Nearby, TEL—made completely of rock this time—scrambled up.
“Remain here, TEL,” Siris said.
“But—”
“Here,” Siris said more firmly.
The small construct obeyed. From there, Siris trod a very familiar trail. Down from the cliff overlooking the God King’s palace, across the barren, packed death zone surrounding it, to the pathway leading toward the gates. The old palace lay decrepit, stone collapsed in places. Why would the Soulless come here? Why not someplace more grand?
On the pathway close to the palace, Siris found the first daeril. Dead.
Siris knelt beside the creature. It had been hacked to pieces with a sharp blade. He thought he recognized the beast from its orange-red skin, twisted too-long limbs, inhuman face. It was one of those who had greeted Siris when he’d come to this place years back, after defeating the God King.
But this creature was freshly dead; the blood was dry, the body cool, but rot had not yet set in. Wary, Siris picked his way across the ruined grounds.
He found more dead just beyond the gateway. An entire heap of trolls, mountainous beasts that he’d once assumed to be unintelligent—until he’d met one with an alarmingly strong wit. That troll had betrayed Siris, unfortunately.
He walked across the causeway and entered the grand hall. More dead daerils, and broken machines. A few chains hung down from the ceiling over a deep hole in the floor, remnants of the lift. It had been destroyed, apparently during the same battle that had killed the tower’s defenders.
With a sigh, Siris removed his gauntlets, stepped back, then dashed forward and jumped out over the void, catching one of the chains. He swung back and forth until the momentum ran out, then began to climb upward, toward the God King’s throne room.
ISA DRANK alone.
Contrary to what many would assume, she didn’t prefer to drink alone. She’d rather be out with the soldiers, enjoying their company. She liked people. Well, she liked listening to people. Analyzing them. She didn’t particularly like talking to them, but a woman could prefer being silent in the company of others, as opposed to drinking alone, couldn’t she?
You’d better not get yourself killed, Whiskers, she thought, taking a pull from her beer. She sat at a barlike shelf in the cavern of the God King’s hideout, waiting for contact from Siris.
“That is not a table,” said Eves, the stout Devoted, as he shuffled past her and checked on some wires. “That is a bank of very important, very holy equipment.”
“Yeah?” Isa said.
“Yes. And you’re drinking at it as if this were the bar of some tavern!”
“I’ll try not to spill,” Isa said, taking another pull on her drink.
The priest huffed and wandered away. Isa had watched him the entire day, including the point where—she was quite certain—he’d almost transformed himself into a Deathless. He’d primed the machine, set some input into the mirror, and stood facing it with sweat on his brow. Then he’d cursed and turned it all off before leaving to get some lunch.
Now he seemed to be fretting about other items. He eventually left to check on the men outside. He wouldn’t make himself Deathless unless permitted to do so by his god. Well, you have to admire his loyalty, she thought, taking another drink.
Wait. No you didn’t. The man was nearly as evil as his master, and culpable in his schemes and murders. That wasn’t loyalty to admire. She’d rather the man worshiped a rock than served the Deathless.
And I’ve basically delivered the rebellion to one of them. Damn. What did she think of Siris? No idea. Maybe the beer knew.
She took another drink.
“You pine for him.”
Isa spun, jumping from her stool, nearly throwing her mug toward the sound. The God King stood in the shadows back there, bare-chested, wearing the head of a jackal as some kind of illusion to hide his features.
She hadn’t seen or heard him enter. How long had he been there? Had he watched Eves consider making himself Deathless?
“You,” Isa said, “are one creepy bastard. You realize that?”
He stepped forward, watching her with eyes she could not see. “It is natural to be captivated by one of the Deathless. We are your gods, are we not? I would love to hear what you have spoken of when alone together, if only to judge what parts of his mortal upbringing he has adopted.”
“You think I’d tell you?”
“Of course not,” Raidriar said, walking over to her pitcher of beer. He sniffed at it, then—surprisingly—poured himself a mug. He raised it. “To our alliance.”
“Go suck on a rock.”
He drank anyway, the front of his illusory head engulfing the mug as he put it to his unseen lips. “I promise,” he said lightly, “that all in my lands will know freedom, prosperity, and ease for the next, say . . . thousand years. A mythologically appropriate number, wouldn’t you say?”
“What?”
“Before, when I first joined with Ausar, you insisted that you would keep fighting me. You said you would never turn the kingdom back over to me. Well, obviously, you are going to do just that. So I have decided it is time for benevolence to my people.” He sniffed, and wiped his hidden face with his hand. “After all, them hating their god was always just a means to an end, to ensure they kept sending the Sacrifices. I hardly need that anymore.”
“You think I’m going to just believe you? Accept that you’ve changed in an eyeblink? Become compassionate?”
“Changed?” Raidriar asked. “No, I have not changed. I am king and god to this people—I have always been both destroyer and life-giver. We do not change.” He inspected the bottom of his mug. “None save for Ausar. He is different. I have not yet decided fully if I find that remarkable or reprehensible.
“Regardless, child, human civilization goes in cycles. One cannot let them have prosperity for too long, or they will misuse it, destroying themselves and others. For this reason, they have been cast down—given humble roots, to inspire simple wholesomeness. Still, it has been a good long time since I have allowed a golden age, an age of discovery and wonder. I had been thinking of having one arrive soon; and for your rebellion, I have moved up the timetable.”
“Go suck on a rock,” she said again. “A muddy one.”
“I have no idea what that means,” Raidriar said. “I assume it’s a grander insult than it sounds. You really mean to keep fighting me?”
“Yes. We’ll rebel.”
He laughed. “Against what? Did you hear me? I’ll make the people free. You’ll lead my people to rebellion while those underneath the other Deathless are being beaten and oppressed? You will waste your time in the one place in the world where everyone will be fed and happy?”
“I . . .”
“I always keep my word,” Raidriar said. “You have won. Rebellion over. Freedom established. Congratulations.”
Isa felt nauseous. The problem was, he might be telling the truth. What would she do if he started treating everyone in his kingdom well, without any further need for bloodshed?
“With freedom proclaimed here,” Raidriar said, “with me becoming a benevolent god who grants technology and wonders, you could take your fighters to the other oppressive regimes. You could change the entire world, free hundreds of thousands. Or, I suppose, you could stay here to sputter and fight, becoming increasingly irrelevant as I bestow boon after boon.”
“I hate you,” she whispered.
“I think you know I don’t really care,” Raidriar said. He set his empty mug on the equipment, then strolled toward the way out. “But don’t sound so surprised that I have bested you. I have been doing this for a very long time, child. Did you think, perhaps, I had learned nothing in those thousands of years?”
He left.
Isa stared at her mug, fuming. Heaven take that creature.
I can’t fight things like him, she thought, angry—though she wasn’t completely sure why. Angry that Raidriar had agreed to give his people freedom, wealth, and technology? Why should that make her so furious?
She turned, looking at the equipment behind her.
She had watched Eves set it up, then almost use it.
She had watched very, very closely.
Oh, hell, she thought, realization dawning.
IT WAS quite an undertaking in full armor, but he was Deathless, and his body worked at a constant peak of efficiency. He arrived cautiously, peeking over the lip of the floor toward the throne room.
It appeared to be empty. The throne hadn’t even been repaired from the attack that Siris had fended off here, so long ago. He heard the faint drip of water leaking somewhere. Raidriar insisted that the copy was here, in this palace somewhere. Could the God King be wrong?
Siris rocked on the chain, swinging back and forth until he could throw himself out over the small gap onto the floor of the throne room. He landed with a crash of clanking armor, but came up quickly and slipped his sword from its sheath with a leathery rasp.
He waited there, in a crouch, listening. He heard only that same dripping from before. That, and . . . muttering?
What in the name of the seven? Siris thought, and spared a moment of amusement that his instinct—given him by his upbringing—was still to curse by Raidriar and his Pantheon.
He crossed the throne room and found an open door at the back. He could swear this hadn’t been here before—but, then, the opening looked to be hidden in the stonework. Perhaps it had existed, but Siris hadn’t found it.
The muttering came from inside. Siris located the source of the dripping. Not water, but blood, dripping from the toe of a daeril who had been nailed to the wall with a spear through its chest.
Siris stepped through the door and into a room of silvery metal and wires. Raidriar sat here, with no helm, muttering to himself and tapping his finger against a mirror.
Hell take me . . . Siris thought. The Soulless wore hair that hadn’t seen a comb in far too long. Its clothing was soiled, and beside it sat a plate of what appeared to be fingers. It raised one of these to its lips, gnawing on the flesh and tapping at the screen.
“He’s going to end it,” the Soulless muttered. “Boom. Gone.”
The Infinity Blade lay in a heap of swords beside the doorway. Discarded as if it were junk. Did that mean the Blade was a fake? Siris slipped it from the pile, causing several swords to clank.
The Soulless twisted in its seat, his eyes wide, hands clawlike and rigid. Siris raised the Blade, falling into a battle stance.
The Soulless snorted. “Come to kill me? Ha! Joke’s on you. Just a copy. How stupid you look!”
“You do know, then,” Siris said.
“Yes, yes. Just a copy. Everything is a copy.”
Siris frowned. “You’re a Soulless.”
“Everything is Soulless!” The clone ran fingers through its hair. “Whole world. We thought we were playing chess with him, you see. We’ve all gotten very good at the game. We know all the rules. Problem is, he’s not playing chess. He’s playing solitaire!”
The Soulless’s mind, it appeared, had not lasted the ten years that Raidriar had said it would.