Chapter 7 #2
The Cardinal, Sancha, sat behind her polished wooden desk, neat stacks of paper piled in the corners. She looked up from the parchment in front of her, a pen in her hand as she finished the stroke, then set it aside in the inkwell.
“Cirian,” she greeted her Acolyte. “I take it last night’s unsanctioned mission was a success?”
“Indeed,” Cirian agreed. “Though not in the ways we’d originally intended.”
Malachi stood stark still a few feet behind Cirian, his gaze trained forward on the Cardinal with a focused intensity that I thought he’d stare a hole straight through her.
The Cardinal’s gaze shifted to me for a moment, lingering in the doorway.
“Come in,” she said, waving me forward. “Whether or not your little outing carried my approval, I would have the full report.”
I took a step forward, the door closing on its own accord behind me.
“With Malachi’s help, we were able to gain access to one of the Converts’ gatherings,” Cirian started, moving to sink into one of the chairs opposite the Cardinal’s desk. “Much like the others, it was held in a neutral space underneath a café over on the mortal row—”
In a blur of motion, Malachi leaped atop the desk, scattering papers to the floor. From within his garments, he produced a silver-handled blade the length of his forearm, and with the same frightening speed, he lunged, aiming directly for the Cardinal’s heart.
“Sancha!”
The Cardinal’s hands clapped around the weapon, her palms on either side of the blade as she held the tip at bay just before it found the flesh of her chest. Her chair skidded back from the force of the blow as Malachi landed on his feet, bearing all of his weight into the weapon, his lips curled back in a snarl.
Shock rooted me in place, but Cirian was out of his chair in a flash, skidding around the desk and loosing a bolt of cerulean lightning that struck Malachi in the side, propelling him across the room where he collided with the stone wall.
Sancha was on her feet in a blink, turning to face her assailant with cold focus. Malachi had barely recovered his footing when Sancha raised her now-bloodied hand, the air in the room suddenly growing heavy with the weight of her magic as she brought it to bear against the man.
With a crackle of energy, Malachi rose from the ground, his body pressed against the wall with such force that the air was squeezed from his lungs with a wheeze.
“Explain yourself,” the Cardinal ordered, her voice calm and commanding.
“I’ve been shown the truth,” Malachi managed through gritted teeth.
“What truth do you speak?”
Malachi struggled against the force of Sancha’s magic, veins bulging under the immense strain. “The lies of the light. The lies of the Church.”
“Let them be heard,” Sancha pressed.
“This world was never meant for the light. Darkness is the true form, and to darkness it must return.”
“And how will that be accomplished?” questioned the Cardinal, stepping closer to the man even as her outstretched hand dripped blood in a trail along the floor. Cracks formed in the stone wall behind Malachi from the pressure, but he remained silent.
“Speak,” Sancha ordered. “Now is your last opportunity to do so.”
Malachi groaned as a cracking sound filled the room, a trickle of blood pouring over his lips. But then something broken bubbled up from within him, and it took me a moment to realize he was laughing. Harsh, short huffs of air that wheezed through his gritted teeth.
“I failed, but there are more. More than you can imagine. You can’t stop it. Can’t outrun it. Darkness comes for us all. And with the embrace of the Umbral, we shall finally know peace.”
I jolted at the name, my limbs coaxed into motion. A second mention of the Umbral.
“Enough of this blasphemy,” said Sancha, her expression hardening.
“Wait!” I shouted, arms outstretched. But it was too late.
Sancha closed her fist, Malachi letting out a final groan of pain as his ribs cracked under the pressure, and his head lolled to the side.
The pressure of the room subsided as Sancha’s arm slackened.
Cirian appeared at her side, taking her hand into his own.
Her dark skin glowed with cerulean light, yet the wound across her palm continued to drip onto the floor below.
“It won’t heal?”
“A Sanguine blade,” Sancha explained, her eyes alight with a certain amusement as she watched the blood ooze from her flesh. “The wound already saps at my strength. I’ll have to bind it for now whilst we deal with this mess.”
I approached the crumpled form of Malachi, examining the body.
My mind reeled, attempting to piece together the series of events that brought him to this point.
There were so many questions I needed answered, yet that was no longer a possibility.
Even if I wanted to bring him back to life, the damage was far too extensive.
He’d only come back for a few agonizing seconds.
Unless….
“Cirian.” I glanced over to the man as he helped the Saint to her chair, her breathing becoming more labored by the second. “I’m going to project myself into the Ether. Malachi’s magic should still be nearby, and I can try to extract some answers.”
“Can you wait just a second?” Cirian called back.
I was already forming the sigil required, my magic’s frigid surge forcing a pent exhale as I reached a finger outward to pierce the Veil. “No, his essence could already have moved on. I need to go now if I want any chance of catching it.”
“Go, Seeker,” Sancha replied, her half-lidded eyes finding me as Cirian worked to bind the wound on her hand. “Gather what knowledge you can.”
I nodded, sinking to my knees as I muttered the familiar incantation. Weightlessness seized me as I expended the final word, my consciousness lurching forward and through the minuscule tear in the Veil.
Color leached from my surroundings as I oriented myself in the achromatic scene.
My body remained below, knelt on the floor with an expression twisted by concentration.
Across the room, the light from Cirian’s aura was nearly eclipsed by the beacon that was the Cardinal.
I had to look away just as quickly, my focus narrowing in on Malachi’s body, slumped against the splintered wall.
Not a trace of color was left in his frame, so I scanned the surroundings, hoping to catch a glimpse of his essence as it waited to be reabsorbed into the Source.
But there was no such trace to be found.
I drifted through the stone walls, searching the nearby cloisters for any sign, but the only light I found were those of the clergy members I came across.
Something wasn’t adding up. A Magi’s essence usually clung to their physical shell for a few hours after they died. Especially if the death was sudden. So why had Malachi’s vanished mere moments afterward?
I returned to the Cardinal’s chamber, mulling over the conundrum, and had nearly reached for the tear when a flicker of movement caught my eye.
I turned, my gaze falling on Malachi’s body once more.
The blood beneath his body had seeped, forming a puddle.
Here in the Ether, the liquid appeared black as night.
It was this blood that was moving, I realized, the edges of the viscous shape teeming as it expanded.
Gooseflesh prickled across the nape of my neck as I watched in morbid fascination.
The liquid—moving far too quickly to be blood—continued to expand, taking shape as it did so.
Tendrils reached out from the central mass, twisting together to form limbs, a torso, and finally a head.
I was looking at an outline of a man, I realized.
A man of Malachi’s stature. And before I could react, the shadowy figure rose from the ground, standing before me as two slits of light cut through the face, revealing eyes of starlight.
The shadow stared at me, its gaze unblinking.
Whatever it was, it had sentience enough to recognize my presence.
My hand hovered over the tear in the Veil.
All of the neurons in my brain told me to run.
To put as much distance between me and this creature as I possibly could.
But I ignored the baser instinct, too seduced by the tantalizing exploration of the unknown.
“What are you?”
My voice echoed through the Ether, and the shadow’s image rippled as if I had cast a stone into a still pond. The eyes of starlight narrowed, then another line of light appeared beneath them, opening wide to nearly blind me with a flash of light. From within the shadow, a small voice spoke.
“I was a man. I was Magi. Now, I am an absence of both.”
“Are you Malachi?” I pressed.
The shadow rippled once more.
“I am what remains.”
Could this shadow really be his essence? I’d never seen such a vivid manifestation, and never one so dark. Typically, the residual magic would take the form of the deceased. I’d yet to come across an account of such a figure, even in all of the tomes of Paradise.
“You spoke of the Umbral before. Do you know this creature?”
The shadow trembled at my words.
“They are almost here.”
“Who?” I questioned again, my consciousness drifting toward the shadow.
Its head tilted back, those pools of light staring up through the ceiling above us as if it were basking in the warmth of the sun.
They did not speak, so I questioned once more. “What about the truth, Malachi? You said that you were told the truth. Help me understand.”
Slowly, the face of the shadow lowered, eyes opening once more with dazzling light. When they spoke, their voice was soft. Sad, almost. “There is no time, Magi. They come now, with an embrace of ultimate peace. Do not turn away.”
“Turn away from what—?”