Chapter 0 of 74 · Book 6, The Eye of the Bedlam Bride

Prologue — Prologue

Book: The Eye of the Bedlam Bride · Part: Havana · Next: Chapter 1 — The Ghosts of Earth · Floor: Floor 8 — The Ghosts of Earth · Series: the series

Opening

“It’s two gods,” Odette cried.

Summary

Another season, another tenth floor, minutes from collapse. Odette — a non-corporeal avatar in a helmet, legless, indentured, five seasons still to serve — floats between her four crawlers and two storm gods that a summoning box has raised out of the mist: Adad, huge and AI-driven, and Dodola, the smaller, sponsored every season by a bored grixist heiress named Huanxin Jinx. The floor's exit needs a nine-piece puzzle, primed by Hold Steady inside the stairwell's circle, to be touched by a storm god or hit with god-tier storm magic; the crawlers chose the worst of four tracks, hunted a priceless dart that turned out useless, and settled for the summoning cube. Odette's friend Armita, a demigod attendant for the Ascendency whose messages the AI may not monitor, has brokered a bribe: Huanxin will hit the puzzle for ten per cent of Odette's bonus — the bonus that would buy a residency berth, regrown legs, citizenship, freedom. Huanxin wants a third, then half, then teleports Adad away and comes for the party. Mordecai, grounded far off in a Ratkin Brute's body, offers to die: his Final Blow skill can target the puzzle so a god's spell on him hits it too — 'Uzzi, see you on the other side, brother.' Odette, thinking of the AI that once made her choose between her friend Armita and her cousin Pieter, decides she is done being made to choose, and orders Chaco by private chat to worship Dodola and throw the Dart of Ophiotaurus into Uzzi, Mordecai's brother — a forced summoning that needs a living vessel — inside Chaco's own Circle of Containment with the puzzle. Uzzi understands, spreads his wings, and dies; Dodola forms in the shell, the puzzle shatters into a key, her own lightning ricochets and detonates before her immunity starts, and 'A deity has fallen. The heavens tremble with rage.' Chaco gets the kill and ten levels; Armita is left to the heiress's revenge; Mordecai tackles Chaco into the stairwell — 'I am going to kill you, Odette' — and Odette, alone as the level collapses, is free.

Characters

• Odette — Indentured, legless, five seasons to serve: she orders a brother killed for her freedom.
• Mordecai — A skyfowl crawler on his own tenth floor, in a Ratkin Brute's form, ready to die for his party.
• Chaco — The wolf-headed bard who worships a god on Odette's order and throws the dart.
• Uzzi — Mordecai's brother, a skyfowl Storm Commander, the vessel; dies with his wings spread.
• Hold Steady — A skyfowl who keeps the puzzle primed; flies after the others.
• Armita — Odette's friend, a demigod attendant for the Ascendency, the go-between; left to die.
• Huanxin Jinx — A six-eyed grixist heiress who drives Dodola for sport and raises her price twice.
• Dodola — A storm goddess, sponsored; killed by her own lightning in a containment shell.
• Adad — A storm god, AI-driven, teleported away by the other.

Locations

• The tenth-floor stairwell — A circle in acid rain, a floating puzzle, a key made of lightning.

Motifs

• The tenth floor — Four tracks, a puzzle, deals half the survivors took; 'never worth it.'
• Odette and Mordecai — What she did: Uzzi, the dart, the deal that was never Chaco's idea.
• The Bolt of Ophiotaurus — Not the Bolt: the Dart of Ophiotaurus, a forced summoning through a living vessel; immunity five units late.
• The gods — Two storm gods from a box; a sponsored god as a bored heiress's toy; a deity killed.
• Sponsorship — Ascendency sponsors' chat is legally unmonitored; a bribe is fraud.