I felt the presence of the Scepter of Mordant in my left hand and idly I wondered what it might be capable of accomplishing. Before I could try anything with it, though, Vostok broke the silence.
“It is good to see you again, Lady Karilyne,” he said, sarcasm apparent in his voice. “And I thank you for retrieving the Scepter for me. I sent five good men and a goddess in there looking for it and none of them has yet to reemerge.” He shook his head. “I fear they never will.”
I started to raise it but Vostok cut me off.
“Hand that to the nearest legionary, if you would be so kind,” he said to me. He chuckled. “I know you must feel a great temptation to try it out—to see what it does. But I assure you there is nothing it can do that will defeat me and all of my men before one of them fires a particle beam or slug into the heads of your two friends here.” He nodded toward Mirana and Davos. “And while losing the big gray one might be tolerable to you, in exchange for a split second of freedom, I’m very sure you do not wish any harm to come to the Dyonari female who works for you.” He gestured toward Mirana, and as he did two of his soldiers placed the barrels of their quad-rifles against her head. She glared at the nearer of them.
I held onto the Scepter another moment and turned to the Hands where they stood idly by. “You have no objection to all of this?” I asked them.
“We are here on other business,” Cardinal replied formally. “This appears to be a dispute between you and the III Legion.”
“That’s scarcely what it—”
“Enough,” Vostok barked. “The Hands have no quarrel with me. They do not disapprove of me gathering up these dispersed ancient energies. For I will be giving them something of far greater value.” He looked down at the five weapons laid out before him, then up at me. “Hand over the Scepter now.”
It was the last thing I wanted to do. For the moment, though, I had no choice. Scowling at him, I held the silver and gold cylinder out. An armored legionary accepted it from me and carried it over to the pedestal, setting it down with the other five.
“And if I feel the temperature dropping even a single degree,” Vostok added, shaking a finger at me, “I will have the prisoners executed.”
My eyes bored into him but I restrained myself. I had a play ready, but I was waiting for an opening.
Vostok meanwhile leaned over the pedestal and gazed down at those six objects and seven crimson stones with almost reverence. Six Weapons of immense raw power, and seven stones that were all that remained of what had been Vorthan. Insane to even bring all of those items so close together—and even crazier to do what I suspected the human intended to attempt.
“Go no further with this madness, Vostok,” I called to him. “You will usher the deathgod back into existence, and he in turn will unleash universal destruction.”
“Silence,” he snapped at me. Then he turned to his own men, frowning. “What do I do next?”
I kept my expression blank. I certainly wasn’t about to give him any pointers, even had I known.
One of the armored legionaries—an officer of high rank, by all appearances—stepped toward him. “According to what Cevelar said before, General,” the soldier replied, “you bring the Six Weapons into close proximity with the stones and then focus your thoughts.”
“This will draw in the power of Vorthan, but not his actual persona, yes?” Vostok hissed at the soldier. When the officer didn’t immediately answer, Vostok cast a quick and nervous look my way.
And then I understood.
Cevelar—the dedicated disciple of Vorthan—had never been the mastermind of all of this. It had been Vostok all along. I should’ve realized that sooner, but my prejudice against the mortals and in favor of my own kind had partially blinded me to the truth of what he was doing. He had played Cevelar quite effectively, and then betrayed him. Cevelar had been determined to revive Vorthan. General Vostok had no interest in that. He merely wanted Vorthan’s power—all that raw, deadly power—for himself.
“Hear me, human,” I said to him. “You are a fool. And you will succeed only in unleashing destruction upon this reality.”
Vostok scoffed. “Oh, I am aware of your stories and beliefs, Karilyne,” he said. “Fortunately, I put little stock in them. I merely wish to tap into Vorthan’s dispersed power, bring it together here, absorb it.” He gestured toward the Six Weapons. “These items we have collected will, I am assured, act as magnets, drawing his power to this place and time, so that it might be harvested.”
I shook my head. “You fail to understand that with that power inevitably will come his personality, his consciousness. The two things are inseparable. You play with fire, and you risk setting the entire universe alight.”
Vostok stared back at me for a long moment, then gestured dismissively. He moved his hands down to touch the Six Weapons, brushing his fingertips over each in turn.
As if in response to this, the cosmic waters of the Pool churned and began to cycle through many different colors.
“Now what?” Vostok asked the officer.
“Wait, wait,” the legionary replied, holding up a hand as he studied the Pool. “Be ready.”
Vostok lifted the Scepter in his left hand, weighing it, getting used to its heft, its grip.
The waters turned blue, then pale green, then deep green. Then yellow. Then orange.
“Be ready,” the officer repeated. “And…”
The waters turned red. Deep, blood red.
“Now!”
And with that, Vostok took two steps toward the edge of the Pool and dived in.
I had been exerting my ability for the entire time, but holding it back as best I could. Now I released it, in two very tight lines of force. In response, the two III Legion soldiers aiming their weapons at Davos and Mirana cried out, as I froze their trigger fingers and turned them to ice.
And then I was moving, sprinting to the pedestal. I knew instinctively what was about to happen, and what I had to do. A part of me was horrified at the idea—repelled by it. But another part of me knew it was our best chance, our only choice.
And yet another part of me, deep down inside, desired it.
I saw Mirana up and moving already, disarming the surprised soldier closest to her. Davos would surely do the same. I hated leaving them behind and at the mercy of such a powerful force of enemy troops, but the fate of the galaxy was at stake.
Without breaking stride, I reached down and picked up the gleaming golden Sword. Two more steps carried me around the pedestal and to the edge of the Pool. At that moment I heard a wail sounding across the courtyard, and saw orange light flaring behind me. Well. Good, then. Perhaps my apprentice and the others would have some help.
But their battle now was not my own. For I had something else—something far more important—to do.
The Sword of Baranak in my right hand, and hot on Vostok’s tail, I dived into the cosmic waters.
* * *
From inside it, the Pool of Dalen-Shala contained nothing like water.
I plunged into its depths, but instead of cold currents rushing past, it felt as if I were spinning through empty space. At first I held my breath, but soon I discovered that it was possible to breathe. My eyes were open and around me I could see stars and comets and constellations burning like wildfire in the black void.
Instinctively I swam, and somehow this caused me to move forward. So I continued the motions. The only light in that place was the faint glow coming from the Sword I clutched in my outstretched right hand. I held it out before me like a beacon and allowed it to lead me on, to guide me deeper and deeper through this bizarre realm.
Down and down I traveled. The Pool seemed bottomless. Surely I had long since passed beyond the physical limits of the structure on the Star-City; now I could only be in some other, adjacent reality. I understood then that the Pool was not just a medium of cosmic energy but also a doorway into this greater realm.
I spun myself around and around again, attempting to
see what had become of Vostok. There was a chance his frail mortal body had been disintegrated by the energies at work here, but I suspected that would be too much to hope for. Even so, at first I could find no trace of him.
Then he hit me.
More specifically, he hit me with the Scepter of Mordant.
I do not know precisely what gives that weapon its power, or even what its particular abilities might be. But one of them without a doubt is simply the power to knock the stew out of someone.
I tumbled head over heels, the careening stars around me now joined by sparks that filled my vision.
He must have pursued me for he had hit me again before I could recover from the first blow.
Desperately I tried to bring the Sword of Baranak up in an attempt to block the next attack, but I might as well have been moving in slow motion—and perhaps I was. The Scepter swept in under my guard and impacted my stomach. I gasped, the wind nearly knocked out of me, and remained doubled up for several seconds. I understood I was extremely vulnerable at that point, but I could barely breathe, much less move.
Again I spun around, and again the Scepter struck me, and at last my waking mind became subsumed beneath a roaring there in the utter silence.
I cannot say how long I drifted there, barely in the world. But something around me changed and brought back a fragment of my consciousness.
Through narrowed eyelids I could just see Vostok floating some ten meters away. His arms and legs were outstretched, the Scepter still held in his left hand. Red lightning bolts flared all around him and traced up and down his body. His mouth was open in a silent scream. It looked as if he were being electrocuted, though I could feel nothing of the currents washing over and into him even from such a short distance away.
I could see them, though. Forking, flickering tongues of raw power; four of them in all, descending through the Pool and raking over Vostok’s inert form. At the same time, a similar stream of energy ran into him from the Scepter in his hand, and from the Sword in mine. Yes, it was precisely as I had feared, and as he had surely planned all along. He was drawing the power of the Six Cosmic Weapons into himself.
Unfortunately for Vostok, and for the galaxy, it did not stop there. He had believed he could claim the power of the Weapons without also drawing in the essence of the deathgod. My allies and I had doubted that was the case. And we were right.
Red bolts of current flowed down at him now, seven in all. From the seven crimson gemstones, surely. The power and the persona of grim Vorthan. The essence of the deathgod, flowing directly into the Pool, and thence into Vostok.
Seconds passed. The currents from the gems ceased. Now, though, all around both of us shone a dim, reddening light, harsh and baleful. It had no visible source but appeared to radiate from the essence of the cosmic aether within which we were both suspended. The light seemed to congeal, to solidify, to form into the likeness of a bald head above a grim, somber visage. A likeness I remembered all too well.
Then came a POP of red lightning, and another. And another. Coruscating crimson energies surged from that shimmering visage into Vostok. Again he screamed, on and on, as if his very soul were being torn from his body. After a timeless time of what must have been the sheerest agony, he relaxed—or more likely collapsed, exhausted, his physical body nearly dead. It floated there, head down, arms and legs limp and dangling.
I was scarcely in better shape at that moment, after the beating he had administered with the Scepter. And so together we floated there, a question waiting to be answered: Which of us would recover first?
In short, he did.
His head snapped up, his eyes still closed, and I gasped. For the figure floating there before me no longer resembled the human called Yevgeni Vostok in any way. He had been utterly transformed.
Now he was bald, with a dark mustache and goatee, and his III Legion uniform had been replaced by black and brown banded leather. He opened his eyes—they blazed with crimson flames—and looked directly at me.
A bolt of red lightning sliced out from his hand. It struck me hard, and I fell back toward the pit of unconsciousness. The hilt of the Sword of Baranak slipped from my insensate fingers. I tried to grasp it but it was gone. I forced my eyes open only to see it tumbling deeper into the black depths, carrying along with it any remaining hopes I might have had for defeating the deathgod. With all of my willpower I demanded that my body go and pursue it, but my muscles refused to move.
Just before my eyes fluttered closed, I witnessed the blazing crimson form of Vostok—no, of Vorthan the deathgod reborn—surging upward, toward the surface. Toward the Star-City, and my friends.
Toward a galaxy and a reality that was wholly unprepared for what was coming.
And then darkness claimed me.
TWENTY FIVE
“Karilyne.”
“Unnnnhh.”
…
“Karilyne. You must awaken.”
“Wrrrr… Who?”
“Awaken!”
What? Awaken?
No. I was in no hurry to open my eyes. In addition to the pounding headache, I feared what I would find if I did.
Instead, mentally, I replied—and hoped that, whoever it was that was disturbing me, they could also read minds: “Have some respect for the dead. Leave me alone.”
“You are not dead.”
“Not yet, then. But soon. And the entire universe with me. Why wait?”
“This is not like you. What have you become in all the years since I last saw you?”
This angered me. How dare this person—this disembodied voice, here in the depths of the Dyonari Pool—say such things to me?
“Go away,” I said—again, mentally. Though I could breathe, sound did not seem to carry here.
“I cannot go away,” the voice said. It was male, deep and resonant, and seemed somehow familiar. “I have been with you from the beginning. I have never gone away from you. And I never will.”
This made me even angrier. At last I opened my eyes. “Just who do you think you are?”
“Who do you think?”
A figure, faint but massive and clad all in gold, hovered there in the waters before me. His hair and beard were blond and so familiar. His muscles filled out his gleaming plate armor well. His countenance was regal and intimidating, and storms danced upon his eyebrows.
“Do you no longer know me? Has it been so long? Have you changed so much?”
A combination of feelings rushed through me. Hope, fear, anger, sorrow, joy.
Love.
“Baranak,” I said aloud.
He nodded his head once. “I was called that. Among other things.”
I stared at him and warmth filled my mind, my heart.
Then I blinked, realized where I was and felt anger surge to the forefront of my emotions. “This is some trick by my enemies,” I said, “or else a dream.”
“It is neither,” he said.
“You are dead. You have been dead for centuries.”
“I have been, yes. And I remain so. That is true.”
“Then how—?”
He smiled at me. I scarcely recalled Baranak smiling at me or anyone else in all of his previous existence, across millennia. Yet, here and now, somehow, it felt right. It felt true.
“You are needed,” he said to me. “You must pick yourself up and fight back.”
Despair crept over me. I shook my head. “It is too late. It is over.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Vostok collected all the Cosmic Weapons. He has gathered the power of Vorthan into himself. He has essentially become Vorthan, reborn.”
“Correct,” he said. “Even now he lays waste to this Star-City. Soon, as his power grows, he will go on to burn down the galaxy, and thence to usher in a wave of chaos and entropy that overwhelms all.”
Baranak waved a hand and visions appeared before me. Dalen-Shala, the Star-City; my own ice world where I had dwelt these long millennia; human world after human w
orld across their far-flung empires. And scattered through each of the images, each of the worlds, I recognized the caustic, corrosive clouds of everlasting chaos creeping in. Just as I had witnessed all along our river journey and then in the far future beyond the Spire’s destruction, I saw a universe reduced to naught but void and entropy.
“You have seen this before,” Baranak said to me. “You know what it represents. You have seen its effects echo up and down through time.”
“I have.”
“You must fight it.”
“But how?” I shook my head. “I remain almost powerless. Vorthan is triumphant. There is little point in fighting now.”
“This is not the Karilyne I always knew,” he rumbled after a moment. “You will not fight?”
I shrugged.
“Not for yourself and your own survival, your own happiness?” he asked. “Then what about fighting for your friends?”
“I have no friends,” I snapped.
“Not true. I have seen it in your mind. Davos, Tamerlane, Solonis, Binari…”
“Allies of convenience. They will suffer the fate the universe has laid out for them. I cannot control that.”
“Lucian?”
I scoffed. “Do not make me laugh.”
“You must hold him in some regard. You gave him my Sword.”
“I should have given him my Axe. In his face.”
“He earned better than that,” the ghostly Baranak said after a few seconds. “He earned my forgiveness—something not lightly given.”
I said nothing to that.
“And your apprentice, Mirana?” he said after another pause. “What of her fate?”
Pain shot through my heart. But I shook my head again.
“I cannot help her.”
“You made her your responsibility. You are her mentor.”
Karilyne- Heart Cold as Ice Page 28
