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Content warning: violence against children and animals, gore

 

 

Chapter 31

 

It stares at the bag and realizes what Silagh Lacinth was trying to tell it. “You had it all this time?”

“Yes,” the Trimagh says.

“Come here, Death of Kilcharni,” Davina calls, “and kneel before the council.”

“Why wouldn’t you give it to me?” it asks. “Why did you let those people die?”

“Death of Kilcharni!” Councillor Hahark barks. “Take your fucking oath!”

“A moment.” The steel beneath the the Trimagh’s calm tone makes the man go quiet. She steps forward and holds out its bag. “Here.”

The bag is heavier than before. It looks and sees seven leather cases: six wrapped in house colours, and the one it brought from the ancient ruins.

The dark despair that overwhelmed it in the council chamber threatens to drag it under again, to leave it curled up and weeping on the floor. “Where are the daggers?”

“N*klabl’ch^gik’dm is one of the great demons,” the Trimagh says. “Too powerful for anyone to fight.”

“The flower daggers—”

“The flower daggers are things of myth, not reality,” Trimagh Ashinitha says, as if explaining to a small, slow child. “They do not have the power to stop the demon.”

Then why take them? “I could have tried.”

“You would have failed and doomed everyone in the city.” The Trimagh puts her hand on his shoulder, and for the first time, it wants to shrink away from her touch. “Now go, Death of House Kilcharni. Perform the ritual and you will save us all.”

But I still won’t be free.

It scans the viewing box, as if the daggers might appear before it. It sees the councillors, the table of food and the cushioned chairs, the two churchmen and the four guards. Nothing else. The councillors look angry and worried, the guards, nervous. The churchmen have their hands clasped behind their bodies and watch it with cold, calculating eyes.

They have them.

If they don’t work, why give them to her guards?

A spark of hope lights inside of it, faint and small and barely enough to pierce its darkness, but there nonetheless. It gives no sign of it. Instead, it lowers its head and hunches its shoulders in defeat, and without another word, kneels before Councillor Davina.

“We, the Council of Ten, chosen to lead the City of Seven Walls to prosperity and peace, have summoned you,” Councillor Davina intones. “We recognize you as the last child of House Kilcharni, and the sole holder of the House’s bloodline. Therefore, we charge you to take your place as Head of House Kilcharni, pledge your allegiance to the city and its people, and  faithfully carry out the duties required by all Houses. Will you take the oath?”

She waits a beat, then says, “Reply, ‘I will.’”

 “I will.”

Another councillor hands her a sheet of paper, and Councillor Davina says, “Repeat after me.”

The phrases are flowery, the words longer and more complicated than they need to be. The oath commits it to protect and help the city for as long as it is a residence, to pay taxes, to serve in war, and to promote peace. It promises to be charitable, to be honest, and to be an upstanding citizen, and ends its oath with, “I so swear, on the life of myself, my heirs, and my descendants for every generation to come.”

“Rise, Head of House Kilcharni,” Councillor Davina says, “and take your place among the Houses of the City of Seven Walls.”

“Now get down there fast,” says Hahark, “before the demon decides you’re the next meal.”

It does as it’s told, not looking at the Trimagh or anyone else as it races down the steps and runs to its spot on the mandala. Kilieteria intercepts it, her hand out.

“Take your contract,” she says, “and give me the others.”

It takes its contract and hands her the bag. Kilieteria walks briskly around the circle, handing their House’s case to each scion. She stops behind the scion of Feclina last, and hands him his case.

The Litarch of Felcina calls, “everyone take out your contract!”

It unbuckles the case, pulls the contract out. As soon as its hand touches the skin, the flayed child stands before it, eyes wide with fear. The other Houses open their cases: Glarin, Tralique, Paskoni, Darlona, Recinta, Flecina. With each touch of flesh against contract, another flayed ghost-child appears, their bloody torsos reflecting the light of the lamps. The scions don’t see them, but the Masters of Deaths do, and several look away.

“Oh please,” the child in front of it begs. “Please not again. It hurts.”

Across the circle, the Litarch of Felcina says, “When I raise my hand, breathe in. When I drop it, begin the chant.”

In the viewing box, the councillors watch, their faces filled with anticipation and fear. The Trimagh and her men stand with them, looking grim. Her men’s hands are still out of sight.

It looks once more at the wide-eyed, terrified ghost-child, and whispers, “I’m sorry.”

The Litarch raises her arm, and it breathes in.

“Please, no,” the child says, falling to its knees.

The Litarch of Felcina drops her arm.

It begins chanting.

An invisible force yanks the ghost-children backward to the ground, arms and legs splayed out as if staked to the earth. The children scream, far louder than any ghost it has heard before, the noise piercing its ears. It focuses on the chant, on repeating the deep, glottal consonants, the long, drawn-out vowels and the harsh sibilants that make up the words. The children scream louder, their bodies twisting as if they are revisiting the agony of their deaths.

On the second time through the oath, its skin tingles, and a tremor starts in its limbs. On the third, a sense of deep, terrible wrongness fills its gut and rises through its body. On the fifth, the air whirls and trembles, like water in a shaken glass, making everything around it unreal except for the screaming children on the ground.

On the seventh repetition, the children’s screams reach a horrifying, deafening crescendo. With the scions of the other six house, it calls out, “N*klabl’ch^gik’dm, N*klabl’ch^gik’dm, N*klabl’ch^gik’dm, N*klabl’ch^gik’dm, N*klabl’ch^gik’dm, N*klabl’ch^gik’dm, N*klabl’ch^gik’dm.”

The air fills with the smell of smoke and acid and the demon stands in the mandala.

Its chest burns white hot with its curse, but its knees are locked, its feet stuck in place by the same power that summoned N*klabl’ch^gik’dm to the circle. The demon turns in its place, pausing seven times as if making certain each house is present, though it has no eyes to see them.

“Hear me, N*klabl’ch^gik’dm!” shouts House Felcina’s scion and the demon turns once more, as if facing them. “Before you gather the seven Houses to properly renew our contract. And though we are late in performing tribute, we have come to swear our allegiance to you as we have every year since our contract began.”

The children still scream, their bodies writhing despite the invisible bonds holding them. It tries turning its head and learns it still has control of its neck to raise its eyes up to the viewing box.

The councillors and soldiers have retreated from the balcony. Only the Trimagh and her men remain. The woman has tears running down her cheeks as she stares at the children on the ground. The men on either side of her watch with identical grim expressions.

Each holds a flower dagger in his hand.

The spark inside it leaps into a fire that burns hotter than its curse. It forces its eyes back to the mandala; to the writhing, screaming children, the terrified animals, and the demon that stands in their midst.

“See the tribute before you!” shouts the scion of Felcina. “Three times as much as before, in recompense for our lateness, as promised in our contract. Accept it, and let it bind you to us as we are bound to you, and all are bound to the contract!”

The children’s ghostly screams stop, their bodies frozen in agony. No one in the circle: scion, elder, or Death makes a sound. Even the animals stop bleating.

N*klabl’ch^gik’dm’s hideous roar of anger tears through the air and slams against its eardrums. Twelve tentacles and the demon’s spiked tail slams into the closest goat. Animals scream and the ghost-children shriek and the scion of House Felcina shouts, “The bargain is sealed!”

The force that holds it and the scions in place vanishes and the six scions fall back, their legs collapsing beneath them. One laughs, the sound hysterical with relief, others weep. One clasps their hands together and prays.

It is exhausted, its muscles are torn, its skin ripped and its flesh badly bruised. Only the clohalc is giving it strength, and it does not know for how much longer.

Stimulants don’t make you stronger, it remembers. All they do is keep you from realizing how stupid you’re being.

A wolf’s grin stretches its face, and the nameless Death of House Kilcharni sprints toward the viewing box.

Chapter 32 comes July 11th!

 

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