Cameron Johnston - The Traitor God

My body shuddered at the mere thought of attempting to move, never mind escape. Something popped and twitched inside me, an organ or muscle sliding back into place. Blood filled my mouth as I bit the inside of my cheek. A magus could survive most things, but this…

The god surged upright, throwing two massive corpses at the doorway, smashing gaping holes through the stonework. Half his face was a ruined mess of shattered bone and jellied brain, but it didn’t seem to matter. He began a frenzied attack on the other two shadow cats, fang to fang and claw to claw, his terrible ferocity forcing the hulking beasts back.

He laughed off the mortal wounds as his hand plucked a huge feline head from its shoulders like a child picking a flower. Ribbons of pulsing blood wrapped around the other in front of him and pulled the screeching daemon apart one limb at a time.

The cat choking on his other hand rolled and writhed across the floor as the severed appendage savaged its way deeper down the creature’s throat. The cat tried to vomit up the hand, struggled until the hand’s owner caught up with it and stamped on its head, crushing the skull to a pulp. The faceless shadow cat was the last, its flanks heaving and bloody froth pooling around its throat. The god bent over and buried his fangs in its neck, a nauseating lapping and slurping accompanying the feast. The severed hand crawled out of the other corpse and scurried back home to his wrist while the corpses disintegrated into black mist.

Coughing racked me, my ribs cracking as blood sprayed from my mouth. His expression was utterly bestial as he scurried over on all fours to sniff me. The light of reason returned to his eyes and he reached under the shelves to drag me out by the throat, dangling me in the air like a deranged child holding a puppy.

I plunged Dissever into the arm holding me, but I didn’t have the strength to cut deep. Ecstatic power flushed through me as it feasted on god’s blood. The Thief of Life winced, slapped my hand away and wrenched Dissever free. The black barbs tore chunks of his flesh out with it.

“What a nasty toy,” he said. “You have no idea what sort of horror you formed a pact with. Not that it matters now.” His hand squeezed. Dissever resisted for a few seconds, then shattered.

I threw up my right arm to protect my eyes as chaotic magic and metal exploded, needles of black metal piercing my hand. I convulsed as the dark spirit that was Dissever burst free of its prison, and from inside me, with alien glee.

Free! It shrieked in my mind. Dissever was no spirit born from the magic of this world, but was instead some sort of vile daemon. The Shroud between realms tore as its essence surged into the sea of magic that lay beyond the barrier, returning to whatever blood-soaked daemon realm had birthed it. With a small thunderclap, it was gone and the Shroud healed. But not all of Dissever had left me: lurking in the back of my mind remained a small fragment of red hunger and blackest mirth. Our pact was still intact and from elsewhere Dissever watched and waited, expectant, hungry to see what I would do next.

Nathair dropped his jaw like a laughing beast. “If you had known how to play with it properly then you might have posed me more trouble, but never mind, we shall have plenty of time to spend together in the coming days. What fun we will have!” He grinned, exposing jagged teeth like a laughing shark. “I admit that Harailt’s little pack of daemons surprised me. I had attributed your previous actions to desperation and now I am forced to admire your base-born cunning. A fine attempt, but futile. Now, back to this secret you possess.”

I grimaced and tried not to pass out. “Why are you so interested in what’s in my head?” I felt him inside me as an oily slick spreading and seeping into every crack in my defences.

“Somehow you killed Artha, mortal. His death was beyond me and I want to know how the likes of you managed such a feat.”

I spat a big glob of blood and mucus into his eye.

He didn’t blink or wipe it off. As it slid down his cheek his tongue stretched out to lick and swallow even as his feral mind-probes sliced my thoughts open like a butcher gutting a rotten pig. I was too feeble to resist. “You really don’t remember killing a god, do you?” he said, amazement in his voice. “Ah, there is the cause.” His power roared through me like a flood. Every part of me screamed in terror as Nathair tore my dire secret free from its prison.

“Artha, uh… m’lord,” I say. “Have you gone completely batshite insane?” I scan the inside of his tower, wary of currents of magic that can easily reduce me to ash.

“You test my patience, Edrin Walker,” the Setharii god of war says. He lies naked on his back atop the cold and unadorned stone slab that is his most holy of altars. “We have a bargain. Cut deep and cut now, while I can still keep my rage at bay. My will falters. My Gift opens and the Worm of Magic devours more of my self-control each time I succumb. Soon I will become more beast than man.”

I don’t know where to look. He is impressive, give him that. I avert my eyes and force my shaking hands to press the edge of Dissever to the notch in his chest just below the throat. I pause. “My friends – you’ve arranged their safety? You will heal Charra?” His promise to kill them if I don’t do what he demands still makes me furious, but now I understand the urgent necessity.

He stares up at the vaulted ceiling of twisted golden beams, to where a storm of magic rages above, not blinking as eldritch lightning flashes and arcs down all around us. “Yes. Their transgressions have been wiped from all record and false papers placed so their child need not suffer the Forging. The Lord of Bones and Lady Night will honour our deal and ensure that no magus or god shall ever harm them. They will see to the health of your friends and enforce our secrets.” He grits his teeth. “Do it now.” His voice brooks no dissent.

As I’d been shown, I open up my Gift and begin to sing, twisting my magic through the words in a very particular way. The words are meaningless, the mental and magical rhythm is the thing. I spit out words fast and sharp, my tune in time with the god’s heartbeat. I feel my Gift beginning to resonate with the inner core of his power, enticing layers of arcane protections to open up and accept my presence. I have been handed the secret of killing our gods, a heady and terrifying burden.

I cut deep, blood welling up as Dissever slices through skin. It’s tough going, even though Dissever goes through most things as if they are soft butter. The blade jars against bone and I have to brutally wrench it up and down to saw my way through, working the cut down the centre of his chest until a ragged red trench splits it in two. His flesh quivers, trying to heal, but somehow he holds that at bay.

Artha’s face is a mask of stoic suffering as he hooks his fingers into the wound and wrenches his ribcage open. It breaks with a crunch of cartilage and snap of bone, splaying open to display organs. His heart pulses with an eerie inner light.

He grimaces, one eye twitching at my hesitation. “Hurry. I can no longer keep the rage in check. My lucid periods grow steadily fewer. Unless you wish a mad god loose in Setharis do it now. Your friends will die first.”

I ram Dissever into his heart. The knife sinks a finger-breadth into the muscle. The altar stone shatters beneath us, shards shredding my coat and skin. Jets of hot blood squirt across my face, potent magic searing a path down my chin. The knife point scrapes something solid. I hack away, widening the slick hole. Fire and lightning blasts the tower walls, burning my skin and crisping hair.