The Keeper's Shadow

by Dennis Foon

  “How do I find him?”

  “If I die, he will know. He will send you a vision. You will find him. Make me this promise,” she says, taking his hand. “And tell no one. It is a secret only we must share.”

  Gripping her hand tightly, he clutches it to his heart. “I promise.”

  Mabatan leans forward so that her cheek touches his. “Thank you,” she murmurs, and lifting his hand to her lips, she kisses it.

  A piercing cry echoes through the library. “Lieutenant!” As Wolf charges down the steps, Lumpy stands to meet him. “Five Brothers have fallen. There is no blood, but they are clearly dead.” Wolf is shouting in Lumpy’s face. “Those caravans are all defended with Apogees! We have no defense against that weapon! We cannot fight it. Four clerics took five of my best warriors! For what? I will not watch my people slaughtered like cattle!”

  Lumpy holds his ground before the infuriated warrior. “I grieve for your men, Brother Wolf.”

  “I don’t want your grief, Lieutenant!”

  “We are working on a solution.”

  Wolf’s hook-sword is twisting menacingly in his hand. “How many more will die before you find one?”

  “You will not fight again until we do, Brother Wolf.” Every face in the atrium lifts at the sound of the voice. Roan is standing at the library entrance. Half his face is burned a deep red, as if he had walked, one side masked, in the summer’s sun.

  Pushing everyone in his way aside, Wolf stumbles to the foot of the stairs. He gapes up at Roan as if he were seeing an apparition. Then, trembling, he cries out, “Prophet! You have met the Friend!”

  THE VAPOR

  WE KNEW WE WOULD BE BURIED ALIVE. BUT WE WOULDN’T STAY BURIED FOREVER.

  —KRISPIN,

  VISION #787, YEAR 38 A.C.

  DREAMFIELD JOURNALS OF THE

  FIRST INNER CIRCLE

  STOWE HAD MERELY TO EXPRESS CURIOSITY IN COOPERATION UNLIMITED to excite Master Querin’s interest. Certain that the physical presence of Our Stowe among the workers of the City would accelerate its restabilization, he had quickly arranged a grueling tour of all the Conurbation’s factories and communication centers. So for the past two weeks, her beatific presence has graced a better part of the City’s industrial complexes and now, at last, Stowe and Willum have arrived at their goal.

  The prospect of spying at Cooperation Unlimited is quite exhilarating and Stowe grins widely back at Master Fortin as he flashes his small white teeth in greeting.

  “Our Stowe,” the manager warbles, trying to maintain a stately pose beneath the entranceway. “We are truly blessed. Two visits to our lowly facility in less than a year. The workers are ecstatic.”

  “It is my pleasure, Master Fortin, to return here to honor your tremendous achievement,” replies Stowe with perfect grace. “Your factory is the apple of the Eldest’s eye.”

  Speaking of eyes, Stowe notices that the manager’s acquired a new pair—scintillating green, they are far too lovely for his toadlike countenance. They might have been Lem’s eyes. But she mustn’t allow these thoughts to affect her, not now.

  “You flatter me,” he smiles. “We work hard, it is true, production increasing daily, but it is a calling, Our Stowe, a sacred duty we perform. It inspires us, imbues us with a religious fervor that feeds and enhances our labor.”

  Oh! How the man goes on! “Of course it does. Well. I suppose we shouldn’t keep our workers waiting.”

  “Forgive me, I’m prattling!” Fortin exclaims. Extending an arm, he leads her and Willum into the main hall.

  How many speeches has she given in the past two weeks—thirty? forty? She used to find them such a chore, but now they have acquired the patina of a challenge. By subtly altering a phrase here, or intonation there, she and Willum seek to place a suggestion in the minds of the workers that the prophecies might deliver on their promises, not in some vaguely prescribed future but soon, very soon. With a bit of luck, maybe she can make Darius sweat enough to do something stupid—well, better not be too optimistic. That road leads to overconfidence and carelessness.

  She watches Willum quickly change into the sterile overalls, mittens, and overshoes required to enter the factory. Due to her elevated status, Our Stowe is exempt, but she’d gladly trade. The outfit looks much more comfortable than the one she’s decked out in. Being in the Farlands hadn’t been pleasant, but she has fond memories of never having to be trussed in and weighted down by her clothes.

  Fortin, now conscientiously germ-free, escorts her up a metal stairway that leads to a balcony. Below, hundreds of workers are busy at their conveyor belts, but the moment Fortin steps onto the amplification platform, every worker stops to look up. No one so much as breathes.

  Raising his hand, Fortin declares, “Our Stowe has returned!” And as he welcomes her onto the platform, the murmuring chant begins. “Our Stowe, Our Stowe, Our Stowe!”

  She regards the workers’ adoring faces, the longing in their eyes. Willum is right. There is more there than an enabled obsession with an inaccessible icon. They believe she will play an integral part in fulfilling the prophecies. She must ensure that her presence here, today, bolsters that faith.

  “When I left you, I sought the vision of the prophecy,” Stowe says softly.

  Every voice rises together. “The Daughter shall have the Sight.”

  “Yes. I have seen, and what I have seen has brought me home. To you. Because you are the future. The prophecy has declared that when my father passes on his scepter, our love will blossom with unity and purpose. Do not be impatient. Labor in the knowledge that a light, suppressed for so long, shall soon be released into the world. That light will benefit you all. I swear this to you!”

  “Our Stowe…Our Stowe…” they whisper, every hand raised, palms facing her, fingers wide, in surrender to their goddess.

  As she backs off the platform, Stowe does not miss the troubled look that darkens Master Fortin’s face. If he has a problem, Willum will have to sort it out. Right now, she has to stick to the script they’ve devised.

  “That was magnificent, Our Stowe. Inspiring.” How quickly the manager masks his misgivings.

  Her voice piteously weak, Stowe sighs. “You are too generous, Master Fortin.” She wobbles precariously and grips Willum’s arm.

  “Our Stowe?” Willum whispers, reaching out to hold her.

  “Is there a problem? Is she not well?” Fortin’s voice is shaking.

  “Her schedule has been very demanding,” Willum explains. “She insists on making two or three appearances every day, but it is a terrible strain.”

  Stowe stumbles, collapsing into Willum’s arms.

  “I see, I see,” says Fortin, wringing his hands. The possibility of the Archbishop’s daughter becoming ill under his roof is making him squirm. “There’s a couch in my office, Our Stowe. If you would overlook its inadequacies, perhaps you could rest there.”

  “You are too kind,” murmurs Stowe. Then with a sigh, she promptly pretends to faint.

  Her head leans into Willum’s shoulder, and through the curtain of her hair she is able to catch a covert look at her surroundings. The corridor Fortin leads them down is clearly the administrative wing of the factory. In office after office bookkeepers and data processors punch figures into machines. Coming to a parquet door, Fortin pauses to look back at Stowe. A piteous groan seems to be just the right key to open it.

  Stowe has to exert a lot of control not to smirk at the elegant interior. The room is far more opulent than the Archbishop’s: the floors are marble, the carved desk ancient oak, and the walls hand-painted tiles. It’s a flagrant exhibition of a status far above a manager’s position.

  Fortin hastily dismisses the decor, distinctly embarrassed to be so exposed. “The previous manager is responsible for this extravagant interior,” he sputters. “Rather than waste more precious resources having it removed, I bear with it.”

  Shaking her head, Stowe makes a show of opening her eyes a fraction to vaguely scan
her surroundings. “A prudent choice,” she says with a generous smile. Spotting a velvet chaise, she signals to Willum to lay her down. “If you don’t mind,” she says to Fortin, as she splays herself across its entire frame.

  Clearly embarrassed, the manager coughs nervously. “We’ll leave you alone then.”

  But he remains there, waiting. Stowe knows he’d like her to stop him—doesn’t much care for the thought of her in his room unsupervised. Resting her head on a feather pillow, she studiously ignores him. And as soon as he realizes a reprieve is not coming, he leads Willum out.

  As much as she’d like to snoop around and see what he’s hiding, time is limited and she must constrain herself to the task at hand. Her etherself rises and floats past Fortin and Willum. For a moment she hovers invisibly before them. On my way, then.

  Willum brushes his hair back in surreptitious greeting. Go carefully, Stowe.

  Sinking through the floor, she notes the very different quality of this corridor. The floors are polished concrete, the walls burnished steel. Heavily armed guards closely examine every worker entering or exiting. Drifting through the fortified portal, she’s drawn to three technicians hunched over a translucent globe no larger than an eyeball, with two finger-length appendages dangling from it. A faint luminescence is darting through veins in the globe, shifting in color from blood red to turquoise to marigold. An enabler. The technicians place it on a tray, and as one of them walks with it, Stowe follows.

  At another set of steel doors, the technician’s retina is scanned and he’s waved through. This laboratory is larger, bustling with workers in sterile garb. The technician takes the enabler to a huge bell jar, at least twenty feet tall. Plum-colored gases swirl inside it under the watchful gaze of a group of scientists. Behind them lies a comatose man, head shaved, the stitches still bleeding behind his ear. As she approaches the jar, Stowe can see what they’re observing. A humanoid shape, perhaps the size of her thumbnail, is skimming the swirling mist, rising until it arrives at what looks like an outstretched hand…Darius’s Throne, just as Roan described it.

  On the other side of the jar, another patient’s neck has been incised; the enabler she followed here is about to be connected. As the second appendage wraps around his spinal cord, the patient’s body spasms. Then a vapor rolls off him, like a second skin being pulled away and toward the enabler. Without hesitation, she slides alongside.

  THE VAPOR SOARS THROUGH BILLOWING CLOUDS, THEN SUDDENLY PLUMMETS INTO OPEN SKY, ACCELERATING TO TREMENDOUS SPEEDS. SEPARATING HERSELF FROM THE FORM, STOWE BANKS HARD TO HER LEFT. AN OLD ACQUAINTANCE OF HERS IS LANGUIDLY GLIDING BELOW HER, A VULTURE WITH A HUGE SCAR DISFIGURING ITS HEAD. KORDAN. ONE LOOK AT HER WITH HIS GOOD EYE, AND HE’LL GO STRAIGHT TO DARIUS.

  BUT THE VULTURE DOES NOT SEE HER. HIS EYES ARE ON THE VAPOR.

  CATAPULTING INTO THE GIGANTIC OUTSTRETCHED HAND, THE FORM LANDS ON THE OPEN PALM, TWITCHING HORRIBLY. KORDAN SOARS OVER IT AS IF PREVENTING ANY POSSIBILITY OF ESCAPE. THE LIVING SHAPE ABRUPTLY DIMS AND THEN IS SUCKED, WRITHING, INTO DARIUS’S THRONE.

  THE THRONE IS CLEARLY COLLECTING THE LIFE ESSENCE DRAWN OUT BY THESE NEW ENABLERS. WILL IT BE ENOUGH—WITHOUT ROAN OR STOWE OR THE NOVAKIN—TO JOIN DARIUS TO THE OVERSHADOWER? TO MAKE HIM OMNIPOTENT, IMMORTAL, A GOD BEYOND THE GODS?

  AS SHE INCHES CLOSER, A SURGE OF ENERGY REACHES UP TO MEET HER, DRAWING HER TOWARD THE THRONE—BETTER BACK UP.

  NOTHING HAPPENS. THIS CAN’T BE RIGHT…

  SHE’S IN HER ETHERFORM! SHE STOLE INTO THE DREAMFIELD ON SOMEONE ELSE’S STEAM AND NOW SHE DOESN’T HAVE ENOUGH SUBSTANCE TO DRAW HERSELF AWAY. SHE EXPENDS EVERY BIT OF WILL SHE HAS, BUT IT ONLY SEEMS TO PROPEL HER EVEN MORE SPEEDILY TOWARD THE RAVENOUS PALM.

  Stowe did not deviate much from Querin’s proclamation, but still…it made Fortin anxious and he is sure to report it to Darius. The situation must be handled with perfect delicacy; the Keeper will seek to interrogate either him or Stowe and one misstep could mean their destruction.

  “Our Stowe’s speech,” proclaims Fortin, as they walk down the corridor, “was most provocative.”

  “Provocative—how so?”

  “That business about the prophecy.”

  “You find Master Querin’s proclamation provocative?” asks Willum, carefully choosing each word.

  “No. No. Of course not,” Fortin twitters nervously. “It’s just…is Darius planning to retire? To hand over the Conurbation to that girl?”

  Striking a pose of surprise, Willum gasps, incredulous, “You were not aware of the prophecy?”

  “Well, of course I am,” Fortin’s irritation is palpable. “We are all aware of the prophecies. Master Querin makes sure of that! But…well…” Fortin glances up and down the hallway, then whispers in Willum’s ear, “I mean they’re prophecies. Nobody really expects them to come true. She’s a child. How could the Archbishop cede his power to her? It’s impossible!”

  “Our Stowe is his daughter,” says Willum, stating the obvious.

  “She’s only been here two years. She’s…unproven. Some of us have served the Conurbation for three-quarters of a century.”

  “Yes, but we are, none of us, indispensable.” Willum goes over these words again and again to himself, indelibly embedding them in his memory.

  “No, none are indispensable,” mutters Fortin, his bitterness rising. “And you—who are nothing more than a nursemaid—you will end up with everything, won’t you?”

  “I serve as Our Stowe’s Primary. Her well-being is ample enough reward.”

  Something dangerous flutters behind Fortin’s new eyes. But before he can shape it into words he is stopped short by the loud thrumming of an alarm. The manager’s face suddenly drains of color. “If you’ll excuse me,” he says curtly, an unmistakable note of panic in his voice. And with a bow, the manager makes a hasty retreat.

  NOTHING SEEMS TO BE HELPING HER OUT OF THIS MESS! AS SHE DESPERATELY TRIES EVERY TRICK SHE KNOWS TO SLOW DOWN, STOWE FEELS THE HALF-RING TIGHTEN ROUND HER FINGER. MAYBE IT COULD HELP—IF ONLY SHE KNEW HOW. THE INSTANT SHE THINKS THIS, A PHOSPHORESCENCE ENVELOPS HER WHOLE BODY AND LIFTS HER WITH GREAT SPEED FURTHER AND FURTHER FROM DARIUS’S VORACIOUS HAND.

  OF COURSE. THE SHOCK BOTH SHE AND ROAN FELT WHEN THE RING SPLIT IN TWO. IT MUST HAVE BEEN THE RING LINKING TO THEIR LIFE-FORCE AND NOW IT RESPONDS REGARDLESS OF THE FORM THEY TAKE. SHE SIGHS, GRATEFUL FOR ONCE TO HER GREAT-GRANDFATHER AND HIS FORESIGHT. AN ALARM SHRILLS AND KORDAN’S MANGLED HEAD LOOKS UP. HA! TOO LATE. SHE IS ALREADY GONE.

  Stowe has barely come to before Willum flings open the Manager’s office door.

  “Are you alright?” he asks, but his eyes lock on hers. Was it you who set off the alarm?

  “Yes,” she replies. “I feel better now.” I’m sorry. I followed a vapor-like form from an enabler straight to Darius’s Throne—it’s just as Roan described—and it gobbled the vapor up. But…

  “Are you well enough to leave?” Willum asks, helping her up. “You are expected back at the Pyramid.” Did anyone see you?

  No. But… “Should we say goodbye to Master Fortin?” Just before it was absorbed, the form dimmed.

  “He may be busy. Perhaps we’ll see him on the way out.” Darius must be siphoning off some of its energy before he feeds it to the Overshadower. The enablers’ new design might serve that purpose. Perhaps even the Apogee as well.

  Stowe stands, locking her arm into Willum’s.

  It’s why he’s after more and more victims. Feed the dark god greater quantity and he might not notice the poor quality. Think Darius’ll get away with it?

  It’s our job to see he doesn’t.

  A PAIN IN THE HEAD

  I AM BADGER. THIS RING WAS FORGED IN MY IMAGE, IMBUED WITH MY LIFE-FORCE. ALL I HAVE TO OFFER IS NOW YOURS.

  —JOURNAL OF ROAN OF THE PARTING

  ROAN’S WORRIED ABOUT MABATAN. She’s terribly pale, a ghost of herself. Every once in a while her hand gestures in a way distinctly not her own, serving some unseen purpose. She scowls in
appropriately, and swaggers. If he didn’t know she was carrying around Kira’s consciousness, he’d think she’d lost her mind. Watching her sit distracted, in front of her untouched lunch, so oblivious to her surroundings, moves him in an unexpected way. He reaches out to take her hand in his.

  Looking up, she lifts her other hand to trace a finger down the center of his face.

  “Your mark is already fading,” she says softly. Then, her brown eyes returning to this world, their world, she smiles, happy to see him.

  But the bulge on her neck is frighteningly disconcerting and he’s barely able to return her smile. “How are you doing?”

  “Kira is in a barren wood. It is a place my people have twice attempted to restore and failed.” The sadness in her voice, combined with a sense of futility he has never heard before, makes Roan grip her hand even harder. “She does not like the fact that they are exposed close to Fandor territory. But she’s calm, relaxed.”

  The cost of this incessant doubling of experience on Mabatan is making him doubt its worth. “What happens when she isn’t?”

  Mabatan sighs wearily, responding to his look. “You’ve been talking to Lumpy.”

  “So. Is he wrong?”

  “Sometimes, Kira has an unpleasant memory...or a nightmare. Jumbled faces and thoughts…death…violent death…and I can offer her no comfort. Her breath becomes my breath. My heart beats fast, too fast, with hers. There is nothing I can do to help.” Mabatan lifts a fork and pokes at her untouched salad. “Those are the bad times. I know I appear…distracted but it is not always unpleasant.” She takes a deep breath, then smiles. “It is good to talk with you, Roan of Longlight. Will you tell me of your encounter with the Friend?”

  Roan feels the weight of her hand in his. He wants to tell her about his promise to the Friend, ask her if she knows how you go about killing a god, report on what he discovered about Darius and the Overshadower, but he can’t. Whenever he even thinks about the experience, the fire, the stars, the astonishing nature of the Friend’s request, it all catches in his throat and he finds himself holding back.