The Black Chalice

Fallen Son
Forty-Two

For the first time Alymere could read the book in its entirety.

There were no more secrets, no hidden words in the writhing script teasing him, staying just out of reach. Everything it had to say was laid bare in a language he could understand.

He trembled as he laid the old book out on the bed, cracking it open and turning page after page quickly, drinking in the words without focusing on what they said. They spun through him, creating web after web of connections, joining thoughts he had never imagined, and, at the centre of the web, one single image, the Black Chalice. It was there at the heart of all of it, the one great truth of the Devil's Bible. The word chalice chalice chalice blurred into a single sound inside his mind. It began as a low insistent echo, like the distant sound of thunder rolling over the hills, and it grew louder, as though nearing, and becoming more demanding with each repetition. The word caused him to wince as it drummed over and over again through his head, chalicechalicechalice repeating itself so many times it lost all shape and form, sacrificing its own identity to become something entirely new, like a snake coming alive in the darkness at the back of his skull. And as its tongue lashed around the hissing sibilants, the word stopped making any sense. But it was no less demanding for that insanity. Far from it, it was all the more demanding.

Alymere let his fingers rest on the indentations of the actual words and the shapes they made within the page, feeling out where the scribe's nib had dug into the paper. And as he did so, more and more of the words came alive inside him, starting with the very first line, being an account of the entire wisdom of Man as transcribed by Harmon Reclusus, and he knew beyond any doubting that all of the secrets of the book were going to reveal themselves to him.

For all that promise, the only thing he was interested in learning about was the Black Chalice.

He drank it all in hungrily, all the dark knowledge that the Devil's Bible contained, beginning with the confession that the book owed its creation not to Harmon's pen and ink, but rather to the pact the monk had made with the Devil himself. Harmon, if his confession were to be believed, was, at the time of writing, a prisoner of his own kind, locked away in the spire of Medcaut for his human frailties — his perversions, as he called them — without food or water. The only things his brothers would allow him, in order to record his confession, were a quill, inks, and parchment pages. But rather than baring his soul and recording his sins, the monk had chosen to embark upon a far more noble — and impossible — task: to record everything he had ever learned in a single volume. It was nothing short of hubris to declare it the sum of human wisdom, of course, but that was only one of his many sins. Harmon Reclusus had been working on the illuminated manuscript for years, but there was no way he could possibly hope to complete his life's work. Not now. His body was in the final stages of the greatest betrayal imaginable.

He was dying.

He could not keep food down. It had been days since he had had even a cup of water, let alone a meal, and as he felt himself weakening to the point of unconsciousness and the inevitability of death, but tormented by the thought of failure, of going without finishing his masterpiece, Harmon had fallen on his knees and made a prayer.

This prayer was not offered to God, who had forsaken him in his hour of need, but to the Devil himself.

It was a desperate plea.

And Satan had answered, granting him a single night of feverish consciousness throughout which he would do more than just finish his book, he would channel the entire knowledge of the divine and demonic, far beyond the understanding of mere man, into the pages of his manuscript, thus transforming it from the wisdom of a single man into something far more dangerous: the Devil's Bible. By sunrise, Satan told him, he would be spent, gone, burned out in a blaze of black wisdom — and the cost of this bargain? The book completed in return for his immortal soul.

Harmon had sealed the pact with his blood, drawn to the promise of forbidden knowledge.

How could he have resisted, wondered Alymere? After years of isolation and study, giving everything of his life to the completion of one great work, the penitent had succumbed not to earthly temptations, not to the sins of the flesh, but to the simple promise of finishing what he had started. It was not about knowing everything, for he would hold that knowledge for less than a single night. And so what if the cost of it was something he himself neither had use for nor believed in? God had abandoned him. That only made the deal all the more appealing to the monk. Harmon got what he wanted, he finished his life's work, and the Devil was just as happy with the price they'd agreed.

Alymere knew all of this in seconds, opening himself up to the book, and understanding even as he did who the voice inside his head belonged to.

I am glad we understand each other, the voice preened inside his mind. Oh yes, he was well aware what — or who — had taken up residence within him. And rather than repulsing him, Alymere found himself embracing the invader. As he had promised, together they would become everything it was possible for him to become. Together they would be Alymere, Destroyer of Kingdoms. They would be Alymere, Killer of Kings. They would be Alymere, Champion of the Wretched. They would be Alymere, Saviour of the Sick and Alymere, Son of Albion. They would be all of the things the Crow Maiden had foreseen for them. Together they would be all of these and more.

I can feel the hunger burning inside you… It is unquenchable. It roars. It rages. It consumes. There is nothing like it, nothing like the desire for vengeance, against the world that has wronged you, against the people who have betrayed you, against the black veins of sickness that permeate every work of God, from the foundations up. I can feel it. You cannot hide it from me. It nourishes me. In return I will nourish you. I will be the fire in your blood. I will be the righteous fury in your fist. I will be the passion in your loins. I will be the flame that stirs your heart. I will be the ambrosial milk that grants sustenance even as it spills from your lips. I will be the light in the darkness of your soul. I will be you. And you will be me. Do you want that?

"Yes."

How much?

"More than anything."

I want you to do something for me, for us, to bring us closer together, to make us complete. Will you do that for me?

"Yes."

As the image of the Black Chalice swelled to fill his mind, the Devil commanded: Bring it to me. Bring me the Chalice. Go first to the great Laird's cairn; you will know your way from there. And, as Alymere closed his eyes, all of the real secrets, the darkest, most thoroughly hidden treasures of the Devil's book made themselves known to him in a dizzying rush. The thrill of them raced from his fingers to his heart, traversing every nerve and fibre, transforming him into a conduit for the book's dark wisdom. He opened himself to it, drinking it in, absorbing every fateful ounce of knowledge from the first sins to the greatest evils, the secrets of creation and the lies of faith and flesh. Every treachery, every deceit and betrayal, every bare-faced lie whispered or told bold as brass, echoed through his head; not the words, but a deeper understanding, of the lies themselves. He not only understood the drive to lie, to cheat, to steal, but revelled in it. The thrill he felt was almost sexual in its nature, a force that owned him body and soul. And it came at no little cost. His entire body trembled, every muscle tensing, and then he began to convulse violently as the arcana took root within him. Beads of sweat broke and ran from his temple and brow over the too-smooth planes of his deformity. He blinked them back as they stung his eyes. He chewed on his lower lip until it bled. His breathing was ragged. Excited. Fearful.

Alymere whispered the words back to the air, repeating what he heard inside his head. As they left his lips, the words began to take on a life all of their own. He fell into a rhythmic chant that matched the pounding of the blood through his temples. The words came faster and faster, growing louder and louder until he was sure he was shouting, yelling, but he couldn't stop himself. And he couldn't pull his hands from the book.

Alymere's eyes rolled up inside his skull, his jaw locked open in a silent scream as the ink chased up from the page, roiling through, over and under his skin, painting him as the illumination fled the book. The symbols chased after each other across the flat plains of scar tissue up to his throat, then up over his chin and across his cheekbones and into his eyes, flooding into him. They began as words, identifiable, legible, but as more and more wisdom bled out of the book into him the ink became a solid blackness that transformed him into something demonic: a creature of ink.

As the last traces of writing fled the page and entered his hands, racing up his forearms, the skin left in its wake returned once more to raw, pink flesh. Stain by stain, his body returned to its natural state, the words of the Devil bleeding into his eyes to stain upon his soul, and then he began screaming again. It was a scream like none that had ever been heard in this house.

Seconds after the screams began the door flung open on its hinges, slamming against the wall.

The huge figure of Sir Bors de Ganis filled the doorway, sword in hand, as Alymere fell forward across the book, utterly spent.

For a moment Bors didn't move. He stood as though trapped in the doorway, staring at Alymere's collapsed body, and then everything exploded into sound and panic as a bird flew at the glass window, cannoning off it in a flurry of feathers as the glass cracked, and whatever spell had bound Bors broke along with it. Seeing Alymere was alone, he dropped his sword and crashed into the room, and bounded forward, arms outstretched as though to catch Alymere, despite the fact that he had already fallen.

The knight gathered Alymere into his arms.

He lifted him and carried him to the cot, where he laid him down, stroking the matted hair away from his brow with curious tenderness. Alymere didn't move; didn't make a sound. It took a moment for Bors to realise he wasn't breathing. He couldn't think. He feared the worst, ready to beat on the boy's chest and try to hammer the life back into him, but as he leaned in close he heard a sound, so quiet he almost missed it: a gasp as the breath caught in Alymere's lungs escaped. It might almost have been a death rattle, but it was followed by a second and a third breath. He felt the warmth of Alymere's breath against his cheek as he began to breathe again.

Bors closed his eyes and said a silent prayer of thanks.

He took the blanket from where it was bundled up at the bottom of the bed and covered Alymere with it.

Seeing the book on the floor, Bors stooped and turned a few of the pages, but could make no sense of the scrawled words. Something about the book, however, the very physical presence of it, repulsed him. It was wrong in a way he couldn't begin to explain. Looking at it, he had the overpowering desire to take it across to the hearth and consign it to the flames.

His skin crawled as he reached down to close the book, and as he did, he broke whatever connection Alymere had to it, but when it came to it he couldn't throw the Devil's Bible into the fire.

It didn't matter. Even with the book closed, Alymere truly was no longer himself. Burning it would not have saved him.

Bors did not see the single white feather that had caught in the broken window. Even if he had, he could not have known what it meant, nor how far his young friend had fallen.