The Broken God by Gareth Hanrahan (desktop ebook reader .TXT) 📕

The physical, and the spiritual – or, as sorcerers prefer to call it, the aetheric. The gods exist primarily on the aetheric plane; mortals, primarily, on the physical. But the two worlds are interconnected.”

“Oh, really? I hadn’t noticed.”

“It goes both ways. Mortal thoughts shape and agitate the aether, pushing it in different directions. Over a long, long time, those eddy currents become self-perpetuating and—”

“That’s all a god is, right?” Cari does know something about this. “A self-perpetuating structure.”

“From one perspective – yes. Gods are structures in the aether, given motion by the action of human souls. And freshly dead souls are most potent of all, for they are free of mortal entanglements. Hence the divine hunger for sacrifices and funeral rites, and the preponderance of psychopomps.”

“Preponderance of psychopomps,” echoes Cari. “Gods below, if you don’t die on the way, this is going to be a hellish journey. Go on, what does all this have to do with the Ghost Walls?”

“The aetheric plane is perilous. It’s elemental chaos, churning with gods and demons. Worse, it’s timeless – effects ripple and echo there back and forth in time, from a mortal perspective. Now, when a sorcerer casts a spell—” Myri conjures a werelight, snuffs it out, “I’m reaching into the aether with my mind, and agitating it just so as to create a physical effect. To do so, I must expose myself to the currents and storms of the aetheric plane – and, often, endure cross-currents and backwash. And, because I am human and thus a creature of the material realm, such backwash takes on material form. Material consequences.” With a hideous grin, Myri wipes away a little blood from her lips and flicks it into the surf. It glimmers for a moment before a wave washes it away.

“And the Ghost Walls? It takes you longer to get to the point than it does to get to Khebesh.”

“They cut the aether of Khebesh off from outside influences, creating a placid zone. And the sorcerers record every act of magic, so they can compensate for it. Maintain the balance of the world.” Myri’s grown breathless. And irritated, as if the discussion of the Ghost Walls angered her. “But speaking of Khebesh – where is the grimoire of Doctor Ramegos? Where did Hawse hide it?”

Cari takes a deep breath. She’s been anticipating this moment for some time, and hopes she’s right.

“I think – right here.”

She shucks off her rags and steps off the rock shelf.

Diving down, to reach the muck of the drowned land.

Falling into the hands of the Lord of Waters.

Cari thinks of that thorn-bush goddess on the mountain, renewing herself after being destroyed. Tethered to that shrine, to the Rock of Ilbarin. Thinks of Hawse’s altar on the Rose, his devotion to a vanished god. His promise that the Lord of Waters had a plan for her.

And her vision in the rift — the Bythos swimming over the grave of the god. Something must have survived. Gods cannot die. There has to be something left, some meaning to Hawse’s long vigil, his martyrdom.

Her thoughts become a prayer.

She reaches the seabed and holds on, sinking her fingers into the mud. Holding on as her lungs burn, her vision darkens. Hoping she’s right.

Movement, in the deeps.

Cari kicks back up, breaching the surface, gasping for air. She swims back to the rock and pulls herself out of the sea, turns in time to see the first of the Bythos emerging from the water behind her. Half a dozen of the fish-creatures swim towards her, lowing softly, their iridescent scales gleaming wetly like jewels.

Only one follows her out of the water. It stumbles as it climbs up the rocks, the sudden weight of its fishy upper body nearly too much for the withered human frame beneath to bear. The human portion of the Bythos is naked, headless, bloated from weeks underwater, but Cari still recognises it by its gait, by its broken hands.

It’s Captain Hawse.

How much of Hawse survives in this hybrid being? Is there still something of the captain in there, or it is just using him, a divine parasite animating that stumbling human form? Did the captain want this, in the end? Is it reward or punishment – or is she applying human words, human intent, to something beyond human comprehension?

As the Bythos approaches, her eyes are drawn not to the holy fish-body that trails behind the creature, nor to the remains of Hawse that carry it, but to the point of union, the spot where Hawse’s neck fuses with the underbelly of the fish. She doesn’t know why it fascinates her so, nor can she draw any meaning from it, but that point of balance draws her eye, as if she can discern whether the Bythos is more god than man.

It stops, and extends its ruined hands – Hawse’s hands, familiar and loved – offering her a bundle wrapped in oilskins. The fucking book, at last.

She takes it, reverently, and lays it on the rock beside her.

Without a word or gesture, the Bythos turns and slips into the ocean, vanishing instantly from sight.

Cari chooses to take it as one last jest from the captain, that he walks away without a word, just like she did six years ago. He doesn’t speak, but the return of the book is proof enough of his friendship.

“To Khebesh,” she says through the tears.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

In the house on Lanthorn Street, Rasce holds a wake for Vyr. He was not well liked by any of the thieves: not by his Ghierdana kinfolk, nor the Eshdana, nor the Guerdon thieves, but he was one of them, and they honour that bond if nothing else. Bottles of wine and casks of arax, then the common ground of whisky.

Vyr’s body, still wrapped in the sheet, lies on the table in the room downstairs. In time, they’ll bring it back to the isles of the Ghierdana and bury him in the crypts. Once, it was the tradition of