Darksiders: The Abomination Vault Page 5

  Only when they’d passed through the battlements did the cannons return their aim toward the surrounding woods and the horizons beyond.

  Within the fortifications, a perfectly geometrical array of smaller structures glinted orange in the sunlight. Each was constructed of an amber-hued glass, just opaque enough to allow privacy to anyone within. Death knew, without the need for close examination, that the substance would be as strong as stone or steel despite its crystalline appearance—not due to any special senses on his part, but simply because he knew that angels in the field would accept nothing weaker.

  In neat rows between the buildings, bloodied soldiers lay on stiff cots, recovering from their injuries. More angels dashed around them, tending the wounded with medicinal balms both alchemical and mystical. They did their best—their faces had gone slack with exhaustion and effort—but they were so few, and their patients many. Blotches of blood and scattered feathers were more abundant on the grass than fallen leaves.

  The accompanying angels peeled off to return to their own cots, or to seek treatment for their injuries, many glaring at Death as they departed. Azrael alone remained to lead the Horseman to the one structure that stood in the perfect center of the encampment.

  Of course.

  No doors marred the perfect crystal surface. As with the portcullis, a section of the wall simply phased away, allowing the angel and the Rider to enter.

  “What is that doing here?” The voice was gruff, powerful, clearly accustomed to instant and unquestioning obedience—but it also quavered, ever so slightly, with repressed agony.

  “A pleasure, Lord Abaddon,” Death replied.

  The greatest warrior the White City had ever produced sat upon a chair of ivory-hued hardwood, gripping it so tightly that the armrests had cracked. Shoulders and chest seemingly large enough to uproot a small mountain were encased in gold-trimmed armor so heavy that most angels couldn’t have lifted it, let alone worn it. The square jaw, framed by an unkempt mass of the angels’ traditional platinum hair, was distended in a furious scowl that seemed quite capable of chewing through the defensive walls.

  A pair of angels stood, one to either side of the great general, tending his injuries. With balm-soaked cloths and foul-smelling unguents, they prodded—ever careful, ever gentle—at their commander’s face.

  And it was, indeed, that face that drew Death’s attention. Vicious gouges marred the flesh from forehead to cheek on both sides, and a crimson-soaked bandage completely hid the angel’s right eye.

  Or, to judge by the concave flex of the blood-stiffened fabric, the empty socket that had once housed the eye.

  That Abaddon was conscious, let alone functional and rational, was enough to impress even the impassive Horseman.

  Azrael stepped between them, speaking softly but swiftly. A few emphatic gestures, a few barked questions, and Abaddon grudgingly nodded.

  “All right, Horseman. Azrael’s convinced me we’re on the same side of this—for now.”

  “How magnanimous of you.”

  The general grumbled, low in his throat. “Tell me what you know.”

  “Less than you do,” Death said. “I know of the attack, up to the appearance of the brass warriors. Beyond that …” He shrugged.

  “There’s little to tell beyond that,” Abaddon said. “They gave us some trouble, and I lost some good soldiers, but we rebuffed them.”

  “Did you?” Death asked him. “Are you certain?”

  Abaddon’s glower returned, stiffer even than before.

  “We did,” Azrael said, stepping in. “I know what you’re asking, Death, and I can assure you, the garden was not breached.”

  “Hmm. I’ll need to see for myself. Once I’ve returned, we can—”

  “No,” Abaddon growled.

  While, at the same time, Azrael said, “The way is barred.”

  “Then unbar it.”

  “I’m sorry,” Azrael told him, and it sounded as though he genuinely meant that. “I understand how important this is to you—”

  “You cannot possibly—”

  “—but we cannot risk it. The enemy may still be watching. To lower the defenses, even for a moment, might grant them the opportunity they require. I won’t do so, not even for you.”

  “I know my way to the gate,” Death said, his voice dangerously calm. Only the blazing fire in his eyes, stoked brighter than Azrael had ever seen it, suggested the growing fury within. “Do you believe your wards can keep me out indefinitely if I choose to break them?”

  “Not indefinitely,” the scholarly angel said softly. “But long. Long enough for our common enemy, whoever he may be, to move to whatever the next stage of whatever plan he’s following.”

  “And you’d be fending off the forces of the White City at every moment,” Abaddon said. “After having had to kill every one of us present just to begin.”

  “Myself included,” Azrael added.

  Death’s mask couldn’t hide his scowl. “You? You’ve never been a warrior, Azrael.”

  “Neither am I remotely helpless on the battlefield, as you well know. Would you really pit yourself against all of Heaven merely to confirm with your own eyes what I swear to you is true? When I’ve no reason to deceive you?”

  The general’s two attendants fell back, seemingly pushed away by an almost palpable clash of wills. Three of the most potent beings in Creation watched one another, each considering what the other might say next, do next. Azrael looked almost to be holding his breath; Abaddon, with his remaining eye, measuring the distance to the impossibly gargantuan sword standing upright in the corner.

  And Death … finally shook his head. Azrael had too much control to sigh in relief, but everyone sensed it all the same.

  “Know this, though,” the Horseman said. “If I find you were wrong, if I find that Eden was breached and the remains of my brethren have been disturbed in any way, not all the blades in Heaven will keep me from you.”

  “Understood.”

  Death turned away, staring at the amber wall as he struggled to swim against the rushing tide of anger. Only when he was certain that he’d regained all control did he look back at the angels.

  “So what now?”

  “We need to decide that,” Abaddon said. The Horseman chose to ignore the fact that the general’s gaze continued to flicker between Death himself and that sword. “Can you …” Clearly he had no desire to say what he was about to say. “Can you ask one of them who sent them?”

  “No. Some constructs have souls, like any other creature; lesser automatons have life, but no true soul. These are the latter. There’s nothing for me to call back and question.”

  “Then,” Abaddon said, “until we can determine who attacked us, I don’t see much we can do.” His lips twisted in a rictus grin: bitter, self-mocking, and utterly without humor. “But then, I’m not seeing as well as I used to, am I?”

  “All the miracles of angelic medicine I’ve heard about aren’t enough?” Death asked. “Surely regrowing a lost eye isn’t beyond your healers’ skills.”

  “Normally, no,” Azrael said. He glanced briefly at Abaddon, who nodded once, reluctantly. “But in this instance, it’s not to be. Something about the weapon that struck Lord Abaddon was … horribly unnatural. The wounds it dealt turned instantly necrotic. Our healers, and the general’s own strength, kept the rot and poison from spreading, but I fear the wounds themselves are beyond even our … Death? What is it?”

  The Horseman’s body had gone rigid as any tombstone. The skin on his knuckles threatened to tear.

  “This weapon,” he whispered, barely more than a breath. The others had to lean in to make out the words. “Was this the sword that one of the brass-armored constructs carried?” Then, at Abaddon’s grunt and Azrael’s nod, “Do you have it?”

  “No,” the general told him sourly. “The construct that carried it was one of those that retreated when it became clear they could not win past us.”

  “A narrow-blad
ed sword? Nearly as long as I am tall, but scarcely three fingers wide at the base? Serpentine filigree running up the center of the blade?”

  Both angels stared openly now. “What do you know?” Abaddon demanded.

  Again Death turned away, apparently scrutinizing some unseen image—or some half-faded memory—hovering between him and the wall. Finally, just as Abaddon was drawing breath to speak again, he said, “We are allies in this? I can trust you to keep me apprised of anything you discover?”

  “Assuming you are equally forthcoming with us, of course,” Azrael said. The general glowered at him, shifting uncomfortably in his creaking chair, but made no overt protest.

  “Affliction.” Still Death kept his back turned, as though concerned, despite the mask, that they might read something untoward in his visage. “The name of the sword is Affliction.”

  “Descriptive enough,” Abaddon said flatly. “But how do you know of it?”

  “Because it’s a Nephilim weapon.” Finally, the Horseman turned toward them, raising his scythe for emphasis. “Taken from the Makers and imbued with our power at roughly the same time as Harvester.”

  “I see.” Abaddon’s sneer had deepened, his single eye narrowed sharply enough to cut, and Azrael didn’t seem much happier. “And who wields it now, Horseman? One of you?”

  “No. No, Abaddon, that’s the problem. Affliction was lost ages ago, on the fields of Kothysos.”

  “Kothysos? I don’t believe I know of that one.”

  Once it became clear that Death wasn’t planning to elaborate, Azrael spoke up. “There’s little written of it, even in the Library of the Argent Spire. We know it occurred during the height of the Nephilim rampage across the many realms. Several races of the Old Ones, concerned that they could not defend themselves if the horde turned their way, hired an enormous army of mercenary demons to crush the Nephilim. They met on the fields of Kothysos.

  “Death’s people won that engagement, but at a high cost. If I’m not mistaken, Kothysos represents the largest single loss of Nephilim life before Eden.”

  “The corpses were stacked in mountains,” Death said, his mind clearly elsewhere. “The world itself was poisoned by all that had happened. The Nephilim—this is after the other Horsemen and I turned from them, just in case either of you plan to waste time accusing me—scoured the battlefield, recovering the dead and what weapons they could. But much was lost, either destroyed or buried so deep in the carnage and churned earth that it was thought gone forever.”

  “Obviously not,” Abaddon snapped.

  “Yes. Obviously …”

  “So someone found a Nephilim artifact on Kothysos,” Azrael said. “Troublesome, but is it truly so disastrous? It’s just a sword, albeit a potent one.”

  “Affliction,” Death said, his voice grimmer even than usual, “was not the only thing lost in that battle.” He whistled, a high sound that the others in the room could only barely hear. From outside, a small commotion erupted among the angels as Despair materialized in a sickly cloud, having stepped through the void so that he might appear once more at his master’s side. “I have to go. I have to see.”

  “Wait!” Abaddon rose shakily to his feet as the Horseman strode toward the phantom spot in the wall. “You agreed to share what you knew!”

  Death looked back over his shoulder. “I don’t know. I suspect. If I’m wrong, my suspicions don’t matter. If I’m right, I’ll inform you then.” He passed through the wall and hauled himself into the ragged saddle.

  “Pray to your Creator for the former.”

  The green mist billowed once more, and the Horseman was gone.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  TO THE DOMINION OF THE CHARRED COUNCIL, SULLENLY obeying an abrupt and unwelcome call, came the Horseman War.

  He appeared through the clouded borders of the realm, as though birthed anew by the heavy, choking smoke. His long white hair and gleaming eyes could have falsely marked him, from a distance, as an angel—yet even the martial inhabitants of the White City had rarely produced a face so stern and unforgiving, or a frame of such immense and blatant strength.

  Thick, angular plates of riveted iron, edged in copper, formed an armor that might well have crushed a weaker wearer. Baroque faces, glowering demons and shrieking skulls, protruded from the shoulders and knees, embossed into the unyielding metal. Atop it all, across shoulders so broad they might just have supported one of Creation’s many worlds on their own, were draped the folds of a cloak as red as the wrath in a soldier’s heart. The deep hood might, in other circumstances, have concealed the wearer’s face in shadow—but here, where the light, though dim, was ubiquitous, no such concealment was possible.

  Across his back, held fast by no visible straps or means of support, was a sword as infamous as the Horseman himself. The leather-wrapped hilt protruded from behind one shoulder, as though trying to see past War’s girth; yet it was the blade itself that boasted an array of screaming faces. Portraits, perhaps, of the damned. The barbed and jagged blade, at its widest, was nearly as broad as its wielder’s chest, and had it stood point-down upon the earth, it would have proved taller than he, as well. It should have been utterly impossible to wield—but should and impossible were concepts for lesser beings than War.

  And lesser weapons than Chaoseater.

  Rock and cinders crunched beneath his heavy tread, while the hazy air swirled at his passing. War squinted against the stinging fumes and blistering heat, so intense it would have proved a tangible barrier for most beings, and once more studied the domain of his so-called lords and masters.

  It was always the air that hit him first. The searing, sulfur stench of things burning that should never have been able to burn; of gritty soot; of toxins that partook of an almost sentient joy in the ravages they caused, and were best avoided by any sane creature.

  Blackened rock spread before him, to every horizon and beyond. Through that stone, like blood from open wounds, ran endless meandering rivers of magma. They poured from cracks in the stone, from the tops of mountains, even occasionally from beyond the ceiling of smoke that obscured whatever might wait above. The lava gathered in pools, or cascaded into gorges so broad and so deep that they might as well have marked the edges of Creation. Spindly crags stood throughout, scattered with no regard for any laws of nature or geography. Some boasted gaping holes running straight through, or protruding ledges that could not possibly support their own weight. A few such peaks narrowed as they neared the thickest layer of haze, then broadened once more before vanishing from sight—as though they were not mountains at all, but great stalagmites that joined halfway with their stalactite brethren. As though the entire realm boasted no sky at all, but sat instead within a cavern of unimaginable dimensions.

  Columns of flame erupted with an even more haphazard disregard for any conceivable pattern, casting their hellish illumination over the broken landscape. They blazed despite an utter lack of fuel, as though the rocks themselves were burning.

  It seemed that nothing should be able to live in such a fearsome environment, but every so often a scuttling shadow suggested the presence of some tiny entity, struggling to survive on the blasted plain.

  And just as often, something else lashed out from within the magma, or the columns of flame, or just an empty crevice, to feast upon the hapless smaller beasts.

  None made any move to attack War, or even appear within his reach. They wouldn’t dare.

  For wearying leagues, the Horseman trudged. Eventually, a faint sheen of sweat broke out across his normally impassive brow. He cursed the Charred Council silently, internally, but would not offer the satisfaction even of wiping the perspiration from his forehead. The arrogant bastards could easily have permitted him to appear directly before them when he stepped across the barriers between realms—had done so before, in fact, in certain emergencies. But normally, they kept their wards impenetrable, save at the very edges of their dominion, even when expecting visitors.

  War was quite conv
inced that it was entirely an effort to remind him of his place, to make him walk and work his way to them as some lowly petitioner. A brief snarl, a twitch where his hand longed for the feel of Chaoseater’s hilt, and then he took the only action he conceivably could have taken.

  He kept walking.

  Finally, just like that, he was there.

  His destination hadn’t appeared on the horizon and drawn slowly near, as it should. One step, and War saw nothing but more of the same burning landscape. A second step and the stairway was before him, leading up toward the top of a short, thick column of rock. The Horseman didn’t slow at that impossible arrival, didn’t pause, but merely set his feet upon the stair.

  Thus did War, not for the first time, enter the court of the Charred Council.

  The top of that pillar—broad enough to have been dubbed a hill, had it been less of a perfect cylinder—formed a relatively flat stage, perhaps a few dozen paces wide. It was, in a way, a microcosm of the entire domain. Jagged protrusions of rock around the edges mimicked the great mountains, and from a raised pool, directly across from the stairs, lava bubbled and fires burned. A molten stream, thin and easily crossed, dribbled eternally from that pool to split the platform into uneven halves.

  And there, looming over it all from beyond that peculiar font, the Charred Council itself.

  Or, at the very least, their façade.

  They were a trio of enormous faces, formed of the living rock. Mouths, literally cavernous, gaped open to show the roaring of eternal flames—and, occasionally visible in the flickering of that inferno, what might have been a rough and precarious cave leading into depths unknown. Those same fires burned in the unblinking sockets above, pouring yet more smoke into the already thickened air. The visages were subtly different—this one had the curved horns of a ram; that one was slightly more slender than the others—but while the details might differ, the overall effect was the same from each to each. They appeared as though some mad god had begun to sculpt the skulls of demons from the stuff of the mountain, then given up halfway through.