Antiphon

Chapter 25

Neb

For the longest time, they followed warm and winding corridors that gradually descended farther into the Beneath Places. Neb’s metal guides ran ahead, the breath of their bellows and the hiss of released steam playing counterpoint to the whir of their gears and the mechanical pulse of their pumping legs.

He ran behind them, surprised at how easily he kept up with them. The deeper down they went, the warmer the air became, and from time to time, the phosphorescent glow faded to leave them moving forward only by the light of their amber eyes in that dark place. Neb used the time to collect his thoughts, giving up on the notion of any answers from them when they ignored his initial questions.

Still hollowed by all he’d learned, he found a numb detachment ran with him. In the span of days, he’d found his dead father very much alive and had discovered through the man’s tearful confession that not only had Windwir’s fall been permitted, but that the man he’d believed his sire was not. True or not, it unsettled him most when he remembered the voice that vibrated through his body as he lay suspended in the bargaining pool.

In those moments, his detachment threatened mutiny.

What kind of father could anyone possibly find here?

Even as he thought it, the whispering started ahead as they once more passed through a broad cavern containing yet another silver pool-this one gurgling in a slow-moving current that fled away out of view. He strained his ears but could not distinguish anything intelligible. Still, the whispering grew in volume the farther they ran.

At last, it stopped when they reached a tall archway with a crystalline door set into it. The first mechoservitor placed a metal hand upon its crimson surface, and the door whispered open. A gust of hot wind escaped the space behind it, and a soft blue-green light poured out with it. The metal men inclined their heads.

Neb heard the quietest hiss, and the whispering started up again. As they stepped back, he stepped into the archway and took in the room behind it. It was another pool, one he recognized as similar to the one he’d awakened in, only this one was in a carved basin. At its center, hanging from a web of silver threads, hung a blue-green orb the size of a bull’s head.

No, Neb realized, not just an orb. Legs unfolded from it-legs also silver and easily mistaken for part of the web it hung from. The light undulated, bent through the thick, glasslike construction of the crystal that contained it. The legs twitched and moved along the strings, and the whisper now was more obviously a song.

Neb’s detachment failed now, and he felt fear grip him. He felt it like a cold fist squeezing his bladder, and as the spiderlike creature moved toward him, he stepped back. “What is it?”

A metal hand fell to his shoulder. “Wade in the waters,” the metal man said. “You can only hear his voice if you are submerged in the pool.”

Neb took a tentative step forward, then hesitated.

“This,” the metal man said, his hand still firm on his shoulder, “is what the light requires of you, Nebios Homeseeker. A tremendous price has been paid to bring you to this moment. Do not be afraid.”

He removed his boots slowly and pulled off his robe. Closing his eyes, he stepped into the pool, remembering the fear on the face of the Gray Guards when he’d nearly backed into the other pool. He felt the fluid moving over his feet, and the cool relief of it ran up his legs, soothing the ache from his run.

Yes.

He did not hear the voice as much as he felt it, and there was a calm in it that compelled him forward. He waded out to his waist and waited.

The silver legs unfolded, bearing the orb along the web as it moved closer to him. Smaller appendages-more slender than the legs-waved the air before it. Neb watched it approach. “Who are you?”

Come closer.

Neb took one step forward and then another. Now, the warm, thick liquid lapped at his chest. Beneath him, the floor of the pool felt spongy but solid. The smell of it was salty in his nose. He waited, watching as a tendril of webbing dripped from an orifice that appeared in the underside of the orb’s silver chassis. The strand of web brushed the top of the pool, sending ripples out from the place it touched, and then the legs bore the orb along the line of the thread to hang inches above the pool and within reach of Neb.

He forced himself to stay put, feeling the vibration of the voice as it moved over his skin. They named you Nebios.

He closed his eyes and pushed his answer into a thought. Yes. Who are you?

He watched the light gutter and then pulse again through the thick crystal of the globe. I am a ghost of the first people, those this world was made for. A series of images came with the words now, and Neb found them disorienting. He saw a vast planet-sized garden, scattered crystalline towers reflecting back sunlight in the midst of orchards of fruit and fields of grain.

Neb’s breath caught in his throat. “You are a Younger God.”

I am the ghost of one. An echo left behind in hope with a pocket full of seeds. And in you, Frederico’s Bargain is finally complete. The path is cleared to the tower, and you will take back what Y’Zir the Thief had no right to. You are Homeseeker and Home-Sower.

More images, stronger now that the silver legs stirred the pool, took shape behind his eyes. Neb felt the power of them on his skin. A white tower-familiar to him-rose up from the jungle and he stood upon it, surrounded by metal men and their song, a silver staff held high in his hand as the sea boiled beneath him.

He could hear the song in the air now even as he felt it moving through the fluid that pulled at him, and the gravity of it tugged him. At first, he resisted, but finally he gave himself to it, took in a great lungful of air, and immersed himself. He felt the pool shift and move about him.

Yes. Neb didn’t know if it was his voice or the voice of the Younger God. Maybe it was both in unison. Regardless, he felt a splash as the globe dropped into the pool beside him.

I have bargained for you as I promised. You are the last of my seed and the last of our people. Last of the line of Whym and last hope of Lasthome.

The words tumbled through his brain, rocks tossed into a well. The line of Whym? How could that be? He tried to collect and focus his thoughts to ask, but that level of control eluded him.

Scenes shifted around Neb now, and they were impossible to discern, storms of light and sound that moved through his mind with an ache that made him groan. He opened his mouth and felt the thick fluid pushing its way into him. It moved inside him now even as it moved over him, and he lost his footing.

Silver legs reached out to steady him, careful in their grip. For a moment, he resisted and floundered. Then, he relaxed. I do not understand.

I am the ghost of Whym. Three sons have I sent out from the basement of the world; only one has returned for my blessing. And so I give it freely: dominion over what was made for you. Your awakening will be gradual and heuristic. You will learn the path by following it. You will follow the path and save our people.

The spider’s legs were tightening upon his wrists and drawing him in. His eyes were closed against the warm pool, but he forced them open to see that the silver waters were now a brilliant blue and green. He wanted to resist but found that he hung limp as the quicksilver carried him. He felt the legs encircle him and felt the heat of the globe against his chest.

Then, those smaller appendages moved over his face, sliding into his nostrils and his ears and open mouth. When the pain came, it was instant and hot and blinding. He felt his body seize from it, and in the midst of the seizure, everything shifted to gray bordered by black.

As the world spun away, Neb heard and felt the voice once more. I give myself for you.

Then what had been light became darkness and what had been song became silence. Neb floated in it wrapped in a solitude deeper than he had ever known. And eventually, in the heart of that silence, a whispering arose. And in the core of that darkness, light bloomed and held.

When he emerged from the waters, the waters lifted him until he stood upon their mirrored surface. He ignored the empty crystalline husk with its limp silver legs. Instead, he fixed his eyes upon the metal men who waited on the shore. He knew them and he knew their song, knew the strands of it that connected them in the aether. He read the code in that canticle now and smiled at how simple it was.

“Time is of the essence,” Nebios Whym said, and his words echoed through a room now lit only by the amber of their jeweled eyes. “The antiphon awaits.”

Yes, a voice within him whispered.

Vlad Li Tam

The rocking of the ship and the rhythm of the words soothed Vlad Li Tam despite the nearby crowd of sailors. All hands were on deck now as his first grandson led some form of Y’Zirite service in the guttural tones of their language. There were songs, as well, and a long monologue with portions read from a black-bound book that Vlad suspected must be one of their gospels.

He found himself willing the service to continue, knowing that each minute that the lower decks were empty was time bought for his family to comb it for anything useful. The longer they were aboard, the higher the risk of discovery and capture. At some point, those stolen rations or tools or magicks would be noticed. They either had to take the ship-an unlikely feat-or escape it to something safer.

His grandson’s voice dropped, and Vlad turned his attention back to him. The young man had raised his arms in supplication, a silver knife held high. The moon rose, and as it did, the waters took on an ethereal glow. Out on the waters, Vlad could make out other ships moving in slow, wide circles around them, and he noticed that they were now adrift in the center of the massive pillars. As the moon rose, he saw the light of it reflected in the silver orb that hung far above.

The setting, combined with the poetry of Mal Li Tam’s voice, pulled at him. And from the looks of rapture on the faces of the crew, it compelled them as well. Two of them rolled barrels to the prow and another brought a plank. They laid the plank across the barrels.

What are they doing? But part of him already knew as his eyes followed the silver blade in his first grandson’s hand.

He’d forced Myr to bring him back when the call had gone out for all hands. Even now, she sat beside him, huddled up against the rail, not far from the hatch that would take them back to the part of the ship they called home. He felt her fingers pressing into his skin.

Do you understand any of this?

No, he tapped. But it fascinated him. Certainly, he’d heard stories about resurgences. And his family was very involved in this particular resurgence, though obviously with a great deal of help from outside. Help from people who bore the marks of Y’Zir not just upon their hearts but upon their entire bodies. He had no doubt it was faith that drove those blades into their skin.

Mal Li Tam was pacing now and speaking with an impassioned voice. He paused and pointed the knife first at one man and then at another. He even pointed it briefly toward one of the women in the party. But eventually, it was the man Vlad recognized as captain that stepped forward and offered a one-word answer.

Then, he stripped down and stretched himself upon the plank as his men tied his arms and ankles so that he was firmly fixed to the table it formed. Deck buckets were passed forward, and Vlad suddenly felt a stab of tension in his shoulder blades as he watched Mal salt the blade and roll up the sleeves of his robe.

The moonlight danced over the captain’s scarred body. He did not struggle or even cry out as the knife made its first pass. But by the seventh stroke, he wept and screamed and his men wept and screamed with him as his blood dribbled into the buckets through holes drilled in the plank. When Mal finished, he cleaned the captain’s wounds himself and then kissed him on the mouth, uttering a loud proclamation with hands outstretched toward the crew.

Then, lifting the bucket, he pitched its contents over the rail. Afterward, he called out loudly, his voice booming out over the sea and Vlad recognized the word once more. “Behemoth!”

The young man waited, and the deck became silent.

Vlad held his breath. Mal Li Tam tossed back his head and laughed loud. The crew joined him and even the captain, tears streaming down his face. Raising his gospel in one hand and his knife in the other, the Y’Zirite priest launched into another long monologue and at the end of it, laid aside his gospel to take the knife to his own hand. He drew the gash deep and held it out for them to see. Then, he cast his eyes upward, and Vlad followed his gaze. The silver orb eclipsed the moon, and for a moment, it was a globe of blue-green water speckled with stars.

He stretched out his hand beyond the railing and squeezed his blood into the ocean with a cry.

Vlad felt a tickle along the back of his neck and realized when Myr squirmed against him that he held her arm too tightly. He released it.

Could it be so simple?

He heard it rising in the stillness of the wind, felt the faintest vibration of it in the deck beneath him as it moved through the deep waters. As it drew closer, it became a buzz and then a roar, and the sea heaved and bucked from it as it moved in a slow upward spiral toward them.

Already, Mal Li Tam was stripping off his robe and fixing the silver knife between his teeth. Around them, the crew raised a shout, and in the midst of that shout, Vlad made his choice.

With one hand, he slipped Myr’s knife from her belt. With the other, he pressed words into her forearm. See the others to safety. You bear my grace.

It broke the surface off the starboard side of the bow, and he’d never seen anything like it. It was larger than a ship, long and made of a pitted metal that bent and flexed as it twisted through the water, gears grinding and shrieking as it moved. Dozens of jeweled eyes cast back the moonlight as it turned toward their ship.

Mal Li Tam leaped overboard from the prow with a loud cry.

Digging the edge of the knife into his own palm, Vlad Li Tam followed him.

Rudolfo

Rudolfo moved through the forest quietly, savoring the silence once he was far enough away from camp. Twice, he passed guard posts, whistling his intentions to them as he slipped by and into the deeper forest. At last, he reached a clearing with a tree he could lean against while watching the stars.

The meeting with Philemus had not gone well. He’d watched the man’s face redden, and in the end Rudolfo had raised his voice to make his point clear. The second captain would follow his orders, but Rudolfo sensed a breaking point on the close horizon. The Gypsy Scouts were the pride of the Ninefold Forest, a fearsome fighting force, and reducing them to a type of state police did not sit well with anyone. especially among the officers. But word now sped south, and tomorrow, Philemus would follow the birds and return home to the Seventh Forest Manor. Tonight, Rudolfo needed to decide if he would ride with him. There was nothing here for him to do, and his epiphany held, the memory of it as fresh as the memory of the knife jarring his shoulder as he pressed it into the woman’s heart.

We cannot win here. And still, he would find what path he could through what came. He had to. The face of his son, conjured up at each intersection, compelled him to find a way.

The forest was still but for the sound of overweighted branches losing their snow when the wind caught them just right. He stood and watched the moon and thought about the family that strengthened his resolve.

Over the past several months he’d found himself frequently asking himself what Jin Li Tam would do. And he’d grown accustomed to seeking her counsel late at night when they lay whispering in bed. Now, with her and Jakob so far away, he found he missed her words the most. The quiet and careful way she spoke them and the hard edge to those words when his stubbornness required it. Their pairing might have been a manipulation, but it was a formidable partnership nonetheless, and she’d proven this again and again.

We cannot win here.

The real enemy gathered strength and now made forays into the Named Lands with blood-magicked scouts who were capable of surviving the toll those magicks took upon their bodies. They were a hardy stock, well trained, and a brutal fighting force. And while this enemy built its own path, his own kin-clave to the south plotted against his family. His best intelligence couldn’t touch the competence and ferocity of Ria’s network, and his best ambassadors could not persuade even the opening of dialogue with any but Erlund, who was too distracted with political reform in the wake of his civil war to care much for what happened with the Ninefold Forest.

Rudolfo swallowed and wished for a moment he’d brought the firespice with him. He pushed the craving aside, alarmed at how quickly it had become a crutch he could limp along with.

The thought of limping brought Isaak to mind, and he wondered how his metal friend fared. By now, Isaak should be in the Marshlands with the others. Before Jin’s coded note, Rudolfo had worried less. But knowing now that another metal man-this Watcher she spoke of-made his home there raised Rudolfo’s hackles to third alarm. Whoever their enemy was, they did not want the mechanicals dreaming. And, more than that, they didn’t want the Seven Cacophonic Deaths loose in the world. He did not doubt for a second that their call for him to release the mechoservitors into their care would ultimately lead to yet more light gone from the world.

Rudolfo sighed and tried to pull the stillness of the night into himself, tried to conjure images of his sleeping child.

He heard the man in the forest long before he saw him. The crunch of frozen snow, the labored breathing and the whispered curses were like shouts across an open plain.

Rudolfo remembered a time when Gregoric would follow him out into the woods. That first captain and closest friend always gave him plenty of time to think in the quiet, but inevitably, he turned up. That was a loss that still rode him hard.

Lysias broke into the clearing, bundled in furs and panting as he placed his boots in the prints Rudolfo had left behind. The old man looked around, clouds of steam rising from his mouth and nostrils as he caught his breath.

Rudolfo whistled low and the general turned. As the man made his way to him, he noted his posture and stride. Whatever anger he bore had been burned off by the quick-paced walk. He nodded to Rudolfo.

“You’ve found me,” Rudolfo said.

“The snow helps.” Lysias took the tree next to him and leaned against it, still gulping his air.

Rudolfo said nothing, giving the man time to gather his thoughts and slow his heart rate and breathing. He waited for five minutes, and then Lysias finally spoke.

“It is quiet here,” the general said.

Rudolfo nodded. “It is good for thinking.” He’d known since boyhood how to woo a crowd, but it was from the quiet, still places that he drew his strength and found his paths.

Lysias’s eyes narrowed in the moonlight. “And what are you thinking?”

Rudolfo took in a deep breath. “I’m thinking,” he said in a slow voice, “that no matter what we do, we’re damned and buggered. We build our army too late for a hunter that has set his snares and harried his prey too long.” As he released those words, he felt their power on the wind and felt relief from finally having said them. “We cannot win here.”

Lysias nodded. “You may be correct.”

“And I am thinking,” Rudolfo said, “that it may have been a mistake, killing the girl.”

The old general nodded again. “It may have been. I think I could’ve broken her.”

Rudolfo regarded him. “Perhaps,” he said, “but I think it would’ve broken something in you. Some actions we take can do that.”

Lysias chuckled. “You underestimate me, Lord. Those parts of me were broken a long time ago.” He was quiet for a moment. “Still, she is dead and that is an unchangeable fact.” He looked back to Rudolfo, and their eyes met. “At least,” he said, “you took action.”

Yes. “I hope it was the right action.”

Lysias shrugged. “It felt right at the moment?”

“It felt. ” Rudolfo let the words trail out. His answer troubled him. “It felt satisfying.”

“Perhaps it was what you needed to find your path again.”

Perhaps it was. But another part of him rebuked that inner voice. He let the quiet settle in again.

The sound of the bird was loud, and Rudolfo heard its shrill cries long before it settled onto a fallen log in the center of the clearing. His hand moved instinctively for his scout knife as it flapped the ice from its wings.

It was larger than he’d imagined it would be up close. Its dead, glassy eyes stared, and even from a distance, he could smell the decay of it. The kin-raven hopped in place upon the log and opened its beak.

A voice leaked out. “Greetings, Rudolfo son of Jakob, lord of the Ninefold Forest. I am Eliz Xhum, regent of the Crimson Empress. Grace and peace to you from the Empire of Y’Zir.” The voice paused, though the beak did not move. “Your father rejoiced at the coming of this day and bid me bear you his pride and love. He had longed to hold the Child of Promise in his arms but, alas, it was not the path set out for him.”

Rudolfo felt the words even as he heard them. They were colder than the winter sky and sharper than knives. My father? He forced his attention back to the mottled dark messenger upon its log.

“I have been informed of the recent treachery against your family and can assure you that every step is being taken both for the prevalence of justice and the safety of the Great Mother and her Child of Promise. I regret the chaos and violence of the past two years and I regret the chaos yet to come, though I’m certain a time is coming when you will concur, as your father did before you, that this is essential for the healing of our world.” There was a pause, and Rudolfo glanced to Lysias. The man listened intently with a look of understanding that grew to look more like alarm with every word. The voice continued. “My emissary will reach your western border by way of the Whymer Road in approximately one week’s time. My eager hope is that they will be met with peace and welcome, and escorted safely to you that our strategy for a successful transition may be discussed. I look forward to our work together, Rudolfo.”

The bird’s beak closed, and Rudolfo did not hesitate. He drew his knife and flung it at the kin-raven even as its great wings spread. He’d not thrown in a goodly while, and he felt the strain of the sudden movement in his shoulder and arm. The knife went wide, missing by a span, and the bird lifted into the sky to shriek at him as it fled west.

Rudolfo cursed and walked to the log, recovering his knife. Lysias said nothing, and by the look on his face, Rudolfo could tell the older officer was trying to read him, to gauge this new information and its impact upon him.

My father. He did not believe it, of course. It wasn’t possible. He’d watched his father ride out to put down resurgences in the name of the Pope. What was his role in this? The knots in his stomach were twisting now as his mind went back to the blood shrine they’d found in the forest. And the list of names, including some of his father’s closest and most trusted friends.

Our strategy for a successful transition. He looked to Lysias. “What do you make of it?”

“Invasion,” the old general said. “And he would not tell you so much if he did not know already that there was nothing to be done for it.”

Rudolfo nodded. “I hope you’re wrong.”

But he did not believe he was, any more than he believed this sudden fear he felt about his father was somehow misplaced. It answered too many questions.

In that moment, Rudolfo wept, and he felt rage and despair rising off of him like heat from a banked fire.