The Mirrored City

by Michael J. Bode

  He made his way through the Seven gates back into Dessim where, predictably, people were celebrating in the streets. It wasn’t as great a turnout as the mourners, but the death of the Patriarch was celebrated by public displays of nudity, copious drinking, and small parades of musicians who played bawdy songs loud enough to be heard over the wall between the cities. He felt nothing but disgust for this fractured city.

  He made his way into his apartments, ready to take a bath and wash away the grime of the streets. Since becoming a Stormlord, he took baths more regularly. Since he didn’t need the water to be heated anymore, his marble tub was always filled with fresh, cold water.

  As he undid his robes, he thought he heard the floor creak behind him.

  “Maddox?” Heath called out to the empty apartment. “Is that you?”

  Silence. Hopefully it was Safina’s courier, but Heath had locked the door behind him.

  He turned and walked into the living area, scanning for any disturbance and stepping lightly to avoid any creaky floorboards. Out of old habit, he had made a point to memorize them.

  He gingerly crept toward his bedroom.

  A figure in a long black cloak stood, back toward Heath, gazing out the window. Its hands were folded behind its back.

  “You have a very short time to explain why you’re here,” Heath said, readying himself to strike.

  The figure took its time in turning around and sliding off the hood. Heath’s stomach clenched. She was dark skinned, middle aged, and deadly serious. The right side of her face bore a nasty scar. Her dark eyes narrowed as she sneered. “Heath. It’s so good to see you.”

  “Daphne… you died,” he whispered. He had seen his old mentor fighting with all her might against Satryn as they made their escape from the tower. He had seen the tower fall over the cliff and into the lake below.

  She grinned out of the corner of her mouth. “Who I used to be died. Just like you used to be someone else.”

  “Why are you here?” Heath asked.

  She scoffed. “Really? You want me to spell it out for you?”

  “You’re here to kill me.” Heath folded his hands across his chest.

  She sighed heavily. “Of course I’m here to kill you. Whom did you think they would send? Or did you think the Inquisition would just let you go on being a heretic and playing house with the daughter of the woman who killed fifty thousand citizens of Rivern?”

  “You taught me everything I know,” Heath reminisced. “You taught me how to fight, how to lie, how to kill… But you’ve got ten years on me. Even without my power, your chances of walking away from this alive are small. You’re a lot of things, but you aren’t stupid.”

  “You’re right.” Daphne slipped a thin glass vial out of her pocket. Inside was a garishly spotted black orchid. The century orchid—one whiff of its fragrance was instantly fatal.

  Heath backed away and covered his face. “Think about this,” he said.

  Daphne laughed. “Don’t worry. This is just my insurance policy. If you blast me with lightning, this bottle is sure to break open. I may not be as quick as you, but I’m much, much smarter.”

  “What do you want?” Heath asked.

  “Vengeance,” Daphne said, her voice cold as ice. “For the fifty-six thousand souls who died in Rivern. Thrycea will answer for each of them in blood until every Stormlord has been wiped off the face of Creation. Your theurgy is dangerous, and I have started a Crusade to bring you down. For what it’s worth, I’m sorry for the way things have worked out.”

  “Daphne—don’t do this. Satryn is dead, and if I can secure votes from the Grand Assembly, Nasara will be deposed. Jessa and Sireen are different,” Heath pleaded.

  “You’re one of them!” Daphne spat, her eyes glowing with anger.

  “So how are you going to play this, Daphne?”

  They glared at each other in silence. Heath could hear the muffled steps of people in the room above and the wisps of melody from a band playing in the crowded street below. A bird chirped happily on the balcony outside the living area.

  Daphne took a deep breath. Heath unleashed a bolt of electricity across the room. Daphne had already thrown the vial in his direction, and she launched herself backward through the window, shattering the glass as his bolt grazed her shoulder. At the same time, the vial came tumbling down through the air toward him.

  His reflexes were fast enough to process all of this at once. He spun and raced toward the bathroom. Taking a deep breath, he continued running as hard as he could. He plunged face first into the marble tub, knocking his head against the rim.

  He kept his face underwater, breathing it as easily as he did the air. Blood from his wound clouded the water with the taste of iron, and he healed it with his Light. Filling his lungs with as much water as they would hold, he emerged from the bathtub.

  Dripping wet, he marched to the spot on the floor where the orchid lay and cupped it in his hand. He carried it toward Maddox’s room, found a vial and stoppered it.

  Heath waited for the air to clear and then spat out the water from his chest. I am officially too old for this shit.

  He was still gasping for breath when he heard a knock at his door.

  “Just a minute!” he said, running his hands through his still soaked graying hair. He composed himself as best he could and went to greet Safina’s courier.

  SEVENTEEN

  Artifacts

  SWORD

  The Great Houses of ancient Sarn bore little resemblance to the Seven Houses of Baash, aside from the use of the word “House” which was a completely different word in their tongue (Thigurasa).

  Thigurasa (House) Crigenesta was known for its wit. Their motto was “The Last Laugh,” which was appropriate given their predilection for elaborate pranks and humiliating curses. Of all the houses, they took the Liberty Games least seriously, fielding ridiculous champions on the sands of the arena.

  For the Games one year, they submitted a chicken in lieu of a gladiator. The bird took over thirty minutes for the lumbering champion of Thigurasa Thanomeda (motto: “The Cutting Remark”) to catch it, much to the howling amusement of the gathered dignitaries. Thanomeda won the contest but lost Liberty (the Sarn equivalent of wealth), a defeat from which it recovered.

  Their only true rival at the peak of their power was Thigurasa Setahari (motto: “The Deadly Whisper”). They were less amusing but no less cunning. For their champion against Thigurasa Cydorine (motto: “The Burning Question”), they entered the three-year-old daughter of Cydorine’s gladiator, who took his own life.

  —EXCERPT FROM QUILL’S THE FALL OF NATIONS, VOLUME 1

  SWORD AND MADDOX made their way through the twisting hive of empty stone tunnels. The Sarn had excavated them millennia ago using great burrowing machines and had finished them with builder automatons. The stonework remained in good repair in many places. It seemed the prison was a fitting monument to the Suzerain’s rule.

  “Look at these cheekbones; there’s a mathematical placement and symmetry. It’s like what an artist wants to paint but can never capture.” Sword was admiring his reflection in his mirror smooth blade.

  Maddox, who had passable cheekbones at best, was not pleased by this revelation. “Stop fucking looking at yourself.”

  “If you can’t admire the craftsmanship of the Patrean Fathers, there is something wrong with you. This body is as much a lost relic as I am. The theurgy to create life and give it this kind of power… You have to agree it’s an astonishing achievement.”

  Maddox ran his fingers through his brown hair. “Do you know how it works? Can it get us out of this maze?”

  “Man, take another bump of devil dust. It might chill you out.”

  “It’s a stimulant, and I can barely feel my teeth,” Maddox said. “I don’t think that stupid plan will help us.”

  “You’re moving around anyway,” Sword said. “That’s better than before.”

  Maddox spun around. “Fuck you.”

 
Sword shrugged. “See? You’re getting angry. Your emotions are coming back.”

  “The point of almost every emotion is to make it go away,” Maddox said.

  “What about happiness or love?”

  “Wouldn’t know from experience.”

  Sword rolled his eyes. Maddox could be so melodramatic.

  Maddox continued, “I’m better off not feeling anything. The knowledge I gained from the Guides makes me a danger to Creation itself. Daphne wasn’t wrong with what she did. The less I feel, the less likely I use that knowledge to fuck everything up. And I would fuck things up.”

  “What Daphne did to you wouldn’t last, not for eternity,” Sword said. “I can’t keep you locked down forever; it’s a full time job, and I need excitement once or twice a century. Fact is, the more years you live in this world, the greater chance a bird will crap on your head. It’s not a reason to spend eternity locked indoors.”

  “A bird?” Maddox asked incredulously.

  “I’m not good with words now. And it happened to Soren the other day.”

  “When my bird shits on me, it levels continents,” Maddox said.

  They really needed to get off this metaphor. Sword said, “You have an education and friends who care about you. That’s more than most people get.” He flashed back over Soren’s memories and felt that keenly. The boy was barely literate and had been tormented as a weakling.

  “They care about you… not me.” Maddox turned away, but Sword knew Maddox was glowering.

  “I care about you… you stupid shit,” Sword huffed. “And if you’d stop being an asshole, for just a second, maybe more people would. Heath turned down a bounty to warn you the Inquisition had you on their list. He may not say it, but leaving money on the table is his equivalent of taking an arrow to the knee. And Jessa? She’s actually a better person than all of us combined. Of course she cares.”

  Maddox shook his head.

  “People hurt you. Your father hurt you,” Sword said. “But if you don’t let yourself feel anything, you will drown your life in loneliness to avoid some hurt feelings. It makes no sense. You’re bigger than the pain you’re afraid of. I know you better than you do, and you’re not a weak person.”

  Maddox puffed his chest a little. “Whatever.”

  They continued down the tunnels in silence. They were marked with pictograms and Sarn script, which Sword could translate. It took them a good thirty minutes to make it to the top level. The remains of human bones and shattered machinery in the corridors told the story of a bloody conflict. Lying atop the shattered remains of a metal octopus was a skeleton, a rock still clenched in its hand.

  They hastened through a room dominated by shattered columns of heartstone. The gem had turned gray and chalky during the Long Night, when all of Sarn’s collected wisdom was destroyed by waves of psychic madness. The archives would have likely held the personal memories of the citizens, their most private secrets lost forever.

  Seeing a light ahead in the tunnel from one of the side passages, they froze.

  Sword asked, “How do you want to handle it? This brain is not so good with making plans.”

  “The fuck should I know?” Maddox shrugged and walked toward the light.

  Sword ran to catch up as Maddox rounded a corner through a stone archway into a vast chamber. A mural of a pastoral lake was painted on the wall, faded and flaking off in chunks. The trees in the image still moved as if by a gentle breeze, and the sun rose over the horizon, providing soft illumination. It was likely enchanted to match the time aboveground.

  “Whoa,” Maddox said, surveying the room. Workbenches were laden with instruments. Skeletons wearing shining mechanical limbs were strapped to tables. Segmented insectile arms and legs were attached over the bones like armor.

  “It’s a lab,” Sword said.

  “No shit.” Maddox leaned over a skeleton with an artificial arm and leg. He tapped his finger on the metal. “Is this the same alloy you’re made out of?”

  “It’s probably a more flexible alloy,” Sword said.

  “Why are they all dead?” Maddox asked.

  “Do you have to ask?”

  Maddox shook his head. “These were your people, right?”

  “I was forged in one of these rooms for House Crigenesta. They were a valiant house of warriors… once. We fought the Patrean armies on the proving fields. Beat them more than they beat us.”

  “What did you fight over?” Maddox scrunched his brow. “Both civilizations had theurgy that could provide for everyone’s needs.”

  Sword shrugged and wiggled the prosthetic arm on one of the skeletons. “They were biomancers, we were artificers. Patreans created servants, we built artifacts. Sarn disagreed with creating artificial life, Patrea felt the same way about artificial intelligence. People had strong feelings that you could only be one or the other.”

  Maddox smirked. “Nice to know humanity can still find ways to divide ourselves based on arbitrary differences.”

  “Moot point now,” Sword admitted.

  Maddox peered at some shelves and reached toward an assortment of slim metal rods in an ornate bronze canister.

  “Stop!” Sword shouted. He quietly added, “You can’t touch any of this stuff. It might still have enchantment.”

  Maddox waved his hand and drew a slim metal rod tipped with a green crystal. It spun in the air above his hand and extended telescopically from four to seven inches. He leveled his green eyes at Sword. “Relax. It’s just a glyphomantic stylus. It looks incredible.”

  Sword thought better about arguing with Maddox. A glimmer of childlike wonder twinkled in the mage’s eye, and for a second, he almost looked like his normal self.

  Sword shrugged. “Go for it. What do we care? If it possesses you, I can cut your head off. I think the residual theurgy from your Seal of Vitae will keep me from starving till tomorrow.”

  Maddox took the stylus in his hand and hefted it. The tip illuminated as he waved it in the air. “By the fucking Guides—it’s stabilizing my strokes, like a mercury core, but it anticipates geometric patterns. This is fucking incredible.”

  Satisfied that Maddox wasn’t possessed, Sword said, “We should get out of here.”

  Maddox gazed at the other implements on the shelf. “This is the archeological find of a lifetime. The lore in this room would be worth millions.”

  “You already have millions,” Sword said. “This magic came at a terrible price, and the people of Sarn reaped that when Achelon unleashed the Harrowers. Do you really want to bring all this back into the world?” He waved at a ribcage that had been fitted with gleaming rivets.

  Maddox pocketed the stylus. “Fine. But they’ll find this eventually.”

  Sword pointed his blade at a heavy metal door at the end of the chamber. “That door is impregnable. There’s no way to the surface from any of these chambers. If it were accessible, it would have been picked clean.”

  Maddox raised his hands and tried to budge the portal, but nothing happened. “I can’t open it. Maybe you could cut through it or do that thing where you disrupt magic.”

  Sword said, “If I open that door, it’s open forever.”

  Maddox glared at Sword. “I just want to go topside and get a nice bottle of wine that I can drink till I pass out. We can’t go back through those tunnels. We’ll be lost down here forever.”

  “Your seal can sustain both of us,” Sword said. “We’ll find another way.”

  “What other way?” Maddox challenged. “Either this set of tunnels connects to the surface or we’re effectively trapped here for all time. I don’t want to spend eternity with you like this. I am inches from losing my shit and inscribing the Seal of Seals.”

  Sword walked over and placed his hands on Maddox’s narrow shoulders. “Help will come. Whether you want it or not.”

  “What help?” Maddox asked.

  They both turned when they heard a woman’s voice say, “Me.”

  The Libertine reclined reg
ally atop one of the empty workbenches. She wore a brazier and tight breeches, crisscrossed by a mesh of metallic ribbons that showed enough skin to be enticing without being vulgar. Her dirty blonde hair hung in lazy waves around her heart-shaped face.

  “Libby,” Sword said.

  “You seem stuck,” she remarked, sliding off the table. “It’s understandable. People weren’t meant to escape these tunnels. As you might imagine, I spent some time down here back in the old days.” She coughed for a moment.

  The Libertine was a Traveler, an ancient race of mages dedicated to their own obscure agendas. Hers was to feed off misery and in its wake leave an unseemly sense of false mirth amid chaos. She was the most ancient power in the room and the closest thing to a god in Creation.

  Maddox stepped toward her. “You were in Rivern. At my old bar.”

  She shrugged. “It’s the only thing still standing in the Backwash. You’re welcome for that by the way.”

  “What do you want?” Sword asked, blade ready to strike. He wondered briefly if Soren’s body could absorb her power and whether that would be wise.

  “I want what you do,” she said. “And I’m not here as part of my wyrd. This is personal. I was down here digging through the Artifex’s shit. The man never threw anything out. Do you remember how battle cards were all the rage during the interregnum? He has all of them.”

  “A Traveler has to follow their wyrd,” Sword said.

  “Our wyrd and our word.” She smiled sadly. “But only if we want access to our power. As I said, this is a personal matter—I need you two to settle a score for me.”

  Maddox recalled, “I thought your whole thing was to purge people of their negative emotions—a bit hypocritical to be carrying a chip on your shoulder.”

  “We are all paradoxes. I had to become something else to remain myself,” she offered as a non-explanation.

  Maddox shook his head. “Last time we met, I was the Sword. But I remember the Sword used my hands to choke you. I will gladly do the same if you don’t get to your fucking point.”