Darksiders: The Abomination Vault (36 page)

One more snort, and then slowly, reluctantly, Ruin stepped aside.

The Horseman knelt beside his fallen brother. He scarcely needed even to look at the ragged hole in War’s chest; he recognized the scent, the
feel
, of Black Mercy’s wounds. But maybe … The Abominations had never been intended for use against the Nephilim themselves, and the four Horsemen were far more, now, than they had been, so maybe …

He held a hand over the body, seeking something,
anything
.

Nothing. No trace of life remained in the sprawling figure. War, youngest of the Four Horsemen, was dead.

Death rocked back on his heels, numb in body and soul, save for a caustic squirming beginning to build in his viscera. Call back his brother’s soul? To what end? Not even his greatest necromancies could restore true life to the departed. He could summon War’s spirit, grant his body temporary animation long enough to talk, but nothing more. Apologize, perhaps? What good might it do now? It seemed unnecessarily cruel—to both of them.

Again he reached out, this time futilely working to brush some of the gathered soot from his brother’s body. He succeeded only in smearing the stuff in filthy swirls across the
cloak and pitted armor. With a gentle exhalation that might, coming from anyone else, have been a sigh, Death cradled the corpse in both arms and lifted it from the dirt. Even if he could do nothing else, he certainly wasn’t going to leave his brother here to—

The dull black of Chaoseater, not
entirely
buried by the dirt, shone as a dark spot against the gray of the earth.

Chaoseater. The blade that not only feasted on the carnage and havoc of battle, but fed that power directly to War himself. The sword that was, however marginally, bonded to its wielder’s soul.

Death dropped his brother in an undignified heap and reached for the sword, focusing with every sense in his possession …

Yes!

It was almost nothing, the faintest ember of War’s essence. Little more than a trace, it remained, slowly fading away, in the spiritual conduit between Horseman and blade—much as a narrow trickle of water might linger in the pipe between two interconnected basins that were otherwise dry.

No, Death could not restore life to the dead, but if a spark of life were to flare from somewhere
else
 …

He knelt over the body, placing Chaoseater in War’s fist and carefully closing the fingers around it. A chanted invocation, difficult and peculiar, followed by a long silence. Death felt an odd pull from a direction he could not name, unlike any of the spirits he’d ever summoned before. It felt … not as if the soul was fighting him, precisely. More that this, one of the strongest souls he’d ever felt, was simply uninterested in allowing any outside influence to alter its course.

“I have never yet encountered a spirit strong enough to refuse my call,” Death hissed between chants. “I am damn well not going to let
you
be the first, brother!”

He redoubled his efforts, and then again. Two of Death’s fingernails cracked, so tight was his fist; a trickle of black, glistening oil, the residue of his necromancies condensed and made manifest, bubbled up from behind his ivory mask.

The body twitched. Once only, so slightly that Death almost missed it, but it happened.

He had War’s soul. He had the last fading ember of War’s life. The first he could infuse into the body without difficulty, but the second? How to coax that last flare of power from the conduit linking his brother with …?

Ah.

Ensuring that War’s hand remained tightly wrapped about the hilt, Death leaned over, lifted Chaoseater by the blade, and rammed it deep into his own chest.

Agony bloomed through him, a flowering vine of poison and thorns. He grunted once but otherwise held himself still, refusing to let the pain overwhelm him.

Which, given how much worse Affliction had hurt him back in the White City, wasn’t actually all that hard.

Chaoseater fed on the injury, the violence, albeit self-inflicted. Fed, and passed that strength on to its wielder, carrying the lingering embers of life along with it.

War’s body rocked in a violent spasm. A worm-like plug of old clots wiggled obscenely from the open wound, followed by a brief spurt of fresh blood and jagged fragments of what might have been Black Mercy’s projectile. He groaned, a deep and juddering sound, attempted to sit up, and collapsed back onto the dirt.

“Steady,” Death said, sliding off Chaoseater and sitting next to his brother. “You were close enough to have studied your reflection in the Well of Souls. Go easy.”

Again War struggled to sit up. This time, he managed it, though he appeared as though he’d keel over at any moment.
“Perhaps …” It came out as a feeble croak. He coughed once, spat a gobbet of clotted blood and dirt, and tried again. “Perhaps you should have left me dead.”

Sorrow and despondency were not emotions to which any of the Horsemen were particularly susceptible, yet Death couldn’t possibly fail to note that his brother seemed as miserable as he’d ever appeared—and not, Death was certain, from the pain of his wounds.

“Why would you—?”

War actually snarled. “Don’t patronize me, brother! I failed. I failed you, the Council, everyone. Death was the least I deserve.”

Protestations rose in Death’s throat, clung to the base of his tongue, and froze into an unbreakable chunk of ice.

“They have the Ravaiim blood now,” the younger continued morosely, “because I wasn’t strong enough to keep them from taking it.”

“War …”
Tell him
. “This is not your fault.”
He deserves the truth
. “The plan—”
Tell him!
“—didn’t go as we discussed. Against Hadrimon and Black Mercy, what more could you have done?”

Coward
.

“Excuses don’t change—”

“And Hadrimon
doesn’t
have the Ravaiim blood.”

For the first time, War looked up. “What?”

“I …”
The truth, now
. “… was able to get hold of the cylinder before Hadrimon could escape with it. It’s gone. Permanently.”

“I don’t understand.
How
…?”

“Later. For now, we have to move. Do you need any assistance mounting Ruin?”

War snarled again, though with less apparent anger. Using Chaoseater as a crutch, he struggled up and shuffled toward
the horse. Death watched until he was certain his brother had the strength to climb into the saddle.

Ruin stared back at him the entire time, and though Death knew he must be imagining it, the beast’s expression seemed accusing.

So, too, did the crooked glance that Dust directed his way as he hauled himself, favoring the fresh wound in his chest, atop Despair.

“I don’t know.” Death spoke in a whisper; perhaps to Dust, perhaps to himself, perhaps to a Creator in which the Horseman only partly believed. “I don’t know why not. But I can’t.”

The guilt when he’d betrayed War, potentially to his death, had gnawed at him. This was almost worse; he had never, in all his eons, felt so craven. In the face of danger, of battles that drowned entire worlds in blood, the eldest Horseman had never known the touch of fear. Now, for the first time, it had seized him in a grip he could not break.

“He doesn’t need to know,” he said finally, glancing back to ensure War and Ruin had not fallen behind. “I know. I do not forget.

“And though it take until the Apocalypse itself, I will find a way to make it up to him.”

It didn’t feel like enough, not remotely, but for now it would have to do.

Still, at least he’d succeeded. The Charred Council doubtless had nothing pleasant in mind for him; he wasn’t certain who had sent the demons after them, though a suspicion had begun to churn in the recesses of his mind; Hadrimon and Belisatra would have to be dealt with, and Black Mercy and Earth Reaver might yet remain active for a short time.

But if nothing else, he could rest assured that the greater threat posed by the Abomination Vault was finally over.

W
HAT DO YOU MEAN
,” D
EATH GROWLED
,
“I
T’S NOT
over
?”

“Precisely what it sounds like, Horseman.” Despite the import of his announcement, Panoptos sounded delighted, almost giggly, as he hovered in the baking air at the edge of the Council’s domain.

Death and War traded suspicious glares, uncertain what the aggravating creature was up to. They’d taken it casually, the long ride from the plains of the Ravaiim homeworld to the nearest spot where they could step between realms. Casually enough that what should have required only the better part of a day had actually required three. The respite had done wonders for the both of them—as had their little side trip afterward, to hunt down a flock of minor demonic entities on the borders of Hell, during which they fed gleefully on the death and the chaos of battle.

Still …

“Panoptos,” War said, “we’re tired, and neither of us is in the mood for games. We already know that we’re late in reporting to the Council. Your jibes are unnecessary and unwanted.”

“Ah, you two.” The messenger began shifting side to side, as though standing atop a rocking ship. “Always so certain of yourselves. Listen very carefully to what I’m saying. Pretend I have lips, and watch them.

“I did not say,
The Council expects your report
. I did not say,
They’re angry enough to spit fire
. Though they are,” he added with a sidelong glance at the elder Horseman.

“The Council
always
spits fire,” Death retorted.

“Fair point. But
my
point, Death, is that it’s
really
not over. Your act of disobedience, your little tantrum? It doesn’t seem to have worked.”

Death jolted upright in the saddle with enough force to send Despair staggering back a few steps. “That’s not possible!”

“I suggest,” Panoptos said, his tone so smug it was clearly slumming just being there, “that you get moving. The Council’s not known for patience at the
best
of times.”

Ruin and Despair both launched into a steady gallop, leaving the winged creature struggling to catch up.

They reached the steps, dropped from their saddles in unison, and raced upward, brushing past several Watchers in the process. They found themselves once more standing before the burbling pool of magma, the faint stream that trickled from its borders, and the trio of blazing stone effigies that supposedly represented Creation’s last hope for Balance.

“Death!”
It was, initially, the leftmost idol that spoke.
“We are
not
well pleased! Observe.”

Lava erupted from the pool, raining down in a thin sheet of drops and particles, almost but not quite a mist. As the geyser roared, streaks of color began wending through the torrent, as though some pocket of gems and minerals had abruptly dissolved in the boiling flow.

When those dribbles of color reached the apex of the spout
and started to fall as part of the lighter mist, they also spread, reshaping themselves—streams into blots, blots into recognizable images. Another moment, and an entire vista spread before them, crisp and clear save for a bit of liquid wobbling around the edges.

What the Horsemen saw was less a battlefield than a killing field; a charnel ruin of heaped corpses and shattered structures. The tattered wings, mangled armor, and singed white hair of the dead was more than sufficient indicator as to who they’d once been. The cracked marble, shattered glass, and hollow, smoking spires was equally strong indication as to
where
this might have happened.

“You are looking at Silverwall.” The voice came from behind; clearly, Panoptos had caught up with them at some point. “Or rather, what used to be Silverwall. You know it?”

“An outpost on the very borders of Heaven,” War said. “Of relatively little importance since they’ve begun building their new one, though it remains the best vantage point for a few of the minor rifts between Above and Below.”

“But this,” said Death, “was no demonic offensive.”

“No.”

At that simple utterance by all three of the Charred Council, as if awaiting precisely that cue, figures appeared at the edges of the vista: four or five angels, as well as the pale-and-purple dervish that was his sister, Fury. A pocket of Belisatra’s brass myrmidons retreated before them, steadily shredded to bits by halberds and Fury’s devastating whips.

War’s cloak folded and rippled as he shook his head, in puzzlement rather than denial. “There’s no sense to this. They should have needed longer to regroup, to recover from their loss of the Ravaiim blood, before they could once again pose any real threat. We should have had time to hunt them down.”

Death had taken a step nearer the wavering image, oblivious
to the occasional splatter of magma sizzling across his skin. “Those toy soldiers didn’t slaughter so many angels, certainly not in their own bastion.” He faced the Council, waiting for an answer to the question he had not asked.

“Yes. Black Mercy.”

“Fury confirmed it the moment she arrived,” Panoptos added from above. “Angels slain by the dozens, showing signs of only the most minor injuries.”

“Any sign of Earth Reaver?” War asked.

“None.”
This from the central column.
“This was a surprise assault. Perhaps the larger Abomination proved too ponderous for their needs.”

“I don’t understand.” Death continued watching the flickering images, apparently hoping to alter their meaning by sheer force of disbelief. “This shouldn’t be possible.”

“You
did
say,” Panoptos offered, “that they might have access to other, smaller sources of the blood. Perhaps one of those …?”

“No,” from both Horsemen at once. War alone continued, “Silverwall holds no strategic value for anyone except a few small communities in Hell. Destroying it—especially openly, without hiding their responsibility—accomplishes nothing for Belisatra or Hadrimon. If they
are
relying on a limited source of Ravaiim blood to awaken the Grand Abominations, an attack like this is a foolish, even asinine waste of resources.