Nightworld

Glaeken watched Sylvia tug the hilt free of the spike and turn in a slow circle. This time she made eye contact—and her gaze was withering.

"This is it?" her voice bitter, brittle. "This is all we get? Alan loses his life, Jeffy sinks back into autism, all for what? For nothing?"

"Maybe it's Nick," Bill said.

"No," Sylvia said disdainfully. "It's not Nick."

"Maybe it wasn't refurbished right," Jack said. "Or like Glaeken said, maybe it's too late. Maybe the signal can't get through."

"Oh, it's too late all right," she said, continuing her slow turn. "Too late for Alan and Jeffy." Finally her turn brought her around to Glaeken. She stopped and glared at him. "But it's not too late for you, is it, Glaeken?"

"I'm afraid I don't understand."

"Yes, you do." She lifted the hilt higher, straining against its weight. "This is yours, isn't it?"

"It's predecessor was, before it was melted down and—"

"It's still yours, isn't it?"

Glaeken felt his mouth going dry. Sylvia was trespassing along a path he dearly wished her to avoid.

"Not anymore. Someone new must take it up now."

"But it wants you."

"No!" What was she saying? "I served my time—more than my time. Someone else—"

"But what if no one but Glaeken will do?"

"That's not possible."

She lifted the hilt still higher. Her expression was fierce.

"Try it. Just try it. Let's see what happens. Then we'll know for sure."

"You don't understand," Glaeken said. His arthritic lower back was shooting pain down his left leg so he eased himself into the straight-back chair against the wall directly behind him. "I served my time. You can't ask me to serve again. No one has that right. No one."

He saw Jack step closer to Sylvia. He kept his voice low but Glaeken made out the words.

"Chill, Sylvia. Look at him. He's all rusted up. Even if he's the one it wants, what can he do against all that's going on out there?"

Sylvia stared Glaeken's way a moment more, then shook her head.

"Maybe. But there's something else going on here. Something he's not telling us." She handed the hilt to Jack. "You figure it out."

She took Jeffy by the hand and led him from the room.

Jack glanced down at the gold and silver hilt in his hand, then looked at Bill.

"Only one other person left to try."

As they led Nick to the blade, wrapped his hands around the hilt, and guided it over the butt spike, Glaeken rose stiffly to his feet and walked down the hall to the rear of the apartment. He needed to be alone, away from the oppressive despair in the living room.

He stopped at Magda's bedroom and looked in. She was sleeping. That was all she seemed to do these days. Maybe that was a blessing. He took a seat at her bedside and held her hand.

Sylvia and the others didn't—couldn't—understand. He was tired. They didn't know how tired one could be after all this living. To have engineered one last victory, or merely to have launched a final battle against Rasalom would have been wonderful. He could have gone blissfully to his death then. But that was not to be. He would die in the darkness like everyone else.

No, he couldn't risk even going near the instrument. Who knew what the reaction might be? It might start everything over again, and once more he would be in the thrall of the ally power. Forever.

I've done my part. I've contributed more than my share. They cannot ask for more.

Someone else had to carry on the fight.

"Where's my Glen?"

Startled by the words, spoken in Hungarian, Glaeken looked down and saw that Magda was awake, staring at him. Their litany was about to begin. Her memories were mired in the Second World War, when they both had been young and fresh and newly in love.

"I'm right here, Magda."

She pulled her hand away. "No. You're not him. You're old. My Glen is young and strong!"

"But I've grown old, my dear, like you."

"You're not him!" she said, her voice rising. "Glen is out there in the darkness fighting the Enemy."

The darkness. Some part of her jumbled mind was aware of the horrors outside, and knew Rasalom was involved.

"No, he isn't. He's right here beside you."

"No! Not my Glen! He's out there! He'd never let the Enemy win! Never! Now get away from me, you old fool! Away!"

Glaeken didn't want her to start screaming, so he rose and left her.

"And if you see Glen, tell him his Magda loves him and knows he won't let the Enemy get away with this."

The words stung, setting their barbs into the flesh of his neck and shoulders and trailing him down the hall toward the living room.

The living room…it looked like a wake. The five silent occupants were separated by a few feet of space, but were miles apart, each closed off, locked behind the walls of their own thoughts. And fears.

Even here.

Ba sat cross-legged against the far wall, eyes closed, silent. Jack and Sylvia stood at opposite ends of the long room, each staring out at the eternal blackness. Even Bill and Carol were apart, sitting silent and separate on the couch.

And here am I, he thought, separated from them and from my wife, as cut off from the rest of humanity as I've ever been.

Rasalom had won outside, and he was beginning to win in here.

And then Glaeken saw Jeffy. The boy was on his knees before the coffee table, his hands gripping the hilt where it lay on the table top, his cheek pressed down against it, as if some part of him knew that what he was missing was locked within the cold reaches of the metal.

All their sacrifices…all their faith in him…Rasalom eternally victorious…

Anger erupted within Glaeken like one of the long dormant volcanoes in the Pacific, exploding in his chest, engulfing him in its fiery heart.

Rasalom winning…having the last laugh…

It comes down to that, doesn't it? Me against him. That's what it's always been.

And suddenly Glaeken knew he couldn't allow Rasalom to win. If there was one chance, no matter how slim, he had to take it.

He found himself moving, crossing the room toward Jeffy, lifting him gently away from the hilt.

"Sylvia," he said, keeping his voice calm. "Take him and stand back."

Sylvia rushed over and pulled Jeffy away.

"Why? What's happened?"

"Nothing yet. And perhaps nothing at all will happen. But just in case…"

Glaeken stared down at the hilt, hesitating.

This is what you want, isn't it? he thought, speaking silently to the power he had served for millennia, wondering if it could hear him. You want me back. You let me go and now you want me back. Will no one else do?

The hilt was silent, gleaming coldly in the flickering light of the silent room. Wondering which he hated more, Rasalom or the power to which he had allied himself ages ago, Glaeken reached down and wrapped his gnarled fingers around the hilt.

Memories surged though him at the metal's touch. Yes, the hilt was alive. The entity that had been the Dat-tay-vao welcomed him back. The smallfolk had done their job well.

And as much as he hated to admit it, the hilt felt as if it belonged in his hands.

He turned toward the blade.

"Everybody back."