Liliana

Crossing the Blind Eternities in the wake of Nicol Bolas was slightly more pleasant than being caught in the wake of a large ship; the current pushed Liliana down and away while concurrently preventing her escape. Whether her inability to pull away was due to some nefarious clause in the dragon's contract, or her own unwillingness to run, she wasn't sure.

Bolas had been silent since they'd left Dominaria, where she learned that there was no escape to a contract brokered by an Elder Dragon. Liliana had once met a diabolist on Innistrad (David...Domrial...Davriel...something like that) who had a knack for brokering contracts with demons. She'd dismissed the minor lord as insignificant at the time, but now wished she'd retained his services before brokering her agreement with Nicol Bolas.

She felt a tug in her chest as she materialized beside a still, silver lake on a serene plane. Liliana had spent time on Nicol Bolas's Meditation Plane before and had often thought it hubristic of him to have shown its location to others. It should be a peaceful place to withdraw from the chaos of the Multiverse; however, the giant twisted horns rising up from the lake and the edifices Bolas had erected of, and to, himself that surrounded the lake destroyed the serenity. As far as the eye could see, silver ground composed of no natural material Liliana knew of spread out in every direction. No grass grew, there were no trees. All that marked the landscape were the lake, pitches and small hillocks, and awful statues of Bolas in various poses. An entire plane dedicated to self-indulgence.

Bolas was already there, gazing into the lake. He used it to view activities on other planes, managing his affairs from afar. His slithering, hissing voice snaked into Liliana's mind.

"Your attempt to free yourself was admirable, while stupid." His baritone chuckle echoed inside and outside her skull, echoing off the stone replicas of himself. "You've grown strong in your attempt to escape the bonds that bind you to me, but this is where you must recognize the limits of your strength."

Liliana kept her mind still so the dragon couldn't pry into her thoughts.

"Your discovery of my Eternals on Amonkhet was timely, I imagine that even your inferior human intellect has put the pieces together."

She still didn't respond. Nothing infuriated Bolas more than disinterest in his grand Multiverse altering plans. He snapped his jaw, and a tendril of smoke wafted from his nostrils. Liliana allowed herself this small moment of triumph at having irritated him.

"Go back to Amonkhet. You will find an army waiting for you there. I need to know that you're strong enough to control them all or if I must find another necromancer."

As Liliana prepared to planeswalk away, he said, "I imagine that I need not inform you of the consequences of running away. There is nowhere unknown to me in the Multiverse."

A bead of sweat dripped down Liliana's temple and landed on her purple silk bodice, creating a small stain. She grimaced.

I didn't sacrifice years of my life just to end up a slave on some half-destroyed useless plane. She flicked her wrist at the mummy standing to her left on the balcony overlooking the destroyed city, and it trotted off to find her some wine.

When she'd first arrived on Amonkhet with the idealistic Gatewatch a few months ago, Amonkhet had been a thriving plane populated by enthusiastic youths and their undead servants. Had it not been ruled by Bolas, it might have been even more suited to her needs than Innistrad.

Now it's pyramids lay in ruins, its obelisks toppled, and its dwellings smashed. She hadn't seen another human since she'd arrived; for all she knew, the fallen gods had done their duty and killed them all. It wasn't any of her business what happened to the insignificant multitudes of the Multiverse.

She checked herself at the thought. It wasn't her business anymore what happened to them. She was sure that if there were a way to expel someone from the Gatewatch, it would be done to her.

The mummy returned, holding a bent chalice brimming with deep red wine. Bolas had constructed or re-constructed, a palace in the center of the ruins of Naktamun. While the vast halls and vaulted ceilings indicated that it was built for the God-Pharaoh and not his resident necromancer, she assumed there wasn't any harm in moving in while she worked. In fact, there were human-sized chambers on the uppermost floors with balconies that looked out onto destroyed streets.

It was on one such balcony that Liliana stood, surveying the city. She'd been here for a little over a week and had spent the first few days wandering the ruins, trying to think of a way out of her current situation. After determining that anything she'd do had probably been foreseen by Bolas and might actually assist him if she wasn't careful, she decided to take on the task assigned her and wait for an opportunity to strike.

The palace was "staffed" by a retinue of mummified former champions who provided her with food, washed her clothes, and attended to any other needs she might have, all without her using her necromancy to command them.

Oh, but what if you did use it? The voices of the Onakke in the Chain Veil had whispered to her in those first hours on Amonkhet. You could seize his army...overthrow him! With our combined power, we would rule this plane!

She had ignored the voices, as she always did. They were becoming more explicit, though, and that troubled her. Initially, she had only heard whispers, fragments of thoughts in foreign tongues. Now it spoke to her as if they were old friends, and she didn't like it.

She sipped from the chalice and retreated back into the palace, away from the blazing suns. Inside, great curtains hung from ceiling to floor. The floor was covered in exotic rugs so soft that her bare feet sank an inch with every step. A chaise lounge sat on a dais on the opposite side of the room from the balcony surrounded by scattered scrolls that Liliana had collected and attempted to decipher in her first few days. She was curious about the plane pre-Bolas and wondered if these people might have anything useful to offer. Thus far, their hieroglyphics had eluded her and the effort given her headaches.

She walked past the dais and left the room, entering the hall and descending the stairs into the giant entrance chamber. This chamber was a vaulted room supported by 18 intricately decorated columns depicting battle scenes. Upon examination, these were all battles where Bolas appeared to be vanquishing his many foes on various planes.

The stairs on which she descended were one of two sets that curved around a dais that elevated a dragon-sized throne. One of the things about Bolas that amused Liliana was the way he walked on two legs and used human objects like chairs. He imagined that they made him more dignified and set him about other dragons. She saw a certain irony in his imitation of human habits as indicators of his greatness.

She walked around the dais and proceeded out of the hall into the street. It was quiet. The only mummies were those that served in the palace and the ones far underground in the lazotep mines. Every so often, an accursed zombie would wander into the old city, but she would simply take control of it and send it in another direction.

The blazing afternoon sun beat down upon her, causing her to pause and consider whether purple silk was really the most ideal desert wear. But, like Bolas, she had an image to preserve. And she hadn't intended to ever go to Amonkhet again.

She made her way past empty homes and training arenas until she arrived at the base of one of Amonkhet's great pyramids. There was a small entrance on the side that she ducked into, grateful for the shade.

Inside, it was cool and a bit humid. Hieroglyphics lined the walls, depicting events and gods that no one on Amonkhet remembered. She couldn't imagine her entire culture being a mystery. Though having just witnessed the degradation of her family's lands on Dominaria, and finally destroying Josu, she considered whether a wipe of her past wouldn't be half bad.

A mummy appeared at her side carrying a torch, and she followed it into the depths of the pyramid. They weaved through passages and descended into the earth until she could hear the familiar clank of lazotep being molded.

At the bottom of the stairs, the room opened up into an enormous, blue-lit chamber nearly the size of the pyramid's base. Mummies worked plating the bodies of humans, minotaurs, khenra, and aven in gleaming blue lazotep. Underneath one of the other pyramids, a similar process was taking place with some of Amonkhet's wildlife - manticores, crocodiles, and hippos, among others. And in a third was Bolas's most ambitious project: eternalizing the fallen gods, Bontu, Kefnet, and Oketra.

Liliana had no fondness for gods. Before the mending, she'd been more powerful than most of the gods she'd ever met, and she was close to attaining that level of power again. Despite this, she was uneasy when she discovered that Hazoret had not been killed with the others. She did not have any desire to battle a god on Amonkhet.

She moved from room to room, occasionally pausing to watch a partially maimed mummy pour liquid lazotep over the skeleton of a fallen comrade or beast. When she was assured that Bolas's operations were proceeding without any problems, she made her way back out of the pyramid into the evening sun.