The Ghosts Omnibus: The Kyracian War

by Jonathan Moeller

  “Psychokinetic manipulation?” he shouted. “Elementary! Surely you can do better!”

  He gestured, sending the shards flying at Sicarion, and a score more rose from the ground. Sicarion cast another spell, and most of the rubble missed him, but some struck him. His wards turned aside most, but Caina saw bloody gashes appear on his forearms and jaw.

  The assassin and the master magus reeled in combat, flinging spell after spell at each other. Ranarius gestured, and one of the pillars exploded to send a rain of rocks at the scarred man. Sicarion snapped his fingers, and he vanished in a flash of silver light, only to reappear as a dozen illusory copies of himself. Ranarius swept his right hand, and the rain of rocks widened to fall upon the illusionary images, each one disappearing in a burst of silver light.

  But none of Sicarion’s spells hindered Ranarius, and the master magus drove the assassin back step by step.

  Caina staggered back to her feet.

  Every inch of her body ached as if she had been beaten by rods, but she could stand. She considered charging at Ranarius. Sicarion held his full attention, but if she drew too close, he would probably kill her with a single spell. His wards turned steel, but not stone. Could she pick up a stone and throw it at his head? She would get one shot, and if the rock failed to stun him…

  She saw Corvalis get to one knee, bow in hand.

  “Sicarion!” Caina shouted. “Break his ward! Now!”

  Sicarion spat a curse, blood flying from his lips, but blue light flashed around his fingertips.

  A heartbeat later the same blue light flashed around Ranarius.

  Caina flung her knife, and this time the blade found purchase. It sank into the magus’s shoulder, and Ranarius stumbled with a scream of pain. A hissing noise, and one of Corvalis’s arrows appeared in his stomach. Caina ran at him, driving her aching legs towards the magus. One blow, one solid blow, and she could end this…

  Ranarius screamed again and threw out his hands.

  Invisible force exploded from him. The shockwave slammed into Caina, threw her into the air, and sent her spinning over the ground, chunks of broken rock raining around her. She came to a stop, bruised and bleeding and cut, and saw Corvalis collapse motionless to the ground. Sicarion reeled like a drunken man, raising his hands to cast another spell.

  Ranarius was faster.

  The snarling magus made a hooking gesture, and a slender whirlwind of gray clouds appeared around Sicarion. The whirlwind picked Sicarion up and flung him into the air like a catapult stone. Caina caught a brief glimpse of him soaring over the roof of the Palace, arms and legs flailing, and then the scarred assassin vanished from sight.

  “I should have done that years ago,” spat Ranarius, voice tight with pain. His enraged eyes fell upon Caina. “As for you…”

  He gestured, and Caina floated up, caught in the grip of his psychokinetic power. She struggled, but his will held her fast. She flung a knife, but Ranarius had rebuilt his ward, and the blade bounced away from his skin.

  “Damned Ghost,” said Ranarius.

  She flung another knife. It ricocheted away from him, and he scooped up the weapon.

  “Gods, that hurts,” said Ranarius, his free hand going to the arrow in his stomach as he walked towards her. “But I know enough of the necromantic sciences to heal myself. Though I’ll have to steal life energy for it.” He smiled. “A fitting end for Corvalis, isn’t it? All those months to save his sister, and in the end his life force will heal the man he hates.”

  Caina flung her last knife, and it bounced away.

  “You can’t kill me,” she said, trying to put defiance into her voice. “You’ll set the Moroaica free.”

  “You’re right,” said Ranarius. “Instead, I’m going to stab you in the gut and leave you to bleed out. It should take you a few hours to die. That will give you time to watch me kill Corvalis.” He smiled. “And it will let the Moroaica watch as I awaken the great elemental, as I bind its power to my service. I think that is a fitting punishment for all the torment she inflicted upon me, don’t you?”

  Ranarius stopped before her, gripped her throwing knife in his left hand, and drew back his arm to stab.

  He showed no fear of the ghostsilver dagger clutched in her hand. And why should he? His wards had deflected her weapons again and again, and this time Sicarion was not here to dispel his defenses.

  So the look of shock on his face was absolute when Caina stabbed him.

  She aimed for his heart, but her arm trembled with pain, and the ghostsilver blade dug a bloody furrow across his chest. Ranarius howled and staggered back, arm coming up to block. Caina’s next blow caught him on the left wrist, and the blade sank between the bones of his forearm. Ranarius shrieked and tried to pull free, the dagger sawing against the jade bracelet.

  The bracelet shivered and shattered into a dozen fragments.

  Ranarius pulled free and gestured with his good arm, and the invisible force holding Caina hammered her to the ground. She screamed in pain, the force pressing upon her like a massive weight. He was going to crush the life out of her, use his sorcery to squeeze every drop of blood from her flesh.

  “Die!” shouted Ranarius. “Damn you, Ghost!” Every trace of ascetic calm had vanished from his face. “Die, die, die, die…”

  At least Caina had freed Nicasia. With any luck, the slave girl was running from the Palace as fast as her legs could carry her. Perhaps Ranarius would bleed to death before he could finish the spell and awaken the Stone.

  Before he could kill Corvalis.

  The pressure pinning her doubled, and Caina's vision began to turn black...

  “Ranarius.”

  The deep voice rolled over the Gallery of the Well like a thunderclap.

  Ranarius turned, his face gone white, and some of the pressure holding Caina faded.

  Nicasia stepped from behind a pillar.

  She had been watching the entire fight.

  “Master, master,” said Nicasia, her voice singsong. “You’re hurt. Master is hurt, Master is hurt!”

  “Go back to your chambers!” said Ranarius. “You cannot disobey me! The damned Ghost shattered the bracelet, but the collar…”

  His voice trailed off as he saw Nicasia’s unadorned neck, and Caina saw the horror blossom on his face.

  “No,” he said, voice hoarse.

  “Master is bleeding,” said Nicasia, walking towards him. “Just as my mother and father bled when you killed them and took me.”

  “Stay away from me!” said Ranarius, and more of the pressure pinning Caina faded away. He thrust out his hand. Caina felt the surge of sorcery, but Nicasia’s fingers moved in a dismissive gesture, and the power of the spell faded away.

  “Mortal sorcery?” said the Defender. “Surely you know better, Ranarius. You will need more power to bind me.” Nicasia’s lips stretched in a smile. “But, ah. You have exhausted your powers fighting.”

  “You look so tired, master,” said Nicasia. “Perhaps it is time for you to rest?”

  Ranarius staggered back, clutching his wounded stomach. “I command you to stay away from me!”

  “Ranarius,” said the Defender. “You cannot command me. What do your philosophers say? Sow the wind and reap the whirlwind?” Pleasure filled the alien voice. “Behold the whirlwind.”

  Ranarius tried to cast another spell, but it was far too late.

  Nicasia surged forward with all the momentum and power of an avalanche. Her right hand caught Ranarius’s collar, and she lifted the magus into the air, her thin arm taut with the Defender’s strength. He screamed and clawed at her, but to no avail.

  “Look at me, master,” said Nicasia.

  Her free hand reached for her blindfold.

  “Look at me,” said the Defender as Nicasia tugged the blindfold away. “See what your skill has wrought.”

  Ranarius closed his eyes, trembling, and Caina got to her feet, her head spinning.

  “Look at me!” thundered the Defender.
/>   And Ranarius opened his eyes. He should have known better. Perhaps he couldn't stop himself, could not stop himself from seeing what so many of his victims had seen in their last moments.

  Caina looked away as Ranarius screamed, golden light falling over his face.

  Then the scream stopped as his mouth and lips turned to stone.

  An instant later a statue of a master magus stood before Nicasia. Ranarius's face was frozen forever, his eyes bulging with fear. Nicasia tilted her head to the side, as if examining a work of art.

  "He will stay like this for centuries, you know," said Nicasia.

  Caina took a quick step to the side, making sure to stay out of Nicasia's line of sight.

  "But a few centuries," said the Defender, "is not so long a time, is it? Something more permanent is required."

  Nicasia's fist hammered into the chest's statue. Ranarius shattered into thousands of pale white shards, bouncing and rolling across the Gallery like tumbling white bones. One final tremor went through the ground, and the golden glow from the heart of the Well faded away.

  The greater elemental had returned to its slumber.

  "I thank you, Ghost," said the Defender. "You have secured my freedom."

  "Our freedom," said Nicasia.

  "Will you return to the netherworld now?" said Caina.

  "I...cannot," said the Defender. Nicasia wound the blindfold around her eyes and turned to face Caina. "Not so long as this child lives. I have no wish to see her dead."

  "The emotions of a mortal," said Caina.

  "Yes," said the Defender. "It is...troubling. Emotions should not afflict one such as I. Still, forty or fifty years is but a blink of an eye. A short enough time to sojourn in mortal flesh."

  "You might think differently in fifty years," said Caina. "A lot can happen in that time."

  Nicasia smiled, and her own voice came from her lips. "I like you. You are a good woman. Can we do anything for you? You freed us."

  "I think so," said Caina. "Wait here."

  She crossed the Gallery to where Corvalis lay, hoping he wasn't dead. To have come so far, to have endured so much, only to die at the end...

  But his eyelids were fluttering, and he sat up as she approached.

  "Marina," he muttered. "We're not dead?"

  "No," said Caina.

  She helped him to stand, and he leaned on her arm.

  "Ranarius?" said Corvalis.

  "He looked into Nicasia's eyes," said Caina. "He shouldn't have done that."

  Despair crossed his face. "Then the elemental...the Defender returned to the netherworld?"

  "Come with me," said Caina.

  She ought to report to Theodosia, she knew. With the chaos in the Palace, both Theodosia and Marzhod needed to know what had happened.

  But Caina had to do something else first.

  ###

  An hour later they reached Corvalis's apartment below the potter's shop.

  "There," said Corvalis, pushing aside the curtain. The muscles in his temples worked. "She's in there."

  "I remember her," said Nicasia, gazing at the statue of Claudia. "She was a good woman. I'm sorry the master made us turn her into stone."

  "Can you turn her back?" said Caina.

  Nicasia grinned at her.

  "Yes," said the Defender.

  The former slave girl faced the statue, removing her blindfold, and Caina and Corvalis both took a step back. Golden light flared in the gloomy apartment, painting the walls with light, and for an instant it looked as if the statue of white stone had been fashioned from brilliant gold.

  And then the light faded...and a young woman in a black robe with a red sash stood in the place of the statue. Nicasia donned her blindfold, and the young woman looked back and forth in astonishment. She was a a few years younger than Corvalis, with the same green eyes and blond hair, though hers was much longer.

  "Sister?" said Corvalis, his voice a hoarse rasp.

  "Corvalis," whispered the young woman. "I...remember. It's like a dream, but I remember all of it. I remember everything. And you...you..."

  Corvalis took a step forward, and Claudia Aberon rushed to him and buried herself in his arms. She wept, and to Caina's astonishment, she saw tears glittering on Corvalis's hard face.

  He caught her gaze. "Thank you."

  "Well, you did help us against the Kindred," said Caina, and she grinned.

  The Ghosts paid their debts.

  And so did Caina.

  Chapter 27 - Never For Me

  "Perhaps," said Lord Khosrau, "I should have seen it long ago."

  He gazed through the open arches between the pillars, over the sprawling houses and mansions and warehouses of Cyrioch. Caina was struck by how much older he looked, how much wearier. Perhaps he had always been so tired, and hidden it beneath his mask of joviality.

  She stood behind Theodosia's chair, again dressed and disguised as the maid Marina. Which was just as well, given that bruises covered her arms and legs. The sound of hammering and scraping rose from the arches. The Palace had been badly damaged during Armizid's death and the peculiar earthquakes that followed, and workmen and slaves now labored to repair it.

  "It is always difficult to see treachery, my lord," said Theodosia. "Especially from those closest to us."

  Khosrau, Corbould, and Theodosia at the table, taking breakfast together. Save for Caina, they were alone. Khosrau, who was no fool, had figured out that Theodosia had high rank in the Ghosts. No doubt he suspected Caina as well.

  "He was always so joyless," said Khosrau. "So grim, so serious. I tried to lighten his spirits. A lord has a role to play, like any other man...but that is no reason not to enjoy himself."

  "I think," said Theodosia, "that your son loved his own dignity, his own prestige, more than anything else."

  "A grave error," said Corbould. "A lord of the Empire must maintain his dignity at all times. But prestige is only a tool to aid in ruling the Empire, not an end to itself."

  "Indeed," said Khosrau, and he sighed.

  "Then I may tell the Emperor," said Corbould, "that Cyrica will remain loyal?"

  "You may, my friend," said Khosrau. "For Cyrica to rebel and declare itself a kingdom would be madness. Cyrica is not strong enough to stand on its own. And the Emperor is a better master than the Shahenshah of Anshan or the Padishah of Istarinmul." He looked at Theodosia. "Certainly the servants of the Shahenshah would not have gone to such lengths to save one fat old man."

  "Well," said Theodosia. "You do appreciate opera, after all."

  Khosrau barked out a laugh. "Cyrica will remain loyal to the Empire, my lord Corbould. Our farms shall grow the wheat and the cotton that shall feed and clothe the Legions as they drive back the soldiers of Istarinmul."

  Corbould smiled. It was one of the few times Caina could recall him ever doing that. "Thank you, my lord Khosrau. That is the best news I have received since Rezir Shahan and Andromache of House Kardamnos were slain."

  "Yes, this mysterious Balarigar," said Khosrau. "I had thought him a legend, but it appears I was wrong."

  Corbould grunted. "A trick. Some clever Ghost playing on the legend of the Balarigar." He gave Theodosia a look.

  Theodosia sniffed. "I'm sure I don't know, my lord."

  "Well, keep your secrets, as spies must," said Corbould. "But I will not criticize your methods. The ruse was effective enough, and it drove Armizid to confess the truth. Though I still think this 'Balarigar' is a construction of Ghost trickery."

  Caina carefully kept from smiling.

  "It won't last, you know," said Khosrau. He waved a thick hand in the direction of the city. "All of this. Cyrica holds too many slaves, and someday they will rise up, and we won't be able to stop them. And too many nobles agreed with Armizid. I shall have a difficult time keeping them in line."

  Theodosia grinned. "Concerning that, my lord Khosrau...the Ghosts may be able to offer a little help."

  ###

  Later that day Caina disguise
d herself as a common caravan guard and made her way to the Painted Whore and Marzhod's workroom.

  His workroom was busy.

  A long table lay covered with books and documents from the Kindred Elder's study. Barius and a few of Marzhod's clerks sat at the table, working through the pages. Barius made notes in a ledger, chuckling to himself every few pages. Saddiq stood against the wall, thick arms folded over his massive chest, and grinned as she approached.

  "Nightfighter," he rumbled. "It is good to see you with eyes of flesh instead of stone."

  "So you do remember everything that happened while you were stone?" said Caina.

  Saddiq shrugged. "It is...like a dream. As if I dreamed that I were wrapped in ice, and nothing seemed to matter. It was not...painful, no. Still, I do not miss it."

  "I certainly do not," said Barius. "It is hard to turn a profit will frozen in stone."

  "A fine sentiment," said Marzhod from his desk.

  Caina stepped towards him. "Theodosia wants to know..."

  Marzhod grinned. "What I've found? Oh, enough information to make me rich a second time." He pointed at the Book of Blood and Gold on the center of the clerks' table. "Half the nobility of Cyrica has hired the Kindred to kill the other half at some point. Not to mention the merchants, the magi, even some of the priests...there are secrets enough in that book to send most of the rich men in Cyrioch to the executioner's block."

  "And you're going to blackmail them," said Caina.

  "Of course," said Marzhod. "Running the Ghost circle of Cyrioch is hardly cheap. I'll merely let these men know that I'm more than happy to keep their secrets...in exchange for a nominal fee. And if they get restive, if they decide Cyrica should become part of Anshan...why, they'll get another little reminder. A man can hardly lead a rebellion if he's gotten himself beheaded for hiring assassins."

  Caina nodded and turned to go.

  "Nightfighter," said Marzhod.

  She stopped.

  "You are," he said, "not quite as big a fool as I thought."

  Caina thought of Nadirah, of the slaves Marzhod had smuggled out of Cyrica in exchange for their loyalty.