Fires in the sky.
The spark of creation
Where gods shall die.”
—Sebastian Gronel, Crell poet, 150 A.G.
A thunderous tremor shuddered through the earth, and Jason’s eyes shot open wide. His head throbbed like his skull had just been bashed in with a hammer, and his vision was so blurry he couldn’t even make out his own hand in front of his face. But after a dozen frantic gasps for air, his senses slowly began to return…and he realized he was no longer in Elashi.
“What…?” he rasped, his voice sounding oddly distant in his own ears. He appeared to be lying down in the middle of a vast wasteland. The ground beneath him was a mixture of dried-out soil and burnished obsidian, almost like a volcano had erupted and annihilated everything for as far as the eye could see. The sky was blood red, but he saw no evidence of a sunset; in fact, he saw no evidence of a sun at all.
For several terrifying seconds, he wondered if he had just woken up in the middle of the Void. Most religious texts described it as an endless, sprawling hellscape of one variety or another, and even though he had never given those stories much credence, he couldn’t immediately think of any other explanation for the wanton devastation and bizarre lack of a sun. But eventually he realized what was actually going on, and the truth was only slightly less terrifying.
He was once again trapped within the walls of his own mind.
“I assume that means I’m not really dead,” Jason whispered. “And you must be lurking around here somewhere.”
When no one responded, he placed his hands in the ashen dirt and hoisted himself to his feet. The last few times he had “spoken” with Malacross, she had conjured up verdant fields and blue skies for their chat. So either she had lost her touch with weaving mental illusions…or something was seriously wrong.
“We are no longer alone,” a familiar voice said from the shadows. After a few moments Malacross stepped forward into the starlight, though Jason barely recognized her—the healthy, vibrant Hassian ruler had been replaced by a withered crone. Her once black hair had thinned and gone white, and her skin sagged like it was about to fall off her bones.
“Are you all right?” Jason asked. “You look…ill.”
“My essence fades as our spirits continue to merge. This is how your mind has chosen to perceive that transition.”
“I see,” he murmured, wishing he did. “Is that why we’re standing here in the middle of a wasteland?”
Her milky eyes flicked around as if she had only just noticed their surroundings. “Yes. Your mind is under siege, and I am not certain how long I can protect you.”
“Protect me?” Jason asked, frowning. “Protect me from wha—”
He cut himself off as the memories flooded back into his mind. Tracking the Aetheric wake through Bal’Aqui, entering the abandoned warehouse, confronting the mysterious golden-eyed man…
“Dathiel,” he whispered. “He attacked us. He wants to take your spirit back to Calhara and give it to the Watchers, but I refused to go with him.”
“Yes,” Malacross said. “He is attempting to separate us. Doing so will result in your death.”
“Yeah, I figured that part out on my own,” Jason muttered. The pounding in his head had started to recede, and he wondered dimly if that was Malacross’s influence…or if his real-world body was simply going numb. “Is there any way you can communicate with him? Did you know him before you manifested as a Hassian queen?”
Her withered brow furrowed in confusion. “I do not know. Many of my memories have become…indistinct.”
“So that’s a ‘no,’ then,” Jason grumbled. “Well, we need to figure something out. Unless you’re really hankering to rejoin your people…”
“I do not wish to see you destroyed,” Malacross told him. “You are a suitable host, and your mind has proven more resilient than I expected. I would prefer to remain joined as a single being until your physical form falters.”
“I’m afraid that’s no longer possible,” a bellowing voice said. A broad, masculine figure materialized out of the darkness, his familiar golden eyes glittering intensely. “He has forsaken his chance to remain joined.”
“Sure, come right in,” Jason said snidely. “The more voices in my head, the merrier…”
Dathiel didn’t even look at him. He remained fixated upon Malacross. “You have been away for too long, sister,” he said. “It is time for you to return home.”
“We have no home,” she replied. “Not anymore. All that remains is a hollow void of shadow and despair. I have seen the specters—the demons—that infest it. And I have seen its harrowing visage in the nightmares of mortals.”
“Those of us who survived the mortals’ onslaught have come together and built a new home here on this world.”
“It was not the mortals who destroyed us. We turned upon ourselves, and now our blood has tainted this world forever.”
Dathiel paused a moment, then flicked his eyes about the surrounding area. “Why have you created this…fantasy?”
“It is the only way for him to understand,” Malacross explained, nodding towards Jason. “I cannot commune with him otherwise.”
“Then commune with me, sister,” Dathiel said. “Leave this nonsense behind. Allow me to show you what has transpired—allow me to show you what we have rebuilt.”
He offered her his hand, and Malacross reached out and took it. Her eyes closed, and for several long moments nothing happened. But then a ripple of light cascaded across her body, and her withered form seemed to regenerate right before Jason’s eyes. Her sagging flesh began to tighten, and her thinning silver hair thickened and returned to its healthy, normal black.
And then without a single word of warning, Malacross jerked free of his grip and stepped away.
“No,” she said, her head shaking. “I will not abandon him, not yet.”
Dathiel frowned. “There is no other way for you to rejoin us. You know this.”
“Then I will not rejoin you. Not yet.” She glanced back over to Jason. “When his mortal shell is nearly expired, I shall return—but not before.”
“And what if he is struck down on the battlefield?” Dathiel asked. “He is not a hermit living in the safety and solitude of the mountains. He intends to fight in a war, and if he dies while we are not present, you will die with him. You will be lost into this ‘Aether’ like so many of our brethren.”
“I know,” Malacross said. “I am willing to accept that risk.”
“You may be,” Dathiel whispered. “We are not.”
Jason shrieked and collapsed to his knees as a fresh spike of pain abruptly and inexplicably jolted through his temples. For a terrifying heartbeat he feared his head might explode right then and there…but then Malacross took a step closer to him, and the pain vanished as quickly as it had struck.
“I will not allow you to harm him,” Malacross declared. “We are joined, and so we shall remain until he can no longer bear the burden.”
Dathiel arched one of his black eyebrows. “You are ill, sister. You have languished in solitude far too long, and you cannot allow the obstinance of one mortal to destroy you.”
“If I promised to take good care of her, would that help?” Jason murmured as he hauled himself back to his feet. “Your offer has been refused. What else do you want?”
“He will not relent,” Malacross said gravely. “I have seen into his thoughts. We will not be able to dissuade him. You must be prepared to fight.”
Jason swallowed, and his hand reflexively reached for his nonexistent sword. “Uh, sure,” he managed. “And how exactly am I supposed to do that?”
“You can’t,” Dathiel said matter-of-factly. “I have spent a lifetime mastering the power of the Godsoul, while you have barely scratched the surface of its power. There is nothing you or any of your companions can do to stop me, not anymore. Accept the inevitable, and I promise to spare you as much pain as possible.”
“Not anymore?” Jason
asked, retreating a few steps. “What is that supposed to—?”
He paused as the barren wasteland around him unexpectedly shifted. After a few seconds, he could see translucent, shimmering outlines of the Bal’Aqui warehouse in which they were presumably still standing. He could make out the insubstantial edges of the floor, the stacked crates…and then even the bodies of his insensate companions. They had all been knocked unconscious except for one, Tam, but he seemed to be having difficulty standing. His features had grown increasingly sallow, as if his mysterious illness had taken a turn for the worst—
And then Jason finally understood.
“Tam,” he whispered into the stillness. “He’s Unbound, which means he’s the only one who could seriously threaten you.” Jason glanced up, his jaw tightening. “That’s the real reason you didn’t confront us in Shanizaar or at the temple. You did something to Tam, and you needed time for the contagion to take effect. You waited until he’d been sufficiently weakened before finally showing yourself…”
“You underestimate him, brother,” Malacross said, the faintest touch of pride in her voice. “He is neither weak nor foolish.”
Dathiel’s eyes glimmered dangerously. “Your ‘friend’ was easily seduced, and my servant was able to corrupt him without difficulty.”
“Your servant?” Jason asked, his mind flashing back to their time in the Talishite city. “You mean the whore he spent so much time with? She wasn’t even human, was she? She was a bloody demon!”
“A sareloth,” Malacross whispered. For the first time since Jason had opened the cube in Lyebel, her features twisted in disgust. “You would willingly bring one of those…creatures…into the realm you claim to protect?”
“In order to protect its people, yes,” Dathiel replied matter-of-factly. “The mortal realm is more turbulent than ours even during the height of our schism, and extraordinary measures must sometimes be taken to serve the greater good.”
“No good can come of summoning demons,” Jason whispered, a fresh knot of disgust churning in the pit of his stomach. He’d had a hard enough time believing that his father had become a warlock…but the Watchers? They were a part of the Triumvirate; they were supposed to be the stewards of Obsidian. They worked hand-in-hand with the Knights of the Last Dawn!
“What mortals call ‘demons,’ are merely shadows of unraveled Godsouls,” Dathiel said. “They are dangerous, yes, but they can be controlled if necessary. Unlike the Unbound—unlike your friend.”
Jason nearly choked on the lump swelling in his throat. “Tam isn’t a threat to anyone,” he managed. “Except maybe the Crell.”
“He may not be the most powerful channeler in Torsia, but that doesn’t mean he is not a threat. Had I been confident that you would accept my offer and return with me to Calhara, I might have spared him. Your presence has been a stabilizing influence upon his development. But once you are dead, I fear his behavior will rapidly degenerate. He is stronger than he realizes, and with time he could become as great a threat as any of these ‘Breakers’ rampaging across Torsia.”
“If you just sit him down and politely explain the reasons why you poisoned him, I’m sure he’d understand,” Jason muttered. Tam’s translucent projection still floated nearby, and he looked to be deteriorating almost by the second. “There has to be a way to help him. If you promise that he’ll live…I will consider going with you to Calhara.”
Dathiel took a step forward, his golden eyes still glimmering. “You really would accept that offer, wouldn’t you?”
“Yes,” Jason said, forcibly tearing his gaze away from Tam’s projection. “But you’d have to convince me that you’d keep your word, and let’s just say I have my doubts.”
“As I said, this one is a worthy host,” Malacross put in. “It is foolish of you to challenge him.”
Dathiel glared at Jason for a moment longer before grunting softly. “Unfortunately, it doesn’t matter. The corruption has seeped into your friend’s blood. He will not survive, and there is nothing to be done about it.”
“I think you’re lying,” Jason said. “But even if you’re not, we have nothing else to talk about. You can try to separate us if you want, but I have a feeling it won’t be as easy as you think.”
“No,” Malacross agreed. “It will not.”
Dathiel smiled. “We shall see.”
Another blinding flash of light seared into Jason’s eyes, and the mental realm surrounding him collapsed. The ghostly specters of Tam and the others vanished and were quickly replaced by the real things; Malacross, too, melted away into the nothingness, and the ashen wastes transformed into the simple wooden floor of the Bal’Aqui warehouse.
Dathiel, for his part, didn’t go anywhere. He appeared to be standing in exactly the same place in the physical world as this hallucinatory one. But this time, his golden eyes weren’t merely glittering—they were glowing inside his head like a pair of blazing suns. Flickering sparks of Aetheric energy crackled between his fingertips, and he was floating a full foot off the ground.
“It didn’t have to be this way, Mr. Moore,” the man said. “But I’m afraid I must insist.”
A low rumble shuddered through the air, and a fist of telekinetic force hoisted Jason up from the ground and suspended him in midair like he’d been strung up in the gallows. Sparks of white light crackled in Dathiel’s palm before hungrily lashing outwards—
And then they splattered harmlessly against a shimmering bubble of energy barely an inch in front of Jason’s face.
He blinked in confusion. He had no idea where the barrier had come from; all he knew was that he was alive when he should have been burned into a cinder. The telekinetic grip holding him in mid-air released, and as he dropped back down upon the floor he felt a sudden and seismic shift in the Aetheric currents within the warehouse. Normally they carried him helplessly along like a piece of flotsam cast out into the endless abyssal void, but this time it was different—this time they broke before him. He became a whirlpool, a vortex, and the Aether coursed through his body as if it were his own blood.
“This is pointless, sister,” Dathiel hissed. “Why waste your energy protecting this obstinate shell?”
“I’m a charming man, what can I say?” Jason said. He extended his arms and felt the bubble surrounding him flex right along with his muscles. Selvhara had taught him how to conjure a protective barrier, of course, but this was different. It was dramatically more resilient, like the Aetheric shields wielded by the Knights of the Last Dawn. He still didn’t quite understand how the technique worked, but he could almost effortlessly control and maintain the bubble. “Maybe if you got to know me better, you wouldn’t want to kill me, either.”
Dathiel fired another blast, but this time the scintillating barrage refracted off the shield. It scorched through the warehouse roof and burned holes into several of the stacked piles of crates. The dry wood ignited immediately, and Jason’s eyes flicked over to his comatose companions. They seemed safe for the moment, but if the fire spread they wouldn’t be much longer…
“You are fortunate the Godsoul was so weak when you unlocked its power,” Dathiel said as he continued floating forward. “Had our sister been at full strength, she could have brushed aside your consciousness without having to worry about your consent.”
“Now you really sound like a demon,” Jason replied. He continued to backpedal, if for no other reason than to shift the battle farther away from his companions. But stalling would only get him so far; he still had no idea how he was actually going to win this fight. “I’m starting to think that maybe the ‘Old Gods’ aren’t worthy of our worship…and maybe they never were.”
“Ever since the day my people first manifest within your realm, we have engaged in partnerships with mortals,” Dathiel told him. Aetheric tendrils began crackling up and down his body, and his palms blazed like he was clutching onto glowlamps. “We grant your people vitality, power, and an unnaturally long life. In exchange, they become our will
ing supplicants.” The man’s head tilted curiously. “You have spent your life studying history and religion. Is this not what gods do?”
“I’d never met one until Malacross decided to try living inside me, so I’m probably not the right person to ask,” Jason muttered as he continued his retreat. The others still weren’t moving, which meant that he couldn’t just turn tail and make a run for it. Dathiel would kill them, or at the very least he’d hold them as ransom until Jason returned. No, there was no way out of this other than to fight…but how could he possibly stand toe-to-toe with a living, breathing god?
Dathiel flicked his wrist, and another torrent of energy splattered across Jason’s defenses. This time, however, even his new protective bubble wasn’t enough to repel the blast. Jason screamed in shock and pain as he was abruptly and violently hurled through the air and into a tall stack of burning crates on the opposite side of the warehouse. Flames licked at his flesh and wood splintered around him, and for the second time today he knew he should have been dead. The impact alone should have shattered half the bones in his body…but the power of the Godsoul continued to shield him. Other than a handful of splinters in his forearm and a few bruises on his legs, he was more or less fine.
But he wouldn’t stay that way for long—not if he couldn’t figure out a way to strike back. Clenching his teeth, Jason vaulted back to his feet, and the smoldering crates around him scattered aside like marbles on an overturned game board. Dathiel remained floating at the center of the warehouse, the Aether swirling around him as if he were standing at the eye of a terrible storm. Jason could barely even make out the man’s features through the thickening cloud of smoke and dust, but it didn’t matter. He was past the point of trying to negotiate.
One way or another, it was time to finish this.
Biting down on his lip, Jason stepped forward and channeled the Aether through his arms and into his hands. A jagged torrent of electricity erupted from his fingertips, and for an instant he thought he might actually catch Dathiel by surprise. The other man flinched away from the blast, and the exploding flash of lightning was so brilliant Jason could barely make out the Watcher’s features. But when the worst of the coronal afterimage faded, Dathiel was still floating in place. Unhurt.
The Godswar Saga (Omnibus) Page 107
