There was a sudden cry—half anger, half anguish—and then the vision exploded like shattering crystal. Fragments of reality rained down on Damien as he struggled to get his bearings again, but for a long minute it was impossible; by the time he could make out the outline of the door it was already closing, and the figure that had passed through it had long since faded from sight.
“Gerald!” No thought for Toshida now; he bolted for the door himself, hoping to catch the Neocount in the hallway beyond. But the Hunter had moved quickly, or else he’d had a substantial lead; not until Damien had run from the building, startling half a dozen guards in the process, did he see ‘Tarrant’s lean form fleeing the Manor grounds, long legs covering the ground with feverish speed—
“Gerald! Stop!” He didn’t know if the man could hear him, but it couldn’t hurt to try. “Please!” It had no effect. He pushed himself for as much speed as he could manage, trying to make up for Tarrant’s natural advantage in height and endurance.
And at last, in a deserted district, he caught up with him, not because he was running faster, but because Tarrant had stopped. Fear showed starkly on that death-pale face; the silver eyes were bright with it.
“Do you know what I did back there?” he demanded. His voice was hoarse with terror. “Do you understand?”
“You shared a Divining,” Damien told him. “And if Toshida saw what I saw, then you may have saved this world. You’ve certainly saved this region—”
He stopped. No more words would come. Because suddenly, he understood. He understood.
“What I’ve done,” the Hunter whispered fiercely, “is to commit suicide. Have you forgotten my pact? Have you forgotten the power that sustains me? There are conditions set on my existence, priest. And if in truth I inspired Toshida to lead this region away from its current course, then I just broke them all.”
For a moment Damien couldn’t speak at all. “You’re still here,” he managed. “You’re still alive.”
The tortured face turned away from him. “For how long?” Tarrant whispered. “Until Toshida commits himself to change? Until that change begins to take effect? Where in that process is my life to be terminated? Nine hundred years of service, wiped out in one careless instant!” He shut his eyes. “You brought me to this, priest. You and your philosophy! You and your human influence! Are you happy now?” he demanded. “Is this what you wanted? Will it please you to imagine me suffering in Hell while you plan your next campaign against Calesta?”
“If I did,” he said evenly, “wouldn’t that just feed the bastard more? Gerald. Please.” The Neocount had turned away; Damien could see his strong shoulders trembling. “I don’t relish the thought of fighting him alone. Quite frankly, without you I wouldn’t last a minute.” As for the other question the Hunter’s words had raised, he didn’t dare face that. Not now. After months of praying that Gerald Tarrant would be brought to judgment for his many sins, that the world would be freed from his tyranny forever, he wasn’t ready to admit that the thought of it actually coming to pass made him feel sick inside. Had his feelings toward the man changed so drastically in these last few months? If so, it was a dangerous development.
A shudder seemed to pass through that lean, tormented frame. “Go find Rozca,” Tarrant whispered hoarsely. “Help him get hold of a ship that can make the passage. Without our pilot we have little chance of surviving a journey, but make what arrangements you can. When they’re done I’ll know, and I’ll come back to you. If I’m still alive.”
He began to walk away.
“Gerald—” The Hunter turned back to him. His eyes were empty, black and cold and utterly without boundary; looking into them chilled Damien to the bone. “I must be what I was meant to be,” he said coldly. Bits of his intentions were manifesting about him as he spoke, fueled by the raw power of his desperation; the images were filled with violence and pain. “So don’t look for me to return to Mercia until you’re ready to leave here, Vryce. Because my only hope in surviving that passage—in surviving to begin that passage—lies in defining myself anew. In praying that the power which sustains me is capable of forgiveness ... or at least of forgetfulness. If I please it.”
“Don’t,” Damien whispered. Sick at heart as he realized what the Hunter intended. “Don’t do it!” But Tarrant wasn’t listening to any arguments. Coldfire blazed up from the ground, engulfing his body in frigid power. His flesh melted, reformed, became a giant winged figure—not a bird this time, but something with a sleek black body and leathery wings, a creature out of nightmare realms—and then he was gone, rising up high into the sky so that he might survey his new hunting-ground.
Sick inside, Damien watched him fly until his black form faded into the distant night. Headed toward Paza Nova, perhaps, or Penitencia, or the Kierstaad Protectorate ... anywhere there was fear. Anywhere there were unprotected souls to be harvested, so that the Hunter might cleanse his dark soul with the terror of innocents.
As he turned back toward Mercia’s central district, as he numbly began to walk again, Damien tried hard not to think about how delighted Calesta would be when he learned of the Hunter’s decision.
Epilogue
Darkness.
Not the simple blackness of Erna’s night sky, with its absence of sun or stars. Not the insulating darkness of the ocean’s floor, with miles of water filtering out each intrusive ray. Not even the total lightlessness of a cavern’s interior, in which a man might put his hand before his face and not only fail to see it, but doubt that it even existed. Those were mere shadows compared to this, echoes of darkness that could be compromised by a single match, or lamp, or candleflame. This was a blackness that would swallow light, just as it swallowed life.
Things stirred in that blackness. Envies. Hates. Hungers. Echoes of the darkness in the human soul, now given independent life. Sometimes a few of them would coalesce, giving birth to entities as cold and as ruthless as the place was dark. Sometimes they would all scatter, and the only hint of consciousness in that black realm would be whispers of hate that wafted through the darkness like errant winds. Sometimes—rarely—all of them would gather together, and a Presence would take form whose nature was so powerful, so corrupt, so utterly maleficent, that if its existence had been stable it would have posed a threat to every living thing on Erna. Men who knew of it called it the Dark, the Evil, the Devourer, and they prayed to their various gods and demons that no man might ever give it a true name—for a human name has the power to endure, and that was the one power the Unnamed One lacked.
Into this darkness a stranger came. Though the body he wore was as black as night, it seemed brilliant as lampfire compared to the darkness surrounding him. For a moment he stood still, and the voices of that lost place whirled about him like some wild music, dismal and discordant.
Who is it
Who comes here
Who disturbs Us
Who
Who
Who
“My name is Calesta,” the demon announced. Several of the voices seemed to coalesce for an instant, and then their whisperings were separate once more. “I seek an audience.”
Calesta?
Calesta
Manborn
Iezu
So hungry
Anger
Hate hate hate
What do you want, Iezu?
“You made a compact with a human.” Something flitted past his face, but he didn’t flinch; the flesh he wore was only an illusion and he didn’t fear for its safety. “Nine centuries ago, with a man named Gerald Tarrant. Do you remember?”
Ah, yes
Blood
Hunger
Promises
The voices were becoming different now, as if all the disparate notes had been gathered up into one great chord. He sensed a presence circling him, studying him. We remember. We feed.
“He’s betrayed that compact.”
Silence. Such utter silence that for a moment he wondered if the voices had left
him.
What business is it of yours, Iezu? A different voice now, screeching and hateful. Go back to manplaces. This compact is Ours.
“He betrayed you!” the demon hissed. “Don’t you care? You gave him life on condition that he serve you and look what he did! Thousands will live because of him. Millions will know peace who otherwise would have suffered. A whole civilization has been jerked back from the edge of ruin. By him! Doesn’t that matter to you? Don’t you care?”
Compact is Ours
Ours
Ours!
Broken?
Conditions
Unlife
Broken
Ours!
The darkness stirred. In it a presence was gathering, so far beyond the flitting voices in substance and power that they might have been mere insects circling around it. Its voice, when it spoke, was deep and resonant, and it reverberated throughout the darkness.
Our compact with Gerald Tarrant is not a Iezu concern.
“I thought you would want to know what was happening.”
We find it offensive that you assume Our ignorance.
“He’s still alive,” Calesta challenged.
That’s Our concern, not yours.
“What about the compact? The agreement—”
We know the agreement. He knows the agreement.
“He defies you! He betrays everything that you gave him life for!”
Are you concerned for Us, Iezu? Or simply driven by your own need for vengeance? We will not become a tool of your kind.
The demon stiffened. “We share a common concern, you and I. If you were to—”
We have nothing in common with the fleshborn.
The demon drew in a sharp breath; rage emanated from him like wildfire. “I’m no more fleshborn than you are,” he snarled. “And if you’re content to let Gerald Tarrant take advantage of you—if you’re content to have him use you—so be it. I thought you might have a little more backbone than that, but evidently I was mistaken.”
Go home, man-thing. We will decide what to do with Gerald Tarrant Ourselves.
With an angry curse the demon dissolved his flesh, abandoning the darkness of that secret realm for the more comfortable blackness of the human soul. For a long time after his departure there was silence, as the various entities considered their exchange. Then, in voices that rippled one into another too quickly for the human ear to distinguish, a waterfall of sound:
Betrayed
Compact
Good service
Hunger
Blood
Betrayed
Promises
Life
Unlife
Betrayed
Betrayed
Betrayed
Vengeance?
Hunger
They began to coalesce once more, and a new thought took root. This Iezu, a voice mused, does not know what he truly is.
No, another voice agreed. None of the Iezu do.
Help him?
Destroy him?
Ignore him?
Wait, a deep voice recommended. Watch. See if his own kind supports him. See if she takes sides.
And Tarrant?
Something new stirred in the everlasting darkness. Something so powerful that the blackness became a fierce whirlpool, into which all the other voices were suddenly sucked. Something so malevolent, so utterly hostile, that the petty hates and envies of humankind were lost inside it, swallowed up by an Evil so vast that it fed on the very essence of life itself. It existed for only an instant, this Power, and then it began to break up again into its disparate elements. But the instant was long enough.
Tarrant, said the Devourer, will have to answer to Me.
A voracious reader from her earliest days, Celia S. Friedman discovered science fiction at the age of ten and instantly recognized it to be the ultimate form of literature in the universe. When not reading or writing, she teaches Costume Design at a private university in northern Virginia and designs period dress patterns for a historical supply company. At the time this book is being printed she is off doing research for the concluding volume of her Coldfire trilogy, checking out live volcanoes in the South Pacific. Her cats (two Maine Coons and a stray) are home guarding the computer.
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