Knight of Gehenna (Hellsong Book 2)

by Shaun O. McCoy

  The villagers parted, and his hunters started making their way to the exit. Hidalgo stepped up beside him to his left. Chelsea came up to his right. With them flanking him, Martin prepared to follow his army out into the wilds—but paused. He looked over at Katie’s home. The door tapestry was folded in a way that hid the picture of the bird from view.

  “It’s okay, Martin.” Chelsea told him. “She’ll love you when you get back.”

  She’ll love me if I get back.

  Martin started walking, following the path the villagers had cleared for him. Somehow having Hidalgo and Chelsea around made him feel safer, more important. As if he was actually a leader.

  Well, here goes nothin’.

  “Come here, son.” Galen’s voice was so loud it caused Arturus to jump. “I want to show you something.”

  “Father! There are dyitzu close!” Arturus whispered frantically.

  “This way,” Galen’s voice beckoned, as calm as ever.

  Arturus followed his father’s footsteps through the pitch black tunnel. Galen was scuffing his boot every three or four paces, presumably so Arturus could keep pace with him.

  “Climb here,” Galen ordered.

  Arturus did as he was asked, climbing up over the cubby, and then onto the aqueduct. He heard Galen come up beside him.

  “Now to the other side.”

  Arturus slid down into the aqueduct. Then he worked his way over to the lip on the far side. There was a metallic thud, and the chamber was suddenly lit up with a shower of sparks. Galen had struck a firestone rock against one of the whetstone pipes. The shower of sparks set his torch alight.

  Quiet hisses of dyitzu filled the chamber. Weak hisses. Desperate hisses.

  Arturus looked down over the lip and into the tunnel’s sister walkway. The ground was littered with fallen dyitzu. Their bodies were skinny, skinnier than Arturus had thought possible. Their muscles were terribly atrophied. Their skin seemed paper thin, and was paler than Arturus had ever seen on a dyitzu. Their all black eyes were sunken into their sockets. Their ribcages stood out in intense relief in the flickering torchlight. Their heads seemed overly large, but in reality, Arturus knew, it was their bodies that were too small.

  “Are they . . . starving?” Arturus asked.

  Galen grunted. “They are.”

  “But I thought you said dyitzu didn’t need to eat?”

  “They don’t, but they do need a tiny bit of water. It is rare to see them like this. They must have entered the aqueduct when a settling cracked it open. When the stones healed them in, they had no way to escape. If we were to keep this torch lit, I bet we would see places where they tried to force themselves out. Perhaps by clawing into the stone or throwing fireballs. Or perhaps all those have healed up, too.”

  “How long have they been here?” Arturus asked.

  “At least for a hundred years. Perhaps more. It takes a long time for a dyitzu to starve. Perhaps as many as a thousand.”

  Galen dropped down from the aqueduct, his torch sputtering loudly in protest as he fell. He landed amongst the dyitzu and drew his dagger. “Help me, son.” He bent down and slit the throat of a dyitzu.

  Arturus drew his razor and jumped down beside his father. He began cutting their throats. He could see the dyitzu struggling to tilt their heads towards him. Some of them would breathe heavier as he approached.

  They’re just dyitzu. It doesn’t matter.

  His razor was sharp, but even so, he was surprised by how easily it sliced through their throats. Barely any blood came out. What little did was a thick, oozing substance. Some of the dyitzu were still strong enough to move their arms a little, though they weren’t able to claw at him.

  They’d kill you, if they could.

  Arturus knew he had to kill them. If there was another quake, and Galen was right about the aqueduct being opened, then a breach in the wrong place might allow a Minotaur to come in and help them. They would have a chance to rise and kill people again. What he was doing now could very well save human lives. It didn’t matter that the dyitzu were helpless.

  Tears were collecting in his eyes.

  Don’t you dare cry, not for dyitzu.

  His hands were shaking. He looked over to his father who was moving with the bubble of torchlight. Galen had no qualms about this at all. The warrior efficiently slit their throats, one after another. No hesitation.

  I can be like that.

  But his hands would not stop shaking. His next cut wasn’t perfect. The dyitzu tried to cry out, but all it could manage was a low guttural whimper. Arturus’ vision was now as shaky as his hands. He forced himself to try and finish the cut. He missed again. The whimper continued. Finally, on his third cut, he got the vocal cords. Even so, the dyitzu was still moving, twitching weakly.

  Arturus sobbed. The tears he’d kept bottled up came pouring out of his eyes. His razor fell from his unsteady hands, clattering against the stone.

  The torchlight grew brighter. He felt its heat coming from above. Arturus looked up and saw his father.

  “Didn’t I ever tell you the story of the Scorpion and the Turtle?” Galen asked. “How the turtle takes the scorpion across the river, thinking it won’t dare sting him lest they both drown. But the scorpion stings him anyway. When the turtle asked him why, the scorpion replied that it was his nature.”

  Arturus shook his head, more tears falling from his eyes. “This isn’t right, Father. They can’t resist. They can’t even beg. All they can do is die.”

  “These dyitzu are killers, Turi. They’re nothing more. It’s their nature.”

  He could barely see his father through his tears and the brightness of the torchlight. “That’s an Infidel Friend story!” Arturus shouted. “The story of evil men! Of course they’d not take mercy on a devil. They wouldn’t even take mercy on a human.”

  Galen tossed the torch aside. It skittered across the stones before coming to rest. Galen’s eyes were tempests of anger. “Stand up boy.”

  “I won’t do this.”

  Galen reached down and grabbed him by the collar, dragged him to his feet, and then threw him towards the aqueduct.

  “I said stand up!” Galen’s voice echoed down the tunnel.

  Arturus barely kept his balance. “I won’t do this.”

  “Pick up your razor!” Galen yelled.

  “No!”

  “Pick it up!”

  Arturus had never seen his father like this. His heart beat in his chest. Galen was advancing towards him. Arturus had never feared the man before. He had never been so keenly aware that Galen could tear him limb from limb. He had never imagined that Galen might be capable of doing such a thing, but now, looking at his father, Arturus really believed that the man would hurt him.

  Arturus reached down and picked up his razor.

  “Kill them, son.”

  Arturus looked at the dyitzu at his feet. It was there, helpless. Its face was so devoid of flesh that Arturus could hardly believe that the thing was alive. But it was alive, and Arturus could see the terror on its nearly human face. This one’s stub wings were folded under its body, but he could see the muscles contracting there, as if they were the only things the dyitzu could move.

  “Kill them.”

  The tears formed in his eyes again. His hands were shaking. “Please, father. Don’t make me do this.”

  “Now.”

  Arturus knelt. He tried to control his sobs. More than any time before, he needed to be strong for his father, but he couldn’t. The sobs were too powerful. The tears were dripping off of his chin and onto the dyitzu beneath him. Snot was pouring down from his nose. His crying shook him so badly that his razor’s cut wasn’t fatal. He tried again, and again.

  “Please,” Arturus begged.

  But Galen would not relent. Arturus moved to the next. He was no longer able to keep his sobs silent. They echoed down the tunnel, just like his father’s anger had. He killed another, and another . . . and another. Each one seemed more difficu
lt than the last. Arturus had never done anything he’d felt was truly evil in his entire life, until today. He had never wanted so much to ignore his father’s orders.

  But Arturus would not disobey.

  He killed them. Every last one of them. And as they died, so too did the child inside him.

  “Should start any minute now,” Q said.

  The cool water of the inch deep stream flowed up and over the back heel of Ellen’s tennis shoes, bringing a feeling of relief to her sore ankle. Alice was crouched the farthest forward as if she was the scout. El Cid said nothing about this, apparently content with Alice’s ability to perform that duty.

  Eagan and Jessica were the only two missing from the group. They were off setting up the lure, which El Cid had warned them would sound very much like a human screaming. Ellen did her best to brace herself for the impending noise.

  They were only a hundred or so feet up the river from where the Cypress swamp room was, so Ellen feared that the corpses might find them again. She looked towards Rick for support. He gave her a smile, his face unworried.

  A long, tortured scream echoed up through the chamber. Ellen started, her hand reaching for her pistol.

  No one else was reacting.

  That’s the lure?

  El Cid held up her hand. “We’ll be working right next to the swamp, so let’s give the lure a few minutes to pull them in. Even so, I should let you Harpsborough folk know that we will almost certainly have to stop working at some point to kill some corpses.”

  Q smiled, hefting his pick over one shoulder.

  The long call never stopped, but it rhythmically became louder and then softer. After a minute or so, Ellen was able to convince herself that the cry wasn’t human.

  “I think I hear something,” Alice said over the lure’s call. “Something else.”

  El Cid nodded towards Q. The black man moved quickly, passing Alice by. Ellen would have been afraid to travel so quickly down the treacherous slope, but Q was as surefooted as she had ever seen. He stopped near the entrance. He waved them down with one hand and put another finger over his lips. As quietly as she could, Ellen walked down the river. Her ankle stung with each step.

  They grouped around the entrance. Ellen tried to get close enough to see, but most of her view was blocked by their bodies. She found herself right behind Massan. His smell didn’t bother her like it used to. The aroma seemed pleasantly familiar.

  “Harpies,” Q said, pointing across the Cypress swamp. “Good ear, Alice.”

  Alice nodded.

  The harpies were calling each other. They sounded like angry birds—or angry women. Or maybe both.

  “You think Jessica and Eagan see them?” Aiden asked.

  Ellen pushed her way past Massan to the front and looked along Q’s pointed finger. She saw them, five of them, flying near the ceiling of the tremendous chamber. They were almost obscured by the mists.

  El Cid shrugged. “Well, if they don’t, they’ll sure as hell notice when the harpies break the lure.”

  “We’re pretty far north for harpies,” Q said.

  “Or east,” El Cid suggested. “They could have come from the Carrion.”

  Q grunted.

  Their flight almost seemed graceful. As the flying devils came closer, Ellen began to see that they had human torsos. For some reason she felt bile rising in the back of her mouth.

  Her eyes followed along the chamber towards where the harpies were flying. A large group of corpses had gathered there, maybe a quarter of a mile away.

  That’s where the lure is.

  “There’s five of them,” Q said. “You think Eagan and Jessica are going to try and kill them on their own?”

  El Cid shrugged.

  Three of the harpies began to descend, lowering themselves down to the swamp in lazy spirals. The two remaining reared backwards, beating their wings and clawing at the air with their legs, hovering in place. Ellen strained to see what their faces looked like, but they were still too far away for her to discern any fine details. Their skin was more grey than human flesh was. Their feathers were a dark brown, but that was all that she could determine. She noticed that her eyes felt like they were burning.

  “That’s odd,” Rick remarked. “Why would they leave two behind?”

  El Cid gave him an approving look. “It is odd.”

  “I swear I can smell them.” Q remarked.

  “You can,” El Cid said. “We’re downwind.”

  Ellen’s nose was running a little.

  The first of the harpies had landed amidst the corpses. Its body was as tall as the undead it moved amongst, but its wings made it seem larger. It stalked its way through the swamp. Two others landed behind it. The trio disappeared from view.

  Ellen waited. The long whine of the lure continued.

  “They’re coming back,” Q warned.

  The three did reappear. They moved clear of the wandering corpses, spread their wings, and took off amidst little bursts of water. They rejoined the pair of hovering harpies, and then all five began to fly back through the chamber.

  “They didn’t kill the lure.” Aiden seemed surprised.

  “Maybe Eagan and Jess caged it?” Q asked.

  El Cid shook her head. “No, they were going to keep it raised on the cave wall. The harpies could have easily flown up and stopped it. They’re scouting.”

  “But for whom?” Aiden’s beautiful blue eyes narrowed as he gazed across the chamber. Ellen felt her heart fluttering.

  “A wight.” Aiden said.

  El Cid nodded. “Time to go. This isn’t a fight we want to pick right now. Follow me.”

  She led them back up the river, her steps as sure as Q’s had been. Ellen’s ankle gave out, and she fell to one knee. Rick and Aiden helped her to her feet.

  Ellen put weight back down on it. It supported her. “I’m good,” she told them.

  Eagan and Jessica appeared further up the river.

  “Did you see that?” Jessica asked.

  “Harpies,” El Cid answered. “From a wight, probably.”

  Jessica shook her head, her eyes wide. “No. We saw a houndrider.”

  El Cid’s head jerked back, her pony tail bouncing with the quickness of the motion. “A Piper?”

  Jessica and Eagan nodded their heads simultaneously.

  “Move it!” El Cid ordered.

  “What’s a Piper?” Molly began to scramble up the river.

  Aiden turned back for a second, his blue eyes flashing. “It’s one of us.”

  “An Infidel Friend?” Molly asked.

  “No, not an Infidel Friend,” Aiden answered. “One of us. A human. A necromancer.”

  “Here we are,” Galen said, extinguishing his torch. “Help me open this door.”

  Arturus remembered when the darkness used to bother him. When he’d first entered the Carrion, he’d seen devils in every shadow. Now it was bright rooms that he wished to avoid. It was he, Arturus, who hid in the shadows, and the devils that needed light. He was the heartless killer. They were the victims.

  He heard the scrape of metal on stone as someone brought Galen’s crow bar to bear on the stone. Then there was the sound of stone grating on stone. Light, bright light, poured into the tunnel. Sounds came in too, as if there were thousands of people working the stone of the chambers beyond. Arturus moved forward, letting the light pour over him, waiting for his eyes to adjust.

  “Oh,” Johnny said. “Oh God. Oh fucking God.”

  Arturus’ eyes were having trouble focusing. It looked as if the chamber beyond were miles deep.

  Shit. It is miles deep.

  “Close it,” Galen said. “Very slowly. Leave it just a crack open.”

  Arturus added his weight to Aaron and Johnny’s, pushing the door.

  “That’s good,” Galen said.

  A crack, in this case, was large enough for one of them to put their heads through. Arturus did just that. He could feel the others crowding in around him.

&
nbsp; “What do you see?” Dakota asked.

  There were human workers in the chamber. Thousands. Maybe hundreds of thousands. It looked as if they were carving their way miles down through the stone. They lined the walls, like the hordes of silverleg spiders had, moving on forests of woodstone scaffolding. Perhaps they were trying to expand that way too, or maybe they were just fighting the natural tendency of the rock to heal. Lines of them formed up in the base of the chamber, each person looking no larger than a single grain of threshed devilwheat. That many people would be able to move tons of rock in seconds, Arturus imagined.

  Standing amongst them, acting as overseers, were dyitzu. Here and there about the chamber, Icanitzu and harpies flew. Some of the harpies had human riders. There were hounds on the ground who also had men mounted on their backs.

  “Oh shit,” Johnny’s voice came from above him. “How could there be so many people?”

  Arturus looked up. Dakota was standing to his right, carrying Johnny on his shoulders.

  When did those two become friends?

  “Keep your head down, Turi,” Johnny said.

  “Tu-El,” Galen said, his fingers slowly stroking his beard. “That’s what they’re digging for.”

  “That’s the Archdevil you said was tied to Lucreas?” Aaron asked.

  “Yes.”

  “And you said the Infidel collapsed an entire section of Hell on top of Tu-El.”

  “Yes.”

  “And was it this section?” Aaron’s voice was full of trepidation.

  “Yes.”

  “And if they find him?”

  “There was a time, Aaron, when the ancients almost had Hell whipped. They had conquered entire regions of it with their armies. They had teased from the stones themselves the very secrets of the Architect. They had warped chambers into giant growing fields of wheat and fruit. They had herds of hounds they raised for slaughter. The Infidel and Tu-El fought at that time, when humankind was at its peak. Now, very little would be in Tu-El’s way. Maybe the Infidel and his people can stop him. Maybe they can’t.”

  “Assuming they can’t?” Aaron asked.

  “We die.”