The Archon's Assassin

by D. P. Prior

  One of the skeletons was peering at a sleek gray slate in its hands. It reminded him of the devices the homunculi of Sektis Gandaw’s mountain used. As Shader pulled it free, brittle fingers snapped and dropped off.

  The slate looked as if it were made of metal but felt much lighter. It was glazed and had black circular protrusions in columns at the bottom. He pressed his thumb against one, blinking as the glazed portion flickered and then glowed with a soft light. Words came into focus on its surface—the last the Ancient had read:

  For if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection.

  Shader closed his eyes, remembering. Remembering resurrection, if that’s what it had been when he came back from the Abyss.

  What had happened to Tajen and the luminaries after he returned to his body? Had they been real? Victims like him of an illusory Araboth? Were they but phantasms of his own imaginings, a near-death vision desperately fabricated by his dying mind as the Dweller smothered him?

  When he opened his eyes, the slate darkened. He tapped it, and it flashed to life for an instant, just long enough for one more line to jump out at him:

  For he that is dead is justified from sin.

  It could have been a line from the Liber, but it wasn’t. The phrasing was different, and the surrounding sentences, what he’d glimpsed of them, were more… cohesive. Was this one of the texts Blightey had bastardized in his compilation of the Liber? Then the thought occurred to him it might even be the same scripture Thumil had promised to loan him at Arx Gravis, a promise that circumstances had stolen from his grasp.

  But why would an Ancient have been reading scripture? Weren’t they all as faithless as the Technocrat who governed them? Only Sahul remained free from that soulless reign, but even there, besides the Pardes community established by LaRoche, and the superstitions of the Dreamers, life had been pretty much “what you see is what you get.”

  Shader found himself studying the dead man’s skull, wishing for answers that could never be given. Had there been pockets of resistance to Gandaw’s atheism? Had these people been fleeing oppression? Or was it something even simpler, baser, more fundamental to human nature: had they seen the devastation of the Reckoning and turned to the old faith in desperation?

  He wanted to know more. Needed to. If he could read on, see exactly what the Ancient had turned to in his final moments…

  He jabbed each of the protuberances in turn. Nothing happened. He shook the slate, slapped it, but all the life had gone out of it. Whatever it had shown him, whatever snippet of the past had been revealed, was lost; as lost as the culture that had sired it.

  He lay the slate back down on its owner’s lap.

  Resurrection. “How did that work out for you?” he said to the skeleton. How had it worked out for Tajen and the luminaries? How had it worked out for Shader? He’d died, and he’d come back. But what had he come back as? And who? The thing that gave the lie to the idea he’d been resurrected in any real Nousian sense was what he’d come back to: more struggle, more doubt, and more bloodshed. Part of him still longed for the peace he’d briefly tasted in Araboth, before the Dweller had put paid to that particular illusion.

  His eyes roamed the carriage, resting on each of the skeletal passengers in turn. Their lives had been brief and fragile; their deaths much more enduring. Although, judging by the state of their crumbling bones and rotted ligaments, even this morbid frieze of the Reckoning would be no more than ashes in a few hundred years.

  Justified from sin.

  But were they? Was anyone? Did death really wipe away all transgressions? Or more accurately, did the death and resurrection of Nous? Was there even any such thing as sin?

  Yes, Shader had to answer. Yes, there was, if what he and Nameless had seen in Gandaw’s laboratories was anything to go by. If a man couldn’t call that evil, couldn’t condemn it as wrong, there was no hope at all, no sense to anything, no purpose.

  So why keep going? Why not back out while he still had the chance? While away the rest of his life in obscurity, doing the only things that really mattered: eating, drinking… He allowed himself a wry smile. It could be so simple, to eat, drink, and make love. The only problem was, he couldn’t see himself doing it. It was all so temporary, a series of diversions, a staving off of the inevitable.

  Shader shook his head at the Ancients wedged in their seats, waiting for their journey to resume but going nowhere. He reached for his hip flask, changed his mind and pulled out his Liber. The soft leather hung loose as he thumbed the curled and yellow-stained pages, looking for something inspiring, but settling—where he always did—on the Liturgy for the Dead.

  ***

  Caledon flicked his mane and rolled his eyes as they passed from the access shaft into another vast tunnel with a track leading away into the distance. This one ran parallel to the former, which had been rendered impassable by the crashed carriages and the bones of more of the dragon-like creatures that had savaged it.

  The roof here was in good repair, its overhead lights casting a warmer glow, and they made good progress as Shader thumbed the knots on his prayer cord, closing off one life-sapping train of thought after another, until he was acutely aware only of the moment: the blood flowing in his veins, the movement of breath in and out of his lungs, the steady beat of his heart. Gradually, that focus shifted outward, onto the uniformity of the tunnel’s walls, and before he knew it, he was counting off the sleepers between the rails.

  Caledon whinnied and balked, shaking his head from side to side. Something scuffed on the tracks behind, but when Shader turned to look, there was just empty tunnel.

  Shader rubbed Caledon’s flank and left him there, then crept to the intersection they had just passed. He pressed his back to the wall and let his hand stray to the hilt of the gladius.

  There was panting coming from the shaft—rapid stabs of breath interspersed with a sucking, slavering noise. A low growl sounded, followed by a few soft pads.

  Shader held his breath, touched his forehead, and then swung into the opening.

  Yellow eyes burned through the gloom, blinking, watching him with the patience of a wary hunter.

  Shader took a step toward it, sword rasping from its sheath. As the creature shifted, he caught sight of its shaggy bulk lurching back down the tunnel a few yards, before it stopped to stare at him again.

  His heart thumped as the beast rose up and advanced with lumbering steps. Murky light fell on a long tongue lolling from powerful jaws. There was no doubting what it was now: a wolf-man, like the ones that had attacked them on the Downs.

  “Back!” Shader growled, waving the gladius, but the wolf-man just dropped to its haunches, eyes fixed to his, thick drool leaking from its mouth.

  It retained tatters of clothing hanging in ribbons around its hips and torso: a gray-green uniform, frayed stripes on the shoulders. It dropped its head to one side, watching him with sad eyes.

  Shader took a step forward and slowly raised his hand. The wolf-man’s breath rattled as he touched its snout, felt the fur on its face. He knelt down and looked into its damp eyes. The slits of its pupils seemed hard and alien, but they pulled at him, as if they were begging, yearning. Then, the realization hit him.

  “Pete?”

  The wolf-man let out a long, torturous moan and slumped to the floor, head resting on its forearms. It started to whimper, the only language left to it.

  It was too much to take in: Pete, here. But how?

  He’s fer the turning, Heredwin had said. We’ll see him through it, then he’ll go where he’s most drawn; like they all do.

  “You following me?” Shader said.

  The wolf-man’s head rose, and the panting resumed.

  Shader stood and brushed the dirt from his clothes. What did it want? Was it his scent—the only familiar smell left to it? Had Heredwin sent it? Or did it want something else? Food? Company? To find a cure? For an instant, something like jealo
usy gripped his heart. Maybe it was Rhiannon. Maybe Pete was looking for her, and Shader was the best chance he had. He dismissed the feeling as soon as he became aware of it. So what if Pete had a thing for her? It was none of Shader’s concern. Not now. And even if it were, the prospects were bleak at best. Even if they found Rhiannon, she’d changed so much these past few years, Shader was starting to wonder if she had a heart anymore. If it was a happy ending Pete had come looking for, an acceptance of his altered state in the name of romantic love, he was going to be bitterly disappointed.

  “Come, if you like,” Shader said, more harshly than he intended. “But don’t spook the horse.”

  The wolf-man stood, looked down at its hands, and then at Shader. It hung its head as it stalked after him.

  The craziness of the situation had Shader chuckling to himself. What was he doing, traipsing through tunnels beneath the sea with a wolf-man in tow, all so he could get to the realm of the Liche Lord and hitch a lift back to Aethir?

  Perhaps he and Pete had something in common, other than Rhiannon. Perhaps that was what all this was about.

  Shader’s thoughts turned to the violet skies of Aethir, to the Perfect Peak, and to the meddling philosopher always interfering with his life, knowing him better than he knew himself, and thwarting his every desire.

  Shader’s fingers tightened around the hilt of the gladius—the sword Aristodeus had coached him to win since childhood. He glanced back at the wolf-man loping at his heel.

  Perhaps they both wanted revenge.

  WAYS OF THE FATHER

  The Perfect Peak, Aethir

  Rhiannon ran along a corridor of flame. Her hair was on fire, her skin a mass of blisters. Her screams came out raw and smoking, and white-hot stabs of pain lanced through her chest.

  She ripped open her shirt without breaking stride. Her heart was a smoldering coal within the bare bones of her ribcage. She started to choke on the sooty breath clogging her throat, and then, without warning, plunged headlong through an open doorway.

  It was dark inside, and she shivered. The blazing heat gave way to the crisp coolness of shadows. A corona of red light bloomed into existence, then another, and another.

  She was in a room within a house of shadows. Columns materialized out of the gloom, each ridged and topped with a bulbous knob that poked against the crimson drapes drooping from the ceiling.

  A couch appeared in front of her, and upon it, a muscular black man reclined, sipping from a silver goblet. He peered at her over the rim with violet eyes.

  “Drink?” He offered her the goblet.

  She reached out a hand. Her throat still burned. Something cool, something…

  People the size of ants wailed and swam in circles around the inside of the goblet. The liquid was dark like coffee, and it had the aroma of musk and pepper.

  “No?” the man said. “Then how about this?”

  Somehow, his hands crossed the distance between them, found the back of her head. She was suddenly on her knees before him, his hardness seeking entrance to her lips. She thrashed and struggled, pushed back against his grip, but he was too strong, relentless.

  “Taste and see that it is good,” the man said. “I am the drinker of souls, but you shall drink of me.”

  Rhiannon tried to twist her head to one side. A scream built within her, but she dared not let it out, in case it gave him the opening he wanted.

  “You know you desire it,” the man said. “Give in. Give—”

  Hands—different hands—took hold of her by the shoulders, wrenched her away.

  “You!” the black man said. “I am hers now. She is mine.”

  “No.” It was a whisper with the trace of a Latian accent. “I will not permit it.”

  Rhiannon knew that voice; had heard it cry out atop the Homestead when she’d gone to the Ipsissimus’s aid. She turned, expecting to see a black great helm and embers for eyes, but the helm she saw was silver, and the eyes were golden. In place of a mildewed surcoat was one of pristine white, emblazoned with the red Monas of Nous.

  “Callixus?” she breathed.

  “Go, now,” the knight said, as the black man slid off the couch and loped toward them. “The sword—” he started, but a fist crashed into his helm, and then the two were locked in a grapple, while all around them laughter shrieked and howled.

  ***

  Rhiannon started awake. She was drenched with sweat, and her arm was dead from her lying on it. She sat up, rubbing the blood back into circulation.

  She was on a bed in a silver-walled room. Light spilled in through a doorway, where a man stood—a dwarfish man, no taller than Shadrak. Pebbly eyes studied her from beneath thick brows. He was dressed in a gray tunic and britches and carrying a tray. His hair was a tangle of what looked like seaweed. One of Sektis Gandaw’s homunculi. One of Aristodeus’s.

  “Wakey, wakey,” he said, as he set down the tray on a nightstand. Was that derision in his tone, a sneer on his face? “Tiring dream?” He raised an eyebrow. “It was certainly noisy. Aristodeus is a snorer, but you”—he offered her a glass of water—“are most definitely a screamer.”

  She gulped it down, if only to help her speak. She turned her nose up at the dry bread on the tray and then gasped as she realized she was naked. She tugged a sheet over her shoulders and stood, towering over the little man.

  “Where are my clothes?”

  He made a mocking sort of a bow and gestured to a neat pile stacked on top of a chair.

  “My sword?”

  The homunculus gave a nod and a wink, then indicated it propped in a corner.

  Callixus’s sword.

  He’d been in her dream, only different. When he’d fallen to that gargoyle thing on the Homestead, he’d been a wraith, a creature of wispy darkness; but the man who’d saved her in the dream had been restored somehow. Had Nous spared him for his last act of self-sacrifice?

  Yeah, right, she thought. The cold thrill of realization dawned on her almost immediately: The thought wasn’t her own.

  Her eyes remained fixed on the black sword, and something like an invisible thread tugged at her chest.

  “I have been assigned to you.”

  She was dimly aware the homunculus was speaking, but her mind was elsewhere.

  Flames. She remembered the flames, and the house of shadows. Her stomach rebelled as she pictured the man on the couch; what he’d tried to make her do.

  Then Callixus had come. Why? What was she to him, save… save the bearer of his sword? It made no sense. Callixus was bad news, wasn’t he? Or was that just what Cadman had done to him?

  “I am Bezaleel.” The homunculus’s voice seemed to come from a great distance. “I said, I am—”

  “Tell someone who cares,” Rhiannon said. “Now shut up. I’m thinking.”

  Her blood boiled, and her heart thudded at the annoyance. If he said another word… With a long, deep breath, she steered her mind back to Callixus. He’d tried to tell her something:

  The sword—

  The blade was definitely evil, of that she had no doubt. Shader had said as much, but so shogging what? The whole world was evil, as far as she was concerned; at least the crap it threw at her was. Not just Earth, either: Aethir, as well. Probably the whole shogging cosmos. The way she saw it, the black sword just evened the odds in her favor, gave her the means of gutting the next shogger who dared lay a hand on her. Or the next shogging homunculus to interrupt her train of thought. And anyhow, she’d had it since the Homestead, hadn’t she? It’s not like anything bad had happened. She was the same Rhiannon she’d always been, and she’d rearrange the face of anyone who said otherwise. More bitter, maybe; thicker-skinned. More irritable. Losing your family will do that to you. Being a refugee in a crazy world war, too. Having a child. It wasn’t like she’d asked for it.

  She saw a flash of Saphra’s face, felt a moment’s pity at the longing in the little girl’s eyes. Saphra hadn’t asked for it, either. It wasn’t her fault. She drew back fr
om that thought before it led her somewhere she didn’t want to go. It was bad enough admitting she had changed. It didn’t matter how or why.

  The homunculus started humming to himself. Rhiannon gritted her teeth and tried to pretend she’d not noticed.

  But what was it about Callixus? What had changed him? Had it just been a dream? Had her mind manufactured the good Callixus as a defense against the thing she feared most: being powerless to prevent the abuse of her body, of her, of what she was? It made a perverse sort of sense, given what Gaston had done to her. Aristodeus, too, in a manner of speaking.

  Or had she really looked into the Abyss? Because where the shog else could she have been? It should have come as no surprise to see Callixus there, but not the way he’d appeared. His last act protecting the Ipsissimus must have counted for something with Nous, freed him from damnation. But then why would he be in the realm of the Demiurgos? To save her? It made no sense.

  The question was, what had turned him bad in the first place? He’d been an Elect knight, the grand master: the best of the best, if Shader were to be believed. Was it Cadman’s magic? Maybe, but why hadn’t it done the same for the other wraith—Osric—who Shader said had accompanied him to the Anglesh Isles? He’d remained loyal to Nous, by all accounts, despite his crumbling certainties. And the other knights of the Lost had been little more than mindless automatons. There was just the one thing that set Callixus apart from the rest:

  The sword—

  Had he been trying to warn her about it when the black man struck him, and she’d awoken from her nightmare? Did he know something she didn’t? She’d known from the start it was screwing with her, making her cut, and making her need it more than she needed booze. But she’d chosen to live with that need, and she’d done a bloody good job of keeping things in check. The second it got out of hand, she’d ditch the sword, no worries, the same way she could give up the drink if she wanted to. She was about to add, “When was the last time I even had a drink?” but that would have made the case against her. Was it yesterday she’d got pissed with Shader, and he’d almost broken his vows? Nous, it all seemed such a long time ago. So much had happened since then.