The Hollow God (Swords and Saints Book 3)

by JA Hutson

  “Aye, the sorceress is the key,” Bolivan says. “Without her, the demons will have to find another way.”

  “But she’s in Ysala,” I say. “And the Prophet is between us and her.”

  “Which is why I’m here, lad,” says Bolivan. “It might just be the end of me, but I’m not about to see those black-blooded bastards suck the life from these lands. That would be a bloody shame. I’m here to show you a shortcut.”

  The saint strides across the room purposefully, and the shadowdancers hovering in the darkness draw back. He ignores them, eventually stopping outside a nondescript door. “And here it is,” he proclaims grandly.

  “That is the toilet,” Zaria says in obvious confusion.

  “Is it?” Bolivan says with a grin, then pushes open the door. Inside is a cramped corridor terminating in a bench with a hole cut into it.

  “Yes,” the abbess replies, shaking her head as if she can’t believe she has to put up with this foolishness.

  “Huh,” Bolivan grunts. “Wait. Perhaps it’s this one.” The saint shuts the door and then opens it a moment later.

  Ghostly light spills into the hall, and the shadows squirm away as if frightened. I gasp,

  blinking at the unexpected radiance. Through the narrow doorway I can now see shining white

  ruins extending into the distance, a shimmer of colors dancing across a star-spattered sky. An

  emerald comet slashes the heavens, green motes glittering in its wake.

  The abbess is gazing dumbfounded at this scene.

  “There we go!” Bolivan cries, sweeping out his arm. He looks extremely satisfied with

  himself. “A quick jaunt and I can have ye back in Ysala by supper time.”

  “Where is that?” Bell breathes, giving voice to the question we’re all thinking.

  “This? Oh, it’s the House of the Gods.”

  Stunned silence follows this pronouncement.

  Zaria is the first to break it. “You mean the house of the saints. The imposters.”

  Bolivan shakes his shaggy head. “Nay. I meant what I said. The saints dwell there

  now, but once it was the abode of the gods. The true gods.”

  “Where did they go?” Bell asks, goggling at the surreal landscape unfurling on the other side of the door. A flower of red light blooms in the distant sky, then fades away.

  “Well, that is the question, lassie. And one no saint can answer, though Lahgokep keeps searching. They left in a hurry, as you can see, leaving quite the mess behind.”

  “And why do we want to go there?” I ask, staring uneasily at the white ruins. The pillars and blocks of stone scattered about seem far too large to have once been inhabited by creatures of our size.

  “Lots o’ shortcuts in the House. I can take you to one that leads to Ysala and gets you to the Contessa right quick.”

  I tear my gaze from the strangeness beyond the door and find Deliah and Bell staring at me, as if waiting for what I have to say. Bolivan is already sauntering forward, his thumbs hooked into the belt straining to contain his gut.

  We need to get to Ysala quickly. There’s no telling what the Contessa’s plans for Valyra are, and the abbess is right that the Prophet will be a threat if we are forced to traverse the empire of Zim again. But can we trust this saint?

  “Is it dangerous?” I ask, and Bolivan pauses, turning back to me.

  “Not with me as your guide.”

  “That’s a yes, then?”

  He gives an exaggerated shrug, rolling his broad shoulders. “It’s not a place for mortals. But these are desperate times. I’m willing to take the risks needed to keep those monsters away.”

  “You mean you’re willing to risk our lives,” Xela says, materializing from the darkness.

  “And mine, lassie. As I said, we saints are not supposed to interfere. I don’t know how the Devourer will look upon my actions.”

  Devourer? That doesn’t sound good. But taking a deep breath, I step forward. “Valyra needs my help. I’ll go with you.” The faces of my companions are unreadable. “No one else need take this chance. The rest of you can find the horses we left below and make your own way to Ysala. I’ll meet you there.”

  Deliah snorts, flourishing her glaive before sliding it into the straps across her back. “We are mated. I will stay by your side.”

  “Do you think I would miss the chance to see where the saints live?” Bell shakes her head. “Every academy in the world will be falling over themselves to grant me a full professorship.”

  Xela seems a bit more resigned, but after a moment she nods. “I’ve had enough of the Umbra and my mother. Time for me to leave Zim again and get back to Ysala.”

  The abbess Zaria shakes her head slowly. “The Stranger and a saint in my monastery. Strange days have come – the end days, perhaps. Centuries ago the gods fled this world because they saw something terrible on the horizon. Only our Lady of Shadows remained, though much diminished. Now a saint is trying to forestall what is coming.” Her perfectly smooth features, so like a doll carved of ebony, look exhausted. “I do not understand what is happening, but I hope you all succeed. The Umbra is on the side of life.”

  I lick my lips, steeling myself to pass through the strange doorway. It appears that my companions are all willing to take this chance, and despite everything that has happened I feel a swelling of hope.

  “Talin.”

  I turn to find Vesivia slumped in the passage leading back to where Shalloch lies. Her face is slack, her eyes haunted. She does not seem surprised by the otherworldly landscape visible through the door. Perhaps her grief has simply brought her beyond caring.

  “Vesivia. We are leaving to go back to Ysala and rescue my friend. This man is a saint” —Bolivan gives an exaggerated wave— “and he is taking us on a shortcut to the city.”

  Vesivia’s numb gaze slides over Bolivan and returns to me. “I wish you well, Talin. My place is with Shalloch, and so it is here I will bid you farewell.”

  I cross the room and gather her into an embrace. At first she is limp in my arms, but then I feel her hands on my back. “Take care, Vesivia,” I murmur. “Wherever Shalloch is, he is waiting for you.”

  “Goodbye, mucker,” Vesivia says, and then she pulls away, her cheeks damp.

  Swallowing back a lump in my throat I turn to Bolivan, who is framed by the strange light spilling from the doorway.

  “Let’s go.”

  2

  The world ripples when we step through the doorway, as if we are pebbles dropped onto the surface of a pond. My stomach lurches, like I’m falling from a great height, but the stone feels the same under my boots here as it did in the Umbra. I blink, dizzied by the brighter light after the unnatural darkness of the monastery. I can’t tell where this radiance is coming from; it seems to be seeping from the white stone ruins, though the profusion of stars spread across the arching heavens also glitter cold and sharp.

  The space between these stars is not a seamless black. In places, the sky is shaded the purple of a raven’s wing; elsewhere, blue and red and green briefly thread the darkness before fading away. There is no moon that I can see, though several strange objects drift through the emptiness. A yellowing skull dimpled by shadows leers down at us as it rotates, and my eyes are drawn to a gleaming iridescent worm slowly undulating through the void. I gasp as an eye with a slitted iris opens, taking up a quarter of the sky, and then slowly closes again as it vanishes.

  The laughter of a young girl drifts from deeper within the ruins, high and crazed. My companions look as unsettled as I feel; all of them have now passed through the darkened doorway, and are staring around wide-eyed at the place Bolivan called the House of the Gods. My heart skips a beat as the great hall of the Umbra – still visible through the freestanding stone doorway – shimmers and fades away. My last glimpse of our world is of the Abbess Zaria raising her hand in a somber farewell.

  “This place feels wrong,” growls Xela, daggers in her hands. I susp
ect there is very little here that could be cut or stabbed. Bell and Deliah have barely moved from where the portal to our world has vanished. Both are pale – Bell’s whiteness could pass for milk, and the lamias’s red skin is now a rosy pink.

  “Where are we, Talin?” Deliah murmurs, peering off in the direction from which the girl’s laughter is still emanating.

  “You heard Bolivan,” I reply, my hand on my sword’s hilt. “The home of the saints.”

  “This is not where the saints dwell,” Deliah says. “The saints of Vel live in the depths of the Eternal Wilds among the roots of the All-Tree. This is known.”

  “No trees here,” Bolivan grunts, beginning to pick his way across the shattered stone, “but plenty o’ red women. For being such a scant few people you certainly have more than yer fair share of the ascended.”

  “Saints are those who have demonstrated unsurpassed excellence,” Bell says, picking up what looks like a tiny stone statue from the detritus on the ground and examining it carefully. “And the lamias are renowned for achieving greatness in their respective specialties.” She slips the figurine into a pocket of her robes and glances at Bolivan. “Though having now met a saint I am significantly less awed than I thought I would be.”

  The blacksmith chuckles. “All us saints are just regular folk gussied up. Still all the same flaws. Lucky we’re not allowed to intervene directly or we’d make a right mess of the world, believe me. Probably why someone with foresight set the system up the way it is.” Bolivan pauses, beckoning us to follow him. “Now come on – time don’t work quite the same here in the House, so we best get moving.”

  We fall in behind the saint as he moves through the ruins. The white stone has a nacreous luster, like the shells of sea creatures. Cracked pillars are scattered about, broken at varying heights, along with crumbling walls and listing doorways. None of these buildings still have roofs, as if those were ripped away by whatever ancient cataclysm destroyed this place. There’s no sign of life among the ruins, no sound now except for the scuffing of our boots on stone as we pass through the devastation, and no movement save for the falling stars and surreal visions blooming in the sky above.

  “This place is strange,” Deliah finally says, breaking the silence.

  “We should not be here,” Xela adds, her words tumbling out too quickly. She sounds like she’s on the verge of panicking.

  “And neither should us saints!” Bolivan says from up ahead. “If all was right with the world the gods would still be lording over us all. Things got cracked a while back.”

  “Where are the saints?” Bell asks. Of all of us, she appears the least affected by this otherworldly realm, staring about in undisguised curiosity and wonder at our surroundings.

  “They might be . . .” Bolivan begins as he pauses beneath an archway perched on the edge of a sudden drop, peering down at what’s below. “Yup. Working hard, as always.”

  More of the saints are here? I approach cautiously, unsure what I’ll find. Will the ascended who dwell here abide us trespassing in their home? Bolivan said that mortals were not usually welcome in this place.

  Tiered steps ripple down a slope, eventually reaching an expanse of flat white stone. It’s not empty – a dozen low couches and divans are scattered across the space, red and purple cushions mounded upon frames intricately fashioned from gold or silver or copper. Some of these are empty, but on others are sprawled men and women and other, stranger creatures. I notice the vibrant red skin of a lamias, her purple hair fanned out upon a pillow, and on another of the couches something that looks halfway between a frog and a man is perched, his legs folded beneath him like he’s about to leap away. His bulbous eyes are fastened on a small pool of shimmering silver water that’s welling up from a hole hacked in the stone floor. All the saints – I’m assuming they are saints – are staring into similar silvery pockets, seemingly enraptured by whatever it is they can see.

  “Is that Belinna?” Deliah breathes softly, clutching at a cracked stone pillar like she’s on the verge of collapsing.

  Bolivan squints at the reclining figures. “Could be. You red women all look about the same to me.” A leer splits his beard, and he waggles his bushy eyebrows. “And that’s very fine, let me add.”

  “Belinna?” I ask, and Deliah turns to me with wide eyes.

  “A legendary warrior of Vel. Unstoppable and fierce on the battlefield, the first to wield the sacred glaive . . . she was called the Tigress.”

  Down below the lamias yawns deeply, then languidly stretches and settles into an even more relaxed position.

  “Looks more like a housecat than a tiger,” murmurs Bell, and Deliah flashes her an annoyed glance.

  With what looks like bored indifference the lamias saint reaches down and lightly touches the silver pool in front of her. The water ripples, bright color welling up from within. She watches for a moment, then flicks the surface again. Different colors shimmer briefly and then, apparently satisfied, she settles back on the cushions, still watching the pool.

  “What is she doing?” I ask.

  “The pools are windows into your world,” Bolivan rumbles. “Just about the only thing to do here in the House.”

  “They’re watching what’s happening in the mortal realm?” Xela muses. “Now I feel embarrassed for some of the things I’ve done.”

  “We can look but we can’t touch,” says Bolivan as he skirts the edge of the steps leading down to where the saints are clustered. He pauses, glancing back at us. “Well, we’re not supposed to, anyway.” He sighs and shakes his head before continuing.

  I hurry to catch up. “Where are you taking us?”

  “Like I told ya. Back to Ysala. The closest door to the City of Masks is a quick jaunt through this corner of the House. We stay quiet and away from the other saints and no one will be the wiser.”

  “Will they be angry if they see us?”

  Bolivan shrugs. “As I said, we’re not supposed to bring mortals here. I’m guessing they won’t care too much, though. The thing about eternity is that it brings on this sense of . . . apathy. Defeatism. A lot o’ my brothers and sisters here know the demons are on the verge of breaking through into the world, but rather than do what the gods did an’ pack up and leave they’ve resigned themselves to what’s coming.”

  “But not you?” I ask, carefully stepping across a shattered mosaic. Chunks of it are missing, and below is a yawning abyss.

  “Might be because I’m one of the youngest saints. Still care a bit about what happens to you mortals.”

  “Well, thank you for that,” I say.

  Bolivan pulls at his tangled beard with stubby fingers. “You can thank me when you get through the House. I’ll feel bad if the Devourer gets a hold of you before –”

  I’m just opening my mouth to ask about this Devourer when I hear a strangled cry from behind me. I turn and find Bell poised at the threshold of some great entrance. She looks more surprised than scared, but I rush towards her, bounding over the gaps in the floor with my hand on the hilt of my sword.

  “Talin . . .” she says softly, peering within. “We’ve found heaven.”

  “What?” I say, but then I’m close enough to see what she has seen. “Oh.”

  The high walls of this building had hidden what was inside, and I’d assumed it was the same empty, tumbled ruin as everywhere else.

  But I was wrong.

  Inside, a vast hall stretches off into the distance, and filling it completely are books. Only books. They hover in the air like they’re resting on invisible shelves. The variety is endless: grimoires of cracked black leather with spines spattered by dark liquid; red tomes inset with many staring eyes that blink and flutter as if each is trying to communicate in code; gleaming silver and gold codices that resemble bricks of precious metal; and tattered collections of yellowing vellum bound together by twine. Between these floating – but stationary – rows of books a few volumes drift lazily, their covers slowly flapping like wings. Motes o
f golden dust float down from the sky above, falling through the gaping rents in the torn ceiling.

  Bell steps into the vast chamber, moving as if she’s in a dream.

  “Wait!” I cry, following her, but she doesn’t seem to hear.

  Bell runs her fingertips along a line of spines. I wince as a small crease that looked to be merely a fold in the leather binding opens into a tiny mouth filled with fangs and snaps at her. Bell blinks in surprise and draws her hand back, but there’s no fear in her face.

  A deep sigh comes from behind us. Bolivan is filling the entrance, his arms crossed. Deliah and Xela are peeking into the strange space from around his bulk.

  “Of course the Library would wander over and put itself in her line of sight. Probably could smell the ink on her.”

  “What do you mean ‘wander over’?” I ask, taking a few tentative steps into the chamber. I’m torn between my desire to stay close to the entrance and wanting to keep Bell in sight, as she’s drifting deeper into the labyrinth of hanging books.

  “Some of the rooms in the House refuse to stay in one place. The Library is like a friendly dog that rushes over to greet strangers.”

  “You said ‘friendly’ dog, right?” I say as I struggle to follow Bell. The flurry of floating books has strengthened, and I can just barely see her through the shifting blizzard of covers and pages that hang down like bulging white bellies. I wave my hand in front of my face, trying to push the books aside. In front of me Bell has stopped, raising her hands over her head as the books swirl around her. She lets out a radiant laugh as she slowly turns.

  Suddenly they skitter away like nervous fish, their covers flapping and pages rustling. Bell pauses, looking confused.

  Not all the books have fled, though – behind her I see a swarm of slim volumes drifting closer. The way they are approaching her looks almost predatory, and I’m about to rush to her defense when something hard and sharp closes around my arm.

  “Ow!” I cry in shock, wrenching myself free from the volume that just bit me. The hovering book has punctured my tunic and managed to draw blood. It snaps at me, jagged little teeth fringing the inside of its cover.