Blackhand Read online

  Chapter 17

  By the following day, Siyer’s strength returned and his spirit grew strong, but doubt still laced his soul. Quintel wanted to offer him words of comfort.

  “Don't worry, Siyer,” Quintel said. “All will go as planned.”

  He saw Siyer was still not convinced, merely compliant. “As you say, Quintel.”

  With those words they parted. Siyer took a straight path to the west. Quintel headed south.

  Quintel covered many miles in only a few hours. He had no supplies or weapons to burden him, and his new strength gave him the speed of a bolting deer. It had taken him weeks to reach the Desert of Salt from Huk’s fortress, but he would need only a few days to make the return journey.

  As he charged across the countryside, his mind brushed against something unusual many miles away. A human. Quintel first saw the being as a flicker on the horizon. Adjusting his attention, the flicker became a complex sculpture of blooming light.

  He saw a young Forestland woman gathering water from a well. A halo of golden light encircled her head and braided down her neck where it joined a bejeweled vest of red and blue luminescence that were her heart, lungs and other organs. Her lifelight was nothing like Siyer’s. Where his light had been sharp and defined, hers was rounded and soft.

  As his mind lingered on the woman, her very thoughts took shape before him. He sensed her feelings.

  She was hungry and slightly ill… An injury to her foot distracted her from her task… And something tugged at the pit of her stomach… Something cold, horrifying.

  Quintel stopped running and fixed upon the woman, peeling back her essence layer by layer, trying to find the source of her terror. No matter how deep he reached, her thoughts never revealed themselves to him completely. He saw impressions, feelings, flitting images. And he saw the thing she feared. She had seen one of the Thogs.

  He continued his journey south.

  As he moved deeper into the Forestlands, he thought about Yuul, the child-god who created him. No, not created. The god had not made him. It had left him something. A part of itself. A part that would surely be missed. What had gone wrong? Why had the god panicked during their encounter? He relived the exchange in his memory. He tried to see it with his new eyes, but they did not help him.

  He turned his attention inward, to the part of him that was not flesh. His god half. Perhaps he would find something there if he looked close enough. But all he saw was light. Blinding blue-white light. Not a memory or feeling to be found. Just power.

  Another night. Another day. Never stopping.

  On the third evening, he encountered a Thog column moving across a valley road. The creatures were identical to the one he had seen at Huk’s banquet. Broad and heavy with muscle, they carried crudely crafted bows with arrows as long as spears. Iron axes hung from their belts.

  At the center of every Thog — in the same place a man’s heart resided — a cold, dark fire burned.

  He could see through them, and unlike the two humans he had studied, with their rich spectrums of experience, the Thogs cast a uniformly gray light. No variation could be found in their gloomy luminescence. Each light was ashen and artificial.

  He paced the company for half a day, but learned nothing from them. As far as he could tell, they had no leader and didn’t seem to communicate. Rather than traveling together, they were simply headed in the same direction. Each had been set forth with a single goal.

  Quintel was not ready to test his powers in combat, so he kept to places where they could not see him. Often, he took to the treetops and silently leaped from tree to tree, leaving no tracks behind him.

  He encountered many more military units, both human and Thog. He listened to the human cadres closely, overhearing the banter between soldiers, the plots between officers, and the speculations of traveling civilians. He not only heard what they said, but saw their souls. The chattering warriors shared great confidence. They were ready for war, sure of victory. Huk's new creatures gave them courage.

  After a few days, he arrived at his destination and perched himself in the crook of an oak tree outside Huk's fortress. While he waited for nightfall, his mind wandered the fortress looking for any threat, any hidden magic that might be protecting the warlord. There was none. Although a hundred armed warriors clanked through the stone corridors, no threat to him existed.

  His awareness crawled through the small castle until he found Huk striding through the courtyard with a group of generals trailing behind him. Quintel saw he was strong and healed.

  He smiled. So, Siyer’s herbs had finally cured the warlord.

  As the night awoke, and lamplight flickered in the fortress windows, Quintel climbed down from the tree. Guards paced the ramparts along the wall, but they never saw him. He moved across the open ground like a phantom, flitting from shadow to shadow, always standing where the guards could not see.

  At the foot of the wall, he leaped into the air and covered half its height before catching hold of the rough stone with his bare hands. Navigating the vertical surface, he climbed to an open window.

  Once inside, something caught him by surprise. As he entered, the smells of the fortress mingled in the air to assault him with memories of his imprisonment. Odors from the kitchen, the courtyard and the mildewed halls filled his thoughts with recollection. For a second, his human half faltered. He realized he was back in his prison, outnumbered and unarmed with enemies all around him. And Siyer was far away.

  Was that fear that touched him?

  The feeling vaporized as quickly as it came. The certainty of a god returned to him. He removed his boots and jumped to the ceiling, his fingers and toes finding the tiniest of purchase between the mortared brick. Upside down, he crossed the top of the room and continued into the hallway. The guards would not look for him up there.

  His mind found Huk in his palatial quarters on the far side of the fortress. Quintel maneuvered towards him. Disinterested guards and officers passed beneath him, never glancing upward. He moved over their heads as if invisible. In a few turns he was there.

  Outside the warlord’s door, he clung to the ceiling until the hallway was empty, then dropped to the floor and tried the door. It was locked. He pressed and the bolt gave way. A snapping sound rang out, but Quintel sensed that no one heard.

  Startled by the intrusion, Huk grabbed a sword resting against his bedroom wall.

  “Guards!” he shouted, holding the blade in front of him. Then he recognized Quintel. His mouth fell open and his chin moved up and down with soundless words. When the shock passed, he began to laugh. It was a wicked, self-satisfied laugh.

  “What humor!” he bellowed through clenched teeth, a deep anger flashing behind his dark eyes. “The Abanshi prince has returned? Have you come back for your old job, Abanshi? I’m sorry, but I have no need of your service. I’ve been feeling better lately.”

  Quintel stood across the room and looked into Huk’s lifelight. It burned red in his chest, rising up to a sharp angled crown of silver around his temples. Quintel had expected a core of blackness, but Huk’s aura was like Siyer’s. The silver crown revealed a disciplined, calculating mind. The red reflected his focus and passion. He was a magnificent sight of will and determination.

  Huk slashed his sword through the air and took a step toward Quintel.

  “Well, Abanshi?” he said. “Why have you returned to me? Has freedom made you tired of life so quickly?”

  Quintel sensed several guards hurrying down the hallway, alerted by Huk’s call.

  “No,” he said. “I’ve come to kill you, Huk.”

  Huk stood in silence for a moment, his mouth open.

  “You’ve come to kill me?” the warlord said, moving toward Quintel. “Barefoot and unarmed?”

  Four guards with pikes entered the doorway. Huk held a hand up to keep them from killing Quintel immediately.

  “I don’t know how you got in here, but you won’t be leaving alive,” Huk’s voice was strong and hi
s pride, evident. He was nothing like the wretch Quintel had known months ago. Pacing with his shoulders thrown back, the warlord continued. “All those years, wasted under Siyer’s spell. All those years, drugged and manipulated. I had foolishly thought I was the warden, but all along I had been the prisoner.”

  Quintel could see Huk’s anger boiling into full-blown hate. He saw Huk measuring the distance between them. The guards shuffled forward.

  “I could imprison you again and torture you for years,” Huk continued. “But I’m too busy for games…” He was only a few paces away. “So I’ll just kill you where you stand.”

  With that, Huk’s sword moved. Faster than an eye could follow, the steel blade cut through the air and sliced toward Quintel’s neck at a fatal angle. Then it stopped a few inches short of Huk’s target. The blade rested in Quintel’s grip as if sunk into stone.

  Everyone in the room froze. Huk took several counts before reacting. Quintel paused so the full weight of the situation could fall upon them. When he saw it, he jerked the blade from Huk’s grip, flipped the hilt to his own hand, and cut Huk’s head off.

  A fountain of red blood exploded from Huk’s neck stump and several of the guards screamed in disbelief. Quintel felt their panic shred the room. Huk's body fell to the floor but continued to kick and flail.

  Cold pain rose from Quintel’s center. He dropped to one knee and clutched his stomach.

  As his blade had passed through Huk’s neck, he watched the warlord’s magnificent lifelight recoil into nonexistence. He saw the man’s memories and dreams shrivel, wither and disappear into nothingness. As Huk’s head fell to the floor, a single word repeated within his mind: Ruined. Ruined. Ruined.

  Huk, enemy of the Abanshi, traitor who served a cannibal god, the fiend who had imprisoned him for years, lay in two pieces on the floor, and Quintel felt crippling grief. His throat closed, his stomach clenched. Where did such pain come from?

  The guards rushed him, but he batted their attack aside, breaking their weapons with a gesture.

  More guards swarmed the hallways and Quintel knew he must leave. He grabbed Huk’s head and dived for the narrow window at the far end of the room. He passed through the slit like a lance and plummeted to the ground.

  Landing on his feet, he tore through the black forest, sensing a frenzy rise behind him as word of Huk’s death passed from person to person. He stopped and tried to control the swirling nausea that filled him. Failing, he vomited. He held the severed head before him. The gory trophy that had once held thought, love, fear, desire and ambition was now an empty husk. Where had Huk gone?

  Quintel braced himself against a tree. Tears glistened down his cheeks and dropped to the dirt.

  What had he done?

  Chapter 18

  After the catastrophe, Yuul had fled to the ether. The god was hurt. A large part of itself had broken off inside the human. Yuul inspected the damage. Repair was impossible. Too much was missing.

  As the god limped past the half-realities swirling around Ru’s world, Yuul knew it had failed. The god did not merely want to defeat Ru. It desired a piece of the world for itself. A place to feel and breathe. A place where it was worshiped and loved. Somewhere to exist. Yuul wasn’t strong enough to create a world of its own, but it was strong enough to make Ru share.

  Now its one chance had passed.

  What had gone wrong? Nothing seemed misplaced or inharmonious. Siyer had done his part. The one named Quintel had been well prepared for the joining. All the correct channels were cut into his mind and he came to the god of his own free will. By every law, Yuul should be walking the earth right now, gathering its allies for the final battle against Sirian Ru, using its insight to form impossible strategies that would bring them victory.

  Instead, the god cowered in the swampy region between infinity and the solid world, hiding among primordial pools of steaming preexistence.

  As soon as Yuul entered Quintel, the crushing weight of the human’s life had smothered it under a mass of flesh, breath, pain and hope. The way the human moved through time burned. His memories were scorching coals.

  After centuries of nudging circumstance towards its goals, Yuul had gambled everything on this one chance to walk, talk, eat, breathe and fight. And it had failed.

  No.

  Yuul would not accept defeat so easily. Another strategy had to exist. This was only one battle lost. Somehow, Yuul would make the older god partition his trophy. It just had to figure out how.

  The god contemplated its next step. Its plans had crumbled and now a new entity had been thrown into the struggle. Quintel. The man was down there somewhere, endowed with the power of a god, undoubtedly very confused. And certainly ready for war. Yuul had made sure of that. The god had chosen an Abanshi for a host because their hatred for Ru was ingrained. They were raised to fight from the womb. Killing would not be easy for a deity. Even harming an insect in that world would be destroying a masterpiece. But if the deity inhabited the body of a trained warrior with a zealous hatred of Ru, the task could become reflexive. It would be easy to destroy life.

  In a rush of understanding, Yuul suddenly knew how it could stay in the battle.

  Quintel had been raised an Abanshi. His hatred of the living god was too deep to be washed away by the powers bestowed upon him. His enemy was Ru. None of that had changed. He would continue to fight.

  So how could he be helped?

  Yuul could influence beings in the physical world. Through dreams, omens and portents, the god could encourage them to behave in certain ways. But the process took time and that was something Yuul did not possess.

  As the god contemplated its options, a ripple moved through time and space. A door parted between the worlds.

  Keeping very still, Yuul hid among the proto-matter and watched as Ru opened a portal and left his earthly bonds to reenter the realm of the gods. Yuul was amazed that Ru could slide between realities with such ease. It watched as Ru passed the swampy nether region between matter and spirit, and into the territory of the divine. Hidden, Yuul followed.

  The elder god was very deliberate in his travels. He kept off the well-trod routes and moved toward a place where he should not go. It did not take long for Yuul to figure out where Ru was headed. As the elder god descended deeper down the never-traveled path, Yuul knew that Ru was going to Non.

  Staying a safe distance behind, Yuul followed its rival into the blackened depths of chaos and destruction. It watched from afar as Ru stood by the gate and spoke to one of the demonic inhabitants on the other side.

  In horror, Yuul witnessed Ru open the lock and release one of the beings.

  Was the old god completely mad?

  Yuul understood Ru’s fascination with Life. The young god even understood why Ru had saved part of the world. Illegal though it may be, at least a reason lay behind the deed.

  But to release an Agara from Non!

  Yuul watched as Ru traced his steps back to the world of life with the Agara in tow. A big one, too. One of the Demonthane.

  After a few moments, Yuul figured out what must have happened. Ru knew that Yuul had made its move. The elder god had seen Quintel and reacted out of fear. Yuul felt a moment of pride. Ru must have been terrified to go to such extremes.

  The moment of self-satisfaction did not last. If Ru could pass between worlds and enthrall a Demonthane, he was far more formidable than Yuul had guessed. Perhaps Yuul had acted prematurely with Quintel. Perhaps Quintel had not been the correct vessel.

  Yuul shook the thought away. It was almost impossible. Through its minions and other means, Yuul had bred Quintel for the task. The young god had even orchestrated Quintel’s elaborate conception. His royal upbringing had been part of Yuul’s plan. His bond with his brother, his banishment, his capture had all been events set into motion by Yuul.

  The god realized what it must do. Neither Siyer nor Quintel were going to return to God’s Finger. Yuul knew it had to act on its own. It had seen how Ru opened th
e doorway between the two worlds. If it could only imitate the elder god, perhaps it could force its way into reality.

  Yuul approached the barrier dividing the worlds. It would find Siyer and warn him about the Agara. That would give the humans the opportunity to prepare for whatever Ru had planned. Then it would figure out some way to help Quintel.

  The barrier dividing Ru’s world from the rest of reality was a tough membrane of improbabilities constructed specifically to keep other gods out. For Yuul to cross into the tangible world, someone had to summon it. Someone had to believe in it. Even then it was no easy task. Nonetheless, Yuul now knew the wall’s secret; it saw Ru open the portal. Given enough time, it could figure out the trick and pierce the membrane.

  Yuul went to work. The god began scratching on a single spot at the base of the wall, concentrating its entire will on one point, picking at the dense strands of improbabilities until, at last, a fray appeared. Yuul had punctured a hole through the fabric no bigger than an atom. The smell of life wafted into the realm of the gods. Being careful not to make a ripple, Yuul poured itself through the rend…

  …and felt existence wash over its form like a waterfall. Time, space, distance, matter, all the things from the past, all the things a god could not have, made it cry out:

  “I AM.”

  Yuul streaked through the sky like a lightning bolt. Without caring if Ru saw it, the god passed over forests, rivers and mountains. It passed over cities and seas. It cut through the living air without fear or worry, oblivious to danger. Existence made it drunk.

  Then it realized that God’s Finger was far away. Calming itself, the god gained a modicum of control and focused on its task. It was vulnerable. In this realm, Yuul could be killed like any other being. Even the gods feared death. Perhaps the gods, most of all.

  Yuul hovered high in the sky, finding its bearings among the clouds. The world lay before it like a great stage. Yuul scanned the broken globe looking for Quintel and Siyer. They were not hard to find.