Dissension

by Cory Herndon

  No one, not even his mother, approached Myc for several moments as he sat, cradling the dead thing and sobbing. Finally, Fonn pulled him away gently, and Myc turned from the body. He handed Fonn her sword and set his jaw.

  “Mom,” he said. “It’s okay. I know what I have to do. I have to defend us now.”

  “We’ll all defend us,” Fonn said. “We’ll stand together.”

  “My dear old—” Pivlic said.

  “Friend Kos,” Kos finished. “Don’t stall. Will it work or not?”

  “According to what I know, which I remind you is entirely based upon idle reading, journals, you understand, and not from any kind of stolen information that would be grossly illegal to possess—”

  “Stow it, Pivlic. You’re not selling me a used zeppelid. I used to quiz Feather about this place on a daily basis, just out of curiosity. She told me about the flaw in the power source. It’s vulnerable. I doubt she ever expected me to use that knowledge this way, but … well, we don’t have a choice anymore. The world is upside down, Pivlic.”

  “At least you are still in it, my friend,” the imp replied, “even in that kind of physical shape.” He returned to calculations. “Now, if I can find the right leads and they have no safeguards, either magical or physical, against just such a well-known vulnerability—yes,” the imp finished as they stepped into the cavernous deck and took a sweeping look at the reality engine, still mounted in place by six huge copper bolts. Tubes and glowing metal cables ran from the rather simple cylindrical engine casing, and even shut down they crackled and sparked with magic potential.

  “Yes?”

  “Yes,” Pivlic said, “it will work. At best we would have perhaps twenty minutes to escape. If I can set it perfectly, perhaps as many as forty-five.”

  “So you’re saying,” Kos said, “you can do it.”

  “To think I actually helped pay for your funeral pyre,” Pivlic muttered. “You could say please.”

  “Please, Pivlic,” Kos said, “and please hurry.”

  There was little for Kos to do right away, so he took a short spin around the engine. Even here, dead angels littered the floor, mummified and scattered pieces of them everywhere. As he rounded the far end of the engine, he saw one that made his blood run cold.

  For one, it was relatively fresh—not a mummy, though the angel was missing an arm and bore a grievously charred hole where her heart should have been.

  It was the spitting image of the false Feather—the slightly different face of the angel Lupul had pretended to be, he corrected. And as the implication of the battered, unmistakable armor the corpse wore sunk in his bones felt icy cold. “Razia,” Kos said to the corpse, “you were killed … Feather said it was ten years ago.”

  “What?” Pivlic called.

  “It’s Razia,” Kos said. “She did die here.”

  The glassy eyes of the Boros guildmaster stared up at them, not accusingly—Kos always found that people who said dead eyes were accusing were usually the ones who had killed the owner of said eyes—but with a desiccated glare of surprise and regret.

  Kos was still stealing glances back at the dead guildmaster as he helped Pivlic finish slotting the last of the cables, crystals, and control valves into all the wrong places. Wrong for proper operation, very right for what Kos had in mind.

  “Did we get forty-five or twenty?” Kos asked.

  “Pivlic always errs on the side of caution,” the imp said. “But now we must go.”

  “No,” Kos said, “you can fly out of here. That vent up there,” he added, pointing, “should get you back to Fonn and the others. Get them out of here. I don’t have time to run around. I’ve got to jump to the command floor. I’ll get them out if I can.”

  Pivlic, to his credit, paused a full three seconds before he shrugged. “All right,” he said, “I will meet you in the Senate chambers.”

  “Don’t wait,” Kos said. “Get out of the chambers any way you can and get out of this building. This is going to be a big bang, Pivlic.”

  “What about the lawmage?”

  Yes, what about the lawmage?

  “Wings feeling better?” Kos said.

  “He almost broke one the last time I carried him, my friend,” Pivlic said.

  “He’ll be good, won’t you Obez?”

  I hate you.

  “Just get Obez, Fonn, and the scouts out of here. I’ll be right behind you with Feather and the ones on the deck. I’ll be wearing a different, er, suit.”

  “Good luck,” Pivlic said. “I will, as always, do my best.”

  So will I, Kos reflected. But if Szadek is there, Pivlic, I don’t know what I’m going to do.

  I’m going to die, Obez thought.

  You’re eavesdropping again, Kos shot back.

  Pivlic waited for the lawmage’s face to go blank, then scooped the fat man up and spread his still-aching wings. He wished he had gotten into the habit of carrying teardrops whenever he did anything involving Kos.

  A flicker of movement caught his attention behind the slack-jawed lawmage, something on the floor.

  The dead Boros guildmaster was moving. No, Pivlic corrected, melting, into—

  “All right, then, up we go,” Pivlic said abruptly, launching himself and his burden into the air as the lurker roiled below, flailing at them with pseudopods, screaming from several different faces that appeared in the center of its writhing body. It was the lurker that had followed them, perhaps. Diverted to where Augustin expected Kos to go. And if Augustin expected this—

  But Pivlic was certain he had set the engine properly. It would work. He had that much faith in his own abilities.

  The last time Kos had left for body parts unknown, the lawmage had started talking almost as soon as he’d taken nominal control of his body back, which told Pivlic that Kos had made his “jump,” or “leap,” or whatever he called it. This time, Obez remained silent until they’d made it some distance down the vent shaft. Pivlic did not bother looking back. Either Lupul had followed or it hadn’t.

  Pivlic hated philosophy, though he admired the long-running scam of philosophy as a principle. Kos was making a philosopher out of Pivlic, and Pivlic didn’t appreciate it.

  Kos burrowed through the Parhelion, disembodied and on a beeline for the command deck. The four occupants were still in more or less the same places, though the weakening form of Wenslauv—another old friend he’d never counted on seeing again, and he hoped that he would have the chance soon to see her in better condition than this—was the one he’d finally settled on.

  Feather would have been impossible. Teysa was trained to fight in the arcane, Orzhov styles, but Kos figured that would just put them at odds. The lurker was too risky. Even wounded, he believed he would have the best chance in a body that had wojek training. Besides, he owed Wenslauv more than one life. It was the least he could do to get her out under her own power if at all possible.

  With a painful rush of breath and life, he blinked Air Marshal Wenslauv’s eyes open on the command deck of the wrecked Parhelion. The first thing he noticed was that Wenslauv was more injured than he’d realized. The second was that Teysa had noticed him blink, and Feather also shot him a look. The second angel—the one Kos knew to be a lurker—stood facing slightly away from him. He couldn’t tell, but he would have been willing to bet this one looked a lot like the corpse he’d seen on the engine deck.

  There was no guarantee his allies knew he was here. As far as they knew this was just Wenslauv waking up. So she winked at Feather and formed the wojek hand signal for situation normal, all botched up. Feather barely reacted at all but blinked twice. Kos pointed Wenslauv’s finger at Teysa, then himself. Then from Feather to the exit. He did not point at Lupul. He planned to be out the door before even the lurker could catch them. In Kos’s experience—and he had more than most with the lurker, he guessed—it became those it impersonated to the extent that it used their eyes to see and their ears to hear. He was sure, well, almost sure, the lurker coul
d not be watching him from the feathers of Razia’s wings, for instance.

  The one open question was how fast Feather could move with her wrists bound. If she did what Kos expected, he would launch Wenslauv’s body at Teysa, grab her, and Feather would take off, pick them up, and head out the exit. It was a sound plan, and the only real one that made sense, so of course Feather would do it.

  He nodded once, then twice, and on the third nod Kos shoved off from the floor, feeling something tear inside Wenslauv’s gut, but it wasn’t enough to stop him from getting to the advokist.

  Unfortunately, Wenslauv chose that moment to regain consciousness. She had been in something close to a coma when he’d taken over.

  What the—

  Wenslauv, long story. It’s me Kos. I’m a ghost. I’m sort of possessing you. We have to get out of here or we’re all going to die. Some of us twice.

  What? Wenslauv’s voice said. Kos?

  Just—trust me on this one. Kos said. We don’t have much time.

  Okay, Wenslauv’s voice answered immediately. But you’d better stick around long enough to tell me this story.

  The exchange of thoughts took a fraction of a second, the time it took Feather to clear the wheel post and join Teysa and Kos. It was also the time it took for the lurker to melt into its familiar amoebalike form and for the ghostly shape of Szadek to catch sight of them and begin flowing toward them, a wicked smile on his ghostly lips.

  “Teysa, it’s Kos,” he said. “Szadek—he’s a ghost. You did that trick with the taj—”

  “Kos,” Teysa objected, “that was different. I was trained to use the taj, and—”

  “Krokt,” Kos said. “All right, you keep going. I’ll catch up.”

  “No,” Feather said, “we’re getting out of this together.”

  “All right,” Kos said and picked up a sword from a dead angel. “I just hope this works. I’m trusting Augustin, here.”

  The writhing mass of Lupul rounded the bend behind them as it made its way cautiously around the bulkhead. Szadek’s ghost passed right through the lurker and drove straight toward Kos, his fingers outstretched and lined in ghostly light.

  Kos, Wenslauv said, I don’t know that a sword is going to do any good. I saw that ghost—

  It’s okay, Kos said. I’m a special case. Then he reconsidered that statement. Augustin had implied that Szadek’s vulnerability to Kos was physical—but what if Kos used a weapon that was physical, to a ghost? Wenslauv, he thought, tell me you’re carrying—

  Third pouch on the right, counting from the buckle back, the voice said with an audible smirk. And you can’t be serious.

  I’m out of ideas, Kos said. But what the Krokt. Procedure worked the last time.

  He just hoped that in doing so he didn’t harm himself as well. But even if he did, it might be worth it if this worked.

  The vampiric ghost caught sight of the silver disk in Kos’s hands and laughed, the swirling worm-form of the lurker making the transparent shape even more distorted.

  “Kos,” Teysa said, “if you’re going to do something, you might want to get around to it. Stop talking to the voices in your head.”

  Kos blinked then looked at the silver disk in his hand and at the face of the vampire that had haunted many of his nightmares for the last twelve years of the wojek’s mortal life. Kos threw the disk on the deck in front of the charging ghost that had been the greatest threat Ravnica had seen before just recently.

  The silver grounder sparked with blue lightning when it struck the ground. The lightning formed a cyclone of electricity that drew the vampiric ghost into its vortex, shrinking the shadowy figure more and more with each passing second. With a sound like a long, lingering electrocution, the grounder—one of the simplest and least-used artifacts in the ’jek utility belt—captured the guildmaster of the Dimir. Or what remained of the vampire, at any rate.

  Kos slipped the grounder into Wenslauv’s belt. The lurker was almost on top of him. Then he scrambled back to the others, where Feather crouched, ready to bolt as soon as Kos had finished.

  Feather’s feet hardly touched the floor. She already clutched Teysa Karlov in one arm when she reached out to take hold of Kos’s borrowed body in a smooth motion. The angel spread her wings at last and immediately soared down the corridor the way they had come.

  They almost made it. But instead of slipping off to lay a trap, this Lupul—unlike the one on the engine deck—got smart. It slipped back into its Razia shape and took off after them, wings driving the lurker’s unburdened, lighter form faster than Feather could manage, encumbered as she was by advokist and wojek. Kos shouted a warning as the flapping Razia imitation extended a pseudopod hand and wrapped it around Feather’s ankle. The lurker snapped the tentacle like a whip, and the angel was yanked off course and into the wall. Somehow the angel caught the brunt with her shoulder, sparing both her passengers and her precious wings. The blow knocked Kos and Teysa free of Feather’s grasp and they tumbled to the floor, coming to rest not quite as far down the corridor as their winged friend.

  Kos rolled Wenslauv’s bleeding, steadily weakening body onto his back. The faux Razia grinned and drew a sword. Kos grinned back.

  “What’s so funny?” the imposter asked.

  “I recognize this corridor,” Kos said.

  “Now!” Fonn shouted, and the scouts and their centuriad commander burst from the sheltered alcove in which they’d been hiding. Each one threw a fully charge bampop grenade at the lurker, which responded as usual by melting into a roiling mass. This didn’t keep the explosions from incinerating millions of the worms and scattering the rest against the walls of the corridor.

  The lurker was stunned, but could pull itself back together, Kos had little doubt.

  He pulled himself to Wenslauv’s aching feet and noted one of her boots was filled with blood. Kos felt the skyjek’s belt instinctively and found a teardrop. He snapped the tip off and pressed it into the wound he had inadvertently reopened. The familiar rush almost made Kos lose both their balance, but Fonn caught him by the elbow. A short distance away the scouts practiced looking grim while furtively gaping at the splattered lurker. Fonn cut Feather’s wrists free and turned to Kos.

  “You going to live?” she asked. “That is you, right, Kos?”

  “And a friend,” Kos said. “Come on, we’ve got maybe five minutes to go before this entire place goes up. And I told you to get them out of here.”

  “I know,” Fonn said.

  “Hello?” Pivlic’s voice said from a vent grate directly overhead. “Hello? Could you give me directions to the front door? This fat man is getting heavy.”

  The Senate chambers had been in ruins when they’d entered the Parhelion. Now the Senate, and from the look of it, Augustin IV’s plans, where falling into ruin as well. The quietmen had arrived to impeach the blind judge. The Azorius guildmaster still sat upon his floating throne, but it appeared that his remaining lurker was fending off attacks from quietmen as well as the few ministers left alive. Several lay dead on the steps, whether slain by the Selesnyan enforcers or the lurker Kos could not say. He could not see Obez anywhere, but could sense that his anchor was still alive—and far from Prahv.

  Smart thinking, Kos thought in Obez’s direction. Stay where you are, Obez.

  Who are you—? Wenslauv broke in.

  Long story, Kos thought back.

  Prahv was doomed. Kos had seen to that. Yet this was what Augustin had wanted, was it not? Open war between the guilds?

  He reached down to Wenslauv’s belt and produced the grounder, still crackling with energy. Perhaps the quietmen would finish Augustin. Perhaps they would not. But in his current state, Kos doubted the Grand Arbiter could withstand his old enemy. And if Kos timed it right, he would still be able to rid Ravnica of Szadek, too.

  Call it insurance, Kos thought as Wenslauv realized where his thoughts were leading. Distantly, he could hear Obez’s mental voice crying out in objection, but he ignored it.

>   “Your honor,” Kos shouted. He thumbed the tiny release switch on the grounder’s base. “Catch.”

  Kos hurled the small silver disk at the Grand Arbiter’s feet just as Augustin turned his head to face Kos. The Grand Arbiter’s face registered alarm for a split second, then the grounder’s releases snapped, releasing the prisoner. Szadek’s ghost sprang into being before Augustin IV with a howling shriek. The Grand Arbiter might have been blind, but he certainly recognized the sound, and the presence, of the vampire’s spectral form.

  “Kos, what the hell are you—” Fonn began.

  “Doing my job,” Kos said.

  Szadek’s ghost stopped shrieking and coalesced into a more stable shape. Without turning toward Kos, the shadowy phantom began to laugh.

  “Augustin,” the ghost said, “we have unfinished business.” With that he lashed a spectral hand into the Grand Arbiter’s chest. Blue lightning surrounded the pair, binding them together in place. The vampire’s ghost continued to chuckle. Augustin IV screamed pitiably, writhing in place. All the while, the quietmen continued to batter Prahv and the other Azorius within.

  Kos, you cannot do this, Obez shouted in his mind, still distant. You will destroy—

  Yes, Kos interrupted. I will destroy. But first I’m getting out of here. Then we’ll talk about courage under fire, lawmage.

  “That ought to do it,” Kos said to Fonn and the others.

  “But you just released the—” Teysa began.

  “I know,” Kos said, and winked. “And they’ll both be occupied for another few minutes. We won’t want to be here. Come on.”

  Kos waited until everyone was sprinting out of the building, as fast as their legs could carry them, then cast one last look at Szadek and Augustin, locked in a deadly embrace—one ghost, one mortal, both doomed.

  “How long ago was it that you said ‘five minutes to go,’ Kos?” Teysa asked, panting.

  “About … oh, damn.”