Bloodcrete: Chapters 23-24 (The Weirkey Chronicles) (Patreon)

Straight into the chapters this week, I guess!

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Chapter 23

Thoughts passed through Theo's mind, clinically and distantly. After demons sacrificed a sufficient number of their own, the summoned demon was formed from their matter. During the time it took shape, it had physical presence but lacked its full characteristics, thus it was vulnerable. Second stage demons summoning a titan were no less durable than ordinary second stages, so the mass forming in the center of the titans wouldn't die easily. It was likely beyond his strength to kill in a single blow, so the wisest decision would be to force the Strongholds to act.

He didn't feel any of those thoughts. Instead he stared at the emerging demon and trembled.

Higher stage demons grew in size up to titans, but the mass of the six was flowing downward, as if it was all condensing into a smaller body. Current of air began to flow so intensely around it that all of the nearby dust was swept away, which made it all too easy to watch.

Even before he saw them, he knew what to expect: the new demon had massive curved horns. The tips of those horns had stabbed Eratius right through the chest. A demon just like the one he saw forming had burned Khaluu alive and slain Brigana and nearly killed him. It was coming for him again.

"Enough of this." The depths Fithan spoke from the edge of the battlefield and cantae flowed through the storm overhead. An unnatural bolt of purple lightning arced through the clouds and then slammed down through the emerging demon's chest.

It caught the bolt. As the demon raised its head, light resolving into a concrete form, Theo saw the fires begin to kindle in its maw.

Gray stone erupted from underneath the demon, spearing through its body. And yet it didn't let go of the bolt of cantae, and it opened its mouth. It was silent at first, then Theo almost heard the roar he remembered before a sphere of crimson dropped onto the demon. The lightning bolt finally broke free of its hands and the power of three Strongholds tore it apart before it could fully form.

Dust expanded in all directions from the smoking crater. Even those who couldn't see what had happened stood silent, because all three Strongholds on the battlefield had acted in concert.

And it almost hadn't been enough. Theo realized that his hands were trembling and he couldn't stop them.

None of the Strongholds acted again, and their silence reigned over the battlefield. Theo couldn't see the Asplundat Stronghold, but the depths Fithan looked disturbed, and Wiltur appeared frustrated. No doubt he hadn't wanted to act at all, but the extreme threat had forced his hand.

If they had been a little late, events might have gone very differently. Theo realized that Fiyu and her relative might have just prevented the worst outcome, yet very few would recognize that. With them floating overhead holding an unknown device, they would be a target for everyone. He needed to act to help them, and he wasn't sure if he could.

"Do you see now?" Guchiro spoke in the silence and raised the cylinder over his head. Theo realized that Fiyu was missing and theorized that she had hidden herself. "Both sides have been deceived."

"Give that to us." The Asplundat Stronghold's voice echoed over the battlefield. "If the Ruling Cities are truly guiltless in this matter, you will have no objections to us examining that artifact."

"You just want to take the evidence!" someone shouted from a minor House's defensive position.

"This is a distraction!" one of the Deepest Blue soulcrafters yelled. "The outsiders are the ones who planted that artifact!"

"All of you, calm down." Wiltur attempted to dominate the battlefield, but even his cantae couldn't contain the rising furor.

"Theo, are you alright?" Nauda appeared beside him and he almost jumped. She rubbed his back and pulled him closer to her. "I can't sense any cantae, but did something hit you?"

She assumed that he was under the effects of some attack, which was reasonable. It was stupid that he was stunned by something that was just inside his head, but Theo couldn't answer. After so many times reliving the memories of his friends dying to that demon, he had thought all the horror had been wrung from it, but now it felt like he had fallen into the chasms formed by that retreading.

A wall of cantae passed over them gently as Fiyu encompassed them with her sphere. "Theo?" She took a step closer, her senses sliding over him. "You do not need to be concerned. The demon is dead. We are here with you."

"I'm fine," Theo said gruffly. "That demon... it looked just like the one that tried to kill me before. Apparently I had some trauma that I needed to work through. I'll deal with it soon."

Fiyu frowned and Nauda squeezed his back. He didn't push either of them away.

Outside, the debate continued, all sides still burning cantae as if ready to resume the battle. The depths Fithan Stronghold left in disgust, condemning all sides, which would have been welcome before but now left the battlefield even more precarious. Guchiro set down the device on an empty plateau a roughly even distance from all sides and retreated, which was probably the wisest choice.

He headed toward their position, though Theo noted that even he didn't seem able to pinpoint Fiyu through her technique. Krikree was cleaning her antennae and searching for them as well. By the time Fiyu released her bubble of stealth, Theo had pulled himself together.

"I've never seen demons emerge that quickly," Nauda said. "Was the device that powerful?"

"Not alone," Guchiro said. "Demons are drawn to soulcrafters, and the presence of so many drew more through the cracks it opened. This is one of the reasons that higher tier soulcrafters hold back until their power is necessary."

Fiyu nodded in understanding. "Guchiro, was that one of the threats beyond Dominion that you're concerned about?"

"No, that was only a fourth stage humanoid demon. A fight between one of them and a Dominion is... difficult and uncertain. But you are familiar with the other breeds, I trust. The bestial demons are stronger even at the first stage, so their fourth stage is impossible for any Dominion to defeat."

He didn't say anything about fourth stage insectoid demons, but Theo had to assume that one would be an immense threat as well. Based on scattered clues, he thought that Fiyu might have had a traumatizing experience with one when she was younger, and thus her relative avoided mentioning it. For some reason Theo didn't think about, that helped him focus better.

"We need to get rid of it," he said to the group. "It would be best to destroy the device, but that would bring suspicion down on us. So we need to convince them to make a compromise that will prevent the battle from resuming."

"I don't know how easy that will be," Nauda said. "I think too many of the people left are basically looking for a reason to go to war."

"I was thinking we should suggest that it be placed in the custody of the local Fithans. The Asplundat Movement would have a hard time denying that, and disagreeing would make Wiltur look bad."

"That's a good idea. It just might work, if we-"

"It will never work."

Theo recognized Tythes by his voice, but when he turned he was surprised to see the Fithan half-breed striding out of what looked like a gate. The shock of seeing the demon had disrupted his senses, but he was fairly certain that there had been no mass there until that moment. Instead of an arch of stone, the gate looked like an unstable white rainbow. Tythes himself showed none of his usual flippancy.

"You think this is finished?" Tythes jabbed a thumb over his shoulder toward Wiltur. "My father wants that artifact, and he wants it bad. He has a new army, paid for with death, and he's going to use it any second. Then this will get much, much worse."

"Why are you here?" Nauda asked. "You want to recruit us into a plan to stop it?"

"Oh no, it's ideal for me if he goes through with it. This is my best chance to hurt him in years." Tythes raised two fingers sharply. "Two reasons. First, I want more people aware of what he's doing so that his plans fail. Second, I'm willing to bend my plans slightly, if they're compatible with yours."

The group glanced at one another. Fiyu and Guchiro clearly considered this offer too suspicious to countenance, and Nauda distrusted Tythes deeply. Theo wouldn't say that he trusted him either, but they needed to play this game if they were going to get any advantage from it.

"House Blacksilver is going to support the local Fithans as a neutral force," he said. Hopefully there was nothing Tythes could do to use that against them. "We want this to end with their survival so they can serve as a buffer zone between the two superpowers."

"That's all? Boring." Tythes shrugged and glanced over his shoulder. "Well, there it is. I'd better go get ready."

He stepped back through the gate and the entire thing vanished. Theo could only speculate that he must have accomplished it via another artifact he'd stolen from the Chasm of Lamentations. It had taken him a few years to master what he'd found there, but it seemed like he was prepared with secret weapons now.

"That was Slest," Nauda said quietly. Theo realized that she was right, but he had been too focused on the politics to notice the other side of the gate. "I don't like this."

Near the central plateau, all sides had sent representatives to officially secure the demonic device. Theo saw Karchibol representing Blacksilver along with a Norro Yorthin Authority he vaguely recognized. The Asplundat Movement had sent Homez and one of their Authorities. Homez looked a bit battered, but hopefully he would be able to prevent the negotiations from getting out of hand.

Then the Asplundat Authority's head fell from his shoulders. Everyone turned in shock as a nearly invisible being lowered its sword.

For just a split second, Theo thought that it was one of the wild tribes soulcrafters. But though the body was muscular and wore various furs, he immediately knew that something was wrong. When the man - if it was a man - smiled, his jaws opened a little too wide and something glinted within. Fiyu looked even more horrified, and Guchiro spoke in a low voice.

"It's a Deuxan fleshmasker. This is a false flag operation."

Though far from the first time Theo had encountered something new in the Nine Worlds, this arrival troubled him. He had never even heard of fleshmaskers before that moment. Knowing that there were countless places he'd never traveled was one thing - being blindsided by an army like this was quite another.  Theo wondered just how much of the Nine Worlds had been hidden from him and what it held in store before he realized those were the wrong questions.

Was this Wiltur's hidden army? Theo got his answer as more soulcrafters emerged from the stone all around the plateaus. Every single one of them had an unnatural soulhome and wore the skin of a Fithan wild tribes member. No other Authorities that Theo could sense, but there were a lot of them, and they had all crept around the central plateau.

The surprise made all sides hesitate for a time, but violence was inevitable. When it came, it came in a form Theo didn't expect: the blue-banded Authority from the Deepest Blue flew through the negotiators, grabbing the demonic cylinder as he went.

He nearly got past the group, but the twisted new Authority reached out, and his arm seemed to stretch, like it was just a rubber suit. The end grabbed his leg, a rope of twisted flesh instead of fingers, and slammed him to the ground. That impact triggered every other force on the battlefield and the center erupted into chaos.

Theo's allies all moved to help, but Theo hesitated a moment longer. Not in shock, but because he saw something else: there was another Stronghold rising on the battlefield, wearing a mask of flesh.

-

Chapter 24

Even though Fiyu had been extending her senses and preparing for the battle, she didn't even sense the arrival. The enemy rose with a terrible silvery cantae that slipped past her until it was almost too late. By the time Fiyu realized what was happening, a silver whip had cut a swath through the battlefield and another was slicing toward her.

Faster than she could react, Relative Guchiro enclosed her and her companions in a sphere of darkness and launched them backward. She reached her senses out toward him, feeling as he exerted all his power to deflect the whip, but no matter how hard she clung, they flew out of range.

When they struck another plateau, the sphere evaporated. She told herself that it was only because the technique was finished and still desperately looked for her relative. If he had thrown them backwards, that meant he wasn't confident that he could defend them. She didn't expect him to be able to fight a Stronghold, but the fact that he had pushed her away scared her.

There was no time for fear. Striving to be the adult her relative believed she was, Fiyu confirmed that all her companions were uninjured and enclosed them within her stealth technique. Friend Theo was attempting to use his senses to sort through the battle, but he would require assistance.

As she examined the plateaus around them as much as possible, Fiyu brushed over more of the new arrivals and shivered in revulsion. Each of them felt like an ordinary body, surrounded by a viscous layer of cantae with a layer of skin on top. The technique was largely spiritual, but where it overlapped with the physical it gave the sense of a person crawling within another's skin. She couldn't imagine what kind of soulhome could do such a thing, or who would even imagine it.

"So that's Wiltur's secret army," Friend Nauda said. "That's repulsive."

"Bad!" Associate Krikree agreed.

"But if he was planning to work together with them, he wouldn't have summoned them now. What were they supposed to do? Steal the artifact and then run away?"

"I believe he will pretend to fight them," Fiyu said. "Then he can be the person who won the battle, but he can collect the artifact from them later. Tythes said that was what he wanted most."

"How did he pay them? There aren't any Stronghold mercenaries anywhere, as far as I know. Clearly they've been given wild tribes bodies, but is that really payment enough? We're missing something here."

"There's something even bigger," Friend Theo said. "There aren't any good gates between Deuxan and this part of the continent - trust me, I checked after Esaire fought me. I also don't think anyone in Norro Yorthin has a Deuxan weirkey."

That was indeed a troubling thought: House Crimson was powerful within one region, but this spoke of power on a much larger scale. Fiyu bit her lower lip as she considered the possibilities. Her own relative had apparently worked with others across worlds, so it stood to reason that there might be other organizations with more sinister motives...

"Fight!" Associate Krikree said, pointing a spear out toward the battle.

"We see it," Friend Nauda snapped. The Slescan immediately dropped to the ground prostrate, her body trembling.

Friend Theo knelt beside Associate Krikree and rubbed her head in a way that made her spine loosen slightly. "She's saying that we need to take action, or it will be too late. Everybody was already tired, and this new army is potent."

"Should we move now? Tythes said he was going to start something, though he's done precious little..."

Even as Friend Nauda spoke, however, Fiyu was sensing a substantial change in the battlefield. She couldn't feel the gate opening, but she identified it when numerous shapes began to flow through. Slescans. A massive force of army ants, rapidly swarming out of the gate and attacking the Deuxan army. No... it seemed they were attacking anyone in their path.

"That can't last," Friend Nauda said, but it didn't sound like she believed it. "Slescans like that can't survive here, so they should start crumpling... but they're not."

"It's a safe assumption that Tythes had a plan for that too." Friend Theo examined the battle with a cool gaze. "So he's brought an army to counter his father's. We don't know what either is going for in the end, but that part makes sense."

The others seemed happy to presume the reasons, but Fiyu stretched her senses further. Something flickered in the mass, and she would have missed it if her senses hadn't merged with her body in her Corporeal Floor. She could just make out a figure moving among the Slescans: it felt like a humanoid figure wrapped in gauze, so she presumed it was Unknown Tythes. There seemed to be a cloak of cantae flowing around the Slescan army, very subtle but definitely present.

"So that's what he's doing." Friend Nauda folded her arms and frowned at the battle. "Do we attack Wiltur's army, then? If Tythes has that under control, and the Asplundat Movement can be convinced to stand down, then Wiltur is the only one pushing the battle on."

"I am not sure that is wise." Fiyu bowed in apology to Friend Nauda, but she continued sharing her thoughts. "That army is large and includes a Stronghold. It also may intend to leave. I believe it would be better for us to locate the artifact. We can have more impact on it than on the battle overall."

Friend Nauda looked at her with a deeper frown, but didn't argue further. Both of them glanced toward Theo, but he only shook his head. "We don't know enough. The Order of the Deepest Blue is a wildcard too, and they might already have run away with the device. It could be essential, or we could be chasing nothing."

"Come on, Theo," Friend Nauda said, "we need someone to break the tie."

"Fiyu-queen good! Nauda-queen bad!"

"Oh, now you stand up to queens?"

Associate Krikree retreated to the other side of Friend Theo's body and brandished her weapons defensively.

"Doing nothing is definitely the worst choice." Friend Theo turned to face the group, and the trembling in his secondary muscles had entirely vanished. "We push closer under Fiyu's stealth, then we split up and avoid attention. Nauda, you find Tythes and argue with him until he stops causing so much collateral damage. Fiyu, you can most easily slip around the fighting, so confirm whether the Order stole the device. Krikree... do you want t-"

"Ivo-sister!"

"Alright, Krikree and I will go to the Blacksilver defenses in case the device was returned. If you see a way to improve things, take it, but I don't think this battle is getting stopped with an easy discussion. The best we can do might be preventing the worst in the aftermath."

It was a sad conclusion, but Fiyu believed that Friend Theo was correct. She strengthened her stealth around her companions and led them into the chaos.

~ ~ ~

Nauda wished that everyone would have agreed with her plan, and she would have preferred to stay hidden within Fiyu's sphere, but she couldn't counter their arguments. With all the best actions seeming likely to fail, they needed to test for what was even possible.

Along the way, she forced herself to take a closer look at the "fleshmaskers" who had arrived. Through her telescope, their soulhomes appeared to be built partially from flesh. They used sublime stones and metals, but fibrous tissue connected them, and some of the walls throbbed as she watched. All of that was repulsive enough, but what troubled her more were their shielding walls. None contained any trace of living materials, and she strongly suspected that if they wanted, they could pass as real Fithans. This attack was designed to horrify, not deceive.

As soon as their group split up, Nauda began sprinting across the top of the plateau. She couldn't fight many of the soulcrafters in the battle, so speed was her best defense. Fiyu had said that Tythes was staying in the center of his Slescan army, which meant Nauda could guess his position. Most likely he was using the stone sphere artifact that he had used on Slest to hide himself.

When she got near the ants, they immediately tried to swarm her. Nauda could have fought her way through, but they might technically be allies against the much worse Deuxan fleshmaskers, so instead she gathered herself. With her bondsfungi hardening her skin, she charged directly through the group, knocking them in all directions. A few jaws scraped off her skin, but none of them managed to draw blood.

Once she got close enough, the barrier around Tythes failed and she could see him: calmly walking among the ant army, a dark blue sphere raised over his head. He used it to wave cheerfully at her and the cantae over the battlefield shifted wildly.

"Nauda! How do you like my bugs?"

"Is this why you seduced Queen Yeshir?" she asked. As she got within a few steps of him, the ants all disengaged and continued rushing toward the other armies. "Did you know that she eats the meat of intelligent humans?"

"Oh, she definitely does, if you know what I... wait, that one actually works. She really strips the bone clean, if... actually, that one could make sense too." Tythes sighed theatrically. "I'm cursed with a gift for tantalizing innuendo."

While he played at being a fool, the ants he had led into Fithe swarmed over a woman and tore her apart. Nauda almost leapt to act, but it was one of the fleshmaskers. No one deserved to die that way, but she wouldn't risk herself for someone who wore human skin to work with Wiltur. She had to admit that Tythes had placed his gate very effectively so that his ants primarily attacked the new fleshmasker army instead of all the others.

"You said that you were willing to work with us." Nauda jabbed Tythes in the chest. "Just what is all this? Do you know how many will die before they're done?"

"Oh, quite a few. To return to the question you carelessly abandoned earlier, these actually aren't Yeshir's soldiers. They were stolen from one of her enemy hives."

"What? How did you manage that?"

"I promised them the flesh of all the humans living in this region."

Nauda stared, wondering if it could be a sick joke, but Tythes only grinned.

"I know, it's really quite troubling how the Slescans have such a limited understanding of commerce." All at once his smile vanished. "I'm sorry, Nauda. But this is too important for your moral concerns."

Before she could react, Tythes flipped a hand upward and Nauda was struck by a wave of cantae. She braced herself, and the bondsfungi deflected it, but she realized when her feet left the ground that it had never been intended to harm her. It only launched her into the air, sending her sailing high over the battlefield where Deuxan and Slescan flesh-eaters tore into one another.

Her arc would have taken her to one of the few less occupied plateaus, but in midair she passed an Asplundat Authority. A jagged piece of stone flew toward her and Nauda barely raised her staff in time to meet it. Even with her full binding technique, her momentum was wrenched to the side and she went tumbling over the stone.

Nauda sailed through the upper part of the dust storm and smacked into the side of another plateau. She managed to get a grip with her other hand and levered herself upward. It took more out of her than it should have, since the blows had shaken her, but there was no one attacking her. In fact, it seemed like the battlefield had grown quieter.

Overhead, the Strongholds were emitting enormous amounts of cantae. The fleshmasker was lashing his silver whip into the stone sphere of the Asplundat soulcrafter, and even if she wasn't inside it, the sphere seemed to be sagging like her strength was running out.

Just then Wiltur attacked from behind with a blinding show of light. It produced a cantae shockwave that blew back Nauda's hair, but she had a feeling that it hadn't actually done much damage. She saw the Deuxan Stronghold fly backward, apparently unharmed, and then he pulled out a weirkey and vanished.

"The enemy has fallen!" Wiltur boomed over the battlefield. "Come, let us finish the others!"

All theater. Nauda wasn't sure if the lower ranked fleshmaskers had ways to escape or if they were being sacrificed, but there were still plenty of them fighting for their lives. She thought it looked like those in the north were slipping away, while those attacked by Tythes seemed to be pinned down.

Then it had all gone close enough to Wiltur's plan. He floated over the battlefield, grandly generating another sphere of crimson cantae. Until that moment, she hadn't seen any similarity between the man and his son, but they both had a flair for the theatric. Now Wiltur could be seen as the hero of the battle, strike a blow to his enemies, and possibly still end up with the demonic artifact in secret.

The earth quaked and a fist broke through the stone of a nearby plateau: larger than the hand of a titan and formed of blood red stone.

Nauda and half the battlefield stared in shock as a golem taller than the plateaus emerged. Every surface of its body bled a thick liquid that felt potent even from a distance. After Theo had told her about the bloodcrete, she had assumed that he had interrupted the Asplundat plan to hide it in the Dustwind Plateaus. Apparently they had more of it than anyone had predicted.

Even from a distance, Nauda thought she could see surprise in Wiltur's posture. He swiveled and released his crimson sphere against the golem... which easily batted it aside with one hand. The sphere sailed into the clouds, dimming to a red glow, and then exploded as bright as a second sun.

When the golem leapt up to a plateau, the earth shook. It reached up, so tall that its fingers threatened to grasp Wiltur. He retaliated, and the burst of cantae sent red stones scattering across the battlefield.

As the fragments plummeted toward her, Nauda threw herself over the edge of her plateau. She struck the opposite side and skidded down, even as she watched the debris from the battle crashing into the opposite wall. The surface was going to be lethal for anyone without strong defenses soon, and she definitely couldn't do any more good up there.

Before Nauda could develop a new plan, she saw a man running past her in a House of Burning Leaves robe. Homez charged after him in full stone armor and gestured wildly at her. "Stop him!"

She hadn't intended to comply, but she automatically thrust her staff and bound the man in place. He seemed like a normal Archcrafter from Norro Yorthin, so she was technically fighting against her own side. Homez had sounded so urgent, however...

Suddenly the Fithan man's flesh twisted, and he slipped out of her binding. Nauda had a brief glimpse of a Deuxan face underneath, then the entire mass snapped together. That confirmed her theory that the fleshmaskers could hide themselves perfectly, and she had seen something even more important: he had been carrying the demonic artifact inside his flesh.

Nauda should have been glad to have run across him. But as she prepared to fight, all she could think was that Fiyu and Theo were charging into the most dangerous part of the battle for nothing.

-

I saw a fair amount of discussion of the new demon last week, but that had always been intended to be a tease, not a shift to the conflict that had been set up. Hopefully this still works. The moment when the story will come full circle and Theo will actually face the type of demon that killed him previously has yet to arrive.

Meanwhile, however, we have gotten to the bloodcrete golem! This is the first major "convergence" battle of the series, in which multiple established forces are at play, but the conflict is also important enough for brand new forces to arrive. I hope that as I continue the series and more corners of the Nine Worlds become fleshed out, these conflicts will become larger but also more narratively satisfying.