The Unfinished World (The Armor of God Book 2) (30 page)

Malachi’s death was what triggered the chain reaction that would lead to more than one ending, not too long after.

Ezra knew things would not get better soon—Nandi was whispering the words into his mind. Standing inside the Caduceus, seeing what had become of Solis, didn’t let him change this pessimistic view.

The man was screaming like the other caged madmen did at night, only this wasn’t the result of the Asili’s grip: it was something much deeper. The man had witnessed his son’s death and, for years, had been struggling with an addiction he freely indulged in—one he couldn’t entertain now. Now that his body needed an intoxication more than ever, when it begged for the memory of Malachi’s death to be removed, or at least hidden away in some dark and distant corner, he was trapped. In more ways than one.

Solis was writhing on the floor like a dying animal, and it was more than Ezra could stomach.

“I’m really trying, you know,” said Ezra, failing to hold in his tears as he watched Solis begging for relief in front of him, asking to be killed. “I’m trying to do the right thing, to be the good guy. To do what you, or Garros, or my mother would do. I can’t. I’m not cut out for it.”

Erin was the only one standing next to him—the others had refused to join him, either because of anger or something else; after all, he had single-handedly crushed the balance in Clairvert in just a few hours.

“I know you are,” she said. “And sometimes the worst things come from the best of intentions. I know you did not do that to this man’s son, you did not cause it.”

“I did, though,” said Ezra, and Erin kept her merciful silence. He knew when he was being judged, even when the judgment was hidden behind kind words. “Both directly and indirectly.”

“So if you did, then—?”

Solis looked up to them, and Erin walked away from his cell, out of the Caduceus and back into Clairvert.

“If you did, then what? Malachi wasn’t the first one to die, and he won’t be the last. What were you doing out there, anyway? What did you tell him?”

Ezra bit his lip.

“Blanchard, you tell me. Right now.”

“I don’t think I’ve told you yet but . . . I’ve talked to Garros about this girl I’ve been meeting outside,” he said, and he could see Erin’s jaw clenching. “I saw her first in Kerek, and then I found she lives in a small cave just outside Clairvert. Garros knows about her too. She’s Malachi’s sister, and he thought she was dead—she was exiled. I was trying to show him that she was okay.”

“What are you going on about?”

Ezra turned around. Garros was there; a bandage covered the knuckles of his right hand. “I’m sorry.”

“We have to get you out of here, Ezra. I said it wasn’t your fault, and it wasn’t—at least not what happened to Malachi—but because of this, almost no one in this city trusts us, much less the Creux. So here’s what’s gonna happen: you and Jena are going to take the first group of people—the ones who actually want to leave—out of here.”

There were tremors again, and all of Clairvert shivered, as though a central piece of it had finally shattered under the weight of the world. The screams of the insane made chaotic harmonies in the tunnel of the Caduceus, making Ezra sweat. They grew pervasive and even more chaotic; the madness was growing stronger—they were like fowl trapped with a hungry wolf; it was no way to live.

“No, I want to leave,” he said, and thought of Elena. “I’ll make sure they get there safe, and come back for others if I need to. Do we know where we’re going? Does Jena know? I’ll do what you ask me, I swear.”

“Jena’s been doing her homework,” said Garros and began walking even farther away from the Caduceus as the screams became louder and more violent. More difficult to hear. “We’re moving everyone to where we found Lazarus. It’s big enough. There’s food, and it’s safe now that there are no more Flecks out there.”

They walked past the Clairvert city square, where the wedding celebration had taken place. The whole place seemed strangely empty, and he could hear the howls of monsters outside. “Are you sure about that?” asked Ezra

“No, not really. Not at all,” Garros said and chuckled—as always, the laughter wasn’t sincere or even ironic. “What’s going on over there?”

Akiva stood in the middle of the square, hand on the pillar, his eyes studying its length, his hands its composition. It wasn’t the first time he had found Akiva there, oddly fascinated by the admittedly beautiful centerpiece of the city.

“I don’t know, but he’s coming with us,” Erin said and walked over to him. Both Garros and Ezra followed her. “He’s part of the plan.”

It took Akiva a few seconds before he even realized that he had been joined. His hand was still pressing against one of the pillar’s sides, fingers following the triangular grooves that decorated it.

“What is it with you and this thing?”

Akiva turned around and shrugged. “I’m not sure. Ah, hey, Ezra. How are you doing? I hate that you had to see what you saw. It couldn’t have been easy for you.”

Ezra could only shake his head.

“This thing—there’s something about it. William says it’s been here for decades; he told me he doesn’t know who built it, but it wasn’t him. Erin, have you been able to contact Roue?”

“No, nothing yet,” she said. “The link is working fine, but no one’s picking up on the other end. It worries me. If William really had been in constant contact, then something happened back in Zenith.”

“How’s Jena’s plan going? She . . . for some reason she hasn’t spoken to me about it. About anything, really,” he said. “I’m sorry if I’ve been out of it lately, this place is getting to me. I want to go home.”

“I know, me too, but we have work to do,” Erin said. “Come on.”

It was clear that leaving Jena alone with William had been a mistake. When Ezra and the others reached the chapel, both Jena and the man were yelling. She was evidently frustrated: face red, voice gravelly from screaming. Not even when her father died—

Her father died under your hands, and she doesn’t know it.

—had she looked so disheveled.

He knew exactly what the discussion had been.

“I’m glad you guys are here. Erin,
you
try to reason with him,” said Jena and walked away from Heath, as though his proximity alone was uncomfortable for her.

“There’s nothing to discuss, is there?”

“You take my citizens away from the safety of the city, and you do it by using away
our
resources? Don’t you people have any shame? Things were stable before you got here!”

“
No, they were not
!” said Akiva, and there was blatant anger in his tone. “You’re ignoring the problem, you power-hungry ass. Things only appeared to be stable—you know perfectly well that that the creature back there can destroy this whole place whenever he wants, and it won’t be long before he does. We can fight it, but
you
need to be far away from here when it happens.”

“Resources, what is he talking about?” asked Ezra.

“We needed to build some way to transport the people back to the island,” said Erin. “We have to use some of the city’s resources—the wood, steel rods, construction materials. I understand why you’d be angry, Mr. Heath, but the fact that so many of your citizens are willing to help build them should tell you something: they know they’re no longer safe here, or they won’t be for much longer.”

Ezra felt like he had been sleeping for days. It was difficult for him to admit that Jena’s plan had already been happening around him, and without his noticing, without his help; he had been too caught up in his own personal hells.

“You caused that man’s death,” William growled, shooting a sidelong glance at Ezra. “My people don’t trust you or the monsters you brought here. Eliza was wrong about all of it.”

And it was like that word,
monsters
, had a summoning effect, because that’s the moment when they arrived.

A deep rumbling laugh crept from behind the red veils at the entrance towards Lys’ sanctum.

“What is that?” Jena asked, but they all knew the answer.

With the laughter still making echoes in the chapel’s walls, William ran across the room and disappeared behind the red veils. Ezra didn’t need to be told to follow the rest when they did the same.

The world turned foggy and dark for a moment, and then he was inside that massive dark chamber, the heart of the mountain, and blue light bled from the pit at its core. The stone giant who held Alice in its grasp stood as he had when they had last seen him.

She was laughing. Alice. The dissonant harmony of the monster’s voices granted power to the horrible noise; it was like a cold wind coiling around their very bones, a grip that could shatter them.

Ezra could feel his soul rotting inside him, poisoned by evil.

“What is happening?”

“It’s time,” Alice whispered.

How did this happen? When did this happen?

You have the power now. You have the power here. You and I are one in the same. Not every labyrinth has a way out.

When Ezra, Garros, and Akiva ran back outside, summoned by the sounds of horns and screams, the witnessed the beginning of Clairvert’s fall with great clarity.

They stood at the mouth of the tunnel that led to the chapel, back in Clairvert proper. Every resident of the city, even the guard that Farren led, were running towards them, hopeful of the chamber’s promises of safety.

“No . . .” whispered Garros, barely able to speak through a dry mouth.

Across the city, at the opposite end where just an hour earlier he had been, Ezra finally saw the source of the chaos: crawing through a mist of their own pestilence, Carrier-type Flecks poured from the Caduceus and into Clairvert.

“No—
How
?” Erin said, looking at the invaders. They could hear their painful screams all the way across the city, carried by the very walls that were supposed to protect them. “
What did this
!”

“Into the chapel!” he heard a voice say. Ezra looked down and saw Farren making signals with his hand, leading the desperate citizens towards the apparent safety tunnel.

“We need to do something!” Ezra said and looked at Garros. “Elena is out there!”

People screamed as the deceptively quick Carriers caught up to them, impaling them with their long, sharp legs, and carrying them back into the Caduceus. A man who had barely made it as far as the city square screamed, trying to break free of the monster’s grasp, and was silenced forever by the creature’s breath infecting him directly.

In less than one minute, Ezra saw at least ten people die.

And he was frozen. He had seen death before, but never so much of it.

“Move!” Farren said, pushing Ezra out of the way so people could run into the tunnel.

He was still in a trance when he saw dozens of people rushing into the passage. It was a particularly strong push by a woman carrying her child that made him get out of the way. He had to fight the current, and then landed in Clairvert proper, where Garros and Akiva were trying to help.

Where’s Elena?

He couldn’t see her. He imagined her being taken away like the man he had seen get skewered. It made his knees weak.

A young woman in a red robe stumbled and tripped, falling beneath the trampling horde. Garros pushed his way through the mob and used his large frame to shield her. When it was clear, he picked her up. “Run! Blanchard! What are you doing, go!”

I need to find her. Where is she? I won’t let her die like this!

You can’t protect her, she’s not here!

Ezra saw the Carriers coming closer. He knew they had seen them; they had a target.

“Where’s Davenport!” Garros yelled. The young woman cried in his arms; her arm was bleeding, and Ezra squirmed when he saw a twist in the flesh, and the sharp, splintered tip of bone that pierced through it.

Ezra looked for Akiva, who had disappeared from sight among the chaos. He found him running towards the atrium—the only one running to face the chaos, and not away from it.

“Akiva!” Ezra yelled again, and when two of the Carriers were just a few yards away from Garros and him, they began to run back.

Looking back as he climbed up the stairs towards the tunnel, Ezra saw Akiva dodge the deadly attack of one of the Carriers who was intent on splitting him in two. Then he disappeared from sight.

Farren was standing at the door to the tunnel, screaming at them.

Ezra knew he could close the door on them. He would.

The clicking of the Carriers’ legs was just behind them.

He closed his eyes, heard Garros roar with a final effort, and then fell onto cold floor. Ezra heard the sound of a heavy door closing behind him.

ф

She didn’t know how much time had passed.

It could have been hours, could have been days. It was cold and dark. The light came and went arbitrarily, and she had begun to believe that Tessa was up there in the observation deck torturing her.

Maybe she was; Vivian could see the deck high up, but not the inside. Somehow, the possibility of being watched made everything much worse.