‘Many ships, more than Xagor has ever seen,’ the wrack complained.
‘Just look for biggest ones, stupid. The archons will be on those. When we find a big one with a white flame on the side that’s our stop.’
‘Yes, yes. Very obvious.’
Yllithian watched the war host prepare from the bridge of his command ship, an ancient vessel with a revered name that would translate roughly as Intemperate Angel in lesser tongues. The Ninth Raptrex had come in force, easily visible by the distinctive feather patterns that marked their Razorwing fighters and Voidraven bombers as they flew into the open bays of the ships. The nominal raid leader, Malixian the Mad was aboard his own vessel, the Death Strike, impatiently waiting for departure. One of the cruisers was from the Realm Eternal, resplendent in the faded grandeur of lost ages. Morr was lurking aboard it, commanding in absentia for his injured master, Kraillach. As Xelian had predicted, Kraillach’s regrowth was proving slow and painful. He had sent word from his regeneration crypt virtually begging to participate in seizing a worldsinger – on the condition that he would also benefit. Xelian’s own hard-edged, hook-winged destroyers shared berths alongside Yllithian’s black-carapaced Corsairs. Ships from a host of lesser kabals squeezed in where they could.
Despite the smoothness of preparations for the raid Yllithian felt dissatisfied. The warriors were loading, the weapons were arming, the military component of the raid was coming together with all the efficiency Commorrites typically exhibited around the business of taking slaves. But the raid ultimately was a sham, an irrelevance in comparison to the true mission to capture a worldsinger, and that part of the mission was not going at all according to plan.
Yllithian turned to reappraise the motley assortment of individuals that had presented themselves before him for inclusion in his supposedly secret mission.
Xelian had sent her own agent, a lithe succubus named Aez’ashya, to ‘make sure everything went smoothly’. She stood brazenly on Yllithian’s command deck eyeing him with frank insolence. She knew he could not deny her a role in the mission. Xelian’s part in the conspiracy was simply too critical to risk alienating her mistress. Like all of her brother and sister wyches, Aez’ashya was quick and deadly so she was at least something of an asset. The two others that had lately arrived before him could claim no such distinction.
Bellathonis had insisted that two of his agents needed to go on the mission to capture the worldsinger ‘to ensure the subject came to him intact.’ It was a piece of staggering impudence that the master haemonculus had justified by ‘the special requirements of the operation.’ The two of them, a shivering little masked wrack and a shifty-looking sell-steel, did not engender much confidence. They stank of cheap drugs and excreta underscored with a sharp tang of chemicals and fear. He was currently weighing whether to accede to the haemonculus’s request or simply have the pair of them flung out of the nearest airlock.
Perhaps most worryingly Kraillach’s executioner, Morr, had been making rumbling noises about going on the mission himself ‘for the sake of my archon,’ apparently driven by some incomprehensible sense of duty to see his archon restored.
Incubi were supposed to possess considerable stealth skills, but a huge, heavily armoured warrior with a two-metre-long blade still did not strike Yllithian as an ideal candidate for an infiltration mission deep into the heart of enemy territory, Once again, however, he would be hard put to deny Kraillach’s chief executioner his wishes if he were pressed. It was to be expected that Yllithian’s allies would be alert for signs of him entirely taking over control and eager to push their own people into the heart of things, but it was getting tiresome to say the least.
Sadly the succession of troublesome unknown quantities attaching themselves to his carefully planned mission were not the greatest of Yllithian’s grievances.
Yllithian’s own primary agent, the individual that the entire effort hinged upon, was nowhere to be found. The elusive agent had been out of contact for several days after promising to scout the target. It was safe to assume that he was dead by now but the preparations for the raid had ground relentlessly forwards once the wheels started turning.
With Yllithian’s agent gone the entire mission became a shot in the dark. It was a shot still worth taking in Yllithian’s opinion on the off-chance that it succeeded, but one to perhaps limit his losses on. He addressed his visitors with ill-disguised distaste.
‘Aez’ashya, be most welcome. Felicitations to your mistress, dear friend that she is to us,’ Yllithian said silkily. ‘Pray take charge of these two… individuals and remove them from my presence.’
‘And then?’ Aez’ashya arched her brows coquettishly.
‘Keep them by your side, they will accompany you on the mission later.’
Bellathonis’s agents looked scared. Aez’ashya looked by turns annoyed and disappointed. Yllithian felt a little better.
As preparations for the raid proceeded above, Yllithian’s chief haemonculus, Syiin, was busy below, burrowing his way deeper beneath the corespur. By crooked paths he went down into the most ancient pits beneath the city where the haemonculi covens had dwelt for countless centuries. Through a maze of cells and oubliettes he followed chalk marks and fetishes made in the spiralling circle that marked the seal of The Black Descent, passing along razor-edged walkways and across iron bridges as he went down, always down into the depths where his coven masters dwelt. He passed into regions where light was a defeated foe and age-long pain and misery accreted on the walls like dark clay. At last he came to the slowly-turning, trap-filled labyrinth that was the coven’s lair. Here he went more slowly, stopping often to rub his hands and lick his lips as he negotiated the twists and turns. It was a long time since he had come below to seek his hidden masters and he struggled to recall the precise route.
Monofilament lines as thin as spider silk bisected the air, gravity traps lurked beneath innocuous-looking flagstones; agoniser wings, semi-sentient venom clouds and a myriad of other deadly devices were concealed behind the walls. It was clearly not a time to be imprecise. He congratulated himself that he had brought an elixir with him for just such an eventuality, a substance distilled from the synapses of a slave-scholar. He fumbled through his hide robes before triumphantly bringing forth a tiny crystal vial. Unscrewing the stopper he allowed a single drop of the viscous liquid to fall on his quivering pink tongue.
Syiin was still savouring the zesty taste when the correct route through the labyrinth came to him as if it had been sketched in lambent neon in his mind’s eye. He moved along the complex, weaving path as if it were dance steps – forwards three, left one, forwards five, turn right… So by spiralling, circuitous routes Syiin made his way slowly but surely into the Chamber of Craft, where coven members of The Black Descent impatiently awaited him.
Four were present, two of them Secret Masters hooded and masked in bone, a third in the viridian and black robes of an Intimate Secretary. The fourth coven member remained hidden in the shadows, an ominous presence concealed by interference fields that easily defeated Syiin’s augmented eyes.
‘You’re late!’ the Secretary snarled. ‘The coven is not yours to command, how dare you keep us waiting?’
‘Humble apologies, Secretary, Masters,’ Syiin puffed, bobbing bows to everyone present.
‘We are only present because you promised word of Bellathonis,’ one of the Secret Masters said peevishly in a thin, high voice.
‘Quite,’ said the Secretary brusquely. ‘So out with it, what have you found?’
Syiin waited for them to be quiet. They might outrank him, noticeably so in the case of the Intimate Secretary, but Syiin held the cards in this meeting with his fresh news. As such he took his time before replying.
‘Your honours, I’m certain that the renegade Bellathonis is undertaking forbidden work on behalf of Archon Yllithian.’
‘Oh really?’ drawled the Secretary with avid interest. ‘And what do you have as proof of this?’
Syiin licked his lips uncomfortably. Proof had been in extremely short supply. He brazenly presented his suppositions as facts instead.
‘Yllithian has met with Bellathonis, and subsequent to that he sent a gift to him by roundabout means. Furthermore I have reason to believe that the renegade is creating a hidden workshop somewhere in the city.’
‘I hear conjecture but not evidence,’ the Secretary sneered. ‘What was this gift? By your coy references it seems safe to presume you did not intercept it and learn of its contents, no more than you can precisely locate this phantom workshop. You bring us nothing.’
‘Ah, but everything is in the context of these seemingly small happenings,’ Syiin said smoothly before playing his trump card. ‘This very hour Yllithian sets out in concert with his allies to raid a maiden world. Archon Malixian acts as patron but I have no doubt that Yllithian put him up to it, and by extension the raid was originally Bellathonis’s idea.’
Syiin let that settle in for a moment, turning his round, stretched face back and forth to peer at the assembled coven members. He was enjoying himself considerably making them feel uncomfortable.
‘It’s my belief that Yllithian is seeking a pure heart.’
The distortion-cloaked fourth member of the coven, silent and motionless until now, reacted sharply at his words. A distorted whisper echoed about the chamber, the sound of a blade being honed on a whetstone.
‘Leave us,’ it said.
The masked Hidden Masters and the green-robed Intimate Secretary turned on their heels and left immediately, vanishing into shadowy openings so quickly they seemed to have been swallowed up in a single gulp. Syiin looked on interestedly as the blurred shape resolved into a darker solid, a tall and hatchet-faced haemonculus wearing the slate grey of a Master Elect of Nine. Syiin was quietly impressed with himself. He had just jumped up a full three degrees in dealing with the labyrinthine hierarchy of The Black Descent.
‘An unfortunate business,’ the stone-on-steel voice said, ‘but one inside your own demesne. The renegade makes his new lair beneath the White Flames’ fortress at the invitation of your master, Archon Yllithian.’
Syiin spluttered with outrage, feeling his stretched face become flush. That Yllithian would take up with the vagrant Bellathonis was bad enough, that he had invited the dog into his house was worse. Haemonculi were slow to anger, ridiculously slow by Commorrite standards, but once their cold, bright fury was sparked it was almost impossible to quench. Syiin felt the first stirrings of that anger kindling inside him now.
‘This cannot be borne!’ Syiin hissed. ‘Bellathonis insults this coven, all of us! He tramples our teachings and mocks our scriptures. He endangers the city! He must be struck down!’
The Master Elect was nodding thoughtfully. Flat plates of black crystal had been used to replace his eyes and they winked at Syiin fitfully in the dim light.
‘You are filled with the spirit of righteous retribution. This is good,’ the Master Elect grated. ‘But is your hate enough to carry you to the next degree of the descent?’
Syiin blinked in surprise. Another degree of descent would make him a master, equivalent in rank to Bellathonis before he abandoned the Coven. There were few things that Syiin wouldn’t do to achieve that.
‘I hate Bellathonis,’ he said and found that saying the words thrilled him. ‘I hate him and I wish to destroy him.’ The Master Elect nodded and extended a small object to him, a key with an ornate barrel that was fluted with many sharp tines.
‘Take this to the forty-ninth interstices and open the chamber there. Your enemy has a weakness for gifts, and you may find something fitting for him inside. Do not tarry overlong. I sense you have little time left. Take it and go.’
Syiin accepted the key with shaking hands and set out through the labyrinth. He began laboriously pacing out the memorised pattern to reach the forty-ninth interstices, sparing another drop of the precious elixir to keep himself on the correct course. In these depths most of the labyrinth was entirely lightless; only strict adherence to the mnemonically implanted routes known by a coven member could prevent fatal disorientation in the inky blackness. Syiin kept his head down and his eyes closed as he took the forty-nine necessary steps.
He opened his eyes to find himself in a stretch of passage that was octagonal in cross-section, and lit by a coldly glowing amethyst crystal overhead. His path was blocked by a heavy-looking circular silver door. Spiralling inscriptions across its surface emanated from a large, central keyhole. Syiin inserted the key the Master Elect had given him and then stopped.
What if this were a test? Or a trap? Perhaps some coven members were using his distraction with Bellathonis as a way to dispose of him… Syiin’s fingers caressed the key uncertainly where it stood proud of the lock. Then he thought again of the insults Yllithian had heaped upon him. Syiin could never hope to strike at his archon and live, but with the coven’s blessing he could still strike at his rival haemonculus.
He seized the key and twisted. It moved reluctantly at first and then more smoothly before vanishing entirely into the hole. For a few heartbeats nothing happened, and then Syiin saw that grooves were forming in the solid-seeming surface of the door, splitting it into concentric rings. The rings began to rotate and align themselves, twisting independently before folding up neatly inside one another to open a path within. A breath of stale air wafted outwards, making Syiin sneeze. The chamber must have been sealed for hundreds of years. Despite his fears no void-born entity rushed out to attack him, or to damn him by fulfilling his every wish. A half-seen glimmer from inside drew him onwards into a small octagonal chamber mostly filled by shelves made of thin sheets of crystal. Syiin emitted a little gasp when he saw what was arrayed upon them.
All manner of arcane paraphernalia was on display: bejewelled boxes, ornately bladed caskets, runic tetrahedrons, tightly-coiled spheres of shining metal, pots, amphorae, censers and crucibles. Precious treasures they seemed, certainly. They were richly made with fine if sinister artistry, but only a haemonculus could appreciate their true value. The contents of the chamber would have beggared a kabal to collect, the wealth it represented could have purchased a fleet or bribed a fortress. These rare and deadly treasures were examples of the very finest devices of excruciation.
The spheres were Animus Vitae, sentient ribbons of razor-edged metal tightly wound together. At a command, they would explode outwards to ensnare a victim before contracting again just as quickly to slice apart their helpless prey with delightful precision. Sadly Bellathonis would recognise one of those distinctive devices long before it could be brought close enough to him to do its lethal work…
Syiin’s eyes strayed to a small, black box with ornamental blades projecting from each corner. He recognised it as a Casket of Flensing. Opening it with the correct command words would unleash a host of invisible assassins upon the target, gnawing through armour and flesh alike in a whirlwind of unseen teeth. Syiin had even heard tales that the ethereal creatures in the casket would bring the skull of their victim back to their master when the work was complete, the brain inside still delectably intact.
The moon-faced haemonculus pondered. Most of the tales featuring a Casket of Flensing portrayed it as a device of punishment and terror rather than execution, ghoulishly emphasising the agonised struggles of the helpless victim. Syiin needed a device that would reliably destroy Bellathonis completely in a single strike with no chance of survival. He regretfully discarded the idea of using the casket and moved on.
A shard of thick, angular crystal lay on a shelf close by. Syiin hissed when he saw it, moving carefully to ensure his reflection wasn’t caught in the shard’s mirrored surface. It was a Shattershard, legendary creation of the demented genius Vorsch. Each Shattershard had been made from a remnant of a complex dimensional gateway called the Mirror of Planes. After the portal’s destruction Vorsch had painstakingly tracked down every fragment and weaponised it. By some strange dimensional sympathy understood only by Vorsch, catc
hing a victim’s reflection in the shard and then shattering it would cause the victim to shatter into pieces too. Syiin had believed there to be few, if any, Shattershards left in the city but here one lay. Perhaps this one was fated to be the doom of Bellathonis?
Syiin frowned. A Shattershard needed a courageous, deft minion to employ it successfully. He could rely on none of his wracks for that, and he could scarcely expose himself to make the attempt in person. Besides which he wasn’t sure he entirely trusted an esoteric dimensional shattering as a way of permanently removing his rival. On a visceral level he really would like to see a body – irretrievably destroyed, of course, but preferably in a red and messy fashion. The thirteen foundations of vengeance had very specific instructions about that – an enemy can never be presumed dead unless their body is found. He licked his thin lips at the thought. It was a rare pleasure to strike down another haemonculus – the covens spent most of their time working to suppress such internal conflicts, rather than enable them. As such, whatever attack Syiin chose had to be totally unexpected and instantly lethal.
He ignored more caskets, orbs and crucibles, all of them devices of psychic torment that would only titillate a master haemonculus like Bellathonis. He was about to turn back to the Casket of Flensing again when his gaze fell on the dullest and most unimpressive item he had seen so far. It was a little three-sided pyramid no taller than his thumb, made of a dull, coarse material akin to charred bone. Silvery runes etched into its surface warned of the dire consequences of activation.
It was a runic gate, a portable key for entering the webway, but this particular gate led to a fragment of the labyrinth dimension that had fallen into madness and dissolution. Syiin had seen one like it used in his days of apprenticeship. His old master Rhakkar had unleashed a dark gate during the sack of a slave world. Syiin could see it in his mind’s eye even now. The slaves’ leaders had taken refuge in one of their larger hutches with many of their armed followers guarding them. Desperation was making the slaves fractious, even to the point of driving back the archon’s warriors with their wild firing. Careless of their shots Rhakkar had stalked forwards and cast a small, dark tetrahedron into the slaves’ midst.
Path of the Renegade Page 14
