Soulkeeper Page 14

  Thaddeus put a hand on her shoulder. The moonlight reflected off his silver eyes as he leaned in close.

  “I know you feel it will get worse, but it will also get better, each in their own time,” he said. “We demand the best of you, Adria, no more, and no less. Have you given that today?”

  “I think so,” she said with a sigh.

  “Then worry not to the future. Focus on your little corner of Londheim and I will do my best to ensure that you have the supplies you need.”

  Adria’s ears perked up.

  “We will? When? And just in food, or also blankets and housing?”

  “I can’t say how Mayor Gaunt distributes the city storehouses, nor what Vikar Caria will assign of hers, but of my division’s stores, we will be distributing what we can spare fairly throughout the churches. I hope to be done in a day or two with all of it, but you should expect an initial allotment come morning.”

  Better than nothing. Even if she might disagree with what might be a “fair” allotment, at least it meant she and Sena would be receiving something.

  “So what brings you to Low Dock?” she asked. “A novice would have sufficed for such news.”

  “I’ve been making the rounds to all my Mindkeepers,” he said, putting both hands onto his cane. “And I must confess, this was my last stop.”

  “It usually is for everyone here.”

  They both smiled, hers far more bitter than his.

  “A novice cannot share the information I am here to share,” he said. “I’m sure you have already received a great many questions about what is transpiring, questions you do not have answers for. Until we have studied this situation further, I’d like you to assure people that the final days of Eschaton have not come. The world is not ending. The sun will rise and fall like it always has. Seek strength from the Goddesses in these trying times as we do our best to illuminate the darkness.”

  The church’s stance went about as Adria expected. The answers wouldn’t satisfy any of the people coming to her for clarity, but they’d at least attempt to tamp down the wilder fears and rumors.

  “I understand,” Adria said. “Thank you for coming to me personally. I will do my best to serve the people of Low Dock, and therefore serve the Goddesses and their divine glory.”

  Thaddeus tipped his hat to her.

  “I expected nothing less from a bright child such as yourself,” he said. “Now go to sleep, Mindkeeper. Consider that an order from your Vikar.”

  He turned to leave, but Adria was not quite satisfied.

  “Wait, Vikar,” she said. “What of the crawling mountain? Is it the void-dragon returned like some have said?”

  Thaddeus’s head sank a fraction of an inch lower.

  “We must still study and learn,” he said. “Things will never be the same, Mindkeeper, of that I am certain. Everything else is leaves of knowledge twirling in a thunderstorm. Perhaps in the coming days you can help me snatch a few from the wind. And Adria…”

  He glanced her way.

  “If that abomination truly is the void-dragon, there will be no peace for us in the coming months. I pray you are ready to do your part.”

  CHAPTER 14

  Blistering light split the absolute darkness of Janus’s prison. The cave floor rumbled beneath his feet. The dark water enveloping him rippled in chaotic waves. Janus flexed his muscular arms, pulling the chains clamped around his wrists to their limits. Only one person could be splitting open the cave wall: the dragon demigod who had first imprisoned him within.

  “Hello, Viciss,” Janus said. His soft voice cracked. It was the first time he’d spoken in… decades? Centuries? “Did you have a fine rest while the world moved on without you?”

  The darkness formed a humanoid shape. A midnight sky drifted along its skin, eerily reminiscent to the black water submerging Janus up to the neck.

  “It seems the centuries have not dulled your tongue,” Viciss said. His voice was the smooth slither of a snake through rain-drenched grass.

  “Things dull from overuse. My tongue remains plenty sharp.”

  Janus stood in the center of a deep pool, his arms chained to the stone at the bottom. Black water fell behind him in a steady trickle from the cave ceiling. Listening to its bubbling had been his entire occupation since Viciss sealed him in those chains. Even during the Goddesses’ enforced slumber it had overwhelmed his dreams. In its darkness stars and gaseous shapes flickered in and out of view, phantoms of other worlds to taunt him in his imprisonment.

  “It is your mind that I require sharp,” Viciss said. The dragon ducked underneath a long stalactite as he neared the edge of the pool. “How has it fared?”

  Janus couldn’t decide if it was an honest request or just another little insult to the dragon’s least favorite creation. Even as his eyes adjusted he still could make out no features. Viciss, like Janus, was all things and nothing. Others would perceive the illusions. Janus saw the truth.

  “My sanity remains, if that is what you wonder,” he said. “I owe that to the Goddesses more than yourself. It is far better to sleep the centuries away than to endure them in complete darkness and solitude.”

  “You speak as if you are undeserving of your punishment.”

  Janus ignored it. If the dragon wanted to argue the rights and wrongs of his past, he’d rather return to the cave’s cold silence.

  “Speaking of centuries, pray tell me, dragon, how did the world fare in your absence?”

  Viciss brushed another nearby stalactite. It shimmered into dust without a sound.

  “The humans built and spread like ants but their inner hunger has only grown more ravenous. We are all but forgotten, and their lives are mere drudgery and exhaustion as they await their soul’s escape. Damn the Goddesses for confining their reality so.”

  “That’s the problem,” Janus said. “There is no one to damn them.”

  “We are here to damn them,” the dragon said. The tone of his voice could freeze rivers. “One by one we return to find humanity living without wonder. They are certain of their divine rule over all other things. It has glutted their pride. It has stunted their emotions. Never before has the need for the salvation we offer shone so clear.”

  “Salvation?” Janus asked. He shook his head in disbelief. “After all your children have suffered, after our banishment, after the death and bloodshed, you still care for the Goddesses’ dull creation?”

  “Humanity is not responsible for the failure of their creators.”

  “Then neither are you responsible for your failings. A convenient truth to spread, don’t you agree? But that also means I’m not responsible for my failings, am I, Viciss? Strange how I’m still chained to the stone and swallowed by black water for using the gifts you gave me.”

  “Your pleasure in others’ discomfort was no gift of mine,” the dragon said.

  “How else was I to perform the art you requested?” His ire grew, his voice gaining strength. “Remind the humans of their place, you told me. Show that we are not subservient to their Goddesses and laws, was that not the goal when you birthed me from within this mountain of flesh and steel? Did I not fulfill my task?”

  “You were to remind humanity of their place,” Viciss said. “Not wantonly slaughter every last man, woman, and child that crossed your path.”

  “You wanted me to paint, and so I painted,” Janus seethed at the dragon. A million times he had imagined this conversation during his imprisonment. At last he had his chance, and he would not remain silent, not even to the demigod who gave him life. “You wanted humanity reminded of their wretchedness, and so I reminded them. You wanted the Goddesses insulted and mocked, and so I covered their ugly creations with my beauty. I did everything you wished, and for that you sealed me away within your own damn body. Why keep me alive if you despise me so?”

  “Because the Goddesses demanded your death,” Viciss snapped. “You were a hateful creation made in a moment of weakness, and that same weakness is why I kept you a
live. Do not give yourself undeserved importance.”

  “Oh, but I am important,” Janus said. He smiled, revealing his perfect rows of opal teeth. Each one contained its own unique pattern, but they all shared a swirling coloration of the entire visible spectrum. “I’m your pure embodiment. You loathe my existence for the reflection it reveals.”

  Based on the thunderous roar that shook the cavern walls and broke multiple stalactites, the dragon was beyond furious.

  “I helped create the world, you wretch! You did nothing but destroy.”

  “Just as my maker intended.”

  Though the massive crawling mountain might be the dragon’s body, the presence before Janus was its mind, and it frightened him far more than any stone claw ever could. The living, walking starscape extended a hand, fingers elongating into claws eager to tear apart the fabric of his existence, but at the last moment they pulled away.

  “There is truth to your words, as much as I am loath to admit it. Your existence is my sin, but perhaps we might both atone. I come bearing a task.”

  “And what is that?” Janus asked.

  Viciss lowered a hand to the black water rippling with universes beyond understanding and dipped a single finger beneath its surface. The shackle about Janus’s left wrist snapped open, followed by the right.

  “Travel southwest of here to the Oakblack Woods. There is a village of alabaster faeries not far into the forest, and they have in their possession an object I have hidden from the Goddesses. Bring it to me.”

  Janus lifted his arms above his head. Water dripped off his skin, the last of his prison rolling away. Tears of joy glinted in his emerald eyes. A hundred desires filled him, and he picked the first to come to his mind. The microscopic building blocks of matter bent to his will with a mere touch. The flesh of his hands stiffened, hardened, and shifted in color. With deep pleasure he looked upon his jade hands. Janus was an artist, his hands the brush, the world his canvas. Every creation a beauty, unlike the mottled carcass that was called humanity.

  Janus clenched his hands into fists, crunching the stone back into flesh and bone.

  “What is this object?” he asked.

  “A starlight tear,” Viciss said. “I will not say more. Secrecy is of the utmost importance, for I bring you into matters that led to the Goddesses banishing us into our imprisoning slumber.”

  Janus ran his hand over his bald head. Hair sprouted and fell down to his shoulders, the left half a vibrant green, the right as black as the night. He stepped naked from the pool and bowed low to the dragon.

  “And once I return?” he asked.

  “Then you may have your reward,” Viciss said. “Free rein within Londheim to kill any and all keepers of the church.”

  Janus’s smile spread ear to ear.

  “With pleasure.”

  “Do not kill wantonly,” Viciss warned. “Slay only the keepers. We seek freedom for the rest of the populace, not their annihilation.”

  Janus smirked.

  “Speak for yourself, dragon.”

  Viciss’s hand shot out in a blur. Long, shadowy fingers closed about his neck with the strength of a noose. Janus tried and failed to breathe as the dragon lifted his bare feet off the stone.

  “I am done bickering,” he said. Janus clutched at the darkness holding him aloft. “Disobey and I shall unmake your existence. You will feel the obliteration of each and every one of your individual cells. With Chyron’s help I shall slow time’s grasp about your mind so that each cell’s death feels as long as a second. Do you know how many cells make up your physical shell, Janus? You will suffer for more than a billion years before the last of you is consumed.”

  Viciss leaned closer. His formless lips breathed warm smoke across Janus’s face.

  “But I, my dear creation—I will watch this torment unfold in mere minutes. Have I made myself clear?”

  The dragon dropped him to his knees. Janus clutched his aching neck and shivered through wave after wave of horror.

  “I understand,” he said. “I understand, and I obey. Only the church’s keepers.”

  “Good. I am not a merciless slave to rules, and I understand that casualties shall happen. Keep them minimized.”

  Viciss waved an arm. What had been a thin crack ruptured into an enormous doorway through the stone. Janus squinted against the surge of light. He was in the base of a mountain a mere hundred feet above the black grass. Half a mile in the distance, he saw the familiar walled city of Londheim.

  “Do not tarry,” Viciss said. “We have not lost our chance to save humanity, but it will only be through decisive action.”

  The shadow that was Viciss dissipated into thin air. Janus lingered a moment and then leapt from the side of the mountain. The grass swayed but held firm upon his landing. The warm sun bathed his naked skin, drying away the last remnants of the dragon’s black water, the liquid embodiment of change. A long, deep sigh escaped his throat. To experience freedom again was overwhelming in its pleasure.

  He brushed the black grass, sensing the corruption within. With a thought it returned to a healthy green for several feet in all directions. It seemed Viciss had been unable to contain his rage, not that Janus blamed him. His pale hands dug deep into the dark soil. The cool earth stuck to his skin, a welcome change from the isolation of Viciss’s black water. His fingers curled and lifted. Dirt came with it, transforming into a pitch-black pair of breeches stretching down to his ankles. Janus dropped to his knees, his fingers plunging once more to the grass. When he stood he lifted up a long black coat, which settled comfortably over his naked arms and back.

  Janus faced the slumbering mountain. Despite his rage, Viciss had stopped just shy of destroying the city. Such a pity. Londheim’s collapse would have sent shock waves throughout the entire east, a good first step in reestablishing proper order in the Cradle. Sentimentalism. It could ruin even the mightiest of dragons. Disgust squirmed in his stomach as he gazed upon Londheim.

  “So you’ve forgotten us?” he whispered to the huddled masses of humanity within. “You no longer fear the dark hunts? The call of the swamp ghosts, the spears of the lapinkin, or the howls of the living snow? You are kittens convinced you are lions. That era ends. The real hunters have emerged.”

  He scooped a chunk of earth into his hand and lifted it to his lips. His will channeled through the touch of his hands, shaping reality with his thoughts. Matter twisted, mutated. Dirt became blood. Stone became dense, ropy flesh and then a human heart. This new heart beat once and then died. Janus smashed it within his fist, his pulse quickening at the sudden surge of pleasure. Blood dripped across his bare chest.

  “I’ll come for you soon, dear humans,” Janus whispered to the people of Londheim. But first, the dragon’s task. He ran east, bypassing the city. A smile lit his face. It might be a few days before he returned to Londheim, but if he passed through a human village during his travel, he might still have a chance to work his art upon their bodies. After so many centuries of slumber, he had a thousand ideas to try…

  CHAPTER 15

  I’m not sure why we’re doing research on religious matters,” Tommy muttered as he plopped two dozen rolled parchments onto the table, kicking up a cloud of dust. He sneezed three times, each one angrier than the last. “Void-dragons? End times? This seems entirely a church matter.”

  “Because they know we’d be more likely to store writings considered to be heretical,” said Malik Sumter. The older man sat on the other side of the table, a mountain of books on either side of him. They were inside the archive on the second floor of Londheim’s Tower of the Wise, doing their best to locate any reference to the time of Eschaton or the existence of the void-dragon. Malik was the assigned Wise for the enormous city, and he’d gladly accepted Tommy’s help when Tommy showed up one morning offering it. “The city’s keepers are afraid, which means the people will be afraid. It is our job to help calm those fears in any way we can.”

  Tommy plopped into his own chair. It�
�d been three days since he’d arrived in Londheim, three very long days spent poring over books at Mayor Gaunt’s behest for even the slightest clue as to what the living mountain might be, and why it’d crawled to Londheim’s gate only to hunker down and settle into perfect stillness.

  “I just don’t see how wasting our time helps the people.”

  Malik closed the book in front of him and frowned over his oval spectacles. It was a frown to be jealous of. Malik’s smooth skin was the color of candlelight, and somehow his frown put no wrinkle or dent in it. It was disapproval personified and placed onto a square jaw that Tommy had a hard time not admiring from the corner of his eye.

  “Is something bothering you, Tomas?” Malik asked. “I can’t help but notice quite a few of those scrolls have nothing to do with religious history.”

  Tommy rattled his teeth together. Of course the older Wise had noticed his uncharacteristic frustration. Nothing went unnoticed by those dreamy brown eyes.

  Less schoolboying, more adulting, Tommy berated himself. Despite his sister’s insistence, it was time to take a risk, otherwise he’d go insane.

  “Malik, as you are my superior I feel compelled to inform you of something I have otherwise not mentioned since my arrival in Londheim.”

  The older Wise watched him with a perfect gambler’s face. Tommy coughed and pulled on his collar. The archive was well ventilated, a tribute to the excellent builders and designers in Londheim’s past, but suddenly it felt intolerably hot and stuffy. Perhaps he should stand next to a window for a minute or two before…