Ghost in the Winds (Ghost Exile #9)

by Jonathan Moeller

  “Wait,” said Kylon, frowning.

  Now that the chaos of battle had passed, at least momentarily, he had caught his breath, and again he could sense the torrents of arcane force gathering around the Golden Palace. They had been strong before the army had passed the gate, and they were stronger now, far stronger, and they were weaving themselves together like the strands of a rope.

  The valikon shivered in Kylon’s hand, and the blade started to glimmer with white flames.

  “Lord Kylon?” said Martin, who had noticed the fire first.

  Claudia stared to the north, her eyes stricken. “Oh, no. No, no, no.”

  “The Apotheosis,” said Kylon.

  There was a sound as if the world had ripped itself in half, the ground shaking beneath Kylon’s feet, and a pillar of darkness erupted from the Golden Palace and spread across the sky like a stain of shadows.

  But it wasn’t a pillar. He could sense the individual creatures in the pillar, the tens of thousands of nagataaru spirits that writhed within it, pouring across the world in search of prey.

  Chapter 18: Perfectible

  Kalgri waited at the entrance to the Court of Justice.

  The Court had emptied as Erghulan and his lackeys went to command the defense of the city, though to judge from the noises Kalgri heard rising from the walls and the Hellfire explosion she had seen near the gate, the defense had not gone well. She wondered if Erghulan’s idiocy had finally gotten him killed, and decided that she did not care, save for a faint disappointment that she hadn’t gotten to kill him herself. Six Immortals stood guard at the entrance to the court, though even those hardened killers made sure to stay well away from Kalgri.

  From her, and from the half-dozen bodies lying motionless on the ground.

  Part of the reason Kalgri was sure the defense had not gone well was that couriers kept rushing into the Court of Justice, begging for the Grand Master to come lend his powers to the defense of the city. Callatas had given her strict instructions to make sure that no one interrupted him. Normally, Kalgri would have been delighted to ignore those instructions, or to wriggle through the loopholes that would let her arrange all manner of interruptions, just to enjoy the expression of immense irritation on the Grand Master’s pompous face.

  But not now, not today.

  She could sense that the Apotheosis was almost done.

  Kalgri was no sorceress and had no interest in becoming one. In her considerable experience, sorcerers were lazy and stupid, relying too much on their arcane power to defend themselves. Like a man leaning upon a crutch, when that crutch was kicked out from beneath them they were helpless, and she had killed many sorcerers.

  But even without arcane skill, both she and the Voice sensed the immense power swirling around the Golden Palace, power enough to blast the palace and most of the city to rubble.

  The huge Mirror of Worlds gave off a steady, pale gray glow, and from time to time the immense glass sheet flexed and wobbled within its frame of steel and wood. The three rings of sigils that Callatas had written around the great Mirror glowed as if they had been written in molten gold, and sometimes the entire palace shuddered in time to their pulsing light. The Padishah still sat chained to his cart and throne, begging for someone to kill him, and Kalgri ignored his pitiful cries.

  Half the time, she couldn’t hear them over the pitiful cries of the other prisoners.

  A dozen chained wraithblood addicts knelt before the circles of glyphs, moaning and sobbing and begging for someone to bring them wraithblood. That had been Callatas’s last command before he had begun the final phases of the spell. He had ordered the Immortals to find a dozen wraithblood addicts and bring them to the palace alive and unhurt, and the Immortals had obeyed. Now the addicts knelt and wept. Kalgri wondered if they realized what wraithblood really was, if they knew what it would do to them, and decided that she did not care.

  Callatas himself walked in a circle around the Mirror and the three rings, again and again, casting spell after spell. He should have collapsed from exhaustion by now. He had been casting spells nonstop ever since the Mirror of Worlds had arrived. The Staff of Iramis in his hand and the Seal of Iramis upon his finger both glowed with the same gray light as the Mirror and no doubt the twin relics were doing the bulk of the work of the great summoning spell. From time to time, the Star of Iramis resting against his chest gave off harsh azure light, painting his brilliant white robes with an eerie glow. That, too, seemed to be carrying the effort of the spell, though Kalgri did not understand how it worked and would not have cared if she had known.

  She only cared about one thing.

  They were moments away from the Apotheosis.

  The Voice hissed in her mind, filled with the gloating expectation of imminent triumph. In a few moments, the Apotheosis would come to pass, and Callatas would create his monsters, believing them to be the new version of humanity. Of course, the old humanity and the new humanity could not coexist so there would have to be a lot of killing.

  Millions upon millions of deaths and Kalgri shivered in glee at the thought of all the killing that awaited her.

  Just a little longer…

  The sound of boots slapped against the flagstones, and Kalgri turned as another courier ran into sight. This one was an Istarish soldier in chain mail and a spike-topped helmet, spatters of blood marking his sleeves and soot staining his face. Perhaps he had been a little too close to that Hellfire explosion.

  “Where is the Grand Master?” shouted the courier.

  “You really shouldn’t disturb him just now,” said Kalgri.

  The courier must not have realized what she was because he gave her red armor and black cloak an incredulous look, and then started shouting at one of the Immortals. “The Grand Master must come at once! Spies entered the gatehouse and opened the gates, and the rebels stormed inside before we could stop them. We have lost control of the walls, and they are even now seizing control of the Hellfire catapults to turn them against us! If we do not have the aid of the Grand Master’s spells, the city is lost. I fear it is already too late!”

  “If it makes you feel better,” said Kalgri, “you were all about to die horribly in a few minutes anyway.”

  “Stop babbling, woman!” said the courier. He peered past her and into the Court of Justice. “The Grand Master must help! If he wishes us to hold the city, we…”

  Kalgri smiled, flexed the fingers of her right hand, and drew on the Voice’s power. The sword of the nagataaru appeared in her grasp, shadow and purpled flame blended together, and she stabbed the courier through the heart. The soldier just had time to scream, clawing at her arm, but the mortal wound stole his strength, and he slumped dead to the ground. The Voice feasted upon his death and agony, some of that stolen strength funneling into Kalgri. She let out a contented sigh and let the sword dissipate, rolling her shoulders. She had killed a lot of people since she and Callatas had returned to Istarinmul, and she felt better than she had in a while…but she was still not sated.

  It would take far more death than this to satisfy her.

  “He should have listened to me, you know,” said Kalgri to one of the Immortals. “I told him to run.” She giggled. “He really ought to have run.”

  The Immortal said nothing. Wise of him.

  Kalgri contemplated killing them. Normally killing them would have irritated Callatas, which would have been an added pleasure, but Callatas was about to finish the Apotheosis, and then he would care about nothing else. That and Kalgri could kill the Immortals when Callatas finished the Apotheosis.

  She might also find a use for the Immortals. If the rebel army breached the wall, they would make for the Golden Palace, and Kylon of House Kardamnos would be with them. In fact, knowing his abilities, he might arrive well the rest of the rebels. The Immortals would make useful fodder to distract him.

  Perhaps she could tell him of Caina’s fate, torn apart by the baboons before she killed him.

  Assuming, of course, that
Caina was actually dead, that Kotuluk Iblis was correct, and that Kalgri had not overlooked something. So many had been undone by overweening pride moments before claiming victory. Kalgri had killed quite a few men like that. Best not to join their number.

  No, the Immortals might yet be useful, so they could still live.

  For now.

  Hooves clattered against the paved ground, and Kalgri looked up. A band of horsemen rode down the pillared arcade that led to the Court of Justice. Kalgri was not surprised to see Grand Wazir Erghulan Amirasku riding at the head of a dozen lesser emirs. Most of them looked grim, and a few even looked panicked. Erghulan himself looked stern as ever, but his eyes were a little wide, the lines of his face cut a little deeper.

  Defeat had that effect upon some men.

  Erghulan started forward, then looked at her, and stopped. He was smarter than his couriers. Of course, he had seen her butcher a score of Immortals in the Court of the Fountain.

  “I must speak to the Grand Master at once,” said Erghulan.

  “He doesn’t wish to be disturbed just now,” said Kalgri in a sing-song voice.

  Erghulan grimaced. “He is about to be disturbed. The city is lost.”

  “Then you should have fought harder,” said Kalgri.

  The Grand Wazir’s jaw worked. “Spies entered the gatehouse and opened the gate, jamming the machinery in the process. Damned contraption!”

  “So you lost the walls,” said Kalgri.

  “The city is lost,” said Erghulan, his disgust plain. If not for his fear of her, he knew, he would have struck her dead. “The city is lost because Callatas did not conjure his precious sorcery in time to defeat them. The Apotheosis indeed! He can enjoy his Apotheosis when the rebels storm into the Golden Palace and that damned Kyracian stormdancer cuts off his head.”

  Kalgri smiled. “Then Kylon of House Kardamnos has been sighted?”

  “Fighting on the walls,” said Erghulan. He glared through the archway and into the Court of Justice. “What the devil is he doing? Walking in circles?”

  “Finishing the spell,” said Kalgri. “Any minute…”

  “Enough!” bellowed Erghulan. “I have put my trust in that sorcerer, and what has it brought me? Ruin and defeat. I am taking the treasury and fleeing the city aboard one of the galleys berthed at the Towers of the Sea. If the Grand Master is with me when the ship leaves, he may accompany me. Otherwise, he can stay here and deal with the rebels himself.”

  The air around Kalgri began to tingle with power, and the Voice’s hissing rose to a moan of fulfilled pleasure, of a long-delayed triumph arriving at last.

  She started to laugh.

  Erghulan glowered at her. “Are you laughing at me?”

  “You really,” said Kalgri, flexing the fingers of her right hand, “should not have said that.”

  A thunderclap rang through the Golden Palace, and behind her, the Mirror of Worlds blazed with light.

  The Padishah let out a long, despairing wail.

  ###

  Callatas walked in a circle around the Mirror of Worlds, casting the spell of summoning time after time after time.

  The amount of power he had channeled should have destroyed him, reducing his body to smoking coals. The relics of Iramis, the lost regalia of the Princes, made such a spell possible. The Staff could summon vast hordes of spirits. The Seal could bound those spirits, directing them as Callatas wished. The Star, joined to both relics, empowered them both, and together the three relics interlocked their powers, producing far greater effects than they could have on their own.

  Even with the aid of the relics, the spell still should have been too much for Callatas. Even for his rejuvenated stamina and strength, the strain of moving that much power should have killed him. The shadow of Kotuluk Iblis filled his mind, and the lord of the nagataaru was more generous with his power than he had ever been, pumping fresh strength and stamina into Callatas, allowing him to continue working for far longer than he could have otherwise.

  “Kill me,” moaned the Padishah. “Oh, by the Living Flame.” He was so agitated that his chains rattled a little as he shifted in his chair. “Oh, by the Living Flame, kill me, kill me. It’s almost too late. It’s almost too late.”

  His moans added to the chorus of whimpering groans from the chained wraithblood addicts outside the circles. They ought to have been rejoicing. They would have rejoiced, of course, if they knew and understood the truth, if they knew they were about to become the first of the new humanity to spread across the world in a tide of blood and fire.

  Part of his mind noted the sound of battle rising from the rest of the city, the screams and shouts and the clang of swords upon shields. He had also noted the sound of several Hellfire explosions, and he supposed that Erghulan had lost the walls. The idiot Grand Wazir could not even hold the fortified walls of Istarinmul. It should have angered him.

  But it did not alarm him. The spell was almost done, the Mirror almost ready. The rebels would arrive just in time to see the nagataaru pour through the gate. Callatas cast the summoning spell one more time, felt it interlock with the others already blazing around the Mirror.

  And then, at last, after a century and a half of labor and experimentation and pain, it was ready.

  The Apotheosis was ready.

  Callatas was about to save mankind.

  The shadow of Kotuluk Iblis surged through him, the sovereign of the nagataaru’s sense of triumph as vast and as overwhelming as a tidal wave sweeping over the world.

  OPEN THE GATE. SUMMON MY HOST. FULFILL OUR PACT AT LAST.

  Callatas shouted, pouring all his will and power into the Staff of Iramis, and struck the end of the relic against the ground. A thunderclap rang out, seeming to roll out from the Staff, and power rushed from Callatas and into the Mirror.

  For a moment nothing happened.

  Then the combined powers of the mighty spells transmuted the Mirror into the single largest gate to the netherworld that Callatas had ever created. For an instant, the gate blazed with gray light, as bright as the sun, and Callatas had to shield his eyes. The light cleared, and through the glass of the Mirror rippled the colorless grass and writhing black sky of the netherworld, as familiar as all the other times that Callatas had seen it.

  Then the Mirror turned black as the lightless void between the stars.

  Tens of thousands upon tens of thousands of nagataaru had blocked the view.

  A heartbeat later they exploded from the Mirror and shot skyward with the force of water bursting from a breach in a dam. The column of shadows hurtled upward, seeming to spread across the sky like a vast black mushroom, and it made Callatas think of black ink poured into a glass of clear water.

  Ribbons of shadow and purple flame broke off from the vast column, flying towards the city as they obeyed Callatas’s commands. Exultation surged through him. It was working. The spell was working. The nagataaru, summoned to the material world, would seek living vessels of flesh to enter.

  And thanks to the wraithblood, tens of thousands of vessels awaited the nagataaru.

  The Padishah screamed, his fingers clawing at the arms of the chair.

  Callatas turned to look at the wraithblood addicts. They gazed at the vast column of shadow with bewilderment. Even as he watched, ribbons of shadow and purple fire flowed towards them, and the addicts recoiled in fear. For a moment the nagataaru spirits hovered before the addicts, like lions contemplating gazelles.

  Then the nagataaru surged forward, hammering into the addicts. The ribbons of shadow and purple flame poured into their nostrils and mouths and eyes, sinking into their flesh, and the wraithblood addicts screamed. The nagataaru vanished, and the addicts trembled and flailed.

  Then, before Callatas’s eyes, the first of the new humanity arose from the shells of the wraithblood addicts.

  Their bodies swelled, growing so large that their ragged clothes disintegrated, and their shackles and collars snapped apart. As they grew, their skins changed, becoming
the color of obsidian and as hard as diamond, impervious to any form of attack. Claws sprouted from their fingers and toes, and fangs grew over their lips even as great black wings sprouted from their backs. The wraithblood addicts had been gaunt and wasted, but their new forms rippled with heavy muscle, and their faces were inhumanly beautiful. Their eyes burned with the purple fire of the nagataaru, and the same purple fire pulsed in the veins beneath their skin.

  The hybrids, the first of the new humanity, straightened up, looking around themselves.

  “Yes,” whispered Callatas.

  They were beautiful.

  Beautiful and utterly perfect. The kadrataagu, created when a nagataaru overwhelmed its human host, were hideous and deformed. But here, guided by Callatas’s spells and the power of the Seal, he had created a perfect melding of mankind and nagataaru, taking the strengths of both and fusing them together. The new humanity was immortal, impervious to disease and injury, far stronger and faster than its predecessor.

  And Callatas could at last guide mankind to its new and better future, freed from the corruptions and the infirmities of the past.

  “Hear me!” said Callatas, and the purple-burning eyes turned towards him.

  ###

  Kalgri watched the black-winged creatures with fascination, while behind her Erghulan and his men gaped with horrified expressions.

  She had to admit that the hybrid creatures had turned out better than expected. For all of Callatas’s boasting, she had expected that he would create a horde of kadrataagu, misshapen monsters that would rampage across the world in an orgy of slaughter. The things that had been created from the wraithblood addicts were beautiful in the way that a poisoned dagger was beautiful, sleek and deadly and dangerous. She wondered how he had managed that. It took a great deal of power to achieve that…

  Ah, of course. The Mirror of Worlds. The huge gate was a permanent weakness in the barrier between the mortal world and the netherworld, and so long as it was open, the nagataaru could draw more power from the netherworld. She supposed all sorcerers could draw more power for their spells, just as any spirits currently in the mortal world would become stronger…