Chapter 43

  In the end, Lord Fool turned on Lord Foe. Perhaps the murder of the Hero of Light recalled to him a sense of his duty. Lord Foe could not last against both the Friend and the Fool, and was swiftly defeated. And with Lady Shadows snapped up into the vengeful jaws of Maugrim, Guardian of Hyperion, Captain Bellafide ordered a retreat. Her job had been done, the hero slain. The We’re Here! sailed up and away into the darkening sky.

  Ferrigo had survived, his feud with his former companion Bellafide unresolved. She had fought well. It had been like old times, and they had both enjoyed it. He leapt from the deck of the pirate ship, trusting something to catch him on the way down. Something did—the Lockbreaker’s vessel. It scooped them all up, all those Xeon who had bailed from the deck of the departing ship, and it lowered them down to the pale land of Hyperion beside the ruined remains of the lighthouse.

  Four bodies lay strewn at the feet of the huge wolf. One was Samantha, scattered about. One was Lady Hearts, crumpled into a heap of bloody wings. One was Lady Shadows, dropped unceremoniously from the jaws of the great wolf. One was the Hero of Light, lying as though peacefully asleep save for the incision pierced into his chest. A pity. Ferrigo had liked the child. And Ferrigo felt somewhat responsible. After all, if he had not knocked the kid out minutes before, things would not have ended like this.

  The Lockbreaker lived, though he was evidently much weakened. His incorporeal form flickered and faded as he joined his crew. Ferrigo could not recall ever seeing the Lockbreaker so frail.

  This is your doing, Lockbreaker, said the Guardian.

  “Yes,” the Lockbreaker replied. “Yes it is. But it makes no difference now. His body was dying anyway. Did you know that?”

  Yes.

  “Then you know what we need to do. We can still go through with the Bleeding God’s plan.”

  The Bleeding God. Ferrigo wondered if she was watching. What did she think of all this? Would she hold him responsible?

  What plan is this, wonders Lord Friend as he descends from above, much damaged but yet victorious over the forces of evil, as good must surely always triumph! (Though the Fool disagrees.)

  “Get the light, Lord Friend,” said the Lockbreaker, apparently too vexed to be concerned about giving a direct order to a Lord of Skywater. “It is there, in the ruins of the lighthouse. And where is the angel? Angel. Fetch .”

  Aha! Lord Fool grasps the plan and the intent of the Lockbreaker and his unlikely patron in this endeavor, the Bleeding God! Spirifage, is it? How odd that one such as Lady Hearts should abide an act so taboo. But what is taboo when weighed against the life of a hero? Surely the economics and the mathematics of a Fool are no match against such calculations! A pity, though, that the hero gets no choice in the matter!

  Ferrigo and the crew of Xeon watched with fascination as the Lockbreaker knelt over the body of the hero.

  Lord Friend returns from the remains of the lighthouse, bearing a double handful of brilliant crystals—the stuff and substance of the light which purpose was to illuminate this colorless moon.

  And the angel, the wounded white dog, appeared in a flash of light before the Lockbreaker, bearing that special box with seven bright lights.

  Lord Friend reluctantly dumped the crystals into a shining pile next to the hero. The Lockbreaker went to his ship and retrieved a cloak, which he wrapped around himself for protection from what he was about to do.

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  He opened the box and carefully spilled the seven souls out onto the pile of crystals. The entire mass at once burned with the light of ten Bright Worlds as it fused into a solid mass of brilliance.

  “Now, guardian,” said the Lockbreaker.

  Shadows lengthened and crept over the landscape of Hyperion as night came near. But no shadows approached the burning pyre of radiance set beside the Hero of Lights. Maugrim lowered his head and breathed upon the hero. A bright vapor rose up from the body and formed into a little ball of light.

  Hurry, Lockbreaker, said the wolf. Nearby, the dog angel whined and paced.

  The Lockbreaker sang, and he used the Voice. There hadn’t been stars in the half-darkened sky before, but they were there now, and they spun to the sound. The Lockbreaker worked as he sang. He took the hexagonal talisman from around the neck of the hero and placed it carefully upon the pyre of light.

  Ferrigo couldn’t tell whether the Lockbreaker’s song contained any actual words. There was a melody, sad and sweet, and such was the power of the Voice that Ferrigo, to whom emotions were distant things at the best of times, felt something strange move within his heart. He would have cried, did he possess tear ducts.

  The stars turned overhead to the sound of the Voice, turning like a key in the mechanism of a vast lock, and the lock was made of stars, and locks were made to be broken.

  The shining light of Jimothy Whyte, the hero, moved itself over to the radiant pyre. It became lost in the brightness. It touched the talisman.

  Everything exploded.

  Watching the replay later from the perspective of an exterior camera on the Lockbreaker’s ship, Ferrigo saw that the entire pile of crystals and souls had fused together into a single source of light, and that it had disintegrated at the touch of the hero’s own light. It had erupted into a cloud of dust and sparks, which dispersed far and wide across the Color Moon, and which had very nearly slain the Lockbreaker despite his precautions.

  Ferrigo took charge once the last lingering motes of the brightness vanished away into nothing, leaving no sign of crystal, light, or soul. Failure, it seemed. No more Hero of Light. All this for nothing. Well, no, not entirely nothing. He had gotten to cross blades with Charlotte again.

  Ferrigo ordered the bodies collected. He told Lords Friend and Fool that he would return the two Ladies to Skywater. He noticed that Samantha’s corpse still carried Niri’s light in a tiny box. Ferrigo took this, and the white hexagonal talisman which remained on the ground, into safekeeping.

  As for the Lockbreaker, he was but a tiny lingering stain of shadow, unconscious. Ferrigo scooped him up and placed him carefully back into the dark stateroom of his ship to recover. How odd, Ferrigo there reflected, that the Lockbreaker had gone to such lengths to preserve the life of one of the few in existence who could slay him.

  The Lords requested that the hero’s body also be taken to the Citadel. Simple enough. Ferrigo only hoped that the other heroes were not the vindictive sort. He did not know how long it would take his boss to recover, but he sure as stars didn’t want to be the one in charge when the other heroes—or even Lord Fierce—came knocking to ask questions about what had happened to one of the six. He could probably blame it all on Charlotte. She would probably like that.

  He plotted a course back to Skywater. His first task was ensuring that Xeon lay low for a while and prepare to scatter should that become necessary. His second was planning the funeral for Samantha and the other fallen.

  The Lockbreaker’s ship slid up and away into the dark sky, leaving two Lords, a Guardian, and a handful of reformed playdoh golems standing beside the rubble of the lighthouse.

  Lord Fool locates paint among the rubble and begins to color the dark bricks.

  Lord Friend sighs and wanders into the dark to locate the fallen corpse of his brother Foe.

  Maugrim turned and silently limped away into the night, and no shadow monsters obstructed his path.

  Elsewhere, the Bleeding God wept.