Shower of Stones

by Zachary Jernigan

  Thoughts and emotions flooded his mind, disturbing in their alien intensity. Arrogance beyond human reason. Anger, cold and fathomless. Confusion upon the discovery that he, Evurt, stood in another’s skin. And attendant to the confusion, disgust. Vedas’s body, even the way the world appeared dim through his feeble human eyes, had repulsed Evurt.

  This, most of all, chilled Vedas to the marrow.

  He knew, now, how a god looked at humankind. The disdain, he had expected. Even the humblest merchant, risen to enough influence, soon became a master of contempt. Power begat this perspective, Vedas knew, and men could not entirely resist thinking of their neighbors as less than human: at various points in the history of the world, peoples had been enslaved and even made extinct. The cousin of such violence existed in every man. He could know that hate more intimately if he allowed himself to blame others for his ills.

  It was appallingly easy to create divisions, to build walls instead of bridges.

  The scorn of Evurt served to render all of his thoughts on the subject irrelevant, as if all of history had been as meaningless as children arguing over the rules of a game.

  As if failure were an inescapable taint, written into the very flesh and soul of mankind.

  ‡

  Vedas wanted nothing to do with gods. He never had, even when he believed all but one to be mere fictions, remnants of a long and deluded past.

  And now, sitting before him, yet a third god made real.

  That is, if Shavrim were to be believed. Vedas wanted to disbelieve him, but could not.

  “Why us?” was his first question.

  “I don’t have that answer, Vedas,” Shavrim said. “It’s not as if I can ask my brother now, is it? He has retreated, or you’ve pushed him to the back of your mind. But, at a guess? You’re strong, and you were in the right place at the right time, openly opposing Adrash on the world’s largest stage.”

  He dipped his head to Churls. “You were equally strong, if not in many ways stronger, and you’d fallen in love with him. You must have been a tempting pair, a lodestone for Evurt and Ustert.”

  Vedas neither accepted nor rejected this, though he allowed himself a measure of relief. How might he have reacted, had Shavrim claimed a god had inhabited him since birth—directing his every move, placing him strategically at this exact point and time?

  “Why are they here at all?” was his second question.

  Shavrim gripped his crossed ankles and rocked back, angling his face toward the open sky framed by the four walls of the ancient temple. Vedas followed his gaze, letting the pause stretch for several minutes before impatience compelled him to break the silence.

  He opened his mouth—and promptly shut it.

  The spheres of The Needle had been rearranged slightly. The two that had appeared closest to Jeroun were noticeably smaller. Both spun at a much-reduced rate. In addition, four of the smallest had been clustered together near the moon.

  Surely, he reasoned, an encouraging sign, yet he could not feel hope.

  “Consider your past,” Shavrim finally said. “Three score years and some, correct? The Needle has appeared the same, throughout. It has been a fixed thing. But three scores and some is no time at all. Still, it feels like something, no? You feel older, seasoned. Consider how alien former versions of yourself are to the man you have become. How few choices he made that you would make. How much of a fool he was, Vedas. Hold that awareness in your mind. Truly feel it, the regret and anger at your own stupidity, your cowardice and impotence.

  “Now, consider what you would do if you had even more time, perhaps millennia, to meditate on the actions or inactions of that fool. Would you not grow to hate yourself as no man has hated himself? Would you not wish to die, knowing you could never right your mistakes? Tell me that would not be the inevitable outcome of a life that long.”

  Vedas fixed him with a cold stare. “You wish to die? Somehow, I think you’re not trying hard enough.”

  Berun looked from Vedas to Shavrim. “Agreed. You tell us of your relationship to these—” he grunted “—gods. You tell us you are one of their number. Now you want death, perhaps the easiest thing for a man to achieve. No wonder you talk of fools.”

  Shavrim smiled, unwilling to take offense. “Wishing to die and dying are two separate things. I continue breathing not for lack of trying to quit. On occasion, that is: I’ve come to embrace my immortality. But this is not my point.”

  “Get to it, then,” Churls said. Without glancing up from her work—which she had continued, despite her wound—she gestured at Vedas with her skinning knife. “He asked a question, Shavrim.”

  “Which I was attempting to answer. Forgive me. I’ve spent many lifetimes not revealing what I am. I’ve had no practice at it, yet I’d prefer for you not to fly into a rage when I tell you this is all my doing. But that is not within my control, is it?”

  When no one answered, Shavrim’s smile dipped but did not disappear. He pointed to the moon, sighting along his thick forearm with a squint. “For most of my life, I’ve had Adrash over my head and five siblings buried under me. Humanity is the bridge between those two worlds. Though your expressions, and those of your creations—” he nodded at Berun “—are not my own, I’m fairly fond of you. My family and I once fought on your behalf, when we first identified the madness in our creator. Twenty thousand years later, when I felt the presence of Evurt and Ustert again in the world, I decided I must persuade them to help me.”

  Vedas stood, restless with questions yet unable to decide upon the most pressing. He massaged his temples and cracked his neck, trying to ease the tension that suddenly seemed bent on crippling him. Since Churls had rescued him, he had swung from one reaction to the next, one extreme giving way to another with no time to adjust. The earth was unstable beneath his feet.

  Fortunately, Berun had not been similarly affected.

  In addition, the constructed man had learned the art of sarcasm: “You felt the presence of Evurt and Ustert? And this simply happened to coincide with Adrash destroying The Needle?”

  “No. It wasn’t a coincidence. I told you the name of the elderman responsible. Pol Tanz et Som incited this. There is no other explanation.”

  “And how did he do that?” Churls said. “You’re telling us Adrash couldn’t simply swat him away? Who is this elderman, that he should inspire such world-shattering rage?” She stood, circled the fire and crouched, one bloody hand on Shavrim’s shoulder, face only inches from his. She spoke through a tight jaw. Spittle flew from her mouth. “Is he another god, then, or is he merely … ridden, like me? Or Vedas? Will we wake up tomorrow and find Berun taken, too?”

  She slapped him, her right arm a silver blur.

  The sound of the impact, the crack of timber.

  Shavrim’s head whipped to one side and he threw out an arm to steady himself.

  ‡

  Vedas tensed. It took him several heartbeats to realize just why he had done so, beyond the clear threat of Shavrim reacting to the blow.

  He stared at Churls’s bare arm, upraised and rigid, every muscle limned with tension.

  Sun-red, freckled skin. The faded markings of tattoos. Nothing more.

  And yet, his eyes had not deceived him.

  She had struck with the arm of the Goddess.

  ‡

  Shavrim chuckled.

  A handprint of hare blood was now emblazoned across his left cheek. His own blood welled at the left corner of his mouth. He licked his bruising lips and nodded.

  “Well delivered,” he said. “When you are as I am, Churls, you learn to appreciate anger that cuts to the point. At the same time, you avoid what is necessary to speed the process up. Don’t let my age fool you—there are things that frighten me. I have abilities beyond merely remaining alive, but they are a threat if allowed too deeply. I’ve not lived so long without … sequestering my existence, without forming identities that were thereafter abandoned. Within me are all the lives I’ve lived, a smat
tering of which possessed unusual insight. A few of these former Shavrims are anxious to return.”

  He stood and retrieved one of his packs. He removed a bundle of thin steel chain and threw it to Churls.

  “Wrists and ankles, as tight as you’re able,” he said, presenting his back to her and kneeling.

  “A chain?” Berun said. He got to his feet, his thousand ball joints sighing. “I can hold you tighter than any chain.”

  “You cannot,” Shavrim countered. “This is no ordinary chain, and I’m no ordinary man. No disrespect intended, Berun, but the one I’m summoning would have no problem proving just how greatly your strength is outclassed.”

  Berun crossed his immense arms. “You are bleeding. From a slap.”

  “Indeed,” Shavrim said. “But it wasn’t Churls who slapped me, not entirely—just as it won’t be me before you in a few moments. It’ll be a wilder, more brutal creature, kept in check only through the will of the man I am now, a small voice of reason attempting to quiet a storm.”

  Berun grunted, and turned away.

  Churls stared at the chains in her hands. For a mad moment, Vedas imagined she would strangle Shavrim with them.

  She began binding his wrists. “Who is this former self, this wild creature?”

  “A seven-thousand-year-old relic,” Shavrim replied. “A fool and a mass murderer. On occasion, I’ve given in to self-pity, allowing my hatred for Adrash to cloud my mind. During one such period, I traveled to the southern Tomen coast. I persuaded the locals there to accept my presence by telling their fortunes and fighting in their border skirmishes. I’ve always been good at the latter, but the former? Somehow, possibly by way of the madness I’d allowed to creep into my soul, I tapped into a potential I’d never known I had. I listened, and for the first time truly heard the dead.”

  Churls paused in her task. She could not avoid a quick glance in Vedas’s direction.

  “The dead?” she said. “What do you mean?”

  “I mean those souls still lingering near the living, unable or unwilling to leave the material world behind. They have much to say. Some are able to read the future—or predict it well enough to appear to read it. They have access to every moment of their lives. They observe us without our knowing. Because of the threat inherent in rousing my former self, I’d hoped to wait until proof presented itself concerning Pol Tanz et Som, who I believe to be dead. He was powerful, yes, and uniquely tempting for me: he inspired me, on many occasions, to bring my own former selves to the fore. Certainly, he was fated to madness because of what he’d done to himself, yet I don’t believe he was inhabited by one of my siblings.

  “As for Berun, I feel quite sure that he … I think I would have recognized …”

  He shook his head and lowered himself onto his side, allowing Churls to bind his ankles to his wrists.

  “No,” he said. “Enough waiting. This is wiser. It’s better to know for certain, now.”

  Vedas caught the man’s expression. It could not be mistaken for anything but fear.

  Shavrim met Vedas’s stare and lifted his chin, gesturing to their packs. “Hold a blade to my neck and remain ready. If I appear about to break my bonds, or if my state persists past the point where I’ve confirmed or denied our suspicions, slit my throat. I’ll bleed, but I won’t die, and it will weaken my body enough for me to reassert control of myself. In that case, leave me here and continue on. I’ll meet you in Ual, eventually.”

  Without waiting to see if his order was followed, he closed his eyes and took four immense breaths, the last of which he held still within him long enough to make Vedas concerned.

  He took a step toward Shavrim just as a great shudder ran through the horned man’s trussed body. Shavrim groaned, varying in pitch as the air—more air than lungs should hold, surely—passed out of him, finally winding down to a grating wheeze. The skin of his face, neck, and upper chest darkened, exactly as though he were choking. With a mighty gasp, he breathed in again. In, fully, and out, fully, the process resumed. Each time the cycle completed, the shuddering became more violent.

  Churls backed away. Vedas put the point of his sword to Shavrim’s throat, maintaining pressure upon it throughout the paroxysms. Berun continued to stand silent, arms crossed, glowering at the scene.

  ‡

  The shuddering stopped. Shavrim’s left eye opened, revealing a madly vibrating pupil. Gradually, it stilled and focused on Vedas, who pressed the tip of his blade more firmly to the man’s throat.

  A smile slowly pulled at the corners of Shavrim’s mouth. The right eye slowly opened.

  The huge, bunched muscles of his shoulders swelled as he tested his bonds.

  He grunted, and his smile grew wider.

  When he spoke, his voice was an octave lower—so low and accented that several seconds passed before Vedas realized the words were intelligible.

  “—that limp-pricked fool,” he said. “Friend to ghosts, fucker of men.”

  “Are you talking to me?” Vedas said.

  Shavrim regarded him silently. To a casual observer, he may have appeared still, yet Vedas noticed the subtle muscular contractions in his thighs, belly, and upper arms that gave him away. Shavrim was testing the chains, methodically, searching for a weakness, determining where best to apply his strength in order to escape.

  “No,” he finally answered. “I’m not speaking to you. I’m speaking to the faggot I’ve turned out to be.” He raised his head and inclined it quizzically, as though listening. He sniffed and sneered. “Or perhaps I’m wrong. You’ve the stink of one who’s been buggered, and also of the dead. Of course, you are going to die. All humans smell of the dead. I may be getting confused.”

  “I have questions for you.”

  A nearly sub-audible laugh. “Of course you do. It’s not as if I don’t know why I’m here. The world is at its end, and all of you …” He lifted his head and winked at Churls. He whistled at Berun. Vedas kept his blade steady. “… believe you can do something about it. Pissing idiot idea. Adrash was more than a match for the six of us gods, and now you …”

  All at once, his body went rigid. Vedas readied himself, but the man did not attempt to break free. In fact, after only a moment Shavrim dropped his head onto the ground and let it roll back, causing Vedas’s blade to etch a fine line of blood on the man’s throat.

  “Ah,” Shavrim said. “Ah-ha, ah-ha. Now I see. It took me a moment, but there it is. Hello, brother! Hello, sister! Can you hear me?” He looked up at Vedas, one eyebrow raised. “Are you in there, Evurt? Come out, come out!”

  Vedas allowed himself several heartbeats of reflection, shining a torch around the interior of his skull, searching for the interloper he knew to be hiding there, before answering. He increased the pressure on Shavrim’s neck, forcing the man to rest his head upon the ground or have his throat slit.

  “It’s only me,” Vedas said. “And I have questions that need answering.”

  Shavrim’s amused expression did not fade. “Oh, ask, Vedas Tezul. Ask away.”

  “You know of the elderman Pol Tanz et Som?”

  A slow nod. “Yes. Another buggering, presumptuous little shit.” Shavrim raised his chin to the night sky. “Still, he did accomplish this, more than most of you mortals ever will.”

  “Is he alive?”

  No hesitation. “Yes.”

  “Where is he?”

  “Don’t know. Don’t care.” He flexed at his bonds, no longer attempting to hide the fact.

  “Is he like us?” Vedas gestured to Churls. “Inhabited?”

  The chain rustled as it shifted on Shavrim’s wrist. “Like you two, you mean …” His eyes widened, and his voice lowered to a whisper. “Oh, good. Oh, very good.” He smiled, and his voice rose. “Pol, I have no idea. He has talent, and not a tiny bit of madness. But the bloody big man made of balls, there, behind me?”

  Berun uncrossed his arms.

  “Yes! You!” Shavrim called over his shoulder. “The fool I’ve be
come didn’t see it, right before his eyes, but I do. Hello, neither brother nor sister! Come out and play with us!”

  The constructed man took two steps toward Shavrim and halted, stock-still, as though both feet had become rooted to the ground. A whisper-soft sound of metal rubbing metal cut through the air: the closing and opening of his great fists.

  “The name, then,” he said. “Speak it.”

  “Sradir Ung Kim,” Shavrim said.

  Berun’s head swiveled from Vedas to Churls. “The names he spoke to you meant something. They stirred you. But there is nothing in this name, Sradir Ung Kim. I feel nothing. He is wrong.”

  “I’m not,” Shavrim said. “You’re merely thick. Sradir is within you, and it will come out. Soon, if I am any judge. It was always an odd one, choosing its odd moments.” He grinned at Vedas. “You’ll enjoy when it when it shows itself. Sradir was—is, I suppose—an unusual creature. It never seemed to get humans, the way the rest of us did. A wooden heart, that one.”

  He flexed at the chains once more, swelling his chest and heaving with every muscle. The chain groaned, and Vedas prepared to do what was necessary.

  Fortunately, the links held. Shavrim simply grunted and rested his head upon the ground.

  “Shavrim?” Churls said. Her voice made it clear which iteration of the man she had spoken to. “Shavrim? We have our answers, or as good as we’re going to get. Come back now.”

  Shavrim laughed. “Oh, he’ll not be coming back. And you haven’t all your answers. I have more to say about the dead. There’s another that hovers around Berun, and he means the world no good. He’d see a blanket of ash covering everything. Why? Who knows?” He shrugged, flexing once more at the creaking chains before subsiding with a contented smile. “And then there’s the little thing my weak heir hasn’t quite worked out. I’d particularly like to talk about her, as she seems to have a legion at her command.”

  “The little one?” Churls said.

  “Yes. The one standing behind you.”

  Churls turned, and Vedas looked up.