She shook her head. “Berserkers took them. Vanished. I have no way of tracking the bastards. I’ll look, though.”
I needed a deep breath to detach myself from this entire situation. We were embroiled in an annoying dance with fate—two steps forward and three steps back. I wanted us to do more, to push forward and break the wheel before we got trapped inside this fresh hell. I missed our island. My dad. My friends. My life as it had once been. I’d never been a fan of dangerous adventures, anyway. I’d enjoyed reading about them, sure, but this was something else entirely.
Looking at Mom, I knew we were on the same page. We both yearned for Shadian boredom.
Thayen
“So, what sets Valkyries and Berserkers apart from each other, besides darkness and light?” I asked Myst. Finally, after the madness, I had a moment to think about what I’d learned regarding these entities from the realm beyond death. Years ago, I’d sworn an oath to never speak of Order and what I’d witnessed on Visio after the Spirit Bender killed everyone there. I’d buried that memory in the darkest recesses of my mind. Now it was coming back, and as I looked at Myst, the faint similarities between her and Order began to emerge. I couldn’t tell anyone what I knew, and it bothered me… but in the end, I really didn’t know that much to begin with. Only that there were three known forces of nature—Death, the Word, and Order, and that once they’d met on Visio to bring order back to bloody chaos. That was it.
Myst stared at me for a while, and I wondered if she would ever respond. I was certainly tempted to try my glamor on her, nosebleed be damned. I’d pulled it off with Haldor, if only slightly. Maybe I could do more with Myst. However, I’d like it better if she spoke truthfully and of her own accord. I loathed compelling people to speak or do anything. It was something I’d only recently realized—glamoring came with an inebriating sense of power that scared me at times. It scared me because I liked how it felt.
Sometimes, I’d wondered if the Spirit Bender had experienced similar sensations, and if those feelings had played a part in his gradual descent into pure evil. I didn’t dare compare myself to him, but still… I had to at least admit the possibility of certain commonalities, if only to ensure I’d steer as far away from him as I could.
“What did Brandon tell you about Berserkers?” Myst asked.
“Just that they’re punishers,” I said. “He wasn’t very forthcoming.”
The Valkyrie let out another dreary breath, as though she were bracing herself for something not just unpleasant, but downright excruciating. I tried to put myself in her shoes for a moment and came up with an enormous blank. My empathy was in short supply after the Port incident, especially since I realized that Myst could’ve helped us more. We could’ve worked better together, and her choice to stay away from us had… offended me.
“The afterlife, as you call it, is not exactly where the likes of Brandon and I belong,” she said. “He wasn’t very specific, I’m afraid. There is another realm before the afterlife. I imagine your Reaper friends have told you the same thing, that they know little to nothing about it, and that they’re not privy to the information.”
I nodded. “That is weirdly accurate, yes.”
“It’s the general message they get whenever they try to peek behind the curtain,” she chuckled softly, and I was charmed by her smile. I was supposed to be angry with her, but as Myst opened herself up to us, I found it difficult to stay angry. “Some of them have tried, though their death magic isn’t powerful or delicate enough to breach into Purgatory, let alone the actual beyond.”
“Purgatory?” Astra asked.
“A tribunal of sorts,” Myst said. “It’s where Valkyries and Berserkers dwell. You see, your living realm has you to keep some kind of order. Supernaturals, as you call yourselves.”
“You seem to know a lot about us.” Viola raised an eyebrow.
Myst nodded once. “I’ve carried many of your warriors into the afterlife.” That statement made my stomach tighten. “Purgatory is a waiting room of sorts, where a soul’s deeds during life are studied, judged, and decided upon. Order is the supreme authority, and Order handles the actual trials of the souls that Reapers send over. Valkyries and Berserkers have no business there. We’re the executive forces, so to speak. Those deemed evil and beyond forgiveness are handed over to the Berserkers, hence why Brandon told you he’s a punisher.”
“They punish evil souls,” Astra murmured, her eyes dark and round with pure wonder. It was hard not to get sucked into this story, especially when we knew it was true. Myst was giving away precious secrets, likely to earn our trust. I had a feeling she needed our help, too, otherwise she wouldn’t have bothered to help us the second time around.
“Yes and no. They torment evil souls with darkness and misery and nightmares before they toss them into the afterlife. I cannot tell you much about that, but I can tell you that every soul that passes through the Berserkers’ hands leaves with the Berserker’s mark on their soul,” Myst continued. “Whereas we, the Valkyrie, carry the good, the kind, and the innocent into the great beyond. We grant them gifts of spiritual value. We sing songs of their glory. We crown the champions who have fought to save lives.” She paused to look at me for a moment, and it felt deeply personal, like she was about to say something else, something aimed at me directly. However, she chose not to. “Berserkers and Valkyrie are opposite forces. They’re darkness, and they feed on darkness, whereas we’re light, and we feed on light. I suppose the way our weapons and powers function is the clearest example.”
Richard cleared his throat, raising a hand slowly as if we were back in school. “What do you need weapons for in Purgatory? I mean, souls are souls. They’re practically helpless.”
“There are other threats. Purgatory isn’t clean or perfect,” she replied bluntly. “And, if I’m to be perfectly honest, the Valkyrie and the Berserkers do not always get along. We maintain a fragile peace, and we’ve gone to war before. Order allowed it at first, for amusement, mostly. But our wars once nearly spilled into the world of the living, and we were forced to form a truce.”
“Did Order make you?” I asked. It would’ve been nice to have Tristan and Unending around for this, but alas… I only had myself and a very blurry memory of a most horrible day to work with.
“Sort of. We’re souls. We were once living, ages ago. Order plucked us out of the stream and gave us purpose, though I am unable to tell you why she chose us, specifically.”
Jericho groaned softly, rolling his eyes. “Oh, hell. All that Viking mythology… I knew I’d heard your names before. Valkyries, Berserkers. Norse legends are full of your kind! How’d that happen? Did it have something to do with that war you mentioned that nearly spilled into the world of the living?”
“Yes, and that is where I must end this conversation,” Myst said sternly, straightening her back. “I cannot say more, for I have already broken my vows. I would like to be able to return to Purgatory when this whole chapter is over.”
I wanted to ask more. I could’ve compelled her, maybe. Or I would’ve passed out trying. Either way, I had to appreciate her openness. Finally, we had a better understanding of who she was, of who Brandon and Haldor were. “What are you and your people doing here?” I asked. That was the gazillion dollar question, after all.
Behind us, the ocean lapped lazily at the shore, the horizon swallowed by absolute darkness. Myst pointed to it. “You see that?”
“See what?” I asked.
“The horizon.”
“No.”
She scoffed. “It doesn’t exist. This place is an anomaly. It feeds on the energy of those who inhabit it. It’s a dimensional pocket, but it’s anchored onto nothing. Normally, such pockets have to be tied to a realm—that of the living, that of the Reapers, or even ours. I remember hearing about a Reaper who could open them up.”
“The Soul Crusher,” I mumbled.
“This one, however, is absolutely rogue,” Myst replied. “I don’t know who commands it, but I know my si
ster, Hrista, is here. I haven’t found her yet.”
“But how did she get here? How are Berserkers here too?” I asked, absently drawing circles in the sand between us. For a moment, I completely forgot about the others—not that I could blame them. They were quiet, feeding on every word that came out of Myst’s mouth.
“I don’t know how Hrista got here. I followed Brandon through a tear between Purgatory and this place, though I have yet to find my way back. The Berserkers move freely between here and Purgatory. I’m not sure about all of them, but I have seen at least twenty here, working with the so-called HQ, the authority of this place. I don’t know what they’re planning or what their endgame is… I just know it’s strange.”
Jericho clicked his teeth. “Haldor said something about Hammer. How he’s got Hammer, and Brandon is screwed.”
Myst’s eyes faded to white for a moment. I assumed it was a powerful emotion manifesting. It further piqued my interest and stifled the flames of my earlier distress. “The bastards… I’m afraid the Berserkers aren’t always to be trusted. Including Brandon. He could help you one day, then turn against you the next. Especially here. I’ve yet to find a Berserker I could work with to find my way back into Purgatory. Brandon means well, most of the time, but if the others have Hammer, he’s forced to comply with most of their requests. I reckon he’s still hardheaded enough to defy them once in a while, like he did earlier… But only Brandon can tell you the details of his presence here. It’s not my place.”
“So, he really can’t be trusted,” Astra sighed. She sounded almost disappointed.
“I’d advise against it. Then again, I’m not to be trusted, either. We don’t share the same goal. We come from different dimensions. We can work better together temporarily, but I would not consider you allies, and you shouldn’t consider me an ally, either.”
Myst was trying to distance herself, and I wondered why. I doubted she would tell me herself, but perhaps time would make things clearer. Soph raised the question that had been lingering on our lips since we’d been forced to leave our friends behind in the Port cells.
“How do we get Isabelle and the others out? How do we find them again?” she asked.
Myst thought about it for a moment, then slowly got up and dusted the sand from her legs. “I’m not sure yet, but I will go out and try to see for myself. I suggest you find another safe place. I doubt this will be good for much longer. It is wide open. The dragon clones do regular flights overhead.”
“We were told to head to the Black Heights,” I said.
“Yes, that’s a good idea. Here,” She dislodged one of the golden disks on her belt and gave it to me. As soon as our hands touched, an electrical current coursed through me. It jolted her, too, as I heard her suck in a breath. “I’ll find you with this, wherever you go.”
“Thanks, I guess?”
“I must leave now. Many questions remain unanswered. I’m afraid I will be of no good to you until I get what I need from this place,” Myst said, raising her chin with nobility and pride.
“Where will you go?” Viola replied, clearly fascinated by the Valkyrie.
“I will try to find out where they took your friends.”
With that, she vanished into thin air, white sparkles left in her wake. They faded quickly, and the beach suddenly felt empty and cold without Myst’s presence. There was something about her that demanded my full attention. I knew a little bit more now, but it wasn’t enough. I needed more.
The upside to what we’d just survived was that we’d gained an ally of sorts. She’d asked us not to think of her as one, but still… she was helping. In my book, that made her an ally. Most importantly, she would find out about Isabelle, Voss, and Chantal. They were out there, helpless and sedated and held against their will, and none of us knew how long we had before the clones started to consider them liabilities instead of assets.
We’d crossed an important threshold. A point of no return. We knew too much to go back to The Shade now, if given the chance. We didn’t know enough to ensure a victory, or even a proper resolution. But we had Richard back. And Viola. It was better than nothing. It was better than our status twenty-four hours ago, for sure.
“We’ll just have to keep pushing,” Astra said, likely thinking the same thing.
Yes. We’d keep pushing. We wouldn’t stop until we got what we came here for. It sounded easy enough, though the practical side of things was slightly more complicated. It didn’t make our objective impossible, however, and we weren’t the type to quit easily. With Myst as a sort of guiding light, I found hope in this strange place.
Tristan
By the morning of our third day on Dain, Unending and I had hatched a plan. The trial itself wasn’t impossible to complete, but it wouldn’t be easy, either. We’d learned the truth, and we understood why Shezin had to be killed. Anunit earned herself a couple of brownie points in that sense, though I still didn’t trust her as far as I could throw her. I doubted I ever would.
But to catch Shezin, we needed to be sly and unscrupulous. First, the bastard had sealed himself inside the temple. We had no way of getting to him on our own, and Death couldn’t be brought here since that would trigger Anunit’s alarms. We had too much riding on the Reaper already, and so much left to learn. No, we had a better way. All it took was a night spent proving to some of the Dainians in the city that there was virtually no difference between Unending and Shezin.
I worried about the priestesses. Shezin was bound to be furious, since one of them had basically led us to discover his evil deeds. They’d supported him for too long, however. They’d been complacent and accepting. Any of them could’ve found a way to weaken him. Maybe. Or maybe I was being too hard on them. They were genuinely terrified during yesterday’s breakfast when their sister broke rank. Maybe they’d tried to stop him, and Shezin had done something horrible to one of them. Or all of them. They all seemed young. I imagined they would’ve been of mixed ages. Perhaps he’d wiped out their predecessors. I shook my head, anchoring myself back into reality as the plan began to take shape.
Unending and I had settled in one of the squares on the east side of the city. Over the course of about eighteen hours, Embry had brought as many Dainians as she could get to believe her—upon learning the truth, the girl had been furious, now understanding that her brother had been killed solely to satisfy the boredom of a vicious psychopath. It wasn’t hard to get other grieving parents on board, or at least curious enough to want to see it for themselves.
Once the square was relatively full, Unending used her scythe to perform a variety of “miracles,” as Shezin had called them. When Embry asked if she could turn dust into water, my wife graciously kneeled and grabbed a fistful of dirt off the ground. She pressed the scythe against her knuckles, whispering the appropriate spell, and crystalline water began to drip from her hand.
“A miracle,” Embry said, almost breathless.
“No. It’s death magic,” Unending replied. “Your god is no god at all, but a man gifted by Death with a trinket and a few good spells. The true forces of this world would never barter like this with its inhabitants. It goes against the laws of nature and the rules of being.”
She went on to perform other spells. She made clouds appear and cry tears of blood, scaring many of the Dainians, but they stuck around. They were compelled to stay, for they were now seeing the truth. By noon, we had about a thousand people gathered, and Unending continued to preach against Shezin, unmasking him as a fraud. She showed them death magic spells, she told them about her realm, about Death and the other Reapers. Normally, that would’ve been forbidden, but Unending knew Death wouldn’t punish her for it. This was the one exception that had to be made, because it was our best and surest way to get that cockroach out of his temple.
The more she spoke, the angrier the Dainians became—especially those who had sacrificed their children. This hurt them the most, but they had to know the truth. They had to understand that they’d all
been the victims of a fraud.
“If you wish to find meaning in your life, do all that you can so that a balance is maintained. Apart, we are mere specks in the universe. Together, though, we are the driving force that makes it spin,” Unending said, and I loved her even more for the strength and dedication she was showing. This wasn’t about Shezin anymore—or not just about him, anyway. No, this was about freeing the Dainians from their emotional shackles.
They cheered and applauded her. My heart swelled with pride, but it also trembled slightly as there was still no sign of Shezin. “We need to get him out of his temple,” I whispered as the noon sun came up. “The clock is ticking…”
“Give it time. He will not resist,” Unending replied with a soft smile. “He’s a malignant narcissist, my love. Once the people of his kingdom come flocking to me, he will be compelled to come try to win them back.” Pausing for a moment, her expression brightened as she came up with something even better. “Or… wait, I’ve got it.” She turned to the people and raised her scythe, kissing its blade as she launched a new spell. This time, her voice echoed through the entire city and across the river. The mountains rumbled as the stone giants responded to her call. “Stone giants! Shezin is blaming you for the death of innocent children. Will you truly let him get away with this?”
Slowly but surely, the ridges of the surrounding mountains came apart. My breath caught in my throat, and the Dainians around us gasped in awe as they witnessed the rise of the stone giants. Their joints cracked as they shook off their centuries-long slumber. They were enormous but slender beings, like supersized Dainians, in fact. Their long limbs were made of limestone, and some trees grew across their chests, the canopies trembling as they moved.
Finally, they surrounded the city and kneeled before Unending from afar, careful not to trample or hurt anyone. My wife smiled again, and I already knew what she was about to do next. “He has thrown us out of his temple because we discovered his lies,” she said, her melodious voice rippling over the river and brushing past Shezin’s temple. Using a Dainian looking glass I’d borrowed from one of the nearby men, I peered over there and noticed the priestesses in the rooftop gardens.
A Shade of Vampire 89: A Sanctuary of Foes Page 21
