by Dakota Banks
Her heart sang, and it seemed like the jungle around her sang with her. The time was right and she was the right person to claim the shard. Quickly packing up the remains of her lunch, she was on her way. She might reach her destination before dark.
At the snake’s-head cleft she turned south, away from the tributary. There was no need for her raft from this point on, so she left it at the canyon’s edge, carefully concealed, along with one of her packs. Traveling lighter, she made better time even though the ground was rougher. She was descending into a valley that showed no trace of human influence. Even the animals were friendlier, crowding her with their curiosity. Maliha’s excitement grew as she passed several more milestones. The conviction also grew in her that somehow, she would keep this shard from Lucius.
As the sun was setting, Maliha checked the map and put it away for the last time. The trail ended at a waterfall, and she could hear it ahead of her. On the valley floor, darkness would come quickly, and she wondered if she should wait until morning to retrieve the shard. Her excitement overruled her practicality.
The waterfall was a thin flow that cascaded in three stages. At the base, mist rose high and covered everything. Trees dripped, rocks were slick, and her skin was immediately coated with a fine spray when she drew close. The full moon, high in the sky, shone through the mist, giving everything a dreamlike quality. Maliha moved forward in the mist to the edge of the deep pool at the base. The spray was harder, her clothing was drenched, and her hair, braided down the center of her back, was plastered to her neck.
She left her backpack in a sheltered spot so she could move ahead unhindered. The only things she took were the dart gun in a leather belly pack and her throwing knives strapped to her thighs.
The shard was embedded in a wall of rock behind the curtain of the waterfall. It glowed as she approached, though it was impossible for it to catch the light of the moon in its location. She touched it, and it came loose in her hand immediately. She slipped it into a pocket.
She turned, and through the mist she could see an imposing figure waiting beyond the curtain of water—Lucius. She didn’t think he could see her yet, but was waiting for her to emerge. She drew the dart gun and loaded it. She intended to fire the instant she was clear of the falling water.
Approaching stealthily, she reached her arm through the curtain, reached a little more to fire, and slipped a little on the wet rocks. She regained her balance right away, but she’d given away her position. With nothing to lose at that point, she fired the dart at the shape now coming toward her, and continued moving until she was in the open.
Lucius was there, right in the path of her dart, and in less than the blink of an eye, he wasn’t. The dart flew on into the night. She loaded another dart, but had lost her advantage of surprise.
I will not give up this shard!
Maliha took off at the fastest speed she could manage, her Ageless speed of old, through the fog. She knew she couldn’t outlast him but maybe she could trick him somehow, fire another dart, and get away. At any moment she expected his arm on her shoulder, yanking her to a stop. She wove among trees and rocks, over exposed roots, and cursed the moon that had been her fortune up until now for trailing her with a shadow.
“Stop…”
She heard his voice whispering like the wind to her, and pushed herself harder. She threw one of her throwing knives back over her shoulder in the hopes that he was close behind her and it would slow him down. The sides of the valley were steep, and she began panting. She was burning through her resources. If she didn’t find a way to outwit him soon, she’d have no energy left to move or fight.
Maliha ran up the side of a tree, injuring herself on branches that weren’t aligned for that kind of stunt. When she reached a good height, she flattened out on a thick branch and tried to get control of her breathing and her racing heart. She had run almost until she dropped, many miles from the waterfall.
I should hide the shard and lead him away from it. What good will that do? He’ll just follow me when I come to retrieve it.
All the buoyancy she’d felt earlier, all the wonder at the way the map responded in her hands, had drained from her.
There is only one thing to do.
Slowly she climbed back down from the tree and sat at its base. She knew it wouldn’t be long before Lucius found her.
He was there within a minute, walking forward, sword drawn. She stood up, leaning against the tree to hide her weakness.
“I follow the orders of Sidana,” he said. “Hand me the shard and you can leave.”
She shook her head. “Do you know about Rasputin and the people he is protecting? What their plans are?”
“Rasputin’s plans don’t concern me.”
“You saved me when I was trying to stop Rasputin.”
“Only so you could find more shards. My demon orders…”
“Fuck your demon. Listen to me for a change.”
Lucius sheathed his sword. “Talk then.”
She drew the dart gun from behind her back and fired. Lucius barely avoided it, then came at her at high speed and twisted the gun from her hand. He threw it into the forest.
“Will you talk or do you have more tricks to try?”
She explained to him about the nanites and the scheme to set back emerging economies. Although he was highly intelligent, living on his island and remaining mostly withdrawn, he had some catching up to do. He absorbed it quickly and asked pertinent questions. Then he thought about it and began offering his analysis.
“Isn’t it good strategy to weaken your opponent for a battlefield advantage? This council is using war tactics that have been around for thousands of years.”
“Where is the war, Lucius? The war is only in their minds. They are demented. Even if there was a battle here, there are honorable ways to fight it and then there is treachery.”
He turned away at the sound of the word. She knew there had to be a personal meaning for him.
“Is that how you ended up as Sidana’s slave?”
“My wife…As a centurion, I was gone for long periods of time from home. Sometimes years. My life was dedicated to the army. If she had taken a man for companionship, I would have understood. On those times when I could make it home, I would again have her heart. But she took to her bed a man who convinced her to marry him so he could have my lands. For her to marry him, I had to die. His name was Caius and he was once a friend of mine. We grew up together, then I became a soldier and he lived off women whose brave husbands were away. He killed me himself, one night in my tent while I was asleep. Gutted me with a short sword and made me die painfully, in a foul pool of my own innards. When Sidana pulled me to him I was ready to claim my vengeance. Was it this way for you?”
His story brought it all back. Losing Constanta, her husband stoning her, the satisfaction of taking vengeance on the woman who’d accused her of being a witch…
“Yes,” she said simply. “But I found a way to change. You can, too.” She reached out to him but he stood resolutely several feet away. “Join me. Or at least give me time to stop the horrible plot to kill so many innocents.”
“Give me the shard.”
“I intend to remove the scourge of the demons from Earth. I would sooner die than give it up. I ask you to return the shard you took from me.”
“You would knowingly suffer Rabishu’s eternal torment rather than give up on this dream of yours to possess the Great Lens?”
“It’s not a dream.” As she said it, the idea crystallized within her. My redemption is only one step of my quest, and not the most important one.
She saw sadness on his face.
“Then there’s something I have to tell you. I have been ordered to force you to drop everything else you are doing in an effort to collect as many shards as possible in six months.”
“Six months? It has taken me years to collect three—” she clutched the shard to her chest—“including the one you have. Why six months?”
/> “Because that is when I kill you.”
She was silent for a moment. Everything had just fallen apart for her—her goals, her whole life. There was no way she could kill the demons in six months, so she would die at Lucius’s hand. “That’s what your heart tells you to do?”
“No. My heart is screaming—”
The pain of her failure made her lash out. “Damn you, Lucius! You’re a coward! Stand up to your demon and spit in his face!” The instant she said it, she wanted the words back. It wasn’t fair of her. He’d been an assassin so much longer than she had, six times longer, that there was no way he could balance his scale. She had no right to goad him like that, to ask that sacrifice of him. She dropped her head in shame. “I’m sorry.”
Just as on his island home, she’d pushed one too many buttons with Lucius. He charged forward and pinned her against the tree, his sword at her throat. She barely managed to get her hands between the blade and her neck, and she’d had to drop the shard to do it. Her palms were no barrier. They were bleeding, and all he had to do was lean forward with his strength and her head would be on the forest floor.
His legs blocked hers hard, preventing any movement. There was no gimmick, no defensive move she could make. No argument she could make on her behalf after what she had just said. Her eyes overflowed with tears and they streamed down her cheeks.
Good-bye my friends. I love you all. I’m so sorry to have failed.
She closed her eyes.
His hand brushed her cheek. She opened her eyes to find him looking into her face. His eyes glistened with tears in the moonlight. Then she realized the pressure on her hands had let up and his sword was sheathed. He took her bloody hands and held them to his chest.
“What have I done? I almost…” He stepped back from her and dropped to his knees. His shoulders hunched as if a great weight had just settled on them.
“Hear me, Sidana! I defy your order! I despise you, you foul snake! I am no longer your slave.”
Maliha fell to her knees and wrapped her arms around him, ignoring the pain from her hands. She knew what would happen now. Lucius would be pulled into Midworld, where his demon could meet him halfway between the Underworld and the Great Above. She clung to him, not wanting him to go, wanting him to take back the words that she’d urged him to say just moments before.
It’s my fault, it’s my fault.
He started to fade and she hugged him tighter. Suddenly she felt the wrenching pull to Midworld, familiar to her but slightly different because she was being drawn into Sidana’s presence, not Rabishu’s. There was no time to think, and then she was there. She and Lucius were a tight package, and couldn’t separate, just as she hadn’t been able to move much when Rabishu drew her to Midworld.
It surprised her that both of them were naked.
The clinging, malodorous fog had a different feel. It seemed to get into her mouth, her nose, everywhere, and when it reached her stomach she felt nauseous. Unable to back away from Lucius, she turned her head and tilted her body as much as she could as she vomited. She heard him do the same.
She wondered how Sidana would appear. Her demon had taken various forms, each more hideous than the next, it had seemed to her. Nothing happened for a while, and when Maliha tried to tell him she was sorry, he wouldn’t hear it. So they talked quietly of small things, anything that didn’t have to do with what was coming.
Or rather, who was coming.
The stench of rotting bodies increased.
“The demon comes,” Lucius said. “He appears as a snake.”
As he said it, Maliha felt a horrible crawling sensation around her legs, a heavy, coiling shape that was warmer than her skin and dripping with slime. She shuddered. The snake came all the way up her back. She could feel the soft flicking of its tongue as it tasted different parts of her body. Finally, the demon dragged a heavy loop over her shoulder so he could look into her face.
The tongue darted over her closed eyelids, under her ears, and just when she was frozen with the thought that Sidana was going to invade her nose and mouth, Lucius leaned forward with great effort and covered her face with his, kissing her. She felt him flinch, but he didn’t move until Sidana pulled back. When the kiss ended, Maliha saw that the snake had bitten Lucius in the cheek to punish him for blocking the way, and a bit of his flesh hung in shreds.
“Stay away from her, demon. She’s not yours, just as I am no longer yours.”
I make no claim on her.
The demon’s voice came into her head, low and mean. Then Maliha was separated from Lucius as though a giant hand had scooped her up. Dumped several feet away, she found that she couldn’t move from her new position, just watch.
You are another story.
Lucius was suddenly pulled upright, his arms over his head, his feet several inches off the floor. Blood dripped down on his chest from his torn cheek. As she watched, his feet remained in one spot but the demon was pulling on his arms, like stretching a piece of taffy. She tried to yell, but she could only emit a squeak. Before his shoulders were torn loose from their sockets, the demon let go. Lucius collapsed.
“Lucius,” she said as loudly as she could, “fight back!”
Her words galvanized him. He looked over at her and regained the spirit he’d had when he first talked to the demon.
“I defy you and your orders. I break my contract!”
The snake rose up, standing on its tail, towering over them.
“Are you too ignorant to understand?” Lucius said. “I’m not your slave anymore! I demand that you send the woman back now!”
The demon blasted his anger in both of their minds. Lucius swayed on his feet.
“Stop this delay. I want to see my contract.”
Blood shot from the circle on Lucius’s chest, the demon’s mark, the point where Sidana extracted blood from him to sign the Ageless contract. At every beat of his heart, more blood flew from his chest. The demon dropped to the ground, slithered to the spot where the blood had pooled, and dipped his mouth in it. Maliha closed her eyes as the demon drank.
My last taste of you, at least for a time.
The fog rose up in front of Lucius and flattened into a wall. Writing in cuneiform began to scroll up it.
Your contract.
The demon breathed on the fog to slow the scrolling and then to stop it.
It says here that failure will not be tolerated. You may die now at my hand or you may live a while longer in the Great Above, but either way you will die. I will enjoy punishing you for your insolence.
Lucius can’t read the contract, Maliha thought. She tried to shake her head at what Sidana was saying and couldn’t. She forced some words out, barely able to whisper them as her throat constricted. “You have…chance. Anu…says.”
Rogue, the demon roared, stop your interfering!
Maliha was swept away, propelled to the Great Above none too gently, and landed back at the tree. The sun was shining, so hours must have passed even though she felt like she’d been gone a short time. His weapons were there, as were hers, and the shard.
Sick with worry, she hoped that Lucius would force the demon into admitting what Anu had forced them to put in the contracts, that each Ageless slave who rebelled should be given a chance to earn back his soul. If Lucius took the first bargain that the demon put on the table, as Rabishu had tried to do with her, he would be doomed, with no scale.
He’d asked for her help before, asked her to talk about how she left her contract when she was on his island, and what did she do? Break his neck and leave.
She wondered whether to backtrack miles to the waterfall and retrieve her backpack, with food, clothes, and the map in it, or wait here for Lucius’s return. She decided that it would likely be hours more before he came back.
Naked, her palms aching from sword cuts that had begun to heal, and with a heavy heart, she picked up the shard and started backtracking. It took longer than she’d anticipated because she’d covered a lot of
ground in her panicked run. She had to pace herself to have enough energy to make the distance both ways. On her way back, she hurried, imagining Lucius there, dazed by the whole experience. She wanted to do everything she could to make his transition to the mortal path easier for him than it had been for her.
He did it for me. I can’t ever forget that. He did it so he wouldn’t have to take my life in six months, so I could continue searching for shards.
When she got near the tree, she was disappointed to see that he wasn’t there waiting for her. He’d been there, though. At the base of the tree, there were bloody footprints—his, meaning that he was bleeding from his fresh scale carving. On the tree trunk, he’d left her a message, chipped out with the tip of his sword.
It was a heart with their initials in it.
Emotion overwhelmed her. Lucius, who had saved her life three times before and now had taken rogue status so that she could live—after all of that, he loved her. She dropped to her knees in front of the tree, clutching the shard to her heart.
Lucius, your sacrifice won’t be in vain.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Maliha was barely back in Tel Aviv, her emotions as raw as Lucius’s new scale, when Abiyram notified her that he had news. She went to see him. Again they sat on the balcony.
He studied her closely. “You seem distracted, my dear. Or sad? What can I do for you?”
“Nothing except what I have already asked.”
“The map. May I ask if you have had any success with it?”
“It was the right stuff.”
His eyes closed and his face relaxed, she thought in pleasure.
“And did you bring it back to me?”
“No. I returned it to the shop woman in Addis Ababa.”
