The Broken Keystone

Chapter One

The god of Babylon was dead.

Marduk had been murdered, and the fifteen stab wounds gouged into his chest still bled golden ichor onto the dais eighteen years later.

Elishar catalogued those wounds as carefully as he could. To touch the remains was profane, so instead he drew them, the exact shape of each wound, where they sat on the body, estimations of depth, the rate at which they bled.

The other priests called him odd, but the zealots bathed in the blood until their skin stained gold, so he supposed solving a murder was the lesser transgression.

He reviewed the evidence again, searching for connections that refused to exist. The wounds matched no constellation, no city map, no rune in any script Marduk had taught them. Eighteen years of pattern seeking and he had nothing. Not even a murder weapon. The lack of it gnawed at him most, that something capable of killing a god could simply vanish. Another inexplicable factor, a glitch, as Marduk called them.

Elishar studied those blank eyes, the laugh lines he had watched crease and deepen through his childhood. He was failing Marduk, not the god but the man who had helped raise him.

For the thousandth time he considered sneaking in to perform an autopsy, but the body was guarded day and night. So instead he waited. Something would change eventually, and he would have his chance. He glanced around. There wasn’t anyone in the room besides a few guards. Maybe he could–

“Elishar, my friend, even the zealots are enjoying the Eclipse Festival. You can steal an evening away from considering murder,” Nabunara said, sitting down beside him.

He held two mugs of ale, the collection of rings on his fingers clinking against the wood.

“I suppose you’re right, I’m sure there are more glitches I’ll need to investigate anyway,” Elishar said, patting his portly friend’s shoulder.

“No.”

“No?”

“It is a festival! You are supposed to have fun, eat sweet food, drink strong beer, enjoy the world turning dark for a few minutes.”

Elishar frowned. “I can’t, Marduk’s runes are breaking and no one can help fix that but me.”

Nabunara raised an eyebrow and scratched his long square beard. “And you can’t take a thirty minute break from that giant systematic issue of yours to spend time with a friend?”

“I… I guess… One beer! Just one! Then I’m going back to work.”

“I’ll release you as soon as the eclipse is over, then you can study tiny little tablets to your heart’s content,” Nabunara said, winking and handing Elishar one of the mugs.

Elishar sipped it. “Thank you, I guess a break could be… nice. How’s Tarani?”

“Counting the days until he’s out.”

“Still convinced it’s a boy then?”

“Of course. Hey, you want to see something funny?” Nabunara asked, standing up and dragging Elishar towards an open window.

“I suppose. Did a zealot fall off the Entemenanki?”

“No, not quite. Although wouldn’t that solve a problem or two, particularly if it was Beltu!” Nabunara said, giving a belly laugh.

Elishar followed him to the window where sunbleached homes crowded between green gardens and blue temples. The moon was rising, but otherwise Elishar saw nothing of note. “What exactly am I looking at?”

“Look at the horizon, just beyond where the Euphrates bends,” Nabunara said, pointing outwards.

Elishar felt the brands across his skin begin to burn as he activated a certain set of cuneiform runes. He nearly lost balance as the distance snapped into focus and he could see something shifting on the hills. “What are those?”

“Scouts say they’re Assyrian golems.”

Elishar broke the enhancement, letting the rebound hit him. His vision went black and a thudding headache hit sharply then faded. “WHAT?”

“Apparently a whole army of them.”

“That isn’t exactly what I would call amusing, Nabu!”

“You worry too much. What are golems going to do against the rune barriers of our walls? Bounce off? It would be amusing to watch if anything.”

“I doubt that they would send them here without reason, they must have a plan. Creating that many automatons would take a great deal of time and resources.”

“Probably some negotiating tactic, block off trade routes or the like. I doubt that it will come to open war in any case.”

“Maybe, but with the glitches…”

“You and the glitches, Marduk’s magic is strong, even if it does misbehave sometimes–” As Nabunara said it, a blue barrier suddenly encircled the dais where Marduk lay.