Chainers Torment

CHAPTER 26

Chainer made his way back to his chambers. He did not go unchallenged, but he might as well have. A small band of Nantuko pounced on him as he came off of the platform, but they were quickly collared and absorbed. Chainer broke a few bones with weighted chains as he went, but for the most part the fighters gave him a wide berth, and the spectators ran at the sight of him.

One of the First's toys was buzzing as he opened the door. It was a handheld mirror with a talking octopus in its glass. Chainer made a half-hearted stab to figure out what she wanted, then shattered the mirror over his knee. He had more important things to occupy his time.

The Mirari was where he left it, under the pyramid of paper in the corner of the smallest room. No one dared enter his chamber after he had deposed the First, and he doubted anyone would have believed him audacious enough to hide it there anyway. He took the glowing black sphere in his hands, and once again marveled at the depth of the power it contained. He should have used it to find a way to kill the First. Cabal City was nothing to him now, and worse, it was an obstacle. He would have to tear it all down before he could build it back up again properly.

Chainer drew the power into him and began to shape it. What he had in mind was complicated and would happen on a scale undreamed of even by the most fervid dementist. He reached out into Cabal City and beyond to Aphetto. His mind flew out past Krosan, across all of Otaria, and beyond into the depths of Mer. He could see and feel every dementia caster there was, each of them linked by their power and their oath to the Cabal. He felt a few dead spots in his continental sweep, a few individuals who could not be contacted. Fulla, for example, and a handful of casters in Aphetto. Perhaps the truly disconnected were beyond even the Mirari's reach.

No matter, he thought. He had more than enough. The Cabal taught them the ways of power, and they in turn used that power to benefit the Cabal. But the Cabal was dead now, just waiting to be buried. It was time for a new covenant, one that Chainer would enforce.

All across the land, he felt casters stop, freeze, and remain rigid. Skellum had always said that a master needs pupils, and in one stroke Chainer had more than any master who had ever lived. With the Mirari, he could enter each of their minds and commandeer them. He could occupy all the dementia space there was and turn it toward his goals. He could assemble the largest and most diverse army of dementia monsters that had ever been.

"Like this!" he cried, and he was suddenly back in his own dementia space even as he remained in his chambers. Both locations superimposed on top of each other, fusing and separating over and over. It was as empty there as it had been when he first arrived, and Chainer suddenly felt very small and lonely. He had been expecting a multitude, and he was unnerved by the complete lack of company. Where had they all gone?

He heard a fresh scream nearby, and he appeared back in his chambers. They were all around him. Sprawled across his floor and spilling out in to the hall, visible in the courtyard outside his window and throughout the streets of Cabal City, a million monsters or more howled and hunted and rampaged and roared. Twisted nightmare versions of people, animals, birds, snakes-fantastic beasts of the forest and terrifying monsters from the depths all lashed out at themselves and the world around them. Chainer had opened the floodgates of his mind, and the Mirari was keeping them open.

Chainer laughed and sat on the pile of paper with the Mirari in his lap as the entire city wailed in horror.

"The Cabal is here," he cackled, "and nowhere else."

Kamahl had never seen such chaos. It became difficult to tell who was real and who was a summoning, and impossible to tell which side they were on. Harpy fought angel, zombie fought trooper, and all manner of things that never had names fought beasts from the forest that had never been seen. Kamahl did not consider himself a brilliant man, but he knew how to learn from experience. An out-of- control catastrophe spelled Mirari, and a flood of monsters spelled Chainer. Kamahl concentrated. He could feel the sphere's presence. His former partner had finally fallen victim to the Mirari's curse. It was not hard to locate the Mirari, and Kamahl made his way through the killing floor as fast as his wounds permitted. There were plenty of victims to go around, and Kamahl encouraged a few of the monsters to find easier pickings with the tip of his sword. Before long, he was at the end of the long hallway that led to Chainer and the Mirari.

"Chainer," he bellowed. A hissing snake man attacked him, and Kamahl burned its throat out where it stood.

"Is that my old friend and partner?" Chainer's voice called back.

"Come on out, 'old friend.' Let's finish this."

The flood of sprawling monsters pouring out of the chamber door momentarily increased just before Chainer came through it. The creatures fled past Kamahl without looking at him. They were far more interested in getting away from their master.

Chainer's braided hair splayed out around his head like a crown. His eyes were black again, but the void had spilled out of his sockets and was obscuring the top half of his face. His feet floated six inches above the ground, and he held the Mirari in his metal hand. He was smiling.

"Kamahl."

"Chainer."

"Have you come to apologize, or to kill me and take the Mirari?"

"Neither. I've come to stop you."

"Stop me? From what?"

"From destroying yourself. From destroying this city." He shrugged. "From destroying everything."

Chainer's smile faded. "Still looking out for me, big brother? I have a bad history with authority figures, you know. They always die or betray me."

"I'm not your brother, Chainer. I'm your friend. Listen to me. You've got to put the Mirari down. You're going to get us all killed."

"We have to get killed," Chainer flared. "Have to destroy before I can rebuild."

"If you don't put it down, I'm going to put you down."

Chainer smiled again. "Aaah, threats. You don't really think you have a chance, do you?"

"Enough talk." Kamahl drew his sword. "Now we fight."

"You don't look healthy enough to fight."

"I'm healthy enough to fight you. Not your monster pawns, not the Mirari. You.

"I don't need pawns," Chainer said darkly. He gestured at Kamahl's weapon. "Don't you know that no one with a sword can get the best of someone with a chain? That's why I carry this thing."

"Then let's go. You're right, Chainer, I'm not healed. But this isn't the pits. There isn't a scheduled conclusion to this fight. Care to test your skill?"

Chainer's eyes twinkled. "Are you proposing that we come to some sort of arrangement?"

"No arrangement. No tricks. Just a plain challenge. I say I can take you using nothing but my sword. Can you take me with just a length of chain?"

"And my dagger. I used to use that, too."

"And your dagger. Come on, Chainer, it's you and me. We both fought for the Mirari. Now we can fight fair, and may the best man win."

"Done," Chainer said. He tossed the Mirari through the open door into the next room and squared off against his former partner. Kamahl breathed a sigh of relief. At least the building wouldn't go up in a black cloud of debris and body parts while they were fighting. Now all he had to do was overcome the pain of his wounds and the fatigue in his body to defeat his insane ex-partner who could kill with a gesture and created both weapons and monsters out of thin air.

After he had done that, Kamahl promised himself he would look into some other kind of work.

Veza swam for all she was worth, but Burke caught her just outside the chasm. He never seemed to get tired, and Veza simply could not keep up the pace. From the mirror around his bodyguard's neck, Laquatus watched as Veza was recaptured.

"Now you are mine," Laquatus said, "along with the empire."

Veza struggled in Burkes grip, but she was staring at the war being waged around her. In the distance, something new was happening on the battlefield. Veza allowed herself a small smile.

"Nothing is yours yet, Laquatus."

"Emperor," a mercenary's voice said, "are you seeing this?"

"Seeing what?"

"Look at the battle. Look! By the depths, what's going on?" Veza looked. Inexplicably, the hundreds and hundreds of serpent warriors who had been grappling with Llawan's soldiers were vanishing in mid-blow. His mercenaries found themselves face-to-face with trained imperial guards, and the guards adjusted much more quickly than their new opponents. Within seconds of the final serpent's disappearance, a hundred of Laquatus's mercenaries fell dead, and the rest fell back in disarray.

"Perhaps you only rented those warriors from the Cabal," Veza called into the mirror. "I'll bet it's not too late to get your deposit back."

"Get my troops back inside the chasm. Burke, kill that wench and bring her body back here."

Veza didn't wait for Burke to comply. Instead, she clamped on to the gel man's thumb with her short, sharp teeth. With a wrench that nearly dislocated her jaw, she tore the digit off and spat it back in its owner's face. Minus his thumb, Burke could not maintain his grip on Veza's wrist, and she was able to kick her way free and dart out into the open ocean.

Burke was close behind, however. Apparently he took any order Laquatus gave him to heart. He elongated his feet to give him more drive, and with each stroke he stretched his arms a little closer to Veza.

When his finger brushed Veza's foot, she panicked and dove for the sea bed. Burke changed course even quicker than she did and actually gained on her before she could hide among the seaweed and silt. She needed to go faster. She needed her tail. It was impossible, though. She couldn't change while moving, and the transformation was extremely painful. Burke would be on her before the process had even begun.

Just as his hand closed around her leg, the empress's ship swam into view. Burke snapped Veza's ankle, and she sank painfully to the sand. She cradled her injured leg and wondered why he wasn't finishing her off. She looked up, and saw the reason.

Burke was beset by the empress's barracuda. All twelve of the spindly killer fish circled around him, breaking their teeth on his body and occasionally ripping small chunks off. The pieces of Burke's body immediately floated back and rejoined the main mass. The barracuda were ill-equipped to deal with something that didn't panic, bleed, or feel pain.

Burke, on the other hand, was killing the barracuda with both hands. They were strong and they were fierce, but they were not faster than Burke, and they had bones he could break. Five of the fish already floated dead in the water around him. In a matter of seconds he would be through them and ready to finish Veza.

Veza concentrated. Laquatus was wrong, magic wasn't about being mentally, physically, and morally flexible. It was about understanding the world and your place in it. Veza felt the powerful tides flowing out of the chasm, felt the palpable force of the civil war around her, felt the bond between the barracuda and Llawan. I am a servant of Mer, Veza reminded herself. I am of the sea.

"Change," she commanded, and her legs merged seamlessly and painlessly into a powerful fish's tail. Burke was just finishing off the last of the barracuda when he noticed Veza's metamorphosis. He elongated his arm across the gap between them to clutch at her throat, but she shot off like an arrow through the air. She laughed, exhilarated as she screamed toward the empress's vessel, until she felt Burke's hand close round her lower extremities once more. The gel man's arm had continued to stretch after her as she swam, and now he had her snared in a long, tough line of his own bodily substance. He didn't have much power at this distance, but he was able to hold her fast. She now outweighed Burke, so he couldn't draw her toward him, but he was quickly pulling himself closer to her by retracting his arm and letting her weight carry him forward. Veza thrashed and clawed at Burke s unyielding hand.

Suddenly, the featureless killer stopped. Through the water, Veza could make out Laquatus's voice from the mirror around his servant's neck. Burke stood still, nodded, then released Veza's tail. He struck out, back toward the chasm.

Laquatus must have summoned him home. There was a cloud of bubbles and a whirling sensation, and Veza found herself and the remaining barracuda on the bridge of the Llawan's vessel.

"Greetings, Veza. We are so glad to see you alive. Is all as you described it to Olsham?" "It is, Empress."

"Then, my mystic, if you would begin?"

The cephalid mystic nodded and once more formed a complicated symbol with his multiple arms. Llawan joined him, and between the two of them they wound up looking like a strange new alphabet.

Veza looked to the screen. All of Laquatus's mercenaries had retreated back into the chasm and were fending off Llawan's troops. Veza tapped the captain on the shoulder and said, "Pull those guards away from there." He looked dubious, but he decided not to question her authority. Several seconds later, the imperial troops backed off.

"All clear, Empress." Veza anxiously counted the seconds. Once more, Veza spotted the flow of the shield defenders' transparent bodies as they positioned themselves in front of the chasm. "The shield is in position."

Llawan clicked, and her shield defenders formed their barrier, larger and thinner than they had ever created before. It sparkled like a sheet of ice, and Veza could even see a ghostly reflection of the empress's troops in it. Olsham reached out and traced a huge circle in the water before him, and the huge convex shield tilted slightly, sparking at its edges and reflecting the light back upon itself.

At last, a huge silver-white plane of energy flickered across the transparent shield. The energy flowed past the empress's servants and continued out to cover the mouth of the chasm. It was almost a mile across, wide enough to overlap the chasm opening by several hundred feet on both sides. It stretched from the ocean floor to the water's surface, and Veza knew it would stretch across the entire chasm, the magical impulses relayed by the crystals she herself had installed, to enclose the entire flood zone in a huge tunnel of mystical energy. A cheer went up among the bridge crew.

Olsham and Llawan opened their eyes. Olsham smiled and said, "Behold, Empress. The largest water portal ever created. Or rather, the largest portal barrier ever created. Nothing outside the chasm can get in, and-"

"Nothing inside can get out. As always, Olsham, you exceed our expectations." Llawan turned and noticed Veza's wound. "All hail the noble sacrifice made by our comrades, warriors and defenders both. And captain, get a medic to the bridge," she snapped. "Our valued sister is injured. Are you blind?" "Sorry, my empress."

Llawan floated down and gathered Veza up in her forelimbs. "Is the damage permanent?"

"No, Empress. I think it's a simple fracture." She flexed her tail and winced. "A very painful one, but a simple one."

"Veza," Llawan said softly. "Are you sure that Laquatus and all his troops were inside the chasm when the portal was created?" "Yes, Empress."

Llawan smiled. "Then we have won." She handed Veza to the medic, then began floating back toward the view screen.

"Empress," Veza called. "You planted the survey data that proved the chasm was valuable, didn't you?"

Llawan smiled. "Olsham altered the recording device before he teleported off the ship."

"So you used me."

"Not at all. We employed you. We assigned you a task, and you performed it. It is the right of the empress to demand service from her subjects."

"Service, Empress, or sacrifice? Your leviathan, its crew, your soldiers and shield defenders. Even me."

Llawan scowled. "What is your point, Veza? Laquatus would have sunk the entire empire into economic warfare and decadence. This is why civil wars are fought. To preserve that which is worth preserving, at any cost."

Veza nodded, then floated quietly as the medic examined her tail. "Forgive me, Empress. My wound has made me light-headed."

"Of course. When you are healed," Llawan said, "you will join us in the palace as our Imperial Counsel. We have risked much together, and we do not refer exclusively to our personage. You and all of our loyal subjects either made us empress, or welcomed us as empress. Now that we have earned that title fairly in combat, we will not forget those who made it possible. We expect a steady flow of consistently good advice from you, Counsel."

"Yes, Empress." Veza felt herself being taken away, and though she didn't know exactly where she was going, for the first time in months that wasn't something she had to worry about.

Chainer sent three separate chains screaming at Kamahl's sword. The first two locked and held onto the blade, while the third snared Kamahl's wrist. Chainer hauled with all his might, but he could not pull the sword loose or Kamahl down.

Annoyed, he sent another chain coiling around Kamahl's foot. With a brutal tug, he finally hauled Kamahl off his feet. Kamahl dropped his sword as he fell, and took hold of the chains himself. When he hit the ground, he yanked hard to pull Chainer toward him, but the chains vanished before Kamahl could bring his superior strength and weight into play.

A rounded weight broke Kamahl's jaw before he could get up. "Guess you'll have to learn how to fight without teeth now too, won't you barbarian?" Chainer's voice was high-pitched and grating. Kamahl sneered and spit blood at Chainer. He reached for his sword, but Chainer struck it and sent it skittering across the floor. "I'm getting bored now." Chainer sank a sharpened weight into Kamahl's thigh, and another into his shoulder. "I can stand here, twenty feet away, and whittle you down to nothing. I told you. The sword is useless against the chain."

Kamahl stood firm, his breath ragged and blood streaming from his wounds. "You should just kill me now, then. There's no audience to be disappointed by a short bout."

Chainer wagged a finger at his partner. "Now, now. We both know you're not that weak." He slashed another chain at Kamahl, but the barbarian ducked under it. "Not yet, anyway."

Kamahl conjured an axe and hurled it down the corridor at Chainer. Reflexively, Chainer threw out his hand and released a large, gelatinous mass which absorbed and muffled the explosion.

"I thought you said no magic."

Kamahl shrugged. "I was just trying to clear us some space."

"Now you've done it," Chainer said. "You've made me angry." He jutted both arms out in the casting position, but instead of the death bloom or a nightmare casting, ten sharp chains exploded out of his hands, streaming and curling in twisted spirals as they flew toward Kamahl. The hallway was not wide enough for him to dodge them all. Six of them found their way into his body, linking his sword arm and both legs to Chainer. Kamahl stiffened but did not fall. He couldn't move, but he would not go down.

"The best man wins. That's what you said, isn't it?" Chainer walked casually toward the immobilized barbarian. He waved his hand, and the Mirari appeared in it. "I think I'll do something really special for you, Kamahl. You rejected my gifts once. If I remake you from the bones out as one of my snakes, however, you won't have any choice but to accept it." Chainer stood less than an arm's length from Kamahl. He reached out his metal arm and daintily flicked Kamahl in the chest. The nudge sent Kamahl teetering backward, and he began to topple like a great tree. Before he fell, however, Kamahl reached out and grabbed on to Chainer's metal arm.

"Let go of me, you lump of rock." Chainer jerked his arm back, but Kamahl didn't let go. He clamped onto the artificial limb with the other hand and steadied himself on his feet.

"I'm sorry, Chainer," he said, and channeled a withering blast of heat from his own body into Chainer's arm.

The metal limb instantly became red-hot, and Chainer screamed. He dropped the Mirari and drew his dagger, stabbing it into Kamahl's forearm, once, twice, a half dozen times. Kamahl grimly held on through it all, pumping more heat and more energy through his hands.

Chainer's arm melted into slag with a wet, angry hiss. He fell backward and lashed his foot out at Kamahl, finally knocking the barbarian onto his back. "That was a gift from Skellum," Chainer hissed. "Can't you barbarians lay off my thrice-damned arm?" He kicked Kamahl in the ribs as he stepped over his prone body to retrieve the Mirari. He took the sphere in his remaining hand, closed his eyes, and concentrated. The smoking end of his stump started to swell, and a new arm began to unfold like an inflating balloon. It wasn't Chainer's arm, or any human's. It was a thin, segmented claw like an insect's, and Chainer looked at it in confusion.

"That's not right," he said. The insect claw vanished, and in its place a large, black rattlesnake sprouted. Chainer scowled at it until it withered. Another attempt produced a mewling, eyeless monstrosity that wailed like a baby until Chainer shook it away.

"Chainer, what's happening?"

"I don't know," he said. What was happening? How could the Mirari keep failing?

Unless he had overtaxed it. Of course. He had been communing with the sphere for days, actively using it for the past half hour, and then had simply cast it aside. Of course it was malfunctioning, he wasn't using it properly. He ought to have pulled himself out of the sphere's bottomless well of power before he tried to do something else. Also, it was probably mad at him for abandoning it.

"Chainer, wait."

"Shush." Chainer absently flicked his arm toward the helpless barbarian, and a torrent of misshapen snakes and monsters swamped Kamahl where he lie.

Chainer tried one final time to make himself an arm, but it came out as a lifeless and callused roll of flesh. Nearby, Kamahl was grappling with the tangle of horrors and losing. Chainer shook his head. That wouldn't do. He had promised Kamahl a fair fight.

In fact, the entire building was getting too noisy and crowded. Chainer needed peace and quiet to kill his friend, and he held the Mirari up to help him get it.

"Chainer," Kamahl gurgled from the bottom of the pile. "Don't."

"Hold on," Chainer said. "I'm almost done." With the sphere in his hand, he once again felt all of the minds he had broken into and pillaged, all of them still frozen and empty. Instead of reaching into those minds, this time Chainer reached out into the world. The other dementists were merely relay stations for his dementia space now, and there was no reason to give back what he had rightfully stolen. He wanted to finish Kamahl man to man, however, and for that he needed quiet.

Chainer used the Mirari to locate each and every one of the monsters he had unleashed since the games began. He was surprised how many of them were left. In fact, there were very few people left alive in the arena around him, and the monsters there had turned on each other. All the more reason to call them home, he thought. The battle's nearly over, and we've already won.

All around Otaria, the flow of power reversed as a million nightmares began to flow back into the fragmented brain that created them.

"This kind of hurts," Chainer said. "Is it supposed to hurt?"

Buried by hostile monsters, Kamahl was helpless to stop Chainer. He watched the Cabalist as the Mirari sent blasts of light out in all directions, and then a thousand smaller beams began flowing back into Chainer's body.

"This kind of hurts," Chainer said. "Is it supposed to hurt?" "Drop it, Chainer!" Kamahl tried to yell more, but something with hooves instead of fists punched him in the mouth.

The swarm of monsters stopped tearing at him as the lights beaming into Chainer began to grow larger, faster, and more frequent. Kamahl was still unable to move, but at least he wasn't being damaged any further.

Chainer was screaming now. They were no longer merely beams of light slamming into him, but elongated streamers of flesh, eyes, fangs, stingers, and claws. Not just energy, but mass was pouring into him, and his physical form was not prepared to deal with it. In a final burst of triumphant, agonizing sound, the air around Chainer's body imploded and a flash of purple light blew outward, knocking stones loose from the wall and almost reburying Kamahl in rubble.

Many silent minutes passed. Then Kamahl broke the silence by shoving one of the larger stones off of his chest and letting it crash loudly to the floor. The barbarian painfully got to his feet and limped down the hall to where Chainer writhed. At first Kamahl thought his friend was coated in some kind of undulating ooze, but as he looked closer, he saw the truth. It wasn't something on Chainer's body that squirmed, it was Chainer's body. Though he still had the same build and the same shape, Chainer's arms, legs, chest, head, even his hair was now a turbulent mass of wriggling monsters. Tiny eyes looked up at Kamahl, and miniature fangs formed, struck, then melted again. Sometimes a head or a hand would rise above the surface of his skin, and snakes swam all through the unstable flesh like sharks in a feeding frenzy. His nose and mouth were only shapes, and those shapes were crammed full of tongues and scales and fingers and talons. Even his missing arm had been replaced with the cancer of living monsters.

Worst of all were his eyes. Chainer's brilliant blue eyes had returned, and they bore mute and tragic testimony to the agony he suffered.

The Mirari had rolled free and sat unobtrusively on the floor. It seemed smaller and drab, its eerie black glow extinguished. Kamahl marveled that he and so many others had fought and bled for something that appeared to be nothing more than a spent cannonball, or a discarded child's toy. He knelt down next to Chainer.

The hideous parody of his friend's body reacted to his closeness, and Chainer clumsily flopped a boneless arm toward Kamahl's hand. Kamahl took it, and he fought the urge to release the hideous squirming thing and start hacking it with his sword. Chainer pulled on Kamahl's arm, and the barbarian leaned forward to put his ear next to the place that had been Chainer's mouth.

"Mu. Ra. Ree."

Kamahl had no idea how the sound was created, but he understood. He shook his head. "You don't need it. It'll only make things worse."

Chainer shook his head, his eyes pleading. He tried to point at it with his free arm.

"Yours. Take. You. Take it."

"I'm not so sure I want it anymore."

Chainer's horrid grip grew tighter. "Must," he gurgled. "Not. Safe." "All right, Chainer. I'll take it, and I'll keep it safe." A hundred battles had taught him not to argue with a dying man.

Chainer's grip relaxed. "Sorry," he said. "So sorry."

Kamahl held his friend's hand until the squirming stopped and his ragged breath stopped completely. He stood, remembering the simple courtesy he had paid to dead enemies and allies alike. In this case, it was the least he could do to free Chainer's spirit from the hideous form it had been shackled to.

With a wave, Kamahl burned Chainer's twisted body to cinders. When he was alone, he caught site of the Mirari once more, so unassuming in repose. He had told Chainer the truth. He wasn't sure if he really wanted it anymore. But he also had made a promise to his friend, and he thought he understood why Chainer had insisted and why he had agreed.

After a few moment's hesitation, Kamahl bent and picked up the Mirari. For a brief moment, he saw a huge, smoking battlefield littered with corpses and an ocean of multicolored flames. And then he was alone, surrounded by the memory of monsters and the death of his friend.