Demon Lord III - Grey God Page 22

  "They cannot see you, can they, Syrin?"

  She smiled. "No, Demon Lord. Only you can."

  "What do you want?"

  "The help of a dark god, it would seem."

  He frowned. "You helped me, so therefore I must help you?"

  "Not must, but perhaps should."

  "Why should I?"

  "For your own sake, perhaps. Maybe to find out whether a dark god is capable of an unselfish act?"

  He walked closer, and she did not retreat, but neither did she look particularly comfortable at his proximity. "Why would I care?"

  Her smile faltered. "Indeed, Demon Lord, a fair question. And not what I was expecting. But if you do not, why are you helping this domain?"

  "Perhaps on a whim."

  "You would risk your life to save strangers, on a whim?"

  "Do you presume to know my mind?"

  Syrin gestured with a graceful wave. "No, certainly not. But I do not believe that you do it on a whim. I believe that you have compassion. You may even consider that an insult, but it is not intended as such. Rather, it is a compliment, in my opinion. The dark power has no compassion, does it? It scorns such goodness, yet you have it. Does that mean that you have mastered the evil within you?"

  "I am tar'merin. What does that tell you?"

  "That you have a good soul."

  "You have seen into my past, yet you do not know why I choose to do this?"

  She smiled again, a little sadly, and refolded her hands. "No. I can only judge your actions, Demon Lord, and draw my conclusions. Your wife is a good person, and she influences you greatly, but can her influence conquer the whispers of the evil you carry?"

  Bane noticed that the blue mages' conversation had stopped, and glanced around to find them staring at him with varying degrees of bemusement and puzzlement. They turned away and began talking again.

  "Now they think I have taken leave of my senses," he said.

  Syrin giggled. "No, Demon Lord, they think that you are communing with some amazing celestial being."

  "Perhaps you should get to the point."

  "Very well. Are you capable of an unselfish act?"

  "I cast down a dark goddess to allow Drayshina to flee this domain."

  "Why?"

  He shrugged. "It was right."

  "So you did it to prove that you could, or for your own satisfaction, perhaps. To possess the kind of power you do must be heady indeed, but would you use it for no other reason than to help others? Are you capable of doing good for its own sake?"

  "I know you are capable of annoying me."

  She smiled, her slanted eyes tilting further in her inhumanly perfect face. "I know. Will you answer my question, Demon Lord, or do you not know?"

  "You do not know me as well as you think, Syrin. Freeing this domain benefits me nothing. I do it to end the suffering of these people. You cannot see into my heart, can you?"

  "Alas, no. I only know you are filled with sorrow, but most people who dare to meet your gaze will know that. Was your agreement to free this domain truly an act of compassion, or because you wish to triumph over another dark god?"

  "Ask what you wish of me, and you will get your answer, will you not?"

  Syrin inclined her head and spread her hands. "Many leagues from here, one of Vorkon's dark armies, which a black mage leads, has attacked a town. People are dying, suffering terribly at the hands of the foul horde. Will you save them?"

  She raised her eyes to meet his, a challenge in their clear, glimmering blue depths. The dark power within him sneered at the thought, prodding him to ask why he should, what was in it for him, and he frowned. Its influence had increased significantly after the battle with Vorkon, for every time he used it, its grip on him tightened, and his disliked the way it made him feel.

  "Does the dark power rule you, Demon Lord?" she murmured.

  "No."

  "Then prove it."

  He glanced at the mages, finding them watching him surreptitiously again. They looked away quickly. "I have to -"

  "It will take but a moment, with your powers."

  "They are vulnerable -"

  "You can use time."

  His brows rose. "I have not tried that."

  "Then perhaps it is time you did."

  "Why do you want to save them?"

  She smiled, folding her hands again. "I am an angel."

  "How do you know of their plight?"

  "I have heard their cries. They beg Drayshina to help them, but she cannot, and could not, even if she was not enslaved. Gods can only hear prayers that are meant for them; else the clamouring of countless voices would madden them. We hear nothing, unless we listen carefully, and then we can hear all prayers, but only as the faintest of whispers, unless they are too far away, and, of course, the pleas of gods."

  Bane considered, trying to recall how he had felt when Kayos had shown him the children being killed within the Eye. Deep down, he still experienced a flare of anger at their cruel slaughter, but the dark power mocked his compassion. He found that the thought of saving a bunch of villagers meant little to him, yet the prospect of destroying a dark army did hold some appeal, if only to demonstrate his power and annoy Vorkon. The dark power did not care whom it destroyed, it revelled in destruction and death for its own sake. He nodded.

  "Very well. Where is this town?"

  "Fifty leagues to the south, a place called Arbordan."

  Bane used the information to gain a fair idea of the location, and let his powers do the rest. He Moved.

  The Demon Lord reappeared in the middle of a scene of fire and carnage. The familiar stench of fear, death and smoke rushed into his nostrils. Black, lightning-shot clouds roiled overhead, the hellish red glow lighting them from within, but no fiery rain fell here. Burning buildings cast a ruddy light over the seething multitude of dark shapes that stalked between them, cutting down fleeing people. Agonised screams rent the air as people were torn apart by monstrous dark creatures the likes of which he had not seen before, or were hacked to death by the hordes of dirty soldiers.

  Hairy, bat-winged vampires crouched over writhing victims, sucking their blood with noisy gusto. Soldiers thrust burning brands into buildings, adding to the blaze. Thick, choking smoke billowed forth, and people ran screaming from the infernos into the waiting swords and axes of the dark horde. Blood ran in the cobbled streets, and mutilated corpses hung from posts and protruding beams, their dangling guts glistening. Bane turned, his cloak flaring, to take in the horror of the slaughter. Evidently the dark army had been amusing themselves in the town for quite a while. Some distance away, a man clad in silver-studded black leather stood atop a hill, four earth demons attending him. The black mage.

  The suffering and death did not affect Bane. The dark power deadened his pity and horror, and he had seen it all before. Evil enjoyed such sights, and he found himself watching the carnage with clinical detachment. Memories of his rampage across the Overworld returned, when he had been the master of just such destruction, and enjoyed it. It was familiar, a part of his past, a part of what he had been, and still was. Was he a man, or merely a receptacle of the darkness, its tool and plaything?

  Bane frowned, held up his pale, slender hands and stared at them. What was he? Why had he come here? He had no wish to save these pathetic, puling humans. Yet was he not one himself? A human? A mortal? A god? If he was tar'merin, why did he have no wish to end the slaughter? He tried to imagine Mirra at his side, her horror, her wide, frightened eyes, but the dark power cast the image from his mind. Nameless doubts assailed him, tugged at the fabric of his being and brought dark thoughts from the hidden recesses of his mind to taunt him.

  A young girl ran from the darkness between two houses, a dozen dirty, laughing soldiers pursuing her. Bane glimpsed her terrified face in the brief flare of a burning house as a beam fell within it, sending up a gush of fire. Her pretty features were set in a rigid mask of terror, and the wind of her flight pressed the soft material of her
dress to her slender form as she ran as lightly as a gazelle through the debris. It seemed that she would outrun her clumsy pursuers, and Bane watched her with a detached interest. She raced past another burning building, and glanced back, then gestured towards the inferno.

  A swathe of flame leapt from the conflagration and engulfed some of the soldiers, setting fire to their greasy clothes and hair. They howled and beat at the flames, but the rest forged through them and chased after the girl with renewed determination, snarling curses. Bane wondered if he had imagined that her gesture had commanded the fire, but as she ran past another, smaller fire, she did it again. More men fell howling and writhing, beating at their blazing hair and clothes, and the girl ran on.

  A soldier emerged from a building ahead of her and leapt into her path. She tried to swerve, but slipped in a pool of blood and fell. The filthy men closed in on her, hiding her from view as they pinned her to the ground. They did not appear to notice Bane; he was just another shadow in the smoky twilight, standing immobile. The sound of ripping cloth came from the huddled group, and the girl's dress was tossed out, then the men laughed roughly, and she screamed.

  A flare of rage shot through Bane, surprising him, and he knew it was his own. He did not know how long he had stood watching without feeling, a few minutes perhaps, but now he was filled with revulsion. The girl's screams spiked his heart, fanning the flames within it to white-hot fury. The dark power's scorn washed through him, mocking his rage, probing his mind with fiery spikes of derision. He thrust it back, ignoring its spiteful attempts to make him enjoy the horror around him, and something snapped in his mind. He closed his eyes, and the image of all that was good and evil came to him. A part of him that he had never known existed sprang to life. It was as if he could still see with his eyes closed, but only the souls around him, the pure, pale light of the good and the dark red glow of the damned.

  The dark power fought him, striving to snuff out that which had just been born, but he mastered it with the savagery it had taught him, bending it to his will. Walls within his mind collapsed, and a surge of knowledge flooded out. He opened his eyes and raised his arms. Dark fire poured from his hands in rivers of shadow, and all that was evil around him died.

  The black tide surged through the streets, and soldiers, dark creatures and demons screamed and perished in the massive wave of his wrath. It spread from him in a ring of death, rushed through everything around him and snuffed out the evil. The black mage survived long enough to turn and see the instrument of his destruction in the instant before his shields collapsed and he was consumed with a howl of pain.

  Bane's flesh burnt as the dark fire poured through him, igniting the seven runes on his chest. The fire he unleashed swept through the town, spreading from it in a wave of shadow that lapped at the distant forests, far more than was needed to destroy the dark army. He had not used so much since Dorel had killed Mirra, and he had summoned Lyriasharin by threatening to destroy her domain. That time, the fire had destroyed all it touched, fuelled by his rage and anguish at Mirra's death. This time, he commanded it to destroy only evil, but his rage fuelled it again. His stomach clenched and heaved as the shadows poured from him, then he lowered his arms and leashed it into his bones. Bowing his head, he closed his eyes as the power receded from his flesh, then looked up.

  The dark army was gone, the demons piles of fetid earth, the black mage a greasy smear on the ground. The burning buildings had been snuffed out, and the dark clouds overhead had thinned to grey, allowing weak sunlight to filter through. In its soft illumination, the streets were filled with odd grey shapes, the forms of the soldiers and dark creatures now made of nothing but ash. His eyes scanned the stillness, seeking the villagers he had tried to spare, but found none.

  Had the dark power tricked him? Had it used him to destroy the good as well as the evil, giving him the impression that he could spare the innocent when in fact he could not? Bane's heart filled with sorrow, and he fell to his knees. Had he destroyed everything? He bowed his head and looked down at his hands again, the instruments of so much death. What was he? What had he done? He had come here to save the innocent, and had thought he had, but nothing moved in the village after the shadows had soaked away into the earth. It seemed that he had slain everything, which was not surprising considering the amount of dark power he had unleashed.

  A soft cough made him look up. The huddled ashen shapes of the soldiers who had been ravishing the girl crumbled and fell apart as a pale, slender arm thrust through them. The girl sat up, her eyes wide in a face smeared with ash, her tangled hair grey with it. She gasped, tears making pale runnels in the dirt on her cheeks. Her eyes settled upon him, and widened, her expression becoming fearful.

  Bane sank back on his haunches and bowed his head. He longed to thank some higher power, but there was none. Gods could not pray. He spread his hands again and stared at them. What had happened to him? He had guided the dark power before, but not like this. Something new had awakened within him, a part of his mind he had never used before had come to life, and with it, more power.

  Vaguely he was aware of other people emerging from the buildings and climbing out of the ash to look around in mystified relief. Most were too stunned to speak, but a bedraggled priest in a torn grey robe staggered from the ruin of a nearby church and shouted, "Praise the Lady! Praise our goddess! Drayshina has saved us!"

  Bane glanced at him, then his eyes were drawn to the girl, who rose naked from the ash, and stared at him with undiluted fascination. Bane resisted the urge to touch his face. Did he look different? The ash had not touched him, and would not, for the dark power cleansed all dirt from his skin. Why did she stare at him so? The priest continued to rant and rave, inciting the people to kneel and pray to the goddess. The girl picked up her torn dress and draped it over herself. The priest grabbed people and forced them to their knees, begging them to pray. The girl glanced at him.

  "No." Her voice carried in the deathly hush that only the priest's cries had broken until then. "It was not our goddess who saved us," she said. "It was him." She pointed at Bane.

  The priest frowned. "He's one of them! A black mage!"

  The girl studied Bane again. "No. He's no mage." She displayed remarkable poise, considering what she had just been through. "No mage could have done this." She gestured to the devastation, then gazed at him with azure eyes.

  "Then what the hell is he?" the priest demanded, walking closer to the girl, the people following.

  "He's a god."

  The crowd muttered, and many of its members frowned at Bane, others looked fearful and some disbelieving. The priest said, "There's only one dark god in Drivania, and that's Vorkar."

  "Now there are two," she stated.

  The priest clasped his head in a gesture of despair. "We will be caught up in a god war. We will be destroyed!"

  The girl shook her head. "Had he wished it, we would all be dead."

  The priest lowered his hands, looking confused.

  "He saved us," she said.

  "Why?"

  "I don't know." Clasping the tattered remnants of her dress to her breast, she approached Bane.

  "Shevra, be careful," the priest said.

  Bane eyed the ragged, ash-smeared crowd.

  Shevra stopped three paces away and gazed down at him. "Who are you?"

  Bane opened his mouth to answer, but nothing came out, and he frowned. A soft, lilting voice spoke in his ear.

  "Say nothing. Leave now."

  He lashed out, striking something soft, and the slight power that had silenced him vanished. "Do not presume to command me, Syrin."

  Bane rose to his feet, towering over the girl, who raised her chin to gaze up at him, and he admired her courage.

  "I am Bane, the Demon Lord."

  "Why did you spare us?"

  He looked at the crowd again, wondering at their mood. "I did not spare you. I came here to save you."

  The throng muttered, and Shevra looked surprised
. "Why?"

  He shrugged, embarrassed. "Does it matter?"

  "Only if you plan to use us in some dark ritual that requires our gratitude, or think you can gain our worship by saving us."

  "I do not."

  "Dark gods don't save people."

  "So I have heard."

  She tilted her head, her eyes flicking over him. "You're mortal."

  "I am aware of that."

  "What do you want of us?"

  "Nothing." He shook his head. "In fact, I must leave."

  "Wait!" Shevra held out a hand, but he swung away and vanished with a sickening surge of dark power.

  "Wait?" The priest looked scandalised. "Why would you wish him to stay here? Have you gone mad?"

  "No, I haven't, Bedak," Shevra said, staring at the spot where the Demon Lord had stood. "He just saved us all, and we didn't even thank him."

  "Not all of us. Hundreds were slain; only a few have survived."

  "We can hardly blame him for that. Those of us who have survived owe him our lives."

  "Which is probably why he did it," Bedak said.

  "No. I believe him."

  "Dark gods lie."

  "Not him. He's different. I don't know how just yet, but I intend to find out."

  Bedak's eyebrows rose. "How will you do that?"

  "I'll find him."

  He gave a bark of scornful laughter. "He's a god!" He swung away with a gesture of despair. "Another dark god! Surely we're doomed now!"

  The priest strode off, and the muttering crowd followed him. Shevra donned her torn dress and went to the spot where the dark god had stood to study his footmarks in the ash. He had been right there, a living god in their midst, and he had saved her. She looked up at the thinning grey clouds, marvelling at the weak light that poured through them, more than she had ever seen. Would she glimpse the sun? Why had a dark god slain a dark army to save a town? She knelt beside the footmarks and touched an imprint with a trembling hand.

  When the men had grabbed her, she had thought her life was over. Then the dark power had surged past her in a river of burning shadow, yet it had not touched her. She had been staring into the eyes of the man who had been crouched over her when his face had blackened, turning to ash. The dark god had unleashed the fire, and commanded it. She bowed her head, tears burning her eyes as she recalled the death of her parents.