Mark Chadbourn - Destroyer of Worlds

Beneath her, Tezcatlipoca raised the obsidian knife again. Ruth was pleased she could no longer smell his decomposing flesh, and she had no desire to witness her body put under more duress so she took her previous thought literally: Rise.

Up to the ceiling, she floated, and then through it into the chamber above, and up until she was inside the dense darkness that enveloped everything. Part of her wanted to keep rising, up past the darkness, past the sky, to search for that welcoming tunnel of light she had heard of so many times, and to see again all those people she missed so dearly.

But she couldn't allow herself to do it, and instead she swooped down so fast that the buildings passed in a blur. When she reached street level, she moved along inches above the cobbles, enjoying the familiar exhilaration. At speed, she ranged through the city, seeing Tezcatlipoca's warriors prowling the deserted streets, slipping into buildings where their victims lay in a jumble and feeling a surge of guilt that she had been indirectly responsible for their deaths; then investigating the other homes and shops, towers, halls and warehouses still packed with the trembling, fearful mass of people who had no idea what was happening around them, but who knew that death was creeping closer. Their faces burned through her dreamlike state and ignited a fierce desire to protect them. She could never give up while a single one remained alive.

The others, she thought. Where are they?

And then the streets and buildings of the Court of Endless Horizons passed in a blur as she searched every corner at speed. Finally she came across Veitch, Shavi, Bearskin, Shadow John and Rachel weaving through an alley to avoid an Aztec patrol as they made their way back to the cafe where they had arranged to meet Church.

As she floated above them, her hazy mind accepted the futility of what she was doing, for in that state she could neither touch nor be heard or seen. Yet to her surprise, Shavi's head snapped up when she came lower and he stared into her face with a shocked expression.

'Ruth?'

Veitch looked at him askance. 'Are you on the mushrooms again?' 'You can see me?' Ruth asked.

Holding off Veitch, who was urging him to move on quietly, Shavi smiled and pointed to his eye. 'This thing is proving a better investment than I ever hoped. What are you doing?'

'You have to come quickly,' she said. 'He's killing me.'

'Who is?'

'The god who's taken control of the city. He's been trying to flush us out.' She glanced at Rachel. 'And, I think, find her. He said he used to be known as… Tezcatlipoca?'

Worry underlined the recognition in Shavi's face. 'One of the most important gods to the Aztecs. This darkness makes sense now — he ruled the night, and death, and he loved tempting people to do great evil.'

'He's got me, and Laura and Tom in one of the tall buildings in the middle of the city. If you can follow me, I can take you straight there.'

With every beat of the drum reverberating through the walls and floor, Church felt his anger ratcheting up. From the moment it started, he knew it was counting out the remaining moments of Ruth's life, each thoom bringing a flash of the woman he loved in pain; he saw each cut, each beating, each agonised expression as if he were standing next to her. The images seared into his mind and pushed him towards the brink of madness.

With his exertion in the heat of the rows of lamps and candles, he had sweated himself dry. He could no longer feel his wrists. The constant drip-drip-drip into the puddle on the floor matched the drum's steady rhythm.

Occasionally his dread for Ruth shifted into blind, red hatred for the Libertarian, who swayed before his mind's eye with his sickeningly mocking grin, and his lies and his contempt, the architect of all his misery. Church knew he could kill the Libertarian without a second thought, the realisation no less troubling than the conundrum of whether it would be murder or suicide.

Thoom. Ruth. Thoom. Ruth. Thoom.

Finally the combustible mixture of dread and hatred exploded in uncontrollable rage. He half-stood, the chair rising with him, and raced backwards, crashing the seat against the wall. The force of the impact jarred every bone in his body, the wood of the upright smashing into his back, but still the rage did not diminish. In a fury, he did it again, and again, falling to the ground, struggling to pick himself up, once knocking himself unconscious.

When he was in the kind of pain he imagined Ruth was experiencing, he heard a loud crack. Barely able to think straight, he slammed into the wall one more time and the chair shattered into several pieces. Stepping through his bonds, he ignored the tattered mess of his wrists and tried the door. It was open. Caledfwlch stood outside.

Stupid, he thought. Do you really think that little of me?

Working the rope against the blade, he was free within a moment and lurching quickly down the corridor towards the drum-beat. His head spun and every fibre of his body ached, but his hatred kept him going.

A maze of stairs and corridors passed in a blur until he found himself stepping out into a small gallery overlooking a great hall filled with several ranks of Aztec warriors. All else faded into a mist when his gaze fell on Ruth, bound to a table on the other side of the hall, either unconscious or dead, her body leaking blood from numerous wounds. The boom of the drum reverberating in the pit of his stomach only added to his queasy despair.

A twitch of Ruth's hand allowed his rage to surface once more, and though the Libertarian was nowhere to be seen — Coward, he thought — his attention fell on what appeared to be a decomposing corpse now looming over Ruth with a black knife.

At the same time, the door into the hall burst open. With a fierce yell, Veitch began to chop and hack at the Aztec Warriors.

Without a thought for his own safety, Church threw himself from the gallery into the midst of the warriors. Several fell beneath Caledfwlch before the warriors realised they were being attacked from behind, and by then Church was cutting a path through them towards Ruth.

In the enclosed space, the warriors' obsidian-tipped spears were useless, and their wooden swords were no match for Caledfwlch. The Blue Fire blazed around the blade with more ferocity than Church had ever seen before, filling his gaze, his mind.

In the chaos of battle, he caught only glimpses of the grotesque grey figure holding the knife above Ruth. His feverish prayers appeared to work, for the knife did not fall. Instead he caught sight of a mirror that appeared to smoke, and then the figure was gone and the Libertarian stood in his place, mocking Church silently.

The sight of the one he hated most in the world drove the last of his rational thoughts away, and then there was only a red haze of blood and bone and flesh as he cut through the final warriors and leaped onto the small dais where the table stood.

Despite the extent of her wounds, Ruth had already come round. She mouthed his name, other words he could no longer hear, and he had no idea why the concern in her face became fear. Slicing through her bonds, he lurched past the table towards the Libertarian.

'You're not going to hurt anybody any more!' he roared.

With a devilish grin, the Libertarian held the smoking mirror towards him, and as the smoke cleared, Church saw what could only have been the reflection of another world. In it, a hellish figure covered from head to toe in blood stared back at him, wild-eyed, in its hands a sword of Black Fire, remarkably like his own. The truth of the reflection did not touch him, or if it did, he did not care, for he advanced on the Libertarian with a renewed rage.

Behind him, he heard one of Ruth's words of power. A flash of lightning and a furious gale assailed the remaining warriors.