Chapter 9 — Seven Heads
There is no pain quite like two demon monarchs fighting inside your soul.
Kael experienced it as a full-body event. He was dimly aware of his real body, thrashing in his bed, of his mother's voice in the hallway, of dawn light through the curtains. But mostly he was here — in the soul-room, on the dark glass floor, watching the sky tear apart.
Void moved first.
The shadow monarch simply ceased to be in one place and arrived in another, a blade of darkness the size of a tower sweeping for the Slyth's throat — and the Slyth caught it on one wing, and the collision didn't make a sound. It made a silence, a hole where sound was supposed to be, and the floor of dark glass crazed into cracks for a mile.
"Oh, he's strong," Spark said, beside Kael's elbow, watching with the fascination of a spectator at a hanging. "I'd forgotten. Four hundred years and he's still—"
"SPARK. WHAT IS HAPPENING."
"A custody battle," Spark said. "You're the custody."
The Slyth's jaws closed on Void's shoulder and the shadow came apart like smoke and re-formed six feet to the left, laughing. Void's answer was a lance of absolute dark through the dragon's wing, pinning it to the sky, and the Slyth didn't roar in pain — he roared in offence.
"YOU WERE NOTHING," the Slyth thundered. "A throne in the dark, a king of an empty room—"
"And you were everything," Void said, and for the first time his voice had edges, "and it bored you so much you spent a thousand years waiting for one human to knock."
They crashed together again. The soul-room bucked like a ship. Kael felt it in his marrow, in his teeth, in the roots of his new white hair — every blow landed somewhere in him, a deep interior booming, and Spark was saying something urgent, and Kael couldn't hear it over the sound of gods.
And then the Slyth got angry.
Really angry.
The monarch planted himself in the centre of the storming sky, spread his bone wings to their full cathedral span, and his body began to change.
His neck split.
Kael watched, unable even to scream, as the Slyth's single head divided — divided — divided — until seven heads swayed above seven necks, each one crowned in a different fire.
Crimson. Azure. Orange. Gold. Violet. White.
And at the centre, a seventh head wreathed in a flame that wasn't flame at all — a consuming black, a fire shaped like an absence, like the world's first hunger wearing the mask of fire.
"THE PRIMORDIAL FORM," Spark breathed, and the rabbit had stopped being funny entirely. "Kael. That's what he was. Before the realms divided. Before there were seven monarchs of seven plains — there was one dragon, and he had seven heads, and every monarch in the Shadowrealm is just one of those heads torn off and given a throne."
'You're telling me,' Kael thought, 'that the thing in my soul is all seven demon kings. In one body. That's been there since my shower.'
"Yes," said Spark. "I thought it would demotivate you."
Seven throats kindled. Seven fires gathered. The soul-room's sky turned white at the edges with heat that did not technically exist, and the seven heads of the Slyth aimed themselves, all of them, at the shadow on the bone throne.
"LEAVE," said the Slyth, in seven voices braided into one, "OR BURN."
And Void — Void laughed.
It was a genuine laugh. Surprised, delighted, unhinged. The shadow monarch looked up at the primordial dragon blazing above him, and spread his arms wide, and said:
"There it is. There's the old monster. Do you know how long it's been since anyone saw you wear all seven faces?" His ink-skull tilted. "Now. Ask yourself, ancient one — you know the law as well as I do. Pour seven flames through that brand, into this soul, and what happens to the boy in the middle?"
The seven heads stopped.
"Nothing survives that," Void said softly. "Not me. Not the vermin. Not him. The vessel bursts, the brand closes, and you spend another thousand years waiting for a soul that can hold you. Or—" the shadow's voice went silken, "—you accept reality. The boy is shared ground now. Neither of us can have him. Both of us need him alive."
Seven fires burned. Seven pairs of eyes fixed on the shadow.
And slowly — terribly slowly — the flames banked.
"...He will grow," the Slyth said at last, in one voice again, and the seven heads began, reluctantly, to fold back into one. "He will grow strong enough to hold a monarch's full power. And on that day, shadow, I will return for what is mine, and I will find out what colour your cowardice burns."
"Everyone's a critic," Void sighed.
The Slyth's presence withdrew — out through the brand, out through the door, one furnace-eye lingering on Kael until the last instant.
"Grow strong, little vessel," said the monarch. "I have never wanted anything to live as much as I want you to."
Then he was gone.
The soul-room was silent. Void sat back down on his throne with the air of a man who had just enjoyed an excellent play.
"So," Void said. "You've seen his true face now. Seven heads. Seven flames. The other six are out there in the plains, boy, wearing crowns of their own — and one day your brand will call every one of them."
He smiled his impossible smile.
"Seven demons. I do hope you're a quick learner."