Darksiders: The Abomination Vault (18 page)

The Horseman nodded. “It’s not a feeling I’m accustomed to. And it’s more than a little unpleasant.”

“And this comes up now because …?”

“My current assignment. Not even the other Horsemen, or the Charred Council, know the
full
story. Nobody living does, except me. I was hoping it would stay that way. Now … Now, for the first time in a
very
long life, I’m faced with the repercussions of my ‘unjustifiable crimes.’ I can readily accept the consequences of any act that I still approve of, that I would commit again, but …”

“Are you seeking advice?” the Keeper asked.

“Not especially.” Death abruptly straightened, and whatever doubt had crept into his voice vanished. “That is, I’ll happily tell you what’s happened …”
Well, most of it
. “… and consider any council you care to offer. But that wasn’t my primary purpose. I think, before I do what I must to make things
right, I just wanted to unburden myself to someone who might understand.”

“Fair enough. I appreciate your trust, Death.”

“Who said anything about trust? You’re just the only person I know who’s potentially as vile as I am.”

The Keeper offered a soft laugh, though it may have been out of courtesy rather than genuine amusement. “So what lies ahead?”

“Hmm. I have Panoptos searching the archives for any knowledge of our enemy that the Council’s agents may have picked up over time, but I don’t have high hopes. Odds are, if there was anything important written there, the Council would know of it.

“I think my best option is the Library of the Argent Spire. You know what sort of sticklers the angels are for record keeping. They’re mostly devoted to writing about their own kind, but they should still have quite a bit about Makers in … Something funny, Keeper?”

“Only,” the other said, once he was able to catch his breath, “that you might want to tread lightly in the White City. I fear they may take a dim view of a Horseman’s presence just now.”

Death actually sighed. “Which one this time?”

“War. It was official Council business, if that helps at all.”

“Oddly, it doesn’t. Why in the name of the Abyss can’t anything ever be—”

As he had done on the fields of Kothysos, Dust went berserk. It wasn’t nearly so extreme this time, consisting primarily of an array of loud screeches, a violent fluttering of the wings that resembled some sort of fit, and a clenching of the talons. On the other hand, last time he hadn’t been sitting on Death’s shoulder when it happened.

The Horseman, wincing in discomfort, reached out to remove the bird’s claws from his flesh. Holding Dust in his cupped palms, he lifted the beast to eye level.

The mental link forged itself almost instantly, the voice of the Crowfather cracking through his skull.
“Death!”

“More accurately, ‘Deaf,’ if you keep shouting like that.”

“Oh, be silent and pay attention! I’ve discovered something in my children’s memories that you need to know.”

Images buffeted Death’s vision, though not nearly as chaotically as they had before.

Soaring over the mesa and the surrounding lands of the Crowfather’s domain …

Fields overrun with strange creatures, shining rather than fleshy, utterly beyond the ken of avian minds …

Blood and pain and feathers as the flock fell upon the enemy, every instinct overridden by the need to defend the Father …

There! At the very edge of the gleaming stampede, a spread of snowy wings cocooned in light …

Death blinked as the contact was severed. He glanced down at Dust, who peered around nervously before beginning to preen the underside of his left wing.

“Well,” Death said to the Keeper, “apparently it’s a good thing I’ve already worked the White City into my itinerary.”

“Oh? And why might that be?”

“Because the man who led the attack on the Crowfather’s realm,” the Horseman said, scooping up Harvester from where it leaned against the wall, “and who is presumably Belisatra’s partner in all of this …

“Is an angel.”

“Perhaps,” the Keeper said softly, “you had best start at the beginning …”

A
S
W
AR HAD DONE EARLIER
, D
EATH DECIDED ON A
diplomatic and formal approach to the White City, rather than simply materializing in the midst of the ivory towers and gleaming architecture. And so Despair, as Ruin had done earlier, trod the nearly blinding expanse of the angels’ golden bridge.

The hooves of this unnatural creature echoed hollowly with every step, in a manner that even Ruin’s had not. The glow emanating upward from the span was warped and muted by the ugly vapors clouding those hooves, until it appeared that the light itself had grown vaguely nauseated.

Horseman and horse ignored it, as they ignored the magnificent falls, the imposing outcroppings of ancient stone, the sculpted sentries who watched their progress with eyes made partly blind by the erosion of ages. Dust circled overhead, alert for any danger, but Death himself had eyes only for the gate, which rose slowly, ever higher, as the horizon drew near.

When the crow swooped low to screech a warning, and certainly when the Rider drew near enough to the wall to observe the abnormally large contingent of guards—all of whom were pointing halberds, Redemption cannons, and other weapons
his way—Death finally allowed his attentions to be drawn from that gate itself.

A second phalanx circled above, just as heavily armed. Death reined Despair to a halt some dozen paces before the gate, and spoke.

Briefly. “Hello.”

“How
dare
you?” The phalanx commander, carrying a naked blade taller than he was, and just as broad, took a single step forward. “How dare you show your face here, Horseman?”

“I am not my brother. I bear no responsibility for whatever occurred during his visit.”

“Visit?
Rampage
would be a more accurate term!”

“Perhaps. He was going about the business of the Charred Council. As am I.” Then, as an afterthought, “I’m also working on the same problem as Azrael. In the interests of etiquette, I’d be happy to wait here long enough for one of you to check with him.”

The commander seemed disinclined to follow that particular suggestion. “You can turn around, is what you can do, Rider! While we still remember ourselves well enough to let you live at all!”

“Would Heaven declare war on the Charred Council, then?”

Several of the soldiers muttered and whispered behind their leader’s back. “The Council did that when they sent your brother to attack us!” he shouted, but even he didn’t sound quite as certain as he had.

“Did we? Odd that we’ve heard nothing from the leaders and generals of the White City. I wasn’t aware that your laws granted every solider in your army the discretion to declare acts of war.” Death waited for no answer, but set Despair to moving ahead at a slow, inexorable walk.

“You can admit me,” the Horseman told them as he approached, “because you have no legal or wartime standing to stop me. Or you can admit me because I am allied with Azrael in my current endeavor. Or you can admit me because you’re all dead, and therefore unable to prevent it.

“I leave the choice entirely in your hands, but I do suggest you make it quickly.”

The untempered rage and simmering resentment of the angels were very nearly a palpable force. It actually felt as though Despair was struggling to wade through a clinging mire of Creation’s fiercest emotions. Fists tightened on weapons, jaws clenched with force enough to bruise the bone beneath, fingers twitched on triggers almost of their own accord. The loathing these angels felt for him now might have given even one of the Grand Abominations a contest in hatred.

But each of them stepped aside, however grudgingly. They knew, as Death knew, that the laws they held so sacred would allow nothing else.

He did draw Despair to a halt once more, only briefly, just before passing beneath the barbican. Ignoring the fuming angels around him, he directed his attention instead to those hovering above.

“If even one of you takes so much as a single shot at that crow,” he told them, his tone matter-of-fact, “then after you are dead, I will summon your spirits to provide me with the names of your siblings, your parents, and your children. And I will animate your corpses to murder them with your own cold hands.”

The eyes that watched the horse and Rider as they passed beneath the gate remained impossibly wide, but it was no longer rage alone that shone within.

D
EATH EMERGED ONTO THE STREETS
of the White City, the artificial valleys that wound between the equally artificial bluffs of angelic architecture. The glowers that swirled around him in a tempest of hostility, coming from every angel in every direction, were ample evidence that the city’s anger was not limited to the guardians of the wall.

He raised an arm, along with a mental call. Dust landed hard upon his wrist an instant later.

“I’m thinking,” Death said to the crow, “that perhaps I should have questioned War on the details of his little sojourn here before I left the Council’s realm.”

Dust croaked at him and hopped over to the saddle horn.

“Pride,” he said in answer to the bird’s unasked question. “I’d already dismissed them, told them I was leaving them behind. To go back after that and ask his counsel …” Death shrugged, then stood briefly in the saddle so that he might get his bearings. Satisfied, he directed Despair to the next intersection and began up a shallowly inclined road to the city’s higher layers.

His gradual ascent had carried him through three levels of the White City, with roughly four or five more to go, when he found his progress hindered.

An angel, not markedly different from any of the hundreds of others Death had seen, dropped from above to land, kneeling, in Despair’s path. His armor, though massive and imposing, was perhaps a bit plainer than the norm for his people. It lacked most of the ornate edges and fluting, though what adornment it
did
have glinted as brightly as any other. He carried a Redemption cannon—the weight distributed between his right hand and a heavy strap looped over his shoulder—and the hilt of a sword jutted from behind his back.

“Welcome, Lord Death.” He bowed his head so low, his snowy hair nearly brushed the roadway.

“Um … thank you. And you would be?”

“I am called Semyaza, Lord.”

“Don’t call me that. And stand up!”

The angel obeyed, finally meeting the Horseman’s gaze. He appeared … Well, he appeared pretty much like most of the other angels currently fluttering about. “Of course. I was merely being respectful.”

“That would make you the first,” Death noted.

Semyaza smiled shallowly. “Yes, I’ll beg your pardon for the others’ behavior. War brought down an entire building while he was here, to say nothing of killing a few score of us.”

Behind the mask, Death blinked.
What in the name of Oblivion were you
doing
here, brother?

Aloud, he said, “I see. And why, then, have you chosen to play gracious host, Semyaza?”

“Azrael sent me. He felt that an escort would help ensure that none of our more short-tempered brethren cause you any difficulty. Not that he was in any particular fear for
you
, you understand, but he wished to avoid the shedding of any further angelic blood.”

“I see,” Death said again. The stirrups creaked as he shifted his weight. “And I know that you’re not leading me into an ambush how, exactly?”

The angel’s smile grew wider. “I’d have thought ill of you if you
weren’t
suspicious. But I’m not ‘leading’ you anywhere. My duty is to accompany you. There are several routes from here to the Argent Spire, where Azrael awaits. You’re welcome to choose whichever you wish, and to stay as near or far from the more populated streets as you prefer.”

“All right. This way, then. And Semyaza?”

“Yes?”

“Stay where I can see you. Slip behind me, even for an instant, and I might get the wrong idea.”

So they went, Despair keeping his pace moderate, less for the sake of their new companion than because of the angelic traffic around them. Semyaza walked several paces to the left and a few in front. Death watched him as carefully as he watched their surroundings, and the angel clearly
knew
Death watched him.

So long as we understand each other
, the Horseman mused.

Up they marched, and over, and up some more, following the rising roads and suspended bridges that brought them ever nearer their goal. Angels swooped overhead in numbers at least as great as those who chose the roads, the steady beat of their wings creating a constant downdraft between the monolithic structures. Death regretted the White City’s ambient light—or, more accurately, the resulting lack of shade. The appearance of a sudden shadow would have made it easier to spot any potential attack from above.

Still, the Horseman’s attention never wavered, and both Dust and Despair were equally alert. Any enemy who could catch them unawares now, whether in league with Semyaza or not, would be an impressive foe, indeed!