Caine Black Knife

“He’ll remember a perfectly ordinary Rite of Atonement.” He produced an earthenware jug and a pair of cordials. “Care to join me? It’s Tinnaran.”

“Another time.”

As I turned to go, Tourann said, “It must be a, erm, peculiar feeling. .”

I stopped. “Yeah?”

Tourann waved the jug in a little circle. “This. All this. Being here.”

“Peculiar is one word for it.”

“I mean, you did this. If not for you, none of this would be here.”

“It wasn’t just me.

Lots of people-”

“Lots of people, sure.” Tourann splashed a cordial full of brandy. “Any of them still alive?”

I took that without a blink. “Purthin Khlaylock.”

“Sure, sure. The city’s called Purthin’s Ford, but it’s the river that makes all this possible; it changed this whole corner of the continent into a garden. You know what they call the river, up here?”

I looked down at my hands while I tried to breathe past the brick in my guts. “The Caineway.”

“That’s right. The Caineway. I can’t imagine how that must feel.”

“Me neither,” I said, and left.

Night had swallowed the vertical city.

By the time I dragged my exhausted ass down the steps of the cathedral, the streets of Purthin’s Ford were buried already in the horizon’s shadow; the sinking sun had levered darkness upward to erase each tier of Hell in turn. The cliffs and the city reflected enough firelight that the street I walked shimmered with blood-colored gloom.

if not for you, none of this would be here

I sagged into a polished stone bench and let my head hang.

Slave culture. Intacts and eligibles.

turned this whole corner of the continent into a garden

I had to look sometime. I was fresh out of excuses to wait.

black knives don’t kneel

I lifted my head and opened the eye of my mind.

Twists of night knotted around me: vast braided cables of interstellar black frayed into strands that tied me to the river, to the Spire, to Hell above and every breath of the damned and their masters: a fractal arterial network pumping shadow from all this place had been to all I was, from all I had been to what it was.

The night smeared and writhed and wrapped itself around me, swallowing me, entering me, oozing like oil into eyes and mouth and nose and ears. I shook my head. A humorless chuckle rattled in my throat. This was what I’d been avoiding? This had had me running scared? It didn’t seem possible.

Since when am I afraid of the dark?

FOREVER AND A MEN

RETREAT FROM THE BOEDECKEN (partial)

You are CAINE (featured Actor: Pfnl. Hari Michaelson)

MASTER: NOT FOR DISTRIBUTION, UNDER PENALTY OF LAW.

© 2187 Adventures Unlimited Inc. All rights reserved.

Sffrins a lxry. Heerz manser.

Here.

Is my.

Answer.

Maxmum bad.

Snot nough.

Not.

Enough.

Hav topen meyes.

Have to.

Fuh kk kk k-

Fuck.

Me.

God.

Hrrr.

Air. Air is all.

Air’s everything but-

So. .

Tired. .

But.

Don’t need air to talk to you.

Technology is a wonderful fucking thing.

I just-

Need.

To hurt more.

It’s night.

Must be night. No sun on my skin.

I can open my eyes. I can. And I will. Pretty soon.

I will.

Keep . . breathing.

Motherfucker.

Wind. . ’s still shifting. Cookfire smoke. . mulch of rotten blood and gamy meat high and soft and blue. . funerary platforms west of camp. . staked out their dead for the buzzards and the crows. .

Just.

Breathe.

Out.

In’s no problem.

Breathe.

Out.

It took J-ahh, hrr. Hrrgh. . conditioning. .

Still can’t-

Here, then. Here. I can do this.

Control Disciplines.

I can.

I can.

I can do this.

I can.

Okay.

This is what I mean.

The son of that old-fashioned god back home, where you are, took all day to die. Not sure how long it’s been for me. Guess I’m in a little better shape. Or maybe it’s because I’m up here for my own sins. .

Or-