38. ADVERSARY #2
“You’re no better, Sister Jinaan.” The Lady of Pain addressed Hesaya.
“Eneva wouldn’t even let you attempt the Trial of the Gate, and you expect to be Gatekeeper?
She never wanted you for a successor; you’re more Telu than Zal.
” Turil wheezed another laugh. “Pity you’re all worthless.
So much ugly history on this world. You know a mere fraction of it—the blood, the horror . . . Is it any wonder we intervened?”
Hesaya’s face contorted. “We were never children to be disciplined from above, you fucking parasite.”
Her rage was real, the strain on her mind apparent. Blood trickled from her nose. But any weakness was feigned. Jacen had worked with her long enough to know she sensed what he was doing—and left herself vulnerable to buy him time.
The goddess’s consciousness radiated out from Seth, vivid enough to eclipse it. But that greater presence loomed behind, and now Jacen could almost see it. Something about it was strangely familiar. He followed the tether as it continued to strengthen, deeper than he’d ever dared go.
Jacen gave himself over to his extradimensional senses, leaving his physical form behind, seeing the fabric of reality as creatures of the Source could. Time and distance ceased to exist, and he found what lay beyond the tether.
He glimpsed a stark grey chamber with a vaulted ceiling. A pale man—or something that resembled one—sat with his legs crossed, eyes closed, beside a window to the stars.
The being did not stir. He seemed to be in a deep slumber, his only sign of life the slow rise and fall of his chest. Jacen sensed another presence close by.
He could not see this one, nor had he perceived it from within Seth’s mind.
But the presence resembled Turil’s enough that Jacen knew who it must be: Ileth, Lady of Despair.
Two gods, opening a channel to the third. Turil was having some difficulty, still sluggish from sedative and under assault from three telepaths, but she was close.
To what end?
The man—who could be none other than Tharanoth, Lord of Hunger—had a presence of exceptional, remarkable clarity. His eyes remained closed; he was as detached from his physical surroundings as Jacen.
Tharanoth tilted his head. A curious gesture, as though he had seen something that, just for an instant, gave him pause—perhaps the strange familiar thing which Jacen, too, had sensed. The Lord of Hunger smiled, broad and white. Pointed canines gleamed in the glow of the stars.
Then the channel opened—from his mind to Turil’s, from the orbital station all the way to the depths of Mount Otavok. A telepathic range so immense, it shouldn’t have been possible.
Jacen had seen all he needed to. He wrenched his consciousness away.
His heart slammed against his ribs as he found himself back in his body and heard Turil pronounce, “I am indulging your pathetic attempts for one reason and one reason alone: to offer an ultimatum. For every hour Neri Semira is not in our possession, we will kill one hundred in Zivora. Bring him to us or face our wrath. Let us demonstrate.”
A scream echoed from the hall. A crack of splitting bone, and a wet splatter. More screams.
Ilusha whimpered, but Hesaya’s resolve never faltered. “Hold your ground.”
“We have just killed one hundred,” said Turil.
“In one hour, we will kill a hundred more. Rich, poor, Guard, civilians, adults, children . . . We will not discriminate. We have you surrounded. We are waiting. You will release this host, and you will bring the boy to us. If he dares try to unleash Naxal’s power against us, we will level your habitable zones from orbit, one by one.
Even your infantile god cannot be everywhere at once.
He cannot protect you all. Tell him that the choice is his. ”
“Monster,” Hesaya spat. She reached out a hand. “I will excise you, worm.”
“No,” Ilusha gasped. Her consciousness dropped away as she staggered back toward Nines and Ogden, hands over her ears. “They’ll kill us all!” She pounded on the door. “Let us out!”
Like a titanic dust storm, the goddess’s presence surged. It shouldn’t have been possible. Seth was not a telepath, this wasn’t possible, and Jacen was not prepared to counter it.
Without Ilusha’s support to stem the tide, Hesaya and Jacen were shoved under.
Turil’s consciousness drowned out all else.
Waves of air and light rippled through Jacen’s head.
All he could do was hold on, clinging to his sanity, a rock in an onslaught of wind and sand with infinite time to destroy him.
Then, there was Nines. She slipped into the space where Ilusha had been—uncertain but strong enough for two. Jacen scrambled for purchase and found it.
“Fools,” hissed Turil. The presence receded.
Jacen was doubled over, panting, blood streaming over his lips. Nines knelt across from him in a similar state. He lifted a hand to stem the flow from his nose and met Hesaya’s gaze.
“Jacen,” she rasped. “We made a— We made—” Whatever she meant to say next was lost in an unintelligible slur. The left side of her face drooped. When she tried to step toward him, she stumbled. Jacen caught her as she began to seize, blood trickling from her nostrils.
“Help!” Jacen shouted at Ogden. Though visibly shaken, the healer was already running their way.
“A stroke,” he muttered. “I’ll do everything I—”
Ogden stopped mid-sentence. His eyes bulged. Sudden, uncharacteristic panic flared out from him. It was a scream for help from a man who could no longer speak—as if something had seized control of him from within.
Nines whispered, “She’s still here.”
Ogden’s breath came in short, strangled gasps, then stopped. He fell, clawing at his throat, his face a rictus of horror. His hands stiffened into unnatural contortions, battling in vain against an intangible force.
Jacen launched his mind at Ogden’s and found it barred to him, overwhelmed by that alien presence.
It burrowed into the heart of Ogden’s vital functions, ripping them apart, devouring him from the inside with personal, gleeful cruelty.
Jacen was too slow. He couldn’t stop it.
He could only watch Ogden die, beating in helpless rage at the prison walls Turil made of his own mind.
Seth turned his sightless face toward Nines, still on her knees in shock.
“Ninety-Nine. Syl Inissa.” He licked his lips, as though tasting every syllable.
“I’ll save you the trouble of a long trip south: your family thinks you’re better off dead.
I know this because I personally designed the social engineering programs we employ in the peninsula.
When your parents discovered what you were, they would have called you a monster.
They probably begged the Church to take you.
” Seth’s laugh chilled Jacen to the bone.
“You belong to us. You always will. You thought your gods weak, and you were wrong.”
Nines’ chest rose and fell, too quick. Her eyes were too wide. Jacen ripped himself back from Ogden’s dying mind—too late, it was too late—and threw everything he had into shielding Nines.
He left himself unguarded as Turil said, “Your teacher believed in you. He might be the only one who ever has. Now you can watch him die and know it was your fault.”
A psychic dagger plunged into Jacen’s brain. In twenty years of exorcisms, he had never experienced an attack like this. He clutched his temples in agony. A scream tore from his throat.
Someone finally shoved open the door, hard enough that it cracked against the stone wall. Ysira and several others barged into the cell,
shouting, arguing. They stopped in their tracks. Shock radiated out from their vulnerable minds.
“Sedative!” Jacen gasped. It was all he could do to shield his own vital functions. “Now!”
Ysira snatched a syringe from a slack-postured Disciple.
She sprinted to Seth, skidding in the sand, and jammed the plunger into the side of his neck.
She replaced his earplugs and gag without hesitation.
Seconds passed. It might as well have been an eternity.
Slowly, too slowly, Jacen’s head cleared.
He was on all fours, sand between his fingers, in his hair.
Tiny grains gritted between his teeth, mixing with the taste of blood.
But he could breathe again. The presence had vanished.
“Nines,” he choked out.
She’d been knocked flat on her back. She levered herself up on trembling hands. She tried to speak, lips forming shapes that might have meant I’m fine, but her face was soaked with tears.
Hesaya was still seizing. Disciples swarmed around her and carried her out. Maybe they could stabilize her. Maybe she had a chance. Ogden, though . . . The old man lay very still. Jacen scrambled to his side.
Another consciousness slammed against his. Jacen flinched, panic constricting his chest, but—this one, he knew. It meant him no harm.
He saw a metal cube, clenched tight in a gloved hand. Ogden’s final words burned across his mind. They left an echo, a scorching afterimage against the back of Jacen’s eyelids:
NO HALF MEASURES.