by Sam Sykes
The rest of the letter I didn’t understand. Ancestry? Genealogy? Subject S?
A problem for another time. Everything I had here, I could use as leverage to find out the rest. Once I got this in Dalaris’s hands, she could get it where it needed to go. I rolled the whole mess up and stuffed it into my belt and was already on my way out the door when I heard it.
“Leaving so soon?”
The voice. I had almost forgotten it. I had almost been able to pretend it was just a waking nightmare. But it spoke closely to me now, purred in my ear and reached into my chest.
“Rather rude, isn’t it? You didn’t even say hello.”
You don’t stay in this line of work for long by making stupid decisions. And listening to a voice that came out of nowhere and wedged itself into your ears like a knife definitely counted as one.
And yet …
I had seen a lot of Vishera’s arsenal and more of Vishera’s machinations already. But I was about to piss off a woman with a lot of ways to make my life terrible. I couldn’t leave without knowing every trick she had, even if one of them was a creepy, disembodied voice. Especially if that creepy, disembodied voice was something she intended to spring on me later.
Right.
I turned and walked back into the room, pretending that I was making sense.
“Ah, very good. Here, dear girl. Toward the back. Behind the bookcase.”
At the very back of the room, a bookcase full of tomes stood. It didn’t take me long to find the hidden switch that made it slide away. It took me even less time to realize what a mistake I had made.
Because the first thing I saw when the bookcase slid away was the eyes: big, black, smoldering things set into a face that I would consider impossibly handsome.
If not for the ebon horns bursting out of his skull.
Batlike wings twitched behind him. Cloven hooves clopped upon the floor as he stepped forward. In the blue light, I could see the perfection of his muscular, naked body. And yet that perfection seemed all the more perverse as his lips spread wide and revealed a smile full of sharpened teeth.
“Ah,” the fiend said in a deep, resonant voice, “how nice of you to visit.”
17
The Father of Fiends
I breathed.
In and out. Shallow and quick. I breathed.
Because it was damn near the only thing I could remember how to do.
I stood transfixed by him: his beauty, his malice, his everything. The slope of the hollow of his neck, the curve of the fangs in his mouth, the veins of his wings and the burning smolder of his gaze. Everything about him was so horribly perfect, I could only stare. I should have run, should have screamed, should have taken out my blade and started stabbing and hoped for the best. But all I could remember how to do was breathe.
Several minutes passed and I was still breathing.
So I figured that was a pretty good sign.
And that’s when I noticed the shackles.
Encircling his slender wrists were clasped iron rings, runes emblazoned across the metal in bright red script. Chains slithered down to the floor, holding him in place within a delicately arranged circle of salt, one magically burning candle arranged at each of the four cardinal directions.
I didn’t know much about summoning fiends, but I knew that this particular one wasn’t going to be much of a threat.
The fear and awe that had held me suddenly ebbed away. It somehow felt difficult to be afraid of a creature so thoroughly imprisoned.
“You’re staring, mortal,” he said, his voice resonating in my ears.
“Well, yeah.” I coughed, discreetly turning my eyes upward and away from his waist. “You are kind of naked.”
“Indeed.” His grin was broad and sultry. His chains rattled as he gestured at his own form. “And am I not magnificent, mortal? Do you not quiver at the very sight of me?”
“You’re quite…” My eyes darted downward for a tasteless second before I looked back up. “Uh, yeah. Yeah, very magnificent.”
“Do not feel ashamed, mortal.” His eyes flared to life, embers suddenly stoked. “Gaze all you like. Look upon me and feel your shame, your will, all your useless emotions slipping away. Look upon me…” He hissed, a long pointed tongue sliding out between his teeth. “And obey.”
I stared back at him for a moment, then shook my head.
“I’d rather not,” I said.
The fires in his eyes died out. His very pretty face turned into a very pretty pout.
“Why not?” he asked.
“Don’t really feel like it, is all.”
“You don’t…” He shook his head and snarled. “I am perfection, a work of art honed to a razor’s edge in the forges of the Abyss. Why do I fail to stir lustful obedience in you?”
“I don’t know.” I shrugged helplessly. “You’re not my type, I guess.”
He narrowed his eyes upon me. “Woman, I am an incubus, the very incarnation of carnal desire, formed specifically to prey upon mortal lust. I am, factually, everybody’s type.”
“Listen, nobody likes a braggart. Let alone a braggart devil—”
“Demon.”
“Demon. Sorry.”
He deflated with the force of his sigh, shoulders slumping and wings drooping. His hair fell over his eyes as he shook his head.
“These damnable enchanted shackles drain my powers,” he muttered, “make it impossible for me to dominate. Were I not thusly captive, I would make you my unwitting slave before I fed upon your soul.”
“I bet you’d be great at it, too, champ.” I patted the papers in my belt. “I take it you’re The Thing mentioned in these documents?”
“Fennoc.” He made a half-hearted bow. “Fennoc the Devourer.”
“Of course,” I sighed. Fiends always had names like ‘the Devourer’ or ‘the Conqueror’ or ‘the Thrice-Damned.’ No one never met a Fennoc the Forthcoming or Fennoc the Pleasant Conversationalist, did they?
I was about to mention this to him when it suddenly hit me. I took in his horns, his eyes, his jawline, and realized I had seen them before.
“Son of a bitch,” I muttered. “You’re Visheron’s father?”
“Who?”
“Visheron? The fellow who lives upstairs? The guy with the horns and the breast fetish?”
“Ah. The spawn.”
Between a mother that locked him up and a father who referred to him as “spawn,” I was beginning to see why Visheron had turned out the way he had.
“He’s your son,” I said.
“‘Son’ is a term that carries affections I do not have. I did not raise him. I have never spoken to him. I only know he exists because the woman told me. I was simply coerced into creating him. Nothing more.”
“Coerced?” I squinted at him.
“Yes. Coerced. Is that surprising?”
“Kind of. I mean, given that you’re from Hell—”
“The Abyss.”
“Right, the Abyss. Given that, I thought your type were usually the ones to do the coercing.”
“Normally, yes. Mortal minds are weak and their bodies are weaker. The time it takes to break both and feast on the soul is little more than the blink of an eye to me. Hence, when we are called from beyond, we answer quite willingly, with intent of seducing and—”
“Yeah, no need for details.” I held up my hands. “I can guess what you do.”
“Such was what lured me to this world. The idea of a mortal in possession of such wealth and power as the woman was pleasing to my masters. I had every intention of using her as my doorway to further souls.”
I glanced at his shackles. “I take it that didn’t happen?”
His face drew tight. The heat in his eyes turned to something cold and bitter. “She was ready for me. With circles. With shackles. With trinkets to guard her mind. She laid me low and … used me.”
My eyes widened. I wasn’t sure if I was more surprised that a mortal could do that or that a fiend would sou
nd so offended at them doing so.
“Her sole interest in me was in creating the spawn,” Fennoc hissed. “Once she had grown swollen with him, she locked me away and did not speak to me except to compel answers regarding his powers.” His lips curled into a slow smile. “Though I have gathered he is quite the disappointment.”
“Well, he’s not a great artist,” I said.
“The woman was expecting power. She desired a sorcerer, a warrior, something with the strength of the Abyss in its veins. Not an artist.”
“And what did she want that for?”
“Is it not obvious, mortal? Even a fool could see that she is ruled by her fears. She is consumed with nightmares of the collapse of her nation, her fortunes, her lineage. She sees enemies everywhere: Qadirans to the south, Galtans to the north, Cheliax and Andoran to the west.”
“Cheliax.” A nation ruled by fiends in all but name. I had heard the stories. “That’s what she wants. She wants to use fiends to make Taldor strong, like they are.”
“Would that were true. She sadly lacks faith in our motives.” Fennoc chuckled. “She envisions Taldor mighty again, with her brood at its head. But above all else, she requires control. Control she cannot assume over my kind.”
“So she wants your power, but not your unpredictability. Seems logical.”
“Indeed? I suppose any sufficiently advanced madness must seem indistinguishable from logic. Alas, the poor woman is convinced that if she cannot summon a suitable leader for Taldor, she can breed it.”
Breed it.
Words flashed in my mind. Elegantly carved letters on the parchments in my belt.
Experiment. Subject. Child and mother. Died. Regrettable. Total failure. Inducing. Conception.
I wished I had words foul enough to say what was going through my head at that moment. As it was, I could only stand there with my mouth open. The words that came, eventually, were slow and weighed with horror.
“Her son is the failure,” I whispered. “But she didn’t kill him. She wants to breed him.” I looked at Fennoc. “But with what?”
He smiled broadly. “My powers are dampened, but even now, I can hear your thoughts, mortal. You are so deliciously close to figuring it out. I can hardly contain myself.”
I growled, started to curse. And then two more words flashed in my skull.
Subject S.
S.
Sidara.
Amalien support. Genealogy. Ancestry. Celestials. Angels. Pinnacles of control.
Dalaris.
“Son of a bitch,” I said. And when simply saying felt insufficient, I screamed. “SON OF A BITCH!”
“Aha. You’ve found it, have you? Isn’t it so delightfully depraved?”
“She’s going to use Dalaris. Gods! That’s why she had Gerowan murdered. She didn’t want the Amalien fortunes, she wanted to make sure no one would miss Dalaris when she was gone. And she used the centaurs to cover it up! That … that … evil … wretched…”
“I assure you, mortal, that all the curses you are thinking remain insufficient for your outrage.” Fennoc drew himself up, gestured to his chains. “And I daresay that the only thing that would satisfy you is setting me free.”
I snapped from my reverie of fury to look at him curiously. “What?”
“Think of it,” he whispered. “All the wickedness she has done pales in comparison to what she will yet do. You need only set me free to make sure that does not come to pass. Unlock my shackles. Disrupt the circle. In the span of two breaths, I can be at her throat and drag her back to the Abyss with me.”
His voice slithered into my ears, settled in my belly on cold, scaly coils. Every word came with the flicker of forked tongue and the glimmer of dark eyes.
“Your friend will be safe,” he said. “And you could be the one to save her. You could be the one to go to her, to hold her in your arms, to tell her that all will be well.”
Images filled my head, blossomed like flowers. I could see Dalaris now, that weak and helpless girl, so desperate that she reached out to a scoundrel like me for help. I could smell her tears, hear her wails, feel my lips whisper the words that would tell her it would all be fine.
“You will be her hero,” Fennoc purred. “You will have done something great and beautiful with your life. All the sorrow and suffering you have taken to get here will all be worth it, if you can but save someone else. No one need ever die because of you again. Not like Sem.”
Sem.
Sem didn’t raise a fool.
I whirled on Fennoc, my blade held up like I earnestly believed it could do a damn thing to him.
“Stay out of my head,” I snarled. “And don’t even think I’m dumb enough to let you out. I know enough about demons to know they don’t keep their promises.”
“Oh?” Fennoc looked bemused in that bullshit can’t-blame-me-for-trying way.
“You’re creatures of wicked whimsies, unable to control your basest desires, unable to resist inflicting pain.”
“That’s not quite true,” he countered. “We can be patient. For example, we can keep someone talking long enough for the mechanical guardian of this chamber to activate its protocol and sneak up behind them.”
I squinted. “Huh?”
My ears pricked.
Metal on stone. Metal on metal. Blade drawing. Wind splitting.
Mind hesitating. Body acting.
I leapt forward.
Too quick to be dead, too slow to be bloodless. Something sharp bit into my back, split the leather and carved a red line in my flesh. I tumbled forward, narrowly stopped myself from disrupting the circle around Fennoc. I whirled, Whisper in my hand as I looked upon my attacker.
If you ever happen to find yourself in a madwoman’s forbidden sanctum brimming with magical paraphernalia, here’s a tip: never assume the nondescript column is just a column.
It had been, of course, when I arrived here. I still recognized my reflection in the polish of its stainless bronze, save that I looked a degree more terrified now. But what stood before me now, I had no words for.
Its body was rail thin, perched upon two spindly legs ending in sharp claws. Long, thin arms jointed in three places extended outward. The remainder of it looked like the column, but only for a second longer. In another moment, it seemed to … unfold itself. What remained of the column extended outward, becoming another pair of long arms. And topping it was a bronze mask carved in an expressionless face of a genderless creature, its hollow eyes fixed on me.
“Subject detected,” it said in a hollow, tinny voice. “Do not attempt to resist. It will all be over soon.”
It turned all four of its arms toward me and I saw the wicked instruments they ended in: a syringe; a writhing probe; a small, whirring saw; and a long scalpel wet with my blood.
“The hell is that thing?” I screamed.
“A golem. Custom-made.” Fennoc hummed. “It activates around this time. She likes its timeliness.”
I glared over my shoulder. “Why didn’t you say something earlier?”
Fennoc shrugged. “It’s funnier this way.”
I had a wittier retort to that than the scream that escaped my mouth, but it’s hard to think when you’re dodging. The golem lashed out suddenly, metal joints squeaking, saw blade whirring. I darted beneath the blow, scrambled away as its syringe-arm thrust at me and bit into the stone floor.
“Do not scream. Do not cry.” Its voice echoed off of the hollows of its mask as it turned its empty eyes upon me. “This is all for the best, you will see.”
I had to get out of Fennoc’s cell. Had to get more room to maneuver. Of course, the only place with more room was filled with horrible magic items that could possibly explode if disturbed by a violent melee, but—
The scalpel-arm lanced out as I scrambled to my feet, bit into my bicep and drew a scream.
Focus, Shy. Focus.
I whirled, Whisper in hand, to face the machine. The clockwork creature turned—or at least, half of it turned.
Its torso rotated with a grating clicking sound to face me and, with its legs still facing the opposite way, it began to approach me by walking backward.
Not that this thing was all that pretty to look at to begin with, but it was just freaky now.
It was still a machine, I reminded myself as it advanced methodically toward me. It was put together, it could be taken apart. It was a matter of finding the right spot to hit.
I narrowed my eyes as it moved closer and drew my blade back. Its spindly arms shuddered with each step it took, its joints continuing to squeak and click as its empty gaze settled upon me. I tensed, held my breath. It raised its saw-arm, ready to strike.
It lunged. I leapt back, snapping my arm forward in one fluid movement. Whisper flew from my hand, tumbled through the air, and bit. There was a sound of metal clanging. The golem jerked back as Whisper lodged right in the left eye of its metal face.
For a moment, it stood there, frozen with a foot of steel stuck in its face.
And then in another moment, it clicked, whirred, and kept right on coming.
Really, I wasn’t sure what I expected to happen.
Screw it. Plan B, then.
I glanced to my right. Alchemical apparatus: tubes, potions, vials. I grabbed the greenest one—green is always useful, right?—and hurled it at the clockwork monster. It shattered against its carapace, spilling green slime all over the metal. I grinned broadly, waiting for the inevitable hissing clouds as the acid ate away at the armor.
But none came. The slime just dribbled down the creature’s chest and pooled on the floor.
What kind of lunatic bottles regular, nonacidic slime?
No time to wonder. I continued grabbing bottles, hurling bottles, shattering bottles. Black oil, yellow ooze, red ichor; it looked like someone had vomited a rainbow on the clockwork, but it was still coming.
“I know you are afraid, but it is all for the better. You will make Taldor strong. Do not cry.”
It lunged at me, swinging its saw-arm in a broad arc. I only narrowly stepped out of the way, darting toward the nearby rack of staves. Its blade stopped a mere inch away from the rack, the clockwork suddenly freezing.
Interesting. The damn thing must have orders not to disturb anything in the sanctum.
