The catacombs were brighter than the rest of the undercity. Fey light flickered in silver sconces, ice blue and arcane purple casting everything in a cold glow.
I heard Caligula’s whispers twisting around me as I descended, goading me on. There was anticipation in the stale, choked air. These catacombs had been a place of power once, before Caligula. Now it was a dead husk, a host for Caligula.
Deeper within, I saw signs of her presence. Old, disfigured statues. Ritual circles, marred. Makeshift quarters and tattered beds. A cult had once lived here, below the city, among the dead. Caligula’s cult.
There were no murals depicting her rise and fall. No journals or autobiographies to scour. Every piece of art and history in the catacombs had been broken. Shards of a vase, torn recruitment posters. There were bodies, too. These ones were skeletal, but not as decayed as the ossified walls. Her followers, murdered.
The imperials had destroyed Caligula’s stronghold before sealing her ghost inside. I wondered if they had trapped the ghosts of her cultists in crystal, or if Caligula had eaten them all over the lost centuries.
When I was thoroughly lost, I stumbled into the heart of the catacombs: an underground cathedral.
The cathedral was cold, colder than anywhere else in the city. The air tasted like a winter morning, crisp and brittle. Shattered pews lined the central walkway, and bone carvings adorned the walls on either side. Some of them weren’t even carvings, just preserved skeletons arranged in watchful poses.
I walked down the aisle with my head held high. At the end of it, a jagged altar cleaved in two. I picked up a crystal shard lying in the gouge and tapped it against stone a few times. It was inert, but the material was familiar: the altar had once been an Ossuary like the Council’s.
Past the altar sat a throne, and on that throne sat the decayed corpse of Caligula. I looked at the throne and I felt a stirring of desire. I deserved a throne.
Her skeleton was wearing the same fancy robe as her ghost, and I noticed a black ring on one finger bone. I stepped over the altar, lifted her hand, and slipped off the ring.
There was power to it, power like Nero’s bracer. It slid onto my forefinger comfortably. Immediately, I felt stronger. My skin crawled, my heart raced. Magic slithered through my veins with greater intensity than ever before. I felt my ghost. My essence. My power.
“Impressive, isn’t it?”
I nodded. “This is power. Real power. What is it? I felt an item like this in Nero’s throne room, the bracer on his corpse.”
Caligula glided over to her throne and sat on it, occupying the same space as her skeleton and almost melding with it. “They are artifacts created by kindred alchemists. Kindred magic bonded with Ancient material. Each one has a… unique quality. The ring gives its master regenerative capabilities. Faster than the healing arts, too.”
I peered at the ring curiously. I drew my sword and ran my fingers along the edge until they bled. The pain felt good, and looking at spilled blood woke something in me. In seconds, all the cuts healed. “Useful. What does his bracer do?”
“It was created after my time, on another world, but through careful effort I have learned of its nature: an amplifier. He used it for his glamour.” Caligula’s glowing eyes gleamed as she revealed that tidbit, and it only took me a moment to realize the greater implication.
“That’s how Nero kept control for so long. That’s why the Triumvirate waited so long to act against him. He was glamouring them.”
“Not just them. Nero’s tendrils were wrapped around the whole city.” Caligula smiled thinly. “I can think of a great many uses for an artifact like that. Can you?”
Scenarios ran through my head. All of them exciting. “Yes. Oh, yes.” I glanced back at the broken Ossuary. “And I think I’m beginning to understand what you were planning.”
She laughed. “That you know I was planning something is clever enough. The dogs that came for me never figured it out, and they were esteemed warlocks of the grand and glorious empire.” Disdain dripped from every word. “Centuries ago, I called it luck that they killed me. In truth, I made mistakes. I was sloppy. We shall not make those same errors, my apprentice.”
“No, we won’t.” I matched her smirk. “I’m going to eat the empire whole.”
A chill wind swept through the cathedral and Caligula frowned.
“What?”
She growled, “Strix.”
I turned around to face the cathedral entrance and saw the First Consul standing in the doorway with half a dozen armored ghosts. “Valerian. Caligula. Having a nice chat?”
My lip curled. “Feeling suicidal, dead woman? You’re a bit late to stop me. You’re not strong enough to take on both of us.”
Caligula growled again. “Pointless sacrifice was never Strix’s style, apprentice. She has just done something very inconsiderate aboveground.”
Strix folded her arms. “You should have killed me when you had the chance, Caligula. When I realized I couldn’t stop Valerian from running to you, I also remembered your grand plan. So I talked to an old friend.”
I recognized that armor. Royal. “You cut a deal with Nero? The bastard who killed you?”
“Better an impotent emperor than a soul-devouring monster. Right now, in the streets above, Nero’s soldiers are cutting down every citizen they can find. By the time you learn how to use the dark art, there’ll be no ghosts left in the city for you to eat.”
I stared at her. I let the shock wash over me. Then, I laughed. I cackled with manic glee. “You, you are something else. I keep underestimating you, Strix. It takes real guts to genocide your own people. I’ll try to learn from your example.” I grinned at her. “Let’s kill her, teacher.”
“With pleasure.”
Six imperial guards charged me while Strix darted behind a broken bench. I blasted them with lightning, obviously. With the ring bolstering my stamina, the greater form of my lightning came easily. Agony magic surged in vicious waves and sent all six staggering. They were strong though, strong enough to take another few steps, gritting their spectral teeth through the pain.
I upped the intensity, and delivered a wicked smile as Caligula reached the first of them and ripped out his glowing heart. She crushed it, breathed in the wisps of energy, and devoured that ghost greedily. Two guards turned from me and lunged at her, slashing wildly, professional training broken by unceasing torture.
Strix moved in the background, creeping closer and closer, using the environment as cover. Her lapdogs kept most of my attention, slowing resisting my ministrations. They were too strong-willed, too bolstered by Nero and Strix.
I cut off the flow of magic to the three guards at my side. In the distance, Caligula devoured another guard, and I let my lightning fade from her last opponent. She could handle it.
Four ghosts came at me and I rolled away from the first spear stab. Three guards surrounded me and I roared my hatred. Crackling agony magic exploded in all directions and sent them all stumbling back. Strix filled the gap, lunging for my neck with her dagger. I lunged at the same time, going low. I fell right through her and emerged the other side, cold and gasping but avoiding her attack.
Another choked gasp from behind me, and Caligula returned to my side. She said, “I haven’t feasted this well in decades. You’ve overplayed your hand, Strix. You’re vulnerable.”
The First Consul wasn’t bothering to hide her emotions anymore. Frustration played in the lines around her eyes and in her clenched fists. “Damn you, warlock. And your little heir.” Then the tension eased, and a cruel smirk replaced her glare. “At least I bought the world some time. Soldiers, hold them off.” The royal guards charged again, and Strix ran to the cathedral entrance.
I made to blast with her lightning but Caligula shook her head. “She can’t run forever.”
We dealt with Strix’s minions easily. A bit of sorcery, a bit of consumption, and the cathedral was ours again. I only let myself revel in victory for a few seconds before asking, “How do I learn the third path?”
Caligula smiled and returned to her throne. “The dark art is a glorious one, and it is also the most difficult to master. Artifacts, my personal tutelage, and your own instincts will make it easier, of course. It is the magic of consumption, feasting, hunger. The ability to devour the life force of your enemies, be they flesh or ether.”
I tilted my head. “I’ve been hungry before, but never felt magic in it.”
“Ah, but that is not true hunger, just its shadow. Craving for a snack is not hunger. Dinner after a long day’s work is not hunger. No, hunger is carnal and visceral. It is what you feel when you look at my throne. It is what drives you to slay Nero. It is why you came to this city, is it not?” She steepled her fingers as she waited for my answer.
“You talk about hunger like it’s about power, not food.”
“Because it is.” Caligula gestured to the rows of pews, and my gaze was drawn to rag-garbed skeletons. “My most prodigal acolytes had been slaves and servants before they came to me. The wealth-born, the fat-fed, they knew hunger only as a triviality to be corrected. But the destitute, for them hunger was a constant companion. It was a reaper.
“Hunger is knowing that someone else controls your food supply. Hunger is scrounging for scraps. Hunger is the burning hatred that festers in your heart when you look at the gilded bedchamber of the glutton who keeps you from eating because you spilled a drop of wine.” Raw, pure malevolence radiated from Caligula.
“You’re speaking from experience.”
She chuckled. “Yes… yes, I am. Does that surprise you, Valerian? It surprised Strix, learning that a slave girl could become the most powerful warlock of her time. But that is because the imperials were fools who thought they could suppress our magic.”
“Our?” I stared at her. “Wait, how could you learn that if you were a slave? I thought only kine were slaves. And I thought only kindred could learn kindred magic.”
“My apprentice, kine are kindred. Just ones from other worlds, with other skin, shackled with devices and implements to restrain their potential.”
The revelation hit me like a bag of bricks. I clutched the altar for support and rested more of my weight on it. “So you escaped, then. And removed those… implements.”
“Anger. Detachment. Hunger. Slaves know these well, Valerian. Magic came naturally to me. So naturally, in fact, that my collar could not suppress it entirely. When I saw inside myself and found that magic waiting, I knew that the world the empire had built was false. Breakable. I learned to inflict pain, and to deceive, and to consume.”
Silence.
I looked at the shards of her Ossuary and toyed with them idly. “Well, you’re right. I’ve never felt hunger like that. I’ve eaten from well-stocked kitchens, and when there was nothing I wanted from there, our forests were lush and bountiful. Our seas full of fish. I’ve never wanted for… anything, until a few weeks ago. All my life, everything came easy to me. I was destined to be the Chosen One, and everyone could see it. For years, I trained, I competed, but it was all an illusion. They knew I would win. I knew I would win.”
“And then?”
“They denied me. Their precious little Council. Called me a threat, and pushed me out. I felt hunger then, I think. Hunger for the power they were trying to take away. I opened a portal, and that just made it worse. They exiled me. That stung. It stung worse when my old rival turned up.” My lip curled at the memory of Duncan. “She offered her aid. We came to this city because I thought there was prophecy here. Something to convince the Council that I was the Chosen One.”
“And now?”
I looked up from the shards and straight at Caligula. “I’m done playing their game. I’m not Chosen. I don’t need to be. I will take, and take, and destroy everything in my way.”
“What are you willing to do? What would you sacrifice for power?”
“Anything. Everything.”
Amusement twinkled in her eyes, but her tone was serious. “Are you sure about that? My methods are extreme, Valerian. If you want to learn the dark art, if you want to learn it quickly, you will suffer. You will starve. You may go mad.”
“And at the end of it all… will I be strong enough to kill Nero? Strong enough to devour this city? Strong enough to conquer this world?”
“Yes.”
“Then I’m willing.”
Caligula smiled. “Then it is time for you to become a warlock. You are ready.”