Ravencaller

by David Dalglish

  Once Albert was gone, Soren slumped like a puppet dropped by its master.

  “What should I do now?” his father asked.

  “Umm…”

  Dierk glanced at the nisse. Vaesalaum hovered in a rapid circle above the fireplace, and for some reason the creature looked angry. Why didn’t it say something? Deciding it best to find out, he shrugged and told Soren to prepare for West Orismund’s newfound independence.

  “Very well,” his father said. He left his glass unfinished and exited. Once finally alone, Dierk turned to the nisse with a raised eyebrow.

  “Is something the matter?” he asked it.

  Vaesalaum wonders why Dierk is acting strange.

  Dierk straightened his spine and pulled back his shoulders.

  “I’m finally living up to my responsibilities. Londheim needs a Mayor who understands the ways of this new world.”

  Dierk is not Mayor. Father is Mayor. Did Dierk forget?

  “And I’m the one who commands my father,” he said. Unlike the other way around, like it had been all his life. “Why do you care? Didn’t you want me to be in charge?”

  The nisse looped in a sideways figure eight, the motions steadily carrying it farther and farther away.

  Vaesalaum hungers. Dierk no longer learns. Dierk no longer brings in bodies.

  It was true. Ever since he’d cast the commanding curse on his father, he’d kept busy talking with advisors and ordering around servants just to get them acclimated to him being in charge. Some took it in stride, while others cast sideways glances and whispered when they thought he wasn’t listening. With all that on his plate, Dierk had spared no time to find a dead body for him and the nisse to plunder its memories.

  “Why not go yourself?” he asked. “You don’t need me to feed.”

  Vaesalaum does. Nisse only share. Gloam made us that way.

  “Well, I’m sorry, but I’ve more important things to do.”

  More important? Human speaks nonsense. Human has forgotten where his loyalties lie.

  A frightful chill passed through him. Vaesalaum had rarely referred to him simply as “human” since that first day they met. There was a coldness to it, a change that hardened his stomach into a rock.

  “Were you not paying attention?” he asked. “War is coming. My loyalties are to protect Londheim and the people who serve me.”

  Protect? The bloated thing stopped its swirling movements and instead hovered in place. Its childlike face scrunched into a bitter frown, and for the very first time, Dierk noticed sparkling black teeth behind those thin lips. Dierk was to accept the new. Dierk was to eat and learn and obey. Dierk was to prepare the way for the dragon-sired conquerors.

  A list of curse titles from the Book of Ravens zipped through Dierk’s mind one by one, and he wondered if any would be useful against the otherworldly creature. All his newfound confidence and self-worth threatened to tumble down like a tower of twigs. How many of his decisions had been at the nisse’s guidance? He’d gone from crying in a basement to secretly ruling the city as shadow Mayor. Why had he been so stupid as to not think Vaesalaum would want something more in return?

  “Sorry,” Dierk said. “It seems we each didn’t get what we wanted from this relationship. You—you can go now. Find another pupil.”

  He hadn’t meant it to sound so dismissive, but his fear was growing. Vaesalaum might not have eyes, but those sunken, hollow spaces seemed to bore into him with increasing intensity.

  Vaesalaum gave much to pathetic human, the nisse said. It hovered closer. Its incisors grew, and grew, so that they jutted well past its lower lip. Vaesalaum found crying child pissing self in fear. Gave him power. Gave him purpose. Vaesalaum will not be cast away so easily.

  Dierk retreated to the wall. What could he do to it? For that matter, what could it do to him? The creature was ethereal. It’d never shown the ability to harm another being, only plunder the memories of its soul after death.

  Does Dierk think Vaesalaum can do no harm? Come, stupid human. Come see. Come feel. Come remember.

  It lunged forward and buried its teeth directly into his forehead. No mark, no blood, but the pain was indescribable. Dierk’s mouth locked open in a silent scream as his limbs thrashed. He felt the world receding around him into pure darkness. It was akin to when Vaesalaum brought him into the memories of another, only this time they were his own. The physical world was gone to him. This was Vaesalaum’s domain.

  “Dierk?” his father asked. Dierk whirled around, so stunned he had no time to remove his hand from his pants. He was a child again, five, maybe six? The details of his room were blurry, encased in a strange smeary fog, but the disgusted look on his father’s face was as detailed as the very first time it happened. He yanked Dierk’s hand out of his pants, the motion strong enough that he fell backward. When he landed on his rear, the back of his head struck the side of his dresser. Warm blood spilled down his neck.

  “That is not proper for a boy,” Soren thundered at him. “Do you understand me? Boys are to behave.”

  “I’m sorry,” he cried. Horrified anguish filled him. The world was an enormous mystery full of dangers. Only his father kept him safe. So why was he yelling? Why was he so angry? Dierk wiped at his neck, and when he saw his hand coated in blood, he shrieked. Still Soren only stared down at him. Why didn’t he care? Why didn’t he help him?

  “You only get what you deserve,” his father said, and then he left him sobbing on the floor of his room.

  “Wait!” Dierk shouted, tears streaming down his face and snot trickling from his nose. “Daddy, wait!”

  The door slammed shut. Dierk flung his body against it and beat on it with his tiny fists as he wailed, but he didn’t dare open it. Whatever pain he felt now would not compare to the anger he’d face if he opened that door against his father’s wishes. So he cried, and kicked the door with his bare foot until blood began to drip upon the carpet from his split toenails. At last he slumped to his rear, buried his face into his knees, and sobbed.

  The memory dimmed, and in the spreading darkness Vaesalaum hovered back into view.

  Does Dierk want to live this again? Time moves slow within the soul. A thousand years will pass before your body will be found and woken. A million memories. Dierk will break. Dierk will crumble. Nothing will remain.

  Dierk thought of living through that embarrassment and pain a second time, and then a third, and a fourth. Despair crashed down around him, and he felt an urge to beg for mercy. Dierk refused to give in. He fought back against the despair with seething rage. He would not be made helpless again. He would not be turned into a simpering child.

  “Same goes for you,” he said as he jumped into the air. He wasn’t a child, damn it. He was a young man, tall, proud, and goddess-damned furious. The strange rules of the dream-world changed his physical representation to match his self-identity. Vaesalaum tried to scamper away, but its movements were sluggish, for it was no longer a slender little creature of dreams but instead a bloated, obese thing grown fat on memories. Dierk caught the nisse in his hands and held it tight.

  “This is your world, isn’t it?” he asked. Vaesalaum squirmed but Dierk’s fingers easily sank into its soft, bloated body. “This is where you are real.”

  Stupid human! Let go. Let go. Let go, let go, LET GO!

  Blue blood began to spill across Dierk’s fingers as he punched through flesh. The nisse turned and sank its black teeth into his wrist. Pain of a thousand cuts and broken bones rushed through him, but none of that could compare to his feeling of triumph over the damn creature. He wasn’t helpless anymore. This time, he was in control.

  “You’re a vulture,” Dierk seethed as he steadily pulled his fingers farther and farther apart. “A fucking carrion beast growing fat off the dead.”

  The shriek coming from Vaesalaum’s childlike face no longer resembled words. It was a mindless pained cry, and it sparked memories of the cries small cats used to make when he skinned them alive. He clench
ed his teeth, and he channeled all the frustration and helplessness the memories had bestowed upon him into irresistible strength.

  “I don’t need you!” he screamed. “I’m better than you! I’m better than you all!”

  The nisse let out one final howl as Dierk ripped the shimmering beast in half. Blood splashed across his shirt, his trousers, the floor… and then it vanished. The darkness around him popped like a bubble, revealing the calm, quiet lounge located in his family’s mansion. He was free. The dream world was gone, as was Vaesalaum.

  Dierk gulped in long lungfuls of dry air. It was over. No presence lingered in his mind. No voice waited to mock his decisions or question his wisdom. The nisse was dead. Dierk was free.

  “I did it,” he told the empty room. “I did it. I fucking did it.”

  There was no stopping him now. His father obeyed his commands. The power of the Book of Ravens remained at his disposal. Vaesalaum, who had tried to steer him toward its own goals, was now a husk lost in a dream somewhere. He looked back at all the times he’d cowered, and he wanted to laugh at his old self. This was easier. Life was always better as the foot than the footstool.

  It was time to complete his takeover of the mansion, and for that, he’d need Three-Fingers. After a quick detour to his room, he returned to the lounge. There was a small wine shelf against one wall, along with a cabinet of glasses, and he retrieved two and set them on a tray.

  “Tell Three-Fingers I’d like to speak with him here,” he ordered after whistling for a servant.

  A few minutes later, Three-Fingers ducked his head underneath the door frame and stepped in. He tucked his thumbs into his belt and grinned at Dierk as if he were the funniest thing alive.

  “I’m sure you’ve noticed the changes here,” Dierk said, trying to sound casual.

  “That I have, you clever bastard,” Three-Fingers said. His lopsided smile split his face. “Your father was always too stubborn for his own good. He’d never accept the new order shaping up here in Londheim. A little magical persuasion will go a long way in ensuring a peaceful transition.”

  “I was thinking the same thing,” Dierk said. He lifted the two glasses and offered one to Three-Fingers. “I was also thinking of elevating your role within the Becher Estate. I need a right-hand man that I can trust.”

  “Already making smart decisions, too,” the giant man said as he accepted the glass. “Get people loyal to you and not to Soren. It’s six years until the next mayoral election. Keep him as a vegetable until then, I say, and then run in his place. People’ll vote for who they know. They’re sheep that way.”

  “To herding the sheep,” Dierk said in toast.

  “To herding the sheep.”

  They both downed their glasses. A long sigh escaped Dierk’s chest. Good. Everything would be fine now.

  “Damn, what vintage was that?” Three-Fingers asked as he squinted at the glass. “That tasted like whale spunk.”

  Dierk took the glass from him, put it on the tray beside the other, and then carried both to the other side of the room. He’d hate to have the expensive glassware damaged.

  “Nothing special,” he said as if his heart weren’t hammering in his chest. “Just a little something for our celebration.”

  When he turned around, Three-Fingers had already dropped to his knees. His face was red, and long beads of sweat trickled down his neck. When he spoke, he had to force the words out through a rapidly shrinking larynx.

  “But… why?” he asked.

  Dierk knelt by his side, and he wondered if he should try to comfort the dying man or not. Did he even know how?

  “Nothing personal,” he said. He watched the veins start to pop in the man’s temples. He’d witnessed dozens of memories of death, but this was the first he’d killed since that frantic time in his father’s cellar when Vaesalaum first came to him. It felt different now. He was calm and collected. The situation was under his control.

  “You’re the only one who knows of my connection to the Ravencallers,” he explained. “I can’t risk anyone finding out. Londheim must be ruled by humans, and those humans ruled by me. Don’t you see? I’ve learned so much, but in the end, it’s time I think for myself.”

  Three-Fingers swiped at him with his mutilated hand, but his strength was already waning. His mouth opened, but no more words came out, just a pained wheeze. It’d be only moments now before his heart gave completely.

  “Don’t fight it,” Dierk whispered. “Go peacefully. I tried to give you that much.”

  Three-Fingers collapsed onto his stomach. His eyes lost their focus. Convulsions rocked through him, and the smell of piss and shit filled the room as his bowels let loose. In that final moment, when the dying man’s body locked into rigid form and his head tilted back as if he were trying to break his spine, Dierk felt a sliver of pleasure rock through him, a hundred times stronger than when he’d brought a knife to the bodies of cats in his father’s basement.

  Dierk counted to thirty before he thrust open the door and shouted at the top of his lungs.

  “Someone? Anyone? Come quick, I think he’s having a heart attack!”

  CHAPTER 33

  Adria’s cautious gaze bounced between the owls patrolling the sky and Jagged Alley, where a single Soulkeeper might notice her meeting with Tamerlane in the long, narrow street connecting two of the southern districts. So far both sky and ground were quiet, and she prayed they stayed that way. She expected to find the disgraced Mindkeeper approaching from either direction, but to her surprise, the man’s head poked out of the window of Sam’s and Sally’s storefront.

  “Come in,” he said. “The door is unlocked.”

  His head vanished back behind the thick curtain. Adria checked her surroundings one last time and then pushed inside. From what she could tell, the store sold cheap jewelry, and she wondered how much of it was stolen. The stairs to the second floor were curtained off, and Tamerlane emerged from behind them with a smile on his face that put Adria’s heart on alert. Unlike all their previous visits, he was clean-shaven and freshly bathed, with his hair smoothly combed so that his long bangs were pulled back from his face.

  “It is good to see you again, Adria,” he said.

  “It seems you’ve found an interesting place to hide,” she said. It was warm inside so she removed her scarf and thick outer coat. Her mask, however, stayed firmly in place. “Do the owners know you bunk here?”

  “They do,” he said as he scooted past her to the door. “They’re a lovely couple of ladies who spent most of their lives living on the streets. I helped find them a home and a proper place of work. The Ecclesiast could arrive from Trivika and they’d still lie to her face about my whereabouts.”

  He locked the door, then gestured toward the heavy curtain.

  “Please, we can talk more comfortably upstairs.”

  The second floor was fairly small, just a single room with a street-side window. Blankets were piled in the center to form a bed. A stack of books lay beside it, the collection a bizarre mishmash of penny stories, news pamphlets, and barely held-together legal texts.

  “I’m sorry I don’t have better accommodations for you,” Tamerlane said. “I’m sure you’d be more comfortable sipping tea in the grand archives.”

  “I’m not here for tea or comfort,” she said. “I’m here to check on you.”

  He smiled and gestured to his meager surroundings.

  “Compared to the conditions of my last abode, this room is a palace. Plus I don’t have to listen to the wheezing and hacking of Deakon Sevold or that other poor soul inflicted with the mutilation curse.”

  Adria walked to the window and peered past the curtain to the outside. The streets were empty. Good. It didn’t appear anyone had followed her from the cathedral.

  “The church has arrested my brother,” she said, broaching the subject most pressing to her heart.

  Tamerlane sat cross-legged on his bed and tilted his head to one side.

  “Under what
pretense?” he asked.

  “He’s a Soulkeeper for the church and for the past weeks he’s housed a soulless woman who… well, is no longer soulless. Alma delivered her a soul during the reaping hour, awakening her from her former state. Somehow the church found out, and they arrested him this morning under accusations of smuggling soulless, using one for pleasure, and a bunch of other shit I know is nonsense.”

  “An awakened soulless,” Tamerlane said. His eyes sparkled with curiosity. “The theological implications are many. Does this mean Alma was weakened, but is now stronger? How does a soul react to a body it has not occupied for years? I’d love to speak with this woman. Why did your brother not bring her to the church?”

  “Because he feared how the church might react,” she said. “Surely a sentiment you can understand.”

  Tamerlane laughed.

  “That I can. But if she is as you say, in clear possession of a soul, then surely your brother will be proven innocent of these accusations… assuming the church’s motivations are pure.”

  “That’s what I’m worried about.” Adria sat opposite Tamerlane on the blanket bed and rubbed her throbbing temples. “I feel my faith in the church fading, and I hate it. It’s like a slow death in my heart. Have things always been this way, and I blind to it, or has the newly blossomed world of magic and monsters changed our leaders?”

  Tamerlane reached out and placed a hand on hers. She flinched but did not pull away. His fingers were surprisingly soft, and his touch lit up her skin with pleasant tingles.

  “Do you know why I found the Book of Ravens so appealing?” he asked. “Our fellow colleagues see its claims as blasphemous and contradictory, but what I see is a humanization of our Goddesses. They are immensely powerful beings who love us dearly, but they are not omniscient. They are not all-powerful. They have granted us our free will, and they delivered to us their most precious gift, our souls. For that, we owe them everything. But they also suffer doubt. They question themselves. They are prone to anger, jealousy, and sorrow. The weight of this world is a heavy burden, one they willingly took upon their shoulders and gladly endure. They are not perfect, and that comforts my soul greater than any hymn or prayer ever could.”