Read Stackpole, Michael A - Dark Conspiracy 03 Online
Authors: Evil Triumphant
Stackpole, Michael A - Dark Conspiracy 03 (28 page)
that I would be needed to destroy P*ygmalion.
Crowley, on the other hand, would not have worried about my attire being in character with the place he
left me. The cave would have been his choice because of the relative safety it granted me, but had I not
been disturbed since he brought me to it, I would have still been wearing whatever clothes I had worn at
the accident site or in the hospital.
Closing my eyes, I brought my breathing under control. As I had been taught to do by Fiddleback's
minions, and had reinforced by Lama Mong at a Tibetan monastery, I
reached out with my mind to tear open the fabric of reality. I focused my mind on the suite 1 had once lived in at the Galactic Brotherhood headquarters, since its stark simplicity reminded me of the cave and bier. Pouring all my energy into it, 1 tried to force my way back to Earth.
My attempt failed utterly and completely. 1 felt as if the proto-dimension in which 1 existed had become
fossilized. The shell that protected it and segregated it from other proto-dimensions had become as hard as diamond. I could not penetrate it and I knew, consciously and intuitively, that my egress had been blocked very deliberately.
I also knew that Fiddleback could not be doing the blocking and that Pygmalion, had he been able to discover me, would have destroyed me. That meant another Dark Lord, or someone of similar powers and abilities, had become enmeshed in my fate.
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For a moment
, returning to my nightmare seemed like a pleasant alternative to living. 1 knew that, as in
viting
as that surcease mi
ght have seemed, allowing myself to accept it would have doomed millions
as Fiddleback
and Pygmalion fought for control of Earth. I had decided long ago that 1 would not be a party, either active or passive, to such a thing, so 1 resolved to live on.
With my stomach muscles aching in protest because of their long inactivity, I sat up. The cave, with its glassy-smooth walls, appeared to have been formed when an oval bubble of gas became frozen in the middle of a
lava-flow. At the end toward which my head had been pointing, a narrow tunnel led out toward sunlight, yet contained enough twists and turns that only a diffuse amount of light illuminated the interior of the cave.
And the woman standing across from me.
Swinging around to face her, 1 let my legs hang over the edge of the bier and dangle an inch or so above the ground. I smiled. "I would have hoped for more suitable attire when I met the Empress of Diamonds."
The petite woman covered her surprise well. I felt none of ft, and only caught a hint of it in the slight tremor running through the dark veil hanging down from the brim of her hat. Wearing a sleeveless, black
leather dress that fell to her calf, elbow length gloves and ankle-high boots, she seemed appropriately
dressed for a graveside appearance. A diamond choker, bracelet and anklet provided a striking contrast to her clothes, and the choker looked especially attractive against the darkish flesh of herthroat.
She spoke carefully, in a voice 1 recognized, with a diction and vocabulary I could not reconcile with the person 1 had known in the body she wore. "Your deductive abilities have been woefully underestimated.
Shall I call you Coyote, or does another of your pseudonyms please you more?"
"Coyote will suffice." I chose not to stand, which left us at an equal eye level. "I admit I am amiss in not having established contact with you sooner, but until now I had not pieced together the implications of
the things in which 1 have been involved."
"You have been preoccupied. Opposing one like Fiddleback is not a task that permits distraction."
I nodded appreciatively. "True, but it is a task that demands certain skills and abilities which prompted my predecessor to choose me to continue his crusade to keep Earth free. Those abilities include things
like being able to actually perceive things in dimensions outside that of your birth and dimension
walking. Coyote could not do those things—he was blind to the reality outside that of Earth."
1 gestured toward her. "This is the reason he concluded an alliance with you and invited you to place Natch Feral as your agent within his core group. He needed someone through which he could gain
information about Dark Lord
activities. Jytte had knowledge of Pygmalion, but even she denied it and denies it still. Entering into an alliance with a Dark Lord is a difficult thing to justify. Did he see you as the least of the evils?"
Even her laughter sounded different. More throaty, it carried with it less of an edge and spoke to eons of life and experience. "I believe he saw me as the
last of
the evils." She stepped closer to me, crossing the small chamber in two steps and readjusted the laurel wreath on my head. "How do you like your clothes?"
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"Funct
ional, though a bit less utilitarian than 1 might prefer." I narrowed my eyes and tried to pierce the v
eil's
shad
ow, but even knowing what lay behind it, I could see nothing. "How are you the /astof the evils h
e could
face?"
She laughed again, throwing her head back and giving me a fleeting glimpse of her jaw. "Unlike your
Pygmalion and Fiddleback, I do not have an aggressive aspect. They are builders and synthesizers. 1 am a
salvager. 1 salvaged your clothing from the Titan who is imprisoned here." She held up her right hand and jiggled the bracelet. "If you think of it, even these diamonds are salvaged from carbon. I salvage things and make them my own."
I reached up with my left hand and carefully pulled off her hat. "You salvaged Hatch's body."
"I salvaged Natch herself. I sensed her distress and actually had some of my people whisk her body away before she was dead." She looked at me through Hatch's blue eyes, but in a way Natch had never looked at me. "I thought it would be suitable to wear a familiar face to greet you on your waking."
I frowned. "Natch is not dead?"
"By no means—she was too faithful and loyal, unconsciously so, that 1 would not let her die." The Empress of Diamonds gave me a smile that almost seemed right. "I salvaged her once before, though she never knew it, because I used Coyote as my agent to save her. As I am a carbon-based life form too, slipping in and
using her body is not at all difficult. I often used her to communicate with Coyote directly."
"And you used her to salvage Bat?"
"My aspect is salvage, not disaster relief." She left her left index finger trace the line of my jaw. "Coyote was willing to work with me to oppose Fiddleback because he knew 1 would and could only exert power
after another Dark Lord had brought something to ruination. Having enough power to conquer and
despoil the Earth would be more than enough needed to destroy me, preventing me from bringing my
plans to fruition, so we had an alliance bom in a common enemy."
I smiled slowly. "So, why are you here? Am I salvage?"
The Empress of Diamonds turned Natch's body away from me in a coy move that would have
embarrassed Natch to death. "No, but I am interested in salvaging my alliance with Coyote."
"1 see." I leaned back, posting my arms against the top of the bier. "You know Coyote did not trust you.
The first thing I did in playing the elaborate charade he arranged for me was to destroy one of your
Reaper outfits."
She shot me an amused glance over her right shoulder. "He always did begrudge me that little inroad into Earth, but I take my power where I can get it. Your effort was damaging, but not very significant and
pales in comparison with the rampage Bat has been on to find those who took Natch's body. Your attack
did, however, draw my attention to your competence. Coyote chose you well."
I stared at the valley between her shoulderblades. "He wanted a weapon to use against Fiddleback. Is that what you want?"
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"I
could
settle for that, but I think I want something more of you than did your predecessor." She tur
ned
full ar
ound,
and intensity flooded her blue eyes. "I would make you my consort: a full and equal companion for me."
She brought her hands together, then opened them again, conjuring a neck torque formed of diamond.
The torque drifted toward me and I felt an almost overwhelming desire to bare my throat to its touch. I
could feel the power radiating off it. Accepting it would make me a Dark Lord just like her. We both
knew I had been groomed by Fiddleback to become a Dark Lord, so handling the power was not a
problem. All I had to do was to accept what she offered.
In concert with her, I knew no Dark Lord could stand against us. Trained to be an assassin, with the
synthesizing aspect of my creator, I could meld together creatures to form an invincible army. My
Empress would be able to salvage the best of the enemies we defeated, and I would cast them in new
molds. With each conquest we would grow stronger and stronger until nothing could withstand our
assaults. 1 could annihilate everything, destroying the universe, and she could remake it in whatever
image suited us.
If we tired of it, if it ever bored us, we could begin the process all over again. It would be the ultimate quickening of the cycle of life and death, through our power, to our glorification. And all it would take was my willing acceptance of the power she offered.
A savage agony thrust like an obsidian dagger into my stomach and started to ripupthrough my chest. I
felt it saw through every connection of rib to sternum, the invisible blade grating against my bones like a wood-saw bumping its way across a steel rod. I raised my hands to my chest, but the second flesh
touched flesh, hands and chest both felt as if they had been pierced by a million molten needs.
"No! No!" I gasped against the pain. The torque stopped its forward motion, then dissolved. As it went, so did the
pain in my chest.
Not so the pain I felt deeper in my soul. The core of my willingness to battle Fiddleback and Pygmalion
came from my knowledge that to sustain their power required the misery of helpless victims. I had felt
the seduction of power when Fiddleback had offered it to me before. I had been tempted by the grand
visions of what our blending, the Empress and I, would bring. When viewing it from the pinnacle of
power, the misery of other creatures seemed inconsequential.
My perspective did not come from the pinnacle, but from the nadir of powerlessness. I had seen the
desperation of people like Tadd Farber. 1 knew the fearful hatred the self-perception of victimization
spawned in people like the Aryan Warriors. I saw the pain in Sinclair MacNeal at the callous and hateful
neglect he suffered at the hands of his father. I knew these people, I counted them as friends and enemies, but I did not want to number them among my victims.
Dark Lords clearly have a sociopathic lack of any sort of conscience. To them, people are resources to be used. They are bees to a beekeeper, but with a subtle difference: The beekeeper does what he can to make
life for his bees wonderful because he draws a product from them. Because the Dark Lords find misery
and fear honey-sweet, the creatures in their hives have to lead hellish lives.
