Surrender to the Will of the Night (16 page)

Bellicose’s friends formed the larger party. The other, called Arnhanders by their opponents, recognized the current state of affairs only grudgingly. And openly hoped for the end of Bellicose’s reign.

The Arnhander party did, in fact, consist almost entirely of outsiders who had come into the Connec during the crusader era.

Though officially only a lieutenant, Titus Consent had contrived himself a seat at Hecht’s left hand. Hecht supposed the rest of the staff had schemed to make that happen. Titus was in charge of intelligence. He would have a lot to report. Especially about those personalities of interest in attendance.

Consent whispered, “I’m still huffing and puffing from the rush to get here.” He had been in the field.

“Well, you made it.” Hecht noted several churchmen watching the exchange keenly. “Don’t take it personal, but you look like hell.” Consent did appear to have aged a decade in just a few months.

“Stress. These assholes want me to be you when you’re not around. No! Listen! We just got Rook cornered. Finally. In the Sadew Valley.”

“Isn’t that where he first turned up, back when?”

“Yes. The place must be important to him.”

Hecht flashed a sinister smile at one of the more notorious clerical agitators. The man wanted to be defiant, dared not. The Captain-General of Patriarchal forces did not, unlike the temporal powers,
have
to defer to the ecclesiastical courts. Which had led to occasional instances of harsh, summary justice.

“How soon will it be over?” With Rook stricken from the roll of revenants there would be no more demand for a Patriarchal presence in the Connec. Except for Shade. He had heard nothing positive about Shade. Yet.

“A while. It’s a loose cordon. They’ll tighten it slowly. They don’t want to get in a hurry and let him get away again.”

Hecht wanted to ask about problems in the force. But practical matters had to wait. He had powerful people to entertain, seduce, overawe.

8. Faraway East, the Oldest City: A Slender String

How old was Skutgularut? Only the Instrumentalities themselves might know. Old enough to have been there in the Time Before Time, if its people could be believed. Old enough to have been there before men learned to write. Across the ages Skutgularut, anchor of the northern silk road, had been attacked, besieged, even conquered countless times. Never totally, not even by Tsistimed the Golden. Skutgularut was a place of high honor, sacred, that even Tsistimed could reverence. It was a place where scholars gathered. Where sorcerers met to study and experiment. It was a city at whose heart lay a small but utterly reliable well of power. A well never known, in all history, to have waxed or waned. For which it was called the Faithful.

Once Skutgularut yielded to the seductions of the Hu’n-tai At, Tsistimed made it his western capital. With age he came to favor the city’s famous gardens. The city prospered, for it no longer experienced war. Bandits dared not trouble the great caravans traveling the silk road. Those who tried were hunted down, man, woman, and child.

The aged Tsistimed seldom left his beloved gardens. He gave warring over to his sons, grandson, and the sons of his grandson. But he could not resist the call of adventure when the Ghargarlicean Empire collapsed. He had to tour the famous cities that were now his own.

The grand warlord of the steppe did not look like a man over two hundred years old. Those who came to grovel before him saw a man in his prime. A man with many years still ahead.

Age had overtaken Tsistimed only on the inside.

He was just plain tired of it all.

***

The savages came out of nowhere. There was no more warning than a few rumors of strange things brewing to the north. Then the men and women with the bones and skulls in their hair were everywhere, killing and destroying. Amongst them walked a thing in near-human form, with too many fingers, no hair, and spotted skin. Later, some claimed it had eyes like a tiger. Others said it was ten feet tall. All agreed that it was terrible. Invincible. Immune to the bite of any lone piece of iron but not to the cumulative effect of ten thousand.

The thing eventually fell. Eventually perished. Eventually melted into a pool of puss inside the temple that housed the Faithful.

Survivors agreed that pollution of the well had not been the thing’s desire. It had hungered for a direct drink from the Faithful.

The savages turned more ferociously destructive after their tutelary went down. They left Tsistimed’s palace a smoldering waste. They wasted most of Skutgularut.

Only a handful lived to flee into the icelands to the north.

***

The Hu’n-tai At courier system was such that Tsistimed learned of the attack while the destruction of Skutgularut was still under way. He ended his progress through Ghargarlicea and turned north.

The eastern world huddled into itself. The Night trembled.

There was no fury like the fury of Tsistimed the Golden.

9. Realm of the Gods: The Ninth Unknown

Cloven Februaren now spent most of his time with the soultaken. The soultaken did not enjoy the isolation of Fea, though he understood its necessity. He was not accustomed to being confined.

The old man said, “I sympathize completely. I do. I get ferociously restless when I have to wait. Be patient just a while longer. We’ll move as soon as my other obligations are covered. So. Here. More maps. So we can narrow the search.”

“You don’t listen, old man. I’ve told you, I know where it is. I’ve been there. I spent a long time there, trying to shut it down.” But that the ascendant would not discuss except in the vaguest possible way. That must have been a time of great stress. Or there were secrets the ascendant did not wish to reveal.

The Ninth Unknown was inclined to suspect the latter.

“You know where it was a few years ago. The world has changed. What did the non-divines do after your vengeance raid? Did they leave? Did they close the way behind you?”

The Svavar of old peeped out occasionally. Notably when the soultaken thought the Ninth Unknown was deliberately inventing obstacles to getting on with what needed doing.

Februaren’s concern was genuine. He wanted to invest the least possible time accomplishing this mythic jailbreak.

***

“There’s nothing more I can learn from here,” Februaren told the soultaken. Failing to mention that he had visited the north on his own and had failed to find a trace of the higher realm — though he had found where the entrance had been before. A powerful resonance remained.

The god realm was still there, over on the other side.

“It’s finally time to go?”

“It’s time.”

“Let’s do it, then.”

Asgrimmur Grimmsson began to change.

Februaren barked, “Wait! There isn’t room in here.”

The soultaken had swollen, shredding his human apparel. The buds of numerous legs had begun to show.

He reversed the change. “Good thinking.” He swarmed downstairs, through the door, down the ladder, to the ground. When the old man caught up he was well on toward resuming his former monster shape. And looking notably healthy — though his hand remained unrestored.

Odd that a demigod would not be able to replace a lost appendage.

Februaren sighed repeatedly. Would the ascendant remain rational and amenable after the change? No way to know. Asgrimmur Grimmsson was unique in modern times.

The people of Fea did not stay around to watch the change.

Soon the only humanity remaining was the monster’s head. Which migrated down to its belly. A ghost of a face using a voice barely audible told Februaren, “Climb onto my back.”

Februaren gathered his belongings. The climb was difficult. Terribly frightening. Yet compliance left him with arrows in his quiver.

He had the Construct, always.

The soultaken did not yet know much about his ally’s capabilities. Said ally meant to keep every secret he could. The enemy of my enemy today could well move to the head of the enemies list tomorrow.

The monster’s shoulders were broader than those of a horse, and less soft or warm. Nor were there ready handholds. Just some bristles almost as fierce as porcupine quills.

The monster surged up. It began to move. It gathered speed fast. Countryside streaked by. Februaren gasped for breath, shook in fright — and enjoyed every instant. He was not one of those old men who disdained novelty.

He settled into the rhythm.

The monster stuck to wild country. That meant traveling rougher terrain. The journey took longer than it could have. Yet Februaren was astonished to see the sunset-stained peaks of the Jagos in just a few hours.

Once darkness fell the monster took to the roads to make better speed. Darkness did not hamper it.

Februaren worried about what the darkness might conceal. Worry was wasted. The ascendant created its own bubble of immunity or invisibility.

Dawn found them well into the Empire, racing past amazed peasants. Instrumentalities seldom materialized these days. Though travelers’ tales from the north promised excitement to come.

The feel of the world began to change. Each league onward seemed more charged with reality, with a growing electricity. Had it been like this in the dawn times, when magic was everywhere? The old man worried. Why had he not felt this when he came north by way of the Construct? Was it something you had to come to gradually, giving it time to grow around and through you? Was it the hope of this that drove er-Rashal al-Dhulquarnen’s cabal?

No. They could not know about this without having experienced it. They wanted immortality. They wanted to become Instrumentalities in their own right.

In a world charged like this everyone would be a demigod.

Reality took a fat bite out of fantasy.

The wells of power were dying. This might be an island of magic in a desert of power, nothing more. One that had not existed long. It was not yet overrun by ravenous things of the Night.

The Ninth Unknown felt those moving all around, headed the same direction. A reservoir of power must have burst, emptying in hours instead of ages. It had happened before, a sort of volcanic burst. The last in the west had taken place almost two thousand years ago, in the eastern reaches of the Mother Sea.

Did the monster understand human speech? Februaren shouted, “We have to hurry! This will draw Instrumentalities from everywhere.” Including Kharoulke the Windwalker, who would take most of the power. Unless the source was too far beyond the edge of the ice.

The ascendant sucked it in as he ran. Februaren felt it growing stronger beneath him.

They were crossing the fields of Friesland, where snow was melting in the shade only because of the advent of the power, the epicenter of which lay somewhere to the west. Which meant somewhere out in the Andorayan Sea. In unfrozen water. The Windwalker of antiquity could not cross open water except to step over it, hop from island to island, or walk a bridge. Could that still be true?

No matter, really. Kharoulke could come to the edge of the Andorayan ice and suck up power from there. But without being able to hog the trough.

The monster reached the shore. It stopped, sank down so the old man could dismount. Then it shrank, folded in on itself, flowed, becoming a huge, naked man with an immense complement of red hair. “I can go no farther in that form.” He pointed westward. “That’s already fading. There’ll be nothing left in a week.” He shook like a huge dog. “It feels good!”

Februaren thought any Instrumentality would say the same. “I hope Kharoulke is so far off he can’t take advantage. What next?”

“The way has to be out there. I’ll become something that swims.”

“I was afraid you’d say that.” Knowing that he had done it before.

“A little water never hurt anyone, old man.”

“Good point. Unfortunately, that’s not a little. That water goes on for a thousand miles.”

“No. The southern tip of Orfland is just a few miles out. It’s low and swampy. We’ll have to swing around it to reach the true open sea.” The man who had been Asgrimmur Grimmsson walked into the surf. “The way is out there. You’ll have to take your chances.” He began to melt. And expand. He turned into a whale of modest size, twenty-three feet from fluke to snoot. Februaren walked into the water up to his waist. He got soaked by the little breakers rolling in.

Slimy skin. He could not mount up. The Instrumentality took pity and grew handholds. Once he was astride its shoulders a sort of saddle formed beneath him.

“Excellent. Just don’t sound.”

***

The whale swam circles where the gateway ought to be. It could sense the Realm of the Gods. Somewhere.

The Ninth Unknown felt it out there, too. But the way was closed.

The whale grew a grotesque caricature of a blind-eyed face in front of its blowhole. The mouth produced spectral sounds. “This is the place. But the Aelen Kofer have blocked the way.”

Who could blame the dwarves? Nothing good came from outside. And the affliction of tyrannical gods had been resolved inside.

“How fine have your descriptions been? Did you exaggerate anything to make the Realm of the Gods sound more glorious, more dangerous, or more exciting?”

The whale did not respond for so long that Februaren began to fear that it might refuse.

But, then, “The bridge. The rainbow bridge. It broke. I did not report that.” After an exchange prolonged by the whale’s slow replies, Cloven Februaren concluded that Asgrimmur Grimmsson had been at pains to accurately describe the private universe of his boyhood gods. And began to suspect that ascension had changed the man’s brain in ways not immediately obvious. Those might be characteristic of many other Instrumentalities.

Dealing with the ascendant reminded Februaren of the difficulties of raising a mildly autistic child. Which he had done, in the long ago. A son, Muno’s uncle Auchion. Love, training, and sorcery had allowed Auchion to live a normal, if truncated, adult life.

“Wouldn’t that be some shit?” the old man asked the salty air. “If the gods were autistic?”