Souldancer (Soul Cycle Book 2)

by Brian Niemeier

  “I was addressing the lady,” Damus said. “I’ll speak with you in your turn.” Gesturing with the gun he told her, “I recommend moving aside.”

  Astlin hesitantly stepped back from the demon and the Gen. She was surprised when Damus lowered the gun and held up the flute.

  “Have I ever told you about this flute?” he asked no one in particular. “I could say it was a gift—from my daughter perhaps—but I’m not haggling with pawnbrokers and don’t wish to embellish the truth.”

  Unlike Astlin, Hazeroth continued his steady advance till he stood with arm’s reach of Damus. “I care naught for your shabby trinkets.”

  “Your apathy betrays a stunted aesthetic,” said Damus. “This fine instrument has many qualities to recommend it—not the least of which is being highly Worked.”

  Astlin heard a click and saw the gun extend to twice its already comical length. Damus rammed his flute down the lengthened barrel and aimed it at Hazeroth.

  The demon’s bloody eyes gleamed. “Here is sport to repay every affront I’ve suffered!” A sudden scowl twisted his face. “Do not take me for an upstart cupbearer scheming on his stolen throne. I know your weapon’s worth. Shall we see if you can fire before I rend the hand from your arm?”

  Two hands—one of stone and one of flesh—encircled Hazeroth so tightly that Astlin heard his bones crack.

  “I’m sorry this was all I could do,” thought Megido, who smiled at her as the demon writhed in his grip.

  He never blocked me after we fought the Regulator. Astlin searched Megido’s mind. Panic broke through the wall around her heart when she saw that he knew Damus’ plan.

  Astlin started toward Hazeroth but stopped when the Gen’s eyes met hers. She saw sorrow there, and grim determination.

  “Look away,” Damus said. “You mustn’t blind those shining eyes.”

  Hazeroth shouted what must have been curses in a score of dead tongues. His flesh twisted in an attempt to change shape, resulting in a nightmare hybrid of human and bat.

  Damus glanced at Astlin. “May your penance be lighter than mine.”

  He pulled the trigger.

  Astlin hid her eyes, but not before a burst of light seared an afterimage into them. The heat and pressure were less than she’d feared. There was an agonized squeal that rose in volume and pitch until it was felt more than heard. Megido made no sound, but his agony touched her mind before she shut it out.

  The chamber’s sourceless glow returned. Astlin heard rushing water and a dull roar.

  Looking again, she saw a churning mass of loose stone hanging in space where Megido had stood. Sand poured into the pool fed by Irallel’s gate. The pure elements didn’t mix, but the rising water threatened to cover Xander’s pale motionless form.

  Stop! she almost begged the water and stone souldancers. But she knew that they never would.

  Zan was helping Cook to his feet at the platform’s base. Above them, the metal egg with its corpselike face slept on.

  “So that’s where my rodcaster went,” Tefler said as he splashed toward Astlin. “I shouldn’t leave stuff like that lying around.”

  “Damus and Hazeroth,” Astlin said, “where did they go?”

  “Nobody knows for sure, but in Hazeroth’s case I hope it’s not pleasant.”

  Left with no response to Tefler’s statement, Astlin was forced to ask the question she most dreaded. “What about Xander?”

  For the first time, Tefler’s cocky grin faded. “Sorry. There was nothing we could do.”

  Astlin walked through the rising flood with growing purpose till she reached the place where Xander lay. She knelt down, lifted his body from the water, and carried it to the pranaphage souldancer’s platform.

  “This was all for you,” she told the hideous sleeping face. “What are you?”

  “He is a great smith and a vessel for the greatest.” Splashing footsteps announced Sulaiman, striding naked toward the platform. “Through him I will seize victory.”

  Astlin’s anger flared. “Is this a game to you? Are the dead just tiles taken off the board?”

  The priest of Midras stood between her and the smith. A puckered scar—possibly an old gunshot wound—marred his lower back.

  “No game; a war to avenge a murdered world.”

  “I don’t care!” Astlin looked upon Xander’s beautiful, lifeless face. “He freed me from the Tower Graves. But the monsters followed us—the priests, the demons, and the gods.”

  “Speaking of monsters,” Tefler said, “that rat-wolf-bat-thing was ugly enough to be Thurif and Hazeroth’s bastard. I hope it’s dead. Anybody see where it went?”

  Cook coughed into his fist and pointed at Sulaiman.

  “He should get that checked,” Tefler mumbled.

  Th’ix faded into view with a burden under each arm. The first was a bundle of drab clothes which Sulaiman took and put on. The second was the Regulator’s head. The imp’s giant helmeted trophy would have looked ridiculous if it weren’t so morbid.

  Astlin wasn’t done with Sulaiman. “Hazeroth turned you into that thing, didn’t he? You wanted revenge, and Xander died for it.”

  “Xander died worthily,” Sulaiman said. “By his final deeds he foiled Shaiel, and in death he finds his lost clan.”

  The priest’s words did nothing to quell the exploding star of Astlin’s grief and rage.

  “It’s wrong.” Hot liquid rolled from her eyes, and she averted her face from Xander. Her tears hissed when they hit the water, forming tiny brass drops that sank out of sight. “He made me his family. Why should the dead take him and leave me all alone?”

  Zan cautiously approached and gave her a hopeful smile scarred by Hazeroth’s wrath. “The gold lady isn’t alone.”

  For reasons even she didn’t know, Zan’s comment broke Astlin’s fragile self-control. She held him in a withering glare stoked with all her loss and pain.

  “I’m just brass! You think you can replace Xander? Do you want to die like him?”

  Zan shrank back, covering his eyes.

  Astlin’s anger cooled. Shame softened her voice. “It’s my fault, Zan. I thought Xander cured me, but I still hurt everyone—even my friends.”

  “It’s not just you,” Cook said in a raw whisper. “We’re parts of a shattered whole. We know something’s wrong, but not how to fix it.”

  A solution dawned on Astlin. It was so simple she couldn’t believe she hadn’t seen it before.

  “I’ll send them all back. I’ll return everyone to the Nexus until only I’m left.”

  A strong hand gently touched Astlin’s shoulder. She turned and saw that it belonged to Sulaiman.

  “Others of your kind may bear men such malice, but not you. Mistake not the folly of madness for the tyrant’s pride.”

  “How can you say that?” Astlin argued. “You don’t know what I’ve done.”

  “I spent centuries among souls bereft of all love. You think yours dead. I yet see the embers of a love to rival saints, were it fanned fully alight.”

  “I kill what I love. The Guild saw to that.” Regret edged Astlin’s voice. “Have you ever broken, Sulaiman?”

  “The Guild’s torments bent your soul but did not break it. Gods and demons covet your wrath, yet a wounded friend stirs your heart to pity. No, you are not lost.”

  “Don’t worry, mind-eating fire monster,” Tefler said. “I still like you.”

  Cook elbowed him in the ribs. “What he means—what we all mean—is, we’ll help you pick up the pieces.”

  Astlin’s sorrow remained, but seeing her friends’ weary, hopeful faces made holding onto bitterness impossible.

  “Thank you,” were the only words she had.

  Cook motioned toward Xander’s body. “I can’t carry your other burdens, so let me take this one.”

  Though reluctant at first, Astlin realized that she trusted Cook more than anyone alive. She laid Xander in his arms, and an even greater weight seemed to lift from her.

 
Sulaiman turned to Th’ix. “Have you the key?”

  The imp rummaged through a pocket of his baggy pants and produced a small piece of white metal. Its face gleamed like a mirror, but its edges took on a purple hue.

  “So rare,” Th’ix said in his high nasal voice. “You don’t think I’d lose it?”

  Sulaiman accepted the shining object and approached the platform’s occupant.

  “What’s that?” asked Tefler.

  “Worked ether metal.” Sulaiman extended his hand toward the plate on the bound souldancer’s forehead. “With it the smith’s last bond is broken.”

  “You’ve been planning this for a while, haven’t you?” Cook observed.

  Sulaiman fit the key to a hole in the plate’s center. “I’ve crawled through blackest pits and hunted under distant suns that justice be done to Thera. Now I see my journey’s end.”

  The latches at each corner gave way, and the plate fell into the rising water.

  “Speak your name,” Sulaiman said.

  The pranaphage souldancer’s eyes opened, revealing saw-toothed irises like clock gears. “Mirai,” the beaklike mouth pronounced with the aid of a metal tongue.

  “Well met Mirai, smith and Thera’s host. I am Prefect Sulaiman Iason of the Fourth Circle. These are T’Zir’Th’ix’An my guide from Avalon, Astlin Tremore of the Fire Stratum, Lawbringer Tefler and cook Cook of the Irminsul, and Zan of the Air Stratum.”

  “Do the Gen still anoint guardians?” Mirai asked Zan in a brusque, precise voice.

  Zan cocked his head. “I don’t know, Mirai Smith.”

  “Assumed from your coat. Forget I asked. “The smith’s clockwork eyes scanned the chamber. “Torn at intersections with two other Strata. Advise moving to a secure location.”

  Astlin heard a chorus of clicks from the metal egg before she saw the first subtle movement. The oval cocoon underwent a bizarre transformation, melting into a mass of gears.

  That’s not his cage, she noticed with a start. It’s his body!

  “Recommend that you follow,” Smith said as he flowed from the pedestal. His shifting form grew mechanical limbs that each took a single step before deconstructing themselves and reforming in odd new shapes.

  Seeing no better choice, Astlin followed.

  36

  “I don’t know what to say,” Astlin told the circle of mourners gathered around Xander’s body near the ruined base camp. She longed to see his face one last time, but part of her was glad that a tarp covered him. A restless wind tousled its corners.

  “I could perform a Lawbringer funeral rite,” Tefler said, “but I doubt he’d want that.”

  Astlin nodded. Xander would have despised Shaiel’s last rites as much as the bland “life celebrations” of the Guild era.

  “What would he want?” she asked.

  “Nesshin teaching on the afterlife is pretty vague,” said Cook, his voice still raw. “The Atavists preferred cremation.”

  Astlin wrung her hands. “I couldn’t.”

  “The sons of Nessh deemed Atavism a heterodox sect,” said Sulaiman. “The Nesshin of my day used caves, entombing several generations of a clan together.”

  “His clan’s gone,” Tefler said.

  Cook turned to Astlin. “It’s up to you.”

  She nodded in resignation. “There are caves near the landing site.”

  “We should get started,” said Tefler. “This heat won’t do us any favors.”

  Astlin led the small procession back down the canyon. Cook, Zan, and the two priests served Xander as pallbearers.

  The sandy path widened as they approached the landing site, where a grim discovery waited amid the scatter of broken palettes and equipment.

  Th’ix pointed a claw at the corpse lying broken on the sand. “It’s the man who fell.”

  Tefler raised a finger. “Actually, he was dropped.”

  Mirai Smith formed a metal rod to poke the corpse’s bloody robe. “Clothed as a Steersman.”

  “He wasn’t really a guildsman,” Astlin said, “but he lied and murdered enough to earn the name.”

  Cook glanced upward. “I think we have another problem.”

  Astlin looked up and saw the empty blue sky; then realized she shouldn’t have.

  “The Exarch left us,” Tefler groaned.

  “Let our cares give pride of place to the dead,” said Sulaiman.

  No one argued.

  Astlin helped Tefler up onto the chasm’s edge. The priest of Thera looked ready to faint as he slumped to the hot sand. She could smell his sweat.

  “A tireless Worked body must make climbing easier,” he said.

  “I’ll trade you,” said Astlin. Still standing on the precipice, she peered down into the canyon. The hollow feeling that she’d left something below haunted her, and she doubted it would ever stop.

  “You sure you don’t want some time alone?” Tefler asked between panting breaths.

  The thought terrified her. “Thanks, but I’ve had more than enough.”

  Astlin scanned the curved cliff top. Zan stood nearby, having flown himself up. Mirai Smith had swarmed up the rock face on thousands of creeping limbs. Cook and Sulaiman, who were the strongest natural climbers, sat nearby. The only surprise was Th’ix, who sat apart from the others. Somehow he’d reached the top before her while still carrying the Guild Regulator’s head. Even stranger, the imp didn’t’ seem tired at all.

  Looking to the clear sky confirmed Cook’s fear. “There’s no sign of the Exarch,” Astlin said.

  “I’ve been thinking,” said Cook. “The Kerioth is only a couple days’ walk from here. Tefler and I could probably fix it with our new friend’s help.”

  “Describe the vessel,” said Mirai Smith.

  Tefler made a trident shape with his hand. “A black three-pronged nexus-runner.”

  Smith flashed a chitinous grin. “Won’t be difficult.”

  Astlin gestured from herself to the other souldancers. “We don’t need to eat or drink. Can the rest of you make it that far?”

  Cook scanned the horizon. “It shouldn’t be a problem. Irallel gave us plenty of water.”

  When she died, Astlin thought. Or worse than died; collapsed into a gushing rift between Strata. Megido, Damus, Xander—so much death.

  She glanced at Mirai Smith and wondered about Sulaiman’s plan. Thurif had also sought the clockwork pranaphage. The little she knew of his designs made her wary of Smith and glad of the traitor’s death.

  A deep hum interrupted Astlin’s thoughts and made the sand dance at her feet. Her gaze flashed to the canyon’s edge, but she felt nexic waves pulsing from its depths before a black hulk rose into view. Dents marred the Kerioth’s sharp planes, and its engines spewed thick smoke.

  “Son of a bitch,” Astlin said.

  “Souldancer of Kairos,” a reedy voice thundered from the ship. “Your liberator greets you.”

  “Known to you?” Smith asked.

  Astlin hoped that her madness had returned with a wild hallucination. But if so, everyone else shared it.

  “Thurif.”

  “Saw him dead below,” the clockwork souldancer said.

  “He can mold flesh,” said Tefler. “That corpse must be a fake.”

  “You walk free by my design,” the Kerioth boomed. “Open your mind, that I may share my vision.”

  “State your terms,” said Smith.

  Astlin felt telepathic signals streaming from the ship. “Don’t trust him!”

  A nexic wave broke over her. Ground, sky, and abyss bled into a harsh whiteout. When the light faded, Mirai Smith was gone.

  The second wave building in the nexus-runner’s core left no time for words. Astlin reflexively stretched out her arms and her will. Tefler, Sulaiman, and Cook flew back from the edge as though tied to speeding drifters. A piercing green-white globe burst from the Kerioth’s hull, blinding her to their fate. The ground beneath her vanished, and she fell.

  37

  Astlin lay next
to a dead man. His half-pulped waxen face resembled Thurif’s down to its tumorous growths and misplaced eyes. But the corpse’s trunk was normal—a fact revealed by the Guild robes’ strange absence.

  Whoever you were, you didn’t deserve this.

  “Are you all right?” Cook called to her from high above.

  Astlin looked upward. A smooth quarter sphere had been gouged from the canyon’s lip where the Kerioth had translated thousands of tons of stone into oblivion.

  “I think so.” Astlin stood and brushed sand from her armor. “How about you?”

  “Tefler, Sulaiman, and I are a little bruised, but we’d be a lot worse if you hadn’t thrown us clear. I didn’t know you could do that!”

  “Me either.” I won’t watch another friend die, Astlin promised herself.

  Zan landed nearby, interrupting her brooding.

  “I’m glad…you’re not hurt,” he said, catching himself before saying something else.

  Astlin saw the fading claw marks on Zan’s white face, and guilt gnawed at her heart. “You’re not hurt, either?”

  Zan smiled. “I flew away.”

  “Good,” she said, returning his grin. “I was worried.”

  Zan hovered beside Astlin as she climbed. She welcomed his company, even though it hardly dulled the ache of Xander’s absence.

  The souldancers rejoined their comrades atop the cliff, where Th’ix surprised Astlin again. Wondering how he’d escaped raised troubling questions about how she’d saved the others, so she dropped that train of thought. In any case, he ignored her as he tinkered with the Regulator’s severed head.

  “Well met, lady of flame,” said Sulaiman.

  “I’m a Kethan,” Astlin said, “not a lady.”

  “You embody one of the high Strata. Your station bestows great dignity.”

  “I’m stuck in the desert, covered in dust like the rest of you.” Being Xander’s wife was the only station I wanted.

  “We mustn’t tarry here long,” Sulaiman said. “The false guildsman holds the smith.”

  “Are we sure it was Thurif?” asked Cook.

  “It was him,” Astlin said. “Unless someone else stripped the robe off that corpse.”