Crown of Vengeance

the bidding of He Who Is.

If he had been capable of it, Virulan would have despaired.

But he was not, and so he sought counsel.

He Who Is had granted them the boon of eternity, but all gifts must be paid for. The Endarkened did not sleep, just as they did not age, but an Endarkened who did not regularly seek a period of silence and contemplation would enter eternity in truth—not death, for they could not die, but the inability to perceive Time.

Such an Endarkened would be useless to He Who Is and it would be his fate to be forever sealed away in a chamber in the Deep Earth. Virulan had no desire to lose the favor of He Who Is. Virulan carefully marked the passage of time by the shifts and changes in the Deep Earth and retired to his secret chamber regularly.

This time, he had a greater goal than his own survival.

“Dread and beloved Lord of Darkness and Endings, hear Your loyal and devoted acolyte…”

The realm of time and matter was no fit habitation for the Lord of All Things, and so Virulan sought Him in His own place. Virulan knew himself to be a created thing, a tool, and like any tool, fitted for the needs of his task. To destroy the realm of time and matter, Virulan himself was a thing of time and matter. But not entirely. That part of Virulan that sought audience with his dread master was neither.

It was a realm beautiful beyond description: lightless and empty and sterile. Virulan’s spirit rose to that place, and waited.

WHAT DO YOU WANT OF ME?

Each syllable thrilled through Virulan’s entire being, bringing such ecstasy that he nearly forgot his purpose. To speak words in answer would be to profane this holy emptiness. Virulan opened his thoughts to He Who Is, knowing He saw all.

THIS IS NOT A TASK BEYOND YOUR SKILL. I HAVE GIVEN YOU TOOLS.

Before Virulan could shape a question, he had been thrust back into the world of time and form. But he was not in his bedchamber. He was in a place in the World Without Sun whose existence he had never suspected.

The Black Chamber.

It lay at the center of a vein of black glass a thousand miles thick. Virulan could feel the vastness of stone above him, and his heart swelled with pride: the Brightworlders boasted of their vast lands, but the World Without Sun was a thousand times greater.

To any senses but his own, the chamber would have been unremittingly black. Virulan saw a thousand shades of darkness, hues that no other race had words for. The darkness showed him a chamber carved of the living rock. Every inch of the walls and ceiling was covered with deeply incised symbols.

Master their meaning and Virulan would take within himself the faintest echo of the power of He Who Is. Virulan’s birthright was to command sorcery—and here was the grimoire from which he must learn

But that knowledge came at a price.

In the center of the chamber there was a long hollow spike of obsidian that stood heart-high. This was the Obsidian Blade, the instrument of sacrifice that made its victim one with the symbols upon the walls. For any other, what Virulan now contemplated would be nothing more than a gateway to the most agonizing death of all—but Virulan was first among the Endarkened, first shaped by the hand of He Who Is. He spread his great scarlet wings and thrust himself into the air. For an instant, his golden horns brushed the vaulting ceiling of the chamber.

Then he fell.

The Obsidian Blade pierced his body.

The chamber rang like a crystal bell with his agonized screams; the glyphs upon the walls bloomed into dark fire, searing their meaning into his skin. He hung there, writhing, impaled, until his screams dwindled to sobs of agony, until his consciousness fled into a nothingness deeper than anything he had ever known.

But when he rose up an eternity later, the sorcery that was his birthright thrilled through his veins with every beat of his heart. Virulan went from the Black Chamber to the foot of the Tree of Night and summoned his Endarkened to him. There he opened their heritage to them, a sorcery fueled by death, a sorcery great enough to give them the victory they craved.

And once again, the Endarkened swept forth from Obsidian Mountain.

The slaughter they wreaked now was a thousandfold greater than before. They glutted themselves upon blood and pain and gorged upon the flesh of their victims. The land around Obsidian Mountain became a wasteland where nothing lived, and each night they ranged farther.

And it was still not enough.

* * *

“What must I do?” Virulan cried. His scream echoed back from the stony vault that was the roof of the world and brought no answer.

Save one.

“You must use the tools He Who Is has given us, my king.”

Uralesse was first among the Twelve, as Virulan was first among them all. Only he would dare to approach Virulan when Virulan walked in the Garden of Night. When he saw his king’s gaze upon him, Uralesse groveled low to the ground, his great ribbed wings wound tightly about his body in submission, his horned brow pressed against the stone.

“Do you say I do not?” Virulan growled. His fangs ached to rend Uralesse’s flesh, even though the words he had spoken were words Virulan had long held in his own mind. He had taught his knowledge of sorcery to his people—but only a fool would give up every advantage, and so Virulan had not taught them all he had learned.

“I say only that the first among us is surely greater than any of us,” Uralesse said, unmoving.

“You are wise, my brother. Rise, and walk with me.”

Uralesse rose gracefully to his feet and allowed his wings to open fractionally. For a time they walked together in silence.

“The Bright World continues to live,” Virulan said at last.

“Yes,” Uralesse agreed, his wings drooping in sorrow. “Each pure thing we make becomes tainted once more. It is as if life replenishes itself as water inexhaustibly fills a spring.”

“I shall learn the Bright World’s secret,” Virulan said. “And I will make of it talons for their throats.”

“Let it be so, my king,” Uralesse said.

* * *

Now Virulan worked the greatest sorcery he had ever imagined. He returned to the Black Chamber and there he studied the runes and the glyphs until he was certain his spell would succeed. Then he sent his Endarkened into the Bright World once more, but this time not to slay. This time, he ordered them to bring its creatures to him alive.

It was a reaping that would long endure in the stories the Brightworlders told one another. The chambers of the World Without Sun became filled with life: weeping and lamenting, profaning the beauty of the Endarkened realm by its very existence. Night after night, the Endarkened flew, and harvested, until the World Without Sun could hold no more.

In a space above the Black Chamber, Virulan had made a place. Its only entrance was through an opening in its ceiling, and it contained only one object: a gigantic mirror of black obsidian. As his subjects had hunted, so had Virulan prepared the mirror. And when it was ready, he ordered all the captives slaughtered at once.

The Endarkened had learned to love the pain of their victims, learned to cherish each scream and tear. Torture was their highest art, but today, Virulan did not call for art, but for blood. And he received it. The halls of the World Without Sun were awash in blood, a red and stinking tide that flowed through halls and down staircases, rushing ever deeper into the Deep Earth until it came to the place where the Obsidian Mirror waited. Hot fresh blood poured through the opening in the ceiling and filled the room to the brink.

And the Mirror drank in the life, the power, the blood, until all the blood was gone, and only the Mirror itself remained.

Then Virulan and his brothers feasted. And when the feast was done, Virulan went to stand before the Mirror.