Nightlord: Sunset (113 page)

Bad sign.  I grabbed Firebrand—I heard it mutter something; I think it was “ouch”—and hurried to the block Shada was on.  She was laid out on the slab, obviously for sacrifice.  She seemed uninjured.  She hadn’t been tied down, not even tied up.  I tried to rouse her, but couldn’t get her attention; her eyes were unfocused, glassy.  I put one hand on her arm, preparatory to lifting her, slinging her over my shoulder, and running like hell.

I froze at the sound of a voice.

“Well done,” Tobias said, behind me.  His voice sounded… different.  More sibilant and richer, if that makes any sense.  The sound of it was still recognizably his voice, but
different
.  Different in a way I’d only heard from Tamara’s throat.  I felt a cold sensation at the idea that Someone might be using Tobias’ dead body for His own purposes…

I let go of Shada and slowly turned around.  He was standing right behind me, holding the hilt of the knife.  The blade was missing.  He dropped it and it shattered at his feet.  His missing hand was back, after a fashion; the member that grew from the charred stump of his arm was bloody, almost flayed.  Bone projected through the pulsing, red flesh.  It was slick and stiff, awkward—but visibly improving.

“Well done?” I echoed.  My right arm was almost in shape; a moment or three longer and I’d see if his resistance to injury extended to bisection.  With luck, not even the Father of Darkness could hold him together.  Without it, I was purely and completely screwed.

Along with the planet.  Plate.  World, anyway.

“Well done indeed, cousin.  Thank you for bringing me in.”

That’s when I saw the eyes.  The Eyes.  I remembered them from a dream.  I looked over my shoulder and saw the Thing that had been mimicking Tobias—or, perhaps, using him as a puppet?—was no longer there.

It was here.  Standing in front of me, barely an arm’s length away, in Tobias’ flesh.

“I don’t understand,” I said, watching it carefully, trying to judge its balance—and avoid those Eyes.

“The dagger was the key,” it replied, smiling with Tobias’ mouth.  “When you took his life with the dagger, you gave that life to me.  Now I am the Devourer cloaked in flesh!  I need fear no light.  Darkness will devour the world.”

Megalomaniacs worry me.  Powerful ones make me downright nervous.  Megalomaniac demons I’ve accidentally helped to take on physical form are the worst of all.

“I thought you were the Father of Darkness,” I confessed.

He/It laughed.  “No, no.  He is more powerful than you think, little cousin; He is the emptiness at the end of all things.  If He were to move against you, even the demigods that came to your defense would be snuffed.”

My arm was almost healed.  I kept him talking.

“What about the Mother of Flame?  She stood him off before.”

The laughter was shocking.  It was a laugh of profound amusement.  It was the laugh of something not even vaguely human.  It sent chills up my spine.

“That was not the Father you saw, hovering there in the void!” It said.  “That was I!  I, who broke the lying goddess’
church of Fire.  I, who led men to invent a god of light!  I, who drank deep of their faith and grew strong!  Now I live within the world while she gnashes teeth and watches.  Her use for you is done, and she drops her tools when there is no further use for them.  Now join with me, little cousin, for I will have you at my right hand and make you lord over the kings of the world!”

Demons lie a lot.  That’s a comfort, of a sort.  But I think the smarter ones also like to gloat.  If what he said was true, then the Mother of Fire wasn’t a duality with the Father of Darkness.  Instead, She was a demigod, a lesser god—an equal to this Thing in Tobias’ flesh.

I’d have prayed it wasn’t so, but to whom?  Nothing seemed to be going right, tonight.  Well, maybe I could change that…

“Why should I?” I asked.  “Why should I help you in any way?”

“Fool!” It snapped.  “Who do you think drove this feeble cleric to madness?  Who twisted his words?  Who found you a dozen times, yet said nothing?  Who put fear in his heart of your world’s weapons, and so kept them from this place?  Who watched over you like a father over a son, guarding and protecting you?  You have a debt to me!”

I thought about that for a bit.  That would fit.  It would make so much sense… but as for his motivation…

“I don’t think so,” I answered, shifting my grip on Firebrand.  My arm was feeling fine and I was about as ready as I could be.  “I think you owe
me.
  You used me as a scapegoat and a target to drive Tobias crazy and to keep yourself here—you
used
me to get into this world!”

I brought Firebrand up in a vertical slash, meaning to hit him in the crotch and carry on up to the brainpan.  Instead, I found myself hit almost before I even started—hit and
pushed
.  He/It had been expecting something, I guess.  Both of Tobias’ hands shot out, connecting with my chest, and sent me hurtling up and backward over the altar, over Shada…

…and over the edge.

The only thing I could think was
This is so gonna suck when I hit that mess of Things.
  What I actually said was more along the lines of, “Oh, sssshhhhhhhiiiiiiii—”

I passed the edge.  A few billion claws reached hungrily for me.

I landed in a cloud of blackness.  One second, claws and teeth and talons as far as the eye could see—the next, complete darkness.  It was like floating in ink.  All around, I could hear whimpering and whining and not a little slavering and yowling, but I didn’t feel a thing.

You should not be insid
e
,
said a voice.  I didn’t recognize it.  I was about to make an angry remark—I was terrified out of my mind; if I stopped to consider how frightened I was, I wouldn’t have time to be angry—but someone else answered first.

“Why not?” Tobias/Devourer answered.  “Because
You
will not be?  I found a way! 
I
did!”

If I had desired incarnation, I would have done so long ago.

“I desired it.  I have it!  Nothing will keep me from devouring the world!”

I felt movement.  The blow that knocked me out of the world had cracked ribs; they hurt a bit, but were mending rapidly.  My arm was as good as new, too.  Wherever I was going, I decided not to fight it.  I wasn’t being harmed and it was a lot better than being eaten alive by Things in the outer darkness of the world.  Still, I was worried.  What sort of entity could have rescued me?

I was afraid I knew the answer.  Something in my blood knew the answer, that’s certain.

I was in the clutches of the Father of Darkness.

“Firebrand?” I whispered.

Aaaaagh,
came the faint reply.

“Are you going to live?”

A few… weeks in a… furnace… would be… good.

“Gotcha.”

The voice of the cloud continued while I conferred with Firebrand.

Little demon, you cannot devour the world.  Or, rather, you are capable of it, but cannot be allowed to do so.

“You would prevent it?” I could almost hear the look of stunned surprise.  “WHY?”

If you devour the world, it will simply be made anew—and the barriers about that one will be even harder to breach.  No.  The game must be played on the board we have.

“Game?  You speak of games?  The purpose of games is to
win!
”

Not so, little demon.  The purpose of games is to
play
.

A snort of derision.  “Play, then, while You can.  Coddle Your pawn and keep it from my brethren if You will.  Prize it and pamper it, or rend it at Your leisure.  I shall take the world and consume it, bite by slow bite, and enjoy it to the crumbs.”

The voice of the cloud laughed.  It boomed like thunder until I thought I would go deaf.  I tensed, trying to see through the all-encompassing murk.  The sense of movement ceased.

Foo
l
,It said, coldly amused.
 
You are no longer a player in the game—players cannot stand upon the board.  You have made yourself a piece.  A powerful piece, to be sure, but a piece nonetheless.  Pieces do not dictate terms to the players.

“If I am a piece, then why not use me?  Work with me!  Help me!”

Because you are a poor piece
,
the voice answered,
and that I will not tolerate.

Uncertainty.  “What… what do You mean?”

Lights.  I could see again!  And stone!  I was no longer beyond the edge; instead, I was falling face-first to the floor, a dozen yards from Tobias, right on top of—

Knight takes bishop
,
said the darkness.  Tobias’ body, fifty feet away, turned at the sound of my thud.  I lay face-down for a moment, scrambling to shift Firebrand to my left hand…

“Ha!” sneered the Thing in Tobias’ body.  It marched across the stone floor, saying, “Give it back, will You?  Then there shall be a double sacrifice to breach the barrier.  I shall have that many more demons at my command.  The conquest of the world shall be all the swifter!”

A heavy boot cracked down on my left forearm, breaking it.  I didn’t think my arm could be broken by anything short of a thirty-pound sledge.  I let out a muffled grunt of pain.  Firebrand came loose from my grip.  I started to get up, my right arm still folded under me, when I felt a hand close on the nape of my neck.  Another closed on the back of my belt.  I was lifted, as easily and effortlessly as a grown man lifts a baby.  With me suspended overhead like a prize lamb, Tobias’ body marched toward the altar.

My right hand held the fork.

I stabbed down as far as I could, aiming for the middle of his back; I’m either a good shot, or I finally got lucky—it centered on his spine, one tine to either side.  He cried out, a wordless roar of agony, and convulsed, sending me flying.  I crashed against the altar while he twisted and arched.  The magic of the weapon drew out his essence and fed it back to him again.  He shivered and twitched as though he were holding a live wire in his teeth.  He thrashed, reaching for the fork, but it was almost exactly in the center of his back—impossible for a human body to reach and grasp.

It took me a second to clear my head; the impact against the altar had rattled my skull, probably cracked it.  When I realized the Thing in Tobias was distracted, I scrambled widely around him and snatched up Firebrand.  I swayed a little as I stood up, but the disorientation of the head-blow was rapidly fading.  I already had a plan.

Enchantments are usually pretty efficient, but they take up some power on their own to maintain themselves.  If that amulet and fork kept going, the Thing would lose power steadily.  If I could keep it busy while that happened, eventually I could wear it down.  And if it stayed distracted for just a few more seconds, immediate and radical neck surgery looked like a really good distraction.

But no.  When I turned, Tobias’ form was changing.  His skin was darkening and turning more glossy-smooth.  Those Eyes were growing larger and began to glow with an inner, hungry light.  The head lengthened, became more predatory; the magical fork looked like the beginning—or the remains—of some strange crest.  Most importantly for him/it, the arms were lengthening.  The physical form of Tobias was taking on the shape of the Devourer incarnate.

A shot thundered through the air.  I looked wildly around.  Another shot sounded and I spotted the flare of the muzzle.  Keria was at the opening of the tunnel.  To either side of her, I saw several men—most of them were magicians, but Linnaeus was also present—coming through the opening.  To my surprise, one of them was Ander.

I’ll be damned,
thought I. 
The cavalry doesn’t always show up late!

Keria had my pistol in her hands and was sighting down the length of her arms.  She fired again and again, whenever she came to bear on her target.  I’ve wondered where that pistol went, but never found time to seek it.  She was missing consistently—I doubt she’d ever fired a gun before, and the range was pretty extreme—but the Devourer didn’t know much about guns either; it didn’t try to take cover.

The Devourer looked at her for the space of two shots, then turned its attention to me.

“A pet of yours, perhaps?” it asked.  “I shall crack her bones and savor the—” it broke off, because one of Keria’s shots finally found its mark.  The top quarter of the Devourer’s skull lifted off.  At nearly a quarter-mile range—with a pistol!—that was either incredible luck or someone getting clever with a spell.  My money was on the spell; nobody can get that lucky.

The Thing staggered back, twitching.  I can only think that having physical flesh gave it some physical limitations.  No matter how mystical you are, if you need a body, you need a brain.  When it goes, so does some control.  It flailed around, trying to keep its balance, moving erratically and with difficulty until it crashed backward into the altar.  That just drove the fork even deeper into its body and probably severely damaged its spine; it didn’t even try to rise.  It paused for a moment to reorient itself and possibly get some measure of coordination back.  I lifted Firebrand and started to approach as it reached back with one taloned hand to pull out the fork.