Caine's Law (2 page)

Defeated at last.

With your final exertion of will, you reach up to the hilt of the Accursèd Blade and ignite its power within the altar. With the touch of your hand, the Accursèd Blade becomes again the Sword of Man, and now the first spastic twitch of your tattered arm will slash the Sword free from its platinum grave, to bring the Eternal Vaunt itself crashing into ruin that
destroys My Body as well as your own—to make of yourself and Me an ending that cannot be unmade.

It is for this I have created you, Beloved. To set me free.

It is for this I Called you here to Me with dreams of Black Knives and murder. It is for this I created the Smoke Hunt and unleashed its hunger upon the innocent.

It is for this I brought you down from the cross.

With your hand on the Sword, the moment stretches ever closer to the infinite, an agonizing extension of eternity. Have you always waited so long to do what you were born for? Has it ever been thus … or …?

Is this—against all possibility, against the weight of Reality itself—somehow
new
?

And here then, now, for the first time forever, you cough your throat clear of the blood from your punctured lung. Scarlet sprays across your useless legs. You gasp against the ripping within your chest, and now, impossibly—

“I know … what You are … fucker.” Your voice is rusted barbwire, yanked up your throat one word at a time. “
Who
You are. You … 
hear
me … fucker? You understand? I
know
.”

You
know
Me—? O Beloved, is this yet merely My Dream …?

It must be. You don’t say this. You don’t say anything. You never have, and thus you never will.

You
can’t
.

“Dunno … if You understand. Dunno if You can … even
hear
me … uh. Fucking listen … anyway. I know You’re not just … the Smoke God. I know how Panchasell Mithondionne Bound You to this place, and I know why. I know You chose me for Your Unbinding … and there’s something I gotta say.”

Had I breath, it would be held for this …

“No.”

What?

“You hear …? Y’understand?
No
, fucker. No. Terms … terms of my bargain … a universe of pain … our own Caine Show … uh. Nothing in there says I have to … kill you. Not like this. Not at all.”

This is not possible. This does not happen. This cannot happen. This has never happened and it never will.

“It’s not … the people who died here. The Pratts. T’Passe. Kierendal. Not the people I murdered. Khlaylock. Tyrklld. It’s not even that I … shot Angvasse in the face … blew her fucking
head
off … when all she was trying to do was
help
 …”

How should I care why you choose to defy Me? How can you even delude yourself that you have choice at all?

“It’s just …” You shake your head, and now tears roll free from your shuttered eyes. “It’s everything. It’s the fucking world. It’s that slave woman in County Faltane … the one who died in the fire …”

I set My Will upon you: Draw the Sword. Give your life to Unbind the prison that is My Body. Now and forever, My Will be done.

And beyond reason, instead of the clench of hand and arm to Draw the Sword, I feel your lips pull back from your blood-salted teeth. “I
felt
that …” you murmur. “So You’re listening after all. Well, all right, then.”

Impossibly now strength returns to your shattered limbs, and you use the Sword to pull yourself upright, and climb to your feet, balancing on your unbroken leg. “Pirichanthe: by Name I conjure Thee: Hear my word. Pirichanthe: twice by Name I conjure Thee: Understand my word. Pirichanthe: by Name thrice I conjure Thee: Believe my word.”

Panting, coughing, hacking up gouts of blood into the storm winds and thunder, your voice is scarcely a whisper, but I hear, and I understand, and I believe …

“You want me to draw this Sword and send you back to whateverthefuck Outside nonplace you came from? Okay. I can kill you. Happy to. But I’m a
professional
, fucker. I get paid for this shit.”

Paid …

Your hand upon the Sword to Bind Us in the permanent now, you lift your blood-smeared wolfen grin to the burning sky.

“I want to make a deal.”

S
imon Faller adjusted his tie for the hundredth time. All his collars were too big for him now; his appearance had become a compromise between leaving his collar half-open like a drunk and cinching it tight like a Temp in secondhand clothes. His image in the palmpad’s default mirror grimaced back at him. Swipes of exhaustion black as dried blood underlined his eyes. His hair—where he still had hair—straggled behind his ears. His lips had gone grey as his suit. When the door beside him slid open, he flinched and almost dropped the palmpad.

The aide was barely a third his age. “Professional? The Director will see you now.”

Faller tucked the palmpad securely into one armpit and followed the aide through three layers of outer office. The new Director’s personal office was unimpressive, as was the new Director, a small nervous man with a permanent frown who was directing that frown toward his deskscreen. He made a shooing motion with one hand without looking up. The aide discreetly evaporated.

“Professional Faller. Don’t bother to sit.”

Faller forbore to mention that the Director occupied the only chair. “Yes, Administrator. Thank you for seeing me on such short notice, sir.”

“And don’t bother toadying.” The Director turned that frown toward Faller. “You were born Professional, I take it.”

“I, ahh, I mean, yes. Yes, sir.”

“My family have been Artisans for more than a hundred years,” the Director said severely. “I was the first elevated to Professional. I am the sole member of my family,
ever
, to rise as high as Administration. Ordinarily I enjoy obsequy as much as the next Administrator, but this is not an ordinary day.”

“Yes, sir. That’s why I asked to see you.” Faller licked his lips and extended the palmpad like a serving tray. “This—I mean, have you seen this? What I’m supposed to show him?”

“Of course.”

“Please, Administrator, you must understand—this will
not
persuade him. Or intimidate him. It’s exactly the opposite of how—”

“Only a moment ago I was onscreen with the Board of Governors making precisely that argument. The Board isn’t interested in argument. They aren’t interested in our opinions. They’re interested in our obedience, and they will have it.”

“Administrator—” Faller almost dropped the palmpad for the second time in five minutes. He set it on the Director’s desk and backed away. “I’m not sure I can do this.”

“And I’m sure you will.”

“But—please, sir. I thought you knew him. I can’t threaten his
family—do
you know what
happens
to people who threaten his family?”

“You won’t threaten his family. Neither will I. Our task is to convey information. Specific information, conveyed as specifically directed.”

“That’s a—” Faller thought he was about to laugh; what came from his mouth was instead more of a despairing bleat. “Do you think he’ll care about fine distinctions?”

“You’re frightened.”

“Of
course
I’m frightened,” Faller said. “Have you not seen footage of the fire at Marc Vilo’s estate? Have you never cubed
For Love of Pallas Ril
?”

The Director lifted a hand as though to massage a headache. The hand trembled, just a bit, and instead he wiped away pale sweat that had beaded above his eyebrows. For a long moment he sat, eyes closed, resting his head against his sweaty hand, then abruptly huffed a sigh and rose. “Professional Faller, the analysis I am about to share with you is speculation, nothing more. Despite it being nothing more than speculation, should you repeat this conversation in any context whatsoever, I will not only
deny it, I will see you downcasted for corporate slander. Do you understand me?”

“I, ah—yes, sir. I mean, I understand, Administrator.”

The new Director rounded his desk and perched himself informally on one corner. “I was a porter and part-time nurse’s aide when Arturo Kollberg came to be Director of St. Luke’s Ecumenical in Chicago. I found ways of bringing myself to his attention, and made myself useful in any and every manner he might so much as mention. He found me sufficiently useful that when he was hired by the Studio, he brought me with him, and sponsored my upcaste to Professional to serve as his private secretary, which I did for more than a decade. After Chairman Kollberg’s breakdown, I served in the same capacity under the new Chairman, Administrator Hari Michaelson. Because the Board of Governors considered Chairman Michaelson to be unreliable and potentially treasonous, they requested I provide periodic updates on the Chairman’s activities. My compliance with their orders led me to find myself
this close
—”

The Director shoved his hand so close to Faller’s face that he could smell the man’s sweat on its palm.

“
This
close to Hari Michaelson’s
face
—close enough to count his
nose hairs
—while he advised me to remind the Board that the only thing he’d ever been good at was killing people with his bare hands.”

Faller took a step back. He’d been that close to Hari Michaelson a couple of times himself. “What did you do?”

“I did my duty,” the Director said though his teeth. “As I always have. As will you.”

Faller noted for the first time that the new Director’s eyes were underlined almost as darkly as his own, and that his chiton and chlamys both showed damp below his armpits.

The Director pushed himself to his feet again, and moved toward the window. “We’re ready for him,” he said. “As ready as anyone can be.”

Faller joined him at the window. The blasted wasteland of the badlands around was pocked with artillery emplacements, bunkers, and hardpoints of all descriptions. In the far distance of the hard blue sky, five stars flickered silver as they fell into a curve that would bring them to the rooftop landing pad. Faller swallowed. His dry throat tried to stay closed.

Some of the field pieces and SAM units tracked the falling stars. The rest maintained their prescribed kill vectors. Four of those stars would be the latest generation of riot cars, packing enough firepower to take a serious chunk out of the emplacements outside. The other—the star in the center—would be a specially modified detention van.

All this for one man. One man who wasn’t even conscious.

“You’ll forgive me, Administrator, for feeling that the entire armed force of the planet could be out there and do us no good at all. We’re bringing him
in
here. In here with
us
.”

“The division isn’t there to protect us from him,” the Director said, bleak as a granite headstone. “It’s to make sure he doesn’t get out.”

Faller stared. “That’s …”

“I believe you’re here for the same reason I am. It’s not so much that we know him—there are doubtless thousands, perhaps millions, of fans and researchers and historians who know him better than both of us together ever could. My best guess is that we’re here because
he
knows
us
.”

The Director turned to him, his eyes soft with unexpected sympathy. “He knows us, and he doesn’t like us.”

Numb horror squeezed Simon Faller’s throat. “So this—” He coughed, waving weakly at the palmpad. “—this
information
 … the Board wants you and me to …”

“Because they believe if he gets loose, he’s going to kill someone. Likely several someones,” the Director said simply. “Ours are the faces he will associate with this … information. My feeling is that this is in accord with the Board’s plan. I believe the Board has calculated that as long as he’s trying kill us, he won’t be trying to kill them.”