Chapter 28. Temple
Temple
I’d fought gods before. Even killed one, an upstart deity of greed and technology who’d cropped up in Silicon Valley.
This R’gngyk fellow made the Silicon Valley godling look like a mosquito.
Everything hurt. My bones and joints ground like an old car that hadn’t had an oil change in decades. The gash Alex had torn through the foundation of the house and the foundation of our reality filled my guts with ice. The two trapped thralls felt like insects beneath my skin.
It wasn’t pleasant.
But I also felt the strength and the history of this place. The echoes of my ancestors, the generations of care and power. The courage and love and determination of everyone here with me.
A thick tentacle shot toward me. Before I could react, a two-by-twelve beam dropped from the ceiling to knock it aside.
The thing on the other side of the rift was strong. It was hungry. It was ancient and alien and fascinating, and a part of me wanted to stick my head through the portal and study it.
I didn’t, of course. I was old, not stupid.
I felt the power and love Jenny and Annette had shared. Not just today. For twenty years, they’d given so much of themselves. They’d turned this old building into more than it ever was before.
I felt the fierce protectiveness flowing from Jenny’s patients. They’d come to see this house as a sanctuary. I felt their strength and the different strands of their power: stone and wood and death and more flavors of magic than anyone could count.
This wasn’t just the Finn homestead anymore.
Second Life Books and Gifts didn’t belong to me.
It hadn’t for a while now. It belonged to us, and we belonged to it.
Its roots had always been deep, but thanks to Jenny and Annette, its branches had grown so much farther than I ever realized, touching so many.
Power rushed through me in a way I hadn’t felt since I was a kid living here with my family.
Power enough to destroy an eldritch god? Not even close. But I only needed enough to close a door.
I released my hold on Phile and approached R’gngyk’s portal. I was dimly aware of others fighting the limbs that tried to tear the wall apart stone by stone from within. I heard their shouts and curses and the angry snarl of a chainsaw.
I sent a mental request to the house. A pair of old reading glasses fell through the ceiling to land in my outstretched left hand. I removed my current glasses and tossed them aside, unfolded the reading glasses, and placed them gently onto my face.
The spell etched into the lenses shifted my vision. The rift in the wall turned to static made of popping white sparks. The glasses couldn’t handle so much power. It was like pointing a telescope at the sun.
But when I turned away, I saw trails of magic cutting through the air like fishing lines made of black fire. The thickest line connected from the rift to Alex Barclay. Smaller trails shot off into the distance.
Two others reached for the trapped thralls, straining to pierce the barriers Jenny and Annette had been clever enough to repurpose.
As always, the book in my hand opened to precisely the spell I needed. Casting the spell frayed me like a tattered dishcloth, but I made it through the words.
A spectral axe appeared in my hand. It was little more than a hatchet, really: two feet in length, with a crescent blade almost a foot long.
I hadn’t summoned the Vorpal Axe in so long, I’d forgotten how good the weapon felt to wield.
It was light as air but as solid as Thor’s hammer.
The handle’s texture was like the softest leather, contoured to my grip.
I swung once, severing the first of the thinner trails. R’gngyk’s connection to Morgan snapped.
A stronger line led to Alex Barclay. This one was thick, a twisted branch of ancient oak. I needed two swings to sever it.
Alex arched upward like his pelvis was trying to fly free from his body, then collapsed.
Again and again I struck. Each cut severed another source of R’gngyk’s power and weakened his link to our world.
My own world narrowed until there was nothing but my magic and R’gngyk’s assault. I stopped hearing the voices of the others, stopped feeling the cold of the air.
A shout of triumph built in my chest. If I’d ever had a theme song, it would have kicked in at a deafening volume right about now.
When I’d cut the last links between R’gngyk and his servants, I turned to the god himself. While others battled the extremities that clung to my basement wall, I hefted the Vorpal Axe with both hands.
In our world, this spell could cut flesh, stone, magic, and even thought. I had no idea what it would do to a being like R’gngyk. The rules of magic—of everything—were entirely alien on the other side of that wall. But if it could reach through to physically assault my world, I could do the same.
“I am Temple Herrmann Finn,” I said, centering myself and gathering what strength I had left. “Wizard. Enforcer of the peace. Protector of this world.” I threw the axe into the portal. “Get the hell out of our shop.”
Several seconds passed, and then a rumbling scream filled the basement. The sound was so low, it wasn’t heard but felt, a drumbeat of pain and rage.
R’gngyk’s limbs jerked back.
A gasp of energy surged through the house. Limestone shifted and re-formed. The flames of R’gngyk’s doorway flickered and died.
“That felt good.” My voice was strange, stronger and clearer but slower.
Each syllable lingered longer. I removed my glasses and squinted as my eyes adjusted to normal vision.
Only it wasn’t normal. It was both brighter and darker.
Most of the beings gathered in the basement were more solid, more real than I was used to.
I looked down. “Ah. Right.”
Jenny was performing CPR on my body. Annette knelt by my head, whispering words I couldn’t hear. Our other guests were tending to their injuries and keeping a wary eye on the now-solid wall.
The only exception was the harvester, who stared directly at me. I nodded. She did the same, then turned to leave.
“Well, that was dramatic.” Margaret Wentworth stood on the bottom step of the stairs, her arms crossed.
I’d never seen her clearly. She was shorter than I’d thought, with sun-browned skin and shoulder-length brown hair and a wide, confident face. She wore a sleeveless yellow shirt that showed off the muscles of her freckled arms.
She was beautiful.
“When did it happen?” I asked.
“Toward the end, when you were finishing your game of Mad Lumberjack with the eldritch horror.”
“When I was winning my game, you mean?” I felt surprisingly good, considering I’d just died. The release and the relief from the daily aches and pains of my physical body were exhilarating. “What are you doing here? I thought you were tied to your van.”
“I stayed with Ronnie long enough to see him safely out of Salem. Then I came back. I had a feeling you might need company soon.”
I’d read about ghosts breaking free of their anchor, but it was a rare and difficult thing, one that required a strong will and equally strong emotions.
Oh . . .
“I’m not going to abandon Ronnie,” she said. “But I can finally step away for a bit, knowing he has people who will look after him and teach him what he needs to know.” She gave Jenny and Annette a significant glance.
I felt the house calling me to join it, to add my power and memories to the generations of Finn spirits here.
Instead, I stepped toward Margaret. I marveled at the easy movement of my hips and knees, the balance and stability I’d lost decades before.
She smiled. “It takes a while to adjust.”
“I don’t suppose you’d be willing to show me the ropes?”
The house pulled at me again.
“Be patient,” I snapped. “I’ll get there eventually. All things in their proper time.”
I took Margaret’s hand. We climbed the stairs together.
I’d spent almost a century fighting for this world. I’d earned a bit of R&R.