In the Darkness

by Charles Edward

  “Please don’t fight us,” several of them said in chorus. Then, “Evin?”

  Evin stepped down toward them. All of them within earshot were staring at him now. “I’m here with the queen. Cydrich will want to see her. We can end this, Gareth.”

  “Get out of here. Don’t let him see you!” Slight variations of the plea whispered by many voices that were all Gareth’s voice fell on Evin’s ears and lay like stones on his soul. “Please go, Evin!”

  The shape of another man swept in through the open arch, and the Gareths instantly fell silent.

  “Take us to him. We won’t resist you,” Denua said.

  When some of the Gareths moved quietly to take the weapons from Denua’s entourage, she nodded and indicated for her people to comply. Then the Gareths led them down to the ground floor, where several surrounded Evin, pulling him to the side and hiding him from view with their bodies.

  “We’re trying to save you,” one of them whispered in his ear. Evin was engulfed by the scent of leather, sweat, and Gareth. His heart lugged in his chest.

  “Hush,” he whispered back. “I’m saving you first.”

  Light flared, and a star-bright spark rose to the room’s high ceiling. Cydrich had activated one of his devices. It lit up the room. Evin peeked over the shoulders in front of him to see glimpses and reflections of the old man racing between display cases. Cydrich shouted in glee, and glass crashed.

  “Cydrich!” The queen’s voice filled the room. “Surrender yourself to me.”

  “Oh, Denua! You’re just in time.”

  Evin ducked and slipped between two of the Gareths. Before they could get their hands on him, he dodged between people and display cases, trying to get close enough to see. In his wake, he trailed shocked gasps as more of the Gareths recognized him. When he got a good view and stood still, Gareths closed around him, and one leaned in to whisper, “We’re trying to save you.”

  “Let me see!” He nudged them.

  The sorceler raked his gaze over the room, seeing his troops guarding the queen’s men. “Oh, I see you brought soldiers for me to surrender to. How nice. Step forward now so I can greet you properly.”

  Denua emerged from the crowd of invading soldiers, guarded by one who had his hand on her shoulder.

  “Don’t let her reach for anything, boy. Hold her wrists.”

  “Why are you here, Cydrich? What do you want that brought you with an army to my city?”

  “Ha-ha! One little thing, Denua, that you might have given me years ago.” He stood before a waist-high display case that he had smashed open. He rested his hands on the gilded edges of the case and gazed down at a sword in its scabbard, resting on a satiny red cushion.

  “That sword? All this death for a trinket in a museum?”

  “That’s what you think, isn’t it, Denua? You’ve lived so long, lifetimes to learn, but you know nothing.” He took something from his bag—Evin caught a glimpse of a stone, small, dark, and polished—and touched it to the sword.

  “I know your monsters can’t stop me from cutting you down,” she said, and the blue glow of her shield’s aura flared. The Gareth yelped and snatched his hands away from her. Denua advanced on the grinning sorceler. From inside the display case, the sword hissed and a red light shone up on Cydrich, creating shadows that made his face demonic.

  He watched Denua approach. “So you’ve decided to find out if your sorcelry is stronger than mine. You suck the life’s work out of the real scholars, using it to your ends, but you don’t earn it, Denua; you don’t earn anything. You’re not educated. Have you ever created anything? Ever performed an experiment? Have you ever spent just one day of your life in study?”

  “Why should I, Cydrich, when I can make use of foolish tools like you?” Denua’s ensorceled sword unfolded in her hands.

  Cydrich seized the museum sword by its scabbard and lifted it from its resting place. “You’re the foolish one, to come here, witch. I’ve beaten you now.”

  He advanced, holding the sword up, his gaze boring into her face as she stared back at him with undisguised contempt. The red light came from the stone Cydrich had placed in the pommel. “I’ve done my research, Denua. This sword will cut through any shield. Even the one you wear.”

  “Would you like to die quickly, Cydrich? I could take off your head first.”

  He swung at her, and despite the little space they had, crowded with displays and people, she danced lightly back.

  “Give me your bow!” Evin whispered to one of the Gareths standing in front of him.

  That one just shook his head. The one beside him said, “You can’t hurt him—” And another finished, “You’ll only make him mad.”

  Denua feinted, then whirled her sword around to cut a gash in the unarmored man’s side. He shrieked and leaped back. Evin saw that Gareth was right. As the combatants circled one another again, a pale, purple light coruscated across the sorceler’s ribs. In that light, the skin closed and healed.

  “Can’t kill my soldiers, can’t hurt me!” he said in a singsong voice. “What next, woman? Are you ready to die?”

  Denua gave a frustrated shout and flew at him, swinging wide. Cydrich managed to bring his own blade up to parry—

  And his sword cut through Denua’s as if it were only a reed. Most of her blade tumbled away to crash into a display.

  After a brief moment of surprise, Cydrich realized his victory. He raised his blade to her throat. “Get on your knees.”

  When she stood in defiance, his gaze flicked to a Gareth who stood behind her. “Put her on her knees, boy. Don’t let go while you still live.”

  Evin shouted, “Please, don’t do this, Gareth, no!”

  That one looked at Evin for a moment. Evin saw guilt and sorrow in his eyes despite the helm covering his face. But then he complied by placing his hands on Denua’s shoulders and using his vast strength to force her down to her knees. The blue light of her shield crackled along his hands and arms. He grunted but held on.

  “There, look at what you’ve come to, woman. I have the sword. Now I’ll take your life and your throne!” Spittle flew from Cydrich’s lips. Denua glared at him in contemptuous silence. Cydrich gripped the sword in both hands and raised it high over her upturned face. She closed her eyes.

  “I’ve lived a long time,” Denua said.

  “Too long!” Cydrich brought the sword down in an arc that ended at her face.

  The blade struck the blue aura surrounding Denua’s head and held there. It didn’t split her skull. It didn’t break her skin.

  Emotion and color fled the old man’s face. His only remark was, “Oh no.”

  “Long enough,” Denua said, “to seed rumors.”

  The pommel stone of Cydrich’s sword glowed with increasing intensity.

  “Long enough to write codices filled with lies of ultimate power.”

  Cydrich shook the sword now, as if his hands wouldn’t release their grip.

  “To scatter false grimoires and clues and trapped devices, there to catch traitorous sorcelers who are so very educated but so very, very stupid.”

  She stood. The Gareth who had been holding her did not resist. All eyes watched Cydrich struggle as the sword’s light enveloped him. He burst into flame and began a long scream of rage and pain. The pommel stone’s light died out, and the sword tumbled from Cydrich’s melting hands.

  Denua laughed. Everyone else stood dumbfounded as the burning sorceler shrieked and danced. He bashed into display counters, breaking some of them and setting frail treasures alight. When he came close to Denua, she reached out with her shielded hand and pushed him away to crash into other displays. His soldiers couldn’t help him. They only scattered to avoid the fire when he came too close.

  But Denua’s pleasure at her victory was short-lived. As Evin watched Cydrich’s death dance, the jagged bolts of purple light rippled over Cydrich’s flailing body; and where that energy flowed, skin destroyed by the fire was instantly renewed. A kind of
struggle raged between the tongues of flame and the purple flashes. Back and forth they raced, fire consuming the remnants of his clothing, blackening and fusing flesh that the magical light restored again and again as the smoke and stench of his burning filled the air. The sorceler still screamed, but after a few seconds, it was obvious that the purple light would win the battle. Soon the sorceler would be whole.

  A blast of flame licked across Cydrich’s face, bursting an eye that had just been renewed and causing the flesh of the brow to melt and run in a suppurating mess. In the instant before the skin was remade, Evin glimpsed an object. A purple jewel embedded in the sorceler’s brow, just above the bridge of his nose.

  One of the Gareths screamed, “The stone!” He ran to the burning sorceler and seized him by the throat. Flames were dying out on Cydrich’s body, but they raced up Gareth’s arm, setting him to burn. His scream turned to agony, but he held on and dug at the sorceler’s forehead with his claws.

  Evin looked on in helpless horror. “No! Stay back!” The fire consumed that Gareth, who was dying even as he struggled to rip at Cydrich’s face. But his claws couldn’t penetrate the sorceler’s skin. Evin watched, wailing and unable to look away.

  Other Gareths stepped past Evin now, moving toward the struggle. The one who held the sorceler wasn’t screaming anymore. Flames had burned out his throat and washed up to envelop his face. Another Gareth reached the burning pair. He put his hand on the back of his dead brother’s burning skull and pressed it into Cydrich’s face. Fire flowed up his arm as he held it there. When Cydrich’s head again caught fire, Gareth pulled his brother away. The sorceler’s brow was briefly ruined once more, and in the moment the gem was exposed, Gareth snatched it free and threw it aside. It shattered against the stone floor.

  Without the stone’s protection, fire raced unchecked back over Cydrich’s body. His screams grew more agonized and desperate. Then the burning Gareth jammed claws into Cydrich’s mouth and eyes and tore the sorceler’s head away. Cydrich’s body crumpled to the floor.

  As fire swept over his own body, the Gareth turned around and held Cydrich’s head up for the crowd to see. He was screaming now in triumph and in agony. Awash in fire, he staggered forward, still holding up the flaming skull as he fell to his knees.

  His body boiled away into an oily, green-black smoke, and Cydrich’s burning skull dropped and rolled on the floor.

  No one made a sound except for Denua’s jarring laughter. Her guards looked around with awe at the evaporating smudges of smoke where the Gareths had been standing.

  They were gone, all of them.

  Panic filled Evin’s veins with ice.

  It wasn’t him I just found him I just found him he can’t be gone

  He turned to look around the room. Display cases shattered, burning, or intact. Tables. Shocked faces. A dark suit of armor, but full plate, not like the ones the Gareths wore.

  Not here outside

  He slipped past Denua’s guards and broke into a run for the open archway to the street.

  They weren’t real not the real one he didn’t die not with Cydrich he didn’t

  He slid down on the stone walk in front of the museum and fell heavily on his ass. He righted himself and found that he had put his hand into bloody snow. Seeing it startled him out of his panic. He lifted the hand and stared at the red-tinged ice and water dripping from his palm. Gareth had done this. Cydrich had made one of him do this. Who will the gods blame?

  He lifted his gaze from his hand and looked around at the street. It was lined with shops and homes with closed doors and shutters. A shattered, blood-spattered cart lay on its side just down the street, and beside it most of a man’s arm. The snow was slushy and trampled all down the street. Easy to see where the army had come from.

  Farther down the street in that direction, a dog chewed on something, its muzzle dripping, dark, and wet.

  Evin got to his feet, intending to walk back along the invaders’ path, when an armored man ran from the shadows at the corner of a building across the street and froze in surprise. “Evin?”

  A sob of relief escaped Evin’s throat, and he rushed toward Gareth, the last one, the real one. Even as he crossed the street, his mind raced to find the right plan to deal with Denua. What should we do? Flee? Surrender?

  He opened his mouth to yell, Hide! but two Parigian swordsmen appeared from around the same corner. Gareth had been fleeing from them, leaving the battle when his brothers vanished. He had realized it was over. Maybe he thought he was free.

  One of the pursuers carried a torch.

  “No, stop!” Evin shouted. “Wait. It’s over. We won.”

  Gareth whirled to face the men and held his sword up defensively. “Please, I don’t want to hurt you.”

  The men split up and flanked Gareth. They weren’t going to listen.

  “Halt!” Denua’s voice came from the door of the museum, behind Evin. “Arrest him.”

  Guards swarmed past Evin and across the street. The two pursuers cursed at Gareth, and one spat on him, but they held back. Guards approached, took his sword, pulled off his helm, and threw it aside. Then his bow and quiver of arrows. Gareth offered no resistance. He looked defeated and sad, as if this was what he’d expected all along.

  “Mercy, Your Majesty!” Evin said. “He saved us from Cydrich.”

  “This one didn’t save us, darling. He invaded my city and helped a traitor kill my people.”

  “But you can’t—They were all him! He would have saved us too, if—”

  “Silence! Chain the beast and put it in the dungeon. I will decide whether to use it or destroy it.”

  Evin seethed but knew he had overstepped. As he struggled to control himself, he noticed how Uliette looked at him with pity, and if anything that made it worse.

  Uliette was right. Gareth would never be free. He’s just a weapon.

  Chapter Twenty-six

  Two days had passed since the invasion. The city was rebuilding. The first thing Denua did after her return to the castle was order that Cydrich’s devices be found, where possible, and returned to her. She also ordered her scryers to watch the searchers closely, to see that none of the sorceled devices might be stolen. Her highest priority was to get sorcelers she trusted—and whom she could surveil—to work on understanding Cydrich’s mirror. It was vital not only to determine how it worked and how to create new ones, but also how to detect and defend against mirror-army invasions.

  The sorcelers requested some of Gareth’s blood in order to begin their experiments.

  Evin struggled to be patient during those days. He knew he could manipulate Denua into letting him see Gareth, but he did not want to appear too eager, and he did not want the memory of his insubordination to be fresh in her mind.

  Finally he took a carafe of wine from their room and carried it up to the war chamber, where Denua spent most of her days now. Its large meeting table was convenient because of the ability to use the city map for planning reconstruction projects.

  When he walked in, one of Denua’s sorcelers—a thin little weasel named Tarcia—was suggesting that Gareth might be used as a “renewable sacrifice” for blood sorcelry to speed the city’s recovery somehow. Evin imagined smashing the carafe and burying its shards in Tarcia’s neck. But he held himself together and even managed to smile as he offered Denua her wine.

  She waved the weasel off and gratefully accepted the drink.

  Evin smoothed her hair back and tried to show only love on his face as he waited for her to drink. When she was done, he asked, “Have things been progressing well?”

  “As well as can be expected. We’ll need raw materials that take time to arrive, so we have some displacements to deal with. The worst problem is the survivors.”

  “Oh? I don’t understand.”

  “The creature, it has the moral views of…” She cast about for words. “It’s weak. As if it were raised by a bloody priest—definitely not by Cydrich. It tried to avoid killing, so no
w we have hordes of beggars, citizens missing arms or legs.”

  “Oh… You can’t just put ’em back on?”

  “Sometimes, not always. Our sorcelry isn’t quite like that thing Cydrich had. It can be difficult or require the sacrifice of one to save another. More than most of the wretches are worth to me. In the end, many would be better off if the monster had simply killed them. Now I’ll have to do it to keep them from cluttering up my city.”

  “Oh!” He was unprepared to hear her speak this way, of murdering hordes of people as if they were an infestation of ants. He wanted to save them. Not as desperately as he wanted to save Teffaine and Gareth, but he believed they deserved saving too. Could he fit them into the new plan? But Denua was watching him. She would expect him to say more. He concentrated on his feelings of love and sympathy, searching for something truthful to say that would satisfy her. “I—I’m sorry. I’m sorry you have to make such painful decisions.”

  She looked at him, her face glowing with youth and unattainable beauty, filled with love. “You do understand how difficult it can be.”

  “Yes, of course. But I came to ask you about the other difficult decision you’re making.”

  Her face hardened. “How long to keep your friend alive.”

  “Yes. I’m not here to annoy you by pleading for him. I just wondered if I could visit him in the dungeon. Please give me permission to see him, if only for an hour or two.”

  She examined him for a moment. Deciding how to let him down. He tried not to get his hopes up. He knew he’d get her consent in the end, just maybe not today.

  “My guards won’t allow you to see him privately,” she said, “and they will report everything to me. Are you sure you want to go and speak to him, knowing that whatever he says might influence my decision?”

  Evin almost collapsed with relief. “Yes, I’m sure. Despite what Cydrich made him do, he’s a loyal Elyrrian. Even after being in the dungeon, he won’t have any ill will toward you. He’s just not capable of it.”

  “Then go, if you’re willing to risk it. Perhaps the guards’ report will bear out your faith.”