The Last Lies of Ardor Benn

by Tyler Whitesides

  “That’s a lie,” Ard said. “You’re just saying that so we won’t try it.”

  In response to his words, Garifus stretched out a hand and ignited a detonation from his palm. The cloud hung in front of Ard, shimmering softly in the fading daylight.

  “Visitant Grit,” explained Garifus. “By all means, human, step inside. Become that Paladin Visitant you so boldly speak of.”

  Ard’s eyes flicked from Garifus’s face to the cloud and back. A bluff? Would Centrum jeopardize everything he had just accomplished for a simple bluff? Ard couldn’t get a tell from those glowing red eyes.

  “What will happen if I step inside?” Ard asked, pushing the bluff.

  “You will be lost in a state of endless limbo, caught in the center of the Sphere, held perfectly still while all of time rolls around you in every direction. Your existence will be scrubbed from the Material Time, and in so doing, there will be no trace of you in any alternate timeline. It will be as though you had never existed.”

  “Sounds like my afternoon naps,” said Ard. “How do I wake up?”

  “There is no way back.” But for the first time, Ard thought he saw a flicker of hesitancy cross Centrum’s face. Just a drib, but enough to tell Ard that Garifus wasn’t a hundred percent confident in this bluff. The Glassmind’s outstretched hand flexed and he began to absorb the Visitant cloud as if to say that the conversation was over.

  “Wait!” Ard shouted, not ready to fold yet.

  Garifus’s face suddenly twisted in impatience. “You doubt my words?” His other hand shot out, a cloud of Grit jetting from his fingertips. The ribbon-like cloud streamed past Ard, sliced through the Barrier wall, and seized one of the Regulators. The man was sucked toward Garifus in an obvious Gather, his boots dragging across the dock, arms flailing. He was mid-scream when Garifus brought his hands together, hurling the Reggie into the Visitant cloud.

  The Regulator disappeared in a wisp of vapor.

  Ard swallowed. Maybe Garifus wasn’t bluffing.

  “Satisfied?” the Glassmind asked, drawing the Visitant cloud into his hand.

  Ard was. At least for now. Garifus clearly wouldn’t have done that if the Reggie had a chance at becoming a Paladin Visitant. But where had the man gone? Into the Sphere? Erased from time, like Garifus had threatened?

  “What now?” Ard asked. “Where will you go now that all of time and space is your oyster?”

  “We go to Pekal,” answered Garifus. “Many of my followers are already venturing to the summit. We will assure that they arrive before the night of the Passing. After their transformation, our mind will be hundreds strong.”

  “Your cultists have quite a head start,” said Ard. “What’ll they do if you don’t catch up to them in time?” It was an empty threat. If a thousand Regulators couldn’t stop Garifus, what hope did Ard and his companions have?

  “We now travel through the Sphere,” explained Garifus. “By stepping into a cloud of Visitant Grit, my kind can travel freely through alternate timelines, returning to the Material Time in a different location without a second spent.”

  Oh, flames. What couldn’t these people do? Ard would never be at peace again, knowing that Glassminds could pop out of thin air directly in front of him.

  “But your human followers…” said Quarrah. “They’ll have to hike to the summit on their own?” Centrum couldn’t move them through the Sphere or they’d end up just like that poor Reggie.

  “They are full of faith and a desire to transform into the Homeland,” said Garifus. “They will undergo the change first. And then our numbers will be sufficient to destroy the dragons. And once they are gone, all humankind will have the opportunity to transform.”

  “You mean, get Moonsick,” spit Raek.

  “That is a natural step in the evolution of our species,” he replied. “The dragons will fall, Moonsickness will spread to every corner of the Greater Chain, and we will begin a systematic process of mass transformation.”

  “Sounds like you’ve got it all planned out,” Ard said. “Where does that leave us in your master scheme?”

  “Standing on the docks,” said Garifus, “waiting for your fate.” He turned, detonating a cloud of Visitant Grit at his fingertips. He stretched it wide, bringing a portion of the detonation to the other five Glassminds. Then, moving in perfect unison, they all stepped into the Sphere, instantly vanishing.

  The peaceful feeling—that Urging from the Homeland—vanished as the Barrier wall was suddenly snuffed out. Ard flinched as the thousand spectating Reggies on the ramps opened reckless fire. Quarrah’s reaction saved their lives, throwing down a mesh bag of her own Barrier Grit to form a small dome over the three criminals abandoned on the dock.

  In moments, Ard’s view of the docks was blocked as Regulators pressed around their protective Barrier dome, guns drawn and shackles hanging ready for an arrest that some had said was inevitable.

  Ardor Benn and the Short Fuse. With the elusive thief, Quarrah Khai, at their side.

  Ard turned to his companions, realizing there was no fighting their way out of this one. He swallowed hard. “I think we should have had an exit plan.”

  I have dueled the clock and lost more times than I care to admit. It has a hand far more deft than mine.

  CHAPTER

  26

  Quarrah leaned back against the cold stone wall of the jail cell, annoyed to be here, and even more annoyed to be sharing the small room with Ard and Raek. Couldn’t the Reggies at least have given her a cell of her own?

  She was well acquainted with the palace dungeon. Two years ago, she and Ard had rounded up the surviving members of the Directorate—the Realm’s highest-ranking position—and locked them away down here.

  It wasn’t the kind of place one broke out of. The stone walls between cells were at least two feet thick, and the door was a heavy slab of wood with a narrow viewing slat at eye level. Tonight, it had been left open, allowing a rectangle of dim Light Grit to shine into the cell. The door would be barred from the outside, with a padlock hanging in a spot she couldn’t even see, let alone reach.

  Not that she’d be able to pick it anyway. The Regulators had basically stripped them, taking every granule of Grit along with anything else that seemed suspicious or useful. They’d even taken the belt to Ard’s pants, which had obviously been serving a purpose, since he could barely keep them up as he paced in the darkness.

  “What time do you think it is?” Ard asked. “Got to be past midnight by now.”

  “Time…” said Raek, who was lying on the cell’s single cot, one muscular arm drooping off the side. “What is time? Is it a ball? Is it a line? Is it a doughnut?”

  The big man wasn’t doing well. His bald head was shiny with sweat, his hands trembling. And when he wasn’t jabbering, he was moaning and groaning. Obviously going through a Health Grit withdrawal, but Quarrah thought the discomfort was even more than that. Raek had been a prisoner here, four years ago. Maybe in this very cell. King Pethredote’s healers had planted that awful pipe in his chest, intending to keep him alive only long enough to beat more information out of him.

  This had to be hardest for Raekon Dorrel, back in the place where he’d thought he would die. Where Ard had rescued him, only to find that his life would forever be plagued by a cursed Heg addiction.

  “Do you think Garifus went straight to Pekal’s summit to wait?” Ard continued. “Or would he have appeared to the cultists to help them hike?”

  “Doesn’t matter,” moaned Raek. “We’re down here. They’re out there. And even if we did get out… What would we do about it?”

  Quarrah was still in favor of escaping, but Raek had a point. They had lost. The Glassminds had been too powerful. And now that they had access to Spherical Time, they could be anywhere, manipulating people’s emotions, and whispering Urges… Maybe this really would be the end of human civilization.

  Ard hiked up his pants and dropped to sit beside Quarrah on the sawdust-littered dirt floor.
“We’ve got to get that guy some Heg,” Ard whispered, jabbing a thumb at Raek. “His downer attitude is really making me depressed.”

  “He has a point, though,” she said quietly. “What would you do if you got out?”

  “I’d start by not getting executed.”

  “Yeah,” she said. “That would be nice.”

  “You might be spared since you didn’t sign the queen’s pardon,” Ard said. “It explained in no uncertain terms that committing any additional crimes would void the pardon, holding Raek and myself accountable for every questionable deed we’ve ever done.”

  “That definitely warrants execution.”

  “Thanks,” he said. “As long as you don’t confess, you’ll probably just be locked up in a Reggie Stockade for the rest of your life. But I bet you’ll grow one of your fingernails really long and use it to pick a lock and escape.”

  “This just reminds me that you don’t know anything about picking locks,” Quarrah said, but she smiled at the idea nevertheless.

  Ard sighed. “Remember how a few hours ago, we thought we were going to become Paladin Visitants and reset time and puff out of existence? Yeah… Well, I might have said a few things…”

  Quarrah reached out in the darkness, taking his hand in a gesture so sudden it even surprised herself.

  “You didn’t have to say it, Ard,” she whispered.

  “I’m sorry.”

  “That’s not what I mean.” She shook her head. “I knew… I always knew how you felt.”

  Sparks. Was she really having this conversation? It was the right thing—the considerate thing—to give closure to a doomed man. That was all she was doing here. Nothing more to it.

  “I guess I’m not as good at hiding my feelings as I’d like to think.” He squeezed her hand.

  What was he talking about? The man was like a walking emotion. Quarrah closed her eyes, feeling the warmth of his hand in hers, remembering a time when her heart had found such comfort and trust in that warmth.

  “If things had been different…” Ard spoke in the darkness. “Could this have worked between us?”

  If you had been different, she wanted to say. She knew that was what he was really asking.

  “There was a time when I thought so,” she whispered.

  “When did it fall apart?”

  The memory of that night came back to her, followed by half a dozen other times when Ardor Benn’s ceaseless motivation had driven a wedge deeper between them. When his own goals came at the cost of everyone and everything around him.

  She pulled her hand away from his. “I think you know.”

  It suddenly felt like fate to have this conversation in the palace dungeon. In a sense, this was the place that had delivered the first blow to that wedge—when Ard had been determined to get down here and rescue Raek. She had suggested they make a more calculated plan, with a careful extraction. Instead, Ard had jeopardized the newly fertilized dragon egg—the only real hope for humanity at the time—alerting the Reggies to its location with three gunshots into the night sky. Three shots that had sent Quarrah running. And despite whatever force kept bringing them back together, she couldn’t seem to move past those gunshots. They had shown him for who he really was. And she’d seen it too many times since.

  Quarrah could tell there was so much more Ard wanted to say, but he was waiting for her to go on. Fortunately, she didn’t have to.

  Outside the jail cell, the sound of an opening door turned all three heads. It was followed by clicking footsteps descending the stairs as the door shut.

  “Hey, Hal.” Ard stood up, moving toward the door. He had been calling their guard Hal for the last several hours, like they were old friends. The guard hadn’t said a single word in all this time, so Quarrah didn’t think that could possibly be his real name.

  “Is that you, buddy?” Ard went on. “Sounds like you got some new shoes.” He was almost to the view slot when the cell door swung open.

  Queen Abeth Ostel Agaul stood in the threshold, her hair and makeup looking pristine despite the late hour. She wore a simple gown of green and pale blue, the blending of the colors indicative of the Islehood robes. A subtle reminder of her Islehood-sanctioned position as a placeholder ruler and crusader monarch.

  Quarrah sprang to her feet. Even Raek managed to sit up on the squeaking, dirty cot.

  “Your Majesty.” Ard bowed his head. “I’ve been asking Hal for a word with you since they locked us up. Let me tell you what really happened.”

  “Quiet, Ardor,” she snapped, holding up her hand, jeweled rings twinkling on her fingers.

  Their relationship with Queen Abeth was admittedly strange. They had pretended to assassinate her, then lived with her at the Guesthouse Adagio before saving her son, blowing up said guesthouse, and failing to keep Shad alive for more than a few moments on the throne. Quarrah knew that Abeth didn’t blame them for that last part, but her mercy toward Ard could extend only so far.

  “Would someone please tell me what the blazes is going on?” Abeth cried. Ard glanced over her shoulder, but she shook her head. “We’re quite alone down here.”

  The queen of the Greater Chain, alone in an open jail cell with three criminals… Strange relationship, indeed. But it showed her implicit trust that they wouldn’t bowl her over, take her hostage, or otherwise use her to escape.

  “So there are these Glassminds…” Ard began. Quarrah watched in silence as he explained everything to the queen, using far more words than necessary and really playing up his own heroics. Every time Abeth took a step or shifted her weight, Quarrah eyed the doorway, resisting the urge to bolt. It was instinctual for her, and standing still took all her willpower.

  “I’d heard the reports from the Regulators,” Queen Abeth said when he was finished. “Your explanation fills a lot of holes. What I want to know is why you didn’t try to stop this Garifus from escaping into the Visitant cloud?”

  “There was no stopping him!” Ard cried. “Besides, he was making us all feel peaceable. And for the record, we never hurt any of your Regulators. I’d say this whole thing is just a big misunderstanding.”

  “Fifty-nine of them have broken bones from your little rat ball stunt,” Queen Abeth fumed. “And I didn’t bother to find out how many more have cuts and bruises. I realize that you were trying to stop Garifus. But there are over a thousand witnesses, and most people thought it looked like you were helping the Glassminds.”

  Raek snorted. “I couldn’t even walk in a straight line.”

  “Either way…” said Abeth. “You broke the law. You assaulted Regulators on duty, trespassed onto an area that was closed to civilians, resisted arrest.”

  “We went willingly!” cried Ard.

  “My reports state that you enclosed yourself in a detonation of Barrier Grit,” said Abeth.

  “That was to stop your guys from filling us full of lead,” Ard argued.

  “Don’t forget reckless detonation of Grit in a public space,” Raek added. “And using Grit detonations contrary to their intended purpose.”

  “Raek!” scolded Ard.

  “What?” said the big man defensively. “We lost the pardon. I just want to make sure people know we went down doing something more heroic than trespassing.”

  Queen Abeth pointed a finger in Ard’s face. “Above all, you betrayed my trust. I took a risk in extending you that pardon. The entire council was against it, but I thought you could behave yourself. You’re a disappointment to me, and to Prime Isle Trable.”

  Quarrah thought she saw a shadow of regret pass over Ard’s face. But it was short lived. He held up his hands innocently. “I think we need to stay focused on who the real villains are here.”

  “I’ve already dispatched a fleet to Pekal,” said the queen. “They’ll apprehend this Garifus Floc and anyone who swears allegiance to him.”

  Raek chuckled, flopping back on the cot. “Good luck with that.”

  “There is little more I can do,” she said. “An
d now I have to turn my focus to preventing the widespread panic that follows wherever you go.”

  “People have reason to panic this time,” said Ard. “If Garifus kills the dragons—”

  “Then we all get Moonsick. I know!” shouted the queen. She cleared her throat and went on, composed. “The noble councils are calling for your execution.”

  Ard turned to Quarrah. “See?” he said with an I-told-you-so tone.

  “But I’m afraid it’s more complicated than that,” said Abeth.

  “More complicated than killing us?” Raek asked through chattering teeth.

  “The Trothians have already caught word of your arrest,” the queen went on. “I have an Agrodite priestess upstairs who is demanding that I turn you over to her.”

  “Oh, flames,” Ard muttered. “Does her name happen to be Lyndel?”

  “Yes,” said Abeth. “She has been in Beripent, looking for you. She claims that you were never released from Ra Ennoth like the reports claim. She says you hired someone to impersonate an official emissary who levied threats against the Trothian nation on behalf of the queen. Is that true?”

  “No!” Ard cried. “That might have happened, but I didn’t hire anybody.”

  “Then who was this mysterious emissary?”

  “Must have been one of my fans, bailing me out of a sticky situation.” He shrugged. “And to think, all this time, I thought you had rescued me. I figured, after all I’d done for you, you wouldn’t stand to see me drown on some Homeland-forsaken islet.”

  Trust Ardor Benn to flip the situation and make Queen Abeth feel like the moral degenerate in this story. The queen took a deep breath, pressing her fingertips to the side of her head as if trying to stave off a headache.

  “I have a difficult decision to make by morning,” she said. “Do I have you executed in Beripent, or turn you over to the Trothian nation?”

  “Either way, he’s a dead man,” Raek called from the cot.

  “You’re one to speak!” Ard snapped.