Page 19

The War Begins

The Academy’s Grand Hall was full of Kings. And a few queens, including his sitting next to him. Cherie’s hand in his was the one anchor capable of keeping him grounded lately.

But nearly every person in that room had Seer’s hands itching to touch. Even those absent. Harlow, Kult, Pain. Atlas and Sync. He’d only shaken Kult’s hand. Now they were on a rescue mission to get Augustine. The second Seer heard of his loss, he’d needed to touch him. Not wanted. Which meant there were things about him he was supposed to see. A job to do.

Seer couldn’t begin to imagine suffering such a thing. Didn’t allow himself to, either. Just the thought was hard to survive.

He moved his gaze around the room, stopping at Beth and Bishop, letting the sight of them together further ground his soul. His favorite power-match was reunited. More powerful than before. But something was up with Bishop. And without looking directly, the man sitting a few chairs down from Seer was responsible. The Master of Mayhem. Sinrik, Krovax had called him. Very interesting name. Not his Christian one, he wagered.

Seer eyed the silence the man locked himself in, gaze turned inward on things both in and not in that room. Beth was one of those things, of this he had no doubt. Since Bishop’s bite, her powers were off the charts, impossible to escape. She was definitely meant to meet Sinrik. The question of why, remained. But not for long. His God-gut said he’d have all the answers within the hour.

Seer eased his attention to the newest kings. The Chaos Pillars, he’d heard them called. Men who studied chaos he’d gathered. Each had an apprentice standing a couple feet behind them. Not just students but guardians too, he sensed.

Did their little team work with Sinrik? One of his top questions. He wagered yes. Somehow. From the moment Sinrik’s voice had broadcast at the academy, Seer knew he was more than any of them imagined. Nobody destroyed an entire nation in the way that he did without a unique motive. Likely even divine. The kind of divine that didn’t ask for help but ordered it. With or without you knowing it. And the current trouble etched on all their faces testified to men being divinely moved upon. The trouble? Thinking they’d been in control, maybe even thinking everything had been their own idea. They definitely looked like men who’d just been told —“Think again, human.”

One thing was a fact. Whatever caused their mountain to be devoured into the earth was surely part of what brought them there. And it was linked to whatever sent Beth on her little mission to do whatever needed doing.

“They’re starting,” Cherie leaned and whispered.

Seer turned his gaze to the center of the Creole Kings table where Nidev stood, eyes sweeping over the faces all around. The Marsh Kings sat at one end of the table, the thirteen Creole Kings at the other and the Quantum King with the Chaos Pillars and company in between. Including Sinrik.

“Gentlemen,” Nidev began, his voice a powerhouse of authority. “Allow me to introduce our new friends. Beginning with the Chaos Pillars and their Apprentices.”

He nodded at the man nearest him. “Oblivion. He is known as the historian of chaos.”

Seer studied the elderly gentleman with the long raven-black hair streaked with silver. Tied loosely back. Asian ethnicity. His dark scholar’s robe completed the look of antiquity and something told Seer it was his everyday attire, not just dress up. But those deep, ink-dark eyes held its own history with a peculiar weight. A man who’d unearthed truths only to realize some things were buried for a reason.

He gave one single head bow, his eyes remaining fixed on things far beyond the room.

Behind him, the middle-aged apprentice stepped forward. “Soren Kai,” he called out. “A watchful student of history.” He stepped back with purpose, his black hair—slightly unkempt—and guarded, steel-gray eyes filled with an intense restlessness.

“Volkan,” Nidev announced to the next man. “The Pillar of Power.”

This one was a fortress. Also elderly. Broad-shouldered with a bald head that reflected the room’s light. Seer saw no vanity in him. No excess. All restraint. His deep-set brown eyes carried the weight of battles fought long before any of them were born. But that tightness in his jaw felt fresh. A man who’d spent his life studying the nature of power and had just learned that there was a force he’d never accounted for.

He lifted a hand in acknowledgement and from behind him, the apprentice, maybe Seer’s age stepped up. “Colton Graves,” he announced. “Enduring student of power.” He stepped back in line, looking more like a survivalist than a soldier. American, maybe. Presented himself like a bad omen. His hazel-green eyes were intelligent but also reckless. A man who didn’t like waiting for answers and often wished he had.

“Noctis – The Psychologist of Chaos,” Nidev introduced next.

Now this one was different. Not as still as the rest. Not as composed. There was something fluid about him but controlled. His features were sharp, angular, his ice-blue eyes sharp as shattered glass. Seer could tell this man had built his entire life on understanding human chaos, but tonight, there was something he didn’t understand. And whatever it was, put him at that table. A world away from his home in a swamp of nobody’s, somebody’s, and everybody’s.

Seer’s gaze lowered to the man’s fingers strumming against the table. Slow. Deliberate. Like he was timing something. Something with no rhythm to follow.

The man gave no reaction to the introduction and from behind him, his young student stepped forward. “Zahir Malik,” he called out in a thick, middle eastern accent, eyes on the air before him. “Willful student of the mind.” Egyptian, Seer guessed as he stepped back in line. His dark-skinned face and expressive golden-brown eyes were framed by silky black, slightly tousled hair. All of him burned with intensity. A student of endless questions with a drive hungry enough to get all of their answers.

“And Nexus,” Nidev said, nodding at the fourth king. “The Synthesis of Chaos.”

Seer settled his gaze on him, finding him the hardest to read. Not because he had no emotion, but because his presence stretched beyond the room itself. What was he seeing? Maybe the long path ahead while the rest of them stood at the threshold. His dark, slicked-back hair was streaked with silver. Blue-gray robes marked with intricate geometric symbols implied a pattern-seeker. He also bore the mark of something heavier. The same troubled one they all wore. Maybe even deeper.

The man standing behind him took a step forward. “Elias Ward,” he announced with an accent Seer couldn’t quite place. “Calculating student of patterns.” He returned to his spot, hands behind him, eyes fixed straight ahead. His eyes were sharp. Analytical. Neutral expression, but clearly forced. And the reason was likely the same as whatever locked his jaw.

Seer finally settled his gaze on the man he most wanted to study and touch. The Master of Mayhem. “Sinrik,” Nidev called out, gesturing to him with a hand. “We’ve informally met him once. We know him as the Master of Mayhem.”

There was an odd shift in the room even though nobody moved. Seer studied him, committing every detail to memory. The sharp angles of his face, the ink stretching across his throat, the black coat that hung open over a lean, muscled frame. But it was his stillness that had Seer’s nerves in a coil. It set him apart. Sinrik was a man who could do nothing and still command the space around him. Though he bore a title, he didn’t claim it. Though he obtained a throne, he didn’t sit on it. The oxymoron brought touching tingles to both Seer’s hands.

Seer looked at Bishop and found he watched him too. Then he found something else. That look. The same one he’d had when avenging Beth became his sole purpose for breathing. Not fucking good. Something had definitely happened. And with each passing second, Seer realized every anomaly in that room bore their Belle Eveque’s stamp of oblivious power.

Nidev exhaled slowly, his gaze sweeping over the long table. “A man might believe he knows his own path,” he began, voice steady. “He might believe he carves it with his own hands, that his choices alone have led him to where he stands.” He let his words settle. “But I believe that every one of you in this room is here because something greater than choice has willed it.”

“Amen,” Seer barely mumbled as all sat still, watchful and measuring.

Nidev continued. “Fate has a way of pulling paths together. Paths that should never meet, one might think. And yet, here we are. Not by our choosing—but by something greater.”

His gaze settled on the Chaos Pillars.

“You believe chaos has rhythm. Structure. That destruction follows laws—if only one is clever enough to see them.” His voice hardened. “And what happened at Velkratos does not seem to fit any pattern. None that we can see.”

A ripple of tension moved through the Pillars.

Nidev exhaled. “Gentlemen. And ladies,” he added, looking around the room. “These men are here because where they have lived most of their lives is no more. Velkratos. The Stronghold of The Pillars. Was devoured by the earth.”

A few sharp breaths broke the silence.

“And how the hell did that happen?” Bullets wondered, his suspicion front and center.

“Ask her.”

All eyes turned to the one called Colton Graves. “She spoke,” he added. “And Velkratos fell.”

Seer’s gaze shot to Beth in astonishment. The guilt on her face aimed at the table said she was still as oblivious as ever. “It wasn’t… it wasn’t like that,” she said quietly.

Colton shrugged. “Pretty damn sure it was exactly like that.”

The tension in the room twisted as shoulders shifted with exchanged glances.

“Because you’re a blasphemer,” Zahir muttered under his breath.

“Here we go,” Colton drawled. “Our mind magician graduated to high priest of know it all.”

“All of you wanted the truth.” All eyes swung to Sinrik who bore the barest hint of a smirk as he leveled his gaze on Colten. “She gave it to you.”

Colton met his stare with a cocky challenge. “What do you know, Loverboy .”

“Uh-oh,” Cherie barely said.

Sinrik looked ready to fully inform the man’s face. “I know your kingdom wasn’t able to handle it, Titan of Talk.”

The water under the bridge came to an immediate boil, putting the kind of energy in the room the Marsh Kings were very familiar with.

“What is done, is done,” Nexus declared with a firm, final authority. “And we are here to learn whatever it is the universe needs to teach us regarding it.”

“If you can learn it,” Sinrik muttered, a last jab they decided to ignore.

“Which brings me to introduce one of our top students,” Nidev hurried, gluing down the temporary band-aid Nexus had just placed over the ugly wound. He turned slightly. “Maggie.”

The sudden attention brought Maggie to a flurry of fidgeting as she nodded at nobody then eyed Spook.

“Maggie possesses a rare ability.” Nidev glanced at the Pillars. “Through touch, she can see things others cannot. Memories, patterns, truths hidden beneath the surface. With your permission, she will touch each of you and see what her gift shows her.”

Nidev turned and beckoned her to come.

She stood quickly then ducked toward Spook. “Are you sure you’re okay with this?” she whispered loudly.

“Baby, it’s fine,” he whispered back, urging her toward Nidev with his hands.

“But we agreed I wouldn’t—”

“This is different,” he pled, his desperation making Seer bite his grin.

She nodded and turned, then hurried back and kissed his cheek before making her way to Nidev.

“Damn, bruh,” Hurricane chuckled quietly as she went. “You got that leash tight .”

Snickers erupted and not just on the Marsh King’s side. The bat bite had taught the Creole Kings all about the obsession Spook suffered with. Seer had news for them all. It wasn’t a new symptom.

The brief comedy relief faded when Maggie stood next to Nidev. “She will not ask you to speak.” Nidev said. “She only needs to touch you.”

“Their hand,” she hurried, glancing back at Spook.

Cherie buried her mouth in Seer’s arm. “That poor man.”

“Yes,” Nidev acknowledged. “And once she does, she will translate what she sees onto paper.”

Maggie’s brow furrowed slightly as she turned toward the table. “Where’s the paper and pen? I have to have it ready.”

One of the Creole Kings lifted them in silent answer.

She nodded, sliding up the sleeves on her red sweater, shifting from foot to foot. Lord, still her, Seer prayed at seeing her fear.

“Okay,” she exhaled, turning her focus toward the Pillars.

She shot out for the first one as if some inner it’s go time signal went off.

Hesitation gone, she stood before Oblivion. “Just your hand,” she reminded.

He stretched out his left one and the room fell entirely silent as she took it in both of hers, closing her eyes. Seer could hear her uneven breaths as her fingers explored all along every inch and crevice, every line and pore.

Ten seconds later, she released it then moved right over to Volkan.

He gave his hand, and she repeated the same touching.

Ten seconds.

Fifteen.

Release and next.

Seer watched, wondering over her quick pace. Was it because she was seeing a lot and needed to draw it or because she wasn’t liking what she saw? Or both?

At Noctis, she paused during touch, angled her head as if listening, then turned his hand over and resumed, sliding her fingers along his skin as if rubbing something in or off. She raised her head and looked right at him. “You will know.”

Nexus was last and he took the longest. She even requested his other hand after many seconds, her gasps coming more frequent. Then she was done.

Seer stilled when she moved to Sinrik, surprising the entire room.

He eyed her. “I’d prefer not—”

“Please,” she begged quietly. “I need to.”

So, she felt it with him too.

Sinrik slowly held his right hand out to her.

“May I have your left?” she whispered.

He switched hands. “You’re her sister,” he barely murmured, a light recognition.

She paused and nodded then began her task. This one had Seer tense as he watched every detail.

Maggie’s fingers trembled as they ghosted just above his skin as if seeking a point of contact. The moment their skin touched, her breath caught. Her lips parted like she wanted to say something but didn’t know how.

She turned his hand over, tracing the veins beneath, her touch featherlight yet deliberate. Her thumbs pressed the center of his palm like she was feeling for a pulse. A sharp inhale and then she dropped it, wide eyes on his.

She regarded his other hand. “May I have your right?” she whispered.

Sinrik’s jaw flexed. His stare was heavy, unreadable. But after a long pause, he switched hands, watching her closely.

Their skin met a second time and her breathing shallowed. She moved slower, maybe careful, maybe reverent. She pressed her fingertips along the length of his fingers, then over his wrist, like she was searching for something buried. A flicker of confusion crossed her face. Then something like recognition. She yanked back, her whole body shuddering as she stared at him.

Sinrik’s eyes darkened. “What did you see?”

Maggie spun and ran straight for the paper. Grabbing the whole stack, she dropped to the floor with them and began drawing. Fast.

Her pen scraped loudly and her entire body shifted with the movement.

One page.

Another.

Another.

No hesitation, no looking up, no thinking. Just translating while the room remained deathly still.

Seer’s gaze flicked to Bishop who had subtly shifted forward, clearly interested in likely what she’d seen in Sinrik who now sat with an impenetrable expression.

Beth looked too, face gripped in a mix of worry and curiosity at what secrets were unfolding.

Seer felt it. This was it. Something was happening. They all knew it but none of them knew what yet.

Page after page filled the floor.

Fifteen.

Sixteen.

Seventeen—

A single drop of red hit the page.

Maggie barely reacted, wiping at her nose absently, smearing blood as Spook hurried to her.

“That’s enough—” He grabbed her shoulders, steadying her as she tried to keep going. “Maggie, you’re done.”

She suddenly surrendered then gave a weak nod, dropping the pen.

Twenty pages.

The answers were there.

Now they only had to read them.

At the head of the room, Nidev called the only one who had done it before. “Zodak.”

Seer saw the shift in his friend before he even moved. He knew the storm that churned behind those black ocular gates, the way his mind dissected before his body followed.

The whole room watched as he stepped forward, his long, black skirt whispering against the stone floor, the tattoo-swirls covering his front and back seeming to move with him.

The air in the room shifted, like pressure dropping before a storm as Zodak walked around the spread sheets, angling his head as he went then circling back to the beginning.

He raised his hand and lifted his ocular gates.

Again, he moved from sheet to sheet, studying. Slower.

He suddenly paused. Looked back at the previous sheets. Then turned to the ones on his left.

He lowered and lifted one, moving it. Then another.

“What’s he doing?” Cherie whispered.

“I think he’s organizing them.”

When they were all in a single line, he turned those sharp, silver eyes right on Seer. “Come.”

The single word cracked through the silence and Seer’s pulse rose to answer as he made his way to him.

Once next to him, Zodak pointed. “Look here.”

Seer’s gaze was already locked on the first image. Had to be the Velkratos stronghold before it fell. Then another picture of a jagged, gaping abyss consuming the stronghold, dark lines dragging into the depths. But at the edges of the darkness—shapes moved within the void.

“This,” Zodak whispered, pointing. “Is the Groaning Deep.” His voice was smooth, but there was something underneath—something dark. “It is the place of the swallowed. The forsaken.”

He moved to the next image.

“And this.” A sharp gesture. “Are the sayyidat al-khaliyah.” Seer met his gaze. “The Lords of the Hollow.” He returned to the pages. “But they have many different names over the centuries.”

Seer’s throat tightened as he stared at them again. The figures were wrong. Twisted, elongated, too many eyes, too many mouths devouring each other.

“Their war is not new,” Zodak murmured, slowly moving. “It is still the first war. The war that never ended.”

He moved to the next image and lowered. “Do you see?”

Seer knelt next to him, seeing the Pillars. But—not as they were. Figures drawn in a past they had never known, their shapes woven into something... forgotten.

Zodak straightened and turned to the kings. “You were once the keepers of the past.” His voice lifted slightly as Seer stood too. “You believed you were tracking chaos. But you were tracking a decoy.”

A decoy.

Zodak pointed to the next page and retrieved it, showing it. “These… are the Creole Kings. Keepers of the hidden knowledge.” He regarded Nidev now. “Hidden even from them.”

“What is this war you speak of?” Volkan demanded in quiet wonder.

Zodak turned and stared at him. “It is a most ancient and ongoing war. Not for fortune, not for might, not for human domains. It is for humanity itself.”

Seer’s skin prickled as his words confirmed everything he’d seen as well from the beginning. This was a divine war. Chaos was merely a component, nothing more.

“Are you saying everything we’ve studied for centuries…” Oblivion muttered. “Was a delusion?”

Zodak regarded him. “Yes,” he said, eagerly. “But you also, were a decoy.”

“Now wait a minute,” Colton cried, face perplexed. “You saying they thought they were fooling us but really we were fooling them? All without us even knowing it?”

“That is exactly it,” Zodak assured, turning to the Creole Kings. “My brothers were given the secrets that the Pillars once protected. But the knowledge of those secrets was hidden even from them.” Zodak lowered and picked up a paper, showing Nidev. “The prophecy coins. They were shielded by myth.” He scanned his brothers. “Their understanding protected by the faithless.”

“I’ll be a son-of-a-bitch,” Colton muttered, sounding like a con man conned.

Soren’s chuckle drew all eyes. “So, we are actually scholars of illusions.”

“No,” Zodak corrected, eagerly. “Your knowledge is valuable, only not how you thought.”

“Just tell me that we get to actually use our knowledge, in a physical capacity,” Soren pled.

“Are you saying the destruction we have seen,” Nexus began in doubt, “our stronghold, this country, the world, was all merely an illusion of chaos?”

Zodak turned to him. “It is not chaos, brother.”

“Then what?” Noctis demanded.

Seer stared at the final paper, suddenly realizing. He lowered and picked it up. “It’s a summoning.” The words sat in the air, now entirely quiet as he looked at Nidev. “To a prophetic war.” He realized even more as he looked at the images. “Velkratos was merely a veil. And it’s been torn away.”

“Yes,” Zodak said eagerly, seeing with him. “The battlefield had been revealed.”

That set off a new round of energy amongst men ready for action.

“So, how does this tie into what’s currently happening?” Rukem asked. “We’ve got thousands of beacons going off on the Dream Bridge demanding immediate extraction. Is this too an illusion?”

Zodak crouched again, lifting one of the sheets and began showing it to the entire room. “These are why the war is being fought,” he said, his voice steady, absolute. “Al-Namuthaj Al-Ilahi,” he said.

“The Divine Templates?” Zahir asked, getting Zodak’s immediate gaze.

“Yes. Humans selected for the restoration. They are to be protected from the Dead Kings who have come to annihilate humanity.”

A murmur moved through the room as understanding laced with the first edges of urgency.

“All of humanity?” Mah-Mah asked.

Zodak turned to her. “The templates are the target. They are the hope for the rest of humanity. If they are destroyed, those that remain will destroy themselves.”

She looked right at Lazure and whispered, “I’ve been saying we’re like an ark,” she whispered with awe and joy.

“Then we don’t have time to waste,” Bullets said, ready for battle. “We need to organize a rescue party now.”

“If those beacons went off for extraction of over two thousand people,” Skul said, “does that mean the Dead Kings are already mobilized?”

Zodak paced along the pages before mumbling, “I don’t know.”

“I think I might know,” 8-Bit said, getting the attention of the entire room. “Just got a report from the Triplets. I asked them to investigate a strange death.”

“What sort of strange death,” Nexus hurried.

“He said a man was turned into something like a pillar of salt.”

“Something like?” Seer wondered.

“Fetch said the body wasn’t fully crystallized—somewhere between salt and stone. Whatever did this started a full-body conversion but stopped before it finished. No struggle, no external wounds. Just frozen solid, mid-reaction. He also picked up a weather anomaly right before it happened—static charge buildup, sudden temp drops, and an electromagnetic spike localized to the area. Whatever hit this guy, it wasn’t natural.”

“That’s not the only odd death,” Sinrik announced. “The pillars found a man sitting up in an alley. Like he’d just stopped to rest. No wounds, no decay, and no eyes. Not gouged, not missing, just gone. Lids half-open, like there was something holding them up. Optic nerves still firing, processing light like something’s there. There’s no way for a brain to keep seeing without eyes but he sure seemed to be trying.”

“What the hell are these dead kings?” Shank wondered.

“The Dead Kings are not simply men,” Zodak said. “They are entities forged in The Groaning Deep—a prison of despair buried beneath the ruins of a fallen empire. Born from the lineage of both jailers and the condemned, they exist to corrupt, to consume, and to annihilate the soul of humanity itself. Their crowns—crafted in the Dark Forge—bind their purpose to destruction, each one a tether to the ancient forces that sustain them. They do not rule. They do not conquer. They unmake. And they will not stop until there is nothing left.”

“Holy fuckin’ moly,” Hurricane cried at those ridiculous odds. “How the hell we supposed to fight that?”

“Very carefully,” Nidev thought.

“Everything has a weakness,” Sinrik said.

“And I’m equipped to find it,” Bishop added.

“How?” Noctis wondered.

“His biology is a self-optimizing system,” Quantum explained. “His blood is a hyper-adaptive construct, integrating foreign genetic and energetic data on contact. Once assimilated, his neural network deciphers its function, strengths, and vulnerabilities—allowing him to counteract, nullify, or weaponize it.”

“What he said,” Bishop muttered. “I just need to touch one.”

“That still doesn’t give us enough boots on the ground for this extraction,” 8-Bit reminded.

“We have several hundred of those Vicki’s,” Bacon reminded.

Bullet’s single laugh split the air like a gunshot. “I wouldn’t trust them to extract their fingers from their asses.”

“I have two hundred Riftborn,” Sinrik said. “They can locate all of them.”

“What the hell’s a Riftborn?” Hurricane demanded.

He met his gaze. “They’re upgraded soldiers. I believe some of your team met them.”

“How soon can you mobilize them?” Bishop asked, tone dark as ever.

“Immediately,” Sinrik said.

The air charged with thick urgency as the weight of what was coming pressed down.

Bishop stood. “Nidev can put together a team that excels in strategic extraction.” His gaze turned to Sinrik. “You and I will discuss other critical particulars.”

****