele Delarac into her bed. Much less into her heart.
Desa stepped into the sunlight with her arms hanging limp, her eyes fixed on the ground. Down the steps she went to where Midnight waited patiently like the loyal friend that he was.
It shocked Desa to realize that she had half expected to find him gone. Why would he stay after Desa's failure had damned the world? But the horse didn't judge her; he just came forward and nuzzled her shoulder.
Desa shut her eyes tight, tears leaking from them to stream over her cheeks. A fit of sobs forced her down onto her knees, and she shuddered with every breath. “Why did I not see her for what she was?”
Midnight bent low to lick her forehead.
“Stop!”
Wiping tears away with the back of her hand, Desa sniffled. “Stop,” she said again in a softer voice. “I appreciate your efforts, old friend, but I fear I have proven unworthy of your kindness.”
Midnight snorted.
She stood up and took the stallion's bridle in hand. Of course, the whole thing fell apart when its metal fasteners melted. That almost had her down on the ground again, but she took control of herself and led Midnight away from the pyramid.
Just before they reached the first ring of ruined buildings, the world changed. The sky brightened from a somber pink to a vibrant shade of blue. The sun was once again a brilliant white disk only a short way past its zenith.
Desa stepped forward, shielding her eyes with one hand and staring hard into the distance. “What happened?” She turned to Midnight and sighed with relief when she saw that he was his proper shade of black.
Turning around, she expected to find the pyramid bathed in a thick haze of red, but it looked normal. The stones were a proper sandy brown. The massive crystal sparkled in the sunlight, and the sky was still blue. Perhaps the world had righted itself. The laws of nature had reasserted themselves somehow.
Three quick strides toward the pyramid put paid to that notion. The sky reddened, and the pyramid and everything else in sight. Even though he stood just outside the borders of this phenomenon, Midnight appeared to be a deep, dark red to her eyes.
So, the effect was localized.
Desa strode back into the natural light, shaking her head. “I don't know what Adele did,” she began. “But we can thank Mercy it didn't spread very far.”
There was no point in remaining here, but another flight across the desert could kill them if they didn't take time to eat and drink, and the only source of water she knew of was in that haunted orchard.
At first, she thought she would have been hesitant to return there, but it pleased her to realize that her fear was greatly diminished. Desa had tangled with a god; what could a vengeful spirit do to her.
When they returned to the small orchard, they found the copper tower still standing, which only made sense. It had not been in the area of effect of whatever Adele had done to the pyramid. But all of the Sinks and Sources were depleted.
Desa reached out to the Ether and found that it came as easily as it had the moment she arrived in this town. The crystal was still doing its job...somehow. Desa had no desire to question her good fortune in that regard.
She scanned the water condenser with her mind, Reinfused all of the Sources and Sinks and set them to work creating water. It wasn't long before she had several buckets full. She gave one to Midnight and let him drink until he was sated.
After that, he started grazing on the grass while Desa ate peaches to fill her belly. Not the most satisfying meal she could have imagined, but it was better than nothing
. If nothing else, it would improve her chances of survival.
Standing before Midnight, Desa laid a hand on his long face, and he leaned into her touch. “I suppose we'll have to choose our destination,” she said. “I don't think we'll find much of a welcome at Fool's Edge.”
Midnight's ears slanted back at the mention of the town.
“We could press on to Dry Gulch,” she said. “Though I'm not sure I know the way, and I have no map. We're likely to find ourselves stranded in the desert with no food or water.” It was quite the conundrum; if they raced back to Fool's Edge, they would find it hard to procure supplies. And it would be several days of trudging through inhospitable wilderness before they reached the fertile lands of the Vinrella. Could they hold out that long without food? Or water? Desa carried a water skin that she had filled, but that would only take her so far. And Dry Gulch...Well, they might not even be able to find Dry Gulch. Quite the conundrum.
Clamping her mouth shut, Desa felt creases in her brow. “Of course, there might be another option,” she murmured. “You could try communing with the Ether. Think about it! If that crystal extended the range of my senses, it will surely do the same for you.”
If Midnight was able to sense Dry Gulch's location, even across dozens of miles, he would know which way to go. He seemed to think it worth the effort because Desa soon felt a resonance from him. His eyes took on the vacant stare of someone who was lost in the Ether's embrace. Several minutes later, Midnight came back to the waking world, and then he did something Desa had never seen before.
He nodded.
A grin stretched across Desa's face, and her cheeks grew uncomfortably warm. “All right, then,” she said. “It seems your senses are more attuned than my own. I assume this means you know the way.”
Midnight turned and walked out of the orchard.
Desa shrugged and followed.
At the edge of town, they found the poor filly standing with her ears flicking this way and that. The girl had been spooked by what she saw at the pyramid. She must have run off. Midnight, dutiful steed that he was, had remained.
