The Secret Kings

by Brian Niemeier

  She unveiled her sapphire light, which was soon joined by Xander’s silver. The six stars’ pure rays shone between the standing stones, and Astlin focused all of her will on closing the pit. She could actually sense Xander’s authority striking the fabric of Avalon like an iron staff.

  Moving by inches, the pit began to close.

  “The Zadokim have issued their edict!” Anris rejoiced. “The Serpent’s chains shall not be broken.”

  Thera wheeled on her opposition. Her face remained impassive, but her eyes blazed with golden malice. A force that made Xander’s iron will seem like straw pressed back against the Zadokim with calculating brutality.

  Resisting Thera’s will was like trying to stop a slow train by standing on the track and pushing. Astlin tore off the veil she’d only lifted. Her light outshone Xander’s, setting the whole square afire with glory and making Anris fall to his knees.

  The full brilliance of Astlin’s crown delayed, but didn’t check, Thera’s invincible will. The pit sank deeper toward the Ninth Circle and the utter corruption waiting below.

  A sudden impulse stirred in Astlin’s soul. She’d felt it while breaking the Nexus’ hold on Teg and vying against Shaiel for Xander. The small placid voice told her to abandon her own will; to stop reflecting the light like a mirror and let it shine through her like a window.

  Astlin almost gave in, but she hesitated out of fear—the deep-rooted fear of losing herself like Zadok’s shards lost themselves to the Nexus.

  Xander, whose own light was fully revealed as a dazzling silver diadem, shook his head. “She is too strong!”

  Anris leapt to his feet with a cry and charged Thera, swinging his great hooked sword. The goddess held up her hand, palm outward, and Anris froze in mid-stride. To Astlin’s amazement, even dust motes hung motionless in the air around him.

  Thera spread her fingers, and dozens of white orbs like pearls made of light flashed into being, floating over every inch of Anris’ giant frame.

  Astlin tore her will away from the pit and mentally beat against the frozen block of time that bound Anris. But Thera closed her hand into a fist, and the prana pearls converged on Anris. They sank into his purple skin, turning it to blazing light that spread throughout his body like wildfire.

  Despite Astlin’s cries of protest, Anris flared into a white inferno that washed over the square and sent tongues of flame reaching higher than the rooftops before fading as if it had never been. The ashes of the malakh’s armor drifted to the ground, and his blade shattered on the pavement with the bright chimes of broken stained glass.

  Wrath consumed the last of Astlin’s restraint. She raised a trembling fist to Thera. “I’ll drag the damned snake out of that hole and shove it up yours, you murdering bitch!”

  “I am surprised at you, Serieigna,” said Xander. “And also impressed.”

  Thera stretched out her hand toward Astlin, who managed to will herself across the square an instant before a blinding white stream of prana tore through the space she’d occupied. The ray engulfed entire houses in its arrow-straight path through town and across the hill’s flank. A high-pitched ringing followed in its wake, which left buildings whole but kindled a long swath of trees into towers of white flame that burned down to nothing.

  “Astlin!” Xander cried, staring in horror at the smoking ground where she’d stood.

  “Over here!” she called back to him from the plaza’s other end.

  Xander heaved a sigh of relief. “Do not scare me like that.”

  Still standing by the ring of stones, Thera looked at her hand and said, “This power is wrong. Had not Shaiel usurped the Void, I could have carried out my work unaided. More’s the pity for this world. The Nahash will make you beg for death at my hand, but your prayer must go unanswered.”

  “I will never pray to you, Mother of Demons!” Xander vowed. He thrust his hands upward, and a surge of force rushed toward Thera, ripping a hail of flagstones from the ground and carrying them along like driftwood on the crest of a tidal wave.

  The invisible tide forked at the center of the square, passing around the ring of stones while leaving them and Thera untouched. Flagstones hurtled by on either side of Astlin to scour the faces of buildings with the sound of a cannon barrage.

  Xander rose from the ground. His body gave off sounds like stepping on green twigs. He didn’t scream but only made agonized grunts.

  “You first had this gift from me,” said Thera, holding her outstretched hand toward Xander. “I will slay you with it, in memory of our former bond.”

  The burning spear was streaking toward Thera before Astlin was aware of throwing it. Thera’s other hand lashed out, releasing a massive yet tightly controlled force that not only stopped the spear but shot it back toward Astlin, who found she couldn’t move. The shaft didn’t burn her, but it drove the air from her lungs as it rammed into her stomach and burst into a thousand fading embers.

  The same force that bound Astlin lifted her into the air and squeezed her like a giant’s fist. She could sense Xander pouring forth his power in a desperate attempt to loosen Thera’s hold on both of them, but it seemed that the best he could do was prolong their agony. Astlin fought through the pain, focusing her will on healing splintered bone and crushed organs.

  “You only delay this flawed order’s rightful end,” Thera said. “Surrender and return to the light that is denied me.”

  A shadow fell over Astlin’s thoughts. A larger shadow fell across the town. She looked upward, and there she saw the tapered oval keel of the Serapis.

  Two figures descended from the great ship on solid columns of air. One wore flowing white robes. The other’s breastplate glinted under his red cloak.

  Nakvin. Tefler.

  Tefler hit the ground running near the square’s west edge. He stopped just beyond Thera’s reach.

  “I know what you’re doing, Mom,” he said. “You’ve got to stop.”

  Nakvin rushed to her grandson’s side. Astlin felt heartbreak from the queen that dwarfed her own physical pain.

  “Elena,” Nakvin said gently. “We love you, sweetheart. Please don’t hurt anyone else.”

  Thera’s gold eyes seemed to look through her mother. “Existence hurts everyone. I will make it stop.”

  Prana surrounded Tefler’s hand. He drew the white scimitar and pointed it at Thera.

  “Don’t make me do this,” he said.

  Seeing the ether metal sword finally cracked Thera’s icy expression. She scowled and thrust both hands toward Tefler.

  Nakvin pulled a lavender rod from her robe and aimed it at Thera. The goddess’ attention was suddenly fixed on her as the rod unleashed a tremendous nexic power that Astlin found chillingly familiar.

  It’s the partition rod. Nakvin’s trying to restore Elena!

  Through the rod, Nakvin wielded strength many times greater than her natural power. Sadly, she was still no match for a goddess.

  Thera sent forth the will of an entire nexus against the assault on her soul. The rod in Nakvin’s hand cracked, and she wisely let go before it exploded in a shower of amethyst fragments that the upraised sleeve of her robe deflected from her face.

  “You lack Zebel’s will,” Thera told Nakvin. “The rod was harmless to me in your hands.”

  Nakvin didn’t shrink from the rebuke. “I thought it might be, but I was pretty sure that dealing with it would take your mind off them.”

  Astlin had immediately visualized herself beside Thera when, as Nakvin rightly guessed, the goddess’ crushing will had released her. Before Nakvin finished speaking, Astlin’s spear was arcing toward Thera’s head. A shock ran up the solid fire shaft as it struck what felt closer to diamond than flesh and bone.

  The fist that Thera drove into Astlin’s side struck faster than she could follow and harder than she’d thought Elena capable of hitting. The blow ground ribs to powder, punctured Astlin’s right lung, and left her gasping at Thera’s feet.

  “Stop it!” Tefler cri
ed as a stream of sallow light rushed from his left hand toward Thera. She answered with a flood of prana, but Xander’s will pulled Thera’s son to safety beside him.

  “Laudable spirit,” Xander said, “but poor planning.”

  Astlin’s mind restored her body. She felt Avalon’s fabric warping and saw Nakvin and Thera engaged in what looked like a staring contest but was really a battle for the realm itself.

  “Xander,” Astlin called out, “help Nakvin!”

  She added her authority to Nakvin’s, shining sapphire light on Thera that was soon mingled with Xander’s silver radiance. With one accord they commanded Avalon to bind the goddess.

  We’ve got her! Astlin thought. She and her allies’ combined strength forced Thera to her knees within an area of space that was now heavier than the huge ship overhead.

  A ship toward which Tefler was quickly ascending via airlift.

  Astlin remembered the end of her first battle with Fallon. He’s not thinking…

  She hadn’t known that there was a sending worked into her dress until Tefler spoke to her through it.

  “Hold Thera for a couple more minutes,” he said. “I’ll rig up an anti-Malefaction field and blast her out of my mom.”

  Nakvin must have gotten the message too. “Tefler, no!” she shouted. “It won’t work.”

  The brief distraction was all Thera needed. She burst her bonds with a sound like the sky tearing. A wave of force pushed her three opponents back the plaza’s edge.

  The goddess raised her hands toward the ship above. There was no time to warn anyone aboard before unseen hands took hold of the massive hull like a child clutching a model plane and pushed down with a force that overwhelmed its engines. The shadow of the Serapis stretched over the town and the whine of the ship’s overtaxed drifters grew louder as it fell.

  Astlin turned all of her light on the crashing ship. Even with the engines’ help, fighting to keep the Serapis aloft against Thera’s will was like an ant straining against the boot about to crush it. But if Astlin failed in her impossible task, it would cost the hundreds of souls on board their lives.

  The shrill whine stopped. Black smoke poured from the Serapis’ stern as its drifters burned out. Astlin would have buckled under the terrible burden of the ship’s weight and Thera’s will, but Xander and Nakvin once again joined their strength to hers.

  Astlin’s brief swell of triumph fled as the Serapis continued its descent. Together she, Xander, and Nakvin had almost been strong enough to hold Thera. But even all three of them couldn’t hold back her destructive will and a multimillion ton ship.

  The great ship’s bow tilted downward, and Astlin thought she could see the bridge crew’s horrified faces through the quickly approaching canopy. The impact would kill everyone in the square—except, she thought darkly, for Thera—but Astlin dismissed the urge to run.

  If we don’t stop Thera here, thought Astlin, there’s no stopping her. I owe it to the people of this world to die trying.

  Thera stood before the ring of standing stones, her arms stretched over her head as the gale raised by the ship’s approach made her hair writhe like serpents. There was no pity behind her gold eyes.

  Yet the sight no longer held any fear for Astlin. I’ve died before, she thought. It’s the worst experience I ever had, but I know what’s waiting on the other side. I came here to save as many souls as I could. If it was just one; that’s enough.

  The small voice returned, asking for Astlin’s surrender.

  I was proud and willful, she thought. I don’t deserve this.

  As the Serapis sped toward her, Astlin reached up to the stars hovering just above her forehead. She wasn’t surprised when her fingers touched a circlet of polished stone. She lifted the crown from her head in both hands, held it up to the clear sky, and let go with all her might. Her crown faded into the blue.

  Inexhaustible light emptied itself into Astlin’s soul and lifted her up. Her black dress and the red hair blown in her face by the wind turned a gleaming white brighter than the Well.

  These are only shadows, she realized, looking at the hill, the town, and the ship above them. And I’m just a servant, but I’ve been raised above the one Thera serves.

  With less effort than it took to move a piece on a chessboard, the will that Astlin shared with the light plucked the Serapis from Thera’s grasp and gently lowered it toward the ground.

  Thera gestured toward the stone ring. A sound like the cracking of a black egg rose from deep below, and nothing flowed out of the pit. That was the only name Astlin could give to the non-color that made blackness look like a rainbow. It poured from between the standing stones, slithering around Thera and rushing toward Astlin.

  The incomprehensible fear of waking from a nightmare to find one of its horrors invading reality shook Astlin’s soul. In her fear, she closed her eyes and willed the light to force the nothingness back.

  Astlin opened her eyes. A circle of bare soil lay where the ring of stones had once stood around the pit. The blacker darkness was gone.

  But so was the light.

  The Serapis fell once more, and Astlin could only watch helplessly as it dropped toward the square.

  Silver rays of light bathed the great ship, and Astlin felt Xander’s nexic power pressing against its keel. Nakvin extended her arms toward the Serapis, and together the two of them pushed the falling ship so that it came down a few blocks from the square. The sound of buildings being crushed was like a rockslide, and a strong wind carried choking dust. But the ship was mostly intact.

  Astlin ran to Xander as he stood panting and caked in dust. She embraced him with arms clad in dusty black sleeves.

  “That was incredible!” she exclaimed.

  Xander tousled her dirty red hair. “High praise from someone who supported the ship by herself. How did you do that?”

  Astlin stared at the grit-coated flagstones in shame. “The light did it through me,” she said. “But I got scared by what came out of the pit. I tried to control the light, and it left me.”

  Xander cupped her chin and gently lifted her face to look at his. “You are too hard on yourself,” he said. “The light leaves no one unless we forsake it.”

  As if to confirm Xander’s words, three points of sapphire light briefly glowed above Astlin’s brow.

  Astlin kissed his cheek and took the bitter grit that stuck to her lips as a penance.

  Nakvin screamed from the middle of the square. Astlin reflexively looked toward her just as the circle of earth where the pit had been erupted. Thera rose from the crater she’d made, covered head to toe in black dust. Her eyes burned like eclipsed suns.

  “You think this a victory?” Thera said, her voice all the more terrible for holding none of the fury of her eyes. “The Builders left other rings. I will seek one after you have all died for your insolence.”

  41

  Teg woke up on cracked pavement near the edge of a big square hole that had been the House of Law’s northwest corner. Smoke billowed from the pit and vanished against a black afternoon sky pulsing with green, red, and blue flashes.

  The only sounds were distant screams and the wail of air raid sirens. Nothing moved within the square. Teg took advantage of the eerie solitude to heal from the fall that he and Fallon had taken but only he’d survived.

  Despite the stabbing pain of moving his shattered arm, Teg patted the still active aura projector on his belt. Thanks to the cigarette pack-sized device, the fall hadn’t killed him. Truthfully it hadn’t killed the kost either. Teg owed that to the orbital strike on Fallon’s vas.

  Which reminded Teg of what he’d seen in Fallon’s last memory and what he’d come here to do.

  A burst of green-white light beside him made Teg close his eyes and brace himself for disintegration. But he felt only a warm breeze and heard a familiar voice.

  “Sleeping on duty is gross negligence,” Celwen rebuked him.

  Teg’s newly healed bones ached as he sat up. He opened
his eyes and saw the Night Gen pilot standing over him. A smile brightened her ashen face.

  “I sleep in on Wellday,” he said, extending an arm. She took his hand and helped him up. He surveyed the deserted plaza and the building’s exposed cross-section.

  “You have earned the rest,” said Celwen. “The death of Shaiel’s Will has thrown the enemy into disarray. Cadrys will be ours before the rest of the fleet arrives from Temil.”

  “I aim to please,” said Teg. “But don’t sell yourself short. You called in the strike. It’s good to see you got out before the hammer fell. And you didn’t bleed to death internally.”

  Celwen looked to the battle raging above. “I translated back to the Sinamarg, and Gien treated me.”

  “Isn’t he the guy Astlin told me about?” Teg frowned. “Chews his own fingers, she said. You sure you can trust him?”

  “If not for him,” said Celwen, “the Sinamarg would not have come in time, and you would have faced this mission alone.”

  Teg raised his hands in a placating gesture. “Hey, you’re a big girl, and I don’t tell folks their business. But I can tell you where Thera’s vas is and how we can pinch it like a fat kid’s pocketknife.”

  Celwen’s grey brow furrowed. “I do not know that expression. Is it peculiar to Keth?”

  “Yes,” said Teg, recalling one glorious fall day in the park. “Yes it is.”

  “Stop teasing and tell me where the vas is,” said Celwen.

  Teg moved to the edge of the pit. “I pried some intel out of the kost while we shared a brain. Mirai Smith’s down in the tunnels working on the vas in a secret lab. It’s nexically shielded and guarded by a greycloak-led platoon. Best of all, Shaiel’s Blade is inside keeping an eye on Smith.”

  Celwen stepped up beside him. Her voice echoed the worry on her face. “I will ask the admiral to send a special operations team.”

  “Let’s table that for now,” said Teg. “I think we can extract the vas, and possibly Smith, with zero losses on our side.”

  “How?” Celwen asked.

  Teg checked his gun. Its ether-metal frame wasn’t even scratched. The action still worked smoothly, so he reloaded.