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I’m writing a billion things.
But I haven’t forgotten –
DEMON OF KNIVES
Three months ago.
She’s not dead.
Maybe.
Cari swims in and out of consciousness. Impressions: the heaving of a ship at sea, unfamiliar voices. Darkness, then light, then darkness. Someone pulling at her skin, then a scraping sensation. Then dreams, horrible dreams, of voices calling to her in the night, titanic figures of black iron hunched over burning cities, the most fucked-up giant demon anteaters imaginable, hungry black tongues licking up a billion billion souls and she’s that tongue and –
SISTER/MOTHER/PRIESTESS/HERALD/CARILLON
Waking to soft sheets, soft pillows. To sunlight streaming through an open window, a gentle sea-breeze, waves lapping on a nearby shore. A house of cedar and golden curtains, of porcelain and glass. On one wall hangs a large frame, a mirror or painting, shrouded by a grey cloth. By the bedside, jars of medicine.
A woman leans over Cari, gently dabbing a soft towel against her brow. Cari’s too weak to move, but she doesn’t want anything in her face. She tries to protest. She can’t make words. Her throat feels swollen. She bats the woman away with one hand.
And it’s not her hand. This hand is larger, olive-skinned, thick-fingered, hairier. A man’s hand.
The woman retreats to a corner of the room. Cari watches her go. The sunlight shines through the woman’s thin garment, revealing the outline of her body beneath it, her hips and breasts, and Cari feels an unfamiliar swelling between her legs.
The woman calls out in a language Cari doesn’t speak, but she’s heard before. Ulbishan.
A man enters the room. Cari’s reactions are, in order, to get up and stab the fucker; to get up and headbutt the fucker; to jump out the window; to scream and scream and scream – and there’s one more reaction, her first reaction, but she can’t articulate it. It’s like trying to recall a dream in the moments after waking. But she’s too weak, too drugged, to do anything.
The man is Vorz. Cari knows him as a servant of the Ghierdana, a renegade alchemist. The fucker experimented on her, drained her blood and stole her magic. He tortured her. He tortured Spar. Now, he sits down at her bedside and examines her with a jeweller’s loupe.
“Rasce,” says the toad of a man. No, not a toad – a leech, that’s what he is, pale and bloodless, parasitic, a thing equally at home in a swamp and or a doctor’s surgery. “At last you’re awake. I drew you out of the water. We had to flee Guerdon. Your life as you knew it is over. The Dragon is dead, by your hand, and that was foolish indeed. Very, very foolish.” He rises and crosses the room to the shrouded frame.
The serving woman kneels and covers her face with her hands, like she’s in prayer.
With one pale hand, Vorz draws the shroud aside, just a little.
It’s a mirror. From this angle, Cari can see it’s a mirror.
The mirror terrifies her. She doesn’t know why, but she can’t let the mirror see her. She can’t let herself be seen. If she could, she’d crawl away from it, but she’s so weak all she can do is whimper.
Vorz looks into the mirror, and a light wells up within the glass. He’s transfigured – he stands taller, his eyes grow bright, his mortician’s drooping features becoming oddly handsome and radiant. His skin flushes with vitality. A groom on his wedding day. “I can use you, Rasce,” he says, and his voice is weirdly echoed, “there is a place for a skilled flyer in my house, and you accomplished wonders in Guerdon. Soon, we shall perform even greater miracles. The victory you won for us shall prove the key to winning this Godswar.” She hides her face with her hand – and her own face is unfamiliar. Stubble scrapes her palm. She runs a man’s hand over a man’s face. She’s not who or what she was.
“I must go to the city. There is much, much work to be done. You must rest. Your connection to the Guerdon entity is gone, your sainthood ended, and with it, the stigmata of the stone plague. You will heal naturally now, but it will take time. Rest, and Tazu will take care of you.”
He lets the cloth drop, and walks out of the room.
Unstabbed. Unheadbutted. Unfuckingmurdered. But Cari’s too weak to act.
That night, Cari won’t let herself sleep. Let himself sleep? Whatever Cari is, the dream of the Black Iron Gods waits beyond the veil of sleep, so fuck that.
Things that are obvious: She’s a Raveller. All her life she’s known there was something wrong with her – she’s heard terrible, distant voices on the air, the monstrous gods calling to her. She fled them by going across the seas, but when she returned to Guerdon, they found her again. In Guerdon, she learned that her grandfather Jermas made her, bred her from his son and a Raveller. Made her to be the Herald of the Black Iron Gods, made her to bring the awful deities back from their banishment.
She is, in short, a monster, born of two different flavours of monster, made to serve bigger monsters.
She doesn’t feel like a monster. But Ravellers are capable of consuming people, eating them body and soul, wearing identities like masks. They unravelled people, then fed them to the eternal hungers of the Black Iron Gods. Cari might say she isn’t a monster, but that might just be the monster talking. I’m not a wolf, I’m your kindly grandmother. All the better to eat you.
She ate Rasce She was dying, broken on the shore after they both fell from the seawall in Guerdon. She ate Rasce and she’s wearing his face.
Did Cari die there too, and the monster kept on going? Is she still Carillon Thay?
And if not, who is she?
Tazu returns in the morning, with a bowl of sweet-tasting mush. Cari eats it with Rasce’s mouth, Rasce’s tongue. Finally, she feels strong enough to speak.
“Bathroom.”
Tazu first produces a chamber pot. Ulbishe doesn’t have indoor plumbing, at least in this building. Cari guesses they’re in some country mansion. And Tazu speaks only a few words of Haithi, so it takes a few minutes for her to understand what Cari wants. Leaning on Tazu, inhaling the musky smell of her skin, Cari’s brought to a bathing room. The servant girl closes the door, and the monster’s alone.
There’s a mirror there – a normal one. For some reason, this mirror holds no supernatural terror for Cari, unlike the large glass in the bedroom. The terror here is different.
She looks in the mirror, and Rasce looks back at her.
His slim body, strong and quick despite all his injuries. She smiles, and it’s his cruel smile, replicated perfectly even though Cari’s never smiled like that. She’s had visions before, had her mind torn from her body and flung across the rooftops of Guerdon, but her body’s always been hers. She’s had that as a reference point, a refuge. A castle of meat and bone. Now – who is she? What is she?
She strips off the nightshirt she’s wearing – or he’s wearing, whatever – and stands naked in front of the mirror. There was a boy Cari knew once, a saint of the Dancer, and he reminds her of Rasce – of this body. She pokes at Rasce’s genitals like they’re a wild animal that’s crept in through a window and curled up on her lap. Runs her fingers over the knife-scar on his belly where she stabbed him.
“Here goes,” she mutters, and she relaxes.
For a horrible moment, she fears that she’ll come back as she was on the rocks. Smashed ribcage, shattered skull, a dying wreck. But no – she’s Cari again, pretty much. Thin, grubby, gamine. Twitchy as an alley cat. All her own scars in place, from the burns on her face to missing teeth.
She’s still Carillon Thay. She’s a monster and she’s Carillon Thay.
Then the door opens, and Tazu comes in, saying something solicitous in Ulbishan that turns to a yelp of alarm when she sees the naked girl before her. Tazu screams.
Cari – no, no, no, something in Cari, beneath her, not her, not her, please, not her, THIS ISN’T ME – reacts on instinct, and it’s terrible.
Tendrils of nothingness erupt from Cari’s mouth, her skin, her hands, and every one of them is a razor-edged knife. She butchers Tazu, fillets her, slicing along the seams and knots of her being, body and soul. Cari consumes Tazu from the inside, unravels her and swallows her, all the threads of her life flowing into the monster. There, her memories of childhood. There, the way she danced on the sands. There, her joy at being accepted as a servant to one of the houses of the Mirror Princes, the way her mother smiled at her with quiet pride. All gone now, Tazu’s soul cut up and consumed, and now there’s only Cari in the bathroom, and it’s Tazu’s scream that’s coming out of her throat.
She falls to her knees and tries to vomit, tries to throw up the woman she just ate, but it’s no good. She shivers uncontrollably, stunned by the unnatural violence. She can feel Tazu sinking into her, an aftertaste of surprise and confusion, dissolving in her belly, a sudden heat that’s fading even now.
Outside, she hears men shouting in Ulbishan, and now Cari understands Ulbishan too. The thread that was Tazu’s language, Tazu’s voice, is now woven into the throat of the thing that’s only mostly Carillon Thay.
“What’s wrong?” They shout. “Where are you?” She hears the door of the bedroom smash open. The guards are just outside this little bathing chamber. There are six of them.
A Raveller could easily defeat all six. She could walk out there and murder them all, knife-tendrils whirling. She saw a Raveller fight a dozen Tallowmen, once, and escape intact. A part of her relishes the idea of going out there. Once, she was the Saint of Knives, and had the power to do as she wished, to walk where she wished. She wasn’t invincible, but she was divine, and that counted. Now, she has another offer of power.
SISTER/MOTHER/HERALD/WEAPON!
KILL/CONSUME/MAKE OFFERING/MAKE SACRIFICE.
There are six souls in the other room, six offerings to the Black Iron Gods. Six pools of potent residuum, soul-stuff, to add to the two she’s already claimed. She’s only carrying Rasce and Tazu for a little while. She will go to the temple of Black Iron and kneel before the hungry gods and vomit out her offering…
Instead, she stands. She swears under her breath.
She looks into the mirror, concentrates, and then puts on Tazu like she’d put on a dress.
Tazu walks out of the bathroom. “It’s all right,” she says to the captain of the guard, Urthu. “It’s Master Vorz’s guest. He pinched me. These Lyrixians, they are pirates. They have no respect, and think they can take whatever they want.”
“Where is the rogue?” asks Urthu.
“In there,” Tazu says, “bathing. Forgive me, there’s no need for alarm. I shouldn’t have called out. Please, do not tell the master.”
“I should teach this pirate some manners,” rumbles Urthu.
“There’s no need. I was surprised, that’s all. Now I shall be on my guard.” The lies come easily to Tazu. Urthu gives a curt nod. One of his men makes the sign of the fig towards the closed door of the bathroom, and the rest laugh. They withdraw, closing the door behind them.
Window, thinks Cari, and Tazu’s moving, crossing the room. She has to force herself to walk within view of that dreadful mirror, but it’s shrouded, and whatever’s on the far side can’t see her.
Tazu climbs out the window. The wall is steep, but Cari’s an expert thief, and she’s got Rasce’s strength in her limbs. Threads of stolen souls flex and reshape, forming into new configurations as the bundle of catastrophe that calls itself Carillon Thay skitters down the wall and flees into the shadows of the ornamental gardens.
She gets off the grounds of the estate without killing anyone. That’s her new benchmark. She called herself the Saint of Knives as a joke, a touch of bravado that amused Spar. Now she’s made of knives. Ruin in human shape. She wanders through a land of little farmsteads and vineyards, mostly empty of life. She hides from the few people she sees. The Godswar reached this land, but only lightly. A few godtouched things – a rosebush with kraken-tentacles for thorns, a wall with holy words written in moss. A lake of wine, ringed with signs warning her not to drink.
Cari has no idea where she is, other than ‘somewhere they speak Ulbishan’. She does know she’s south of Guerdon – she always had a vague, itching impression in her mind, a whispering voice calling to her. For most of her life, it was the Black Iron Gods, a distant stain that made her feel so unclean, unholy, that she ran from her life. Then, for a few glorious, loving years, she had Spar in her head instead, her friend watching over her even as she anchored him to the mortal realm.
She can’t hear Spar any more. The Black Iron Gods are back in her head, almost as loud as they were when she stood next to them in bell form, in the Holy Beggar or St. Storms or the Seamarket, bellowing and roaring – calling her home.
She’ll never hear Spar again. She’s certain of that. Whatever grace allowed her to temporary slip clear of her destiny is gone, squandered by her own stupidity. She’s what she always feared she was – monstrous. A thing of darkness, a tool. A walking sacrificial knife.
If she returned to Guerdon, if somehow Spar saw her like this, then surely he would turn from her too.
The thought gouges her soul like a knife.
Whatever remains of her soul.
Everything’s a weapon if you know how to use it. That’s been one of Cari’s mantras for a long time. Dol Martaine, of all people, taught it to her. Years and years ago, back on the Rose, they’d quarrelled. She grabbed a knife, he picked up a bucket, and he won. She’s used her sainthood before as a weapon, stolen power from the gods. But this is different – she’s different. There’s a hunger in her, a primal desire to take souls and bring offerings to the Black Iron Gods. To stir them to wakefulness, to be their Herald.
Kill yourself. The thought runs through her as she walks down a deserted laneway. She remembers her cousin Eladora’s office, with a bomb under the floor. Eladora, too, fears falling under the sway of the Black Iron Gods. It almost makes Cari laugh – El’s got a tiny little speck of dirt on her soul, and her reaction is “better set up a warded bomb under my office to blow me to kingdom come on the off-chance I have a single naughty thought.” And here’s Cari, up to her neck in filth, made of evil, a literal fucking demon, and she doesn’t have a bomb. Hell, she doesn’t even have a knife.
I shouldn’t have to die, I didn’t choose this, it’s not my fault, wars in her head with how would you kill yourself, anyway, you idiot? You’ve already fallen to your death, and that didn’t work.
She walks, and walks, day slipping to brief twilight and then night. A smear of light on the southern horizon, reflected off low cloud – a city.
Carillon isn’t sure where she’s going, but she’s not just Carillon any more.
A familiar knock on the door of the little cottage wakes Mashu. She throws on a shawl and hurries to let her daughter in.
“Come in, child, come in. Have you brought leftovers from…” Mashu’s voice trails off as she opens the door and sees her daughter Tazu on the threshold. Tazu stands there in a light robe, shivering, hollow-eyed. Mashu enfolds the girl in a warm embrace, leads her to sit by the hearth, pokes the embers of the fire into life. “Sit, sit. Tell me, what’s wrong?”
Tazu starts to speak, then makes this choking noise, clasps her hands over her mouth, shakes her head. Her eyes are those of a frightened animal.
“It’s all right. Take your time.” Mashu drapes a blanket around the girl’s shoulders. Something has gone wrong at the manor, clearly. Mashu fills the silence with gossip, telling Tazu about how two of her younger brothers have gone to the city to find work in the new alchemical factories, how Mashu was allowed a glimpse of the Shining World last week, how there’s some new treatment that’s going to save the vineyards.
Still, Tazu doesn’t speak. Her words exhausted, Mashu sits down next to her and just holds her, marvelling at this long-limbed, beautiful creature that she made, memories of Tazu as a squalling baby or laughing child overlaid onto the grown woman in the chair. Tazu flinches, then nuzzles into her.
Finally, just as Mashu’s drifting off, Tazu whispers something very strange: “I’ve never had a mother before.” Like she’s dreaming.
They fall asleep together, mother and daughter.
When Mashu awakes, Tazu is gone.
South. South to Ulbishe.
Months ago, far away across the sea, Cari cut a deal with Doctor Vorz. Her friend Adro was sick, and needed help. Cari let Vorz experiment on her, use her, maybe awaken the Raveller in her, and in exchange he promised to help Adro.
He’d lied. Adro died, and the worms ate him.
In Guerdon, Vorz augmented Rasce, injected him with Cari’s stolen blood. He ensured that Rasce could steal Spar away from her – and Rasce’s in here with her too, shouting that Vorz betrayed him, ruined him, took the sky and the favour of the dragon from him. Poisoned him with stone and blood. Rasce hates Vorz too, and that unites the tattered threads of the Raveller.
If there’s one desire in the thing that was Carillon Thay that’s stronger than the unnatural desire to consume souls, it’s the very fucking natural desire for revenge.
South to Ulbishe. South to Vorz.
Demon of knives.
Gareth Hanrahan 