Mister Kindly’s tail curled about Cleo’s neck, not-eyes turned to the dome above.
“… best to be prepared for your arrival…”
Cleo stared at Mia with eyes as deep as centuries.
We knew you were coming. We heard you calling in the desert. The wastelings who answered your summons.
“Kraken,” Mia nodded. “Retchwyrms. How can they hear us calling?”
They are all that remains of the city that once stood here. Worms and insects, twisted by the magiks that bled from this corpse that was empire.
“And why do they hate it when we werk the dark?”
They remember in their souls. They know in their blood. His fall was their ruin. And we are all that is left of him.
“Anais,” Mia whispered.
Cleo’s eyes narrowed at the mention of the Moon’s name.
You come to claim that which is ours.
“Unless you want to give it to me.”
Cleo sighed and shook her head.
Little one. Nothingling. Serf and sycophant to a power too weak to save herself. Bidding us die that her son might live. Condemning us to the grave so she might know reprieve. Asking all and giving nothing and never once questioning the right of it.
The darkness about them shivered as the woman raised her hands, palms up.
Goddess she names herself. And slaves she names us. Thinking us tiny players on a stage built of weak and hollow grandeur.
Cleo looked at Mia, black lips curling in disdain.
She offers nothing, save what she will take back. And still, you kneel before her.
“I kneel for no one,” Mia spat.
Cleo’s laughter echoed off the gravebone walls, rolling among the gathering of daemons like ripples through black water.
“I mean it,” Mia said. “I give no fucks for gods or goddesses. I don’t care about winning a war or restoring the balance between Light and Night or Niah or Aa or any of it. I never have. I’m here for my brother.”
Cleo licked at her lips, fingertips digging into her skin. The whispers about her seemed to hush, the dark sinking deeper as she dragged broken nails down her arms again. She shivered at the pain, eyes wide and shining.
We had familia once. A boy. A beauty. All we had, we gave to him. And he left us, dearheart, sweetheart, blackheart. Left us all alone. Seek not your worth in the eyes of others. For what is given may be taken away. And what then shall remain?
“I’m not here to answer your riddles,” Mia growled. “I’m not here for the meaning of life. I’m here for the power to rescue the only thing I have left that matters.”
We will not give it to you.
Mia took one step closer. “Then I’ll take it.”
“… mia, you can’t win like this…”
“Shut the fuck up, Mister Kindly.”
“… look around you…,” the shadowcat insisted. “… look where you are, what you face. stop and think for a moment, for once in your life…”
“Fuck you,” she hissed, drawing her sword.
Cleo raised her arms, and the shadows erupted. Ribbons of living darkness unfurled like wings from her bare shoulders. She rose into the air, long black hair whipping and coiling, her legion of daemons swarming, swooping, swaying around her.
Mia reached into her belt, flinging a handful of red wyrdglass right at Cleo’s face. Cleo’s body shimmered, the glass exploded, blooms of fire flaring briefly in the gloom. But the woman was already gone, Stepping out of a shadowbat’s body and hovering in the gloom above Mia with a dark smile. Cleo’s long black hair formed itself into blades of shadow, flowing like liquid, sharp like steel, streaming toward Mia like spears, and Mia
Stepped
aside, reached back into her belt, flinging a handful of white wyrdglass this time. The globes exploded into a toxic cloud, but again, Cleo was simply gone, Stepping out of a shadowhawk’s fleeting form, back to the air over Mia’s head. The girl Stepped, up, far up, directly into the shadowed roof of this strange cathedral. Kicking off the crumbling gravebone ceiling and diving back down out of the sky, blade raised in both hands. Cleo flickered again, avoiding Mia’s blow, catching her up in tendrils of liquid black. Mia slashed at the darkness,
Stepped
away like a hummingbird, flinging more red wyrdglass. Cleo simply vanished, appearing out of Mister Kindly’s shape, still waiting back up on the landing.
And so they danced, the pair of them. Black smoke, echoing dark, hollow booms. Mia was silent as death, her face a grim mask, her blade flashing. Flickering around the room like a