The Maelstrom

  Something flashed in the west, an enormous light that filled the sky with a sickly green light. The sound came after, a rumbling chorus of horns and drums that was soon eclipsed by something else … a keening, wailing sound akin to an air-raid siren. Max rushed to another window and gazed out.

  The west was ablaze, its skies exploding in wild flashes of light and pluming fire as though the clouds themselves had ignited. Horns sounded from afar, and a tremor ran through the earth, shaking the tower. Down in the courtyard, Petra was calling his name.

  “What’s happening?” she cried.

  Max cupped his hands. “A battle!” he shouted. “The armies have met!”

  More flashes and the earth shook again, the tremors as slow and rhythmic as a battering ram. Far off, there was an explosion, and then a brilliant fireball rose in a mushroom cloud against the night sky. The tremors continued.

  Max watched, spellbound, as the battle raged on. The armies were too far away to make out many details. But for the incandescent flashes, it might have been a forest fire, a haze of flames and smoke that stretched all along the horizon. Occasionally he caught glimpses of the army columns gleaming like molten gold. The tremors continued, a percussive thump, thump, thump that shook the remaining shards free from the windows. They fell about the room’s perimeter, shattering like little icicles.

  Something to the southwest caught Max’s eye.

  He trained his glass on a number of small lights glimmering in the surrounding woods. At this distance, he could not be certain if the lights were torches or lanterns, but they were now converging swiftly on the palace.

  Max ran from the room, leaping down the stairs and yelling for the others to pack up. He hoped the appearance of these horsemen was coincidence, that they were merely deserters or refugees seeking shelter. But in his heart, Max knew otherwise. These riders were hunting for them.

  Arriving at the courtyard, Max saw the Kosas hastily gathering up their things. Over the din of the distant battle and Patient Yuga, Max could now hear the sound of galloping hooves. He ran to the gatehouse and peered outside.

  The riders had passed the orchards and were now racing over the fields. Looking wildly about, Max saw that the outer gates had been broken, but one of the inner portcullises was still intact. Racing into the guardhouse, he found the winch that controlled its chains and spun it about as quickly as he could. With a reluctant groan, the heavy iron grill slid down its grooves and fell into position. From outside, there were several shouts and the hoofbeats slowed. Max ran to Madam Petra, who had hidden the others behind the ruins of a fallen tower.

  “What are you doing?” she hissed. “We haven’t seen another way out—you’ll shut us in!”

  “No,” he panted. “Sneak the others and the horses back into the keep. Go as far back as you can, as close to the eastern wall as possible. There must be some other exit, a postern gate or something. Start searching.”

  “Yes, but how—”

  “Just trust me. If I can deal with these riders on my own, I will. If not, the portcullis will delay them long enough so we can find the door and get away. If there is no exit, I’ll make one.”

  “And what if they kill you and we’re still trapped inside?”

  Max unsheathed the longsword and handed the weapon to the smuggler.

  Taking the sword, Madam Petra lifted David and led the others into a dark archway that opened into the main keep. Stealing across the courtyard, Max saw the riders assembled beyond the portcullis, dark silhouettes against the moonlit countryside. Spurring his horse, one of the hooded figures approached the gatehouse, brandishing a torch.

  “You can’t outrun the Fates!” the figure called out. “Cease this cowardice and show yourself. Embrace the death that comes for you.”

  When Max heard that voice, his heart nearly stopped. From far off, the war horns blared and the western sky flashed with light. Another tremor shook the palace, knocking debris from the walls in little avalanches of rubble and broken masonry.

  Smiling grimly, Max walked to the gates and unsheathed the Morrígan blade. He had been mistaken after all. That was no troop of Prusias’s soldiers waiting outside the gates.

  The Atropos were here.

  And the voice that challenged Max was his own.

  The clone leaned forward in his stirrups and studied Max through the heavy bars of the portcullis. He might have been Max’s mirror image, but for his close-cropped hair and more powerful build. The Workshop had evidently tinkered with the source material, as though they had melted Max down and recast him into a form that was bigger and stronger than the original. Beneath his cloak, the clone was armored with a breastplate of polished black steel. Golden runes were traced upon the metal and gleamed like pale fire by the light of his torch. Behind him sat a dozen of Prusias’s malakhim. They formed a horseshoe around the gate, silent executioners whose faces were hidden behind darkly beautiful masks. One rode forward to take the clone’s torch and hand him a heavy, ancient-looking spear. The clone tested its weight and gazed across at Max. His handsome face was composed and cruel as he urged his horse toward the portcullis.

  “I was afraid you wouldn’t answer,” he said calmly. “The buyer said you were a coward, that you’d run again and again until we finally caught you. But I told him you were better than that. You and I come from the same place, after all. And I don’t run.”

  “So what now?” asked Max.

  “I kill you.”

  The response was chillingly flat, no emotion.

  “We’ll see.” Max shrugged. “Did you murder those people at Piter’s Folly, too?”

  The clone’s eyes glittered like dark jewels. “The world’s at war. There is no such thing as murder. Just obstacles and accidents.”

  “I’m sorry you think so.”

  The clone smiled and steadied his horse. “Prusias said you were weak,” he sneered. “Said his imp had to make up stories about your Arena opponents so you’d fight angry. Pathetic. You’re lucky you fought Myrmidon. I’d have had your head, brother.”

  Walking closer to the portcullis, Max stared through the bars at the brazen youth sitting astride his coal-black courser. “You’re not my brother,” he remarked. “I don’t know what to call you. You’re just an experiment that didn’t work … a Workshop castoff scooped up by the Atropos to nip at my heels.”

  In unison, the malakhim drew their swords, red-hot blades that smoked like hearth irons. The clone merely gave a venomous smile and laid the spear across his saddle.

  “I don’t nip at heels. I bite at throats. Open the gate and find out.”

  Max recalled his battle with Myrmidon. At several points, he’d overwhelmed his clone and struck what should have been a conclusive blow. And yet Myrmidon always recovered; the gladiator had advanced again and again as though nothing could hurt him. The encounter was seared into Max’s memory, its imprint as painful and poisonous as anything he’d experienced. This clone was far larger than Myrmidon had been. The Workshop must have conducted different experiments on each of its three prototypes. The assassin sitting astride the courser looked as though he could tear through the portcullis with his bare hands. Max wondered why he didn’t. Perhaps the clone was curious—intrigued about the original from which he’d stemmed. That curiosity might give Petra enough time to find another exit. Assuming there was one.

  “Do you have memories?” Max wondered. “Or do they implant false ones?”

  Talk of pasts and memories apparently displeased the clone. His face darkened momentarily before relaxing into a faint smile.

  “There is no past; there’s only now. Memories are nostalgia, and nostalgia is for the weak.”

  “The Workshop took my blood three years ago,” Max reflected. “You’re awfully big for a three-year-old. Did they grow you in a little tube or some giant machine? Did they have to train you, or did you just pop out, ready, willing, and able to kill?”

  The clone’s smile became dangerous. “No big machines,” he r
eplied. “Just a cozy little incubator with nanobots, accelerants, and neural feeds. It didn’t sing me lullabies, but it did make me strong … far stronger than you, brother. I’ve fought a million hyperbattles in the simulations and I’ve never lost. You want to think of me as a copy, as a cheap imitation. But you’re wrong. I’m an original. And you can stall or run for as long as you like, but you can never escape us.…”

  As he said this, the clone held up something tucked inside his breastplate. At first glance, Max thought it was simply an ornament on the chain that fastened his cloak. But as the torchlight danced upon its gleaming case, Max recognized the object.

  It was a magic compass.

  Cooper had used the very same device to locate Max when he’d been imprisoned deep in Prusias’s dungeons. David had made it. Instead of pointing toward magnetic north, its needle always pointed toward Max.

  “So that’s how you tracked us,” he said heavily.

  The clone slipped the compass back inside his armor. “Your name has been written into the Grey Book,” he said. “Your life is over. Submit and we might spare your companions before Yuga devours them. Do you submit?”

  As he said this, the sky rippled with a wash of incandescent light. Its brilliance cast a host of shadows that stretched through the gatehouse tunnel. Max glimpsed shadows of torches and chains … and a figure stealing up behind him. He whirled to face the assassin. When the sky flashed again, it revealed a familiar face.

  The assassin was the second clone.

  While Max had been speaking to one, the other must have scaled the high walls. Silent as a wraith, the nimble clone bore down on Max with a long dagger in each hand. Sparks flew as Max caught one blade on his cross-guard. But the other blade struck home, piercing his mail shirt and cutting along his ribs as he twisted aside. Seizing the clone’s wrist, Max turned and hurled him against the portcullis.

  The clone crashed into it, his knees buckling from the impact and bending several bars. Backing away, Max saw him clearly for the first time. This clone barely resembled the one outside the gate. He was a good fifty pounds lighter, as gaunt as a week-old corpse, with tangles of black hair that hung past his shoulders. Like the witches, every inch of his pale skin was covered in tattoos. But the runes and hieroglyphs were not made with any ink; they were carved into his flesh by a knife or scalpel. The clone was panting, handling each blade with terrifying expertise. Gazing at Max, he grinned and revealed a row of razor-sharp teeth.

  Max gasped. “What the hell did they do to you?”

  The clone began sniggering like a madman. “Everything,” he whispered. “Everything … EVERYTHING!”

  The clone was a blur as he leaped, a frenzied assault of knives

  and teeth as he lunged at Max like a rabid animal. Driving Max back into the courtyard, he gave a primal howl as the pair circled one another beneath the flickering sky. The clone was a quick-twitch nightmare with animal instincts far superior to anything human. Every time Max thought he had an opportunity to strike, the clone sprang away or slipped just out of reach. It was like trying to stab smoke. Even worse, the gae bolga felt heavy and leaden in Max’s hand. It was uncharacteristically silent and seemed little more than an unwieldy length of metal. Perhaps the blade was reluctant—even unwilling—to harm its own flesh and blood.

  Blood trickled into Max’s eyes from a cut across his forehead. Backing away, he feigned a stumble over a fallen block. As the clone lunged in, Max twisted aside and cracked his opponent’s cheekbone with the gae bolga’s heavy pommel. Howling, the clone bounded away on all fours, leaping onto one of the squat guard towers and scuttling sideways into the tunnel like a great black spider. A moment later, Max heard the winch being spun as the clone raised the portcullis.

  An eerie dance took place as the malakhim galloped through the gate and rode about the courtyard’s perimeter with their torches and swords. They hemmed Max in, surrounding him and drawing the noose ever tighter as they leaned from their saddles and swept their swords in long, lethal arcs. Max fought defensively, careful to vary his patterns and keep an eye out for the clones. His only hope was to whittle down the odds and capitalize on rare opportunities.

  And while such opportunities were rare, they did exist. The Morrígan’s blade might have balked at the clones, but it had no misgivings about the malakhim. The weapon roared back to life, keening for the cloaked spirits and cleaving through their swords and mail with frightful ease whenever one ventured too close.

  Four of the malakhim had fallen when a fist-sized rock struck the back of Max’s head. He stumbled forward, catching himself on one knee. Another smashed into the base of his skull and he crumpled onto the snow-swept courtyard. Blood now trickled from a dozen wounds, stinging his eyes and fingers, hissing whenever it touched the gae bolga. Dazed, Max scrambled to his feet and staggered sideways, tripping over icy stones at the base of a fallen tower. With a jubilant howl, the savage-looking clone dropped the rock and rushed forward with his knives.

  The other joined him, leaping down from his saddle and racing at Max with his spear. The gae bolga fell silent as they closed the gap, leaping over scattered stones and converging like a pair of hounds closing on a wounded quarry.

  The spear struck first, a screeching blow aimed right at the heart. Max turned the point aside, but the blunt force of the collision cracked his collarbone and sent him staggering back against the well. Turning, he evaded another thrust and just managed to duck as the other clone came leaping after him, brandishing his knives.

  As Max battled the clones, the remaining malakhim cut off any escape. The fighting was the most frenzied and brutal Max had ever experienced, skills and strategy devolving into a desperate, savage contest of wills.

  At last Max saw an opening. With a roar, he downed the knife-wielding clone, striking him a blow to the temple with the gae bolga’s pommel. But when he made to finish him, the other clone darted in, dropping his spear and seizing hold of Max from behind. Before he could counter, Max’s feet were wrenched off the flagstones.

  With appalling strength, the clone squeezed tighter and tighter, driving the steel rings of Max’s hauberk clear through the tunic to bite the flesh beneath. Max nearly lost consciousness. He was only dimly aware of his captor’s voice shouting above Yuga’s incessant moan and the din of the distant armies: “You fought well. But your time has come.”

  Rising on unsteady legs, the other clone pushed his long hair back from his face. One eye was swollen shut and his jaw appeared broken. Spitting blood through a jigsaw of shattered teeth, he nevertheless grinned at Max and offered a soldier’s salute. The grisly smile remained, but the clone’s eyes went as cold and dead as a shark’s. Stepping forward, he raised the knife high and brought it screaming down.

  But no blade struck Max.

  Instead of a dagger, the clone now held a wriggling asp by the tail. Its body thrashed wildly about, but its fangs were sunk deep into the other clone’s cheek. Howling with pain, he released Max and scrabbled at his face, prying the venomous snake free and flinging it away. For a surreal instant, the three looked from one to the other in stunned confusion. Across the courtyard, Max glimpsed a small figure on horseback steadying his frail form against the keep’s great archway.

  David!

  Rowan’s sorcerer was trembling with anger. The night grew colder as he rode from the keep, the atmosphere twitching and crackling with an electric charge. As David approached, Max felt energies emanating from him, sluggish ripples of Old Magic that seemed to warp and buckle the air. The remaining malakhim and even Max’s clones backed away from the boy as if he were radioactive.

  Crack!

  The masks of the malakhim shattered.

  They fell in a tinkling shower of obsidian shards, revealing the ghastly faces beneath. In the moonlight, they were milky and translucent, a swirl of features that bubbled like melted wax, ever seeking to assume a beautiful visage. But as soon as one was formed, it instantly liquefied and curdled into something grotes
que. The spirits turned away, covering their naked faces as though each held some secret of their shame and fall.

  The sorcerer’s attention locked onto the clones. They were rooted in place, but every muscle and vein now shone as though they each were straining furiously against some invisible binding. Trembling uncontrollably, the larger one managed to raise his spear. Glowering, he spoke through clenched teeth.

  “You’re not strong en—”

  With a backhanded gesture, David blasted the clones off their feet. They flew as if they’d been shot from a cannon, somersaulting through the air like rag dolls until they struck the courtyard wall in an explosion of stone and debris that knocked the malakhim from their horses. From the palace wall, there was a groan. A moment later, a vast section collapsed inward, sending a cloud of dust rolling across the dark courtyard. The clones were entombed.

  David turned to Max, his face weary and spent.

  “Can you ride?”

  When Max nodded, David called out for Madam Petra. The smuggler emerged cautiously from the keep, leading the other horse by its bridle. Katarina was ashen-faced, clutching the reins as she stared at the broken malakhim. Slumping against his saddle’s pommel, the sorcerer gestured toward the eastern sky. He struggled to make himself heard over the coming storm.

  “Max and I are hurt—we have to make for Bholevna. Yuga is getting closer; it might be very dangerous. Do you understand? You can come with us or go your own way.”

  Mother and daughter gazed into the east, at the consuming blackness that blotted out the stars. Then they looked at each other and reached a silent agreement. Handing the smee back to Max, the smuggler swung up into the saddle behind her daughter.

  “We’re wasting time.”

  The group fled northeast beneath the moon, cutting across sparse forests and empty homesteads as they raced toward Bholevna. Max rode with David, holding the reins as the exhausted sorcerer struggled to remain conscious. He slumped back against Max, holding his injured shoulder and wincing whenever the horse jumped over a ditch or clambered up a hill. Max tried to keep his friend awake, but he was having difficulty himself. He was badly wounded, and despite his remarkable powers of recovery, he’d lost a tremendous amount of blood.