Heretic of Set

by J. Steven York

  As for Dejal, boyhood friend, and once comrade in battle, there was a very personal score to be settled before Anok’s final day came. Dejal must pay for—

  He grimaced, and tried not to think about the beautiful Sheriti’s murder. He pushed the rage he felt down into a deep recess of his heart, to fester with the almost infinite supply already waiting there. He had to maintain the pretense of friendship with Dejal, at least a little longer.

  They passed the huge golden statue of a coiled serpent guarding the temple entrance, then through the doors to the ornate outer hall, with its gracefully tapered columns and wrought-iron chandeliers. They turned left and took a win dowless corridor parallel to the main ceremonial chamber. Passing an archway watched over by four scarlet-sashed guardians of Set, they left the temple’s public areas and descended a long staircase leading down into the catacombs beneath.

  It was in this maze of ancient passages, many of which predated the construction of the temple itself, that the true secrets of the cult resided. The tunnels went on for leagues, extending far beyond the temple’s foundations, and even beyond the plazas and gardens that surrounded it. In his time there, Anok had never come close to seeing their true extent. Some of the senior acolytes claimed they had no end, and others, that they led down to the flaming pits at the heart of the world.

  Anok suspected these were mere tales concocted, like so much of the cult’s doctrine, to create fear and confusion. On the other hand, he had seen terrors and wonders in these depths that prevented him from completely dismissing any claim, no matter how absurd it might seem, without firm evidence to the contrary.

  He had seen forbidden caves filled with giant serpents, shrines to forgotten gods, pits filled with the bones of countless thousands, lakes of blood, glittering treasure troves, libraries full of ancient scrolls, and vaults brimming with artifacts both ancient and evil.

  But these catacombs were at least one more thing. To the novice acolytes of Set, they were home. For it was in the catacombs that they lived in their humble cells, studying Set’s evil works and seeking power in his service.

  Their path took them back, beneath the great altar, where countless innocents had been sacrificed to Set through the ages, to a quadrangle of corridors that surrounded the cells.

  Or should have. They turned the familiar corner, only to find themselves at the end of a long and unfamiliar corridor. Anok stopped short, as did Dejal a few steps later. They both looked around in confusion.

  “Spell of deception,” said Anok. “We’ve been tricked!”

  Dejal quickly reached beneath his robe and extracted the short staff he had of late been building as his focus of power. The staff was as thick as a man’s wrist and the length of a man’s arm. Dejal had carved ancient runes and mystic picto glyphs into the dark wood, and a fist-sized ball of crystal was held in the mouth of a metal serpent at the top.

  He held the staff up in front of him and waved it back and forth. “Power of Set, protect me from my foes!”

  Anok said nothing, produced no object of power. He merely raised his hands.

  Suddenly, from the dimly seen end of the corridor, a ball of flame appeared, and with a roar began to rush toward them, like a charging bull.

  “Flood of Flame!” shouted Dejal. “My ward won’t defend against that!”

  Anok planted his feet firmly on the dusty stone, held out his spread fingers, and shouted, “Deluge!”

  From nowhere a wall of heavy rain appeared in front of him. The ball of flame struck the rain with a sizzle, and the combination instantly flashed into a thick, warm fog that flowed over them harmlessly.

  “Clever, Anok Wati!” The deep voice seemed to boom from the air all around them. “Your elemental magic never fails to impress. Yet can it save you from a more subtle attack?”

  Anok cried out in pain and grabbed his head. He felt as though a hand had reached inside the skull and was crushing his brain.

  He struggled to resist, to summon some counterspell, but the maddening pain gave him no quarter. His power failed him.

  He dropped to his knees, groaning in agony.

  Dejal stepped in front of him, arm outstretched, staff parallel to the floor. “Ward of protection, to my ally as myself!”

  The pressure instantly released, and Anok dropped to his hands and knees as though cut down from a hangman’s noose.

  “Quickly,” shouted Dejal, “counterattack!” He waved the staff. “Peal of thunder!” With a mighty rumble, a visible blast of force shot down the corridor at their unseen enemy.

  “Anok! Some help here!”

  Anok struggled to stand, managing to get up on one knee and raise his hands. “Pestilence!” The air swirled, and a few cockroaches materialized on the corridor walls before the swirl faded out. Anok sagged, exhausted from the failed effort.

  “Enough!” The voice boomed again, this time from behind them.

  Dejal lowered his staff, and turned to face the footsteps approaching from behind.

  Anok finally managed to stand. He saw three robed figures approaching them. The two on the outside wore dark, blood-colored robes similar to his own, though the yokes over their shoulders marked them as full acolytes and not just novices as Anok and Dejal were.

  The man in the middle, taller than the others, wore the scarlet robes, trimmed with gold, of a priest of Set. As he approached them, he threw back his hood, revealing his pearly skin and white hair, identifying him as descended from one of the most ancient and revered of Stygian lines. Both Anok and Dejal knew him well. He was Ramsa Aál, the temple’s Priest of Acolytes.

  Ramsa Aál stopped and looked at Dejal. “Well done, acolyte. You’ve prepared your staff to store a useful assortment of spells and wards. However, as the Flood of Fire spell proves, you need to be prepared for simple, physical attacks as well.”

  Dejal bowed his head. “The staff of power is far from complete, Master. I’m preparing a jewel of reckoning to be mounted beneath the crystal. That should deal with such attacks.”

  He turned his attention to Anok. “That was—disappointing, Anok Wati. You carry the sacred Mark of Set on your left wrist. It is mysterious to me that such vast power should fail you.”

  “I’m sorry, master. As you know, I expended great energies when I went on my mission of vengeance. Perhaps my powers have yet to recover.” This was no lie. Believing his friend and lover Sheriti to have been murdered by the gang lord Wosret, leader of the White Scorpion gang, Anok had hunted down and killed them all, finally calling down lightning that blasted their stronghold into rubble.

  Yet it was also a lie, for he suspected he had tapped only the smallest sample of the power he now possessed. The trouble was not in tapping the power, it was in keeping it in check once released. Only after killing Wosret had he learned that Dejal was Sheriti’s true murderer, and now his anger, and his power, had a new natural target. It took all his will to keep that power in check, to keep from vaporizing Dejal with but a thought, and to direct the power elsewhere.

  It was that effort which had brought him to his knees, not the summoning of energy for a counterspell.

  Ramsa Aál studied him. “Perhaps it is time for another test. There are many aspects to a sorcerer’s abilities—power, yes, but also skill, knowledge, and of course, will. Let us see if you still have the will to be an acolyte of Set.”

  Ramsa Aál gestured for the two novices to follow him. The senior acolytes remained behind. Doubtless it had been they, not Ramsa Aál, who had performed the practice attacks and the spell of deception. A priest such as Ramsa Aál would never waste his great powers on such a trivial task.

  They rounded a corner and instantly were back in their familiar home, the corridor outside their cells. Anok glanced back and found only a solid corridor wall behind them.

  Ramsa Aál led them past their individual cells to a common room often used by the novice acolytes for discussions or games of chance. He went to a locked cabinet in the corner and, extracting a brass key from unde
r his robe, unlocked it.

  He glanced back at them and pointed at the round, wooden table in the center of the room. “Sit,” he said.

  Anok and Dejal pulled up benches and sat across from each other at the table. Anok watched, curious, as Ramsa Aál extracted an unfamiliar metal object from the cabinet.

  It was round, as wide as a man’s body, shaped like two shallow bowls, or perhaps two shields, joined lip to lip. It was made of bronze, inlaid with polished copper, and intricately engraved with ancient hieroglyphs in concentric bands that circled its circumference. At the extreme bottom of the object was a small, bluntly pointed, projection.

  Ramsa Aál put the object on the table between them, holding it balanced on the bottom point. “This,” he said, “is a wheel of Aten. It is a simple device, powered by its own mystic energy. It responds not to power, but to will. I will spin it, thusly.” He gave the disk a rapid spin, which caused it to balance, wobbling, on its point.

  “Anok! Focus your will on continuing the wheel to your left!”

  Anok stared at the spinning object, pictured its movements in his mind, then tried to imagine it spinning faster. To his amazement, the wheel responded, the hieroglyphs turning into a blur. The wobbling ceased, and the wheel spun smoothly in the center of the table.

  “Now,” continued Ramsa Aál, “Dejal. Focus your will on the wheel also, but I want you to focus your will to spinning it to your right!”

  Dejal leaned forward, his dark eyes narrowing. His brow furrowed with concentration.

  The wheel wobbled slightly, then lurched.

  In an instant, it was spinning as rapidly as ever, but now to the right.

  Ramsa Aál stood back and smiled. “This is a contest of wills. Let us see which of you will be the victor.”

  Anok lowered his head, felt the spinning wheel in his mind, and willed it to spin to the left.

  Nothing happened.

  Harder!

  Anok smiled as the wheel reversed direction, spinning ever faster.

  Dejal frowned, his lips pressed tightly together in concentration.

  Suddenly the disk was spinning to the right.

  Anok strained, again reversing the disk.

  Then Dejal.

  Then, with great effort, Anok.

  Dejal leaned closer to the spinning disk, putting his palms flat on the table at his sides. He seemed to tap some deep reserve.

  The disk reversed, spinning ever faster to the right. Dejal smiled, then laughed.

  Anok struggled to reverse the disk, but without result.

  Dejal laughed louder.

  Anok looked into Dejal’s face, ivory-pale like the priest’s. The black eyes sparkled with malice. Again the laugh.

  That laugh! Anok imagined that laugh as Dejal slit Sheriti’s throat. That face, cruel and utterly lacking in kindness or mercy—

  There was a snapping sound, and the disk again spun to the left, faster now.

  Anok remembered seeing her body, the bruises on her alabaster skin, the blood caked on her wounds—

  Something howled, a long, rising note. The disk spun faster, no more than a blur now.

  Ramsa Aál’s eyes widened with concern. “Anok!”

  But Anok thought only of Sheriti. He now admitted to himself what he had never been able to when she was alive.

  He loved her.

  He had always loved her, since he first met her in the Great Marketplace as a child. Since he had saved her life and returned her to her mother, and they, in turn, had given him a place to live, and a new purpose.

  The howl turned into a shriek, growing in volume. The wheel spun furiously, and wisps of smoke curled up from the wood under its supporting point.

  Why had he never admitted it to himself? Why had he never told her? He had shared, in the end, his bed with her. Why had he never shared his heart?

  The disk weaved from side to side, tracing curling lines of charred wood on the tabletop as it moved. The shrieking grew louder, becoming almost unbearable.

  “Anok!” Ramsa Aál shouted.

  What he could give, what he would pay, an eternity of torment, for but five minutes in her company, to show her his heart, to pledge to her his love!

  But that would never happen.

  Never.

  Betrayer!

  Defiler!

  Murderer!

  A deafening crack echoed through the room.

  The disk shattered, fragments flashing through the air.

  Wood splintered.

  Pottery shattered.

  Chips of stone flew through the air.

  Anok blinked, stared at the empty table, with a startled Dejal cautiously peering over the edge.

  Anok looked up at the priest, who in turn was calmly contemplating the long, jagged, shard of metal half-embedded into the stone wall next to his head.

  The priest licked his lips. “Well,” he said, “that was unexpected. This isn’t usually such a hazardous exercise. Clearly, Anok Wati, you are not lacking in will.” He reached out and touched the metal with his finger, then looked back at Anok. “In one week’s time, you will be promoted to full acolytes, and it will be time for you to take the next step in your studies. Especially for you, Anok Wati, I will have to consider how you may best restore your powers.”

  The priest turned to leave. “I think, perhaps, a journey may be in order.”

  2

  IF KHEMI WAS actually three cities in one—the slums of Odji; the enclave of foreigners, Akhet; and the inner city of true Stygians—then Anok’s life had wound through all of them.

  He had been born with the name Sekhemar, in Akhet, the product of an arranged marriage between an Aquilonian merchant and the daughter of a Stygian noble. His mother had been killed by bandits when he was an infant. He had been raised in isolation by his father until his twelfth year, when his entire life changed.

  Strangers had come to their home late one night, dressed in concealing robes. His father had greeted them with familiarity, and so it was with shock and horror that Anok had seen the men murder his father before his eyes.

  As his father lay dying, he had given Anok a mysterious iron medallion and instructed him to flee Akhet. He should not seek revenge. Instead he should seek out his sister, a sister Anok had never heard of before, and give her the medallion. She would know what to do with it. Anok had fled the house as the robed men were burning it to the ground, and left Akhet forever.

  Orphaned and alone, living in fear of the men who had killed his father, he had gone into the slums of Odji, taken the name Anok Wati, and learned how to survive.

  He made friends there: Teferi, the dark-skinned giant of a warrior with a surprisingly gentle heart, beautiful Sheriti, daughter of a whore, pledged never to follow her mother’s path, and Dejal, runaway son of a Stygian noble, seeking, or so he claimed then, to escape his father’s influence and the corruption of the Cult of Set.

  He had lived in the old horse stalls beneath the Paradise brothel, where Sheriti’s mother plied her trade. His friends gathered there. They called themselves the Ravens, and Anok’s humble dwelling the Nest, and together they had made a reputation for themselves on the street.

  They were hired by merchants, tradesmen, and the gang lords who ruled the streets. They served as couriers, guards, bouncers, and negotiators. They developed a reputation for honesty and honor that had served them well. Anok was known for his negotiating skills, and he had settled many an intergang or business dispute without spilling a drop of blood.

  But they were also known as fighters, swift, agile, and fearless, a force to be reckoned with if blades were ever drawn. Anok, who could fight as well with his left hand as his right, and always carried two swords, became known as the “two-bladed devil.”

  There were other Ravens who had come and gone, and a few who had died, but it was the four friends, Anok, Teferi, Sheriti, and Dejal, who had stayed together and been there for all their adventures. For years, they were princes of their tiny world.

 
But Anok’s life had changed again. Despite his pledge to his father, he had never gotten over the murder or his thirst for revenge.

  Of his supposed sister he had never found a trace, but he had learned one secret of the medallion he had been given. It could be opened with a hidden catch, and inside was hidden a golden charm that he later learned was called a Scale of Set.

  As they reached adulthood, the Ravens began to crumble. Teferi developed a wanderlust and wished to leave Stygia behind. Trained to read and write by Anok, Sheriti had been accepted as an apprentice scribe, a position that would allow her to escape both Odji and her mother’s fate. Worst of all, Dejal reconciled with his father, embraced his dark Stygian heritage, and joined the Cult of Set as a novice acolyte.

  As for Anok, he was being aggressively recruited by the gang lord Wosret, leader of the White Scorpions, who feared the adult Anok would turn from hireling to rival.

  Lost, troubled, and running out of options, Anok had taken up one of Teferi’s people’s traditions and gone on Usafiri, a sacred journey into the wilderness to seek wisdom and purpose.

  Anok had only half believed, yet he hoped to lose his father’s medallion in the shifting sands of the desert and finally put his past behind him.

  It wasn’t to be. After many trials where he nearly died, Anok had an encounter—be it vision or real he still could not say—with the skeleton of a giant snake. The snake talked to him and claimed to be Parath, a lost god of Stygia. Once friend to the gods Set and Ibis, Parath was betrayed by both and cast into the desert for eternity.

  In return for his aid in gaining revenge against Set, Parath promised to help Anok take revenge against his father’s killers and to find the answers to all the secrets of Anok’s past. But to do this, Parath told him, he had to join the Cult of Set as Dejal had, learn its secrets, and strike at it from inside.

  To find his destiny, Anok would have to become one with the very thing he hated most.

  He would have to become an acolyte of Set.

  LATER THAT EVENING, Anok sat alone in his cell, studying yet another ancient scroll from one of the temple’s archives. The cells were small and sparsely furnished, making the Nest, his old quarters under the Paradise brothel, seem positively luxurious. There was a table, a narrow bench for sleeping, a bench for sitting, a cupboard for storage, and a small scribe’s desk where he could conduct his studies.