Empire of Bones (11 page)

Arachne was beside Nolan, sitting straight up in her chair with her hands folded politely over her saggy bag of spiders like an etiquette instructor. Her icy eyes were focused on Niffy, where he stood on the hearth, and her obsidian hair was pulled back so tight that it looked like black glass. Cyrus wondered if her spiders had done it for her. Probably. Arachne was small and quiet, and he’d never seen her move quickly, not even when she’d faced Phoenix. Wherever there were spiders, she was dangerous. And spiders were everywhere.

Gilgamesh overwhelmed a little wooden chair, and it squealed in pain every time he breathed. His legs stuck out like felled trees, and his six-fingered hands were splayed out on his knees. His serpentine lips were sneering in his beard, and his cow eyes always seemed to be on Cyrus. He could explode like a humpbacked rodeo bull, and the small ice-eyed spider girl beside him might have been the only thing keeping him from tearing Cyrus’s
head off. Of course, Cyrus had saved Gil from Phoenix in a burning cigar factory on the Mississippi. Maybe that was enough to erase Gil’s hate.

Cyrus met the huge man’s eyes. They were still and dark and unblinking. Anger was trapped inside them, like a prisoner behind glass. Cyrus looked away quickly.

Gil was a problem.

The Captain stepped into the lodge, carrying Pythia on his back. The small girl with the wide eyes and the dark skin peered over the Captain’s shoulder. Her thick ropes of hair were coiled around his arms, holding her in place. The other transmortals seemed almost normal by comparison. Her hair moved and gripped like the tentacles of an octopus, and life—ancient and mossy—almost dripped from her eyes. But unlike the other transmortals, her bright eyes looked young, and her focus seemed sharp enough to bend the world and time around it. She was mute, communicating in thoughts and dreams to seers like Dan, or in mysterious words written in fire on leaves so that they couldn’t be kept and treasured.

From the Captain’s back, Pythia cupped a dry leaf in her hands and blew it at Niffy. A fiery word sparked on the leaf as it fluttered through the air and settled on the hearth beside the monk’s feet. Without a glance, he kicked it back into the fireplace.

The Captain lowered Pythia to a chair, but she slipped down onto the floor, wrapping her hair around
herself and beginning to rock in place. Her eyes were locked on Cyrus, and he could see her lips moving in a string of endless whispers. He could guess what she was saying—the same thing Dan had been dreaming about for months, starting right before they had found their father’s body and stopped Phoenix in the cigar factory where he had been using the tooth to redesign and resurrect a crop of New Men, where Phoenix had even managed to resurrect himself into the body of his nephew, Oliver.

Dan only ever came away from the dream with a string of words about the one called Desolation, and abominations, and the darkness of his shadow, and even the dragons being afraid.

It was about Radu Bey. Or Phoenix. One or the other, and as far as Cyrus could tell, it didn’t really matter which. They were both terrifying enough without a crazy oracle or Dan’s nightmare visions to spread the good news.

Nolan, Arachne, Gil, John Smith, and Pythia. Five transmortals. None if you figured that Gil was going to turn on the group eventually and the other transmortals would all be kept busy trying to control him.

How many transmortals did Radu Bey have? Rupert had been unwilling to guess, but Antigone had gotten a number out of him eventually. Over two hundred and climbing. Maybe two dozen of the great ones, at least as powerful as Gil. Two or three as powerful as Radu Bey
himself. And how many New Men did Phoenix have? As many as he had had the time to make. And how tough were they? Nobody knew. Yet.

Cyrus looked up at Rupert Greeves, feet spread, strong arms crossed, narrowed eyes focused on a grinning Irish monk with a Mohawk. He knew that of all the obstacles they faced, Rupert’s greatest fear—greatest
fears
—still lay beneath Ashtown, in the deepest vaults, behind hidden doors, beyond ancient seals.
The Burials
.

That number had been easy for Antigone to get out of Rupert. He had insisted that they memorize it. One hundred and forty-four Powers had been Buried before the first modern treaties and the settling of the New World. All had some form of flesh, even if stolen, but many were in no way truly human. The oldest and worst were gods and goddesses of war. Necromancers. Fallen stars. Leviathan. Panic. And worse. Seventy-two more had been Buried in the five centuries since the treaties, and they were mostly modern transmortals—once human, but no longer.

“Right,” Niffy said. “Lovely little gathering. I’d been told you had Ponce along as well.”

“We did,” Rupert said, and he glanced at Arachne. “Now we don’t.”

“He’s safe,” Arachne said. “In hiding. This fight wasn’t for him.”

“Ah.” Niffy glanced at Rupert as he said it. “Tight
ship you run, eh? What’s it matter if the occasional hare slips the noose.”

“I’m sorry,” Nolan said. “You think we’re prey? Last I checked, we’re volunteers, all except Gil the vassal.”

Gil snorted, shifting his glare from Cyrus to Nolan.

Rupert groaned and waved at Niffy. “Could we move along, then? Get on to the crucial bits. I’m only allowing this as a courtesy to your order.”

Niffy grinned. “Right. Well, these are the crucial bits as far as my Brothers are concerned, and the very bits that Monasterboice requires me to press. Five centuries ago, we broke from the O of B when they chose to enter into treaties with the transmortals. We refused to make peace with darkness, and we would not lay down our strongest weapons even if all the transmortals had agreed to have their powers bound. The O of B has made do without us. But now that the treaties have been dissolved …” Niffy shrugged. “Ashtown’s oldest weapons may be used again. Help us acquire them and put them to use, and we are your allies to the end, until the last dogs have been put down and the last pints have been hoisted and our voices are raw from the singing.”

“Dogs?” Nolan asked, his brows rising. “Do we have a dog problem?”

Niffy stared at him. “Our call in this earthly sphere is to triumph over evil, not to arrange a cease-fire. Some enemies cannot be made into friends. Or pets.”

“And we’re evil?” Nolan’s eyes hardened. Cyrus saw a vein quiver on the ancient boy’s temple.

“You?” Niffy said. “No more than any mortal down the blood river from the first Adam. But for us, the struggle against our inner darkness ends at a headstone and full stop. For you, seeds of evil grow to weeds no matter how often you pluck them from the garden. One with eyes to see can spot it in you even now, Nolan, once called Nikales. Rage. Despair. Boredom. The asp sting of bitterness. You fight against it for lifetimes. You fall and you rise and you fall again, but your inner war can never leave off, it can never stay won. Mortals weren’t made for it. We were made to run the race and hit the finish. Transmortals face pain with no end but the world’s end. And most can’t take it. They grow weary. They go mad. The flesh never dies, but the soul rots away inside.”

Nolan was perfectly still. Cyrus waited for him to explode, but the monk’s words seemed to have frozen him. After a moment, Nolan’s jaw relaxed and he sank back into his seat. Niffy adjusted his rope belt and stepped forward, staring at the undying boy, older than empires. When he spoke again, Cyrus was surprised at how soft and sad the monk’s voice had become.

“You’ve held up better than I ever could,” Niffy said. “But you wear your guilt like a gaping wound. Evil haunts you, little brother.”

Niffy turned back to the hearth while Nolan stared
at the floor. Gil smirked. The room was silent, and outside, tall trees popped and sighed in a breeze.

“The point,” Niffy said, “is this. Those treaties locked away the O of B’s most dire weapons. Blades and charms and chains and seals useful for the confinement and destruction of Powers of spirit and flesh. Why loose the devils and leave willing devil catchers unarmed?”

“There was a reason for laying those weapons down,” Rupert said. “Some of those things were corrupting—the Dragon’s Tooth not least among them.”

Niffy ignored Rupert. “The monks still within the O of B, your so-called Brendanites, have requested our … 
assistance
 … in cleansing the Order from her cellars to her spires. They desire a purge, and no small one at that. They want Bellamy Cook, the traitor Brendan, tried, hundreds of memberships vacated, assets seized, and strict monastic orders instituted throughout the whole of the O of B.” He grinned. “It has some appeal.”

“But?” Rupert asked.

“But before we gave our answer, I was sent to find you, to see if there was yet hope for our mother Order.” Niffy scrunched his face, and then grew serious. “Hear the questions of Monasterboice and my brothers. Will you take up the arms forgotten? Will you sign no treaty with the last Dracul and his
Ordo Draconis
? Will you hunt the dog Phoenix until his death or yours?”

“Brother Boniface Brosnan,” Rupert said, and his
voice was edged. “I will take up no weapon that would darken my own soul. But while God and my fathers guide me, I will hurl every stone, swing every ax, slash with every blade, fire every gun, and loose every arrow and dart that I believe to be clean, holy, and fit for slaughter. I will sign no peace with Radu Bey or his
Ordo
, though I would rejoice to gift him with fresh chains. As for Phoenix, I hunt him even in my dreams.”

Niffy’s lips were tight, his brows low.

“And Gilgamesh of Uruk,” he said. “Why is he among you unless you have already made peace with one of Radu’s beasts? And here also is John Smith, a traitor to his own Avengel vows, who knowingly took up transmortality. Why have they not both been put down?”

Gilgamesh stood, nostrils flaring. “Monk,” he growled. “You rope-belted Celts are no more than flies to one such as I am. I cannot count how many of your blood and cowl I have crushed and brushed aside when they came hunting for a hero. Your Druid magic does nothing more than tickle the hairs on my arms while my fingers crush your Irish skulls.”

John Smith inhaled slowly and every hair in his thick beard seemed to crackle with static. The gold on his breastplate shone suddenly red, like copper. He reached up and put his hand on Gil’s shoulder, and his voice was a low growl.

“Ho, now, beastie. The monk may be fool-born, but
he’s not all misses. I deserve no better, nor does one as blood gorged as ye. Though this one and his crew couldn’t do nay about it.”

Niffy ignored them both and looked at Rupert.

“If Gilgamesh of Uruk is condemned, it will be enough. My brothers will put him away, and Monasterboice will aid you against Phoenix and the dragons. If not …”

Rupert inflated his cheeks and looked up at the ceiling. “Then you aid those tomfool Brendanites in opening the weapon vaults of Ashtown and attempting to purge the O of B.”

Gil picked up his chair with one huge hand and raised it like a club.

“Gilgamesh.” Arachne sounded like a disappointed kindergarten teacher reminding a boy in the back row not to pick his nose. She was tiny next to Gil, and she looked up at him from her seat with raised brows and wide eyes, still as the moon turning a tide, waiting for him to make his decision.

The giant set down his chair. And then he sat.

The room was silent. On the floor, Pythia resumed rocking in place. She looked at Gil and her eyes sparkled. Gathering up her hair to cover her face, she began to giggle. A leaf floated through the air toward Gil, and two burning letters said simply,
HA
.

Gil closed his fist around the leaf and shook the ash onto the floor.

“Make your choice, Avengel,” Niffy said.

Rupert sighed and looked at Gil. “God knows he deserves it, but I gave my word. Until Gil breaks his, I will not break mine.”

Niffy nodded. “Then you have already chosen the fool’s path, laying out new treaties to bind yourself and give him time to betray you. Cheers, mate. Best wishes and all that, and I’m away for Ashtown.”

“I’m afraid I can’t let you leave,” Rupert said. “Not knowing what I know.”

“You’ve no choice,” said Niffy, smiling. “I’ll not stay on a dog’s lead, and my brothers are waiting for me outside.”

“What?” Rupert glanced at the lodge windows. “You led them here?”

“You led them here,” Niffy said. “But I’ll lead them away.” He winked at Cyrus and Antigone. “Been lovely meeting the cheeky young Smiths. Pleasure and all that. Enjoyed the brawl and frolic.” He backed toward the door and nodded at the Captain. “And you, guv. Bit of a hero of mine since I was a lad. Admire you still despite the circs.”

The Captain drew his sword. “The Avengel bade you stand.”

“Niffy,” Rupert said, and he unsnapped the leather flap on his holster. “Please.”

Niffy laughed. “And I bid the Avengel not to start a brawl he’s no chance of finishing.”

The lodge doors opened and four lean monks with hard, creased faces stepped inside. They were all unarmed, and Niffy was as thick as any two of them. The oldest-looking was also the shortest, with a ring of white hair on his speckled scalp and a pair of needle eyes peering out from a nest of wrinkles.

He stepped forward and reached up to his neck. Cyrus gaped as a small golden snake became visible in the man’s hand. Patricia suddenly went frigid cold and cinched tight around Cyrus’s neck, cutting off his breath.

Gripping the little snake by the tail, the old man lashed it forward like a whip. The gold serpent grew in size as it swung and a heavy writhing body slammed into the plank floor. It reared, hissing, ready to strike, with a head the size of a football, fangs dripping, and egg-size emerald eyes glistening against its gold scales. The monk still held the tip of the snake’s tail. Surveying the room and the stunned crowd, the old man spat on the floor.

Choking, Cyrus forced two fingers beneath Patricia and behind the key ring at his neck, just managing to loosen her enough to take a breath.

The monks began to retreat.

“Wait!” Cyrus gasped. “Niffy! If I ever need, you know, a Cryptkeeper, how do I find you?”