Chapter 66 – Teller of Fate

Teller of Fate

Sixth Movement: The Fate of Stars

Chapter Sixty-Six

* * *

Like placing the final piece of an elaborate puzzle, Dævara let her card, the Blue Lamp, blaze. Unlike the others, her card changed form.

When the pale blue-silver sparks retreated she was holding the Lamp.

The Templar recognized it as the lamp that had baited the trap he had left for John Airkhart on a world Azathoth had then consumed. It was also the lamp the Miu, Erahndira, had used to pull knowledge from his mind when he wore the body of the custodian Jane Airkhart.

He knew it would look different to his daughter and to everyone who had seen it in whatever guise in the past.

Carefully and with obvious reverence, the Teller of Fate placed the blazing lamp atop her staff. Its glow was clearly visible even in the white shaft of light.

The lamp rose in the beam, through the base of the red container.

As soon as its blue-silver glow entered the region of the spinning lights, the sides of the huge red container began to lean toward each other. In moments, it was sealed—a perfect tetrahedron of dense magical energy.

The lamp became the blazing center of the orbiting lights.

Its brightness increased very quickly until it obscured the others.

Despite that, the Templar had no trouble looking at it and no inclination to look away.

A miracle was imminent.

A triumphant blast of sound—an overture that might have heralded the birth of Reality—and the light was gone. In its place was a tree.

It was, rather, The Tree.

Bare rooted, with slender, curving branches; its bark was sparkling silver.

The fruit of this tree were glowing crystalline gems in every colour and shade.

No leaves did it have, but alive it most certainly was.

A pale blue glow shone through the wood of the tree where the trunk met the roots—the Blue Lamp’s light shining through the heartwood.

The creation of Life had been the crowning achievement of the Templars. Looking at the Tree, Phæthon felt a passing admiration for the architects of the Syrat who had mastered this miracle before his race was spawned. With the help of the Hermetist leadership, Dævara’s Syrat had now demonstrated the full potential of a Syrat’s power: the creation of Life.

The Trap was baited.

Life, the White God wanted, the perfect expression of Order. A perfect, energetic life, made from the stuff of magick, was the honey for this cage.

The tumult in the city gradually softened and stilled.

The Templar glanced toward the Red God. Even it had stopped its fight to get to the square. With a little relief, Phæthon noted it had indeed passed the Pillar in the Street, leaving it unaffected.

Absolute silence fell, but for the fires still burning. Smoke began to disperse in a breeze not felt at street level.

Now was the moment.

Everyone waited for some sign that the White God had taken the bait.

The Templar was the only one not looking at the Tree when that sign came.

The Wanderer in the Wastes moved. He raised his arms until they resembled an upturned bowl and looked up at the Tree.

Light from the Tree began to stream down to the Crawling Chaos in visible threads.

The substance of the Tree began to diminish rapidly.

The Blue Lamp began to fade.

Several things happened then.

The Red God made a leap that covered half the distance to the Wanderer. Everyone who had been engaged with it leapt to follow and began pounding on it again. They slowed it, but not by much.

It would reach the Wanderer in seconds.

Phæthon wasn’t sure that would be a bad thing.

He turned back to see his daughter.

Likely motivated by the desire to prevent the Blue Lamp from being extinguished, the Teller embraced her staff and rode it up the light beam into the trap until she was among the roots of the Tree.

Just as she passed the barely visible barrier of the tetrahedron, the White God finally reacted.

The tumbling, rolling, grinding, grating came again as the city shook violently.

With a tickling sensation, as if someone were peeling a layer of dead skin off the Templar’s body, the smothering presence of the White God was gone.

Everyone had colour again. Colour also began to return to Glyph itself.

“Phæ!”

The Templar heard that with his ears. He wasn’t alone, either.

Several Hermetists near him reacted to the voice by looking around—

And there was his sister. Bits of her, anyway.

She had taken advantage of the White God’s distraction to pull herself partway free. Her head and one of her arms were visible. From her frantic shaking, she looked to be trying to kick her legs free as well.

The Templar sprinted to her and grabbed her free arm, taking care not to cut himself on the bladed weapon she carried in that hand.

Adding his weight to her thrusts, he was able to free her in moments.

With a distinct sucking sound, she pulled free. She landed atop her brother in a heap.

For a few moments, the siblings lay together, in a fierce embrace. Joy blotted out Phæthon’s every thought.

Paris let go of the two weapons to return her brother’s embrace. Unique in all the Multiverse now the weapons, called Orrymi, clattered to the paving stones of the Plaza of Dying Suns.

Her body was covered in slimy goo, but Phæthon barely noticed. All he cared to feel was her flesh, warm and alive. Her heartbeat stuttered against him, her breathing loud and hoarse in his ear. And the smell of her under the mild stench of the stuff that coated her, that unique scent that was hers. It had been so long, so long.

He felt the distinctive sensation of organic metal as she gripped his shoulders and panted into his ear. His hands found the flesh of her lower back and buttocks. She was as naked as the moment she began her near endless war with the White God.

The avatars of a couple of Hermetists were noticeably staring.

They didn’t do so for long, however. A renewed clamour from behind the siblings brought both their heads around.

A last-minute blitz attack by the defenders of the city was trying to prevent the Red God from reaching the Plaza, or the Wanderer in its line of advance.

It was only yards from the Crawling Chaos, who held his pose and was now glowing slightly with the Life stolen from the Tree.

The Templar siblings scrambled to their feet.

Paris was almost exactly her brother’s height. Same long, curly hair same beautiful features. There was no mistaking her gender. Despite well-defined lean muscle all over her frame, Paris was unmistakably female: slender waist, small breasts, and a softer hipline.

Paris’s most startling features were her hands and forearms.

At first glance, she appeared to be wearing silver gauntlets. In fact, the narrow silver bands were flesh of a kind. They signified the supreme warrior rank among the Templars. It was a distinction that no longer counted for anything.

She held those hands out and the Orrymi sprang into them. They looked like short swords with sharply bent sickles welded to the butt ends of the hilts.

The handles thus formed the middle of the weapons. The sickle blades, emerging from the tail ends of the grips, were edged only on their inner sides. The three-foot-long sword blades opposite them were edged on both sides.

After sharing a nod, the last Templars headed for the fight.

The White God continued to shrink.

It was obvious now that it was withdrawing into the trap. This troubled Phæthon because of his daughter’s presence. Her protection lay solely in the Blue Lamp.

If she failed to reach it, or if it went out…

Phæthon had no time to think about it as the crisis precipitated by the interference of the Wanderer was upon them.

Before either of the Templars could reach the site of the conflict, two appendages of lightning from the Red God lashed out and wrapped themselves around the body of the Crawling Chaos.

The Wanderer was yanked off his feet and disappeared into the roiling mass of scarlet energy.

At a magick-amplified shout from Phæthon, all combatants ceased their attacks and those close to the Red God began withdrawing.

The siblings themselves halted a good distance away. The Hermetists nearest were perilously close, but that couldn’t be helped.

The energy drain on the Tree stopped when the Wanderer was interrupted by his capture and the former blazed again.

The substance of the White God enveloped the red pyramid of energy protecting the Tree, seeking a way to penetrate it.

For the first time since it arrived, it was clearly visible to all: a cloud of mist that was brightly lit from within. Like a sun behind mundane clouds, it seemed to hide its glory from mortal eyes. It hovered over Glyph, obscuring the spheres of Nonspace completely.

As one point in ITs contraction, all the White God’s substance was within the four pillars on the guild towers of the city.

The trap slammed shut.

Where there had only been space, now there was a translucent cube of golden light. It was ten miles on a side, one thousand cubic miles in volume.

The White God was trapped, and there the crisis should have ended.

But: Dævara was in the trap with the White God.

But: The Red God was shrinking as it changed to the form of Nyarlathotep.

In moments, the shape of Crawling Chaos stood only a few yards farther from the Plaza of Dying Suns than he had been.

There were other changes to him, as well.

A red glow shone through Wanderer’s rags. bits of scarlet lightning, small as sparks, spat through holes and seams.

The gauze covering its face completely burned away revealing a visage black-eyed and flame defined.

* * *

The trapped White God began to shake violently, and the cube shook with him. Paris gripped her blades tightly, staring with the rest. “That cage won’t hold IT,” she said.

“I know,” replied Phæthon. “It would have, had not the Wanderer interfered.”

The Wanderer-Red God thing was eyeing the cage as well. Suddenly, it launched itself up towards it. Paris hoped she was wrong, and the cage was strong enough.

It was, though just barely.

The entire structure of the cube shook with the impact, and it didn’t stop. The form of the Wanderer began to change.

The cause of their sorrow lost definition and began to flatten out along the bottom of the cube. Bits of rag began to drift down, most of them smoking. What remained was only vaguely humanoid. The red of it was darker and wrapped in strips of black; the latter seeming to hold it together.

The Rakhesh, Admoio, and Myr remained still, but several mages began readying spells.

“Hold fire!” Phæ shouted.

He used his ‘outside’ voice, “No one is to direct any fire at the cage!” As the echoes died, the tumbling, rolling, grinding, grating began to increase.

The cage began to shift as well as vibrate.

“Damn!” Paris’s brother swore under his breath.

“What is it?” she stepped to his side; looked where he pointed. The cube rested on the four coloured pillars at the corners of the city. If it kept on as it was, the entire edifice would slide off.

“Phæ, the gods are trying to get at each other.”

“I know. The cage won’t hold much longer, even if it does it will crush the city when it falls.”

They shared a look; made a decision.

“We need to get Dævara out of there,” he pointed up.

“Dævara?”

“My daughter. She’s the key. If she still has possession of the Blue Lamp, all we have to do is pull her out—what?”

“The Syrat, Phæ? Why?”

His smile was lopsided. “We couldn’t beat the White God last time. It was the only thing left to try.”

She gave him a look that promised a verbal reckoning later. “How do we get her out?”

“She’s carrying a Conjunx. Its twin is—” he pointed up to the top of the Mages Tower—“up there. His name’s Bradwold. Tell him to call her. I’ll get things ready down here.”

“Will the Myr even listen to you?”

A shrug was only answer she got. He turned and began his walk to a waiting group of temporary allies.

Travelling from point to point was a skill learned in the mists of childhood. Paris remembered learning it no more than she remembered learning to speak. It was something of an embarrassment that it took her a moment to recall the trick of it. Finally, though, she was ready.

Enhanced by magick, her eyes picked a spot on the roof. She breathed in sharply, held it, and whispered eight syllables—

And was standing on the flagstones atop the Mages Tower facing a tall, armoured man who looked only slightly distracted by the sudden appearance of a short, armed, naked woman.

Paris wasted no time on explanations. “Bradwold, call to Dævara.”

“What?” His eyebrows rose, his eyes widened.

“Your Conjunx, man! Call to her.”

“Oh! Right!” He turned and looked up into the shaking cube.

A moment later, a small elf woman in black leather, holding a red metal staff and a brilliantly glowing blue lamp appeared in front of Bradwold. She was kneeling with her face buried in his crotch.

Paris moved closer, gripped by an intuition that the explanation would be amusing. She rounded Brad’s hip just in time to hear, slightly muffled, “You promised you’d wear that damnéd thing on your collar, so you did!”

“I forgot, love. Honest I—oowww!” He pulled back, bent over, and pushing at her head, laughing.

She relented and looked up from her knees, the light of mischief in stunning ruby red eyes.

“How did you get here?” he sounded genuinely surprised.

Evil faded from her face; replaced with an ‘I get it!’ expression. “Father! He must have made them work like Portals.”

The other, Brad, nodded. “In the Under! I forgot about that.”

Further banter was halted by a change in the tone of the tumbling, rolling, grinding, grating.

Dævara stood, noting Paris’s presence but not commenting on it.

They looked up and watched the dissolution of the cage so carefully built.

The Blue Lamp had been the keystone of the Working. Without it, the rest was collapsing.

Though it could not be seen behind the light, the Tree had to have faded almost immediately. The rest was now following.

A muffled boom echoed across the city and the triangle of columns sprouting from the town flickered and went out, the Pillars holding them up exploding in sparks. The golden cage cleared. The form of the White God coalesced at the bottom and flattened out above the Red God. Of the Crawling Chaos, there was no longer any sign.

The cube was over a mile above the trio on the roof, but its size made it seem much closer. The corner directly above was resting on the glowing golden column directly behind them.

They could see that corner slip, becoming dangerously close to sliding off altogether.

It never had a chance to.

The cube began to glow brighter and to become more solid-looking, humming all the while. A strong odour of ozone assaulted Paris’s nostrils. It stung badly enough that her eyes began watering.

“Get down! Cover your eyes!” the Brocach Templar shouted to the others to be heard over the noise. Bradwold and Dævara followed her instructions.

The boom of Phæthon’s voice echoed her orders over the entire city.

When it came, the rupture of the cube was painfully loud. A pressure wave bowled Paris over and send the other two tumbling her way.

As soon as she had her balance back the Brocach Templar stood to see the result.

Bar the artifact Dævara still possessed, the last of the Working was gone. The pillars atop the towers; the glowing colossi in the Plaza; even the triangles stretched across the pavement of the plaza had all vanished.

Above the city, what had been once two distinct beings was now a flying collection of coloured light, spinning, buzzing, and spitting sparks.

A noisy, musical tinkling sound came from several directions around Glyph.

Sparkles in their scores flew toward the tower Paris shared with the lovers.

The elf Dævara stood, Blue Lamp held high, and caught all the sparks in its light.

“Emeth!” she intoned and now was holding only a pack of bright metal cards. The Syrat had returned to its Teller.

Quickly, Dævara slid the Syrat into an indigo silk bag and secreted it about her person.

Over the City Glyph was a white and red ball.

It no longer glowed but was entirely opaque; the colours vivid and moving over its smooth surface. It seemed highly polished. Such was the fury of its tumbling, rolling, grinding, grating movement that individual stretches of one colour or the other became impossible to distinguish.

It began to drift down toward the Plaza. Paris was worried whether her brother had been able to convince the Myr to spare the city. She’d sensed his tension when he’d spoken to them.

She needn’t have been concerned.

Twelve silver horses bearing the collections of sparkles that the Myr appeared to be from this distance, rose from the Plaza of Dying Suns.

They flew below the contending gods in a ring almost a mile wide.

The air within that circumference began to shimmer and then to warp, as if the Rakhesh were stirring it. After a few moments, the disc was a uniform grey.

Nine Admoio arrayed themselves beneath it, facing in. Lifting their lances, they directed black lightning into the heart of the circle.

The clap of thunder followed a second later. The center of the grey disc began to dip. Lines of black appeared, spiralling down into the depression. The vortex widened slowly.

Within was NOTHING.

Paris, having been schooled in the Brocach Temple, was used to exposure to NOTHING. She endured it with ease.

The other two held up remarkably well, considering. Dævara—‘My niece,’ Paris realized—gripped her staff tightly but otherwise was still.

Bradwold did not seem to react at all, until his knees buckled as he slumped. His lady love dropped her staff and grabbed his arm, preventing another nasty bruise from joining the one already on his skull. Her staff clattered to the stone as she did so.

She couldn’t hold him up, but he landed more softly than he would have without her help.

Dævara settled on the ground beside him, trying to wake him. The pair remained there, below the level of the parapet, until it was all over.

In the NOTHING appeared a thing even she had never seen: Azathoth, The Lord of Entropy. Being a Templar, she saw it exactly as it was.

A hateful, discordant drumming and piping filled the air.

An awful sucking sound, like the draining of a sea, rose and overwhelmed the music. The sphere of warring Gods descended until it had passed through the plane of the Portal.

The Brocach Templar saw it accelerate as it was drawn to the obscene bulk of the Daemon of Dispersion, shrinking in size rapidly, until it was an insignificant pink dot.

It winked out as it struck the embodiment of the End of all Things.

With no ceremony at all, the portal winked out.

Over the city hung a roaring silence.

— Gideon Jagged
Innsmouth, September 2026

© Gideon Jagged
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