Ascension (Demon's Grail Book 1)

by Amy Cross

  Leaning past the doorway, I see that Keller is at his desk while Emilia is sitting on the floor next to him, leaning her head against his knee. For a moment, the scene is so shockingly tender, all I can do is stare in horror, until Emilia's eyes turn and she spots me.

  “She's out!” she hisses, getting to her feet and taking a step toward me. “Abby's out of the chamber!”

  “Leave her,” Keller says firmly.

  “I'll finish her!” Emilia sneers, with anger in her eyes.

  “Emilia, stop!” Keller shouts as he stands. “I command you!”

  Stopping just a few feet from me, Emilia is clearly writhing with hatred, but she obeys and holds back.

  “Did you have fun rooting around in my head?” I ask, taking a step into the room. “You didn't find everything you were looking for, did you? I guess you realized that some of it had been taken out already. Don't worry, though, it's being kept somewhere safe. You'll never get to it.”

  “We have what we need!” Emilia shouts, stepping closer.

  “Stop!” Keller says firmly. “Emilia, you have your task, so go to it!”

  “You have to let me finish this miserable bitch off first,” Emilia replies, with her eyes fixed on me. “She's mine!”

  “Maybe you shouldn't be so confident,” I tell her, taking a step closer.

  “You think you'll be lucky on the third try?” she asks with a faint smile as Keller limps up behind her. “Face it, Abby, I've already put you in your place twice. It really only makes sense that this time I should finish you off for good. I've been trained to fight, remember? I can spot an amateur like you from a mile off, your blood is going to -”

  “Stop,” Keller tells her, placing a hand on her shoulder. “Remember what I taught you, Emilia. Remember the importance of discipline.”

  “I want to tear her head off,” she says darkly.

  “You will follow the orders I gave you,” he replies. “You will walk out of this room, past Ms. Hart, and you will go to the council. I will deal with everything here.”

  She flinches slightly, as if the thought of not fighting me is enough to sicken her to her stomach. “I want to be the one who finishes Abby Hart off,” she mutters, before turning to him, “but if you have to kill her before I return, save something for me. I want to know what her blood tastes like.”

  “Why don't you try to find out now?” I ask, even though I know that I'm woefully ill-prepared to fight her.

  She pauses for a moment. “Sorry, Abby,” she says finally, stepping toward me but then brushing past, nudging my shoulder on her way to the door, “but I have more important matters to deal with. Unlike you, I can control myself a little.”

  “I'm not going to let you walk out of here,” I reply, stepping after her.

  “Stop, Abby,” Keller says suddenly. “You know you can't beat Emilia, not in a fight. Rather than throwing your life away, don't you think you should let her go and, instead, try to work with me?”

  I watch as Emilia walks out of the room, and then finally I turn to Keller. Although I want nothing more than to go and drag Emilia back in here, I know I need to focus on the real threat here. There'll be time to deal with Emilia later, but Keller is already limping back toward his desk, leaning heavily on his cane, and I can tell he's the real danger, even if he looks like nothing more than an injured old man. How's that for discipline? Once Emilia is gone, I step over to the middle of the room and watch as Keller stands next to one of the flickering candles, leafing through some documents on his desk.

  “I've read parts of the Book of Gothos,” he says calmly after a moment, not looking up from the pages. “I'm fascinated by the way the book of the vampires and the book of the spiders are in some ways so similar, but in others so different. Often the same people and the same events are described in much the same way, but with just a few little changes to make them fit a different narrative. It's true what they say, isn't it? History really is written by the winners. Fortunately, it can also be rewritten when the truth emerges.” He turns to me. “It took a long time for me to teach Emilia that she must not believe everything that's written in the Book of Karakh. I trained her to think more critically. Perhaps you should learn the same when it comes to the Book of Gothos.”

  “You'll never find Karakh,” I reply, taking another step toward him. “You can cut my head open again, but you'll never get all the information you need.”

  “I'm starting to think that you're correct on that point,” he says with a smile. “Fortunately, we have a few other clues, and I'm confident we can piece it all together given time. We might not reach Karakh as quickly as we would like, but we will get there. It's our birthright.”

  “Not as long as I'm here to stop you,” I tell him.

  “We're all just cogs, Ms. Hart,” he replies. “The destinies of our respective species were playing out for thousands of years before we were born, and they'll continue to play out long after we're dead. The most either of us can do is make a minor impact.”

  “My father taught me to aim higher,” I mutter, making my way toward him. I know I'm probably going to have to fight him, but I figure I should at least try a calmer approach. After all, the closer I get, the more I can see the creases and wrinkles on his face. He's old, older than I realized before, so hopefully that'll give me an advantage. When I reach the desk, I try to grab the large, leather-bound Book of Karakh, but suddenly Keller grabs me by the throat and swings me, slamming me hard into the wall.

  “I'm an old soldier,” he sneers, his eyes filled with the same anger I saw in Emilia before, “but I still know a few tricks. Even a tired, wounded veteran of an ancient war is more than a match for an untrained, ill-disciplined runt who just happens to have picked up a few tricks along the way, so don't even think about using force against me!”

  I struggle to get free of his grip, but he squeezes my throat tighter and all I can do is let out a pained gasp. I hoped his age would make him weaker, but if anything he's stronger than I ever could have imagined.

  “Did Emilia tell you about my injuries?” he asks, before reaching down with his free hand and starting to unbutton his shirt. As he does so, I see twisted, gnarled flesh running across his chest, and when he pulls the shirt aside I see that, like Emilia, he has a thick vertical slit running down his belly, except that in his case the slit is bulging slightly and seems more deformed, as if the sides have been torn and healed many times.

  I try once again to get loose, but his grip is far too tight.

  “I was left for dead more on more than one occasion,” he continues, “on the battlefields near Karakh. Vampires were swarming past, trampling our bodies into the mud.” He carefully parts the edges of the slit on his belly, and several thick spider legs start to poke out, although some of them are scarred and damaged, with sections having long ago been cut away. “I remember watching as thousands of vampires made their way toward the great palace. I was certain that we would be saved, that the remaining spiders would repel the barbarians, and it was my faith that forced me to rise up from the sea of blood, take a weapon from one of my fallen comrades, and limp after the vampires. I thought that I could maybe slow them down and save Karakh, but finally I collapsed. When I woke, Karakh was gone and the vampires had all run off to write foul stories about their great and honorable victory over the evil spiders. While Gothos was setting down his celebrated accounts of victory, I was crawling through the blood of my brothers.”

  He leans closer.

  “For thousands of years now, the nice, safe, clinical vampire version of history has stuck. People believe the spiders to have been cruel, monstrous beasts. They swallowed the vampire propaganda wholesale.”

  “My father fought you,” I gasp, still desperately trying to get free. “My father didn't need to read the Book of Gothos to know the truth, he fought the spiders and saw them with his own eyes.”

  “And he lied about us!” he shouts, pulling me back from the wall and slamming me against the side of the
desk before sending me crunching to the ground. “Your father was the worst of the worst!” he adds, kicking me in the head so hard that I fall back and let out a gasp of pain. Looking up at him with blood in my eyes, I see several spider legs twitching and flexing as they reach out from the slit in his belly, as if his real form is slowly emerging and casting off his tired old human body. “One of his victims was my own brother,” he continues. Kicking me again, this time in the chest, he sends me sprawling across the floor until I hit another wall. “When I tried to get back to Karakh all those years ago, after the vampires had finished their work, I found that the great palace was gone. That day, I swore that I would not rest until Karakh was restored, and now I'm so close...”

  He takes a step toward me, as the slit in his belly is forced wide and the dark central mass starts to poke through.

  “It's only fitting,” he adds with a smile, “that my last act before finding Karakh should be to end your miserable life. I was wrong to keep you alive. I would rather kill you know and then set out to find the palace, my soul strengthened by the sound of your dying screams.”

  I stare in horror as the mass in his belly twists and stares at me. Just as I saw with Emilia, this mass has eight eyes, although this time some of the eyes are scarred and damaged, as if the wounds of the ancient war still haven't fully healed. Whereas Emilia's spider form was fresh and young, Keller's is knotted with scars and wounds.

  “We hide for now in these human bodies,” Keller explains, closing the eyes on his human face as his spider face leans further from the slit, “but our true forms are so much more impressive.”

  “No!” I shout, lunging at him, desperately trying to grab his throat. Instead, I'm knocked to one side, clattering against the wall but immediately getting to my feet. Reaching out to grab one of the candles from the desk, I use the flame to set fire to some of the papers in the hope that I can destroy at least some of his information about Karakh, but Keller grabs me again and smashes my head down against the desk's surface. Almost knocked unconscious, I drop the candle and fall to the floor, only to find that a swarm of smaller spiders is already starting to crawl over my body, their razor-sharp legs quickly slicing into my skin. I brush them away, but more quickly come.

  “Karakh will be found,” Keller continues, stepping toward me as huge spider legs poke out even further from his belly, “and when history is corrected, I will personally ensure that you, your brother and your father are shown to have been the true monsters.”

  Brushing more spiders from my body, I struggle to my feet, but I quickly drop back down to my knees as I feel a sharp pain in my chest. Nearby, the papers on Keller's desk are burning, but he doesn't seem to care as he limps closer. He probably sent the necessary information away with Emilia, which means I need to go and catch her.

  “You're wrong,” I tell him, fighting through the pain. “Karakh is going to stay hidden forever, and I'm personally going to make sure that every spider is wiped from existence.”

  “You're too late,” he replies, towering above me now, his legs continuing to writhe as they poke out through his belly. As he changes, he seems to be growing, becoming more like the imagined spider I fought at Absalom's home. “Emilia is already on her way to the council with the information we found in your mind, and in your brother's too. Once she reaches them, it's only a matter of time before the location of Karakh is discovered, and then the spider empire can start to rise again. Do you think I sent her away on a fool's errand and kept you here where you could cause real damage, Ms. Hart?” He smiles. “My work is done. I swore to find you and your brother, and to mine your heads for as much information as I could get, and I was successful. Now all that is left is for me to taste the pleasure of your deaths, and then I can follow Emilia and make my final pilgrimage to Karakh, where I can die with honor.”

  As the flames spread from his desk, I start crawling back, desperately trying to work out how to stop him. Having already been defeated in battle by Emilia, I'm starting to think that there's no way I can beat any of these creatures in a straight fight. Absalom was right. I'm not ready for this.

  Staring at Keller, I watch in horror as the legs in his belly reach out even further, and this time they start tearing at the slit, ripping his skin and finally cracking his chest open. His human shoulders and head tip back, as if they're now just worthless parts of an old body, and the dark mass starts to burst out from his stomach, reaching down to the ground with its long, thick black legs. I can hear his human body splitting apart as the bones shatter, and the spider part of his form seems to be growing stronger with every passing second. As his legs continue to curl out and press down against the floor, a kind of thick clear liquid runs down their length until, finally, Keller's human legs wither and fall away, leaving the spider's scarred face staring at me as fresh venom drips from its fangs. He rises up, towering several meters above me as his venom sacs start to throb.

  This is him. This is his real body.

  For a moment, all I can do is stare. This is just like the image I fought when I was training with Absalom, except that this time it's absolutely real. Even the stench, as the newly-reborn spider towers high above me, is enough to make me sick.

  Suddenly one of the large legs darts toward me, stabbing down at the ground with its sharp tip and giving me barely enough time to roll out of the way. I struggle to my feet, but a moment later another leg slams into the back of my leg and knocks me back down. I turn just in time to see one of the legs rising up high, but I'm able to duck aside as it comes crashing down; as the tip hits the floor next to me, it cracks the stone with enough force to send several small chunks spinning through the air, but already the spider is turning to attack me again, leaning closer with its fangs rearing back, ready to strike.

  Scrambling across the floor, I hurry around the desk, hoping to find a moment to come up with a plan. The spider is too quick, however, scurrying toward me and slamming into the desk, knocking me down. At the same time, the last parts of Keller's human body drop to the floor like a withered, discarded skin, and the spider towers above me as if to make me see just how much it has managed to grow in the past few minutes. All this strength and power was curled up inside Keller's human form, waiting to burst out and extend itself, and now it seems to be waiting for the perfect moment to strike. At least when it was lashing out with its legs, I could defend myself; this time, however, I stare up into its eight scarred eyes and realize that it's actually thinking in there, and plotting, and trying to decide exactly how it wants to kill me.

  “I'm not the only one, you know,” I stammer, trying to get up but feeling a shooting pain running down my my head into my chest. “Kill me and there'll be other vampires after you, others who already know what you're planning.”

  He leans closer, and after a moment some of the venom from his fangs starts dripping onto my leg. Wincing at the pain, I pull back.

  “You'll never get to Karakh!” I shout, as anger grows in my chest. “Do you think you can just walk through the doors and put your empire back together? The age of the spiders is over, you're never going to be anything more than bugs crawling under our feet!”

  I don't know what he's waiting for, but slowly his fangs start protruding a little further, and I swear there's more venom than ever, as if he's preparing for his strongest possible strike.

  And then I remember my training with Absalom. What little training I completed, at least. I was only able to defeat the imagined spider by losing my fear and throwing myself into the fight. Maybe with Emilia I still held back a little, but with Keller... I either die here on the floor, or I try to take him with me.

  And if I'm going to die, at least I want to die fighting.

  Launching myself at him, I manage to push him back as I grab hold of his thick, venom-covered fangs and hold them so they can't reach my neck. He's stronger than I imagined, trying desperately to inject his venom into my body, and my flesh is already burning from the thick black liquid that's running down
from his fangs onto my wrist and arms. I know I can't stop now, so I continue to force him back toward the burning desk until finally one of his rear legs brushes against the flames and his whole body shudders. Figuring that my only hope is to set light to the venom trail, I try to twist Keller's huge body around, but at the last moment my hands slip and his fangs dig down into my chest, burning through the skin and starting to pump venom into my body even as I scream.

  All I can do is use the pain and try to twist it around against him.

  Crying out, I force him back toward the burning desk. His rear legs are scrambling for purchase, but the pools of venom beneath us still haven't reached the flames. I can feel more of that venom spreading through my body, burning my heart and lungs as it continues to fill me up, but all I can think about is that I have to keep pushing him back, that even if this my last battle, I'm going to make sure that it's his last too. I scream again, summoning all the strength in my body as I push and push, and then finally there's a burst of flames from nearby and I feel heat rising all around. Looking down, I see that the venom on the ground has begun to burn and that the inferno is quickly spreading up Keller's legs. A moment later, his fangs dip out of my chest and he starts to rise, as if he's trying to get the main part of his body away from the flames that are consuming his legs.

  I drop back, staring up as I see that he's too late. The fire has reached his fangs and has begun to burn with fresh intensity, while more flames are already ripping across my venom-burned hands and arms. I start to crawl away, desperately trying to escape the heat, and then I hear what sounds almost like a scream. I turn just in time to see that Keller's entire body is now burning, as if the flames have shot up through his fangs and into the venom sacs deep inside his body. He turns and tries to stagger away on his eight flaming legs, but one by one each of those legs starts to fail him until finally he slumps down to the ground, twitching and flailing as his burning venom sacs consume him from within.