Vultures

by Luke Tarzian

  “It’s a bit abstract,” Serece said, trying to make sense of it, trying to apply it the current state of her world. “In order to have peace, there must first be madness?”

  “Somethin’ like that.”

  They parted ways at the Bastion gates, offering nothing more than nods. Serece was sure that Leyandra would tell Theailys about their encounter, about their exchange of information. Just as well she did.

  What now? She snuck a backward glance at the Bastion, rising up like a jagged tooth in the fog and rain, and trembled. She hoped Fiel and Fenrin were faring well, but she dared not try to imagine what they had found, if they had stumbled upon anything at all.

  Serece walked on, melding with the throng, weary and lost in thought.

  * * *

  The illum network was an interesting thing. Puzzling, really. In all his eons Behtréal had yet to truly comprehend exactly how it worked. He understood the illum of various individuals overlapped, that it was possible for Illumancers to occasionally catch a glimpse of someone else’s thoughts and memories. What he didn’t understand was why. It was horribly invasive, even if it was accidental.

  “Though you have little reason to complain,” Te Mirkvahíl hissed, “seeing as how this little…imperfection has given you the means to manipulate your martyrs like the little puppets that they are.”

  The monster had a point. Despite its invasiveness it was undeniably beneficial to Behtréal’s cause. The things he’d learned of the drenarian, Fenrin, and the phantaxian, Serece, were useful to say the least. Sad, too, enough to earn his sympathy.

  “Fear not, Te Luminíl. Soon they will cease to be,” Te Mirkvahíl said.

  I know, Behtréal thought. Thus, they will never come to feel pain.

  He pushed Te Mirkvahíl away and looked at the twins standing before him. They had come to see Mistress Khal. Behtréal grinned and took them both in a large embrace. “Ronomar. Raelza. It’s been some time.”

  “Indeed, it has,” said Raelza, pulling back and smiling. Celestials, but they had unnaturally white teeth. “I’m glad to see you are well.”

  “Likewise,” Behtréal said, releasing them both. He motioned they take a seat beside his office window; he had always liked the sea view it’d afforded him. “So, what brings you here?” It was an honest question in two parts. Behtréal was genuinely glad to see the twins, but he was also curious about their motivations, especially since he couldn’t detect a hint of illum about their characters. They’d always been tricky, even as children.

  “Nostalgia,” Ronomar said. “War has a way of making one long for simpler times.”

  There was truth to what they said, but Behtréal was quite certain the twins weren’t here simply because they were homesick. They knew something, or at the very least were suspicious of something.

  “It has been some time since Ariath knew peace,” Behtréal agreed, allowing himself a melancholy smile. He was not entirely proud of the things he’d done, of the war he’d waged. His undertaking had ruined innocent lives and for that he felt immense shame.

  But pain is nothing to those who never come to be, he reminded himself for what felt like the millionth time. He wasn’t sure how much he actually believed that anymore, if at all, and it made him sick.

  “How have things been here?” Raelza asked. “The Faithbringers seem riled.”

  “Aren’t they always?” Behtréal said.

  “I suppose,” Raelza said. “But this is different. It’s fanatic zeal. Furious, even.”

  They know, Behtréal thought, and he was unsurprised by the notion. Ronomar and Raelza had always been different, more attuned to the abnormalities of the world. It was part of what made them so endearing. Their fierce curiosity was admirable.

  “Does it pain you,” hissed Te Mirkvahíl, “knowing that you’ll have to spill their blood?” Behtréal’s left eye twitched and the monstrous voice cackled. “I can hardly wait to taste their illum.”

  Behtréal pushed against the voice. Sleep. This is—

  “No time to interfere?” Te Mirkvahíl mocked. “Someone needs to keep your mind on track, Te Luminíl, lest your infatuation for these parasites dooms this undertaking to its end. And then how would you feel, knowing you let Aveline and little Jor remain ghosts of memory so this sentient plague could persevere?”

  “Are you all right?” Ronomar placed a hand on Behtréal’s arm. “Mistress Khal?”

  Behtréal blinked, Te Mirkvahíl’s cackling fading to silence in his mind. “Yes. Just—it’s been a long few days.”

  “Care for a walk?” Raelza asked, standing from their chair. “I find working long hours indoors a bit monotonous.” They offered their hand to Behtréal. “Would you not agree?”

  Behtréal took it and the twins led him from the office. “Where did you have in mind?”

  “Anywhere, really,” Raelza said. “Anywhere at all.”

  * * *

  A vague response to a question with a very specific answer, Behtréal thought. “Anywhere at all,” had really meant a few miles east of Helveden to a patch of forest so incredibly dense it was impossible for sound to echo. A few threads of gray light peeked through the trees, though they did little to illuminate the woods.

  Behtréal arched an eyebrow at Raelza. “Anywhere at all, hmm?”

  Raelza conjured an illum wisp, its pale light bestowing a soothing aura upon the trees. “Do you not remember this place?”

  “I don’t,” Behtréal said. He took a few steps, looking aimlessly about. “Should I?”

  “It’s where you found us nearly forty years ago,” Ronomar said. “Two crying babes, abandoned to the darkness of this silent place. Left to die by hands unknown. Do you truly not recall?”

  “I…”

  “You could snuff them out,” Te Mirkvahíl urged, manifesting at Behtréal’s side as a towering white-eyed silhouette. It snaked around him, flicking tongue just inches from his face. “You could take their illum, reap it for your own. You’re hungry, I can tell.”

  I require noth—

  “Oh, Te Luminíl… It amuses me how often you forget, how often you desire that the truth be fiction,” sneered Te Mirkvahíl. “What I require, so too do you, for we are one and the same. It would do you well to remember this, to accept this. You want to see them again, do you not? Aveline, Jor, the rest of the Reshapers? Our success shall bring about their restoration.”

  “Mistress Khal.” Again, Ronomar drew Behtréal back, their voice helping to quell Te Mirkvahíl. “Do you remember?”

  “No,” Behtréal murmured, leaning against the tree nearest him and rubbing the spot between his eyes. Why were things so foggy all of a sudden? No, not all of a sudden. They’d been murky, questionable the entire day, ever since he’d risen from bed. Now he felt…weak.

  He looked up at the twins. They were before him now, above him; when had he fallen to the ground? Were these tears? He made to wipe his eyes, only to find he couldn’t move, that everything around him was fading to black.

  “Wh-what…”

  “Truth from madness,” Ronomar murmured, reaching for Behtréal’s face.

  * * *

  They say the light is darkest just before the dawn. I hold that statement to be true. This war has lasted far too long. I pray to Vara’szen for strength enough to subjugate Te Mirkvahíl’s will but still its progeny come. For every thousand troops we arm Te Mirkvahíl sends two thousand more. I fear our forces will be tragically outnumbered by month’s end. Keepers help us, we already are…

  Every day we march to try and gain a foothold on the outskirts of the Heart, and every day our forces are repelled. I have asked the Church for aid. I have pleaded for more Illumurgists. Those we have, have begun to feel the tolls of war. They spread their energies too far. Some have all but lost their light. Others…others have burned out. With their illum stretched thin by overuse, we cannot hold our own in battle. What hope does the Ariathan army have when its numbers fall so quickly to the lokyn swarms? We have seen
too many of our own claimed, souls reaped from freshly dead flesh. Something has to give.

  Ronomar looked up from the journal, quill held lightly in their trembling hand. Wartime fear, they thought, looking for somewhere they might catch a glimpse of the countenance they wore.

  “General?” a voice called from outside the tent.

  “Come,” Ronomar called, and the voice sounded horribly familiar.

  Third General Szen entered and approached, giving the formal salute.

  Ronomar returned the gesture, their faint reflection in his war-scarred breastplate confirming that this memory belonged to one Searyn An. Their friend. “Well?”

  “Vahnyll and his scouts have returned,” Szen said. His face was hawkish, his graying hair pulled back and braided in several areas starting near his temples. He acknowledged her with yellow eyes. “They have found a breach in the Heart’s defenses.”

  Then this is it, Searyn thought, adrenaline coursing through her like a spring stream.

  “How close?”

  “Half a day,” Szen said. Anticipation swirled in his eyes.

  Searyn stroked her ear pensively. She narrowed her eyes, lips forming a straight line. She had served her country since her youth. Keepers knew she’d love to see this monstrosity of a war end before her thirtieth year. She missed home. She missed Theailys. It’d been a couple years since they had seen each other.

  “Speak with Nharmais and Lugus,” Searyn said. “Broach the idea of infiltrating. If they seem favorable…”

  Szen gave a silent salute and withdrew.

  Searyn sighed and paced her tent, catching the occasional glimpse of her sword. That beautiful, brutal dragon’s tooth of a blade. She felt complete when wielding it, yet at the same time longed to put it down. She’d spent more than half her life training to and being used by the Empire as a weapon. She’d spilled blood, innocent and not, and she was tired of it all.

  “Khar Am, give me strength,” she whispered, returning to her makeshift desk.

  She tore a blank piece of parchment from her journal. If the other generals favored this breach the scouts had found, it meant they’d all be marching into chaos and their possible ends. It would be foolish, Searyn decided, to descend with total arrogance. Nothing of this war had given her the privilege of being so. She took up her quill, dipped it in the ink, and started writing.

  It took Searyn little time to finish the letter to Theailys. She sighed, narrowing her eyes. Her lids felt heavy, everything felt heavy. Her partial intent for the letter had been some semblance of catharsis, but it had instead served only to magnify her fears and reservations. Not that she had needed to—Theailys understood her well enough to know.

  Searyn folded the letter and sealed it shut, deciding to hand it to the courier before the day was done. She stood and started from her tent. She pulled the flap back and ducked out into the world, greeted by the darkness that the skies had known nearly as long as Searyn was old.

  * * *

  They’d made camp at the outskirts of the breach earlier in the day. Now, sleep was nonexistent to Searyn. Never had they been this deep inside the woods. Leaves were scarce upon the trees, which gave her clear sight toward the sky. It was dark as always but there was something more to it. Something sick and eerie, something sentient. She was not the only one to notice.

  “These woods are foul,” said Nharmais, joining Searyn at her tent. “Listen.”

  “Silence,” Searyn noted several minutes later.

  “Not a cricket’s chirp to lull the night,” said Nharmais, narrowing her red eyes. “Something is off. I can feel it in the air and in my bones. A wood this vast should not be ruled by silence so profound.”

  Searyn nodded. It was more than just the sky that tugged her nerves, it was the atmosphere itself. She observed her soldiers as they circled on patrol.

  “No sound,” she uttered breathlessly. “Their footfalls make no sound.”

  “I agreed to this because the plan was sound, the information firm. But…” Nharmais paused, chewing on her lip. “It all feels wrong.”

  “Then may Khar Am and the Keepers give us strength,” Searyn said, clapping Nharmais on the shoulder. She had never before seen the Fourth General tremble so apparently.

  “I will pray they do,” Nharmais said, standing. “In a few short hours we march toward fate, whatever it may be.”

  Searyn bid the general goodnight. She watched her soldiers walk about, gradually shifting her attention to the woods again, to the silence, and the foulness of the sky.

  Te Mirkvahíl surely watches us, Searyn thought. It knows of what we try…and yet we must. She felt warmth coursing through her, surging like the tide. She glared into the night, westward past the twisted branches in the direction of the Heart. We are on your doorstep, monster, and we will see your end. The light is darkest just before the dawn, and when we finally meet, it will be my blade that sets the fire in your eyes and wipes you from this world.

  * * *

  The lack of sound had made its mark upon Searyn’s soldiers as the night endured. Their courage would not sway, though, and they marched ahead, growing closer to the breach with every step. She marched at point with Lugus at the rear and Szen and Nharmais at her sides.

  We near fate. We near the end of war and the start of peace, she told herself, her jaw clenched tightly as she gripped the hilt of her sword. Whatever menace lurks below will fall.

  “There,” said Nharmais.

  Before them stood the entrance to the breach, a cavernous maw of stone deprived of light. Searyn glanced at the sky, shuddering. Had the darkness grinned at her? She set her gaze upon the breach and drew her blade, the others doing as she did. She ventured toward the entrance, blade extended forward. Should anything approach them she would spear its life away.

  They descended silently into darkness. Searyn saw no reason for a speech. The outcomes were clear, and she knew her soldiers would follow her until the end. She had earned the titles of First General and First Faithbringer and that was something none of them would question. Her resolve was theirs, as was her courage. She had their respect and they hers.

  Passageway illuminated by wisps, they delved deeper, walking straight for Keepers knew how long. The walls and floor were simple gray stone, nothing special, but eventually they began to change. Where the walls and ceiling met a slick membrane had developed, seeping toward the floor and reeking horribly of…well, just horribly. Had this tunnel been a disposal of sorts at one time?

  Wouldn’t make much sense, Searyn thought of the possibility. Not for the lokyns, at least. The demons weren’t keen on keeping hostages. You either escaped captivity or you died.

  They emerged inside a wide, high-ceilinged chamber. It was comprised of the same rough stone as the passageway and smelled equally as nauseating. The source—sources, rather—of the smell hung from the ceiling.

  “Keepers have mercy on their souls,” whispered Nharmais. Her eyes looked past the dangling suits of flesh, resting on a naked figure in the center of the room. “You there…”

  “Vahnyll?” Searyn started toward him. Nahrmais followed as the others fanned the room. “Vahnyll, are you all right?” He had not left basecamp, and so far as Searyn knew, the scout was supposed to have taken a day’s rest before heading south. She reached out toward the trembling man. “Vahnyll…?”

  His arm shot forward, grabbing hers. Searyn gripped her sword tighter. Vahnyll tittered, looking frantically around the room, then leaned in toward her ear.

  “We are fashion,” he uttered. Oh, how his breath reeked! “We are suits and dresses, flesh veneers for masquerades.” His tittering melted quickly into tears. He held his arms up, revealing swirling black glyphs. “Please! I do not want—”

  Searyn shuddered as the man went still. She glanced at Nharmais, who had her crystalline longsword at Vahnyll’s neck, then withdrew, greaves clanking with each step. Searyn gripped her blade with both hands and brought it level with her eyes, extending parallel t
o her feet. Szen and Lugus neared. The four generals circled Vahnyll slowly, the man’s eyes frozen wide and fixed upon the ceiling.

  “I do not want to be a mask,” he sobbed, causing everyone to start. The glyph marks on his arms began to glow. Vahnyll fell to the floor, flopping like a fish, shrieking. “I DO NOT WANT TO BE A MASK! END ME! END ME NOW BEFORE—”

  “Keepers have mercy on his soul,” Lugus said.

  Vahnyll wailed, flesh sundering down the center of his body, starting at his forehead. A mass of…something slithered from his body and ascended quickly, taking Vahnyll’s flapping corpse and hanging it amongst the others.

  Then, they came.

  The blackness whirled around the room and slapped itself inside the meat suits. Figures slopped to the floor and launched themselves at Searyn and the others. She cut them down with no remorse—they weren’t people anymore.

  She moved in tandem with Nharmais, the pair striking down lokyn after lokyn. Truth from madness—that was one of Khar Am’s ancient teachings, and apparently one some of her soldiers were having trouble with.

  Searyn broke from Nharmais and rushed an Illumurgist cowering on his knees, wailing, begging for his wife to forgive him.

  “I was away from you… My fault you are dead…” he sobbed as a blonde-haired girl in rags approached

  “You said you loved me!” she wailed, descending on the Illumurgist. “You said that we would be together, always and forever! HOW COULD YOU LET ME DIE?”

  Searyn severed head from neck and kicked the body away, watching as the blackness—the lokyn’s true form—rose into the air. She gripped the Illumurgist by the shoulder and pulled him to his feet.

  “It’s not her!” she yelled. “Truth from madness! Come on!”

  Searyn parried several of the creatures as they came then knocked them forward. She drew illum from the crystals hanging from her neck, raised her sword high, and plunged it toward the floor. Crystal punched easily through the old stone and a wave of brilliant energy radiated outward, disorienting the lokyns within its immediate vicinity. Nharmais and Szen followed her example, bathing the chamber in a light so hot and blinding Searyn felt her hair might catch fire. Instead the lokyns shrieked, and when all settled, they were gone.