Heart of a Traitor

by Aaron Lee Yeager

  The greatest swordsman can be slain while he sleeps.

  The fastest runner can be outrun when he is sick.

  Such is the delusion of those who think they are strong.

  -Attributed to Lady Arista Nolecott, the Saint of Astaire 4172-4276rl

  “All service to Him,” Ustin said, clapping his palms against his chest. He rose from evening prayers and allowed himself a moment of peace as the Luminarch’s spirit embraced his own. He could clearly hear the Luminarch’s voice in his heart. “Allow your heart to weather the storms of life without becoming hard,” came the gentle instruction. With a deep sigh Ustin went back to work.

  Lord Ustin Michka had only two regrets in his life. The first was that in his youth, he was possessed of an unquenchable ambition. He wanted power. Not the meaningless power that his peers sought, the kind of power that enjoys titles and ceremony, but real power. The power to make decisions that affect the lives of trillions of people. He wanted the power to guide the course of humanity and change it for the better. He wanted the power to triumph over the enemies of the Confederacy and keep safe the lives of its citizens. This ambition had led him to create many alliances with questionable individuals over the years and had led him to break many promises to people of integrity.

  His second regret was that he had been unfortunate enough to achieve his goals. In front of him lay an incredibly detailed three-dimensional map of the Interstellar Confederacy, which covered the entire western half of the galaxy with Terra itself situated smartly at its center. More than three hundred thousand inhabited planets, united under a single banner of the Luminarch. To the east, like a cancerous blemish sitting in the galactic core, was mankind’s bane, the Uragan, the great storm. An area of space that had been dedicated to the dark gods of the ether. A place where the fabric of the universe had been torn apart and the natural laws of time and space coexisted with the raw insanity of the ether.

  Ustin Michka was one of the most powerful men that had ever existed. He was Rehepar-akured of the Tyrant sector, the most important sector in the entire Confederacy, next to Terra itself of course. A chain of five hundred fortress worlds and about a thousand other inhabited planets that directly bordered the Uragan.

  For eight millennia the Tyrant sector had held back the flow of filth that spewed out of the Uragan and now, after all of this time, the Tyrant sector was about to fall. The warring factions within the Uragan had been united. Thousands of former enemies now fought together under the same banner. Everywhere along the Tyrant Cordon defensive line, Confederate forces were being completely overwhelmed. All reserves had been fully applied months ago and fresh battle groups from neighboring sectors were not being built fast enough to stem the tide. Who could forge such an alliance against mankind? Ustin knew there could only be one. After all this time, the Great Betrayer had returned.

  Ustin turned his head to the side and spat into the waste receptacle near his desk. Only a devil like Heinreich Verräter could forge such an alliance as they now faced. He had been a Luminara, after all, the most favored son of the Luminarch. His fall from grace caused the greatest loss mankind could ever imagine. He was the first to dedicate a planet to the demons. His home world of Min’Draguard now sat in the center of the ever-expanding Uragan.

  Without asking leave, Ustin’s attaché Yakov Valkashin entered the room. There was no need to stand on ceremony when it was just the two of them. Ustin trusted his attaché completely, and yet he was saddened to see that same ambition in Yakov’s eyes that he’d possessed himself as a young man. Yakov did not know that Ustin had already appointed him as his successor, instead of that idiot Valkiev, but it was doubtful that anything would be different between them if he knew, for Yakov’s ambition was partnered with a terrible patience, which would make him a very dangerous leader for anyone to contend with.

  A saucer of stew was placed down along with a shot glass of vodka, which would go untouched, as always. In his youth Ustin had been a heavy drinker, but now he could not touch the stuff. He needed both eyes open to make the decisions that were his burden to make. Ustin took a few spoonfuls of the hearty stew before pushing the bowl away from him. He could not remember the last time he’d had an appetite.

  In a recess built into the floor sat a ring of mysterious figures, hooded and cloaked. Wires and cables spilled out from where their arms should have been, connecting to the base of the projector that created the display in front of Ustin and Yakov. They were Atrudi, high-ranking Technologists who had voluntarily given up their humanity to become the most perfect expression of their faith, cybernetically altered to such a huge degree that their will had been completely swallowed up. In fulfillment of ancient oaths, they served the Rehepar-akured of the Tyrant sector as the core of his intelligence network. Their minds touched every machine spirit on every planet in the sector. Their eyes saw through every camera and sensor on more than a thousand worlds and their minds perceived every message and command.

  Ustin had ordered them hooded and cloaked, for they were horrible to look upon with cables and machinery bursting forth from rotting gray flesh.

  With a simple command the projection spread and passed around Ustin and Yakov as it enlarged, highlighting the center of the cordon where the fighting was most fierce. The planet Tridia winked and changed colors, indicating that it was now an Uragan world. The nearby Ural system was faring no better.

  Ustin wished that he could go back in time and speak with himself as a young man. There was no glamor in command. There was no glory or honor. To be in command is to be a butcher, not of the enemy, but of your own. To be in command is to send men and women to their death and it was not something that anyone should aspire to achieve. It was a horrible numbers game. You kill ten in the hopes that it will save twenty, but it does not change the fact that you are the one sending them to die. Trade a thousand lives to save a billion and you are a hero, to everyone except the thousand that die, that is.

  “Battle group Omera is to disengage from Ural immediately and reinforce Battle group Nepena at Loftin,” Ustin commanded, with some difficulty.

  “Estimate complete loss of Ural system within sixteen days of battle group withdrawal,” came the cold mechanical reply from an Atrudi.

  “Execute,” Ustin ordered coarsely. The decision was wrenching, but he had to make a dozen such decisions each and every day. This decision, in particular, had been acutely difficult. If he did nothing, both systems would be destroyed, but Ural was his homeland and most of his family still lived there. Ustin put his aged hands up to his face. He would kill every man, woman, and child on Ural in the hope of saving Loftin, which was regrettably more important strategically.

  “I am a butcher,” he said as he thought about his nieces and nephews. At that moment they were probably playing in the backyard of his brother’s estate in the Nekov Mountains, blissfully unaware that their uncle had just condemned them to die, or worse.

  Ustin felt a pain in his chest, but it was not brought on by the burden of his office. He clutched feebly at his heart and doubled over in pain. He moved to scream, but his throat was on fire and he could barely squeak out a whisper.

  “Yakov, please call a doctor in here,” he choked out.

  “I’m afraid Mister Valkashin has been dead for some time now,” came the cold reply from the man standing over him.

  Ustin tried to reach out to tap the control runes on his console, but his strength gave out and he fell out of his chair to the ground, knocking over the bowl of stew that the man had brought in.

  His vision blurring with pain, Ustin could feel his heart stop beating. As he lay there dying, he could only watch helplessly as the man posing as Yakov lowered himself down into the recess with the Atrudi. Pulling out a small ceramic dagger, the man began cutting the cables and tubes coming out from their backs one by one. The Atrudi could do nothing to defend themselves, their decaying bodies having lost the ability to move centuries before. With their nourishment cut off, the clicking of
their cybernetics became slower and slower and then finally stopped.

  “My master Heinreich Verräter sends his regards,” the man said.

  The projection of the Tyrant Cordon flickered a few times before dying and the room went dark.

  Chapter Nine

  The Pools of Despair

  A lack of war is not peace. When your enemies exist no longer in living memory, when no record can be found of them and no ruins or rubble remain to be rediscovered by future generations. Only then do you have peace.

  -Excerpt from the Grey Council official report 12.12.7811rl

  Nariko sat silently in one corner of the small room, her knees against her chin. Her blonde hair had been stained by the watery rust and filth that clung to the floor and occasionally dripped from cracks in the ceiling. It hung from her head in long clumps of brownish red. Her eyes were blank and exhausted. Dirt and grease had collected in the contours of her face. Her cheeks were pale and lifeless. She looked much older, like a bitter old crone, letting slip the last tendrils of life.

  The floor of the room had become littered with waste and broken fragments. The long humming lights that illuminated the room had been removed and broken against the walls. Shreds of clothing were scattered on the floor and stuffed into cracks in the walls and under the door to stop any light from seeping in. The mirror above the metal sink had endured the worst treatment, having been smashed and the fragments ground into small chunks, little more than specks of dust, lying on the floor.

  How long have I been in here now? Days? Weeks? She decided she didn’t care. The hurt had lasted so long she had become numb. She felt tired, a deep and greasy tired that seemed to settle into her core. Her whole life she had always felt strong. Her strength gave her confidence. Her confidence had cast out all doubt. Without doubt, she had lived her life without hesitation in everything she did. It gave her life a tremendous momentum that impressed everyone around her. A fluidity of thought and motion, each action leading smoothly and logically to the next. Efficient and effortless, without waste and without fear.

  Now it was gone. It felt like a large hole had been carved out of her soul. She had always seen clearly a path laid down before her, which had led everlastingly to the Luminarch. Now there was nothing before her, only a dark and bitter mist. It no longer mattered what she did, the result would be the same. She felt very small and she was afraid.

  There was one light in the room she couldn’t block out with locks and rags. The dim pulsating light from the Dral’eth sword, which sat propped up against one wall.

  Nariko lifted up her head, eyes trembling. The darkness inside her was stirring again, a festering sickness inside of her.

  You are a traitor.

  Nariko flinched in surprise. The voice was sensual, but spiteful and full of subtlety. Each word brought the horrible images of death and pain to her mind and her hearts felt like shards of glass were churning around inside of her.

  No tear shall ever fall from the Man of Wisdom’s holy face on your behalf. No matter what you do, history will record your name only with hate and contempt. You can never be forgiven of your crimes.

  Nariko winced in pain. The words the voice spoke were her worst fears made real. Her entire life she had served the Luminarch and had held in highest contempt those who betrayed their vows to Him. To hear those words of cursing spoken about her and to know that they were true, to know that she had become what she had most hated, filled her with unimaginable horror and made her shudder with shame.

  She knew that she could never face the Lightbringer. She had betrayed Him and she would rather run forever from Him than see the pain in His eyes at the sight of her. She wished that she had never been born, that all memory of her existence was erased. She wished for oblivion.

  Another part of her balked at the thought. She could not even end this nightmare by taking her own life, for the curse would simply restore her to life the following day. Even death itself was denied her. Only eternal damnation awaited her. Even still, the smallest voice inside her protested.

  “I pray for His mercy on my soul,” she whispered.

  The Luminarch cannot forgive a soul that does not belong to him. If you sat in judgment of others guilty of the same crimes as you, you would condemn them. What makes you think that the Emancipator would be more merciful than you would be? What makes you think you deserve His mercy?

  “But I want to live,” Nariko pleaded pitifully.

  The voice cackled. You want to be free? You want to be human again? You were never human. You have always been a beast. On Tridia you found your true form. There is nothing left for you to do but to take up the role given you. The servants of the Liberator will hunt you like a beast for all time, they will never forgive you and you will never forgive yourself.

  Nariko opened her mouth to defend herself, but her rational side would not allow it. This horror was all true. She was in a nightmare she could never wake up from. The hurt in Nariko’s chest became unbearable. She gasped in pain. She couldn’t breathe. She felt like something was strangling her. She gasped for air and clutched at her chest and throat, trying to remove something that was not there. Weakly, she cried out the only thought in her mind.

  “Why?”

  The voice laughed a deep and sensual laugh. I will tell you, but understand that knowledge of our lies will not shield you from them. It is our nature to deceive, the voice mocked. To taste the darkness, to touch the darkness, to embrace the darkness, that is what leads a soul to destruction. Whatever lies lead a soul to touch the forbidden, that is our trade. We have a snare for each kind of soul.

  Your snare was a simple one. We whispered to you from the shadows in your mind that you had no choice, that you did what you must do to survive and you believed us so willingly. We whispered to you that as long as you were following orders, anything you did was beyond reproach and you agreed. Step by step, the way you carried out your orders became darker, from the white light of day to the darkness of night we led you, little by little, shade by shade, all the while whispering to you that no evil can be done in the name of duty.

  You honored your own murders and took pride in your crimes. You felt joy as you participated in evil acts. At first it was the joy of duty well done, but gradually it became the joy of the evil itself. We taught you to enjoy the evil. You learned to embrace the dark, all the while imagining yourself the very image of perfect obedience in defiance of the very darkness growing inside you.

  Our whispers hid the weight of your crimes from you, until they darkened out your sun and withered your branches. Now, we leave you to drown in the full weight of your crimes and allow them to swallow you up in despair. Your despair ripens your soul for harvest and we can already smell the delicious fruit of your pain.

  As she writhed on the floor in pain, Nariko could feel great chains shackled to her body. Heavy iron manacles were bound to her hands and weighty steel fetters were bound to her feet. A great bronze collar gripped her throat tightly. The chains tightened on her and she screamed in agony. Blood flowed from her neck, wrists, and ankles and in the deepest part of her mind she knew that she could never be free.

  You have chosen every step of the path you are now on, the voice concluded. Deep down, you know this is what you really are; this is what you really want. Deny yourself no longer. Take up the role you have chosen for yourself, your true form, the only thing you will ever be.

  Nariko’s body jerked as the chains pulled her upright, moving her agonized body until she stood in front of Dral’eth.

  Anything is better than this pain, she realized. Anything is better than this weakness.

  She did not want to die; she just didn’t want to live anymore. Not like this. Why prolong the pain needlessly? It will make no difference.

  Either she could suffer for centuries and then fall to the curse, or she could fall now.

  The end will be the same either way, so why suffer for another hundred years first? Nariko reasoned. To subject herself to n
eedless suffering was so unbelievably illogical and wasteful that it made her cringe just thinking about it. How could she allow herself to act so wastefully?

  Nariko reached out toward the hilt of the blade, her small hands trembling with shame.

  We will make you strong, the voice promised. We will make you strong like you were before. We will push the pain away and fill your mind with victory and honor. You will stand as an example to all who see you and you will rid humanity of all doubt. You will crush all who stand before you.

  Nariko closed her eyes and allowed the darkness to take her. Its cold fingers wrapped around her body. From somewhere deep within her, from a place she didn’t even know existed, a voice cried out.

  From deep within her soul, Nariko screamed.

  NO!

  She pulled her hands away and stumbled backwards, falling to the ground with a painful thud. The dark fingers that held her retreated into the shadows. For a time she lost consciousness. When she came to Nariko found herself curled up into a ball, lying on her side, the black tar of the floor sticking to her face and hair.

  The voice laughed and cackled maliciously as the light from the sword began to withdraw.

  My kind are very patient, it explained. No mind can endure pressure forever. Everyone breaks. You may break in a year’s time. You may break in a hundred years’ time. It is all the same to us. You will break and when you do, we will savor the sweet suffering of your soul for an eternity.

  Nariko cried out again, weakly. Her voice trembled and her body shivered.

  “Someone, please help me...”

  Alone in the darkness of her cell Nariko wept bitter tears.

  Chapter Ten

  The Throne Room of Bael’Eth

  In a broad sense faith is the motivation behind all human action. We labor because we have faith in reward. We plan because we have faith in result. We prepare because we have faith in our opposition. It is for this reason that knowledge is immeasurably inferior to faith.