Ecko Endgame (9 page)

But it wasn’t just his stealth-cloak he’d lost, his footwear and his flamethrower and Lugan’s fucking lighter – in agreeing to play nice, eat his greens and go to bed on time, he’d lost a fundamental necessity.

His freedom.

He was Ecko, fucksake, he was the ‘me’ in team. He was gonna do whatever the hell he wanted and no bastard was gonna stop him…

Not even his friends.

Chrissakes.

He held a hand to the fire as if he could hold out the thought and let it go, watch it rise like burning paper, and spark into nothing in the gathering dusk. Friends were a responsibility, something that had to be worried about and taken care of…

Freedom
, for chrissakes.

But what could he do? Ditch these fuckers, do a runner? He might make a day, two. But in this barren, almost-lifeless nothing, this wind, this cold… he’d get lost. Or starve. Or break his neck. Or catch fucking dysentery or something. Cities, he could do, but this crap?

The embers popped, laughing at him.

Somewhere under them there was a flicker of blue, of real heat, compelling. Heat like Maugrim’s Sical, heat like his own breath.

His freedom had gone, his independence was over. He’d surrendered them both when the others had pulled him off of Amal.

Family
, Triq had said.

The fire leaped and crackled.

Yeah, an’ y’know what?
His thoughts flared in symmetry.
If I’m gonna do this, I’m gonna fuckin’ own it. I’m gonna win every trophy and every fuckin’ side quest. You peel back my layers all you want, bitch, but when these Kiss Vahl Thingies rise in flames or whatever, I’m gonna kick their fuckin’ asses.

You just watch me!

After Amos, their first few days had been bright, sunshine-cold. The trade-roads had been violent and lawless, dirty. Yet the Bard had ridden through them and the people had fallen silent – he was a maverick, a knife-slinging outlaw, dressed in black and reeking of liquor and reputation. Ecko’d half expected Wanted posters to appear on walls, and for the reward to be higher every time he passed one.

Yeah, you don’t mess with Wild Bill Bigcock.

But no one had voiced a challenge. Roderick had shown no sign of emotion, no flicker or falter of doubt. His black horse was as lean and mean as he was – in his scarf and hoodie he looked like some comic-book manifestation of villainy, some doom-bringing monster from the world of anywhere-but-here…

Finally, they’d passed beyond the town’s ending, the buildings fading to dilapidation and garbage, and then failing altogether. Beyond, the plain was black and grey and windblown; the whole damn thing was like some fucking rural dystopia, a ruin that followed Vahl Whosit’s release.

Chris
sakes.

The heat from the fire’s embers was growing and Ecko leaned back, opening his soggy wool cloak to let the warmth reach his body.

Roderick passed him a waterskin. Without lowering the scarf, he said, “What do you see in the fire?” His voice was very soft, as if he didn’t want to
unleash
it.

“Corn,” Ecko replied.

The fire burned shelled corn, an easily portable fuel they carried with them – Ecko had been almost tempted to ask if it popped. The slices of meat spat and sizzled.

The Bard chuckled. “It’s called paow, but close enough.” He glanced sideways, then said suddenly, like the jab of a blade, “Are you ready for this?”

“For what? You quit bein’ Wild Bill to be Bozo the Clown?” Ecko took a swig from the waterskin, then spluttered something that tasted like cinnamon-flavoured meths. Gasping, he croaked, “What the fuck is that?”

“Heating,” Roderick told him. “Drink it.” His tone was all mirthless smirk. “You don’t seem to realise where we’ve finally found ourselves.”

“The ass-end of beyond?”

“Look around you,” Roderick told him. “We’re here.” He gestured at the fading light, at the trashed remains of the range patrol campsite. “Fighting the fucking Final War. Pits of fire and mountains of ash. Well, maybe not quite,” his grin was wicked, “but Nivrotar has given you what you wanted. You should be
happy.
”

Amethea watched them both, one face then the other, said nothing.

“Dancin’ a fuckin’ jig here.” Ecko took another swig from the waterskin. For a moment, he thought he’d made a ghastly mistake and was gonna empty his guts in the corn-burning fire – but the churning receded and the booze was shimmering-warm, uncoiling like a serenaded snake. “Where you goin’ with this?”

“You’ve been given a second chance, Ecko.” Roderick’s voice had a mocking edge, savage. “You almost failed, brought my whole world to ruin, despite—”

“Christ, don’t you fuckin’ start,” Ecko said. “You’re the one who sat around for a hundred years with your thumb up your ass. Oh, there’s a bad guy, but no one knows where. Oh there’s a prophecy, but no one remembers what.” Ecko raised the waterskin to take a third swig, lowered it again. “You clueless motherfucker, you don’t get to blame me for this—”

“
Everything
Nivrotar has planned depends upon this message, and Rhan’s reaction.” The Bard’s gaze fixed Ecko like a blade through the eye socket. “Rhan is an old friend, inhuman in his loyalty, and extraordinarily powerful – but often he sees no further than the end of his own nose.” The Bard gave a grim smile. “And he doesn’t lose well. Nivrotar’s gamble is less that the Kas will follow him, and more…” he paused to make this sink home “…more that he will agree to go.”

Amethea still watched them both, silent.

“So – what? You need my help?” Ecko grinned, mocking. “Truss him up an’ drag him.” He grinned. “Who’s your great shinin’ hero now?”

“I need to know,” Roderick said, “that you’re onside. That I can trust you.”

Across the fire, his gaze cut like an amethyst blade.

Caught, Ecko bared his teeth. He wanted to get up, fume, throw his toys out the pram – shout back that maybe Roderick was the one that couldn’t be trusted because, hell, he’d been to Mom and had his fucking soul ripped out – but this was the loss of his freedom tagged exactly, as precise as a pin in his fractal map.

That I can trust you.

As precise as a Save Point.

“So – we gonna get these often?” His grin was savage. “Love to know where they were at. Reload, get my cloak back, rewind, get Salva’s rifle. An’ hey, maybe if you fuck this up, we can jus’ do it over—”

“We get one chance at this,” Roderick said. “If Rhan refuses, we can’t force him. There won’t be enough left of us to make a greasy smear.”

“Yeah, right.” Ecko snorted. “Mom loaded us both. Like he can fuckin’ bring it.”

“You’re not listening to me. If we get this
wrong
,” Roderick said, “Nivrotar’s gamble will all be for nothing. The world will die with you still
in
it.”

The word “nothing” went across his shoulders like a skitter of claws; it raked his back and belly, left him staring at the fire.
The world will die with you still in it.
For a moment, he remembered the image he’d had of Eliza turning the program off, him still plugged in. That empty horror of endless nothing – like being on Doc Grey’s pacifier drugs, like being stuck gazing at the inside of his own head until the end of fucking time…

“
Kazyen.
”

It sent a shudder down his spine. For a split-second, the overlap of the two worlds chilled him to the absolute core – if Roderick had been in London, had the London he’d been in been real, Ecko’s London, or just another, deeper layer of code?

Reality within reality.

Mirrors facing mirrors, reflecting endless…

His stomach turned over again.

Calming and cool, Amethea said, “You really think the Kas are coming?”

The Bard glanced round. “Yes, I do.” Whatever else may have changed, his conviction was still absolute. “My body is altered, not my heart, or my calling. Not what I saw in the waters of the Ryll. And I can feel… the world, the Powerflux, more strongly than I’ve ever done. I—”

“She’s waking up, isn’t she?” Amethea’s question was pointed. Ecko glanced up at her, oculars flicking. “The world, I mean. Right from the beginning, from when Maugrim…” She coloured, looked at her fingernails. “He started something, that’s what I mean, he was like a… a catalyst. I think he’s the one that woke her. Maybe we should thank him.” Her voice caught, and she fell silent, frowning.

Roderick said, softly, “You woke her, Amethea. Maugrim had power and passion – elemental focus that brought the Powerflux from somnolence and legend – but the love and courage were yours. We should thank
you
.”

“We blew a hole in the world—”

“And with it The Wanderer and I found a world anew.” He glanced at Ecko. “That has saved us once already—”

“Yeah, keep rubbin’ my fuckin’ nose in it—”

“Saint and Goddess.” Amethea glared at Ecko, checked an irritated sigh and then turned back to the fire, her fragile confidence lost. Roderick watched her, his gaze glittering, calculating. She said stubbornly, not looking up, “This is the end, Ecko, the end of all things. And if you’d stop being so cursed snarky all the time, you might just feel it as well. Maybe you should talk less and listen more and then maybe you’d learn something.” The Bard’s gaze flickered, amused or surprised. He watched her for a moment longer, and then went back to the cooking meat.

And Ecko did feel something. Not the knee-jerk urge to hit back, though that was there as well – something else, something strange enough to pull him up short, yet something familiar. Like that flicker of recognition he’d known in The Wanderer, or the faintly satisfying snap of the right key in the right lock.

What the…?

It stopped him cold, made him stare at the fire as if the world – the program, whatever – had really lost it this time.

What the hell was that? A hint? Extra points, unlocking secret treasure, now?

Was
that
how he knew he was on the right track – that faint sensation of something fitting, something falling exactly where it should?

Was he winning this shit now?

Well whaddaya know. Fifty fucking experience points and I’ll take plus-two on my perception stat…

He shivered, the gusting wind cold, but the moment had passed – like his flash of the void, it was there and gone, too swift to be really understood.

Roderick reached for the stones at the fireside, checked the now-blackened creature. He lowered the scarf, flexing his chin as if his neck was stiff. Warmth pulsed and flared along the line of his throat, in his jaw and into his ears.

“Make no mistake. Nivrotar gambles all on this roll of the die… but I think,
feel
that her path is the right one. Rhan…” he paused, as if he could pull his fears from the firelight, “…I hope he comprehends.”

“He’d better,” Ecko muttered.

The Bard held out a strip of burned critter. “Will you eat, both of you, while I beg your indulgence? Perhaps it will help you understand what we walk into.”

Ecko took the meat, held the shred to the flame and let it crisp.

Flesh, burning.

“When you first came to The Wanderer,” Roderick told him, “I was going to tell you a tale – a saga pieced together from the thousand broken fragments of memory I’d spent my life unearthing. Here, we have a fire and the open evening. A better time for tales, don’t you think?”

Amethea said, “I want to hear the tale. I need to understand this.”

The Bard took a swallow from the waterskin, said, “I’ve spent all my life gathering information. This is what I know.”

And he began.

“Once within the time, when the great Tusien was still a seat of high learning, there lived a maiden of the Red Desert. Her hair shone as the dusk-lit sands and her eyes had the depth of the oasis. She had a swift mind and a ready laugh; she was loved well by her sire and those of his Banner.

“This is the first thread of many, the tapestry beginning. It’s the song of Tesrae-Mai, the Mother of Mayhem. Other threads tell that, charmed by a dream, she bore a son and she named him Vahl, meaning ‘might’. And Vahl grew to vast power, unifying the scattered Banners of the Desert into a single warrior force.

“Other threads tell how Vahl marched north into the Varchinde. He drowned the Soul of Light, and the very Powerflux trembled. It withdrew from mortal ken. He cursed the grass to die in the winter. He destroyed Tusien, seat of highest learning. He ripped the great city of Swathe stone from stone, and used its remains to build a citadel of his own, high upon Rammouthe Island, thus pronouncing it accursed.

“And there, he waited.

“In time, Swathe was forgotten, and the Archipelagan Saluvarith came to build a new city, naming her Fhaveon. Samiel, Godsfather, was pleased with the city and he sent Saluvarith a Promise, his manifest word that Fhaveon would never fall, no matter what assailed her.

“And her assailant came. Rising from Rammouthe, Kas Vahl Zaxaar rained war and death upon the First Lord Foundersson Tekissari, barely more than a boy. Steam and flame bathed all.

“But he was repelled.

“Samiel’s Promise rose in flesh and power, a creature of pale might and terrible warfare, and it upheld the word of the God. It wielded the Element of Light; it threw back the assault and it triumphed, white fire and glory. And with that victory, so came peace.

“And here our own tale begins. Guarded always by the Promise of Samiel, Fhaveon brought us prosperity, and peace… and stagnation. Terhnwood became our passion, and our purpose. The Elementalists, Priests of the People, were forgotten, charlatans and conjurers. The damaged Powerflux faded from memory and was revered no longer.”

He glanced at Amethea. “Until Maugrim found its centre. You, Amethea, were his catalyst and his focus and his lynchpin, and you destroyed him. And our peace is ended—”

“Hold!” The word was a bark, startling all of them.

Adrenaline hitting like a jackhammer, Ecko was on his feet and moving, back and out of the light.

Amethea had the time to look up, her mouth falling open.

As the Bard had woven his tales, so the sun had died upon the far Kartiah and the air had thickened with cold and shadow. Outside the warm ring of firelight stood a loose scatter of soldiers, their kit battered and scruffy. Eyes and teeth glinted, sharp and spiteful, though no weapons were drawn.