The Demon's Call

by Philip C Anderson

  The Grand Master could hold them no longer. He sidestepped and guided the missiles past him, but it felt like trying to direct a pellet from an old Dwarven firearm—contemptuous weapons that used explosive detonations to propel small pieces of metal and allowed their user to kill from shameful distances. One of the bullets shot into the darkness behind him, but Willa wheeled the other around and struck Trent in the back with a hot crack.

  His suit’s cooling system reactivated, and his display warned him about a vent on his back-left side: ‘CPD,’ in pulsing red letters. Critical Power Diversion. She’d overloaded him. His suit analyzed her in the bustling twilight and warned him of the power she’d already charged. Its threat-level settled on the border between three and four, five being the worst—Trent had never seen a five.

  Sweat beaded across Willa’s forehead and ran down either side of her face, catching stray hairs against her cheeks. Intense focus creased her brow and folded her ears back against her head. Her teeth bared in a sneer. She’d planted her right foot behind her and dug her heel into the dirt against the electricity that crackled between her joined fists. She stepped forward, and a ball of lightning grew between her hands when she pried them apart.

  Thunder echoed in a gale.

  Trent raised his left arm. “No more.”

  She took two breaths. “Do you yield?”

  He considered, eyeing the ball-lightning in her hands. The movements she’d used had proven unfamiliar to him, and he didn’t understand how to hit her through her defenses. He’d tired, and not wanting to cause problems with his armor, he nodded.

  Willa watched him, then her ears perked up and a smile spread across her lips and made it to her eyes. The lightning between her hands dissipated, and she hopped around and clapped, giggling. “Gods, that was incredible!” She ran to him, but she halted half a pace away. “Sorry, I just”—she offered her left hand.

  “I’ve never seen movements like that,” Trent said, shaking her hand. “Who taught you to fight?”

  “No one could. The—the Priests aren’t syste—matized yet. I’ve gotten to help figure out techniques, so this stuff was—mine, I guess.”

  “What was that ya did with your tail?”

  Willa shook her head. “Instinct. I’ve told myself time and again to not let anyone get behind me, to not turn my back, drilled myself on it. But it still happens sometimes, and I panicked.”

  “To be fair, you didn’t turn your back. You should follow your instincts more often. You’re a good fighter.”

  “Thank—thank you,” she said, still out of breath.

  Grenn clapped where he sat. He’d taken his helm down. “So the Undertaker’s been training Priests a hell of a lot better than they’re training Karlians. Story of my fuckin life.”

  “Don’t be sulky,” Willa said as they joined Grenn by the fire.

  “Not sulking. Just stating a fact. How long have you been training?”

  “Five years.” She sat. “And that’s just as a Priest. I was at High Tower when the Undertaker came for me.”

  Grenn tutted. “Five years ago, I was in Yarnle, so I think I get a pass. Not like they’re training Karlians better now than they were then.”

  Willa shrugged. “Maybe. Have you fought one from a younger class?”

  Grenn’s face twitched when he responded. “No.”

  “See. So how do you know?”

  He stared at her through squinted eyes. “Trent, back me up here.”

  “He’s probably right,” Trent said. “They’re not training ‘em any better now. Up until a few days ago, there was no need.” He wanted to add that the king had everything to do with the Priests learning and codifying what they knew, but he didn’t—probably wouldn’t be telling her anything new.

  Willa frowned, but she didn’t speak against him.

  Later that night while they ate, Trent asked Willa about how the Priests “… merged Ley and Light. I felt the power you channeled yesterday. I’d not experienced it before.”

  “You probably couldn’t have,” she said. “Light’s not the same. With the Ley, you can feel it, all the time, talk to it if you know how. You call for it, and it answers because it’s here even when we don’t. But the Light”—she shook her head—“cuh—comes and goes. Always there when you call, but it doesn’t stay. It’s like a sink fau—faucet. Trying to talk to it is like trying to talk to someone who’s speeding past you on a freeway while you stand on the shoulder.”

  Willa held out her hand and seized a static manipulation of Light, which magnified and bent the air around it. It answered her call as it did Trent’s, except she infused this instance with magic, and it became something else. She rolled it over her hand like a large coin.

  Its luminance transfixed her, and she spoke to herself: “Like the Ley, just a little different.” A few second’s quiet passed. “The Undertaker calls it Ley-Light. Simple, I know, but that’s what she wrote in the Leydendum—gods, and that’s a stupid portmanteau she came up with for our codification codex. She’d meant to change it, but it stuck.”

  Trent watched with envy-dosed wonder. The Light stayed for her—she cut it off from its source and kept it without having to channel. This had to be it: the future; the answer. Or a large part of it if not the whole. “Is it really so simple as the Leynar just not being Called?” he asked.

  “Dunno,” said Willa. “It’s en—ergy, just like the Ley. Light purifies the magic, and the magic spoils the Light. But it’s a good kind of spoilage, so I guess that might be the wrong word. Not bad, just different. S—something the Goddess condones, even needs of us.”

  A stutter of blue darted through the Light. It reminded Trent of something, but he couldn’t bethink what. “I just keep asking myself why we didn’t try before.” He honestly wondered if anyone ever had.

  “We couldn’t. Arnin”—she stopped. Surprise rounded Willa’s eyes at what she’d said—almost said—and quickly, her attention turned to the nutrition bar between her fingers.

  Trent didn’t push her. When next he spoke, he tried to sound casual. “Do you know much about the early days of the Order?”

  Willa stared into the fire. “Depends. How early?”

  “Tens of thousands of years ago.”

  She shook her head.

  “Back then, the scepter used us in means the Goddess didn’t intend—using our power in lieu of electricity before we even knew what electricity was, tasking us to fight unholy wars that didn’t serve our Purpose, expecting us to keep the peace. In trade, Karlians could practice their rites without consequence—as though they needed such permission. It bred a time when the Order split into two sects: one where they used their power with abandon, and one where they believed their ordained gift should serve a higher plan. That’s the reason the scepter and the Order are separate powers now—because the Aseities fought for and won that right. And I would counsel anyone to not conflate the two again.” Trent hoped Willa could discern a question he didn’t ask.

  Her face remained plain. “I’ve only known Manifeld as leadership. Well, he and Madam Undertaker, of course.” She bit a piece off her bar and crunched a peanut. “I don’t think that’s happening anyway. The king doesn’t seem too fond of him.”

  “Yeah.” After a pause, Trent added, “That’s how it seems.”

  “Anyway,” Grenn said, out of mood for the conversation, “saw that doggy you’re drawing. You should ask Trent about it. Did ya know he killed one the other day.”

  “You did?” she said.

  Trent cast a sullied look at the younger Karlian, whose indifference to the topic grated on him. He nodded. “Had to,” he said, keeping his voice even. “Is how it is.”

  “Saw you’re also trying to get a likeness for the thing that gave me this”—Grenn pointed to his face.

  Willa folded the pages she’d drawn on into the book she studied. The fire reflected off strokes of gold and black that formed the demons she drew. “Don’t go through my things.” Xenia made a dim
inutive chirp when the Priest snapped the book shut. Pawp.

  “I didn’t. They were just there.”

  “Well,” Willa said. She quieted for a few seconds. “Don’t.”

  “Do you know the doggies get bigger when they’ve got a master?”

  “I’ve only ever seen demons mastered by Warlocks. I’d love to see one true-mastered, though.”

  “You would?” asked Grenn, the mislike plain on his face. “Live long enough and it sounds like you’ll get to. Makes you wonder about the size of all of ‘em, huh?”

  “I mean, they don’t all get bigger like that,” she said. “Once a master gets to them, I mean.”

  “The lesser ones do,” Trent said, “but the greater ones are always that ugly. They don’t need the size advantage the lesser ones get. They’ve got—different abilities. Much different, especially after the last. But they do need a master to get outside the nether.” Trent reached for his tablet. “I’ve got a picture of the one from my farm—before I banished it.”

  “You do?” said Willa. “Can I see it?”

  Before he’d gotten the program up, she’d already moved next to him. He looked at her, bemused.

  “Sorry,” she said. “I—I just—can I?”

  “Sure.” Trent opened the proper application and swiped to the demon, a few back in his files.

  “Oh my gods.” Willa took the tablet and held it near her face, zooming in and out at different parts on the picture. “It’s huge. Looks like—just muscle with canvas stretched over it. And those teeth.” She stared into the fire for a few seconds. The light bounced off her eyes, and her pupils narrowed into slits. “We’re gonna need to study them if we want to put an end to this. I mean a real end to it.”

  Trent almost asked what she meant, but Grenn spoke first.

  “Can I ask you something?” He didn’t wait for her to respond. “Where’d you get your ears and tail from? I’ve seen cybernetics before—there’s nothing that good-looking on the consumer market. Were they a gift?”

  Grenn either didn’t notice or ignored it when Willa’s body tightened. She dropped her hands to her lap, and after a taut silence, she said, “I don’t want to talk about it.” Her voice had become rigid.

  “Come on,” Grenn said. “We’re all Order members here. What? Is your father rich or something? Do you regret ‘em?”

  Willa stood. “I said I don’t want to talk about it. Is tha—that okay w—with”—a growl came from deep in her throat, and she raised her voice—“okay with you?” She handed Trent his tablet before she padded toward her things. “Do you know an exchant?” she said to herself and flicked her right ear. “Try to take these off. Maybe the whole thing is just an illusion.”

  “Cool off,” said Grenn. “It was just a question.”

  Willa rounded on him. “Are you naturally thick-headed, then? Goddess, has it always been this hard when someone’s better than you at—anything? You must be mad a lot.” She headed toward the tent she’d set up for herself with her effects. “Thank you for the meal, Grand Master.”

  Though she couldn’t see him, Trent waved. He turned his attention to Grenn, whose gaze followed Willa.

  “Where ya going?” asked Grenn.

  “To bed! Is that all right?” None of them spoke as she entered her tent and pulled shut its flap.

  Grenn turned back to the fire and hooked his thumb behind him. “What in the hells is her problem? It’s like she didn’t understand me.”

  “Do ya have to antagonize her, Grenn? Goddess, do ya have to be a dumbass all the time?”

  “What? What the hells, you’re taking her side?”

  “There are no sides. And if you’re too blind or stupid to realize when you fuck up, you’re gonna have a hard time learning anything.” Trent stood and pilfered through his saddlebags, found the tent mechanism, and tossed it toward an open patch of grass away from the fire.

  Grenn said nothing. The fire filled the silence until Trent advised him, keeping his voice low.

  “Look, Grenn, you’re better than this. Demons won’t care about your good looks or your sense of humor. Even someone like Manifeld could prove an irreplaceable ally if the War goes on. You may not like it—I sure as hells don’t. But there comes a time when life trumps politics, and that time came a few days ago. We need these peoples’ help, and the last thing we should want is to estrange them, especially if they’re getting cozy with the king and cookin up something without Karhaal knowing about it.”

  Grenn, again, said nothing as he stared into the flames.

  “All right,” Trent said. “Try not to beat yourself up too much. Just do better.”

  Grenn nodded.

  “G’night.”

  Trent reckoned, as he entered his tent, that Grenn wanted something outside himself, and the young man both hadn’t found and didn’t know what to look for.

  The young Karlian’s whistles echoed and disappeared into the night, through which Trent edged the line of falling into pense while he rolled the stone his wife had given him between his hands, aware of the eyes that watched him. They didn’t push against him enough to make him set a ward, but they made sure he knew they saw him. His tablet chimed intermittently as it lost and gained service until it finally stopped during the dark hours, then the world quieted.

  The next day, an undue frost clung to the grass, a lingering touch of winter in the southwest. Trent fell from his pense and exited his tent. He stretched his left shoulder and tensed his thighs until they got a good burn in them.

  Grenn already waited at the fire. Willa had just sat on its other side.

  “Hi,” Grenn said with a sheepish awkwardness.

  “Hey.”

  “Sorry”—

  “Don’t.” She looked at him, deadly cross. “Just don’t bring it up again.” She got a small plate of potatoes from over the fire but eschewed any of the bacon.

  The rest of Grenn’s conversation directed toward Trent. “Been thinkin. It’s for the best I’m investigating the witch and the corruption. It’s my area of expertise, right? Handling a demon—I mean, would I even be able to?”

  Trent crunched into a piece of bacon. Goddess alive, this is gonna crack my damn teeth. He picked at a piece between his molars with his tongue. “Course you could. You’re fine at what you do, you’re just not hard-trained, War-trained. Fighting is different when it counts. Don’t disregard yourself.”

  Grenn ate the rest of his meal in silence, and Trent couldn’t help noticing the doubt across the young man’s face. He tried to remember if he had ever been so unsure. Not about fighting, at least.

  They headed out not long after they finished their food.

  Eastward gusts blew against them as they moved from the edge of highland forests to grasslands, where Tanvarnian winds ceded sand from the valley’s desert floor to the dirt and grass over which their steeds now carried them. To the south, the Sister Hills rose and fell along the Trustian border all the way to the Swoen Sea. Friendly raccoons tended the rolling lands, and though the aquifers there made it difficult to secure trade with the serrens, condors oversaw the grounds from the air.

  As they sped westward, the wood receded far off to their right, yet its darkness pressed against the day, crept too far into the light. The rune on Trent’s arm grew cold, and he peered north.

  Grenn pulled up next to him. “Did you feel that?”

  “Been able to,” Trent said, sensing the gazes from the distance. A whisper darted to keep up with him.

  Then a different voice spoke. “Clocks tick.” Her voice. D’niqa came to him as a double vision, a second sight that hung as a projection against the streaking landscape. “Coming into our domain, our hunting grounds, if you will.” She sounded excited.

  Muddy anger tempered Trent’s voice. “You and yours own nothing on Coroth, bitch.”

  She laughed. “What is ours spreads each day, right under your noses. Our power grows even now. Give up. Let this all go away like a bad dream. Your pursuit will not
end well for you, Grand Master.”

  “Are you afraid of what will happen when I catch you?” said Trent, unsure if he even whispered. “Away from me, foul demon.”

  Enough silence filled the interim while Raverord pounded dirt and grass underfoot that Trent wondered if she’d gone away, and that surreal notion of questioning one’s immediate past turned his insides cold.

  But she hadn’t left. “We’ve been watching you, Russell.”

  “Because you’re a creep. Your kind’s obsession with mine is nothing short of hideous.”

  “Not at all if you knew just how important you are to us. We can’t think of a better person to spend all our time looking after. But mark our words: do not challenge us.” She giggled and left. Despite her departure, the scrutiny of watching creatures impressed upon him their undeniable hunt.

  Trent pushed Raverord to move faster, and the albune’s legs yielded to his impulse. He couldn’t afford to not find her, none of them could, and though the master let him go with only taunts, finding the Tomb glued itself to the forefront of Trent’s mind.

  The grasslands gave way to chaparral, and farther west, mountains rose in bumpy, snow-crowned ridges.

  Tanvarn leaned over the horizon at midday. Its skyscrapers reached toward the heavens and framed the lower part of the city in a backdrop of sun and burnished steel. The River Niniphen flowed from the northern hills to a shimmering sea hundreds of miles to the south and split the city down its middle. Water channeled into the Lower City on its east bank in lanes miles long, where passenger ships and commerce vehicles made port, the latter taking special advantage of the river’s winter surge. To their left, Trent set his eyes on a freeway, a skinny serpent that dipped from the far-away mountains and pushed south and out of sight into the highlands beyond.

  “There she is,” Grenn said when they stopped at the last hill’s crest before the landscape descended to the valley floor. He sighed. “Not the way I thought I’d meet her, but I’m here.”