Kali had wondered how exactly the final exchange might take place — how Redigor's delivery of the Ur'Raney back to Twilight would occur — and as she staggered back she got her answer.
The expansive, seething, screaming base of the pillar of souls filled and bloated, and exploded, dazzling those present. As Kali watched it through her fingers it blasted harmlessly through her and the wall of the Chapel behind her, towards the tombs. It wasn't harmless, though, was it? It was deadly, conjured across the millennia to be as insidious as anything could be. At least to those who had been chosen to be the recipients of what it contained. Kali could not help be awed by the sight, but knew full well that, within the next few seconds, it was going to end the existence of countless innocents who, through no fault of their own, had become caught up in the schemes of a madman who had plotted against them almost since before the human race had been born.
How would they end, though?
Despite herself, Kali couldn't help but ask the question. She pictured the soul wave expanding rapidly through the tombs, individual tendrils of it darting into each of the thousands of ancient resting places like snakes before snapping back out, carrying within each of them the physical essence that had been preserved in the remains of the Ur'Raney. Then, perhaps with a violent spasm from each of the soul-stripped assembled before the tombs, these snakes would strike, darting into necks, eyes, mouths, preparing to infuse themselves into the horrible emptiness from which the true inhabitants of these bodies had been so cruelly torn.
It sickened Kali — the awareness that somehow these things had to know which tomb to seek out, which body to violate, and they would move to them as unerringly as salmon returning to their spawning ground.
This, though, was all her imagining, and by the time she could see the Chapel once more, she realised she might never know.
Those souls belonging to Redigor's Ur'Raney Court had already found their homes, slipping into the bodies of Katherine Makennon and the other dignitaries as easily as worms into soft soil, and the effects on their hosts was immediate. Soft groans escaped each of them. Their eyes widened in response to the intrusion, then took on a peculiar blankness. This faded away, to be replaced by new eyes that took in their surroundings first with an almost childlike innocence, then a growing curiosity, and then a hunger unlike any Kali had ever seen.
They began to metamorphosise — ever so slightly but enough — taking on the slightest sharpening of their physiognomy, a subtle elongation of the ears, and the lightest of green tints to their skin. Kali could also have sworn — but this may only have been because of the manner in which they carried themselves — that they grew taller.
With almost reptilian twitches of their necks, each of the Ur'Raney rannaat sighed and, as one, turned to face Bastian Redigor. Their Lord stood smiling at them, a welcoming smile, his mu'sah'rin already draping herself languorously about his neck.
"Hooper…" Slowhand's voice said weakly from above Kali. "This might be the time for that 'long shot' you mentioned to Freel."
Kali said nothing.
"Hooper, the long shot?"
This time, Kali bit her lip.
"Hooper, you do have a long shot, right?"
Don't ask me that, Liam, don't ask, Kali thought.
What was it she had said to Freel, back in the Sardenne — I tend to work on the hoof? Well, she wasn't on the hoof now, was she, she was on her backside, collapsed helpless against a wall, and it didn't look like her long shot was going to be materialising at all.
"Sure, Liam. I'll ask Baz to stop, shall I? Get him to send his people home to Kerberos?"
A drop of blood fell from the archer, and he spoke slowly, quietly. "They have no home other than the hells, you know that. They don't belong on Kerberos and they don't belong here. Hooper, come on, you always have something up your sleeve…"
"Not this time. I'm sorry."
"Kali…"
"Not this time!"
Shocked, Slowhand stared down at her. But Kali was not looking up and all he saw was the top of her head.
"Kal," he said. "We've all lost people close to us, and we know how much that hurt. Now that's about to happen again, only on a massive scale. As I see it, as soon as that pillar disappears, they've lost their loved ones for ever, but so long as it's there we have a chance to bring them back… somehow."
Kali's eyes slowly rose to the base of the pillar of souls, still emptying itself of the last dregs of Ur'Raney souls. What the archer said was true — while that pillar still existed, there might still be time to save them somehow, to bring them back, for something to happen — no matter how much of a long shot it might be.
"Hooper," Slowhand said. "You're the only one who can do this…"
"I know," Kali whispered to herself.
"What?"
"I said, I know!" Kali shouted, picking herself from the floor. Between her and Redigor, the rannaat, who were just about to move away from their tombs, turned at her defiant cry. She uttered a primal roar as she ran along the aisle to launch herself at the Pale Lord. The rannaat looked almost amused, and looked to their Lord for guidance. Redigor, looking less amused, shook his head.
Kali pounded towards him, beads of sweat falling from her.
"Enough," Redigor said. "You are a meddlesome pain, child. I could easily strip your soul and take your body for my collection, but I do not believe I wish to keep either."
Redigor's arm shot out and he curled his fingers. Kali found herself halting in her tracks and collapsing to her knees with a cry of agony as something seemed to close around her heart and pull. She looked down, her mouth falling open in shock and pain. Whisps of light were being drawn from within her. As he had with so many before her, Bastian Redigor was extracting her soul — and doing so, it seemed, in as slow and as agonising fashion as he could.
"Hey," Kali uttered between clenched teeth, "that just isn't fair…"
"And since I do not wish to keep your soul, child," Redigor continued, ignoring her. "Why don't I simply tear it out?"
The elven sorcerer jerked his outstretched hand again and Kali wailed with pain. Though she remained on her knees, she was bent backwards, her spine and neck arched like a bow, throat taut, mouth stretched open as far as it would go. The light poured from her and across the Chapel to Redigor's fingertips. There the Pale Lord breathed in deeply and with satisfaction, as if he were drinking her.
Kali groaned. The more her soul was drawn from her, the more agonising it became. She was struggling desperately now to hang onto the last of her being, but she was fighting a losing battle. Her vision darkening, her thoughts dimming, feeling as though she were adrift in some dark expanse, she was only peripherally aware of a shape that staggered into her distorted vision, and then of two blurry flashes that sliced through the air before her. Through the air and through her departing soul. Kali screamed in agony as the whole of her self suddenly snapped back in like an elastic band, and she bucked on the floor taking deep, gulping breaths.
In that instant she realised that Redigor's grip was gone, and that she was whole again.
Whole, and not alone.
"Stay behind me," Gabriella DeZantez said, wielding the Deathclaws. "I guess what they say about these things slicing souls is true."
What? Kali thought. What they say about the claws is true? But Gabriella has the claws and Gabriella is dead… she died.
Gabriella was dead… she had seen her die in the Sardenne, at the hands of the juggennath. But at the same time here she was.
Kali shook her head and saw Gabriella, pulling her to her feet. The Enlightened One was scarred and battered, her armour crushed and misshapen beneath her torn surplice, and a dark rivulet of blood leaked from the side of her mouth, but she was there. And behind her, staring with a strange mixture of curiosity and rage, was the Pale Lord.
"No, no," Kali said to Gabriella, trying to push her away, "he's too powerful. Get out of here, get out of here now."
Gabriella grabbed her by the shoulders. "It's all right, remember."
"All right?"
"Yes, all right! Now, stay behind me."
Kali nodded, not really understanding. And then she began to remember. Remember because Redigor was attempting the same trick on Gabriella that he had tried on her, but with absolutely no effect at all. Gabriella, in fact, still had her back turned to him, and she hadn't even noticed what he was attempting to do. Then — Redigor still trying without success to rip out her soul — she turned and began to limp slowly up the aisle towards him, drawing Kali in behind her.
From over Gabriella's shoulder Kali saw the Pale Lord hesitate.
"What is this?" He said. "Some kind of resistance? Who are you, girl?"
"My name Gabriella DeZantez. I am a Sister of the Order of the Swords of Dawn."
The Pale Lord's eyes narrowed. "And pray, Sister, what brings you here?"
"I come to smite thee."
The Pale Lord looked, for a second, amazed, and — as Gabriella and Kali continued their approach. But then his face reverted to its usual arrogant mask and he raised his arms towards Gabriella. Kali knew what was coming and it was clear that so, too, did Gabriella.
The Enlightened One's fingers curled into the top of her breastplate, ripping it away, and she drew in a deep, preparatory breath.
"Bring it on, you unholy bastard!"
Bastian Redigor's lip curled.
"Very well. We shall see how strong you are."
Lightning burst forth from his fingertips, smacking Gabriella directly in the chest. It had no physical effect other than to slow her slightly, discharging in bright arcs and cracks about her shoulders as she pushed against it. Redigor loosed another bolt, equally ineffective, and his eyes widened. He thrust his arms forward once more and this time a plume of fire lanced towards Kali's protector, bursting about her body. Kali ducked, but still Gabriella moved forward.
Now Redigor tried ice, and the crackling, steaming bolts of magical energy slammed into Gabriella with a serpentine hiss but, again, only slowed her in her tracks. It was like struggling forward against a strong wind, and this was exactly what Redigor tried next, summoning a gale to pummel Gabriella that, while it set every loose object in the Chapel flying, she strode through as if it were an inconvenient breeze.
The pair of them were halfway up the Chapel's aisle now, nothing stopping them reaching Redigor.
The Chapel was filled with shrieking hags as phantom horrors materialised out of every corner and swept at Gabriella, threatening to tear her apart. As they came, so too did great, writhing snakes whose wide, fanged maws bit down on her. Nor were they the last of what Redigor had to offer. Spectral daggers hurled themselves at her in wave after wave, fist-sized explosions detonated about her body, and stone barriers assembled themselves out of the floor, only to crumble before Gabriella's determined march. The Pale Lord actually looked visibly shaken now — was perhaps even becoming drained — but rather than feel a sense of impending victory Kali felt increasing concern for Gabriella. It was true that the Enlightened One seemed unstoppable in her progress, but Gabriella seemed at last to be weakening before it.
She moved more slowly now and, above the noise of the assault, Kali thought that she even heard Gabriella wheeze with strain. She wanted to say stop now, that's enough, you've done what you can, but she knew she couldn't. If Gabriella gave up now the two of them would be dead, and any chance of stopping Redigor gone for good. Suddenly all of Kali's attention was focused not on Redigor's continuing barrage but on Gabriella herself.
A great, unremitting river of destruction poured from Redigor's fingertips, slamming relentlessly into Gabriella. No one, however gifted, could withstand such destruction for much longer, and Kali's heart sank as Gabriella at last began to falter. She felt the sheer impotence of her own position, the fact that she couldn't help the woman at all. Knowing that she would be inviting instant obliteration if she stepped from behind Gabriella's protective guard, all she could do was will the Enlightened One onwards despite her mounting pain.
And more than pain.
At first Kali wasn't quite sure what she was seeing, but Gabriella's muscles were now less pronounced than before, and somehow deteriorated. Her skin had lost its golden sheen, becoming less vibrant. With horror Kali realised that this wasn't simply a reaction to the suffering Gabriella was enduring; she wasn't just weakening before Redigor's onslaught, she was aging before it. Kali placed a hand on her shoulder, felt bone rather than muscle beneath her fingers.
Oh gods, what's happening to her?
The answer seemed clear. As immune to magic as Gabriella had announced herself to be, she might have had the ability to spend her entire life shrugging off any one of the Pale Lord's individual attacks — of anyone's attacks — and somehow recovered. But what she had suffered from Redigor collectively in the space of minutes was already a lifetime's worth. She had been drained of everything she had in attempting to save her, in attempting to save everyone, and Gabriella DeZantez's life was ending right before her eyes.
Redigor's barrage continued and Gabriella, having almost reached him, faltered, staggered, and crumpled to the floor, more bone than flesh.
Redigor lowered his arms and looked down. His eyes widened and he bent and plucked the Deathclaws from Gabriella's twitching hands.
"Ah," he said, "I've been looking for these for a long, long time."
Kali's rage was incandescent as she stood before him, but she could do nothing. If she made a single move, the elf would reduce her to dust.
"Now," Redigor said, "wouldn't you agree that was just a waste of time?"
Kali's eyes rose to him, but the Pale Lord was calmly looking at her, awaiting an answer to his question. He wanted an answer, Kali realised, so that he could bask in his supremacy, and, in all honesty, she wasn't sure that she wouldn't have to give the one he desired. But not yet. Not yet. She looked slowly around the Chapel of Screams, at Slowhand, at Freel, down at Gabriella DeZantez, and then up at Makennon, from whose eyes a stranger stared haughtily down. She hoped that they understood she'd tried her best, and that this time her long shot hadn't paid off.
Her eyes returned to the Pale Lord. As they did, she heard something that the Pale Lord hadn't yet picked up on. It was a sound that she had been hoping to hear almost since she'd arrived at the Sardenne, a sound that when she had first heard it had filled her with dread, but which, now, buoyed her heart.
That was the thing about long shots, she guessed. Sometimes they took a while to arrive.
"Actually, no," she said to Redigor, "I wouldn't agree at all. What Gabriella did wasn't a waste of time, it bought us time."
Redigor looked up, now recognising the disturbance in the air above.
"That's right, Baz," Kali said, springing up and hissing in his ear. "Remember those?"
Redigor stared through the shattered roof of the Chapel of Screams, his face twisted with anger. Three massive machines hove into view, and whether Redigor had personally set eyes on the Engines of the Apocalypse before or not, there was no mistaking the immense cones for anything other than what they were. But if any more proof were needed, the sudden blare of their positioning sirens as they began to spin above the necropolis was more than adequate. Redigor snapped his gaze from them down to Kali and then to his rannaat. The twelve-pseudo elves looked at him with pleading, but already their features were reverting to human, his hold over them disappearing.
His hold over other things was disappearing, too. At the far end of the Chapel, Slowhand fell from where he was pinned against the wall, crashing to the floor with a thud. He picked himself up, his expression dark, and, clutching his broken arm, began to weave his way down the aisle towards Kali.
"No," Redigor whispered.
"Yes," Kali corrected. "That's right, Baz. That old black magic is going away. Quite ironic, don't you think, since that's how this whole thing began?"
"Impossible!" Redigor protested. "The Engines are designed to negate only elven threads, and my magic is… is — "
"The dead bits in between?" Kali said. "What remains of dragon magic, perhaps?" Kali shrugged. "Under normal circumstances, yeah. But, hey, you know, if you twiddle the dials, turn everything up to eleven…"
"No!" Redigor cried.
His voice echoed throughout the Chapel of Screams and he raised his arms, trying to propel Kali and Slowhand back along the aisle. Only Kali staggered back, and only because he physically shoved her. Redigor threw his arms wide, somehow finding the reserves for one last outburst of energy, trying to infuse his people with his own essence, to slow their reversion, but the energy fizzled even as it began to spread, dissipating into a cloud of nothing, and Redigor collapsed to his knees, spent. He stared in disbelief and could do little but watch as the whole sequence of soul exchange reversed itself before his eyes, the souls of the Ur'Raney pulled from the bodies of their hosts and back towards the pillar, and the pillar, in turn, brightening with the return of the human souls from Kerberos. Kali doubted that Redigor felt the same but the whole process was quite magical to watch, the whisps of humanity slowly twisting and twining throughout the Chapel, finding their rightful homes first in those who had been doomed to be the High Council and then travelling further afield, to the general tombs, to reinhabit those who waited there.
The exchange complete, both Kali and Slowhand stared up at the pillar of souls. The essences of things still writhed within it, still sought somehow to escape, and perhaps even to snatch at those whose flesh they were now denied, but there was one important difference — these souls were Ur'Raney, and they were going back where they belonged.
The pillar of souls disappeared and Kali and Slowhand found themselves staring at the looming masses of the Engines, still rotating above.
"Hooper, I thought you said…" Slowhand interjected.
"Sorry, Liam. For one thing I didn't know if I had programmed them correctly but, more importantly, I couldn't even think about them in Redigor's presence. He'd have sensed it, stopped them somehow…"
"You worked out a way to bring them all the way here?"
"Made it up as I went along," Kali said, smiling.
Their smiles faded as they heard Katherine Makennon groan and were reminded of the ordeal she'd been through. Slowhand was about to offer aid, but Kali placed a hand on his arm, holding him back, allowing the Anointed Lord to emerge from her nightmare by herself.
Her gait stiff, her head erect and proud, Katherine Makennon moved slowly from the altar by the kneeling Redigor to a slab where her clothing, armour and weapon lay neatly folded and stacked. For the moment, she ignored the garments, regarding them curiously, fingering them, but nothing more. Instead, she took the shaft of the battleaxe in two hands and wearily dragged it towards her. Seemingly lacking the strength to lift it again, Makennon paused a second, drawing in a deep and contemplative breath, and then turned to face the Pale Lord, her expression devoid of emotion. Then, equally slowly, she began to walk towards Redigor, dragging the battleaxe with her. When she stood in front of him, she stopped and, in a dry croak, demanded he rise.
Showing no fear, no remorse, only the arrogance that had marked the man for all his long and depraved life, Bastian Redigor stood. For a second his eyes seemed to flick beyond her but then he leaned forward, and whispered in her ear.
"Your church will crumble at my hands. I will destroy it."
Makennon's gaze rose until it met his. Her eyes were unblinking, her face blank. Almost imperceptibly at first, the muscles about her mouth began to spasm, her face contorted into a mask of rage and fury, and then she swung the battleaxe up from between her legs with a guttural roar that shook the Chapel.
Bastian Redigor had no time even to cry out. With a sound more at home on a butcher's block than a chapel's altar, the blade sliced into the Pale Lord at the groin and continued up through him until it swung out over Makennon's head. Arcs of blood and entrails spattered the faces of those watching but no one moved. The Anointed Lord held the battleaxe over her head, dripping blood and gore, and then gradually set it down. Before her, the halves of Bastian Redigor parted and crumpled to the floor, landing with wet thuds.
Makennon's words were whispered.
"I'd like to see you try."
Kali looked around her at those assembled, seeing in their eyes the same return to humanity that she had witnessed in Makennon's. Then her eyes moved to the prone, shrivelled form of Gabriella DeZantez and she knelt by her side. The Enlightened One was still alive, just, but the life was already fading from her eyes.
Kali cradled DeZantez's head, wanting desperately to offer some comfort but not knowing what to say. In the end, it was Gabriella who spoke first, though her voice was not what Kali remembered — a cracked, aged thing, little more than a sibilant whisper.
"Do you see the light? Gabriella DeZantez sees the light."
"The light?"
"Kerberos," Gabriella said slowly, and smiled. Her eyes were focused upward, not on Kali at all. "My time is close."
"You saved my life. Bought the time to save all our lives. Is there anything I can do… to make things easier?"
Gabriella emitted a low chuckle. "Are you offering to pray for me?"
"Yes. Yes, yes, I am, if that's what you want."
Gabriella shook her head, laughed again. "Maybe it would be… more appropriate if… you had a drink for me instead…"
Kali smiled. "I'll do that. More than one. The whole of the Flagons will."
A cough. "Such a request from a Sister of the Faith is, of course, prohibited."
"What the hells, eh?"
Gabriella suddenly tensed beneath her. "Looks like we were wrong."
Kali frowned. "About what?"
"My being one of the Four."
"Hey, I don't think so," Kali said. "You did more than your bit to save the world today."
Gabriella shook her head again, but this time didn't laugh. "No. This wasn't the time, I sense that. Not the threat that is meant to bring the Four together…"
Kali turned away, biting her lip. When she looked at Gabriella again, the Enlightened One was staring directly at her.
"There's more you haven't told me, isn't there?" Gabriella asked. "You know something, don't you?"
Kali took a second before she spoke. "Not much. Something's coming. Darkness."
Gabriella absorbed the information, swallowed, and her body spasmed once more. But she retained enough control to study Kali intently. She clutched at Kali's hand, squeezed it. "Tell someone. Tell Slowhand. Don't go through this alone."
Kali nodded, while beneath her, Gabriella groaned.
"Do something else for me," she said. Slowly, her skeletal hand slipped into her charred surplice and withdrew the shard of Freedom Mountain, which she pressed into Kali's hand. She swallowed again, dryly, and her next words emerged almost as a wheeze. "Please. Watch me go."
Kali looked at the shard and at Gabriella and nodded. The Enlightened One squeezed her hand in thanks and held her gaze. Only after a few moments had passed did Kali realise that she was never going to look away again.
Kali took a shuddering breath and slowly raised the shard. She gasped, eyes widening, and smiled.
Gabriella's soul rose from her body in much the same way as Brother Marcus's had done, but there was something that distinguished it, not only from the Faith soldier's soul but from every other soul she had now seen.
Gabriella's essence shone brightly, blindingly. As it slowly wove its way upwards, towards Kerberos, it flared with all the colours of the threads, a rainbow burst filled far more with life than it ever could be with death.
Kali thought about everything she'd learned about Kerberos in the past few days. About how it might, despite her previous disbelief, be a part of everything.
And maybe, she thought, Gabriella had been wrong about not being one of the Four. Maybe, just maybe, she might yet still be.
A hand fell heavily on her shoulder.
"Hooper, I'm sorry," Slowhand said. "The Engines — there's something wrong."