Chapter Ten
ADAMANTINARX-UPON-THE-ACHERON
The long journey back to Adamantinarx taxed Eligor more than he thought possible; he never thought the trip could be made so rapidly. If anything, the two Demons Major had held back because of him.
The approach to the city was obscure; an eruption to the west had created a vast front of dark ash clouds, and the city was just beginning to feel its arrival.
When Sargatanas, Valefar, and Eligor alighted on a rise outside the city, Adamantinarx was already on a war footing. Zoray had seen to that. Protocol dictated that they be met at the Eastern Gate by an escort contingent of Zoray's Foot Guard, and the party could see them gathered beyond the wall.
These were the very best of the Household Guard, each stone-gray soldier bearing two curved lava-tempered swords that grew, instead of hands, from his thick wrists.
Zoray's First Centurion of the Foot Guard stepped forward carrying Sargatanas' robes of state and bladed scepter, and following him was an imposing line of standard-bearers, each carrying a stretched demon skin upon a pole. Some of the skins retained their owner's bones, and they clacked together in the hot breeze.
When Sargatanas was before them, adjusting his robes, the assembled soldiers knelt in unison, fists to the ground.
"Are these what I think they are, centurion?" asked Sargatanas, silvered eyes sweeping across their number. The skins' empty eye sockets gaped back at him.
"Yes, my lord," he said, kneeling. "The Baron expressed his hope that this display of Astaroth's spies would please you. It was Zoray's idea to let him handle the problem.
Apparently the skins were removed in ways that—"
"Faraii has been very busy, I can see. As has our venerable neighbor," Sargatanas interrupted, smiling slightly to Valefar. "Thank the Baron for his diligence and good work, centurion, and have these displayed prominently at each gate."
"Sire!"
As the centurion departed, three giant soul-beasts were brought up by their white-masked mahouts and the weary demons were helped into their howdahs. From his high vantage Eligor watched as the clay-colored throngs of foot-dragging souls, most of them work-gangs whipped aside by Scourges, crouched against the sides of buildings. The streets were, if anything, more crowded with the additional flow of legionaries streaming out to assembly points outside the city.
There were many more soldiers now in Adamantinarx than when the three demons had left. In his mind's eye, Eligor could easily picture the raising of additional legions in the fertile lava-fields not so far south of the Acheron. Dispatched from the palace, dozens of decurions bearing Sargatanas' conjuring glyphs, Eligor imagined, were coursing over the lava incunabula, carefully choosing the best sites. A fertile lava pit could easily yield a thousand legionaries, but finding one was a challenge; successful decurions were often rewarded with citations and sometimes promotion.
Long ago, Eligor, curious as always, had accompanied one such decorated decurion, had seen him expertly select just the right spot, where he cast the fiery glyph high into the ashy air and watched it plunge into the bubbling lava. Almost immediately, Eligor had marveled, the tips of halberds, the spikes of helmets, and the fingers of reaching hands broke the surface, parting the slowly swirling, incandescent flow of the lava. He had never forgotten the thrill of watching a battle-ready legion pull themselves from the very stuff of Hell, opening their eyes for the first time and lining up by the hundreds before him, steaming and tempering as they cooled. All this, Sargatanas had told him, was happening even as they entered the city.
The soul-beasts' lumbering progress was steady through the congested streets. Carrying Sargatanas' sigil-topped vertical banners before them, the Foot Guard and Scourges pushed through the milling souls, Overseers, municipal street-worm hunters, legionaries, and officials, widening a broad path for the three mounted demons.
Halfway to the center mount, Sargatanas had the other beasts draw up next to him and stop.
"Before we rest, I would visit the site of the ridiculous statue Beelzebub insisted be built.
From here I can see that it is very nearly finished."
And, indeed, when Eligor peered into the cloudy distance he, too, could see the dark head of a colossal statue. The three demons turned their beasts, following the redirected troops down a long, gradually descending street toward the work site.
DIS
Adramalik followed Prime Minister Agares along a narrow dim corridor, like the fleshy, dank inside of a worm, that sank sharply beneath the Prince's Rotunda. They were nearly as powerful as each other in their own spheres, nearly as influential, and their mutual suspicions kept them silent as they walked, a not uncommon occurrence when the two were together. Adramalik distrusted the Prime Minister, and in the paranoid world of the Keep distrust kept demons alive.
The corridor terminated into the entrance to Lord Agaliarept's Conjuring Chamber.
Beelzebub had ordered them to attend him here, and, having no other choice, they dutifully agreed. If anything bound the two demons together, it was their sense of incomprehension and distaste for the Prince's Conjuror General. Sequestered deep beneath his master's Rotunda, he never left his circular chamber, never interacted with other demons until they visited him, and never spoke unless it was in the course of a conjuring. His was an obsessive world of ancient spells, muttered incantations, and bricks. In many ways, bricks were Agaliarept's primary focus, for it was through the combined and varying energies of specially selected bricks—souls of particular darkness— and through their kinship with other bricks throughout Hell that his powers played out. Endless deliveries of bricks, sought and found across Hell, made their way to his chamber and found themselves stacked everywhere.
Agares and Adramalik entered the wide kettledrum-shaped chamber and were immediately confronted with the sight of a thousand soul-bricks floating through a shredded mist at various heights. They moved in ceaseless concentric rings, hovering over the concave floor, out from which Adramalik could see complex branching patterns of brickwork radiating. At the Conjuring Chamber's center, barely visible for all of the circling bricks, was Lord Agaliarept, illuminated only by the chains of glyphs that hung in the air before him.
The bricks, some of which narrowed their eyes as Agares and Adramalik passed, parted like a school of the Abyssal flyers they had seen many times in the Wastes. Agares pushed those that did not move quickly enough aside, and Adramalik heard them sigh or sputter or swear. As the pair moved downward they were careful to avoid the occasional gaps in the brick floor. Adramalik knew that the floor acted as a kind of abstract map of Hell itself and that the gaps, or the simple placement of brick into them, affected those that Beelzebub chose to influence.
As Adramalik and Agares drew near him, the Conjuror General swung toward them. In his spindly arms Adramalik saw a single brick, a mouth visible upon its folded surface.
He is so different from us, thought Adramalik, jarred as he always was when confronted with the Prince's chief sorcerer. Agaliarept stood, an ill-defined, robed figure, countless arms jutting from his torso like the spines on an Ash-burrower. These wandlike arms were constantly moving, seemingly tasting the air or feeling the ever-drifting currents of events. What little head protruded was cowled deep within a collar of skin-enfolded eyes, each tiny orb a different color. Disconcertingly, Adramalik never knew if he was being watched or, more irritatingly, perhaps, whether he always was. He regarded Agaliarept as a dark tool of his master's and little more; the distance both Beelzebub and the strange being had created to keep him obscure also served to keep him relatively unapproachable.
Agares and the Chancellor General took up a position yards away from Agaliarept but close enough to discern the ember-lit flies that circled him. Without a word, the Conjuror raised a dozen of his thin arms and began weaving ghostly glyphs from tissues of misty air, drawing toward him selected bricks from the vast floating catalog and gesturing them into specific holes in the floor. The single brick that he held began to whine piteously and glow from within, and when the dozen or so summoned bricks were firmly in place Agaliarept laid it gingerly into a space at his feet.
The mouth on the brick snapped open. A flattened black tongue poked out for a moment, failing to moisten its cracked lips.
A susurration gradually filled the demons' ears as the chamber came alive, the faintest of whispers growing as the myriad dry mouths of countless bricks gave voice.
The two demons unconsciously stepped back as the brick at the Conjuror's feet coughed.
For a moment it was silent, working its lips as if to speak. And then it retched up a fine mist of blackish blood that reached eight or ten feet into the air, spattering Agaliarept.
Burst after burst of the mist hung before them until they saw a shape appear within it, the motionless, congealing form of a Demon Major.
A low buzz, Adramalik imagined of approval, emanated from the flies around the Conjuror.
The blood-formed demon, an avatar only, raised his head and looked at the demons present. Adramalik recognized the Grand Duke Astaroth, his sigils palely lit against his dripping chest, his sagging shoulders creating an impression of age and weariness.
The buzz of the circling flies became a Voice.
"Your spies have not returned, Astaroth. They were intercepted through the efforts of a Baron Faraii, I believe. Sargatanas' Guard are very well trained."
The conjured demon hesitated. Two tiny glyphs of sight blazed in his blood-filled eye sockets.
"Indeed. I taught him their drills." Astaroth's voice was distorted, gurgling.
"Their leadership is quite good as well. Of this," the buzzing Voice said, "I am sure you are also aware.
"My six legions," it continued, "are marching into your wretched wards as we speak.
They will be held back until they are needed. They will reinforce yours, if yours falter.
There must not be the perception in Adamantinarx that we are leading the attack on his wards."
Astaroth's chin sank. "It will be as you say, my Prince."
Adramalik knew that the old demon had hoped for more, that he wanted Beelzebub's alliance to be known to all in Hell.
"Are your troops in readiness?"
"No, my Prince, but we are close."
"While you may have superior numbers on your side, Astaroth, do not be fooled.
Sargatanas has managed his wards brilliantly ... far better than you ... and he is cunning.
This is a second chance. Be clever and what is his will be yours. And mine."
Astaroth's chin rose and he nodded.
"Victory to you, Astaroth!"
The distant Demon Major bowed and was gone in a shower of descending blood.
Agaliarept, spattered from head to toe, bent and plucked the brick from the floor.
The Voice returned.
"Agares, see to it that Duke Fleurety's legions in the field do not engage Sargatanas'
armies. They will remain after the battle. Also, Adramalik, have your Knights and Nergar's agents round up all of Astaroth's emissaries here in Dis and have them destroyed. That weak fool Astaroth's time in Hell is at an end." And with that the Voice trailed off into a barely audible wheeze and then nothing at all.
Adramalik and Agares bowed and turned to ascend out of the Conjuring Chamber. Before he was too far from its center the Chancellor turned, for a moment, and caught a glimpse of Agaliarept, his many long tongues extended. The Conjuror General was cleaning himself, lapping the blood from his darkly glistening robes. Adramalik shook his head and followed Agares.
ADAMANTINARX-UPON-THE-ACHERON
Hani was pushed up against the giant plinth along with the hundreds of other brick workers. After the quayside ramp had been completed he and the remaining souls were shunted to a new location—the site of a towering figure of Sargatanas that loomed over the Forum of Halphas.
It was a colossus among colossi. Cruciform, with its arms and six wings outstretched, the black statue stood nearly five hundred feet tall. Built upon a natural rise in Adamantinarx, it faced the river, chin down, eyes closed in the tragic, court-sanctioned idiom of nearly all monumental statuary in Hell. During breaks, Hani looked at it, trying to fathom the emotion that must go through the demonic mind when it regarded such works. It was impossible; not having been an angel, he could only guess.
Work had finished on the statue itself. Hani and his gang had been called in at the very last days of construction. Only the last step of the plinth remained unfinished, and as the demon engineers and architects gathered at its base he could see that some sort of ceremony was about to take place.
Overseers prodded him and Div and the others into a long line that paralleled the plinth.
There Hani stood waiting, watching.
The demons assembled in what he could plainly see were hierarchical ranks, anticipating the arrival of some official. Hani tried to hear any name, but the moaning of some of the workers was too loud to penetrate. It was amazing, he thought, how much sound some of the mouthless souls could make.
After standing for a short time, he saw the vanguard of the approaching party—standard-bearers carrying their narrow, vertical banners with the ubiquitous sigil of Lord of Adamantinarx Sargatanas blazing above. A thrill of fear washed over Hani; it would be his first close-hand glimpse of a Demon Major and he did not know what to expect.
Whatever a high demon's appearance, it was the awareness of his dreadful capriciousness when it came to souls that terrified Hani.
Scourges set about the throng of souls, whipping them into silence. For that he was almost grateful.
Looming behind the phalanx of skin-cloaked standard-bearers were three enormous soul-beasts, creatures that Hani had seen before but never so close. He had heard that these souls were special, that in their Lives they had been prominent but corrupt religious leaders from many sects and that their transgressions had been deemed even more punishable than most. Because of this the demons had taken an unusual and heightened interest in them. Hani thought it showed.
As the small procession approached, he could hear the dull thud of the heavy beasts' feet, the scraping of their unshorn nails upon the flagstones, the grunting exhalations of their breath. A dozen harness-spikes were driven into each of their heads, through which their jingling bridles and reins were strung. They were so near as they passed him that he felt the air move from the swaying blankets that hung upon their rough-hided bodies. He could not help but be amazed at their size. One of them rolled its giant head and its bloodshot eye fixed upon him. A strange ripple of some distant memory, of creatures nearly as ponderous and eyes nearly as intelligent, flashed before his mind's eye. He closed his eyes to try to grasp it, to analyze it, but it was too fleeting and vanished altogether.
He was so distracted by the beasts that he almost neglected to look upon their riders. And when he did he was thoroughly, breathtakingly impressed. These were dark, godlike beings, terrible to look at, yet fascinating in every detail of their appearance. When their creatures came to a halt before the plinth, they dismounted, light upon their feet for creatures more than twice his height, and his stomach churned as they came toward the line of souls.
Sargatanas, for it must have been him, led the trio, and he was all that Hani would have expected of the Lord of Adamantinarx. Huge legs covered in skins and bone greaves and as thick as Hani's torso carried him easily toward the assembled demons. Tiny sparks sprayed when he walked. His steaming body was covered in layers of deep-crimson trailing robes, finely decorated with his sigils picked out in gold thread, and adorned with long garlandlike strands of organs picked out from choice souls. A gaping hole, jagged and seemingly ember filled, glowed from his medal-decorated chest, but it was nothing next to the fires that crowned his bone-plated head. Hani stared at his face, aquiline, broken, animated, and fierce. He saw tiny, wholly nonhuman bones shifting as unfathomable emotions played upon its surface. It was a face that, even in its frightful, degraded state, suggested something lost long ago—an alien grace, perhaps. Hani knew what Sargatanas had been—the colossus showed him that—and now knew what he had become. Stealing a closer look, craning his head up, he saw the silvered eyes that glittered and darted, veiled, armored eyes, he imagined, to look upon the sights of Hell.
Sargatanas stood mere yards from Hani and he felt his knees buckle slightly. For all his observations, the physical presence of the Demon Major was overwhelming; there was, it seemed, a tremendous, supernatural power to his proximity. Hani did not know if it was some studied force of intimidation that the demons used to enforce servitude or merely some innate part of their being. And Hani was not alone in its influence; some souls actually fell before the demon, unable to stand, whimpering without control. The demon engineers, architects, and Overseers, too, seemed as if they were holding their breath.
Only the banners flapping loudly in the hot wind fought the silence.
Hani watched as one of Sargatanas' two companions leaned in to his lord. This demon, too, was impressive but, if appearance was any gauge, was the Demon Major's inferior by reason of his less elaborate decorations.
"I know that you never wanted this, Lord," Hani overheard. His eyes widened in amazement. While he had understood the Overseers' infrequent guttural commands, he had never imagined that the higher demons' speech would be intelligible. Their accent was strange and hard to penetrate and their voices many layered, but with some effort he could understand them!
"Here it stands, Valefar. I accept that. But I do not accept why Beelzebub insists on these hollow gestures. I do not like this thing any more than I like his motives."
Sargatanas' voice sent a chill down Hani's spine. It was a terrible voice, resonant, and almost hoarse to the soul's ears. He tried not to imagine what it would be like angry.
"My lord," the demon called Valefar said, "this was not a battle worth fighting. Just accept it. Anyway," he said, looking up at the figure, "it looks good here."
Sargatanas shook his head. "I have never been good at blind acceptance."
Hani saw some more workers collapse.
"Enough," said Sargatanas to Valefar, taking a thick, glyph-dotted scepter from him. "Let us finish this pretense and go back to the palace." He beckoned the Chief Engineer, a beast-headed demon whom Hani had rarely seen, who nearly fell in his haste to obey his lord.
"Yes, my lord," the engineer said, saluting, covering the hole in his chest.
"You have done a splendid job, Abbeladdur. And you have left the last step for me to finish."
"Thank you, my lord." Abbeladdur's eyes never met Sargatanas'.
Hani quailed. He realized that he and his small group of workers were very close to the unfinished step. Overseers edged in, prodding and compacting the line so that he was even closer. Dangerously close.
He turned back to Sargatanas, who had his scepter in hand.
More souls tumbled to the ground, begging not to be turned to bricks.
"No, please. My only crime," a soul waving his forked flipper-hands cried out, "was to steal bread for my family. Please, please don't do this to me."
Another soul with half a jaw shrieked, "Please, Lord, please. This is forever; please, no."
This he repeated over and over.
Hani clenched his jaws and tried to close his eyes but could not.
As he raised the scepter, Sargatanas stopped. Hani saw him staring at a single soul who, it appeared, was unafraid to stare back at him.
Hani had seen her earlier, as they worked; she was hard to ignore. Tall and striking with unusually piercing, blue eyes, she, like himself, was relatively unscathed by the Change.
He had almost thought her attractive, a thought so ludicrous in Hell he had smiled inwardly. Souls around her had called her Bo-ad and given her some breadth for her fierceness. Now, she stood proudly at the moment of her ultimate punishment.
But the Lord of Adamantinarx was not about to suffer the insolence of a soul lightly. He moved a pace, which brought him toweringly before her.
Hani saw her trembling, saw how she resisted sobbing or simply collapsing as the others had done. Instead, she looked up at Sargatanas, shaking, and Hani, himself shaking, swore under his breath in incredulity. Looking closely at her, he saw that she was wearing a necklace upon her well-formed bosom, a necklace from which hung a tiny white figure, the sister of his own!
"Why," she asked, "why am I here? I killed, it is true, but I fought justly against a ruler who neither understood nor cared for me. Is that any reason to spend eternity here? Is it?"
Again Hani swore, but this time in admiration. The passion and forcefulness of her words carried Sargatanas back half a step. For a few seconds he stared at her and then, incredibly, he turned away, brows knit, jaw set. Valefar stepped toward Sargatanas. The two demons stood looking at each other for a moment.
"What is it, my lord?" the demon named Valefar asked.
"It is the same reason I am here," Hani thought he heard Sargatanas say. Walking past Valefar, the Demon Major placed the scepter in his companion's extended hand, and the Prime Minister spun, glaring at Bo-ad.
With an uttered command, Valefar sent a bolt of luminous writing forth from the baton touching the female's forehead and imploding her in a horrific instant. The glyphs flickered outward to each side of where she now lay, a steaming, rectangular brick.
Vengefully, it seemed, the glyphs jumped from soul to soul converting each of them into a brick and stopping only two souls short of Hani.
The step, smoking from the heat of its creation, was complete.
Sargatanas turned, like one who had forgotten something. He moved slowly back to where Bo-ad had stood and knelt down, his robes falling in a wide arc around him. Hani, who could see what no one else could because of his position, watched the demon probe with his clawed fingers in the brick, poking into the folds of what had been the woman.
He saw Sargatanas pause for a moment and then, tugging lightly, withdraw the necklace, sinew strand first and followed by the amulet. The demon rubbed its polished surface, thoughtfully, and then clenched it tightly in his fist. And then, without any warning, an eye opened on the brick's uppermost surface, a piercing blue, pain-filled eye that looked up accusingly at Sargatanas. The Demon Major started and then stared back. Hani could just see a tear welling in the eye, unable to free itself, pooling. Amazed, he watched Sargatanas carefully dip a claw into the welled tear and, after a moment's hesitation, inexplicably smear it upon the little white statue's surface.
The demon rose, a mountain of flesh and bone and fire, majestic and menacing again.
And yet, the soul thought, he seemed somehow shaken. Hani had seen something no one, let alone a soul, was meant to see, and it had given him a great deal to wrestle over.
"Valefar," said Sargatanas, his voice low, "bring up the mounts and let us go back to the palace. I am very tired."