Duskfall (57 page)

Then Knot was alone in the blackness.

T
HE MIST SWALLOWED
W
INTER
’
S
scream as it pulled Knot from her. One moment she was holding his hand, the next he was sinking back into the dark, and then Winter was alone.

All around her was nothing but blackness. She looked down, but could not see her own body. She could feel it; she placed her hands on her face, her arms, her belly, but she saw nothing. The dark was tangible, overwhelming, and Winter felt as if she would drown in it.

Perhaps this is Oblivion. Perhaps I am dead.

Then, the Voice. A deep, booming growl, every syllable rolled in flame. The same one that had spoken as the mist poured from the shadow above the throne.

“Not death. Death is the easier path; I bring something else.”

Winter looked up. She shook her fist at the Voice in anger.

“I’m not afraid! You’ve already taken everything I love. You have no power over me!”

The Voice laughed, deep and booming.
“All things fear, daughter. And so, I have power over all things.”

Screams in the distance. Winter thought they were her own, at first. It was difficult to tell in the black. But, as she listened, the voices grew more distinct. One was a woman. There were two others… two men, Winter thought. They sounded familiar, but she could not place them.

“If you think a few screams will scare me, you’re—”

Winter stopped. One of the people was screaming her name. And finally she recognized the voice. A deep pit of horror opened up within her.

“Papa!”

The screaming stopped. Before her were three figures. Her father, in furs and wool, and Lian. Between them was a short woman that Winter did not recognize. Her hair and eyes were raven-black, just like Winter’s. She wore a red dress, simple but elegant. She smelled, faintly, of cinnamon.

“Mother?”

Winter’s father shook his head. “Do not speak to her, Winter. You have no right. You stole her from me, you made my life miserable by taking away the only person I loved. I hated you for that.” Her father’s soft brown eyes grew hard. “Every moment, I’ve hated you.”

Winter stepped back in shock. Her father had never spoken this way.

“And how do you repay my kindness? How do you repay my sacrifice? By destroying yourself. Losing yourself in this
faltira
, in this ridiculous world of psimancy and magic.”

“Murderer,” her mother whispered.

Winter’s heart crumbled. “I’m so sorry, Papa, I didn’t mean to let it go so far. I didn’t mean for any of this to happen, you have to believe me!”

Her father shook his head. “What is done is done, Winter. Don’t waste my time with excuses.”

Winter stared at her father, unable to speak. How could he say such things? He had loved her, her entire life he had loved her.

Hadn’t he?

“Murderer,” her mother said.

“I never forgave you,” Lian said, shaking his head. “What I told you was a lie. I knew we would die here because of you. I lied to you, but I see now I should have told you the truth. I should not have given you the benefit of the lie. I’m disappointed in you, Winter. You are not the woman I thought you were. You are much less.”

“Murderer!” Winter’s mother stepped forward, a frown creasing her beautiful face. “You killed those people in Navone. All those innocent people. You killed the dealer in Izet, and others besides. You are a murderer. Like the season for which you are named, you leave everything cold and barren in your wake. You are a murderer. That is all you will ever be.”

“Mother, I—”

“You murdered
me
, daughter. Do you think there is forgiveness for that? Do you think I could ever care for you when you took my life away?”

Winter hung her head. She had nothing to say.

They were right.

* * *

One moment Astrid had been sprinting away, hearing Knot and Winter’s footsteps behind her. The next, she was devoured by the black, completely alone.

“Shit,” Astrid whispered. She knew the Voice; she had heard it before, in her nightmares. All daemons knew Him, and all feared Him.

“Astrid, my child. You could be such an elegant, horrific fiend. Why choose the path of misery?”

“How are you here?” Astrid asked. “How are you doing this? I’m awake, I know I am.”

“I could not then, my child. Now, things are different. The door is open. Our path is set. The Rising begins.”

Astrid shook her head. “No,” she whispered. “You cannot reach me when I am awake!”

“Things have changed, daughter.”

Astrid closed her eyes, despite the impenetrable darkness, and rocked back and forth. When had she fallen to the floor? She didn’t know.

“No, Astrid. Open your eyes. Your nightmare wakes.”

Astrid’s eyes snapped open. She was sitting, alone, in a cabin. There was a single door in front of her. Closed. Astrid gripped her chair with both hands, tightly, her knuckles turning white. She breathed quickly, shallowly. Her heart pounded in her ears, in her head.
She
was coming.
She
would be here. Astrid didn’t know when, but it had to be soon.

A knock.

* * *

Knot fumbled about, shouting Winter’s name. The blackness reflected his shouts back at him; he was trapped, alone, defeated.

“Winter!” he shouted again. He could see nothing, not even his own body. “Astrid!”

No response. No response, except for the Voice.

“You are alone, my son. You are alone, and you are mine.”

“Who are you?”

There was no answer.

“
Who are you?
” Knot asked again. Still, no response.

Then, the Voice rumbled through the void.
“You know my name.”

“Don’t know anything about you,” Knot said. “What d’you want from us?”

“You know my name, as I know yours. Your heart spoke it at your wedding. Your body whispered it in Navone, when you found her, and every day afterward. Your soul cries it out every time you kill. I have many names. I am the First. I am the Fear. Speak my name, and tremble.”

Knot did not know how, but the name came to his lips. He said it, he feared it, and the Voice was right. He did tremble.

“Azael.”

The Voice rumbled, a rolling fire in the void. A laugh.

“As for what I want from you… there is one thing, and one thing only.”

Suddenly a little girl rushed towards him from the darkness. At first Knot thought it was Astrid, and ran towards her. But as he ran, Knot saw it was not the vampire. This girl was too young, her hair too dark. The way this girl looked at him was not the way Astrid looked at him. This girl looked at him as if…

“Papa!”

It was the girl from his dream, the dream from the dungeon. When Knot dreamed of owning a farm, being part of a family, this had been his daughter. As Knot recognized her, love formed in a colossal blossom. It spread through him, warm and powerful. The girl leapt into his arms, embracing him tightly.

“Papa, I’m so glad you’re home.” She buried her head in his shoulder. He felt her soft skin on his neck, her fine hair against his face.

“Ava,” Knot said, recalling her name, recalling everything; recalling the way she would pat his cheeks as he carried her to bed, the way she would laugh when he let her pinch his nose, the way she kissed his ears after a winter day’s work because she liked the feel of the cold on her lips.

“I’ve missed you,” Knot said.

“Your cheeks are wet, Papa,” Ava said, patting Knot’s cheeks, smiling, her brown eyes wide.

Then she coughed. Her tiny body convulsed. When Ava looked up at him again, she was different. Her face pale and thin, lips cracked, eyes empty.

“I’m sick, Papa,” she said, and coughed again. Blood seeped from her mouth and nose.

“Oh, Goddess,” Knot whispered. He laid Ava down on the bed, the bed that was right next to him. Knot remembered, vaguely, that there had once been blackness where the bed now stood, that he had once been somewhere else and not where he was now, but none of that mattered anymore.

His daughter was dying.

“Goddess,” Knot begged. “Please.” He felt Ava’s forehead, hot as flame.

Ava coughed again, and began to cry. The sound of it was the sound of Knot’s heart tearing in two.

“It hurts,” his daughter managed between sobs. “It hurts, Papa.”

“I know it does,” Knot said, looking down at his daughter and knowing with certainty that there was nothing he could do. “I know it does.”

Then, Ava’s eyes widened. “Light, Papa. I see light.”

Knot trembled. “Let the light in, Ava. Let it in.”

When Ava spoke again, her voice was sad. “The light goes away, Papa, there is only… only dark.” His little girl’s eyes widened even further. “They want to take me! Save me from the dark! Save me from the monsters, Papa!” Ava gripped his hand tightly in hers; Knot felt her fear through her skin, ugly and crawling. Ava stopped screaming only to cough, wetly, violently, and then scream again.

“Save me, Papa! Save me!”

Cough.

“The monsters…”

Cough. More blood.

“They want to take…”

Ava coughed again, then looked up. She choked. Her eyes froze in horror.

Silence.

Then, Ava was gone, and Knot was left alone, once more, in the black. He looked up.

“Why?”

The pain of what he’d just seen, the pain of realizing that it was an actual memory, was as wide as a gaping chasm. Above all, the fear that he might see it again consumed him, crawled beneath his skin.

“Why?” he screamed.

“Because we all experience pain, my son. My pleasure is to remind you of it.”

Then, suddenly, the black mist receded. The darkness that shrouded Knot’s mind and the chamber drew back, and Knot found himself once again in Roden’s throne hall. He was kneeling on the marble floor, head in his hands. He looked up. The golden steps up to the throne, still covered in blood, were directly in front of him across the room. The great doors to the chamber were behind him, so close he could touch them. To the left Astrid sat on the floor, clutching her knees, rocking back and forth. In the distance, to his right, Winter lay on the ground, not moving.

Knot was about to run to her when he noticed the figure standing by the throne. A tall, dark figure, cloaked in black. The hood was drawn up, creating deep shadow where the man’s face was hidden. The robe hung loosely, falling in folds to the floor. The folds, Knot realized, reached outward, blending with the black mist that still crept along the marble. Knot blinked. He could not tell where the cloak ended and where the mist began. One was an extension of the other, but he could not tell which.

Above the figure, the shadow in the air still twisted, shimmering.

“It has been ten thousand years since I could have such direct influence on the people of the Sfaera.”

The figure was the one who had spoken in the darkness, Knot was sure of it. He knew by the mindless terror he felt, the way his judgment clouded as the figure spoke. He knew because he was paralyzed with fear; he could not move, could not call out to Winter or Astrid. And yet, as the figure spoke, the voice focused. When it had once echoed in Knot’s ears and around his head, it now seemed closer to the voice of a man; still deep and rumbling, but changed.

“I’m happy to see my talents are still honed. You three were wonderful test subjects. But I’m afraid I must take my leave. My colleagues arrive.”

Slowly, the black mist gathered closer to the figure.

“I shall leave you in the company of some old friends of mine. They have been starved for friendship, one might say. Ten thousand years elicits some dreadful cravings. Something you understand, my dear Astrid.”

Above the dark figure, the shimmering shadow grew larger.

“Farewell, my children,” the figure said. “Until we meet again.”

The black mist converged on itself, and the figure was gone.

As the strange figure disappeared, the growing shadow above the throne coalesced, and a large, dark shape dropped from the portal. In the same moment Knot realized his transfixion, his paralyzing fear, had ended.

“Astrid!” Knot shouted, “we need to leave.
Now
.”

“I said that ages ago, remember? Why in Oblivion didn’t you listen to me the first time?”

Knot ran towards Winter. She was slowly rising to her feet. A flood of relief rushed through him.
Not dead
, he thought.
I still have her. Let Oblivion take me, but at least I still have her.

Before Knot had gotten three steps, a deafening screech echoed around the domed chamber.

Knot looked up. There, towering over the throne, at least twice the height of a man, was a monster unlike anything Knot had ever seen.

* * *

Winter stood shakily, her legs trembling. When the monster shrieked, they nearly buckled beneath her once more. She covered her ears with both hands and looked up in horror at the beast that now stood before the throne. Its thin, snakelike body twisted with sinew and muscle, but it stood tall on hind legs. Two thin arms, ending in claws each as long as swords, extended far from the creature’s body. The thing’s head was massive, a gaping maw as long as a man, nearly half the length of the rest of the creature’s body, displaying hundreds of long, slender fangs. The jaw seemed to weigh the rest of the creature down, giving it a hunched appearance. A spiked tail trailed behind the beast, waving lazily.

Never could Winter have imagined such a horror, not even in all the stories of the Age of Marvels.

“Astrid,” Winter heard Knot say, “what in Oblivion is that?”

Astrid had only one word. “Outsider.”

The monster screeched again, opening its long maw even wider. The thing’s head turned, and suddenly Winter realized the monster was staring right at her with deep, dark pits of eyes.

Knot shouted her name; he was running towards her. He would not get to her in time, Winter knew. If the creature chose to pounce, it could be on her instantly.

Then Winter heard a different screech. A blur sped across the room and time seemed to slow as Astrid collided with the creature, knocking it off balance. The Outsider stumbled, then looked down at Astrid. The vampire barely stood as tall as the thing’s knee.