Chapter 54

The death of Arkohnus cast a pall over not only my family but the kingdom of Zuunkhorun. My heart was heavy for his death, and for others of my children. Threch, his orcish heritage cursing him with a short life, but he made the most of it. Euvorio died young, his sickly body not the equal to the stresses he placed upon it. I took some comfort in the fact that the beauty of his words would be immortal. I had begun to outlive my children. Such a thing was inevitable for a wizard but that did not make it easy.

I celebrated my hundredth birthday in this time. Not long after, Nesugen died and I easily seized the throne of Zuunkhorun. I converted internal enemies to friends and purged the ones I could not. My machinations are described in more detail in the The Mad Tyrant, though it does not charitably describe my motives. Nor does it properly credit my wives. Their counsel was as ever at the core of my success.

None of my wives bore children during this time. Despair was too heavy a cloak to entertain the idea of creating a new life. I had begun to make plans to flee Zuunkhorun if necessary. A ship would take us east where a set of standing stones existed on an island that could then take us nearly anywhere on Thür.

Were it not for Deimara I might have gone mad. She reminded me of her mother, and though a ghaunt rather than a full ghoul, she took after Maireili. Her teeth were blunter, and she grew a shock of dark hair at the crown of her head, but she possessed Maireili's sweet features and liquid black-in-black eyes. Deimara was a more talented wizard than I ever was and was diligent with her lessons. She had already stayed with me longer than I stayed with the old man and for that I was grateful.

The war went poorly. Though the Battle of Crimson Rushes was a victory for Zuunkhorun, the strength of the Heacharids has always been that they can absorb crushing losses and return as strong as before. They effectively choked off any approach to Ironmotte, which was well worth the thousands of lives they had spent.

My fleet was diminished. Kucyone had died and Arishat retired to the rewards I had promised, living on a modest estate in Yamanai. Malycent had left the fleet years ago to become a freeblade, an adventurer, and an explorer. What was left were the pirates my old companions had recruited. I did not trust them as I had my old friends, but they were what I had.

Prince Mar-Urukh summoned me to Uraraoi. He was Arishat's heir and I suspect sometime paramour. Now he commanded the Shattered Reavers. He was able enough, but lacked Arishat's genius.

Quiyahui had grown to impressive proportions, large enough now to ride. It made travel through Zuunkohrun easy though such journeys exhausted her. I made my way to the same tavern where so many years ago I met with Arishat and Kucyone. Quiyahui landed in the street and took her human form to accompany me inside. As she grew, she found assuming her human form easier and could maintain it for longer. A different man ran the tavern but he knew me as well as the old one. Though I was Tyrant of Zuunkhorun, I traveled among the people without fear.

I found the purpose of my visit waiting in one of the rooms upstairs. Prince Mar-Urukh was a mountain of a man, a barrel-chested Kharsoomian who had adopted Zuunese dress. A pharcyl rode on his shoulder and which he claimed he would eat if he were ever hungry enough. It was a lie, of course. He loved that hideous little thing.

"Lord Belromanazar," he said. "Thank you for your prompt attention."

I took the pirate's massive paw. Rings glittered from every thick finger. "Why have you called?"

"Dire news, I'm afraid. The Heacharids have a fleet coming. They struck out from the Lapis not long ago, making their way around the Onyx Horn."

"How big a fleet?"

Mar-Urukh whistled. "I have never seen its like."

"You saw it?"

"Aye, I did. I thought to raid the port at Olbeius and there saw an endless line of ships, traveling south along the coast. I sent spies into the city and I bring you this tale. The Heacharids have assembled a fleet like the world has never known and they are coming here."

"How long until they arrive?"

"The currents are against them and travel round the Horn is never easy. I suspect they will not be here until late summer at the earliest."

"Thank you, Prince."

He grinned. "Were you not the Dreadstorm himself I would say that you were doomed."

My own smile was strained. "Take your men to the hospitality house. Tell Ku-Aya that I will pay for your visit."

"Ku-Aya?"

I shook my head. Ku-Aya was gone. She had died an old woman two winters ago. "Forgive me." I fumbled for the name. "Shala. Yes, Shala."

He nodded, the smile leaving his eyes. "Thank you, my lord."

He left me and I collapsed into a chair. Quiyahui knelt beside me, resting her head in my lap. I found no comfort in stroking the iridescent white feathers she had in place of human hair. A fleet as Mar-Urukh described would break us. While our farmlands were fertile as ever, the Golden Sea was no longer providing its grain. We needed the trade that came through that port. They would blockade us and when starvation had sufficiently softened us, they would invade. That would be the end. I would have no choice but to surrender.

***

My enemies chose to strike not long after I had received this news. Perhaps they thought the timing ideal, for I was at my lowest point, but indirectly, it defeated them. I was still in a black mood, ruminating over my inevitable and ignominious defeat. There was no solution to the arriving fleet and we were barely holding the Heacharids off by land. It was already late into the night and while my brides slept peacefully, I was awake by the fire, sitting with Zhahllaia.

"Speak to me, my love," said the djinn. "I know your mind is with this fleet. Together, we can determine a solution."

My oldest concubine was still the perfect flower, bronze flesh unhidden by her costume of delicate chains. "There is no solution this time, Zhahllaia."

"You mourn Arkohnus. There is no--"

"Do not speak his name. Not now."

Her tone was even. "He was mine too. All of your children are mine. He called me Mama Zhahllaia and he loved me."

I turned away, ashamed. "Forgive me, my love."

"There is nothing to forgive. You need to understand we all share your pain. We created this plan. We charted the downfall of an empire. Did we think it would be easy?"

"No," I allowed. "What would you counsel? If one of your shahs were facing this?"

"I would counsel raising an equal force. Or a tempest."

I shook my head. "Even my greatest storm could not defeat the fleet Mar-Urukh described. They will have witchthralls on those ships too that would counter or slay me."

We fell into silence, the problem as insurmountable as before in our minds. If it baffled Zhahllaia what hope would I have? Still, I felt as though I was missing something obvious, some solution that existed that needed only to be seen.

"Belazei," I murmured.

That was when I felt the first sting. A feathered dart suddenly stuck from my chest. I stared at it in mute incomprehension for a moment before tearing it from my skin, where it left a spot of blood. I felt Quiyahui outside, in fear and anger and I cursed the new size that kept her from my side.

Black-clad men burst in through the windows. I tried to summon my magic, but I was sluggish, my will heavy. Something on the dart.

"Wake!" screamed Zhahllaia. One of the men swung a blade through her and for a moment her form wobbled but swiftly righted.

Maireili sprang from the bed like a cat. She was nude, her skin silver in the firelight. Three darts were in her in the space between heartbeats. Lysethe was next, struggling to wakefulness but soon feathered herself. These men knew who the most dangerous among us were.

I reached for Ur-Anu, willing the lighting to strike and fill my hand, but I could not concentrate upon it. One of the black-clad men loomed over me, ready to slice me into ribbons.

He stopped, his blade falling from his nerveless fingers to clatter to the flagstones. A spearpoint pushed through chest with a hideous wet crunch. He fell, twitching. Behind him loomed two shapes I had nearly forgotten. My tent sisters, reanimated by my magic, their rotted forms encrusted with sea life and alive with lightning, had emerged from their boxes to slay these assassins.

Their skills had been undimmed by their deaths and long dormancy. They fought fearlessly, and as the men turned to face them, their blades hacked into dead flesh, into rocky barnacles, into rusted armor. The assassins had brought tools to slay the living. They were helpless against the dead.

The arrival of my hetairoi was exactly what we needed to rally. Tanyth had gotten her hands on a sword and showed them that she was still a daughter of Kharsoom. Sarakiel got to Fidget and with a word, the stone figurine transformed into the living bird-thing. The feathered horror leapt into the black-clad men, killing with abandon.

I focused my will and a boom brought Ur-Anu into my hand. I saw the lines of threads, pushing through the haze of poison in my system. I cut one man down, then another. I forced myself into the whirling dance of death I had perfected during my exile. The weapon had been forged to slay a god. It could make short work of mere assassins.

The fight was swiftly over. Maireili and Lysethe were unconscious and Sarakiel was tending to them. My tent sisters were heroes.

We quickly found that our personal guard outside our suites had been poisoned, their throats cut. We summoned doctors and exorcists, and though it was a near thing, we survived. Maireili had the worst of it and when she finally woke from her poison slumber three days later, we rejoiced.

On that day, I opened the boxes where my hetairoi waited. Their eyes opened, flashing with lightning. The sight of them like this still filled me with shame and sadness, but they had saved my life.

"Brother," whispered Einoë.

"How did you know to save us?" I asked.

"We felt your fear," Kallea said. Her voice was mushy.

"I did not command you," I said.

"You need not command us," Einoë said.

"Why not?"

"The vow," said Kallea.

"Your vow as hetairoi."

"We swore you would be safe. We will do what we must," whispered Einoë.

After that, they were given charge of the door to our suites. If I could trust nothing else, I could trust the honor of the amazon. That would last beyond death.

***

I returned to the impulse I had before the assassins attacked and sent an enchanted bird to Belazei. I was running through hours and days I did not have but I thought that if anyone could bring salvation it would be she.

I met my eldest daughter at Uraraoi not a month after Mar-Urukh delivered his warning. She emerged from the water of the bay, striding up to the seawall to meet me. It had been many years since we had seen one another, but for a wizard and a nereid, it was but an instant. I wrapped her in an affectionate hug and kissed her slick forehead.

"Father, you look well," she said, speaking Abbih.

I smiled, pleased that she remembered our household's language. "My beautiful daughter, I have missed you. Here, while we're on land." I handed over the meager clothing she used to wear during her years in Castellandria. She donned it without protest.

I chose to meet her this far from the bustle of the bay specifically to avoid too much attention. I was the Tyrant and I journeyed on the back of a massive feathered serpent. Still, I wanted my reunion to be as private as I could manage. A few curious onlookers watched us from shore, though they kept their distance.

"Are my brothers and sisters here? Threch? Arkohnus? Little Faustan or the twins?"

I sighed. "Threch and Arkohnus have died. Faustan and Abilyth are far away."

"Oh," she said. "You are lonely. I should visit you more."

"You should, but I did not call you for that." I explained my situation. "Could your mother or your sisters do something?"

"Not for what you describe. We have power, but not that kind of power."

"That is not what I wanted to hear," I said, chuckling in my despair. I consoled myself with the presence of my daughter. "I am pleased to see you. Would you care to come to the capital? It's on the shore of a lake I'm told is depthless. It could be fun to explore."

"I would like that. I miss...I miss my other mothers."

"They miss you too. They speak of you often, especially Zhahllaia."

She flushed, her gills momentarily visible through the slits on her neck. The djinn often hid her approval, and so attaining it was all the more precious. "Is that Quiyahui?"

The coatl fluttered over the bay, dancing in the wind like an iridescent pennon. "She has grown, has she not?"

"Like a sea serpent." Her eyes, already huge, widened as a memory surfaced. "Father! I saw a beast I wanted to tell you of."

"Oh?"

"In the Lapis! A creature of incredible size. It reminded me of the tale you told of your exile. The city of bones."

"Mu-Baoth, perhaps. I heard that beast still lived."

"It was covered in lightning like one of your stormwights. I was coming here to tell you of it when your bird found me."

"It was?" I frowned, falling into thought. I could not feel the leviathan. I could always feel the others. The Deadwall was a constant susurrus just out of my conscious understanding. Diotenah, whatever remained of her in the ring, was pleased at its size and purred whenever it grew. Einoë and Kallea were present as well. I sensed their rudimentary minds standing watch over my brides. An idea occurred to me. A mad idea. "We are not going to the capital yet, Belazei. First, we're going to the Lapis."

***

We flew upon Quiyahui's back, crossing Aucor, finding the northern coast and following that to the Lapis. Quiyahui was a creature of the sky and with my enchantments, travel was swift. I did not like to move this way, announcing my location for all to see, but these were desperate times. News of my absence would spread and the Heacharids would hurl another attack at Irommotte. I could not stop it. I could only hope Lysethe and the others could cast the horde back.

We skirted the edges of the Golden Sea, finding the Heacharid settlements with their antlike hordes of men. We passed over a Sabbatium, though not the Sabbatium where the armies sent against us would mass. Sabbatius was the man who carved out the Heacharid Empire centuries ago and in a display of Heacharid modesty, named at least twenty cities for himself. This one was a hamlet on the edge of a river that emptied into the Turquoise.

Then we were along the coast. Fishing villages and trade hubs dotted the northern border of Heacharid expanse. It was my duty to ensure that it stayed that way. The first night we landed upon an island. Quiyahui, unused to bearing two passengers, was exhausted. Belazei dove into the Turquoise, returning with a bounty of fish. The three of us ate well, though I remained troubled.

We passed Axichis on the sixth day. My heart ached. We did not get close enough to see what the Heacharids had done to its pastoral beauty, but the islands were diminished in my heart. My attention lingered on the coast of Melisis where Naeri's Revenge had sunk and I had slain my hetairoi. I once again swore vengeance on the Heacharids. My war could not fail. Someone had to stop them.

The Heavenfall loomed before us on the ninth day. The sight of the block filled me with uneasy curiosity. I would not leave it unexplored forever. We passed close enough to see the outlines of the creatures who flew over the lush jungle crowning the rock. I had seen creatures like this before, in Ul Adrax, and they bore some resemblance to pharcyl. The Heavenfall would keep its secrets for some time yet.

Then we were over the Lapis. Quiyahui was past exhaustion. I felt it through the connection between wizard and familiar. Her aches filled me. I longed to give her rest, but we had no time for such things. Belazei helped by spending most of her time in the waves. She was slower than we, and had to make up the difference when we rested on some lonely spit of rock for the night.

The Lapis Ocean had not the Azure's breadth, but it was deep. Its name came from its color, stained by the abyssal reaches of the floor. Belazei spoke about it often. She appreciated the beauty of its trenches, though some of its deeper denizens disturbed her.

Quiyahui dipped low over the waves, undulating through the sky as we hunted. The ring encircling my finger whispered to me. Now I had to listen, for only one long dead could guide me. I closed my eyes, focusing on the whispers that lingered perpetually at the corners of my awareness.

I opened my eyes and I was elsewhere, in an endless field of black. I had gotten fleeting glimpses of this place from time to time, most often when I was deep in the slaughter. When my storms struck down Heacharids by the legion and the ring pulled them to their parody of life I found myself in this blasted place. This time, I had nothing linking me but my will.

Inky shapes danced everywhere, but I could not tell if these were trees lashed by phantom wind or water surging in the midst of a storm. I knew only that I stood, alone in this place, and I was not alone. A pull came from below, dank and clinging, meaty like the grave. A gentle tug wanted me in the untouched sky, where wind and rain would anoint and cleanse.

A hand emerged from the roiling ground as though pushed up from the grave. The black clung to it, but as it pulled free, it left no mark, revealing smooth pale gray flesh. Black claws tipped the hand's spidery fingers. The hand pushed against the swirling ground, and now a slender arm, then a bald head adorned with an antlered crown emerged. The figure rose, revealing an identity I knew.

Diotenah the Shadow's Daughter stood before me, beautiful and terrible. A ghoul, she bore the markers of her race with her hairless, pale gray flesh, her black-in-black eyes, her sharp teeth, pointed ears, and black claws. She had the slender form of a dancer, and she was nude, save only for her horned crown. She bared her silver teeth and cocked her head, invitation in the liquid black of her eyes.

"Father?" Belazei's voice was distant and muddy.

"We are close," I murmured. My voice was far away too as I communicated across the veil. I felt my body outside of myself. My daughter had been holding me about my waist, and I felt her let go, and her weight vanish from Quiyahui.

As Diotenah approached, I felt a cool hand take my own. I turned to find Quiyahui clad in her human form. She was diminutive, her features like those of the people native to the Ocaital. Her flesh was smooth and white blue, and soft feathers of iridescent white grew from her head and between her legs. She looked to me with love and concern. I held onto her, her touch cool like air carrying the promise of rain. She would keep me from being pulled down into corruption.

Diotenah touched the side of my face, caressing me once, her claws running over my flesh, then she turned my head. On the horizon behind me was an army. Lightning played over their gaunt forms. I felt them in the quivering of my body, waiting to be unleashed. This was the Deadwall, my horde of stormwights defending my adopted home.

Diotenah stepped to me, erasing the last few inches between us. Her flesh was cool, her razored teeth a breath from my throat. Quiyahui turned as well, wrapping her other arm about me. She was as strong as the coils of a massive serpent, but gentle.

Ahead, over Diotenah's shoulder, a massive shape rose. Indistinct in the clinging black smoke of this place, but undeniable in its reality, and gargantuan in proportions. Diotenah kissed me, her silver teeth gently slicing into my lip. Blood flowed between us. I gripped her hairless body, ready to lose myself to the seduction of her lissome form. My hands found the small of her back and pressed her to me. She uttered a contented hiss.

Quiyahui turned my head, her lips finding mine. Her kiss was cool, salving the sweet pain Diotenah had given. We parted, her eyes clear and blue as the storm. I saw in her the sky, an impossible blue so far above this place.

Diotenah's claws stroked my length, lightly enough that she did not draw blood. It was only then that I realized I was nude. She spread her legs, easing me inside, taking me deep. She leapt up on me, wrapping her slender legs over my hips, holding herself with her supple strength. She pulled my face to hers, and in her black eyes, I saw the shape once again, surfacing from the black. She filled my senses, from the cool embrace of her sex to the faint miasma of decay that she wore as a cloak.

Quiyahui held me closely, her body pressed to mine. Her nipples, hard like pebbles, the downy feathers between her legs caressed my back. She rocked her hips forward, pushing me into Diotenah as her lips found my neck. She encouraged this coupling, but it would be on her terms. She was the pure wind of the storm, the kiss of love. Her scent was as bright as unshed lightning.

Diotenah's orchid was hungry. Her muscles milked me. With every bolt of sensation, my eyes cleared. The creature beyond the necromancer was closer. Dimly I understood the exhausted Quiyahui was moving through the sky, following the knowledge I took from Diotenah's touch.

I found myself losing control, my thrusts harder into Diotenah's lithe body. Then, at the moment when I felt myself ready to spill into her poisoned womb, a bright point of pain flared between my legs. I could not see from the vantage, for I was buried in her, her insides still churning. I noticed then she reached between her legs from behind and I knew then that her claw pushed a hot divot where coin purse met staff, keeping me from spilling.

I stayed poised, but she did not stop. She continued to move against me. The sensation, combined with the point of pain, sharpened me. The great shape cleared. I knew now what I saw.

It was a leviathan with a mouth as big as the world. A webbed fin ran over its back, but my attention was a prisoner of the maelstrom of its maw with is tree-sized teeth. Lightning played over the rotted surface of the beast. Wreckage of ships adorned its back, entangled there with nets and embedded in the mortified flesh. In the center, standing on a splintered deck beneath a tattered sail, I saw another figure, this one I knew well.

Jerrika Grendel, her body wreathed in lightning, stood as though on the deck of a ship. She had taken me from Axichis but partway across the Lapis Ocean, we had been attacked the very beast upon whose back she now stood. Mu-Baoth, the leviathan of the Lapis, the legendary predator of ships had chosen us as its next meal. Now the creature was her steed. Lightning struck from her to the beast and back again, uniting them in the same storm.

My eyes snapped open and I was in the sunlight, the wind in my face. My belly ached from my bliss denied. Quiyahui responded to the knowledge that now spurred me and moved south and west. I recognized this place from my time with Jerrika. We were over a current that spanned the deepest part of the ocean and made for one of the easier ways from the eastern coast of Uazica to the west coast of Aucor.

An island appeared on the horizon in the midst of the deepest ocean on Thür, a leaden storm massed over and about it. Lightning stalked over its surface. Diotenah's whispers drew me and her claw pressed into the base of my staff, her presence pulling itself into this waking world. The ache radiated from my belly through my body, begging for relief.

The colossal beast pursued prey, a ship desperately sailing from its gaping maw. Once that had been The Burning Knave, Captain Grendel's own ship. I had been one of the terrified people on the deck, gazing at the awesome beast that sought to devour us. The storm roiled over the monster, lightning clawing beast and water.

A tiny figure stood on one of the broken decks atop the beast's back. It was Jerrika Grendel and her perch was the remains of The Burning Knave. Her old vessel continued past its death just as had its mistress. The deck was partly embedded in the mortified flesh of the creature, a mobile shipwreck, one among hundreds. Innumerable tattered flags and sails flapped in the stormy winds, evidence of Mu-Baoth's many victims. The ship below would be one more, perhaps to join them, or perhaps to merely be devoured.

I had no care for the vessel. The war had rendered me cold, but perhaps more importantly, I was at the end of a mortal span of days. I had become what Varanaya had warned me of. Wizards aged out of being human. To keep from becoming a monster, I have forced myself to engage with those whose lifespans seem like the blink of an eye, but this was early, before I had learned to cope with the cruelty of time.

I bade Quiyahui swoop low as I reached out through the wind. I sought the whispers that would unite me with these stormwights and give me the strings that would make them dance to my will. I knew such levers had to be there, for I had slain both of these, Jerrika and Mu-Baoth, and now they had returned as undead beasts. Only with focus, sharpened by the point of agony at the base of my staff did I hear the whispers. The voice was distorted, as though through a thick fog and I could not grasp it.

I opened my hand and lightning struck, leaving behind Ur-Anu, my spear. The godslayer hummed, eager to add another behemoth to its ledger. I raised the weapon as Quiyahui neared the leviathan. The air coming from the creature was a miasma of decay, a foul stench of rotting wood, of the salt sea, but also of storm and wind. Mu-Baoth's maw was so vast a storm rumbled within, lightning spanning its colossal mouth.

Finally, I could make out Jerrika's features. She was recognizable and I first I thought the decay visited upon my stormwights had somehow passed her by. She had been beautiful in life, with a golden complexion dusted with freckles, a mass of curly red hair, and warn brown eyes. Her features were mischievous and I remembered her sensual lips with particular relish. She'd had a figure that longed for softness, with her full breasts and hips, but hardened by a life at sea. She had dressed in breeches, a loose blouse and jacket, and had always gone barefoot so that the tattoo of the sea serpent wrapped about her right ankle was displayed.

Death had undeniably changed Jerrika. Her entire form, now gaunt with death, glowed with a green goblin light. Her flesh was pale green even beneath the glow, her eyes a deeper shade of the same color, the light strong in them. Where the lightning passed over her, her body rippled like the tide of the ocean. In its wake, I saw her skeleton, encrusted with sea life, evidence of her long death.

"I know you," she hissed, the lightning crawling over her face, rendering half of her lovely countenance a grinning skull. At turns, in her expression I saw confusion, rage, and the ghost of affection.

I reached for her, through the whispers that would command her to my bidding. I might as well have tried to grab water.

Mu-Baoth lunged, its massive bottom jaw coming free of the water and unleashing a wave that hurled its quarry forward. Quiyahui, though weary, danced out of the way, climbing. Her exhaustion and my weight meant she would not be able to evade for long. I leapt from her back, murmuring a spell. Clouds gathered below me, tentacles of storm reaching across the endless broken decks. Now I stood upon a kraken made of pregnant clouds booming with the pure blue-white of storm.

"Jerrika Grendel!" I called to her. "You know me!"

Below, the ship fought is way from the shadow of the perpetual storm wreathing the massive stormwight, riding the waves of Mu-Baoth's thrashing. I could not grasp Jerrika, but perhaps I could take the leviathan. I reached for the great beast, but once again found control impossible to seize. This time, though, I gripped the reins of power but they were washed from my hand by a malign will. It was not hard to divine whose.

I leapt from the stormcloud to land on the deck before Jerrika. I felt the link between her and the god beneath her, feeding one another, making them powerful. I saw patterns there, worn in her life but grown deeper in death. They were trapped in this place.

Suddenly I was upon Naeri's Revenge the deck pitching in the battle against the Heacharids. Salt wind and rain lashed my face and thunder pounded my mind. Einoë and Kallea begged me to slay them that they might serve their purpose unto death.

No. The way the deck tilted, the contours of the scents, the barnacles beneath my feet...my senses returned to me. The creature's stench was undeniable, but it was a bizarre mélange, melding filthy decay with salt wind. Lightning struck and danced over the surface of the monster. I was not there, trapped in that awful moment. I was atop an undead leviathan about to do battle with the ghostly form of a former paramour.

Jerrika drew a cutlass from a scabbard crusted with barnacles. The gaps in the rusty blade had been filled by the same glowing green that covered her.

"Hold," I said. "We were friends once."

Lightning writhed over her eyes, turning them into the empty pits of a skull. She attacked. I sensed her trapped as a wagon in mud. Until he was pulled free, she could only be what she was. Her attack was swift enough that she might have overwhelmed me were it not for my time in exile. My years in the jungles of Uazica and wasteland of Kharsoom were many years off, but such things never truly left, especially as I had recently sharpened my spear on the bones of many a Heacharid.

I caught a swing of her blade on the bone-white wood of Ur-Anu's haft, deflecting the stroke. Crazily, I noted that the wood now had a sculpted representation of me battling Jerrika on the back of the monster. Skyfire lanced down, touching Ur-Anu's obsidian blade while we remained locked. The veins shot through the black glass glowed brightly. The whispers that led to her will were solid then. I gripped them, but they melted away as she backed off for another swing.

I knew then that I could strike her down. She had been my creation. The misery she had unleashed upon the Lapis was my doing. I had not truly known of my culpability until this moment, but I could correct it. A stroke of Ur-Anu would end her permanently. The threads it sent to me, describing the next moments in time rendered the perfect map.

I let her back me over the deck. She was not soulless like most wights. She had direction, and in direction there was emotion. She hated me for something, but the green glow of the lightning dancing over her form could not tell me why. Yes, the misery was my doing, but did I truly mean to execute one who had never been anything but a friend?

I knew then what I would do. I waited for her to overextend herself and I caught the hilt of her weapon. With a spin, I cast her blade aside where it clattered over the deck. The sword melted into glowing green sludge that surged for us, desperate to return to its mistress.

Lightning flashed and Ur-Anu was gone. I had my hands on her, grappling her to the deck. She struggled beneath me, her teeth bared. For a moment, she snapped with a skinless jaw. My storm found her, wrapping about her legs, and yanking her trousers from her. My robes opened and I found myself painfully hard. It was not merely the memory of her, but her new state, the beauty of her death, drove me. And there was the fact that my bliss had built in me and was a great ache permeating every part, centered on the single point of pain that somehow Diotenah maintained.

I pushed my knee up, roughly spreading her legs. I kept hold of her wrists even as the slime that had once been her cutlass reached them and flowed into her palm. The blade began to reform, but she had no way to swing it.

I thrust, burying myself into her. Her expression changed. What had been mad rage softened, her brow furrowing. Her body was cold, but it was not dead. I felt her moving about me, a delirious slickness to her that caressed and welcomed the intrusion. For a moment we remained thus, united. I thought of the many times we had lain together in her hammock, now doing the same on the broken and heaving deck of this bizarre shipwreck.

Then the evil fell over her face and her skull snapped again, her ghostly green flesh reasserting after the lightning passed. Diotenah whispered in my mind. She could not make words, that part of her was gone, but I felt her will. She spurred me, demanded I take this stormwight.

I needed no encouragement. The ghoul's lingering soul had teased me to heights and I needed relief. My strokes were brutal, little more than hammering into the writhing undead mariner. Every time I buried myself into her, she moved more with me. Soon, her hips were rocking to meet mine, even as she tried to free her sword arm or sink her teeth into my neck.

Then, suddenly, the pain was gone. Diotenah had removed her phantom finger. All at once the bliss boiled from me, and I emptied myself into Jerrika with great, wracking shudders. For a moment, my vision was gone, so held was I by the incomparable ecstasy of this delayed bliss. I thought I would never finish filling her as gout after gout of hot seed flooded her body.

I opened my eyes and found myself looking into hers. The green was subtler. Life stared back at me. "Ashuz?" she murmured.

"Jerrika." I leaned down, not hesitating, and kissed her. She responded, her cold tongue sliding past my lips.

"Ashuz," she purred. The sword turned once again into the slime. I released her wrists, and she touched my face. "I know you."

"You know me, though my name is Belromanazar."

"No," she said. "You are Ashuz." She kissed me again, this time harder. I had not pulled myself from her, but I was softening.

"What do you remember?" I asked between her kisses.

"It is like a dream, but I know you. I saw you, even when I was asleep."

Now I touched her face. Where my fingers passed, lightning, and then bone followed. She was frightening but I found I craved her strange beauty. "That is good."

"I need..." she murmured, her brow furrowing. Then with sudden strength, she rolled me onto my back and pulled herself from me. Her remaining clothing fell from her, becoming more of this glowing slime. It retreated, wobbling nearby. More of this leaked from her sex, reaching for me. I saw none of my seed, as though her body had consumed it.

She knelt between my legs, taking my staff in hand, licking what little still clung to me. I remembered her technique well from our time together on The Burning Knave and death had not robbed her of it. She spat once, a glob of the glowing slime, and massaged it into my swiftly hardening staff.

Only when I was coated did she take me in her mouth. As she had done so many years before, she drooled copiously over me, sloshing the glowing liquid about me. I was treated to the lewd sight of this phantom, her bee-stung lips straining to take my thick staff, with rivulets of glowing green falling down me to bead in my hair.

Experimentally, I thrust against her, and she took me without hesitation. She bobbed her head eagerly, her ghostly spit and active tongue washing over my body. Though I had finished not long ago, it did not take much to stoke a second bliss. I cried out, arching my back as I filled her once again.

She swallowed greedily, licking what remained as though it were the most delicious meal. When she looked up, she was far more solid, and the lightning that played over her gave only the impression of death. She licked her lips. Her undead beauty was breathtaking. Quiyahui alighted upon a mast above us.

"Where were you?" she asked.

"Forgive me. I did not know what I had done. I heard rumors, but I dismissed them. I know now that I should not have."

"You have not come to slay me?"

"No, Jerrika. I thought to command you, but I see how that you are not one to be commanded. You are a typhoon."

She smiled languidly. "I am."

"I had a favor to ask of you."

She cocked her head. She gently toyed with my staff, testing me. I could not stop the swelling. "Ask."

I explained what I wished of her, of the desperate straits I had found myself in. She considered, coaxing me to hardness all the while.

"For a price," she said. "Your sex has brought me to a place I had forgotten. You will fuck me, keep me in this place."

"Happily," I said. "You will be my concubine."

A grin spread over her face. "These terms are acceptable. Now I will take you once more."

"Jerrika," I protested.

A strange expression rippled over her face, a memory she groped for. "You still have a hole to claim."

I could not refuse her, not after she invoked our time together. When she sat down upon me, I knew it would not be the last time.

***

Quiyahui, Belazei, and I stayed upon the back of Mu-Baoth for two weeks, allowing Quiyahui to recover her strength. As much as she rested, I was a happy slave to Jerrika's desires. By the time we departed, I was the one who was exhausted, my staff raw. I kissed Jerrika once and left her.

Quiyahui bore Belazei and me home to Zuunkhorun. When we returned, Quiyahui rested, unwilling to leave her favorite trees in the palace garden for a month. During this time, I found myself wishing I had someone to pray to. Velena would talk of the Ghess'tagh, the spirit of the Nachtwood to which she was dedicated. That had been my closest exposure to religion, as I had not yet met my beloved Ten Ghosts.

Jerrika was months behind the Heacharid fleet. I knew Mu-Baoth was faster than those ships, but swift enough to overtake the fleet? I could not know. I could only prepare.

I sent Lysethe and the two wizards we'd trained to the Arkohnum Gate. Tartu was a Jegu man from a noble family while Amala was low-born and predominantly of Besh extraction. They were a good symbol of the unity of Zuunkhorun and had become excellent war-wizards. They would have to hold the west.

I took Tanyth and Deimara. My daughter would assist me with her magic. My wife would be the symbol of hope Uraraoi would no doubt need.

We prepared defenses. The simplest were the mundane, and we ensured they were ready. Nothing could repel the fleet Mar-Urukh had described, but we could perhaps make Uraraoi too costly a prize. The outer seawall and edges of the bay were dotted with forts, manned with ballistae and archers. We replenished their supplies of dragonseed and fire arrows.

We armed every ship we could find and I sent summons to every pirate I had given marque. We had their ships repaired and armed, and readied them to get free of the bay at first sign of the Heacharids. Once the enemy had committed, I wanted the defenders to crash upon a flank, much as we had in the Wooden Bay so long ago.

Lastly, Deimara and I prepared our spells. We readied innumerable enchantments, which could be focused with a word. The Deadwall did not extend to this place and I felt its absence now. I would not draw the stormwights away from Ironmotte or the passes. Defending Uraraoi would be meaningless if I lost them.

We could prepare, but the stark truth was that everything hinged upon Jerrika Grendel and Mu-Baoth.

We waited for an eternity, anxiously scanning the horizon for the Heacharid fleet. Each day I was filled with dread that I would see them. I felt no relief when I did not. They finally arrived on a summer morning, not long after Mar-Urukh predicted they would. The watchtowers spotted them the instant the sun rose over the Azure. Bells rang and fires were lit and every defender rushed to their place.

The Zuunkhorunia's description of the battle is as accurate as I can remember, and in fact contains many details of which I was unaware. Its author, Orbei, tracked every single ship, every ballista. I leave the logistics of the battle in Orbei's capable hands. I will hold myself to what I saw, what I experienced.

My heart sank as the Heacharid ships closed in. I knew that all of our preparation had been mere theater. Just as with Axichis, nothing could truly stop the Heacharids once their eye was fixed upon a prize. I could only fill graves that day. I resolved to fill more than anyone ever had. I would annihilate a generation in this place.

The Heacharids made hard for the bay. Defenders filled the air with arrows, bolts, and fire. Heacharid vessels blazed, crashed, swamped. Our ships closed in from the north, destroying still more. My storm bloomed overhead, my lightning ripped over their decks, their sailors rose as murderous stormwights. Deimara's spells tripped as tentacles of inky night rose from the waves to rot their ships out from under them.

It was not enough.

Their numbers were endless. They would die in hordes if they needed to. They would walk across the water on the backs of their own dead. Heacharid sails blotted out the horizon. Their screams replaced the wind.

A terrible awe took me as the realization of our doom dawned upon me. A shape raised over them. At first I believed this to be my own mind breaking, showing me what could not be. But it kept raising. And at the top, a tiny shape stood at the base of a tattered flag.

Mu-Baoth's maw eclipsed the sky. Its teeth, like trees, bared in ravenous hunger. A cry went up, from the throats of Heacharid and Zuunese. It was a cry of terror, of knowing that the world was filled with sublime destruction.

Mu-Baoth's jaws closed and it reared up, wrecked ships and screaming sailors raining from its jaws. This was apocalyptic, an evil without equal. I had been its author.

A cloud bore me up, over the bay. I slew whatever Heacharid I could find. They rose and butchered their comrades, whose minds had been broken by the creature now devouring their fleet. It was carnage on a scale that no rational mind could truly comprehend. Few Heacharid ships survived, fleeing south to cross the Onyx Horn once again.

Wreckage filled the bay. Sharks and serpents cavorted, feasting on the dead. I sent the legion of stormwights created that red day overland to bolster the Deadwall. This became known by the Zuunese as the March of the Dead, a festival that was celebrated for centuries.

After its great meal, Mu-Baoth sank into the depths. Jerrika Grendel walked across the broken planks and floating bodies to the shore. She embraced me. I held her cold form.

"You have your savior," she said.

"And you have your charge." I kissed her cold lips. I had become death's own bridegroom.