Dark Fate: The Gathering (The Dark Fate Chronicles Book 1) (63 page)

He found none of those things, but a peculiar-looking man was standing in front of the closed door to his study. Flesh, pale as freshly bleached bed sheets, shone brightly in the shadows beyond the window’s light. Black clothes swathed the tall frame, and hair as dark as his outfit hung well below his shoulders, framing his pallid features.

The ensemble was quite ghastly and had no regard for the season. Kesh shook his head with displeasure. “And who might you be?”

“My name is Vinnicus.” He stepped away from the door toward Kesh. “I would like to inquire about your travels of late.”

“Usually visitors are announced and
invited
.” Kesh thrust his chin forward even as he took an involuntary step backward.

Before Kesh could take another breath, Vinnicus was directly in front of him. There was no sign of the intruder’s movement—he had just disappeared from one spot and materialized in another. Kesh choked in panic and tried to back away for the pale man.

“Calm yourself.” Vinnicus’s eyes glowed solid red.

Kesh’s shoulders relaxed from their hunched and defensive position, and he could feel his stress melt away. Of course he should relax.
This is my home, after all
, he thought. No harm could come to him here.

“Tell me of your travels to Pelos. Start with your departure from Waterfall Citadel.” The words of the command seemed to come from the red orbs themselves. The color fascinated Kesh, and he relayed his story to the man in black. Every detail. Every plot.

“I see,” Vinnicus said when Kesh finished his tale. “This Banlor Graves—he is the architect behind all of the scheming?”

“All but the kidnapping,” Kesh replied. “That was my doing. I would have had Princess Sacha for my own.”

Vinnicus smiled. “Your information has been helpful to me. Do not fret about those who hunt you now. You will be under my protection. I will require only your servitude in return.”

Kesh pondered the offer. Vinnicus seemed trustworthy enough. Wait. Had he just used the term “trustworthy”? Kesh rubbed at his temples, struggling to clear his clouded mind. “I may need time to think on your offer.”

“It is not a choice, Kesh Tomelen. You will serve, or you will die.” Vinnicus placed a delicate, long-fingered hand on Kesh’s shoulder. “It is not my hand that will end you, however, but the hand of your benefactor, Banlor Graves. What you have described can lead to no other conclusion.”

Kesh stared at Vinnicus, knowing the truth of the intruder’s words. His confidence in his own ability to gain back Banlor’s good graces was a lie. Depression began to swirl about him.

“Tell me, Chancellor Tomelen, wouldn’t you prefer to sleep in your own bed this evening?” Vinnicus’s dark brows rose. “Safely?”

The stress of the past weeks crashed down on Kesh like a physical weight. Exhaustion threatened to fell him where he stood. He swayed in place, shoulders slumped, thinking that there was nothing he wanted so much as to stay right here, safe and protected from his enemies.

“Would you not like to see your dreams realized... the success you crave to be granted in full?” Vinnicus persisted.

A spark was kindled in Kesh’s mind. He did long to be a man of stature, of power. He had never lost those desires. One day, men would grovel at his feet and women would be his—as many as he liked, doing whatsoever he should please... Sacha. His head began to nod as his almost-drowned dream of power filtered through the pain and suffering that had seemed to become his only due.

“Then look into my eyes, Kesh Tomelen, and it will be so.”

Kesh hesitated for only a moment. Thoughts of free will fled to the deepest recesses of his mind as he looked into the pale man’s glowing red eyes.

Vinnicus perched on the railing of Minister Graves’s balcony. He peered in through the windows at the aged mortal.

Banlor’s posture spoke of power and influence, but his body was becoming weak. Deep lines were etched into his weathered skin and grey was the dominant color of his hair. Mortality had stained this man from head to toe.

Decades ago, Vinnicus had contemplated making Banlor part of his property, but there were other things to distract him. He had underestimated this man’s potential, it would seem. He had been aware of the minister’s dealings, both legitimate and illegitimate, but it was surprising, even to him, how extensive the man’s reach had become.

Questions of motive and direction were what Vinnicus considered as he watched the man sit in a large, plush chair and begin to thumb through a large and aged tome. Vinnicus slid off the railing and moved to stand in the shadows beside a set of glass doors that would give him entry to Minister Graves’s library. The minister’s scheming had very nearly upset decades of carefully laid plans, and though it appeared coincidental in the light of the chancellor’s tale, the event could not be ignored. Vinnicus needed the human nations to be bound together, and this man’s apparent desire to wrench them apart had to be understood. If it came from the man, a simple death could rectify matters. If it came from elsewhere, then other avenues would have to be pursued.

Vinnicus stepped up to the doors but froze as he reached for a curved handle.
That smell...

He backed away from the doors, deeper into shadow, and forced his dead heart into motion. His will sank into the dark fluid that was his blood and his senses came to life as no mortal’s could.

The smell that had arrested his motion blossomed. A powerful, pungent stink overwhelmed the odors of the garden below the balcony. It was not a physical smell that emanated from this man’s study, despite its subsuming effect on the world around him, but an almost psychic stink. And it was a smell that he knew.

The door to the minister’s study opened, and a lovely young woman entered.

Vinnicus narrowed his eyes. This woman was not human.

She sauntered across the room toward the greying old man. He was too engrossed in his reading to notice her. She came to a stop not far from him and gazed down with affection.

So, they have finally come,
he thought.
Chancellor Tomelen will be of more use than I had previously anticipated
.

Vinnicus stepped to the railing and leaped over the side. The arrival of the Skinner had made it too dangerous to act directly. If the creature were to discover his presence, its master would know as well. The Skinner, and Banlor Graves for that matter, must never know of his existence.

He touched down on the wet cobblestones below the minister’s patio and sped away to the outer walls of the city. Once he had reached the city’s perimeter, his thoughts drifted back to Chancellor Tomelen. It had been long indeed since Vinnicus had thought of a power beyond himself, but it was akin to divine intervention that the foolish little man had developed an infatuation with Sacha. Had he not altered the assassination, the loss of the twins would have been devastating to his plans. Perhaps irretrievably.

Vinnicus slowed as he approached the southern gates. The high walls kept out most of the moisture from the Tanglevine on either side of the city. Mist from the churning water beyond settled heavy on the streets here. Over the years, the populace had decorated the inner walls with colorful mosaics that depicted scenes of fisherman, ancient battles, and old kings. A mark of their history. A way to prove to the future that they had existed.
A complete waste
. One day, this city would be gone—worn to dust over time, along with all of the other great civilizations of Orundal.
One day soon, should I fail...

As he flowed with the populace and through the open gates, a burning sensation grew in the back of his mind. His lips curved slightly in satisfaction. His minions had returned.

Vinnicus separated from the flowing masses of humanity and stepped to the edges of the cliffs that the mortals had named “The Cliffs of Judgment.”
How little they know
, he mused as he stepped off the edge and plummeted into the boiling mists of the falls. Will infused blood into his limbs to support him as he landed heavily on the rocks below and turned back to face the massive cliffs.

The familiar long crevice that crawled its way up the rocky surface looked like the silhouette of a dying tree in the moonlight. The fissure was wide enough at its base to accommodate a single person and was located across one of the many swirling pools that collected at the bottom of the falls.

Vinnicus jumped from his stone perch to the entrance in one great leap. Mentally, he changed his focus of will from strength of sinew to clarity of sense, and the darkness before him parted like a veil. The twisting tunnel stretched beyond even his senses into the darkness beyond.

The practice of centuries eased his path almost as much as his supernatural grace. Each turn and twist of the tunnels he moved through had been traversed by him hundreds of times. He barely noticed the desiccated corpses of the explorers he passed as he rushed to his minions’ call. If a human was prepared to face what existed in the dark, then he must face the consequences of what he found—even if the consequence was Vinnicus himself.

The passages eventually let into a chamber much larger than the bleak oubliettes he had passed, wherein lay the husks of those he had disposed of. A pungent odor emanated from the green and blue moss that covered the shores of the dozens of small, shallow pools. The moss was luminescent, but the dim light only highlighted the deeply alien character of the two creatures he had summoned from Dausos.

Their many legs rose and fell randomly and thick mandibles rattled against hard carapaces as each monster became aware of his presence.

Vinnicus stepped forward. “You have succeeded?”

In response, the giant, arachnid-like creatures danced about. Long arms reached back and sliced through strands of grey silk to free cocoons from where they had been fastened to the bulbous abdomens. Two mummified forms were laid carefully on the floor of the cavern, pillowed in the glowing moss.

Success!
Vinnicus smiled and waved the monstrous demons of the otherworld away.

They rattled loudly with discontent but disappeared into the shadows as commanded.

He knelt beside the two bodies and rested his hands upon them. “Rest now,” he said. “There will be much to do when you awake.”