Younger Gods 1: The Younger Gods (25 page)

CHAPTER

FORTY-FOUR

“I
accept! Choose the weapons!” Esther said, speaking the ritual response. The choice of weapons was usually a formality, as any Greene worth the name would lean on their command of sorcery. Sometimes the choice would be more specific, like summoning, Deeps shaping, or elemental magic.

But those were not the
only
options.

“I choose friendship,” I said, shouting across the distance. “I have brought my friends, and you will match with your own.” I broke from the script. “Since I know that the term is unfamiliar to you, friends are people who choose to stand beside you, of their own free will, without bargaining, bribery, or enslavement. Who are your friends who would stand for you?”

Esther stopped. “Invalid choice. The weapon must be something both parties have at hand.”

I continued, a smile on my face. “Incorrect, sister. I’d invite you to remember the duel between Bartholomew and Jedidiah in 1432, when Jedidiah had been cut off from his magic by Templars, and his brother, knowing that, chose sorcery and melted his brother to the bone. Or do you claim to know better than our forefathers?” I asked, taking almost perverse glee in being able to throw family precedent back in her face. She was always the stronger magician, the greatest magics concealed from me without my knowledge, but I knew the family histories and our public customs perhaps even better than Father.

“This is just a cheap trick,” Esther said, her voice growing uncontrolled, wild. Finally, I had the advantage. Now I had to get her to concede or to violate the terms of the duel.

“It’s nothing of the sort, and you’re stalling. The challenge has been met, and the weapons chosen. Pick the time and place or forfeit,” I said.

If she waited until Mother or Father could arrive, she’d miss the window to open the Gates, and even the Hearts might not be enough. She had to win now or accept that the duel was lost.

“I concede,” Esther said, continuing to pace forward. She held out the family’s ritual dagger, handle first.

I tried to let myself relax, tension slide out of my back, from my spine. But the smile on Esther’s lips ruined any such efforts.

“As the scion, I bequeath to you the ritual dagger, and all of its responsibilities. Do you accept?”

I’d come too far to turn back now. I stepped forward and opened my hand. “I accept the mantle of scion of the Greene clan,” I said, taking the knife.

Esther stepped back, her smile growing impossibly wide. “Then as the scion, I beseech you to finish the ritual, which has already started. The Gatekeepers have accepted terms, and await only the remainder of the payment promised.” She pointed to Nate, held aloft by Esther’s magic. “The heart’s blood of a Bearer and chosen of the Gardeners.”

“No!” Antoinette said.

“It’s a trick,” Carter added. “She’s beaten. Let’s get Nate and go.”

One of the Gatekeepers flickered forward, looking down a yards-long beak. It spoke without any lips or mouth, pointing to Nate.

“The payment, Greene. If you tarry, the bargain is broken, and we will take our penalty in the lifeblood of a million more.”

“They can’t reach the surface, can they?” Antoinette asked.

“They can. It’s part of the bargain my family made with them. If the Greenes ever break a bargain, the Gatekeepers are given free rides to the surface, courtesy of my family as hosts. And there are a great many of us, when all is said and done. Thousands. Enough to jump-start the apocalypse even without birthing the god.”

I was inviting no end of trouble, possibly greater problems than I could ever hope to handle, but it was the only option I could see to avoid this apocalypse.

And it would still cost an innocent man’s life. And this time, I wouldn’t just be a helpless witness. It would be my hand, my blade, and my crime.

Refuse, and I’d be giving over my body and inviting the Gatekeepers to the surface. But there was no other choice.

Or was there?

“As the new scion, I wish to renegotiate the deal,” I said to the Gatekeeper.

“Refused,”
the Gatekeeper said.
“The deal is struck. Pay, or forfeit.”

The tiniest working told me that the solstice was only minutes away. There was no time to bargain, even if the Gatekeepers would allow it.

As I strode toward Nate, the knife heavy in my hand, my mind raced through the lore, through our family myths, through Esther’s recollection of the prophecy.

I racked my memory, scouring through memories of dusty texts, histories of bargains between the Greenes and the Gatekeepers. I needed a loophole, a contingency, some alternative that would let me walk away from this situation without becoming a murderer.

Keeping the bargain would mean taking the life of an innocent man and beginning the last age of humanity.

Breaking the bargain would unleash the Gatekeepers’ wrath upon earth. They were happy to stay in the Deeps as long as humanity upheld its bargains, continued to make deals that fed them blood, bound humanity into further bargains. But if the Greenes, one of the Gatekeepers’ greatest partners, defaulted on a deal, it wouldn’t just be these Gatekeepers that lashed out, and not just at the Greenes. I did not doubt the figure of millions that the Gatekeeper above me had quoted.

Either way, there would be blood on my hands. I’d be no better than my sister, than my parents. Remorse would mean nothing if it did not stay my hand.

On one hand, there was the uncertain future of the gods’ birth. On the other, the certain doom of the Gatekeepers unleashed.

I made my choice.

The birth of the Younger Gods would spell the beginning of the last age of man. Beginning. Not the end of the Last Age. Humanity might survive, perhaps as servitors. Or perhaps I would be the singular instrument of the end of days, having been just clever enough to steal the title away from my sister, but leading to exactly the same result.

I could not look Nate in the eye. His hair was disheveled, hands and fingers bloodied. He’d fought, he’d struggled, and he’d resisted. And I was going to be the one to write the last chapter of his story, when it was only beginning its second act.

The weight of obligation pushed me forward, nearly guiding my hand. There was no time for another trick, for a middle ground, or for salvation.

I’d failed Nate like I’d failed Thomas. I’d made friends just soon enough to become a murderer before their eyes.

I closed teary eyes as I lifted the blade.

“I consecrate this man as sacrifice,” I said, my voice shaking.

“Jake, what are you doing?” Nate said, his voice broken by terror.

His words hit me like a sledgehammer. Nate spoke, but I heard the words in Thomas’s voice.

I retched, my stomach revolting at my unconscionable act, but I pressed on, pulling myself back up. “To fulfill the bargain made and sanctified on behalf of the Greene clan, in good faith.

“I’m sorry,” I choked out, the words barely intelligible even to me.

My entire body revolting, I had to force the blade down, piercing Nate’s chest. The pain was over. I took the tiniest of solace that he died in that moment, his soul taken by the knife as payment, just as Thomas’s had been.

The bindings vanished, dropping Nate’s body over the edge and into the abyss below.

“I’m sorry,” I said, tears staining my face.

“It is done,”
the Gatekeepers said as one, their voices a terrible dissonant chord that cut at my soul.

And above, a sound greater than human hearing could encompass shook my entire body, as the Gates began to move. They unfolded like a four-dimensional puzzle, retracting into and through themselves, moving here and vanishing there, an eons-old puzzle solving itself.

Beyond the Gates, I saw a humanoid form as large as the sky, simultaneously small and fragile yet impossibly immense. The cavern receded yet grew closer, like a camera trick in one of Carter’s old horror movies.

Antoinette and Carter were beside me, and I could feel Esther just behind. She was laughing, victorious.

A voice deeper than a foghorn cried out in wordless need. A shape moved forward, emerged from shadow.

It was bigger than my eyes could fathom, but in struggling comprehension, my mind showed me the image of an infant, black hair on its head, a dirt-black umbilicus stretching off into the abyss.

The cavern around us shook, dust and rocks falling from the ceiling.

“Jake . . .” Carter said.

“I can’t leave,” I said, knowing it to be true. The god was linked to me; my hand had unlocked the Gates, and my blade had spilled the blood to bring it to life. And I could no more abandon it than the mother of a newborn could cast aside her child. It was an existential need, a supernal compulsion stronger than I’d ever known could happen, more powerful and inexorable than the compulsion to complete the ritual.

The god descended toward me, shrinking, its voice approaching a human register. This was . . . not what I expected.

“What is this!” Esther shouted.

“Stand down, sister,” I said.

The newborn god dropped into my arms, crying, flailing, acting far more like an infant than a world-ending divinity.

“This . . . is not what I expected,” I said, repeating myself. My emotional apparatuses were broken, pummeled by the week’s roller coaster of fear, anger, as well as rare moments of grace and pride. But everything now was covered by guilt at my failure to save Nate, failure to stop the ritual. I’d been clever enough only to put myself into a position to fail.

“What about the Last Age? What about shaking the foundations of the earth! This is our promised salvation?” Esther shouted, pointing at the infant like it was diseased, her composure shattered.

“I have no more idea what is happening than you,” I said.

“It’s just a baby,” Carter said, seemingly stunned.

Esther stepped forward. “Give me the child. We must see that it comes into its power as quickly as possible to fulfill the prophecy.”

I scoffed. “No, sister. As the scion, I will interpret the prophecy as I see fit to best serve the family.”

“How can you even pretend to talk about serving the family? The family you deserted, abandoned. You turned your back on us. . . .”

“As foretold in the prophecy, was it not?” I asked. “Perhaps we were all wrong about the prophecy. The Younger Gods, this one and others, are the heralds of the last age of man, we all agree on that. But perhaps the Last Age does not mean the imminent doom of man. Perhaps it is the last and greatest age, with the gods our partners. Perhaps there is more to the future than ambition, greed, and the family’s demands of inheriting the earth.”

I looked to Carter and Antoinette. “Maybe there is a chance of redemption for humanity.” I looked over to the abyss, the blood on the precipice. “Even for those like me.”

EPILOGUE

W
ith Esther unable to challenge my power as the scion of the Greene clan (as a long-standing precedent declared that the defeated could not rechallenge for a period of a year and a day), and unwilling to endanger the infant god (it would be blasphemy of an order so high even she would not dare it), she merely stormed off, cursing my name as she left the three of us with the crying conundrum inside the bowels of the earth.

We followed Esther, lest she decide in spite to close the portal on us and strand us in the Deeps, and parlayed for safe passage through the portal—arguing that if the god was left in the Deeps, there was no chance for her or any of the Greenes to reap the benefits of its nascent power.

Not that the infant god seemed terribly powerful in any way but lung strength, continuing to wail. But none of us had any food, just mostly-empty water bottles.

Returning to Central Park, we parted ways with Esther as quickly as possible. She headed east, and we made our way down from the hill, bearing west. I held the baby inside my coat, turning the collar up to shield it from the winds. We shared our heat, though in truth, the process was rather one-sided, the tiny god sapping my warmth.

And then, at the bottom of the hill, I saw a dead woman.

Dorothea stood at the ready, with a most odd assortment of belongings.

Before her was a functional but unimpressive baby stroller, containing a bag filled equally with diapers and liquor.

She had one hand in her pocket, the other holding a muted floral-print bag.

I wished to race down the hill to embrace her, but as I was holding an infant divinity, I curbed the intent.

Carter had no such limitations, nor did Antoinette. They hurried down the hill, leaving me to make my way slowly, always sure to brace the infant’s neck, remembering lessons learned as an older brother back in North Dakota. It may be a god, but while it was human, I dared not risk exposing it to any mundane threats.

In my years of study, I had never come across a single text that would indicate that the Younger Gods would be born as human children. We were far off of the script of prophecy, scholarship, and expectation.

The future was our own, in all of its terror and possibility.

“You did it,” Dorothea said, her voice seeming to carry neither praise nor condemnation, though it was the latter I deserved.

“I thought I had a solution,” I said. “But even with my cleverness, Esther still got what she wanted in the end.”

“But not the way she wanted it,” Antoinette said. “And we’re the ones with the god.”

“So you are. City told me to expect that. I brought supplies. Let’s get the baby out of the cold.” She led us toward the entrance of the park.

“Colt 45?” Carter asked, holding up a bottle of malt liquor.

“Seemed appropriate, since I’ve got a real Colt .45 in my pocket. That baby so much as sprouts one tentacle and I’m ending it sooner than you can say Ia.”

I reeled at Dorothea’s unapologetic pragmatism. But my entire emotional equilibrium was shattered, not only by her return, but by the blood on my own hands, despite my cleverness. Another death that I could not blame on anyone, not really.

The choice was mine, and I had taken the long view, sacrificing my humanity in the short term for a chance to protect all of humanity in the long term. Cutting corners to serve my own agenda, unafraid to get my hands bloody, to sacrifice allies along the way.

Truly the scion of the Greenes.

The tiny god gurgled, arms waving. I held the baby up, hands steady where they should be shaking.

I was thankful for my younger brothers and sisters, who had prepared me for this eventuality in small, if not sufficient ways. The child god spat up on my coat, which was already torn and stained, and therefore made no real change to its condition.

“Little god. Whatever are we to call you?” I asked myself, supporting her head with one hand. She was so tiny, fitting entirely in my hand and forearm, her swaddled feet curled up by my elbow.

The god reached out with one hand, eyes closed, and grabbed my nose, yanking with uncommon strength. I shrank inward with pain, pulling her off my nose.

Carter chuckled, but it was a pained laughter.

Shortly, we reached a coffee shop, and Dorothea used her impressive stare to clear off a table for our use.

Antoinette emptied the carriage seat, and I placed the god into it, tucking her into the blanket Dorothea had placed in advance, maintaining the swaddle as best I could. I considered the contradictory facts of the child’s divinity, barely-contained infinite potential, and the seemingly very real fragility of infancy, of a tiny mammal far from ready to fend for itself.

Each movement was considered, given that I was holding the hope or doom of humanity in my arms.

And that was it, wasn’t it.

“I know what to call you. Ahri,” I said, watching the child. Tears came then, hot, conflicted tears, my emotional buffers completely overwhelmed, letting any and every feeling flood over me.

“Ahri?” Antoinette asked.

“It’s Enochian. For ‘hope.’”

“That’s cheesy,” Carter said.

I looked to my friends, who shook their heads.

“Anyone need medical attention?” Dorothea asked, keeping her voice low. The crowds were watching, but no one had spoken up yet. Once more, we benefited from the city’s heterogeneity. That and the fact that the city had to be in shock, following the upheaval of Esther’s attacks and locking away of the islands.

Those workings were done now that the god was born, and soon emergency forces would take control—FEMA, the Red Cross, and others. We would be well advised to be out of sight in short order.

“How are you . . . here?” I asked.

Dorothea mixed baby formula, her hands working with the confidence of an expert. Another wrinkle of her history to unravel. “I guess the city wasn’t done with me. Can’t say I remember much between that fall and waking up in Central Park this morning with orders burned into my head. I had a shopping list and a time, and so here I am: carriage, bag, and twin Colt 45s,” she said, gesturing with her gun to the malt liquor.

“And the alcohol is for what?” I asked.

“We just averted the apocalypse. It’s time to get drunk,” Carter said.

Dorothea nodded. “I think ‘delayed’ is more accurate, sadly.”

Ahri cried in response.

“I’m very glad to see that you’re well, Dorothea,” I said.

“Thanks. And I’m glad to know that you remembered what I said to you on the roof. No one of us is more important than the future.”

“That is rather difficult to stomach imagining saying it to Nate.”

To that, Dorothea sighed. “Ain’t that the truth. But you bought the world, and yourself, time to make sure that his death wasn’t for nothing. In terms of consolation, it’s shit. We all have to live with the choices we’ve made along the way.”

“We need to get Ahri to a hospital. There are immunizations to be done, records to be made . . .” I said, rambling.

“Leave that to me,” Dorothea said. “Once she’s fed, we get you all home, and some friends will take watch while you three sleep this off.”

But it couldn’t be . . .

Carter procured coffee and confections for the group, both of which I promptly inhaled.

“Esther will not let this go unanswered. Mother and Father will take the family to another city, find another Younger God, and seek to provoke a confrontation. All of the writings agree that the Younger Gods will be responsible for the shape of the Last Age.”

Antoinette said, “Then we reach out to our friends around the country, and they reach out around the world. The Greenes can’t be everywhere. There’s what, a hundred of you?”

“Ten close relatives with enough power in the blood to be as dangerous as myself or my sister. But we have cousins and agents and vassals far and wide.”

“So it’ll be a war,” Dorothea said. “That means that we’ve won the first battle.”

“Please pardon me if I do not feel like much of a victor,” I said.

Carter clapped a hand on my shoulder, squeezing in sympathy. “There was no other way, Jake. We know it, Nate knew it.”

“And yet, another lies dead because of me. Sacrificed to dark powers due to coming into my life. I’m afraid I cannot take solace in the greater good, nor should I pretend that my hands are clean.”

“It’s war. No one gets through with their hands clean.”

I lowered my head. “That is what I am afraid of. How far will we go for the greater good? I fear that we may no longer deserve the world once we’ve saved it.”

To that, they had no answer.

Once Ahri had finished her bottle, we bundled ourselves up, paid our bills, and walked out into the sunrise of the first day of the last age of man.

I sent Ahri and the others ahead, searching for a still-functioning pay phone. Upon finding one lone machine, draped in a metallic shell to protect it from the elements, I inserted all of the change I had left, and looking at the keypad, froze. A long moment later, I gathered the will to continue, muscle memory tapping out the number for the main line for Thomas’s house.

On the third ring, a tired woman picked up. “Sandusky residence.”

I choked on my words, as I’d done a dozen times before.

“Hello?” Thomas’s mother, Susan, repeated. “Is this another crank call? Can’t you leave us in peace?”

“Please don’t hang up,” I managed finally.

“Who is this?” Susan asked.

“This is Jacob Greene.”

“Jake?” she asked, her voice quick.

“I’m sorry I didn’t call before.”

I could practically hear Mrs. Sandusky shaking with excitement. “What happened? Is Thomas with you?”

“No. I’m sorry, Mrs. Sandusky. This is a call I should have made a long time ago. I was afraid.”

“Where is he?” she asked, voice growing louder.

“He’s dead, Mrs. Sandusky. I’m so, so sorry. My family killed him, and it’s all my fault. The police and the sheriffs are in my family’s sway, and if you try to press the matter, they’ll do terrible things to you and anyone else who comes after them. That’s why I left. I couldn’t face you, I couldn’t stop them. But now, now I am trying to make amends.”

“What? This is insane.”

“The world will grow far madder before matters are settled, I’m afraid. I would advise you move the family far away from North Dakota. But not too close to the coast. Arizona should suffice.”

“You’re not making any sense, Jake.”

“And for that, I am also sorry,” I said, sobbing. “Know that Thomas was my first and best friend, and everything I do now, I do in his memory. Take care, Mrs. Sandusky. I pray that our paths will not cross again, and that this is the last you hear from anyone in my family.”

And with that, I hung up and slumped against the metallic shell surrounding the pay phone, taking a moment to regain my composure.

The call may have done more to upset the Sanduskys than give them peace, but they deserved the truth, deserved what warning I could give them, acknowledgement of what Thomas’s life and friendship had meant to me.

I hurried on to catch up with Dorothea, Carter, Antoinette, and little Ahri.

In the end, this Last Age, all we had was one another.

But like the dawn of any age, it was far too early to determine how it would play out. Would this be humanity’s great last stand, would it be the age when we truly inherited the earth from the divine beings that had ruled from the shadows for millennia? Or would the coming years prove once and for all that we did not deserve the world, that we were no better than the petty gods who had nearly broken the world before it was finished becoming itself?

The answer lay with us, literally in our hands. My own hands were too stained to ever be washed clean, and would get bloodier still if I were to stand with humanity against the rest of my family.

But for the first time since I’d left North Dakota, I had a true family, and I had hope.

Hope alone would not win the day, but with it, we could at least try.