The Masque of Vyle (9 page)

‘Against this time of triumph, hear now one tale of cunning, perseverance and endeavour from a later age. Hear of one who has crossed the stars and returned with a story to tell. Heed his words and ask yourself if you would have acted differently!’

Kassais grinned broadly at the idea that he had somehow thrown the Harlequin’s performance into disarray by acting too early. Good, let them work around him. Only then did it strike him that Motley’s rushed and formulaic introduction had sounded like a joke – a joke being made at Kassais’s expense. He glared around at the little clown but Motley had already skipped back out of reach, the golden staff in his hands wagging ludicrously above his head. Isha’s song drew Kassais’s attention back upwards and the momentary vexation with Motley was forgotten.

‘We sailed through the ether, three ships together spearing the blackness,’ Kassais called out to Isha. ‘We set forth to snatch a few delicacies, a few slaves and entertainment from here and there before we turned our keels back for Commorragh and home. But then we found a prize worthy of our efforts. Full-bellied with glittering flanks like a fat golden sow, she was. An ungainly beast of burden sent floating hither by the slave races and virtually begging for our knives.’

Beyond Isha’s comely shoulder the complex skeins of light described by the orbits of the other gods were drifting closer. Kassais could see the gods’ masked faces increasingly turned towards him with seeming disapproval. He cared not at all, he had the full attention of lovely Isha and desired nothing more than to continue his story of piracy.

‘She had two guard dogs with her, so valuable was the prize. They were as lean and grey as winter but no match for our hard-driven cannon. As the hounds fell away in flames Akir Heliaq rushed in to be first onboard and she tore the belly from his ship with neutronium fangs. Myself and Dhorun of the Broken Circle nipped at her heels and pulled her teeth until we could more cautiously approach.

‘We chased and she fled hopelessly, unthinkingly before us. Soon she was brought to bay and we grappled her like an unwilling lover. Her crew fought but they were children, mere babes in arms, compared to our hard-driven blades. The decks ran red… and the screams! Oh! How they echoed in those tight metal confines of the sow! We made such music as we slew that some of those we fought went mad at the sound of it. I–’

Kassais’s tale was cut short by a giant blade of gleaming fire that swept down between where he stood and where the moon-goddess floated. Part of him knew that it must be another one of the Harlequins’ illusions; light, given the appearance of substance as it flashed past his eyes. But by now Kassais was thoroughly enmeshed in the psychic weavings of Cylia and her chorus of fellow Shadowseers. Also the faint, exotic spice of hallucinogen gas was in his nostrils; so he
heard
the blade rushing down and he
felt
the heat of it on his skin.

Kassais sprang back and looked up to see the armoured helm of Khaine, the war-god, glaring down on him from above the blade. For all his bravado Kassais quailed in that moment as any mortal must quail before a god. Yet the fiery sword was withdrawn and Kassais looked up again to see the god Kurnous remonstrating with Khaine while the armoured warrior-god laughed in his face. Beyond them both Isha was floating away, with many a backward glance, to join the court of other gods. Kassais was bereft.

‘Don’t be sad,’ Motley whispered in his ear. ‘She can’t help it – see there, Asuryan, the Phoenix King in the centre of it all, he’s ruled that the gods can have no more contact with mortal kind.’

‘But…why?’ Kassais cried. ‘I had barely begun my tale!’

‘There, there. You’ll get to finish it, I promise you,’ Motley said consolingly. ‘As to why – you see the Maiden up there beside Asuryan? Lileath, she had a dream that the eldar would be responsible for the destruction of Khaine one day. On hearing that, Khaine swore to destroy the eldar race in its entirety. He only relented when Isha pleaded with Asuryan on our behalf. The price of our survival was that there could be no more contact between gods and mortals. Now watch what happens next.’

The majestic skeins of light being described by the gods’ gyrations resumed. They were perhaps more straitened or chastened than before and definitely more distant. Over time the courses of Isha, her paramour Kurnous and Vaul, the smith-god, intersected more closely. Kassais watched without comprehension as Vaul withdrew to hammer at his anvil for a time before returning to bestow some sort of gift on Isha. On the moon-goddess’s next circuit she scattered gleaming lights in her wake that resolved into bright snowflakes drifting down to each eldar in the hall.

Kassais watched in fascination as one of the glimmers sailed serenely to him. He could sense a thread of Isha’s presence even as it approached and he held out his hand palm upwards to allow the flake to settle in it. It vanished in a tiny flash and a smooth, blue gem was left in his hand. The stone was warm to the touch and felt in some way alive. The sense of connection with the goddess intensified as he held it. With a flash of insight Kassais knew that when he held this stone, something he knew must be one of the fabled Tears of Isha – she could converse with him!

More importantly he could now converse with Isha. Kassais immediately continued to recount his story and was conscious that the other eldar in the hall were attuned to it too through their own spirit stones. It was as if he stood on a vast stage with only shadows beyond the brightness of the lights of Isha’s gaze, the spirit stone as warm as flesh in his hand. Quiet murmurs and susurrations implied an unseen audience just out of view but Kassais cared nothing at all for them and plunged on with his tale as if he had never been interrupted.

‘We ran them to ground, my divine goddess! The sow’s crew soon fled squeaking through their metal mazes and we hunted them down like vermin. Most of them I kept alive – for later of course – and when I found what they carried in their holds I had questions for them too. Their cargo bays were fairly groaning with the weight of plunder: precious metals and rare woods, polished stones from a thousand different worlds, a million pigments and dyes, the brightest feathers, scales and shells from across the void. It was a barbaric treasure trove, certainly, but made up of such objects that sufficiently trained artisans and craftsmen can put to great use.

‘So we questioned the crew and under my tender ministrations they told me everything that I wanted to know. They gave me their secret destination for these goods, and told me of the curious inhabitants of the place. In that moment I knew that I must go there, that all through my long life this particular adventure had been waiting for me. The only difficulty was the extreme length of the voyage, for we were provisioned only for a brief sojourn and not an odyssey – though that was easily remedied by consuming Dhorun and his crew before proceeding–’

Kassais became aware that the war-god was sweeping past above him with increased frequency. The fury of Khaine’s gaze was almost palpable, as was the delectable sense of indulging in a forbidden act by continuing to commune with Isha. He spoke on, more urgently now as he had an ominous feeling that circumstances were about to change for the worse.

‘So I set the prow of my ship into the void and we trekked to this hidden worldlet of the slaves. What I found exceeded my wildest dreams… It was an entire realm of devoted craftsmen who spent all their days and nights crafting icons of their dead God-Emperor. Their homes were crusted with dour representations of their carrion lord. Their walls were carved with pious proclamations in their deity’s name while honorific statuettes and commemorative triptychs stood in every corner. There were warehouses filled with hand written tracts detailing His comings and goings with interminable detail. It was one of those rare jewels of a slave enclave where blind faith in a higher power is poised ready to be shattered overnight. After dispensing some lessons in who was now in control I told these industrious little slaves that they could live to continue their life’s work only if they obeyed my will.’

Kassais could see the artisans in his mind’s eye as he communed with Isha through the spirit stone. Row upon row of dirty, ugly, tearful faces looking up from where they kneeled in the dust of a distant world. They hadn’t believed him, of course, but they had thought that they could perhaps save their families if they complied. He smiled at the memory and then felt a pulse of urgency from the stone he held in his hand that prompted him to continue.

‘So I set them to work re-sculpting every dour face and maudlin icon on that world into something more pleasing. I drove them relentlessly as time was short before we must away and return to Commorragh. Because of this many of the slaves did not survive their labours, which is a shame because they excelled themselves. They began by re-carving the glowering visage of their God-Emperor into a rendition of my own handsome physiognomy wherever it occurred. Then the workers swarmed across every inscribed lamp stand and devotional wall, every prayer-banner and sheaf of vellum blotting and rewriting, obfuscating the truth and promoting the most outrageous lies.’

Kassais was laughing by now. Tears of mirth rolled down his cheeks as he recalled the anguish he had caused the slaves. They were such simple, primitive creatures and had given themselves over entirely to devotion to their dead god. Demonstrating to them that the application of pain and fear could so thoroughly overrule their higher selves had been one of the most pure and fulfilling acts of Kassais’s long, cruel life. He wiped his eyes and tried to control himself to finish with the sting in the tail.

‘At the end of it all I made a final judgement before I flew away. I actually kept my word and let them live on in their misery. I took a hand and an eye from each survivor so that they would always remember my brief period of rule and not hurry too quickly to restart their icon-carving. I told them that I would return in a year and a day to punish anyone that transgressed my laws. I’ve returned twice since.’

Just as Kassais completed his tale the spirit stone in his hand pulsed red-hot. He cursed in confusion and dropped it. There were shrieks all around him as other guests echoed his gesture. For Kassais all sense of being in Vyle’s hall in the Sable Marches had vanished. He drifted in something akin to a waking dream where there were gods above him, distant and yet so close that he could see their actions. All that he knew was that his connection to Isha had been cut off as if with a red-hot knife. He looked up uncomprehendingly and saw the armoured figure of Khaine dragging Isha and Kurnous before Asuryan for judgement.

Motley was invisible behind him as he whispered in Kassais’s ear. ‘See? Khaine has caught Isha breaking the rules by listening to the mortals and he’s demanding that Asuryan dispense punishment. Sadly the Phoenix King has no stomach for such savagery and elects to place Kurnous and Isha into Khaine’s custody instead. The war-god decides that this means he may do as he wishes, so he imprisons the pair and tortures them grievously.’

Hideous, heart-wrenching cries split the heavens. The complex interweaving skeins of the gods’ passage now included fire and blood in plenty as Kurnous and Isha suffered in Khaine’s orbit. Kassais stumbled forwards a few paces without thinking, shouting his outrage at the distant, unhearing figures. He was aware of pandemonium around him as others joined in with his cries. He became aware, too, of those around him who remained silent in apparent support of the war-god’s actions and a spark of hatred for them sprang into being in his heart.

‘Calm yourself, my lord!’ Motley hissed. ‘All is not lost, many of the other gods feel as you do! The smith, Vaul, by all accounts is a friend to Kurnous and Isha and wants their suffering to end. He is bold enough to confront Khaine and make any agreement. The war-god demands a hundred of Vaul’s fabulous blades delivered within the year to secure the couple’s release! What choice does Vaul have? Perhaps he feels guilt over his part in making the spirit stones. The task is nigh-impossible, but he accepts it!’

The performance of the dancers switched to focus around Vaul at his labours as he worked feverishly to complete the hundred blades Khaine had demanded. Tears streamed down Kassais’s cheeks again as he urged the smith-god onwards with his monumental task. At times the other gods secretly interceded to help or hinder with materials or advice: Morai-Heg, Hoec, laughing Cegorach, even Lileath. The Harlequins darted and weaved about the labouring god and his pile of finished swords grew higher until, with the slow inevitability of death, the time approached when Khaine would demand his payment.

Kassais felt a cold hand close around his heart. He knew that the smith-god had failed in his task. Ninety-nine swords lay complete, but the last sword was unfinished! Kassais looked around for Motley, expecting some explanation of this dreadful happenstance. He saw only Vyle sitting on his clawed throne looking suspiciously pleased by the outcome. Vyle’s hawk-like features radiated smug approval of the war-god imprisoning Isha and continuing to torment her. The spark of hate in Kassais flared up into a slow-burning flame as he looked grimly upwards to see the outcome of the meeting of Khaine and Vaul.

Kassais barked with laughter as, with the war-god virtually at his door, Vaul hid the unfinished blade among the rest. Swaggering and victorious Khaine took possession of the hundred swords without examining them in detail. The war-god freed Kurnous and Isha immediately and the pair soared away from him so swiftly they seemed to temporarily vanish from view. Vaul, too, withdrew and the chorus of Harlequins now moved around Khaine as their lynchpin as the war-god began to test the swords.

Khaine whirled the blades around his body with fantastic skill, hurling them into the air and catching them before sending them spinning outwards to orbit, point first, around his floating figure. Soon a halo of spinning swords had formed about him, a hedge of steel that Khaine added to with ever more death-defying feats of swordplay. Now a great wheel of moving blades spun with intricate precision around the war-god and he hefted the last of Vaul’s blades to test its worth…