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  Janus turned her way, and she trembled beneath his seething hatred and disgust.

  “And then the Sisters created you. The supposed culmination of every lesson the dragons had imparted. Even then their pride interfered. This human race would bear no link to the dragons, and would share none of their innate gifts. You’d be theirs, only theirs, their precious little children. They tried to downplay the aspects they did not understand. They denied you claws or scales so you would be vulnerable, and therefore cooperate instead of compete. They gave you short lives so you would rebel against the pull of time. Sermons and rituals would tame your doubts, and the Keeping Church would ensure that all questions were answered with unyielding faith. You would either master the elements like fire, or hide from them like the storm.”

  Janus shook his head. There was no hiding his disgust.

  “The Sisters should have seen what would come next. Your frail, confused species would only crumble beneath the superiority of the dragon-sired. Instead of burying you beneath the sea, the Sisters reached through the void and clutched a piece of the same infinite power that gave them existence. The First Soul. Their indisputable proof of their preference of humans above all other creations.”

  Adria struggled against the sealed-over flesh of her lips. As dire as her situation was, she was fascinated with the monstrous man’s knowledge. Here was a being that had walked the land alongside dragons, who spoke of the Goddesses with intimate knowledge. Perhaps he would kill her, perhaps he would give whatever “blessing” he spoke of, but either way she would attempt to garner what knowledge she could. Janus saw her attempting to speak, and after a momentary hesitation, he passed his fingers across her face. She felt the seal break. Cool air breathed across her teeth and tongue.

  “What of the void-dragon?” she asked. “Is it true? Did it attempt to swallow the light of the First Soul?”

  “I don’t know,” Janus said. He smirked. “I wasn’t there. But I do know that your tales of the void-dragon’s blood being the reason for your flaws and sins is utter nonsense. Like all their creations, your flaws were of the Sisters’ own making.”

  Thin cracks of light were beginning to grow upon the ceiling, and Adria realized they were faint only because they were so far away. A brief vertigo passed over her as she suddenly understood that she stood in the center of a domed opening thousands of feet high. Nine little streams of light pulsed like veins toward her from all directions before connecting to the machinery flanking her sides. Where in Anwyn’s name was she?

  “Why tell me this?” she asked. “Why do you care what I know, or what I believe?”

  “The gift you are to receive would crush the weak. This power would sow chaos in the selfish hands of a coward.” Janus was not mocking her. He wasn’t angry. His eyes shook with intensity. His words carried such earnestness it bordered on desperation. “For once, just once, humanity might become worthy. They might become free of imprisonment to the Sisters, no longer chained to their life-and-death cycle of souls. You could lead them there, but it involves a heart and mind willing to go beyond rote dogma and slavish loyalty.”

  He shook his head and clenched his teeth. Adria could hardly believe how panicked he suddenly looked, how unsure.

  “Viciss requested a champion, and so I have chosen you. I cannot have chosen wrong. I cannot! You have heard my words, Mindkeeper. The Sisters are imperfect. They have failed, again and again, and they have failed you most of all. This gift, this burden, could you bear it? Is your heart willing? Did I make the right choice, Adria? Tell me, did I?”

  Adria licked her dry lips. He pleaded for an answer. He hung on her every word. For once since waking up, she held a scrap of power over him, and she would not waste it.

  “Anwyn of the Moon, hear me,” she said. She felt the power reverberate within her head the moment the first syllable left her tongue. Janus stiffened instantly, as if a great chain had wrapped about his form. “This flesh before me hides its rot. This smile belies its sickness. These bones deny the weakness within. Anwyn, hear me, Anwyn!”

  Janus’s skin bubbled as if it floated atop a pot of boiling oil.

  “Tear.”

  Flesh ripped and separated seemingly at random to expose muscle.

  “Break.”

  He screamed as his arms and legs twisted at irregular angles. His fingers bent backward. His ribs collapsed inward.

  “Sunder.”

  A force like a charging bull smashed Janus to the ground, grinding and twisting his mangled form so that nothing remained as it should. The last words exited Adria’s tongue with a sudden calmness, a finality to the power she had already wrought.

  “Show me truth.”

  Janus lay on the smooth ground in a frighteningly similar replica of the state to which Mindkeeper Tamerlane had cursed Deakon Sevold. Adria tugged on her manacles, trying to see if she had any room to move. Not much at all, but there was some give. With enough time, and perhaps with a bit of blood and torn skin, she might finally…

  Janus laughed, and laughed. His malformed body twisted and shaped like clay. In mere seconds he had undone the damage. Eyes crazed with rage stared into hers, and he flashed her his opal teeth.

  “Did you think my body as unmalleable as a human’s?” he asked. “That the distortion of change into corruption might affect one who is the embodiment of Viciss’s will? You would curse me, Mindkeeper? Me?”

  Janus closed the distance between them. At any moment she feared he’d kill her with his rapidly mutating hands of blade and bone. His lips hovered beside her ear. His words were a seductive whisper, and they trembled from his barely controlled intensity.

  “You whispered the words of a Ravencaller. You invoked forbidden power. Here, in this chamber of demigods, you tossed aside the Sisters’ demands so you might survive.” He leaned closer. His warm breath blew across her neck. “I chose perfectly.”

  His hands were on her wrists before she knew what was happening. Janus broke the constraints, bent down, and grabbed the two sides of whatever construction she stood within. With a screech of metal, he slammed them shut over her, locking her inside. While the sides were solid, a large portion of the substance before her was translucent, and through it she saw Janus staring at her. Smiling at her. She pounded at the sides, but he said not a word before he walked away into the darkness.

  At her feet, the blue liquid swirled higher and higher.

  CHAPTER 44

  Devin had not expected to sleep when he lay down on his bed to rest his sore muscles, but his exhaustion had different ideas. He stirred hours later with his head pounding and his throat cracked and dry as a desert. However much he slept, his body desired more, but it’d have to wait. Daylight slipped through the cracks of his drawn shutters, and in their thin rays he dressed for another excursion to the strange chamber underneath the city.

  When he exited he was surprised to find Tommy, Jacaranda, and Tesmarie all waiting for him in his living room.

  “There you are!” Tommy said, and he hopped up from his seat. Of all of them, only he seemed to be awake and energetic. “It’s a long story, maybe not that long, I guess, but nonetheless with Tesmarie’s help and a timeshroom I believe I cracked the code to the underground chamber’s power conduit.”

  Devin rubbed at his eyes and tried to focus through the cobwebs of his mind.

  “Say that again, but make sense this time,” he said.

  “Oh, um, all right,” Tommy said. “How’s this: I spent all night at the strange chamber and I think I know where Adria is.”

  That got his attention. Devin glared at the group, his frustration mounting.

  “What? Why didn’t you wake me?”

  Jacaranda lifted her hands defensively.

  “Don’t ask me,” she said. “I woke up ten minutes ago. This is the first I’m hearing of it myself.”

  “Fine. Please, forgive my rudeness, Tommy. How did you discover where Adria is?”

  “Tesmarie gave me a mushroom that made m
e not need to sleep a wink,” Tommy explained. “Something about time manipulation and hypersleep. That’s why I called it a timeshroom, earlier. A little joke, you… right, not in a joking mood, sorry. Anyway, it looks like whatever the well in the center is, it started to activate. There’s a thin line of light leaking from it to a wall, and I surmised that if it was conducting the substance of the well toward some specific direction, then surely a tunnel was also there following it.”

  “So you found a tunnel?” Devin asked.

  “Yes. It took a few hours, but I finally found a panel on the wall where a star was not a star, but a button that activated… honestly I don’t know what it activated, but it caused a door to appear.”

  Devin felt his excitement and dread growing in equal measure. They might still save Adria from Janus, or they might discover whatever terrible fate had befallen her.

  “Are all of you ready to go?” he asked.

  They nodded in affirmative. Even Puffy hopped out of the fire and stomped its feet atop the brick of the fireplace.

  “You too?” he asked.

  Puffy bobbed its head up and down. Devin could not describe how touched he felt. A few weeks ago he’d not even known most of them, but here they were ready to give their lives to help him save his sister.

  “Thank you,” he said. “All of you, thank you for being here when I needed you. I pray I can ever repay your kindness.”

  “We’re not doing this to get paid,” Tesmarie said, and she swirled around Devin’s head and harrumphed. “Stop being a silly human and grab your sword and pistol.”

  Devin donned his coat and hat, then began the process of buckling his sword belt and holster to his waist.

  “What about the church?” Tommy asked as they watched. “A few more Soulkeepers wouldn’t hurt.”

  Devin glanced at Jacaranda’s exposed tattoo on her throat, then the onyx faery and firekin. The Keeping Church knew about none of these three, nor that they lived with him in his home. The same went for Tommy’s magic, and Devin could only guess as to what the church would think of that.

  “The Keeping Church may not approve of my friendship with any of you,” he said. “Worse, they may view you as threats to Londheim. If I must choose between all the Soulkeepers of Londheim and you four, I’m taking you four. Now let’s go save Adria.”

  The five traveled through Londheim, a most bizarre assortment for a rescue team. Devin carried a torch in his left hand, Puffy safely disguised within its flame. Tesmarie huddled inside one of his deep pockets, explaining only that she felt uncomfortable going out in public since Janus attacked the market. Devin remembered the address well enough that he needed only the occasional reminder from Tesmarie as to where to turn. When they reached the dilapidated home, it was strange to look upon it in the sunlight. Nothing about it appeared special or unique, but he could still feel that intangible sense of power rolling outward in all directions. Even the men and women passing by on the street gave the home a wide berth, as if they, too, could somehow sense the chamber of stars and monsters hidden underneath.

  Once inside, Tesmarie swirled away the illusionary wall like so many grains of sand and then put her hand atop the center until it opened. Devin drew his pistol and placed the cold barrel against his forehead. His eyes closed, and those around him fell silent as he whispered his prayer.

  “Lyra, guide our steps this day as you do all days. Protect the life Alma gave us, and should we fall, deliver us swiftly into Anwyn’s embrace.”

  He lowered his pistol, and the heavy silence broke with Tommy’s sudden, awkward exclamation.

  “Oh! I almost forgot!” He dug into his pocket and came out holding what appeared to be a flamestone, except instead of red it was colored a strange swirl of yellow and orange. “I made this while waiting for you and Jacaranda to wake up.”

  “What is it?” Devin asked as he accepted the gift.

  “Well, when we fought that horrifying void-monster thing, your pistol wasn’t exactly… how do I say this nicely… doing anything of significance.”

  “That’s one way to put it,” Devin muttered.

  “Well, since we might encounter another one of those things, and fire was effective in destroying them, I made you that. It’s a flamestone, but with a time-delayed spell enchanted into it that will trigger upon any significant burst of energy.”

  Devin rolled the flamestone between his thumb and forefinger.

  “Try again, Tommy.”

  His brother-in-law scratched at his chin.

  “Put it in your pistol and pull the trigger. You’ll shoot one of my fire spells, so aim carefully.”

  “Interesting,” Devin said. “Are you sure it will work?”

  “Uhh… mostly sure?”

  Devin put the flamestone in a separate pouch from the rest.

  “Emergencies only, then,” he said, and he winked at his friend.

  They returned to the chamber of stars. Immediately Devin sensed a change in the air. The stars pulsed with new life. The well itself appeared to overflow with the blue-white essence that dripped into it from the domed ceiling. Just as Tommy described, a small line of it poured over the edge, the light a little wider than his finger. It raced toward the star wall and then vanished.

  Tesmarie flew among the stars for a moment while muttering to herself. Tommy joined her, and after tracing a few formations they found the specific one they’d mentioned. Tommy pushed it with his thumb. Instantaneously an opening appeared where the stream of star essence reached the wall, exposing a long tunnel lit only by that thin glowing line in its center.

  “How far does it go?” Devin wondered.

  “Half a mile at least,” Tommy said. “We didn’t go far before we decided it best to turn around and bring everyone.”

  “A wise decision,” Devin said. He took point, Jacaranda and Tommy not far behind. They didn’t speak, and even Tesmarie fell silent after a few minutes as she hovered around their shoulders. Everyone’s nerves were tightening, their minds preparing for battle. Puffy shuddered atop his torch after a minute. Devin had not even considered that the firekin might be afraid, but those little black eyes were spread as wide as they could go.

  “Do you not like it here?” he asked as they walked.

  Puffy enlarged its head slightly so it could shake in the negative.

  Time and distance lost any semblance of meaning as they walked the long dark tunnel. It never turned, though many times it dipped lower, taking them deeper and deeper into the earth. No fire burned on Devin’s torch but what composed Puffy’s body, diminishing their light but preventing the release of any smoke. A distant hum greeted them, steadily growing louder with each step they took. The vibrations were deep and thick enough that he felt it in his bones. After another lengthy slope downward they saw an end to the tunnel and a massive room beyond.

  “Be ready for anything,” Devin whispered. Power pulsed through the tunnel, much stronger than before, and at last he recognized the sensation. It was the same heightened intensity he felt during the reaping hour. Pistol leading, he exited the tunnel and stepped into a room from another world.

  The center chamber was a dome like the first, only a hundred times as grand. No otherworldly stars graced the ceiling. An uneven mixture of flesh and metal hung above their heads, the support rafters switching between iron and bone seemingly at random. White veins pulsed with stardust instead of blood, and it was their light that granted them sight. The ground was smooth but soft, and with a pale pink color to it. Devin feared to stab it with his sword lest blood spurt forth and his mind break trying to understand. Nine different beams of light converged from various tunnels into an enormous steel heart at its center. Multiple pipes connected to the top and bottom like veins and arteries, but it was not blood that pumped through them but instead that blue-white star essence from the peripheral chambers. The walls of this heart were clear like glass, the interior swirling with a bluish liquid that flowed like smoke.

  Inside that heart Ad
ria beat against the sides and screamed.

  “Sisters be merciful,” Devin said. “Get her out of there!”

  He ran across the soft ground, the others at his heels. Panic coursed through his veins. That blue smokelike liquid covered her head, and by all rights she should have drowned, yet Adria clearly was awake and drew breath. He was now close enough to hear her, and she shouted at him from inside.

  “Run!” she begged. “Run, now, while you can!”

  “Not a chance,” Devin shouted back. He circled the heart but he saw no door, no opening, nothing. Out, out, he had to get her out! He touched the glass, trying to decide whether it’d be safe to shatter it with Adria so close to it inside. His insides squirmed. Large parts of that heart might be steel, but there was no denying what his senses told him. Not glass, no, that he could understand. Instead it felt like flesh; this barrier was some sort of clear membrane sealing his sister inside. Devin struck it with his sword, but the sharp edge did nothing, not even scratch it.

  Slow, steady applause turned him from the heart to the green-and-black specter of Janus emerging from one of the other tunnels.

  “You’ve proven more resourceful than I anticipated,” Janus said, casting a disapproving glare at Tesmarie. “Though perhaps I should not give you humans credit when the aid of dragon-sired allowed what progress you made.”

  Devin positioned himself between Adria and Janus, finally able to put a face to the monster that had been attacking his fellow keepers of the church.

  “Release her and I’ll let you live to stand trial,” he said.

  “A trial? By a court of your fellow ignorant sacks of meat and blood?” Janus shook his head. “I shall not be judged by those who cannot begin to understand the importance of our actions. Put away your weapons and sing praises to the heavens, all of you. You shall witness humanity’s potential salvation. There is no reason to resist. Your sister is not in danger; quite the opposite. We shall make her as a goddess. Your people will revere her as you do your Sacred Mother, but unlike her, your sister’s name shall be remembered, and echo on throughout the coming centuries.”