The Strength of the Few

Siamun approaches the gold mutalis door. As before, the thrumming sound makes him nauseous and afraid. He touches the door and it opens. The massive room beyond is filled with gold light and glyphs. In the center is a shallow pool with a golden altar in the middle. The water shudders and vibrates, and the area shimmers with mutalis energy. Siamun realizes that the altar is a sarcophagus with a man carved onto its surface.

He finds a golden crook and flail hanging on the wall and believes they are the weapons Caeror said were hidden here. He touches them and suddenly sees himself carried on a horse, with a missing arm, then a black-eyed man holding Aequa’s head with one hand.

The images stop. He takes the crook and flail, leaving the sarcophagus untouched. In the corridor, he tests the weapons. Recognizing the glyph for blood, he smears a drop of blood on the crook and touches it to a wall. The wall explodes. He leaves Qabr and heads toward Duat.

Catenicus and Aequa meet outside the prison. He leaves to check the street while Aequa watches the entrance. He hears Aequa talking to someone and recognizes Decimus’s voice. Aequa cries out in pain, and Catenicus returns. Decimus says that Iro has died from his injuries. He wants Catenicus to experience the same loss he did. He grabs Aequa’s head and crushes her skull.

Then he attacks Catenicus, breaking his legs. He intends to leave Catenicus there, feet away from the prison where he knows Catenicus planned to save Lanistia. Decimus taunts him, saying, “The needs of the many will always be loud. […] But in the end, it is only the strength of the few that matters” (610), and leaves.

Catenicus uses his metal triangles to form braces for his broken legs and walks to the prison. With his forged papers, the guards let him in. He searches in the logs for Lanistia’s cell and is shocked to see that Ulciscor is there as well.

Catenicus finds and releases Lanistia. He gives her some Will so she can see. He tells her what is happening, including the civil war and what he now knows about the Labyrinth and Caeror. Suddenly, Lanistia gives the Will back to Catenicus. The voice in her head returned when she had his Will. She decides to wait there while he gets Ulciscor.

On the way to Ulciscor, Catenicus finds Relucia in a Sapper. He wakes her and demands everything she knows about the Anguis’ plans. She tells him everything she knows. She adds that Ostius helped Estevan build the weapon used during the naumachia. She insists that she does not like the violence but says it is necessary. He puts her back in the Sapper.

He finds Ulciscor. They meet up with Lanistia and leave without incident. He takes them to the Telimus estate. Kadmos gives Catenicus a tea to numb the pain. Lanistia and Ulciscor make plans to escape the city. Catenicus heads to the harbor with Diago following. He breaks the medallion that Ostius gave him for protection on the way.

Siamun reaches Duat and uses the crook to blast a hole in the wall. Overseers charge him, and he fights them off, running into Duat. He reaches the giant obsidian bridge and blasts chunks out of the rock while Overseers run toward him and Gleaners fly in from the desert. The bridge breaks and falls into the river below, taking him with it. In the water, he fights against Overseers and escapes into the water tunnels.

Tara sneaks into Deaglan’s hut and cuts his bonds. She pulls the stone broach out of his neck, and his strength returns. They try to escape, but Gallchobhar catches them. Tara challenges Gallchobhar to a duel. If he wins, she dies. If she wins, she and Deaglan go free. He accepts.

They fight, but Tara loses. She is severely wounded. Gallchobhar calls for Ronan, offering Tara’s life for Ronan’s. Ronan accepts. Gallchobhar’s men send Tara to the gate, and Ronan walks out, where he is tied and left with Deaglan. Gallchobhar takes Ronan and Deaglan to the lake to sacrifice them to the gods. As mockery, he ties the silver arm to Deaglan’s severed stump, then stabs him through the stomach.

Next, Gallchobhar cuts off Ronan’s head. Warriors pour out of the Caer Aras gates. Gallchobhar kicks Deaglan into the lake. Deaglan struggles, sinking. Then Cristoval appears. He unties Deaglan and removes his Vitaeria, putting it around Deaglan’s neck. Deaglan’s injury begins to heal. Cristoval stops moving, truly dead.

Suddenly, Deaglan can feel his missing arm. He has imbued the silver arm on instinct and can now move it. He climbs out of the lake and screams for Gallchobhar. Warriors freeze at the sight of him, believing he has been sent by their gods.

He sees Lir’s druid staff on the ground and picks it up, needing a weapon. When he touches it, he is suddenly standing in a rotunda of white columns with Lir. Lir instructs Deaglan on what to say to Gallchobhar: the gods have made Deaglan draoi nasceann, and have rejected Gallchobhar’s sacrifice. Fiachra’s men must surrender or be punished by the gods for dishonoring the Old Ways.

Then Deaglan is on the riverbank again. He repeats what Lir told him and challenges Gallchobhar. They fight, and he kills Gallchobhar. Ronan’s men carry Deaglan into Caer Aras, where he collapses.

Siamun wakes in the overflow cavern. Netiqret is there with Kiya. She gives him clothes and leads him out of the tunnels, asking what he needs. He needs a priest who can get him into the inner temple. Netiqret explains that she worked for the Nomarch. When Kiya was chosen to join, it was supposed to be a great honor, but she regrets not resisting. A year later, someone contacted her through a iunctus, offering to give Kiya back if she killed a priest. The iunctii brought Kiya to her but said that only the Nomarch could restore her mind. After that, she became an assassin to gain favors in hopes of accessing the Nomarch.

They reach the temple but find that the priests have been evacuated and the temple sealed. Netiqret accepts that there is nothing more she can do for her daughter. She asks Kiya to connect to the Nomarch and distract it long enough for Siamun to enter Ka’s Pyramid, knowing that this will destroy any remnant of her daughter that remains.

Catenicus staggers through the battle on the docks. He finds Eidhin and begs him to leave with him. When Eidhin refuses, Catenicus tells him the truth about who he is. He let the Anguis manipulate him, and he is therefore partially responsible for the current carnage. He says that the Republic will either break Eidhin or kill him, and warns that even if he succeeds in “mitigat[ing] one tiny part of their evil” (674), he will be unintentionally helping his enemies in other ways.

A Military soldier attacks, stabbing Diago with a spear. Eidhin and Catenicus argue about what to do. Catenicus has a plan. For reasons he does not understand, it seems that Ka does not want this level of chaos. He intends to negotiate with Ka. Catenicus will campaign to be the next Military Princeps. With that role, he can end the civil war. Then, after things have calmed down, he and Eidhin can stop Ka. If they do nothing, everyone will die anyway and it will not matter if Ka starts another Cataclysm or not. Eidhin agrees.

Siamun enters Ka’s Pyramid. He climbs a stairway that curves out and around the outside of the pyramid. Gleaners head toward him. He reaches an enormous gold door that opens at his touch. With the Gleaners close behind, he runs and reaches another door. The massive chamber beyond is filled with bookshelves, desks, and comfortable chairs. He pushes a desk to block the door.

He finds a large triangular stone table with a man lying on top of it. The man’s arms are crossed, and he looks Catenan. Siamun touches the crook to the man’s chest, and nothing happens. His resistance to the mutalis seems proof that he is Ka. Siamun stabs his heart.

Deaglan wakes, and Tara says the siege ended four days ago. Fiachra’s men fled. Ruarc surrendered. He has asked to speak with Deaglan. Grainne and her entire family are alive and well among the crowd, having escaped before the warriors burned down the farm.

They hold a funeral for Cristoval, burying him in a cairn marked with the whorled lines he saw on the Fornax archway. Tara calls it the triskeles, which symbolizes honor and respect.

Then Deaglan sees Ruarc. The man wears a silver torc around his neck, imbued with Will. He speaks in Vetusian and claims to be Caeror. He has surrendered because one of Deaglan’s counterparts has made a “terrible mistake” (694). He hands Deaglan the silver torc from his neck, saying it contains answers. Deaglan thinks about the violence and death that Ruarc has caused. He crushes the torc in his silver hand.

They leave Diago in Kadmos’ care and head into the city, hiding in a burned building to rest. A iunctus appears, speaking Vetusian and claiming to be the man they are looking for. Catenicus offers a deal: He will become the new Military Princeps and stop the civil war, but he needs something that will force his enemies to submit. The iunctus agrees, saying that the Cataclysm is a necessary sacrifice to “prevent the obliteration of two worlds, and the enslavement of whichever remains” (699), and now Catenicus is the only one who can fulfill this duty.

The iunctus takes them to the Necropolis, explaining that he is not the Concurrence, but its enemy. The Concurrence is a “self-contained latticework of iunctii. The remnants of a rogue system that once controlled the lives of hundreds of millions of people across the world” (702).

They enter a cavern filled with corpses on stone slabs. The iunctus says that this is the real Necropolis, “one of our earliest attempts to build something to rival the Concurrence” (703). The Military learned how to use it to preserve the knowledge of the dead. There are nearly 80 thousand in the chamber, and he wants Deaglan to wake them all. By using Will to imbue the first three, he can start a chain reaction. Each person will retain their personality and will have Will equal to a Princeps.

Eidhin begs Catenicus not to do it. The iunctus says that this is the sacrifice Catenicus must make for the greater good. Catenicus touches the first corpse. He tells Eidhin that “fear is a lack of control” (706), and he is tired of being afraid. Eidhin says he is still with him. The corpses wake. Among them is Catenicus’s mother and sister. A familiar voice calls for him. He and Eidhin turn and smile.