29
SHADOWCREST
VIRGINIA PRIME
SHEKARCHIYANDAR
THE SCREAMS OF THE DEAD are music to Shekarchiyandar’s ears. He shuts his eyes, letting the sounds of wraithly suffering refresh his resurrected spirit. Some of his slave spirits still remember a time when screaming had a purpose, when a cry of pain might have brought help running—or at least inspired sympathy—and their voices are the loudest, the most desperate. But here there is no help and no sympathy. Eventually they will learn that. Eventually they will tire of defiance, and their cries will subside to mere whispers of misery, background music to the terror of new arrivals.
All those notes—loud and soft, desperate and despairing—are testaments to Shekarchiyandar’s power. Yet even they pale beside his greatest accomplishment, the creation of the ruuh-bal. The fact that seven of his hunters are still functioning after so many centuries is a monument to his skill as a necromancer, and the fact that they are as obedient to his will now, when he is acting through Virilian, as they were on the night he created them, strikes fear and wonder into the hearts of his fellow Shadowlords. How many could manage such a feat?
He does prefer their original name to what they are called now. Devourer of souls. Much more poetic than reaper.
As he walks down the halls of the Bayt al-Hikma—the House of Wisdom—he knows that he is in a dream, but he lets the illusion play out. One of his greatest shocks upon his return to the living world was learning that the great Persian library had been destroyed, sacked by Mongols after his last death. In his first lifetime the place had seemed eternal, yet it had fallen like so many political monuments, its priceless books and scrolls cast into the Euphrates until the river ran black from all the ink. Or so Virilian’s history books claim. How anyone could destroy such a storehouse of knowledge is beyond him. Wars might be writ in human blood, but it is knowledge that determines the course of human history. That was the weapon he used to bring the Dreamwalkers down, casting them as monsters whose existence threatened all of humankind. Once the historical records were altered to reflect his fiction, and enough generations had passed that the truth was forgotten, the Dreamwalkers’ fates were sealed forever.
Now there is a new Dreamwalker in town. He is perversely pleased by that, as a dog trainer might be pleased by the appearance of a fox. Even a leashed predator needs to be blooded now and then, and his reapers have little prey these days. But though he is using the reapers to find her, he doesn’t want them to kill her. Not yet.
He will do that himself.
That is assuming she manages to escape from the Badlands alive. If she does, and he is able to capture her . . . ah, what pleasure it will be to bind a young new Dreamwalker, her senses crisp and clear, her talent fresh and strong! How many centuries has it been since he last experienced the heady rush that comes of devouring an enemy’s soul? Even remembering such things sends a shiver of anticipation through his undead flesh. And once she is dead there will be the challenge of breaking her spirit, as one must break a wild stallion. Perhaps he will even mold her into a new reaper, and command her to join the others and hunt her own kind. So many possibilities! But first he must capture her.
He reaches for a book—and suddenly is aware that he is not alone. Virilian might not have recognized the source of the sensation, but Shekarchiyandar is more knowledgeable about such things. A Dreamwalker has entered the scene. Might it be his quarry? Would she really dare to come here, to this mental landscape which he controls? The first time she invaded Virilian’s dreams she had done so stealthily, hoping to avoid detection, but with Shekarchiyandar in the picture such stealth was no longer possible. He had dealt with her kind during the Dream Wars, and knew the signs.
But she has no way to know that, he reminds himself. She has no idea what she is facing in me.
As he turns toward his visitor he transforms his Shadowlord robe into a gown of Persian silk, setting a turban of twisted gold cloth on his head like a crown. It is the kind of outfit he wore during his first lifetime, when kings and priests feared him. Let her see him as he was in the days of his living glory.
The girl who stands before him is younger than expected, but she bears herself with dignity and confidence—or at least the illusion of those things. She’s dressed in clothing made from a type of cloth that Virilian identifies as camo, the hallmark of modern warriors, but she wears no protective armor, and the only weapon visible is a long knife clipped to her belt. It doesn’t mean much, of course. She can create any weapon or armor she needs in the space of a heartbeat. As can he.
When she sees that his attention is fixed on her she asks, “Do you know who I am?”
“Jennifer Dolan, I assume. Since there are no other Dreamwalkers around these days, it seems the logical conclusion.”
“No other Dreamwalkers that you know about.”
He ignores the obvious bait. “Do you know who I am?”
For a moment she doesn’t respond. She came here to see Virilian, but obviously he doesn’t look like Virilian, so she’s probably trying to apply her limited knowledge of the Shadows to make sense of that. “I know whose dream I entered,” she says at last. “I also know that the man standing in front of me took part in the Dream Wars, and those ended centuries before Augustus Virilian was born.”
“I am Guildmaster Virilian. I am also Shekarchiyandar, called the Lord of Hunters, who helped bring about the defeat of the Dreamwalkers.” He folds his arms across his chest. “So, what brings you into my dream? If I find your story interesting I may hold my reapers at bay long enough for you to finish the telling of it.”
If his mention of the reapers stirs fear in her, it doesn’t show. “I’ve come here to parley.”
He raises an eyebrow. “For what purpose?”
“To end an ancient war.”
“The one between your people and mine?”
“Is there another one we should be discussing?”
He chuckles disdainfully. “That war ended long ago, child.”
Anger flashes in her eyes. “You’re still hunting my kind. So no, sorry, it’s not ended.”
“Cleanup.” He shrugs. “Nothing more.”
“The people you took captive back then are still your captives today, Does that sound like ‘the war is over’ to you? Because it doesn’t to me.”
“You speak of the souls of Dreamwalkers.”
She nods.
“You want them freed?”
“Yes.”
“All of them?”
“Yes.”
“And you are . . .” he smiles indulgently, “. . . demanding this?”
“Let’s say I’m asking it. For now.”
Her audacity amuses him. Impresses him, even. He wonders what it will feel like to drain her of her memories and dissect that defiant spirit. “Even if such a thing were possible, do you imagine I speak for every Shadowlord on earth? Or can give them all orders?” He shakes his head mockingly. “Would that I had such power!”
“I know it’s possible. I’ve met a spirit who was bound by the Shadows and then released, and if it can be done for him it can be done for others. So let’s not waste time pretending I don’t know that, okay? Second, you may not be able to give orders to every Shadowlord on earth, but you can set things in motion. Bear witness to the other Guilds that war with us is no longer necessary. Order the freeing of Dreamwalker souls within your domain, and encourage neighboring Shadows to do the same. After that, if I must repeat my message to others Shadowlords, city by city, so be it. At least there will be precedent.”
“That would take considerable time.”
“The Dreamwalkers you enslaved have suffered for centuries. What’s another year or two, added to that?”
“And what do you offer in return for all this?” His tone is scornful. “Your eternal gratitude? Undying friendship?”
“How about, we won’t tell everyone how you enslaved the Dreamwalkers to claim their Gift? I doubt the other Guilds would be pleased by that.” Her gaze is defiant. “And we won’t tell the other Guilds how you fed them lies to get them to help you, or how you falsified historical records later so they would never find out the truth.”
Anger stirs inside him. “You dare to threaten me?”
“I’m offering you peace. An end to secrets. Release my people and the past will be forgotten. No one need ever know the truth. Surely that’s best for everyone.”
“I could kill you here and now, you know. In this very dream. I could summon my reapers and have them tear your soul to bits—”
“Your reapers are gone, as is the great Shadow army that once destroyed our tower. So who will you fight us with this time? Shadows to whom we’re no more than legend?”
His reapers are gone? She is bluffing. She must be bluffing. He reaches out with his mind to contact his ruuh-bal, to summon them to his side . . . but there is no response. He tries again. Nothing. It’s not possible, he thinks. She lacks the Gift required to do such a thing. “Your tower is gone,” he tells her. “We knew it served as a focus for the Dreamwalkers’ Gift, so we destroyed it. The information stored in it was likewise destroyed. I know, because I set that fire myself. So what will you show to the other Guilds, as proof that your accusations are true? Everyone knows that your Gift brings madness. Tell whatever stories you like; it will only be further proof of your insanity.” He smiles coldly. “Didn’t you think that I planned for this from the beginning? Only a fool trusts that mere silence will guard his secrets forever.”
“We made mistakes when we fought you before.” Her voice is quiet now, but in the way the stillness before a storm is quiet. “If we have to fight again, you won’t have that advantage.”
“And who will your army be composed of? What Dreamwalkers have survived our purge? Madmen perhaps, who evaded us because their Gift was mistaken for mental illness? Children so young they haven’t yet manifested their Gift? We’ve been hunting your kind for centuries, Dreamwalker. A few might have slipped through our fingers, but I’ll wager there aren’t enough of you left to stage a street brawl, much less a war.”
“Don’t underestimate our numbers,” she warns. “Or our capacity. Open conflict wouldn’t be good for either Shadows or Dreamwalkers. That’s why I’ve come to you, to seek a solution that will allow us to avoid further bloodshed. Release your captives, and all the rest will be forgotten. On this you have my word.”
“You speak for all the Dreamwalkers, then? All—what?—two of them? Three? Perhaps as many as a dozen?” He chuckles scornfully.
“Enough.” There is ice in her voice. “Don’t test us, Guildmaster. You won’t like where that leads.”
His smile fades. “Your threats are empty. I didn’t fear bloodshed in my mortal life, and I don’t fear it now. So summon your dozen great dream-warriors. Do your worst. When the dust has settled and all the spilled blood has dried, I will take pleasure in binding your soul myself. You will spend the rest of eternity hunting your own kind.”
A muscle at the side of her jaw twitches. “That’s your final word?”
“It is.”
“Then I’m sorry, Shadowlord. For all the people whose blood you would spill. If you ever change your mind . . .” She pauses. “I’m sure you know how to dream up a white flag.”
I know how to turn one into a shroud, he thinks as she disappears.
30
BADLANDS
TERRA PRIME
JESSE
“DID YOU FIND HIM?” Isaac asked.
I opened my eyes. Overhead the canopy at the Grand Portal was a black void against a starlit sky, its carved supports nearly invisible in the darkness. Though the sun had already risen on the east coast—hopefully prompting most of the Shadowlords to retire for the day—we still had an hour or two before the sky would lighten here. Even after that, the full heat of the day would take a while to build. Call it five comfortable hours.
When you’re planning to abandon your body for an indefinite period of time, things like that matter.
“I found him. He didn’t go for my offer.”
“Did you expect him to?” Dr. Redwind—Ahota—was setting out the supplies I would need for my journey. Bags of colored sand, an assortment of weapons, and of course the small notebook I had recorded Morgana’s observations in. Hopefully I’d transcribed all that information correctly. Ritual herbs were being placed in the appropriate braziers, waiting to be ignited. Things were nearly ready.
The sheer magnitude of what I was about to attempt was just starting to sink in, and with it a kind of fear I had never felt before. The last confrontation between the Dreamwalkers and the Shadows had resulted in a field of dead bodies, followed by the genocide of my kind. Did I really think I could do better than that? Up until now, death had been an abstract concept to me. Now, I felt as if the real Reaper—the Grim one, with black robes and scythe—was in the corner of this ritual space, watching me. Waiting for me to make a mistake.
“No.” I forced my tone to sound casual; nothing would be gained by letting the others see how overwhelmed I felt. “But it never hurts to try, right?”
Isaac helped me to my feet. “A different Shadow might have listened. They’re not all the same, you know. Virilian, he’s obsessed with power and not likely to do anything that could be viewed as surrender.” There was bitterness in his voice. That was certainly understandable, since Virilian was the one who had banished him. “Arrogant bastard,” he muttered.
I already knew the Guildmaster’s weaknesses from Morgana’s book of fear. Sunlight. Submission. Condescension. That kind of man wasn’t going to let a sixteen-year-old girl tell him what to do, unless he believed there was no other choice. And maybe even then he would refuse. “I’m not sure it was Virilian I was talking to.”
Ahota stopped what she was doing and looked at me. “Wasn’t he the one whose dream you went to visit?”
I hesitated. How was I supposed to explain to them that the dreams of a Shadowlord were ten times more complex than those of a normal person? That the uniquely layered consciousness of the undead meant that each dream might reflect a different personality? I remembered the man I had talked to in Virilian’s dream: tall, aristocratic, striking in his features, but with a black gaze as empty as the Abyss and a presence as cold as the arctic wind. In my dream I’d been able to control my appearance, so it wasn’t hard for me to hide my instinctive response to him; I just created an avatar who didn’t look repelled. But there was something wrong with that version of Virilian, in a way, that hadn’t been true of his other personalities. Something I couldn’t give a name to, but I could sense it, and it terrified me. “He called himself Shekarchiyandar.”
“Whoa.” Isaac’s eyes widened. “Are you sure that was the name?”
“I might be a little off in the pronunciation—he had a bit of an accent—but yeah, that’s pretty much it. Why?”
“That’s the Shadowlord who created the reapers. All the information I gave you about them was from his biography. Virilian must have Communed with him to gain control over them, which means . . . Shit.”
“Why ‘shit’?”
“He was crazy, Jesse. And all the people who’ve tried to Commune with him—” Suddenly he winced in pain.
“It’s all right,” I said quickly, putting a hand on his arm. “Don’t worry about it.” Sebastian had told me in private that he thought something had been done to Isaac to keep him from revealing Guild secrets, and it certainly looked that way now. Though I wondered how they were defining ‘Guild secrets.’
“It’s not all right,” he choked out. “I want to be able to help you.”
“You’ve helped me already. And you just warned me that I’ll be dealing with a madman. That’s a pretty important piece of information, considering he’s
central to this whole operation.
“He shouldn’t have an accent, Jesse. And he shouldn’t be using the name of an earlier incarnation. Communion’s not supposed to work like—” Again I saw him stiffen in pain, then he doubled over. He seemed to be struggling for breath.
“Hey.” I squeezed his arm. “It’s okay. I got the picture.”
“Let me go with you,” he gasped. “I can help you.”
My hand fell away from his arm. “You know that’s not possible.”
“You brought me with you last time.”
“Last time I didn’t have allies who hated the Shadows so much that if they even suspected I had one with me, they’d leave and never come back. I just can’t risk that, Isaac.” Not to mention I don’t want to pit you in battle against your own father. That’s the kind of thing that could scar you for a lifetime. “To be honest, they’re not that thrilled with me either. I’m trying not to push my luck.”
Ahota asked, “You still won’t tell us who they are?”
I chose my words carefully, not wanting to betray the trust of my allies by revealing their true nature to anyone. “They’re Dreamwalkers from less travelled worlds, places the Shadows didn’t really focus on. I mean, it isn’t possible to inspect every infant on every human world, right? A few must have slipped through their net now and then, and those who learned to keep their heads down survived to adulthood. The tower enabled me to find them.” That seemed to satisfy Isaac, but Ahota looked like she understood what I wasn’t saying. As usual.
I took some weapons from her and started arranging them around the edge of the circular platform, leaving room for the sand painting I would have to create to access the tower again. Knives, swords, spears, a bow with arrows, a pistol, a shotgun . . . I had no clue what I might need in the other world, but I was setting out everything I could think of, just in case. The less energy it cost me to create a weapon in the dream world, the more I would have free to invest in other things. God knows, I was going to need a shitload of energy for what I had in mind.