"Zero, my boy!" Philonecron stepped forward. "Is something troubling you? You don't seem yourself!"
Don't seem myself. As Philonecron got closer, Zee's head fogged more, and soon Philonecron's voice seemed to be ingratiating itself with Zee's very veins. Zee shuddered and tried to move back a little.
"No!" Philonecron said quickly. "No! Don't retreat from me! Oh, Zero. Don't you see? We're going to have so much fun together, you and I." He got down on his knees, grabbed Zee's hands, and stared into his eyes. Zee was helpless to resist.
"My precious boy. We're really going to change things! We'll clear this place of bureaucrats, throw the Shades into Tartarus, and make a new world! Don't you see? There's nothing to be frightened of. You must be happy. Don't look back anymore-look ahead! It's going to be a bright, new day. Do you see?"
Bright, new day. Look ahead!
"Now, my Zero. What would you like to do first? Do you want to talk awhile? I could read to you. Would you like me to play the violin?… Or would you like to see your army?"
Zee sat up. Suddenly his mind was perfectly clear. "I would like to see the army," he said.
Philonecron beamed and clapped his hands together. "Oh, how grand! How grand! The army it is, then! Oh, boys?"
Philonecron snapped his fingers, and two more Footmen entered the cave. There was barely room for them, and they had to sidle around Philonecron to get behind him. Not that there was anything behind them to get to-just a craggy cave wall.
Or so Zee thought. The Footmen stood on either side of the back wall of the cave, looked at each other, nodded, and in perfect synchronicity pressed down on two rocks that jutted out from the wall.
And then the wall evaporated. Just like that. Poof! Zee gasped. Their cave was not shallow at all, rather, it was the doorway of an enormous expanse, of a great cavern the size of several football pitches, lit by countless burning braziers. Zee's eyes could not take it all in; it went on and on-but he knew the cavern was far, far bigger than the rock that housed it.
And the shadows were there. Thousands, tens of thousands, of four-foot-high figures-all lined up in perfect formation, waiting to be brought to life.
They were in the vague shape of people, yet without any real definition. They looked like, well, like shadows – black, flat, faceless, opaque, each one identical to the next. They had bodies that seemed to grow out of the ground, thick and shapeless at the bottom, narrowing up through the torso, with ovular bulges where the arms should have been and heads like candle flames. And they were all perfectly, eerily still-objects forever stuck in space, an endless series of black paper dolls, like crosses in a military graveyard. The shadows stretched as far as Zee could see, and beyond, and still beyond that. They looked like a great ghost army frozen in time. Zee shuddered.
"Impressive, isn't it?" said Philonecron. "If I do say so myself."
Zee could only nod.
"Would you like to examine the troops?"
He nodded again. He hated to give Philonecron the satisfaction, but he did want to look more closely at the wonder before him. He needed to know what he was dealing with. So, willingly, he followed the creature who had taught him to hate into the room with the vast legions of shadows.
"See, my darling?" Philonecron said, holding his hands out. "This is what you have done."
Slowly, carefully-aware of his heart beating too fast and the dry taste of fear in his mouth-Zee walked along the front row of the army, examining the soldiers.
As Zee studied the shadows, he tried to keep himself calm. He could look through one and see the foggy forms of those behind it, on and on. He reached out to touch one, slowly, and his hand passed through, as if through smoke.
"Oh, do not worry, my dear Zero!" Philonecron said. "As soon as you enchant them, they will be able to gain substance at will-or become as insubstantial as fog. It's going to be quite devastating!" He cackled.
As Zee walked, he noticed that the farther away from Philonecron he was, the clearer his mind was. Philonecron was talking to him, but the words were just words – they stayed out of his head, out of his blood.
But what use was it? The army was too big. Once launched, it could never be stopped. The shadows were insubstantial, could not be hurt-and vested with Philonecron's power, who knew what they could do?
It occurred to Zee then that there was another plan, a far simpler plan. Philonecron needed Zee to enchant the shadows. If Zee were dead, he couldn't utter the words of the spell. All he would have to do was run, run as fast as he could. If he could get to the Styx before the Footmen got to him, he could jump in and save the world. Easy.
It was the best way. The best way for everyone. His other plan was far too complicated, and he could easily mess it up, and what if it didn't work and what if Philonecron stopped him and what if he then doomed humanity because he was just too weak-minded to resist?
Zee's heart pounded. He was on fire, every part of him. This would do it. This would humiliate Philonecron, leave him just as helpless as he made Zee feel. This would solve all Zee's problems. All he had to do was keep away from Philonecron, get free, run, and then jump-and then it would all be over.
He walked behind a row of shadows, trying not to attract attention. If he could just get past the small cave, he'd be home free. Slowly, resolutely, he made his way toward the door of the vast room, trying to quell something that was rising in his chest and throat. No, no, this was the right thing. He was almost there, he was ready to make his break, and then-
And then he felt Philonecron's hand on his shoulder and his voice whispering in his ear. "Shall we get started?" he murmured. And that's when everything went black.
The next thing Zee knew, he was standing on a large platform, supported by four of the Footmen, holding a hollowed-out horn of some beast or another, shouting something in a language he'd never heard before:
"Ek skotou es to phaos!"
The enchantment had begun.
Philonecron was standing right behind him, telling him what to say-and the words, whatever they meant, were coming right out of his mouth.
"Ek thanatou es to sden!"
He still felt so foggy, as if he were half there-but he was aware enough to know that he had completely failed. He couldn't even kill himself. He wanted to sob, to run, to die-but he couldn't move from where he was. And now it was too late, and it was all his fault.
In front of him were fifty thousand shadows, in perfect rows, still and stiff. From where he stood, they looked even more like headstones towering up into the night.
Zee could hear his words booming through the hall over them-he barely recognized his own voice, sounding so strong and sure through the bullhorn.
"Ek skotou es to phaos! Ek thanatou es to sden!"
And the shadows heard him too. Suddenly he was not addressing paper dolls anymore. The shadows were coming to life.
"Ek skotou es to phaos! Ek thanatou es to sden!"
It was as if the whole room had taken a breath. Zee could feel the air change. Where once there had been six living creatures in the vast room (if the Footmen could be described as living), suddenly there were fifty thousand. The shadows twitched and stirred, stretched and shook.
They were alive.
"Ek skotou es to phaos! Ek thanatou es to sden!"
They were alive, the shadows were alive -because of him. It was as if the room had held thousands of pictures of fire, and then before his eyes the fire had become real. The shadows drank up his words, thrived on them; they stretched, grew, upward and outward. They were five feet tall, then six. They thickened, too, gained depth and substance-the paper dolls were now three-dimensional creatures with life and will. They bent and swayed and stretched and flickered, shaping themselves arms, then hands and fingers, stretching the fingers out to impossible lengths, reaching their heads up to the sky, then molding it all back into their bodies again. They were animate spirits, ones with intelligence and desire-and what they desired were Zee's words.