The Catherine Kimbridge Chronicles #1, Inception (34 page)

They became known as The Dark Lords and they hated Love. For they compared themselves to Love and found themselves lacking. They were not as strong nor as powerful as Love. And they could never be.

They hated that knowledge.

So they turned to His mirror. The thing that birthed them. The thing they could master. But they could not master it if it were whole. And so they whispered in creation’s many hearts. They planted doubts. And with each doubt, corruption began to spread. Tiny cracks appeared in the parts that had turned from Love. Eventually there were so many who had fallen away that it took but the lightest, gleeful, touch of the Dark Ones to shatter the mirror.

And thus the world was sundered.

But Love, the Author of Creation, had a plan.

Prologue – The Dark Path   (After Fall, AF1504)

S
ome doors are best left locked…
-
A Seventh Kingdoms Proverb

“Do it. Do it now!”

T’nere drove the blade home. Blood surged from the wound. The bound man struggled for an instant.  Blood stained the once pristine King’s Guard commander uniform.  T’nere watched the man’s eyes bulge, whether from the pain or disbelief, he couldn’t say. Perhaps, it was safe to say both.  Betrayal was definitely one of the last and T’nere felt a brief, no he wouldn’t allow it. He had to focus on the prize. The smell would help him with that. The humid, salty tang of a human blood letting filled the small chapel. For T’nere, the feeling of destiny was exhilarating.

A shrouded woman stepped forward, out of the shadows. “Well done, child. You have taken your first step.  You are ready to be marked for the beast.” Her cold voice was approving.

“Thank you, mistress.”  T’nere murmured glancing down before meeting her gaze again.

Her eyes were hard and penetrating–like knives that cut through to the heart.  “Now that we have begun, I will not brook disappointment.”

“I won’t disappoint you.” He gulped.

“I know you won’t,” she answered in a cold voice with an air of absolute confidence.

T’nere shuddered. Her voice held all the warning it needed to. The price of failure was too horrible to contemplate. He could not, he would not, fail her.

“Take his heart and let us leave this foul place.”

T’nere complied, working quickly and efficiently. Never once did he allow his eyes to wander to the now dead face of his older brother. Regret was an emotion for lesser men. He would not allow himself to become a pawn to it—not now that his reward for years of patience and toil was at hand. Hadn’t he already been given the satisfying knowledge that his brother would no longer scorn him?

He watched as the woman moved her hand to the shawl veiling her face and he realized what she was about to do. In all the many months they had been meeting, she had never once allowed him to see her face. Theirs was a covert relationship necessitated by the nature of the dark calling to which she invited him. Now that he had committed his soul to her lord there was no longer any need for secrecy.

She removed the cloth from about her face. Luscious volumes of dark hair framed a startling visage. She was beautiful— except for a scar that marred her left cheek. He found the imperfection strangely alluring. She smiled coyly and he realized this was the second of many rewards to follow. Her face was strangely familiar but he could not place why. He put the thought aside for another time. He was surprised by her age. He had assumed she was much older. He could see now that he had been wrong. T’nere guessed but doubted that she was even eight years his elder.

She saw his surprise and smiled deeper. Guessing his thoughts, she said, “I’m much older than I look.”

“Is that one of the gifts the Dark Lord grants us?”

“It can be.” She handed him the shawl. “Wrap it in this.”

“What?  It? Oh, yes,” he stammered. His brother’s heart was still warm in his hands. He felt awkward as he wrapped it in the black silk. The blood on his hands was sticky. He looked around and saw the baptismal font. Perfect, he thought as he washed his hands in the basin. The water ran pink with his brother’s blood.

The two made their way out of the now desecrated chapel. It was late enough in the night that they ran little risk of seeing anyone in the corridors of the castle. Still, the woman set a grueling pace that was little short of a run.

“Where are we going?” T’nere asked breathlessly as he struggled to keep up.

“To meet friends” she answered. “Tonight is a night of grand destinies. For you, the road is but barely begun; for others, tonight is the culmination of many years of work.”

They were rushing down a stairwell he would have sworn wasn’t there a day ago. She had waved a hand and he felt the tell-tale pressure of magic at the base of his skull.  A section of wall turned in on itself… revealing the staircase down.

T’nere didn’t recognize the corridors they traveled. The shortcut had taken them past the familiar walls of the castle proper. These walls were dank and moldy. The oil lanterns used by the castle housekeeping staff had been replaced by sputtering rag torches. Even these were few and far between. Soon enough they turned a corner and faced a dead end in the tunnel.

T’nere smirked sarcastically and shook his head.  “We must have taken a wrong turn.”

“So little faith for one so young,” the woman chuckled. She waved a hand and T’nere again felt the familiar press at the base of his skull that indicated magic was being used nearby. The wall shimmered and was replaced by an open door—open to a brightly lit room scarcely larger than the small chapel they had fled moments before. T’nere wondered how many fake walls there were in the castle.

The room held a black granite table but it was not this that drew T’nere’s attention. Seated in the room were four hooded and robed figures. The largest, seated at the head of the table, spoke.

“Az j’ta bloom.”

T’nere shuddered. The phrase was in a tongue called Old World Arathin. His brother had insisted he learn it a few years back. It seemed most of the old books of learning were written in that ancient tongue. As he sifted the words through his memory the meaning became clear. “Pawn takes knight.”

The woman smiled warmly. The effect was startling. T’nere saw every back in the room stiffen involuntarily. It seemed these men were no more accustomed to seeing her smile then he was—only unlike him, they had learned to fear it.

“I think you should know that our young friend speaks Arathin. Further,” she turned to face the bigger man who had spoken first. “He is no pawn... he is a partner.”

“Is he now?” the hooded man proclaimed with a bluster that said he wouldn’t be publicly intimidated. “Then let us be properly met.” The man pulled back his hood.

Now it was T’nere turn to be startled. The man had the chiseled chin and regal brow that had become the hallmark of the Holden line. This was none other than Raymond Holden, the king’s uncle and—in the event of Randolph’s death, heir to the throne. That, of course, would soon change, as the queen was late in her eight month and the infant would secure the succession.

The others removed their hoods and T’nere saw the faces of several of the lesser nobles in Randolph’s court. One of them spoke now, his voice eager. “Did you bring it?”

“The boy has it.”

“Good,” Raymond spat. “Kindra’s gone into labor – a full month early. We must act tonight.”

“Then tonight we shall” the dark-haired woman responded. “Thanks to our new associate,” she absently waved to T’nere, “the captain of the king’s personal guard is no longer a hindrance.”

“Does the boy know what is required of him?”

T’nere broke into the discussion. “I am ready to do anything that is required to serve the Dark Lord.” He cursed his voice for betraying him and choosing that moment to crack but he would be damned if he would let himself be talked over as if he weren’t even in the room.

“Then let us begin,” the woman whispered. She waved an arm in an encompassing sweep about the room and the torches dimmed to the barest flicker. The room was plunged into faint candlelight. Shadows danced between the faint flickering lights and around the men.

The woman reached under the black granite table and produced a sturdy cast iron bowl along with a bone pestle. She nodded to T’nere and he handed her the cloth-wrapped bundle. The woman placed it, shroud and all, in the waiting bowl. She paused for a moment, head bowed, giving T’nere the impression that she was in silent prayer. When her head came up her eyes glowed with a fire of their own. She pushed the bowl towards T’nere and spoke in a voice many octaves too low to be her own, “Spit into the bowl!”

“What?”

“Hush, boy, and do as you are told!” Her voice was her own again but clearly strained. “This magic requires something of the executioner. I could use blood if you prefer, but you must choose quickly. I am controlling forces beyond your understanding and I cannot hold them long.”

T’nere spat. As the spittle hit the cloth, the bowl ignited in a white hot blaze that blinded all. It lasted barely a second, but, when T’nere’s eyes cleared, the bundle of cloth, heart and all, had been reduced to a small pile of smoldering ashes. He felt his bile rising at the smell. As he looked about desperately for a place to be sick, he heard Raymond laugh mercilessly at his distress. Shame flushed T’nere cheeks and he forced down the nausea. No one would laugh at him.

The dark-haired woman produced a bottle from under the table and added a few drops of its contents to the ashes. She briefly ground the mixture with the pestle and then waved a hand in a stirring motion over the swirling contents of the bowl. It now steamed and churned of its own accord; producing a thick grey smoke with wrapped itself around T’nere like a clinging lover.

When the smoke cleared, the woman took the now empty bowl and poured a measure of foul smelling wine into it. “Drink,” she said calmly.

T’nere looked doubtful.

“Drink!” she repeated more forcefully.

Her hand flashed out, blindingly fast, to grip his wrist. Her nails dug into his flesh. The pain flared and surged throughout his entire body as she fed it with her magic. “Make me force the issue and you will regret it.” The pain intensified. His hands found the bowl and he brought it up to trembling lips.

The taste was everything he expected and feared; but he made himself drink the foul liquid. He had no doubt that she could and would force the issue if she needed to.

When finally he had choked the mixture down, he lowered the bowl. The young woman reached under the table and produced a cloth, which she handed him to wipe his mouth. She seemed shorter—in fact they all did. Raymond’s bemused expression warned him that something was amiss.

“What’s wrong?” T’nere started to say when he noticed that the timbre of his voice was off. It was deeper, more like his brother’s than his own. With a haunting sense of dread he raised a hand feel the features of a face he was sure was no longer his own. His arm froze midway when he caught a glimpse of his hand. It was larger and more callused than he remembered. More like that of a soldier than a boy. His suspicions were confirmed.

“He’s perfect, except for the undersized clothes,” the man next to T’nere said approvingly.

“How long will it last?” Raymond asked, more pragmatic.

“Long enough…” the woman answered. “Perhaps four hours – maybe a little more.”

“What’s happened?” T’nere finally asked. Some small part of him still refused to accept what he knew to be true.