CHAPTER 40

ALAMEN FAE

334 AR

The mimic grew legs as long as the tunnel would allow, sprinting hard from the collapsing ceiling. The stones would delay pursuit only a short time, but it would be enough for the mind to lose them in the maze of the depths.

Yet the Heir was fast. Soaring past the worst of the collapse, he batted the last of the stones, knocking it into the mimic’s back. The drone’s armor held, but it was knocked from its feet.

The Consort looked back. The Heir was alone, trapped on the far side of the cave-in. He had his spear and cloak, but not the hated crown. It was a rare opportunity to rid himself of the scourge of the Mind Killer.

The Heir was unprepared as the mimic bounced off the wall and used the force of his own attack to spring back at him. As the Consort surmised, the Heir did not have the focus to sustain flight while fending off a concerted attack. He dropped back to his feet, that he might better access the repetitions that formed the basis of human combat.

The Consort had studied sharusahk in the human drone’s mind, learning its strengths and weaknesses, and watched the Heir’s style closely.

It was all the human could do to block the mimic’s attacks. His aura was filled with aggression, but he did not lose focus. He knew he was divided—weakened. He gave ground as the mimic pressed in, shedding his armored robe to bare the wards scarred into his flesh.

The mimic spat the thick, sticky acid of a swamp drone at the Heir’s face. His defensive wards would have protected him, but as expected he flinched, losing a moment’s focus as the drone grew multiple limbs, each ending in a sharp, chitinous spike. The Consort Drew from those spikes, leaving them magic-dead and immune to the defensive wards.

The Heir dodged the acid, taking a spike in the side. He rolled away from the blow, too shallow to kill, and somehow managed to block the next three attacks before the fourth pierced clean through his thigh.

Still he fought, hacking off the next spike and drawing a mimic ward that knocked the drone hard into the tunnel wall, creating fighting space. The Heir rushed past to cut off escape, pinning the Consort between himself and the collapsed tunnel.

His spear came alive with cutting wards as he spun it at the mimic, and this time it was the Consort desperately trying to defend. Any appendage that came near the spinning weapon was lopped off, weakening the drone and robbing the Consort of the magic stored in that flesh.

But while there was little defense against the spear, the Heir was all but blind without the crown. The Consort shifted the drone’s armor to blend into the tunnel, melting into a sinuous shape as it flowed up the wall and onto the ceiling to regain favorable ground.

It was too much for the Heir’s weakened vision, but he responded on instinct, guessing the plan and drawing great mimic wards at the ceiling. The drone was bashed against the stone and lost purchase, dropping to the tunnel floor.

The Consort shifted the glands in the mimic’s throat to those of a specialized water demon, producing a thick, viscous black ink. He Drew from the liquid until it was magic-dead, and spat.

This time the Heir did not flinch, catching the blinding ink right in the face. Shock ran through his aura, but he did not lose focus, driving his spear right through the mimic’s midsection, inches from where the Consort hid.

The Heir was no longer trying to keep him contained. He was there to kill.

The Consort realized how foolish, how arrogant he had been. True, the Heir was weakened, alone, but he was still the Mind Killer, and the Consort was hardly at full strength.

He sent out a vibration, Reading the stone around them. He sensed a cavern not far below, vast and sprawling. There would be countless places to hide long enough to flay the wards from the Consort’s flesh that he might dissipate back to his place of power.

The Heir opened his eyes and they were alive with magic, burning the ink away with a hiss. Already his wounds were closing. He sent a jolt of magic through the spear, shocking mimic and mind alike before tearing the spear free to draw back for another thrust.

The Consort blocked the blow and pressed the attack, stabbing with magic-dead spikes and forcing the Heir to give ground.

When there was enough space, the Consort grew a sinuous limb and siphoned magic into it to draw wards even as the other limbs attacked. With no power to waste, each ward was precisely placed to drive cracks into the stone supporting the floor.

But before he could complete the task, the Explorer dissipated through the still-settling stone of the cave-in. It was a dangerous move. Magic moved in tides in the deep, and could sweep the unwary into the Core, from which there was no return.

More, the between-state would have opened the Explorer up to psychic attack, if the Consort still had his powers. Mimics were effective at duplicating the skills of lesser drones, but they could not replicate the complexity of a prince’s mind.

The Explorer took no chances, solidifying the moment he was on the far side of the collapse, the hated crown in hand.

If the Explorer had donned the relic, it might have been the Consort’s undoing, but human weakness saved him.

“Ahmann!” The Explorer threw the crown at the Heir even as his other hand began drawing wards to keep the demons contained.

The Heir caught the crown, but before he could place it on his brow, the Consort drew the last ward, and the floor collapsed beneath them.

The Consort was prepared, snapping the mimic’s arms out into wind demon wings as he elongated and streamlined the body. It caught an updraft and glided away into the cavern as his enemies fell.

Arlen tumbled amid shattered rock, wind rushing in his face as he was buffeted by the stones. He glimpsed Jardir in similar free fall while the demon soared off.

For the second time, he risked dissipation. On the surface, ambient magic flowed across the ground in subtle whorls and eddies, like low fog. There the call of the Core was a distant thing, like the great horn in Tibbet’s Brook. Here it was a thunderous roar, the flows of magic like great storm-waves threatening to drown him and drag him into its depths.

He watched the currents, finding one flowing upward and latching his will to it. He rode the draft of magic, solidifying enough to maintain cohesion and resist the call of the Core while remaining light enough to stay aloft.

Jardir let go of the spear, picking up speed as he struggled with the crown. He managed at last to get it onto his head, and summoned the spear with a quick sketching of wards. It returned almost eagerly to his grasp, and he, too, took flight.

Arlen scanned the air, catching sight of the mimic as it glided through the cavern. He pointed and saw Jardir change course after it. Without another word, Arlen focused his magic in a concentrated burst, hurling himself at the demon like one of Leesha’s flamework rockets.

Jardir spent magic recklessly as he raced after Alagai Ka. There was a limit to what the Crown and Spear of Kaji could store, but the past months of sacrifice were meaningless if the demon escaped, to the doom of all Ala.

But the Par’chin was with him now, and the crown was back on his brow. He’d kept his wits when the abyss broke loose and now Everam stood with them again.

Miles sped by as they pursued, slowly closing the gap until the demon was nearly in range of the crown. Aware of the gain, the mimic furled its wings and fell like a stone into a deep canyon, momentarily dropping out of sight.

The Par’chin dove after it as Jardir arced into the canyon, putting on speed instead of letting gravity do the work. The Par’chin was floating in midair, turning desperately to search for the father of demons. The ambient magic was thick this far below the surface, and Jardir knew the demon could hide in it like a Watcher in the shadows.

But while Alagai Ka might hide from the Par’chin, he could not escape Jardir’s crownsight. Jardir pretended not to notice it cowering against the canyon wall, the mimic’s body perfectly blended with the stone. He turned his head, giving the creature a moment’s hope before he spun, bashing mimic and mind against the wall with wards of forbidding.

Stunned, the demon was slow to react as Jardir rushed in close, throwing the crown’s bubble around it at last. The Par’chin tackled the demon in midair, more than willing to grapple as mind and mimic wards flared on his skin. They fell into the canyon, battering and bashing at each other.

Jardir followed them down, drawing in the bubble. The demon had little room to maneuver when they hit the ground. The Par’chin broke the clinch and rolled back, bleeding from deep punctures from magic-dead spikes the demon had grown.

But the wounds of his ajin’pal were already closing as he and Jardir stalked in. The weakened mimic was no match for them together. The Par’chin caught a spike-tipped tentacle and tore it clean off the demon’s body. Jardir blocked stabbing spikes and spun the spear to slice a deep cut of meat from its back.

Ichor splattered them both, but it only made them stronger. Jardir lost track of time as they fought, slowly wearing down the foe.

At last, the mimic grew too weak to sustain a transition, locked in a crippled form. Then it lost cohesion entirely, sloughing away to coat the floor in a reeking ooze, revealing the mind within.

Jardir charged, spear leading, but then the demon did something unexpected. It knelt in the Krasian fashion, hands on the ground, eyes lowered.

“Enough,” it rasped, voice harsh and cutting. “I surrender.”

“Since when can you talk?!” The Par’chin gaped, pulling up short even as Jardir checked his attack.

The demon gave an almost human shrug. “When I dissipated in your tower but failed to escape, I re-formed with a throat and tongue that could form your primitive grunting sounds.”

Jardir lifted his spear. “So Shanjat…”

Another shrug. “Was a useful drone.”

Rage gathered in Jardir’s spirit and he Drew magic to power the killing wards still tattooed on the demon’s flesh.

“Would you have done differently, child of Kavri?” the demon asked. “When has your kind ever shown mercy toward mine?”

Jardir shook his head. Do not let Alagai Ka speak, the Evejah taught, for he is the Father of Lies whose silver tongue can convince men night is day and friend is foe.

But the Par’chin stepped forward. “Plan ent changed, Ahmann. Still need him, we want to see this through.”

“Perhaps,” Jardir said, “but is that truly what we want, Par’chin?”

“Ay?” the greenlander asked.

“He is the Father of Lies, Par’chin,” Jardir said. “He has deceived us at every turn, never as helpless as he seemed. He hollowed Shanjat like a melon rind, killed Shanvah…”

The Par’chin shook his head. “Shanvah ent dead. Renna’s with her.”

“And where are they, Par’chin?” Jardir asked. “Where are we, for that matter? We have come a long way from the tunnel where this began.”

His doubt was mirrored in the Par’chin’s aura as he stared back the way they came. “Might be able to trace our path across the currents…”

“And if we can?” Jardir demanded. “Slowly hunt our way back over a hundred miles away from our goal?”

The Par’chin frowned. “All the more reason we keep the demon alive.”

“I can still take you to the mind court,” the demon said. “It is close. The drone and your females will only slow you now.”

There was no lie in the demon’s aura. Jardir found he could read it better now that the demon did its own speaking instead of projecting through Shanjat.

“He will try to escape again,” Jardir said.

“Of course I will,” the demon agreed. “As would you, in my position. But I will guide you to the hive.”

“And into traps along the way,” Jardir said.

“The mind court is not without defenses,” Alagai Ka said. “Whether you can survive them is, as you say, inevera.”

Jardir raised a finger, sending power into the demon’s tattoos until it shrieked and writhed. “Do not speak that word, slave of Nie.”

He let go of the power and the demon looked up at him with its massive black eyes. “I am no one’s slave.”

“What will your jiwah do when we do not return?” Jardir asked as they marched through the canyon and into deeper tunnels beyond.

Arlen’s thumb ran across the wards of his wedding ring. “Don’t know. She’ll be mad as spit, half with worry and half at me. Like to think she’ll take Shanvah and head back to the surface, but…Ren’s stubborn.”

Jardir laughed. “Something you have in common.”

“Easy for you to say,” Arlen snapped. “Ent your baby in harm’s way.”

“Do not condescend to me, Par’chin,” Jardir growled. “I have already lost my eldest son to Sharak Ka, and you fought alongside my eldest daughter in the Hollow. Is your sacrifice greater than mine?”

“Jayan and Amanvah are grown,” Arlen said, a lump forming in his throat. “Made their own choices in life. My son…”

Jardir reached out and put a hand on his shoulder. “A father’s fear for his children does not fade when they grow, Par’chin.”

Arlen nodded. “Ay, reckon that’s so. Din’t mean…”

Jardir squeezed his shoulder. “Of course, Par’chin.”

“Your sentiment is pathetic,” Alagai Ka rasped as he matched their pace on his spindly legs. “It will be your undoing.”

The words were meant to cut, but Arlen found they had no edge. “Seen your kind fight. When I killed one, its brothers didn’t lift a claw to help. Rather die for sentiment than live in a world without it.”

The ambient magic grew stronger as they marched, until Arlen felt he was swimming in it. His tattoos formed a constant Draw that suffused him with power. Jardir, too, shone with magic. Only the demon was dim. It kept a tight hold on its power, lest the wards on its flesh activate.

Arlen spent the power freely, tracing wards in the air as they walked—silence, confusion, unsight—masking their passage to the many demons whose paths they crossed.

The glow of their auras was not the only light. Arlen began noticing that he could see, however dimly, in natural sight. The walls were glowing softly green. On closer inspection, he found lichen clinging to the damp rock, alive with magic and emitting the faint light.

As the light grew brighter, the air lost the stink of demons but quickly became something altogether worse.

“Gah!” Arlen said. “What’s that corespawned awful smell?”

“We have entered the larder,” the mind demon said.

“Alamen fae,” Jardir whispered, remembering Kavrivah’s letter. The phrase meant “those below Everam’s sight.” “Kaji’s warriors, taken prisoner five millennia ago.”

“How many generations is that? Two hundred?” Arlen shook his head. “After just a year living on a greatward, Hollowers who didn’t even fight were stronger than regular folk. What does five millennia this close to the Core do to people?”

“You will soon see,” the demon teased. “We’ve wandered too close to the warren of one of their rut tribes. They’ve surrounded us.”

“Could’ve warned us,” Arlen muttered.

“You knew this was coming,” the demon said. “It is your own fault if you did not prepare.”

“You ent worried you’ll get ripped in the crossfire?” Arlen asked.

“The stock know the futility of resisting my kind,” the demon said. “But we seldom intervene in their dealings with other stock. You, they will kill and eat.”

“They eat their own?” Jardir asked, just as an arrow whistled through the air and caught Arlen in the shoulder.

“Corespawn it!” Arlen cried, wrenching the bolt free. The shaft was some tough, fibrous plant, tipped with obsidian, sharp as a razor.

Stooped creatures materialized out of the stones around them, walking as much on four limbs as two. In the rocks above, others leapt and climbed like monkeys. Their teeth and nails were thick and sharp. They were naked and filthy save for a few pouches and straps of leather, some carrying crude bows of bone and gut, others with obsidian-tipped spears and clubs.

Their stringy muscles were hard, auras bright with magic.

Jardir expanded his warding bubble, but the creatures passed harmlessly through the barrier. Likewise, Arlen’s wards of unsight had no effect as the tribe’s fighters stalked in, heading straight for Arlen and Jardir.

Arlen glanced at his friend’s aura. It was twisted with indecision and guilt. Were these truly the descendants of Kaji’s army, and what did he owe them, if so? Rescue? Death with honor? Or were these creatures forever below Everam’s sight?

Arlen stepped into the lead position. “Keep your eye on the demon. Got this.”

“Par’chin…” Jardir’s voice held a warning.

“Ent gonna kill anyone,” Arlen said. “But ent gonna be pushed around, either. Need to set the tone.”

“Very well.” Jardir’s aura still churned. He welcomed a few moments to simply observe.

The biggest core dweller roared a challenge at Arlen, lifting a giant bone club studded with obsidian chips. The auras of the tribe showed this one was their leader, and his aura thrummed with primitive need to establish dominance over newcomers. He thumped his chest.

Arlen kept his wards dark, thumping his chest in return and stepping forward. The provocation worked, and the leader attacked. He outweighed Arlen, long arms giving him dangerous reach, and his strength and speed were almost a match for Arlen’s.

Almost. The core dweller’s attack was as crude as his weapon. Arlen easily slipped the blow and struck back, hooking a punch into the dweller’s ribs.

The punch might have felled a surface man, but the core dweller accepted it with little more than a grunt, backhanding his club Arlen’s way.

Again Arlen ducked the blow, snaking his forearm around the thick, hairy wrist. He locked the arm, establishing control over the weapon as he drove his knee into the core dweller’s midsection once, twice, a third time.

The dweller took these blows as well, bending in and biting his shoulder. Arlen screamed and stopped pulling his punches as sharp teeth ripped into his flesh. The core dweller clawed at him with sharp, filthy nails, but Arlen slapped them away. His uppercut cracked the dweller’s jaw. A push-kick sent the brute tumbling back until he hit hard against stone.

The dweller shook even this damage off, more interested in the taste of the blood in his mouth. He wiped it from his lips, sniffing like an animal. His aura was confused, but he knew the taste of blood. Their crude weapons had never made a demon bleed.

He held up the hand, yelping, and a shower of arrows came at them. Arlen drew a ward in the air and they were batted away.

There was a cry from above, and one of the core dwellers dropped at Jardir, spear leading. Instinctively, Jardir dodged the blow and stabbed it in midair, twisting to slam it into the floor.

Jardir’s aura filled with horror. It was a girl, barely more than a child. He pulled his spear out, meaning to save her, but he had struck true. The girl coughed blood, and her aura snuffed like a candle.

“Everam’s beard.” Jardir reached out with shaking fingers. “It is true.”

The dweller girl had overlarge ears and eyes. Long fingers and toes for gripping and searching dark places. But with her aura gone, Arlen could see the distinct Krasian turn to her features.

The leader was already recovering, his magic strong. He gave a howl that was quickly echoed by his fellows. The entire tribe, males and females, closed in with clubs, spears, and bows.

Several carried children on their backs, but their eyes were no less cold than the fighters’. One held a suckling babe to her breast with one hand and waved a jagged, obsidian-studded club in the other.

“Enough!” Jardir boomed, stamping his spear with a thunderclap of magic. His crown flared with power, filling the cavern with light.

The core dwellers froze, wide eyes squinting tears in the light. They turned back to Jardir, and Arlen tensed.

“Erram,” the leader grunted, dropping to his knees and putting hands and forehead to the floor in the Krasian fashion.

“Erram.” The others immediately followed, the entire tribe falling to their hands and knees, chanting the name.

“Erram?” Arlen asked. “You don’t think…” A glance at their auras killed the words on his lips.

“They think I am Everam,” Jardir whispered.

The mind demon hissed in amusement. “This is your faith, Heir. It has always been animals grunting in the dark at what they cannot understand.”

The females moved in, some carrying children as they moved to sniff at Arlen, still too afraid to approach Jardir. They started purring, and Arlen caught the scent of their arousal. One bent to present her sex to him.

“Ay, that’s enough!” He let the wards on his skin flare.

“Erram.” Again the tribe fell to their knees. “Erram. Erram.”

“Ay, great,” Arlen muttered. “Now we’re both Everam.”

“Or neither,” Jardir said quietly. Arlen glanced at his aura and began to worry.

He is the Father of Lies, Jardir reminded himself.

But what did that mean if the Evejah was just a book?

War is, at its crux, deception, Dama Khevat taught. A great leader must hold his deceit so close that even he himself does not think on it until the time to strike.

Yet Abban taught Jardir that the best deceptions were mostly true. The demon was trying to hurt him, yes, but that did not mean it was lying.

“Erram,” the alamen fae chanted, and Jardir wondered if his primitive ancestors had done the same, making a deity of the sky and spinning tales to comfort themselves in the night.

Jardir knew to praise Everam before he took his first steps. At times he doubted Inevera’s dice spoke Everam’s will, but he never questioned the existence of the all-powerful Creator. Never doubted He was looking down upon His children from Heaven, guiding their paths and waiting for them at the end of the lonely road.

Not until Alagai Ka began to whisper his poison.

But Jardir searched for Heaven when he held the full power of the Spear of Ala, and found nothing.

“Erram,” the animals chanted.

“How could Everam allow this, Par’chin?” he asked. “His children, fighting His war, dragged below his sight by the alagai. Abandoned for hundreds of generations, left to live and die as…”

“…livestock.” The Par’chin shrugged. “Been makin’ this argument with folk since before we met, Ahmann.”

“And perhaps you are right.” Jardir felt cold as he said the words. Alone and vulnerable as never before.

The Par’chin looked at him, but there was no satisfaction in his aura, no righteousness. “What does it matter, Ahmann?”

“How can you ask that?” Jardir said.

“Does it change the job we gotta do,” the Par’chin asked, “if we’re striking a blow in some cosmic proxy war, or just killin’ a nest of animals that like to eat on us and ours?”

The words were a lifeline, and Jardir clutched it. “Indeed not.”

“And that means we got a choice right now,” the Par’chin said.

“What do you mean?” Jardir asked.

“Ent got time to save these folk right now,” the Par’chin said. “But we can teach them to save themselves.”

Arlen pointed to the rocks above, where stone demons were gathering.

“Shepherds saw the lights and came to check the flock.”

“We must kill them immediately,” Jardir said. “We cannot let them give word of our passing.”

Arlen shook his head, studying the auras of the demons. “They can’t see us. Our wards don’t work on the dwellers, but the demons just see a light.”

He and Jardir both let their wardlight fade, Jardir pulling his bubble tighter around the Par’chin and Alagai Ka.

Arlen stepped up to the hulking male that led the dweller tribe, reaching out his hand. “Give me your spear.”

At first the man seemed not to understand, but Arlen pointed with his other hand to the weapon. “Spear.”

The chief took a tentative step forward, quickly slapping the weapon into Arlen’s hand and falling back to his knees. The entire tribe watched closely.

“Piercing ward.” Arlen lifted a glowing finger and drew the symbol in the air. It hung there in silver light. He used his magic to harden a fingernail until it could carve the symbol into the spear’s obsidian tip.

He fed the ward power and held it up for all to see, the symbol reflected in their great wide eyes. “Piercing ward.”

Then he turned and launched the spear at one of the small stone demons moving in to investigate the tribe. The weapon blasted through the creature with a flare of magic, sending it tumbling down to land at their feet. Arlen powered the stone ward on his foot, pinning the squirming demon as he pulled the weapon free.

The ward needed no power from him now, sizzling in the demon’s ichor. Arlen thrust it back into the chief’s hand, then pointed to the demon. “Kill.”

The core dweller froze. Arlen could see it understood his meaning if not his words, but even this savage brute knew better than to attack a demon. He looked at the creature, writhing under Arlen’s heel.

Bleeding ichor. The dweller touched the wetness on the tip of the spear, bringing a finger to his mouth.

“Kill,” Arlen said again, this time in Krasian.

A wild look came into the core dweller’s eyes then, and he thrust the spear into the demon. The warded obsidian punched through armor once thought impenetrable, and the dweller let out a wild cry as magic shocked up his arms.

Arlen turned to a female, pointing at the three obsidian-tipped arrows she kept slung over one shoulder. She handed them over, and again Arlen used a nail to ward them in front of her.

“Piercing ward,” he said again.

“Peesing wad,” she grunted reverently, watching the lines of silver light he drew on her arrowheads.

He handed one back to her, and she took his meaning, searching the stones above and spotting another demon. She drew back carefully and fired. The demon yelped and fell from its perch.

“Peesing wad!” Others stormed forward, holding forth their weapons, chanting the words over and over as Arlen scratched wards into the obsidian, arming them against their gaolers for the first time in millennia.

“What do you think to accomplish?” the mind demon hissed. “Teaching animals to draw crude wards on rocks will not be enough to defeat the guardians of the hive.”

Arlen smiled. “Probably not. But it’ll sure get their attention.”

“Peesing wad!” The crone thrust the spear into the air, and the new tribe roared, raising their own crudely warded weapons into the air.

“Erram!” they chanted. “Peesing wad!”

The elder females of the alamen fae spun stories for the tribe like chin Jongleurs, communicating with a mix of pantomime, mimicked sounds, and a broken form of ancient Krasian that Jardir could almost follow.

With each tribe they met, the number of women spreading the tale of Erram’s coming with the holy wards increased. Already, hundreds of core dwellers had crude wards etched, painted, or carved into their weapons. They were quick to put them to use, growing stronger with every alagai they killed.

Alagai Ka had gone quiet, displeased at the turn of events, but Jardir still had doubts.

“They cannot win against the enemy,” Jardir said. “Are we saving the alamen fae, or dooming them?”

“Core if I know,” the Par’chin said. “Never believed in Heaven, but I always wanted to die with a spear in my hand. Owe them the same. Maybe that’s Everam’s will, maybe it ent.”

“You used to be certain He did not exist,” Jardir said.

The Par’chin sighed. “Ent certain of much these days. These folk can help us—keep the hive distracted while we do what we came to. We manage it, and they’ll be better off. We fail, and they’ll likely get et when the laying’s done.”

Jardir looked at him, and it seemed the gap that had stood between them all these years closed. “Indeed, what does it matter, if Everam is watching or not?”

“You used to say for certain that He did,” Arlen said. “Were willing to kill me over it.”

“I am not certain of much, these days,” Jardir echoed the Par’chin’s words. “But I see I have wronged you, my true friend.”

“Ay, maybe.” The Par’chin turned his eyes away. “Or maybe it’s the other way around. Past is past. Ent worth dwelling on.”