No one was guarding the dark blue door as the Prime approached. There were guards, but the thing needed more than Authority Enforcers to keep it captive. Learning a way to bind it had taken years-and gave him an education written in blood. But the Prime had to increase his Powers, and those of his allies to fix the final locks and set an invisible watch upon the prison.
The somber Central Operative walking beside him was silent. He hadn’t uttered a word in the elevator as they had dropped to the Tower’s lowest level. The leader of the western world did not make a habit of inviting mere soldiers to his inner sanctum, but he had long encouraged a campaign of disinformation to keep his military arm dubious to the realities of his other research. He had no wish to share his true might with them.
The Prime had a section of Central Operations devoted to Powers research and trained its members as adepts. His Operatives collected information about Powers but were encouraged to doubt them. The Prime felt the blind necessary for two reasons: It was none of their fucking business. And secondly, they were less likely to abuse information they discovered if they didn’t think it was real. Some of his adepts were beginning to suspect that there was more than scientific research going on, but those could be dispatched, as others had.
The Prime could name two that had just participated in his Sending who were one mistake away from being ground up and fed to the Tower gardens.
He came to a halt at the end of the hallway. What would look to the Operative to be eight yards of gray polished tiles was actually a mini-biosphere of Infernal creatures. The Prime had painted the protection symbols himself. They were the culmination of fifty years of top-secret investigations combined with Powers loaned him by his allies. He would not trust his adepts to do the spells. There were arcane symbols painted in the Ardor of Fallen. Knowledge of those symbols meant knowledge of the Powers upon which the Prime based his ambitions. With the symbols in place, he could maintain his grip on the Divine plan. He wouldn’t even imagine what would happen, should they be broken.
It was simple for him to walk across the tiles without alerting any of the invisible defenses. The path was ingrained in memory. He was obsessed with it. Sometimes on his sleepless nights he would traverse the corridor to gaze upon his prized possession. He was the only human being who could do that. Since the Prime had laid the symbols, he was able to move by them without disturbing the Powers they contained. They were drawn to keep Divine and Infernal Powers away.
God help any man or woman that tried to walk them. The invisible creatures turned the color of blood as they fed upon the unwary. In a moment of indulgence, the Prime had tested the protective spells on an unwitting functionary from the mayor’s office. His empty husk was burned in the Tower incinerator.
Today, with his companion, he’d have to be sure that none of the symbols were disturbed. This Operative had to survive the meeting because he needed to know the truth of magic, so he could investigate the events of the last two days. He turned to the man’s impassive black face. “Place your feet where I set mine.”
The Prime then gingerly, energetically danced his way past the symbols and to a broad step before the dark blue door. His business suit constricted his actions, and he pined for the freedom of his Sending robes. It was still impressive. How a man of his bulk could move with such energy was a mystery; but none knew of his Powers or his Union.
The Operative waited. The Prime watched his features, waited for the first sign of mockery. But there was nothing of the kind, the Operative followed, mimicking the movements exactly until he stood breathlessly beside his superior.
The Prime had already explained the symbols to the Operative. He accepted the information with a shrug. An Operative might think the Prime had gone insane but would never say it. The Prime turned to the door. He waved a hand across its unmarked surface-and it answered the gesture with the grate of brass on steel-a deep boom, and the door slid into a recess in the wall. Before them was a foot-thick window of polycarbonate that covered the doorframe from floor to sill and was blemished with three small holes half way up its face.
Beyond the covering was darkness. The Prime was pleased that some small cloud of apprehension had appeared on the Operative’s features.
“You!” The Prime tapped the plastic barrier. “I command you to speak!” He paused to drink in the wonderful moment of anticipation. He noticed sweat on the Operative’s brow.
As always there was never a sign of life behind the wall. The black was complete. This darkness held a moment longer, its opacity reflecting their images on the plastic. Then the Prime felt it-a presence in the black, as absolutely powerful as the darkness that imprisoned it. The leader of Westprime tapped the barrier again. He knew that a being was inside watching him. He could feel its hatred. So many years had he kept it in darkness, he wondered from time to time if it had gone insane. Perhaps time was different to it.
“You will do as I command you.” The Prime matter-of-factly studied his nails, a show of bravado for the Operative. These things hated insolence.
The air around him changed, it grew chilly-the Operative looked at him uncomprehending. The Prime knew it was an attempt by the captive to Send Power. The damned thing always tried something. He could see that the Operative was unprepared-the Power had rocked him on his heels and he’d taken a step back. The Prime broke the spell.
“Stop or go to Limbo!” His voice echoed into his face. “Do as I say.” He paused a moment to let the Operative see he had control. “Now!”
“Your time is running out!” a voice whispered through the holes in the acrylic. Its tone held husky secrets. “You do not understand this Prime.”
“Silence! I didn’t ask you to speak.” The Prime’s cheeks flushed scarlet. Threaten me in front of the help?
“And yet, I speak,” the voice carried on.
“Silence!” The Prime had a second of doubt. If he lost control, if someone had tampered with his protections!
“I taste your doubt!” Urgency had crept into the voice, a hint of passion.
The Prime turned his back on the blackness. He had to prove his power. It seemed that something was changing. And the thing had said that his time was running out! But that could be taken many ways. He had too long relied on the prescience of the Infernal and the Divine to distrust it now, and yet, it could be an attempt to unhinge him-they were all capable of lying. It was a vain attempt to win advantage over him. A lie! It had to be punished. If he no longer controlled it, he was about to find out.
“You doubt, Prime,” the voice said.
“Doubt this!” The Prime lifted his hands as he spoke the words. With one he stroked an invisible symbol on the left side of the door, with his right, he touched a mark opposite it. “I command you to obey, by the Power of the Lake of Fire!”
A tortured scream answered from in the black-a terrible sound that started low like breaking rocks, then swept upward toward a screech of pain that threatened to shatter the acrylic-then nothing.
“Now!” The Prime stood so close to the wall that his belly touched it. Glancing to his right he saw that the Operative was shaken. “You will obey my commands and speak only when I allow it.” His voice turned to acid. “Do you hear me?”
The darkness was broken by the gray suggestion of a weary man’s shoulders-then the voice. Weak now, it whimpered, “I hear.”
“You hear-what?” The Prime felt pride swell his body and stiffen his cocks.
“I hear, Master.” The voice was beaten, its passion muted. “I shall hear your command and comply.”
“This Operative must be given the power of spiritual silence. No one among your kind or among your enemies must be able to read his thoughts.” The Prime pushed his face, livid with unborn curses, against the plastic. “Now!”
“I comply, and yet, it is imperfect, for there is no perfection,” it hissed quickly, as though its abjection had driven it to loathe the sound of its own voice.
The Prime hesitated, his hands unconsciously rising toward the symbols of pain that were etched invisibly on the wall around the door. How he enjoyed overpowering this creature. He had tested its endurance before. On more than one night, the Prime had dropped the many floors to approach the thing in its cage and test it. It was a servant-a slave. The Prime had been impressed by its ability to take punishment. At night he dreamt of fucking it.
“It is done,” the creature whispered past the plastic.
The Operative spoke, “I feel a strange sensation, Sir-light-headed.”
“Do not be concerned.” The Prime turned away from the Operative, looked into the darkness again. “You have kept your bargain, and I will bring you no more pain.” He stepped back. And that’s all I’m bringing you. The Prime continued grimly, “Your information about the First-mother was correct. We have her,” he glared. “What of her guardian?”
The voice said: “Unknown. His power is great.”
“His appearance?” the Prime growled back his doubts.
“Like all men,” the voice breathed wearily. “And his mind is closed.”
“Well open your mind to his,” the Prime ordered quietly. “Do what you have to do and tell me when you know.”
“I will search,” the voice said. The gray shadow shape behind the plastic faded.
The Prime cursed his luck. If only there were another way to keep the thing. He would love to watch its face as the door closed. The Prime shrugged his shoulders and spoke to the Operative, “Follow me as before.” A different flex of his arm, and the door closed.
“You have been given a great power,” the Prime told the Operative, and then a quick reprimand. “But you must never step away from one of them.”
“Where should I begin?” the Operative’s voice held a note of self-recrimination.
“You have the file.” The Prime began to pick his way across the hall. He paused to be sure the Operative was following. “Investigate it as you would any murder.”
As they walked toward the elevator, the Prime thought to ask his ally if there was any progress on the God-wife. He still wasn’t sure who he was fated to know exactly, but by all accounts he’d soon have a world all his own to repopulate.