I continued to stare at the sand. Stay calm. What did it mean? Stay calm. It knows it’s almost defeated, it’ll say anything, try anything. Slippery, slimy, the better to fit through loopholes.
“Did you not know that, human?” it went on, the gloating unmistakeable now despite the scratchiness of the voice, the lack of humanity. I turned my head away.
It said, “I thought not. Witless creature, pathetic lapdog. What drives a man to become? Tell me, you who think you are a man, not an animal. Is it guilt? Greed? Lust? Is it different from her? Yes, I think it is.”
The sand was trembling now, rocks dancing half an inch above the surface. I unlocked my knees and straightened my back, trying to ride the waves, my bad ankle shrieking in pain, about to give. I ignored it. Not going to kneel in front of you again, asshole. What in the hell was it implying? Had it come here simply to harangue us about its impending failure?
“Don’t,” Johnny said, sharply. Of course. Figured it out before me. Prodigy. But what?
“Don’t? You little lover of truth, so you say, how long have We watched you? And you have never told him. Let this then be the last thing he hears before We rise. If he is the one you wish at your side when it ends. If he is the one you wish to witness. Is he?”
Close now, so close the desert couldn’t cover its smell, so close I could see the things that made up its wings, not skin at all but thousands of blind, black, leathery creatures clinging to one another. I gagged, recovered, finally found words. “Whatever it is, I don’t care. I don’t want to hear it.”
“No,” it said, “you do not. Had you wondered why you were not killed at once? Why We allow you to live? Why you see Our truths in your dreams?”
“B—because...”
“Nick, don’t listen to it,” Johnny shouted, her voice thick with tears. “It’s lying. You know They lie.”
“I did not lie about your device. Did I?” Drozanoth flapped a wing negligently, sending a wave of sand and stones towards her, crashing against the invisible barrier of her warding spells. Enough got through that she went down, coughing and spitting, nearly into the half-extinguished fire. I turned towards her as if on a string, then stopped. Drozanoth was chuckling.
“You were part of her covenant,” it cried; the ground cracked as if in response.
“Wha...”
“O witless one, perfectly matched! She feared, when we first came to her, that she would spend all her life alone,” it said, laughter now coming from its wings, its chest, the creatures that comprised it all delighted, laughing together. “Thought that Our gift might leave her bereft of love, her great works unadmired. And so she asked for a present. We believe, in fact,” it chortled, bringing its face within feet of mine, “that she wanted a sister. What she got was you.”
“How?” I said, aware of how faint it sounded. All the blood in my body seemed to drain into my gut, all the blood in brain, heart, hands. Everything trembled around me, dark around the edges. My body was lead, sinking into the sand. The buzzing voice seemed to come from inside my head, it was so close.
“We... made arrangements. Planted seeds. Covenanted with others. Arranged a performance. And after you were struck by the human weapon that had struck her, she summoned us and said: Him. He will never leave me. Put him under my protection. You cannot kill him just as You cannot kill me.
“And We always... keep... our word.”
Memory exploded back, driving me almost into the hole; I felt my head slide over the edge of it, hair hanging. Darkness, the smells of blood and piss and cigarette smoke, the dim light of the windows, rough voices. The agony in my shoulder, screaming till I lost my voice, the explosions that had taken off the walls and doors. Two survivors. Two survivors. Bullets striking the small, bloodless corpses. The lie that only ugly things are evil, that only beautiful things are good. The lie, the lifelong lie.
“No,” I said, struggling up, balancing again on the seismic sand.
“Yes. Ask her if it’s true. We are not the ones who lie. She lies.”
My head turned of its own accord to look at Johnny, getting to her feet, scarf gone, her hair sweat-soaked and dark. “Nick,” she said. “I can explain, it’s not the way—”
“Twenty-seven children died that