Page 80 of The Malevolent Eight
I steeled myself inside, covering up a dozen competing emotions with a veneer of amiability as casually impervious to scrutiny as that of any diabolic. ‘Glad you’re not dead, old buddy,’ I said to Tenebris as I turned to face him.
He grinned. ‘Me? I’m a survivor, Cade.’ He poked me in the centre of the chest with his clawed forefinger. ‘Like you.’
Trumpets began to blare from either side of the looming Pandoral, the brilliant brassiness of the Auroral horns rendered discordant by the reediness of the Infernal instruments.
‘Ugh,’ Tenebris groaned, covering his ears momentarily. ‘Why does our side always have to sound like fucking untuned clarinets?’ The question was rhetorical, because he immediately answered, ‘You know why our horns sound so shitty? Because a couple of the Lords Devilish like it that way and the others don’t give a crap, which means the rest of us have to suffer from their lousy ear for music.’
‘A metaphor, perhaps?’ Aradeus asked, twirling the strands of his moustache. Unlike Alice, he’d kept his rapier in its scabbard, knowing it would serve no purpose to draw steel against what was unfolding on that ill-fated field before us.
‘Exactly,’ Tenebris agreed. ‘That’s what’s screwed up both realms for millennia. Twelve Celestines and thirteen Devilish: twenty-three guys who fought their way to the top and then decided to play at being gods over everyone else.’
‘Then why not rebel?’ Galass asked. ‘Join our cause—’
He waved away both her plea and her idealism. ‘Because when the guys on top have cannons to shoot you with, you don’t come at them with wooden sticks, girly.’
At last, we’d come to it: the scheme beneath all the other schemes. The reason why everything I had tried to do had been doomed from the start. In fact, we were half to blame for what was about to happen.
The other half, though?
‘It was you, all along, wasn’t it?’ I asked Tenebris, working through the tiny, almost insignificant details of the past few weeks. Our first encounter with the Spellslinger, when she’d taken control of one of the Angelic Valiants and brought forth her doom, which had led me to seek out information from the Infernals because they were the most likely culprits. That had led us to that secret prison and the three captive diabolics, two of whom Tenebris had made sure were dead so there’d be no alternative but to free him. Shit. And when the Spellslinger had finally shown up in person, it had been at Tenebris’ restaurant. From there, the meeting with the Lords Celestine, our capture by the Lords Devilish, the mission to take the Glorian Banner and my subsequent kidnapping by the Pandoral minions, who’d been tricked into thinking they were pulling one over on the Devilish. . .
But no. . . Tenebris’ influence had begun even earlier.
‘You’rethe one who devised the plan to kill the Seven Brothers up in the Blastlands,’ I continued. ‘You orchestrated the ruse to turn them into gates so the Celestines and Devilish could come to the Mortal realm and begin their Great Crusade, knowing all along that they would screw it up and you’d be able to turn them against one another.’
‘Why?’ Shame asked Tenebris. It was unusual for her to care about such things, but I suppose with the world ending and all. . . ‘You sounded so committed to the plans of the Devilish– so dedicated to the Infernal cause.’
‘I’m a patriot,’ Tenebris said without irony as he polished his claws against his crimson brocaded coat. ‘And like any patriot, I’m loyal right up to the point where my rulers turn out to be absolute fucking morons who’re going to ruin everything we’re supposed to stand for.’ He looked at me, apparently expecting some acknowledgment of his assessment.
I didn’t give him any.
‘We Infernals believe in embracing experience, Cade. We’re aboutliving– here, now. The Aurorals, they think life is only a practice exam for some other, more perfect existence. But this Great Crusade?’ He swung an arm towards the armies who were about to attack the Pandoral. ‘There’s nothing toexperiencehere; it’s just one endless slog of drudgery and misery. And thanks to those half-witted Lords Celestine with their so-called “virtues”, it’ll keep going on for ever– there’s no end to the exam, no perfect “other existence”. But no matter how many of us– onbothsides– urged them to reconsider, those dumb fucks refused. The bosses are the betrayers, not us.’
‘How many of you?’ I asked.
His gaze shied away briefly. ‘Let’s just say, I represent a consortium of like-minded individuals in key positions within both camps. Unlike most of the Lords Celestine and Lords Devilish, these individuals are capable of envisioning a future in which the Mortal realm and all its opportunities are, if not shared, then let’s say, split down the middle. Under the right leadership, of course.’
Mostof the Lords Celestine, he’d said. I glanced back at the Auroral army. The Twelve Virtues stood at the very front of the line. One of themmighthave sensed my presence, as her head turned. I could’ve sworn she’d winked at me.
Shit, I thought ruefully,if it turns out the traitor within the Auroral Hierarchy is the one Celestine I slept with, Corrigan willneverlet me live it down. Not that living is likely to be a concern of mine for long.
‘So, a new bunch of fucks to take the place of the old bunch of fucks,’ Corrigan said. He sounded pleased that the universe was proving to be just as corrupt as he’d always claimed.
‘Not as many, though,’ Tenebris insisted, as if that was important. ‘Twelve Celestines and Thirteen Devilish is way too many.’ He grinned at me, his fangs gleaming in the early morning light. ‘Can’t have twenty-three gods in the pantheon, am I right?’
I probably shouldn’t have slugged him. Given how well he’d been manipulating events, it was highly likely that within a matter of hours, Tenebris was going to be some sort of demi-god. But I had it on good authority that I myself was only hours away from dying. Possibly even minutes. Mostly, though, I thumped him because the banality of my former agent’s ambitions pissed me off.
‘You’re going to regret that, Cade,’ the diabolic informed me as he got back to his feet. ‘I was going to go easy on you on account of us having a history together, but now—’
I slugged him again, harder this time, then turned to the others. ‘Listen, I’m going to try something. All evidence suggests it’s going to fail, but I can’t think of a better plan and I don’t intend to sit out this disaster without putting up some sort of a fight.’
I expected questions, or at least dubious looks, so I was kind of taken aback when Alice asked, ‘Is this plan of yours righteous?’
I wasn’t sure how to answer that. It had been a long time since justice had been any concern of mine, but I found myself nodding. ‘I think. . . I think it might be the most righteous thing I’ve ever done.’
Her whip-sword stiffened, the segments rattling together into a gleaming blade whose hilt she held to her heart. Weirdly, on demoniacs the heart is just above the belly. ‘I am Aliciaj Meharcorum Jedashaavethan Bestrezaada—’ followed by a bunch of other barely intelligible parts of her demoniac lineage that were painful to hear until she got to the last part: ‘. . . daughter of Hazidan Rosh and atrueGlorian Justiciar. Give me my orders, First Paladin. I will not fail you.’
Daughter?I repeated that silently to myself. Hazidan Rosh was going to have some explaining to do when next we met. If we ever met again.
