Book Of Tongues (Hexslinger 1)

Pinkerton nodded. “ Hell I know, same as every other man,” he said at last. “‘Gods,’ well — no such except the Almighty, in my book.”

“There are more books than the Book,” Asbury pointed out, mildly, in return.

You’re right about that, Morrow thought.

But he had no dog in either fight — and Asbury was already off again in any event, theorizing out loud.

“As for the idea of ‘gods,’ Mister Pinkerton, consider them as magicians writ large, truly cosmic predators. The bloodshed perpetrated by Maya and Aztecs in veneration of their pantheons is, indeed, legendary. In fact, some credit the entire fall of the Mayan Empire to their religious excesses: killing whole generations of beautiful youths and maidens, destroying forests to build pyres, polluting rivers with entrail, ash and gore. . . .”

“And that’s what-all this woman of Rook’s aims to bring about again — that right, Morrow?”

“Far’s I know? Yes.”

Enthralled with his visions, Asbury just kept on going. “‘Gods,’ then, would be the sum of Expressed magicians plus worship, as a system of human sacrifice channels both the power inherent in such sacrifices — chosen without doubt from amongst the Unexpressed — and the power of human faith, of sheer zealotry and credulousness, into the ‘deities’ in question. A fascinating equation indeed.”

Pinkerton smacked the table, sharply. “Doctor Asbury,” he said. “Seems to me Mr. Morrow has not finished his account, some of which I gather may still be of interest to you — and all of which has earned him, at the least, courteous attention.”

To Morrow: “Now then. Where did this Lady Ixc

hel take you, precisely?”

Morrow took a deep breath. “She called it the Moon Room.”

The arch itself was perfect and smooth as any cathedral’s, the rock in which it was set raw, rough and dripping with lichen. Above the arch, at its apex, sat a gouged half-circle curve, an inlaid sickle of flint splotchily patterned with dark stains: a moon shape, fit only for shed blood, mirrored in the yellow-black sky above by an almost-full real moon — skull-bright, a burst lantern.

This is the Moon’s House, said Lady Ixchel. A door between worlds and ages, poised to open. Be honoured, my kings . . . and you too, o blood-guards, my husband’s retinue. For this is where the old age will come anew.

They entered.

Inside, the moon seemed to loom closer still, making a pitiless roof that blocked the rest of the sky entirely. Under it sat that same black disk from Songbird’s, re-grown to full size: ten feet in radius, from its ragged-punched central hole on out, its circumference a smaller, bleaker, reverse-coloured parody of the painfully white orb above.

Their boots clopped dull and dead upon the round black stone, as if swamp-thick air swallowed the noise, though to the lungs the cavern’s air felt breath-hitchingly thin and dry — the painful draw of a mountaintop. The men ranged themselves around the stone’s circumference without even being told to, an instinctive movement — the circle of the tribe in wordless wonder, agape at the blackness of the infinite night sky.

At the centre of the circle Lady Ixchel stood, hands uplifted and her hair stirring about her in a great black cloud, as if she floated in invisible water. To the right and left of her stood Rook and Chess, facing each other like bride and bridegroom. Between them, the hole in the centre of the stone yawned, so empty it went beyond black into something that seared with anti-light, antilife — as sight-sore to look at directly as the sun.

Against that emptiness, the power in all three figures blazed, actinic and flashing. Morrow had to shade his eyes and fight not to double up, retching, to try and cough out the acrid stench of magic.

Rook lifted one hand, stroked Chess’s jawline as if memorizing its feel. Then smiled, and murmured: “Skin off, darlin’.”

Without a second’s hesitation Chess flung away his hat, shrugged off his vest, blank face empty. His hands moved entirely of their own accord. But it wasn’t until the gunbelt hit the stone with a clatter — until Chess’s guns themselves went spinning away — that Morrow finally found the strength to protest. “You son of a bitch,” he choked out. “Just what the hell you fixin’ to do to him? He loves you.”

Rook didn’t look around, as Chess finished stripping down. His eyes seemed to shine in the murk — a tear, or just the gleam of power-lust? “Guess he really must, at that,” he said, wonderingly. “The Lady tells me this wouldn’t work, otherwise.”

The air was so thick with magic now that Morrow almost felt he could see the cord of Rook’s geas: a shimmering tension like a glass rod glimpsed in flowing water, running taut from Morrow’s head to a point inside Rook’s coat, the pocket where the mojo-bag rested. He sucked in the deepest breath he could and grabbed for the line of power — felt it quiver against his palm, a ghost-wire of air and static.

“No,” Morrow ground out — and pulled on the geas, hauling himself a step forward, into the circle. It hurt like yanking his own brain out through his eye sockets. But Rook winced too, and put one hand to his head as if pained by a too-bright light.

Slowly, Chess’s staring eyes blinked.

Lady Ixchel did not move, her rapturous gaze holding fast upon the gigantic overhanging moon. But a wavefront of fury struck the circle in a sandstorm, hot and stinging; the men cried out, dropped to their knees. Given that Morrow was already half-mad with pain, however, it didn’t make much never-mind to him: he hunkered down and pulled himself another step forward. Two more, and Chess would be within arm’s reach. . . .

Rook sighed, and brought his hand to the nexus of the mojo-bag, stroking his coat. Every nerve in Morrow’s body went dead in an instant. He crumpled — slack, but for just that moment so blissful with numb release he didn’t care at all, tears smearing over the cold black stone, as he gasped out sobbing breaths.

“Now that . . . is truly something special,” Rook said. “Never once occurred to me you could pull on a binding from either end. Never thought anyone wasn’t already a hex’d be fool enough to try.”

“Ash . . .” Chess turned his head slowly, drunken. “Ash, I can’t . . . can’t move, Ash. Whuthah . . . fuck . . .”

“Shhh.” Rook cupped Chess’s face in his hands, and cold-kissed his forehead. “’S’all gonna be all right, darlin’. I wouldn’t do nothin’ to cause you real harm. I love you.” Holding Chess’s eyes with his own: “You believe that, right?”