His whiskers drooped with sadness. She had changed all of that. Why was it that a woman could entice a male to grow up and build things when, if left to his own devices, all he wanted to do was pick a fight and then retreat to his lair to crunch on some bones?
He opened his eyes to discover the elderly scribe had returned, his tail stiff-straight in the way it always was whenever the lizard man had news he knew would irritate the heck out of him.
"What now?" Shay'tan asked.
"Admiral Musab has hailed us again, Sir," the scribe said. "The Alliance shuttle refuses to leave the planet's airspace until they speak to you, personally."
"Tell them I said no," Shay'tan growled.
The scribe glanced furtively at the scientists. "Admiral Musab thought you might be interested in what they have to say."
"No means no."
The scribe did not budge. Shay'tan craned his neck, now curious.
"Yes?"
The scribe nodded his head.
"Very well, then," Shay'tan said. "I'll take the call. But if it's just the usual recriminations, I'll be roasting you for supper and picking my teeth with your bones." He bared his fangs and gave a good-natured snap at the scribe who did not flinch. The scribe had known him long enough to know that after his fire-temper cooled, he tended to be in a good mood.
"Yes, Sir," the elderly scribe said blandly.
Shay'tan grumbled something noncommittal. The elderly lizard was a treasure, one he'd grieve when he was gone. That was the problem with surrounding yourself with mortals. No sooner did you get one broken in then they'd die; and then you'd spend the next hundred years missing them as you trained their replacement to be just the way you liked.
He lumbered into an adjacent room and plunked his hindquarters down in front of a holographic projector, draping his massive bulk carelessly onto the floor, his wings askew and his scales jutting out all helter-skelter.
"Send it through," Shay'tan grumbled at the A.I. The hologram hummed as it projected a white orb, and then in the middle a life-sized humanoid figure appeared, clothed from head-to-foot in black.
Shay'tan's golden eyes grew large with surprise. He sat taller and posed for the camera, showing his good side, and tucked his leathery wings neatly against his back so that he appeared more like the beneficent god whose picture adorned every temple in his empire.
"You requested an audience with me, widow of The Destroyer?" Shay'tan asked.
The human female appeared to be disoriented as she glanced around the confines of her own space shuttle, unfamiliar with the technology. Someone off-screen gave her instructions and she turned to face the central projection lens so he could see her clearly. She gestured to her forehead, and her heart, and her lips in a reasonable facsimile of the Sata'anic prayer-gesture.
"I did," Sarvenaz said in heavily accented Galactic Standard. "I come to beg your permission to retrieve my husband's body."
She stood, small and graceful, the black drapes of her widow's garb only accentuating, and not hiding, the pendulous shape of her midsection. For hundreds of years Shay'tan had tried every bribe he could think of to entice Abaddon to defect. Money. His own planet. Even governance his own collective of quasi-independent colonies. Abaddon had wanted none of it. And yet, in a way Shay'tan had bribed him, only he hadn't known at the time what Ba'al Zebub was doing behind his back.
"You know I can't just give you access to that planet," Shay'tan said as gently as he could. "Your husband stumbled into a top-secret military installation. I cannot risk letting it fall into Alliance hands."
Sarvenaz's eyes filled with tears as she clutched her hand to her breast and suppressed a sob. Shay'tan felt the echo of that sensation within his own chest, the pain of losing someone you loved.
"My husband said you are not creature without honor," Sarvenaz said. "He said you live by a code, that the dead should be treated with dignity."
"That is true," Shay'tan rumbled.
"Then please," Sarvenaz sobbed. "Let me retrieve my husband's body so I can say the death rituals and know his spirit is at peace!"
He felt her grief catch at his own chest, and he had to clear his throat to be sure his voice didn't break as he denied her the one thing that any decent creature would give her.
"I cannot…"
Sarvenaz clutched at her cloak and stood taller, not just a grieving widow, but the woman who had fractured Parliament with her impassioned speech. He had watched the video, fascinated, as she had stepped out from the shelter of her husband's wings and rallied the Alliance to defy their emperor and god. She took a shuddering breath, and then she spoke to him again.
"Then you will need to order your men to murder women and children," Sarvenaz said, running her hand down upon her swollen abdomen. "Because I am going down to that planet, whether or not I have your blessing, to bring my husband home."
She turned towards whoever had aimed the holographic projector at her and ordered them to turn it off. As she did, it silhouetted the heavy bulge of Abaddon's child growing in her womb, the child he had wanted so badly he had cast away his god. Shay'tan watched, transfixed, as the proud woman, born to be an empress, defied him just as she had defied the Eternal Emperor.
She reminded him a bit of her…
"Wait, Madam," Shay'tan stopped her.
Sarvenaz turned back to the camera, her expression hopeful.
"Your husband was a worthy adversary," Shay'tan said. "The bravest I ever met."
A tear escaped Sarvenaz's mahogany brown eyes, a most unusual color, and slid down her cheek, lingering on her chin like a raindrop. She nodded. Yes. This, she already knew.
"Do you know what it means to make a bargain with a dragon?"
"Yes," Sarvenaz whispered.
"I want your word of honor that you shall take no technology from that cave except what you need to transport your husband's body home. Can you agree to that?"
"You have my word," Sarvenaz said.
"Very well, then," Shay'tan said. "You have half a day, and not a minute longer."
"Thank you," Sarvenaz said. She gestured to whoever operated the camera."
"One more thing," Shay'tan said.
Sarvenaz waited, her eyes filled with expectation and sorrow.
"Under Sata'anic law," Shay'tan said, "when a man defeats a worthy adversary and learns that death has left behind a widow, it is that soldier's duty to ensure the widow gets back safely to her family, and if none can be found, to marry her himself and raise her offspring as if it was his own."
"So my husband told me," Sarvenaz said.
"I do not know where your homeworld is, Madam," Shay'tan said softly. "It was rogue elements within my Empire which found your planet, and then hid it from me when I refused to sell your people into Alliance prostitution. I will find your planet … eventually. But until then, if you are unable to find a safe haven, you are welcome to take refuge within my Empire and become my thirty-seventh wife."
Sarvenaz raised one shapely eyebrow. He could feel her scrutiny as her eyes raked down from his sharp dorsal ridge to the tip of his tail, and then settled on his leathery red wings.
"I will make no demands upon you other than to raise your son to be respectful of Sata'anic law," Shay'tan added.
"It is Abaddon's daughter I carry," Sarvenaz jutted out her chin. "It was my husband's wish that she be born free, free from the expectations of either empire."
It was perhaps the most spirited rejection he had ever received. Although he'd expected it, he found himself curiously disappointed.
"Very well, Madam," Shay'tan said. "But if things don't turn out the way you wish, you are free to reconsider my offer."
"Thank you," Sarvenaz said. She made the Sata'anic prayer-gesture again, her fingers to her forehead, her heart and her lips, a little out of order from the way things were done here, but close enough that he appreciated the gesture.
The hologram went dead. The ball of light faded, leaving only the projector, which otherwise lo
oked like an ordinary table.
Shay'tan sighed. Somehow, now that Abaddon was dead, his victory felt a little hollow. Hashem refused to play chess with him, Lucifer was gone, and now Abaddon was dead. What was a dragon supposed to do to amuse himself?
He stalked back out to the laboratory, the palace trembling beneath his feet, determined to find out just why in Haven there had been an active sacrificial brazier beneath Shemijaza's legendary genetics laboratory.
"What were you up to, Emperor of Tyre?" Shay'tan mumbled as he lumbered past the decapitated bovine head, its slips still curled up in an eternal sneer.
The scientists all clustered excitedly around the torso. The lead scientist ran up to him, his tail bobbing with excitement.
"Your Eminence! Come and see what we have found!"
The wall of scientists parted, allowing Shay'tan to see what they had pried out of the intestines of the robot.
"A cryo-chamber?" Shay'tan's eyebrow-ridges rose in surprise.
"And the creature inside of it is still alive!" the head scientist exclaimed, his gold-green eyes wide with wonder.
"Sata'anic?" Shay'tan asked.
"No," the head scientist said. "It's a Nephilim. Female. Perhaps only seven years old."
"Nephilim? All the Nephilim in that cave were dead."
"Not this one," the head scientist said. "The reactor was low on power, but the cave was so cold it reduced her live support needs to nearly nothing. We just found a 74,000 year old living artifact!"
The scientist ran off to chatter with the other scientists, ecstatic at their discovery. Shay'tan stared with numb horror at the sight of his prize lizard-people crawling like ants all over the robot. No. Not a robot. A prosthesis. His mind whirled. A Nephilim? No. It couldn't be!
Guilt settled into his gut like rotted meat. After their betrayal had cost him his mate, he had exterminated every man, woman and child until the entire species had packed up and fled. He had sterilized their colonies, exploded their suns, and explosively decompressed their space stations so that the basis of his former armies would never rebel against him again. He had done so out of grief, but the Nephilim were extinct because he had made it so. That's what dragons did whenever they lost control. They were stupid, mindless monsters.
He gulped for air even though he didn't need it and wiped an itchy spot in his eye. It was not a tear. Dragons did not cry!
"This species is forbidden to exist," Shay'tan said softly to the scientists who had all turned their backs on him.
They ignored him, still ecstatic in their discovery.
"Get out!" Shay'tan said, louder this time. "I said, get out of here. All except for the physician."
The scientists gathered up their notepads, giving him curious looks as they huddled together, snout-to-tail, and crowded out of the room until his scribe shut the door behind them.
"You too," Shay'tan said to his scribe. "I will call you if I need you."
"Yes, Your Eminence," Budayl said. His wrinkled scales curved up in an expression of curiosity.
Shay'tan padded over to the cryogenics chamber and peeked in through the glass. Yes. It was just a child. Seven or eight years old, with wires drilled in to every square centimeter of her body. The doctor had begun the thawing process before they'd asked or he would have told them to grant the child the mercy of dying in her sleep.
"How degraded is she?" Shay'tan asked the physician.
"She's pretty bad, Sir," the doctor said. "It's like … freezer burn. The extreme temperatures preserved her, but it damaged her on a cellular level. Her EEG levels are erratic, as if there are great chunks of bioelectrical activity missing from her body."
Shay'tan stared at the girl's nut-brown skin, slanted forehead, and her otherwise humanoid features. The bodies in the cave had been dead for tens of thousands of years, but this one, although pale and sickly, still possessed a living aura. Her life-energy had been fed upon, repeatedly, until all that was left was a shallow husk.
"That damage is not from the ice," Shay'tan said.
"What did it?" the physician asked.
Shay'tan did not answer, and the physician had enough sense not to press him. All knew better than to antagonize a dragon.
"Remove the electrodes."
"We think they're the only thing keeping her alive."
"This isn't living," Shay'tan said. "And even if she did wake up, where would she go? She went to sleep 74,000 years ago, and now her entire species is dead."
The physician knew better than to say, 'you're the last of your species, too.' He removed the electrodes, checked the creature's heart with his stethoscope, and declared her heartbeat was fading.
"Leave us," Shay'tan said.
The physician packed up his medical bag and, with a mournful expression, passed through the door into the crowd of scientists who waited anxiously on the other side.
Shay'tan stared down at the dying child. Yes. That's what it was. A dying child. He'd always known Moloch had preyed upon the young because their life-energy was easiest to feed upon and misdirect to do his bidding in the absence of his own body, but this contraption was a new low. Moloch couldn't incarnate into physical form, nor could he manipulate matter directly. All he could do was whisper suggestions and, in a few rare genetic cases, find a mortal vessel compatible enough that he could possess it.
This child, he suspected, was just such a vessel. Imperfect, or why encase her body in a prosthesis, but a vessel nonetheless.
Shay'tan touched the child and channeled enough warmth to heat her body up to a normal temperature. He was not a god of healing, but sometimes all a body needed was to feel warm.
The little girl stirred and opened her eyes. He was not surprised to see that her eyes were pale bluish-grey, not the brown of most Nephilim. Not quite silver, for she was not genetically evolved enough to act as a full-fledged vessel, but close enough that Moloch had been able to use her consciousness as an interface. She reached towards him, the brightest object she could see.
"Am I dreaming?" the little girl asked.
"No," Shay'tan said. "Do you know who I am, child?"
"You are the dragon who devours planets."
Shay'tan snorted, but not in anger.
"I am your god, come to set you free," Shay'tan said. "Do you know how long you were asleep?"
"I can't remember," the girl said. She began to cry. "Where'd my Mama go?"
"Would you like me to take you to her?" Shay'tan asked.
The little girl nodded her head yes.
"First you must do something for me," Shay'tan said. "And then I will carry you into the dreamtime and see if I can find her."
"Will it hurt?"
"No," Shay'tan said. "Your mortal shell is too weak for me to save. I will wait until you pass naturally, and then I will peek into your soul, to see if I can figure out where they sent your Mama. Would that be okay?"
The little girl nodded. Shay'tan gently picked her out of the cryo-chamber, stifling his anger at the electrodes which had been drilled into her skull, and cradled her to his breast as though she was his own offspring. The little girl turned gasped for breath, her life-force fading from even the slight effort of their conversation.
Tears of fire streamed down Shay'tan's muzzle.
"Shhh," he soothed her. "Don't fight it. Just let your mortal vessel expire, and when you wake up, I will take you someplace pretty."
"Mama," the little girl gasped, and then she breathed no more.
Shay'tan transformed back into his natural form. Fire-dragon. Destroyer of worlds. Cleanser of all that had been touched by Moloch. He used his fire to cremate the child's remains, and as he did he could see into her short, tragic life.
For three years Moloch had used her body as an interface, and in that time her spirit had overheard plans to overthrow his empire. The rebellion of the Nephilim, the capture of his mate, and the destruction of Nibiru had all been part of an elaborate plan, but those plans had not solidified until after Moloch had aba
ndoned this vessel for the next one.
She did not know the location of Earth. The ice planet was nothing but a dead end.
Shay'tan carried her spirit to the gateway of the dreamtime. The girl shimmered, puzzled, until she figured out how to shape a facsimile of her former form, free from the painful electrodes and wires.
"Are you ready to go?"
"The little girl frowned. "I did some bad things, didn't I?"
"You are a child," Shay'tan said. "An innocent. Moloch used you because children are always willing."
The little girl's lip trembled. Guilt crushed Shay'tan in the chest even though in this form he had no heart but the nexus which formed the basis of his fiery essence. He had not been innocent when he had exterminated them in his grief.
"Will you find my parents?" the little girl asked.
"You have my word," Shay'tan said, "and a dragon never lies."
The little girl stared through the veil which separated that portion of the dreamtime traversed by the gods from that portion reserved exclusively for the spirits of the dead. For all HER faults, She-who-is was meticulous about making sure as few souls as possible were left exposed in that vulnerable in-between state when they were not inhabiting a protective mortal shell. Having watched her own brothers and sisters get devoured, she made sure none of her creations suffered that same fate … unless they displeased her.
"I will hold you to your promise," the little girl said.
She let go of his hand and skipped through the curtain, unafraid in the way that children often were. It was why they were such easy prey for Moloch, food for a malignant god.
Shay'tan breathed relief, as though the child's gifting of that one single task had somehow granted him a path to absolution, a way to make up for the genocide he had committed. He transferred himself to the remotest part of his empire and let loose his rage, the rage of a dragon who'd been outsmarted, until dozens of planets were destroyed, all lifeless, of course, because she had taught him to value life. Then he teleported back into his palace to tear apart the useless statue of Moloch bit-by-bit until there was nothing left but a pile of molten metal.
Sword of the Gods: Agents of Ki (Sword of the Gods Saga) Page 53
