He rose, bare feet upon the smooth bamboo floor, and crossed the room to where a suit of armor stood waiting. One of the newer sets, the height of current design and technology. He’d been meaning to begin using it—this offered a good chance.
His old set had probably been taken by thieves by now, robbed from his corpse.
He checked the wall-mounted deadmind mirror—that mirror would have been called a ‘monitor’ in earlier eras, but it had been so long that he’d stopped using such terms. They could be confusing to people in this era. The mirror’s information indicated that his new body was functioning normally, that reincarnation had been a success, and that all was well in this particular quarter of his kingdom.
He stepped into the armor, which lay open and splayed like a corpse on a dissection table. It began to fold around him, locking into place.
The fight replayed in his mind. Another in a long line of “heroes” come to kill him, responding to the seeded legends. An offer to join him refused. A duel, one on one, after the classical ideal. Did these mortals understand the honor he did them in granting them such a privilege? Probably not—after all, this mortal had ended that duel by ramming the God King’s own blade into his chest.
For just a moment, lying stunned at the foot of his throne, the God King had known true fear. He could not suppress a shiver. That . . . that
boy
had used the Infinity Blade, killer of gods.
I could have died,
he thought.
Died the final death, real death
. The concept was unfamiliar. He turned it over in his head, like a man tasting a new vintage of wine.
He found that wine bitter. It reminded him of something he had been long, long ago. He had no more in common with that person of old than an acorn had with a mighty oak. No—no more in common than an acorn had with a
temple
constructed from that oak.
The comfortable familiarity of his armor enveloped him, locking onto his arms, hands, neck, torso. Cool air immediately circulated over his skin, and the armor took account of his vitals, delivering strength, bursts of healing, and other aid through careful injections. He slipped on the helm.
The armor itself had no life, of course—not even a deadmind—and the boosts it gave were minimal. In clashes between the Deathless, one’s own body was the true test. Armor that worked like a machine had been abandoned millennia ago. When you could not be killed permanently, you found other ways to prove yourself superior. Duels were about finesse, skill, and class, not who could construct the most powerful device to aid them.
His Devoted entered in a cluster, then fell to their knees. The God King passed them, his footsteps crunching on the bamboo rug. “Activate the deadminds in the temple of Lantimor,” he said, waving a gauntleted hand.
“Great master?” asked one of the Devoted, looking up. “Has something gone wrong?”
“Of course not,” the God King said.
The Devoted said nothing; they knew the God King was not supposed to have been reincarnated here for some time yet. They also knew not to demand answers of him.
Some Deathless would execute their servants for even this small amount of questioning, but the God King was no fool. Mortals were a resource, one he had used to great advantage when many of his peers dismissed them out of hand. In fact, he was fond of many of them, including Eves, High Devoted of this particular temple.
Surround yourself with people too afraid to speak, and you left yourself to only your own ideas. That could be disastrous. It was important to have men who would question you and see flaws in your plans, so long as you could control them. It was all about control.
The rain continued outside; the God King wished he could control that. He was trying to find ways, for it galled him that he could not do something so seemingly simple.
The eye of the room’s primary deadmind displayed a window into his palace on Lantimor, the place where that . . .
child
had defeated him. It displayed an empty throne room, and information came up in lists beside it.
A week had passed since his death. A tiny smidgen of time, barely worth noticing—except it meant that the child had had time to escape with the Godkiller. No matter. Raidriar had good ways to keep track of him.
A particular bit of information scrolled past, and it gave the God King pause.
Dead,
he read.
All three of my captives. But those were soul cells. They couldn’t be completely gone unless . . .
The sword
was
working. That should have been impossible, in the hands of one such as he’d faced. The proof was before him, however, and he felt a thrill at it. How, then, had Raidriar himself survived? He confronted this question, the one most worrisome to him, as it displayed a profound lack of control. That fight had not gone the way it should have.
Of course. It was strong enough to kill lesser Deathless, but not yet at full power. He should have realized this. Perhaps only one more death of the right bloodline, and . . .
Ah,
he thought, seeing another bit of information.
That could be an issue.
“Find me a recording of the moment where I let him defeat me,” he said out loud. The servants worked, and the deadmind mirror displayed an image of him fighting the child in the throne room.
Too many questions. He
hated
questions. They would surrender their secrets to him; he had come too far to let this plan spiral away from him now. In a way, all that had happened was good, as he now had the proof he needed.
And so, he decided he had
not
been defeated. This was what the plan had required, even if he hadn’t known it at the time.
Those moves . . .
he thought idly, pondering the recording.
So familiar. Who trained him . . . ?
And then it all locked into place.
He’d been played. Masterfully.
Worker of Secrets,
he thought.
My, but you
are
a subtle one.
“Gather the Seringal,” he said, sending his Devoted to fetch the most skilled of his knights. “And set up surveillance on that child.”
The Devoted burst into motion. The God King sat back, contemplating. He waited for six hours, practically motionless, a few thoughts playing across his mind. He could faintly recall when six hours would have felt like a great deal of time to sit and think, but now it passed as quickly to him as a single breath.
His servants located the child, crossing the rocky expanses of his homeland. The God King laced his fingers, inspecting the child’s path.
So. This ‘Siris’ was returning to the palace, was he? Why? The God King leaned forward and watched with interest.
S
IRIS STEPPED UP
onto the edge of a rocky precipice overlooking the God King’s castle. It squatted in the cliffs, like a nugget of dark iron trapped in the surrounding rocks.
He’d decided that he needed to start here, primarily because he wanted to lay down a new trail for anyone looking for him. He didn’t want them tracking him to Drem’s Maw; he needed, instead, to lead them another direction.
He started the hike down to the castle.
The other Deathless,
he thought.
Maybe I could . . . buy them off.
He looked down at the sword he wore in an improvised sheath at his side. They wanted the God King’s weapon; perhaps he should just give it to them.
No,
he thought.
They’ll still execute me for killing their king.
A mortal did
not
slay a god.
He continued down the pathway toward the God King’s palace. It stood to reason that they’d begin looking for him here; if there were daerils still in this place, he could make a big show for them of going somewhere other than Drem’s Maw. That might work, might give his mother some protection.
The rocky path was slippery with pebbles and shale. He remembered walking this long route just over a week before, each footstep electric. He’d been marching to his death. That doom was one he’d come to grips with, however, and he had even been excited by the challenge ahead of him.
This time, he walked with a slower step. He felt . . . older now. Ancient.
At the base of the cliff, he put on his armor. He continued forward, reaching a tree hung with ropes just outside the palace walls.
He stopped and inspected the tree. A rope could be a weapon, if you really needed one. Tie a heavy bit of metal to one end, then swing it about and attack. He’d practiced that.
The children of Drem’s Maw had done something different with ropes. They’d created swings on the trees outside of the maw. Siris had once stood on one of those, then had several boys push, so he could practice keeping his balance on unsteady footing.
He’d never just sat down and swung.
What is wrong with me,
he thought, continuing forward with clanking steps.
Why didn’t I ever try it, even once?
He reached the side gate to the castle, and a daeril stepped out. Long of limb, with red-orange skin and a skeletal cast to the arms and legs, the daeril had a horrifically twisted face.
Siris raised his sword with a sigh. He’d have to fight his way in again, it appeared.
“Great master!” the daeril exclaimed. It jumped forward, and Siris stumbled back, wary. The creature didn’t attack, but threw itself at Siris’s feet. “Great master, you have returned!”
“I . . . State your purpose, daeril!”
“We live to serve you, master. I am Strix, and I obey. The castle is yours, now! The
kingdom
as well.”
The kingdom . . . mine?
He almost laughed. He’d never be able to stand against the forces of the other gods, even
if
this creature were telling the truth. Which he found suspect.
“What am
I
supposed to do with a kingdom?” Siris said, walking around the daeril—keeping an eye on it—and crossing the bridge to enter the palace’s outer court. The court seemed strikingly familiar to him, though he’d only passed this way that one time.
“Great master—” Strix began.
“Don’t call me that,” Siris said.
“Greatest lord of all that is powerful and—”
“That’s really not any better.”
The daeril fell silent. “My lord . . .” the daeril began again, stepping up to him. “Please. Let us serve you. Remain here and rule us. Do not leave us again.”
Siris hesitated. “How many of you are there in this place, still?”
“Perhaps two dozen, master.”
“And you will all serve me?”
“Yes, great master. Yes indeed! You have slain our ruler, and in so doing have become our leader.”
“Who led you before I returned?”
“Kuuth, master,” Strix said. “He is ancient and wise, a troll nearly
forty years
old.”
“Send for him,” Siris said. “And gather the other daerils. Every one of them in the castle. Bring them to the throne room.”
He didn’t trust these creatures, not for a moment. But perhaps he could use them.
F
INISH WHAT YOU BEGAN
.
Siris sat on the God King’s throne. What had his mother meant by that? Surely she hadn’t meant to imply that he should take the God King’s place. That would be suicide.
The God King’s throne wasn’t very comfortable—though Siris was wearing armor, which never made sitting particularly comfortable. He’d removed his helm and set his shield to the side, though he kept the Infinity Blade close.
Seeing his face unnerved the daerils. That seemed a good enough reason to him to keep the helmet off, for now. He inspected the Infinity Blade as he waited. The blade had some kind of magic that had let the God King summon it, making it appear as if out of nothing in a flash of light. So far, despite a week of tinkering, Siris hadn’t been able to figure out how that magic worked.
Something chirped beside him.
Siris jumped, glancing down. Only then did he remember the little mirror built into the armrest of the throne. He poked at it. The thing had done . . .
something
following the God King’s death. It was magical.
Poking at the thing made it speak, which chilled him. “What is your command?” it asked.
“I . . .” Siris looked up at the shuffling host of daerils—in a variety of shapes and colors—gathering at the back of the room. “I’d like to know how the God King’s sword works.”
“Answer pending. Please enter the pass phrase.”
“Pass phrase?” Siris said. “I don’t know it.”
“Would you like to retrieve it?”
“Um . . . yes?”
“Very well. Please answer this security question: In what kingdom did you first meet the Worker?”
So it was a riddle. His mother had told him stories of magic mirrors that asked riddles. “In the kingdom of night and dawn, at the break of the day,” he said. It was the answer to one of the riddles from the stories.
“Answer incorrect,” the mirror said politely. “Security question two: What was the name of your first and most trusted Aegis?”
Aegis. It was a word for a master duelist, after the classical ideal. The daerils that guarded the castle had all followed the old precepts. Horrific and terrible though they had been, they had each shown that much honor.
“Old Jake Mardin,” Siris said, saying the name of the first man who had trained him in the sword, a retired soldier.
“Answer incorrect,” the mirror said.
“Your riddles make no sense, mirror,” Siris said. “Am I supposed to answer as myself, or as the God King?”
“I’m sorry,” the mirror said. “I don’t understand that query. Security question three: How many days passed before your first reincarnation?”
“Uh . . . five?”
“Answer incorrect.”
“Damn it, mirror!” he said. “Please, just tell me how I make the sword come at my will.” He was silent for a moment. “Even better,” he whispered, “how can I find freedom? Can you answer that for me, mirror? Can you tell me how I can be free of all this and live my life?”
A rope swing from a tree,
he thought. He’d write that in his book tonight, beginning a list of things he
would
try, once he didn’t have to worry about being hunted.