It sprung.
“No!” I pushed Sienna out of the way and threw my hand out in front of me on instinct.
I felt power come into me as I unintentionally Pulled magic from Sienna and there was a crack from somewhere off to my right.
A moment later something flew into the ghoul just as it crashed into me.
It bellowed again, but this was one of pain, not triumph.
We went to the ground, the creature atop me.
The landing knocked my breath from my lungs and it was all I could do to keep the giant ghoul’s snapping, dripping jaws from tearing off my face.
A spike of wood stuck out of its neck—had I done that?—dripping its black blood onto me, and I tried to pull away, not let it get in my eyes or mouth. I didn’t know what swallowing or even merely tasting it would do, and I didn’t want to find out.
It reeked of death and rot, and like Sienna before it, its smell blocked out the smell of the woods. But this time, it was far from pleasant.
If I had eaten recently, I might uneat all that I’d consumed.
The horrid, evil thing kept pushing forward against my forearm, which was into its neck, snapping its sharp, jagged teeth at me, dripping saliva and blood, its and the lycanthrope’s.
Its long nose had been partially bitten off—I assumed by the lycanthrope.
But I was no shapeshifter, and I had no teeth large and sharp enough with which to bite back.
I had instinctively Pulled, used my magic to save Sienna, but now it was all I could do to not get my face torn off.
Suddenly vines appeared behind the ghoul, floated there like charmed snakes, and I watched in fascination as they slithered around its neck.
It barely had time to react before it was violently wrenched off of me.
I scrambled away and watched as the vines wrapped around its body, grasping it tight against the ground.
It screamed as they kept tightening, its skin puffing out around where they wrapped. Then the skin split as they broke through its tough hide.
It kept screaming, the noise maddening, and the vines kept constricting, again like snakes, until black blood began to pool out from the tearing flesh.
Still, they didn’t stop.
The creature’s scream was abruptly cut off as its body suddenly gave way to the vines, which tore into it, vile liquid squirting from its mouth and eyes, and guts spilling out of its stomach.
They kept pulling until bones cracked and all that was left was a pile of gore, which the vines sucked down into the earth, leaving only a few bone fragments behind.
I tore my eyes away from the sight to see Sienna standing a few paces away from where the carnage took place, her legs and arms roots which were planted in the soil.
Her skin was hard, the color of oak, and she nearly looked like a tree herself.
Then the roots retracted, her skin lightened and softened, and her limbs became human-like arms and legs once more.
She rushed over to me. “Are you hurt?”
I shook my head in wonder. “That was amazing.”
“So was what you did. I felt you inside of me, taking magic.”
“I didn’t mean to.”
She shook her head, smiled faintly. “I liked it. I get plenty from the earth. Take all you need.” She gently caressed my face. “We’re connected even more now.”
I winced as pain lanced through my leg.
“You are hurt,” Sienna said, her expression turning worried.
“I’m—” I began, but then glanced down at my leg and saw a wound where the ghoul must have caught me with its claw. Its poison claw.
I hadn’t even felt it.
But I did now. And I could see the green poison seeping through me.
It acted rapidly, the green line shooting up my leg, the pain excruciating. I watched as it quickly wound over my hip and my lower abdomen, where it disappeared from the surface of my skin.
I clutched at my chest as I felt the poison at my heart.
What a shite way to die.
Sienna moved to the wound and hovered her hands above it. They glowed golden and suddenly I felt the poison retreating from my heart, being sucked out of me.
I watched entranced as the poison floated out of the wound and evaporated as it touched the golden light from her hands.
I let my head drop and took deep breaths at the relief.
It was so great that I felt I might need relief from the relief.
“You’ll be alright now.”
“Th—”
A gurgling cough drew our attention to the form of the lycanthrope.
She was still alive.
She had reverted to her—mostly—human form now, and it was obvious even to me she was female.
“We saved her,” Sienna said, studying the lycanthrope.
Even in this form, she didn’t look quite human, not with the pointed ears on top of her head, or her hands with fingers which narrowed to hard claws. Fur covered them and her forearms up to just below her elbows. The rest of her body was bare, except for a patch of fur that grew in an upward direction over her sex.
In Krann’s Bestiary, there’d only ever been depictions of males of the species.
I didn’t even know females existed, though of course they had to reproduce somehow.
The fur over her sex was much sparser than that on her hands and forearms, and I could see bite marks from the ghoul there.
I shook my head.
Truly horrid creatures, ghouls were. The section on them in Krann’s was large, as the man had had extensive and unpleasant experience with their kind.
But was that a ghoul? If so, how was it so large?
Something moved, and I saw it was the lycanthrope’s bushy tail, which poked out from under her and now after briefly stirring rested limply by her side. It too had several bite marks taken out of it.
The fur there, like that on her hands and over her crotch and the hair on her head, was black as midnight.
Her breasts were small and undamaged, as was most of her upper body. A body which was lean and muscular.
Her mouth hung partially open, black ghoul blood trailing down her chin and neck, and I saw her teeth were sharp, though not like the ghoul’s were. Hers looked almost human, but with larger canines, and the other teeth I could see were small and pointed rather than flat.
I hadn’t gotten a really good look at her when she was still transformed, but even now she looked like a fierce opponent.
Sienna placed her hand on the lycanthrope’s chest. “She can heal on her own. She is healing. Soon she’ll wake. I’m not sure she’ll be so pleased with us.”
“Well we just saved her.”
Sienna ran her hand down between the lycanthrope’s breasts and to her stomach, right above where the fur covering her sex stopped. “She’s not pregnant. That’s good. She might try to kill us if she were. She’s tough. She has to be to have survived as long as she did against a grogen.”
“A grogen? What’s that?” I didn’t recall ever reading about that in Krann’s. Then again, I was never the best student, especially when it came to monsters.
I was more interested in politics, not children’s fairytales and monsters I would never—or so I thought—encounter.
In answer to my question, Sienna pointed at the fragments of bones that remained from the monster. “That.”
“I thought it was a really big ghoul.”
She shook her head. “That wasn’t a ghoul. It was a grogen. Like you say, ghouls are smaller. Not so ferocious. Certainly a single ghoul would never try to take on a grown lycanthrope. Even a female. That one went after her. They hunt large predators. That must have been the howl we heard. They mimic and try to draw their prey to them.” She looked down at the lycanthrope. “She was tricked. Thought a potential mate was calling to her.”
I shook my head. “You said she’s healing? Will she be okay? What about the poison? Do you need to pull it from her like you did me?”
“Lycanthropes can heal from it on their own. She might not take kindly to me interfering. They’re proud creatures.”
I didn’t remember that, but now that she mentioned it, I did recall their healing ability. Much faster than that of a human’s. I thought there might have been something about them being able to regrow limbs, like the greater reptiles.
“When’s she going to wake up? We need to be moving on.”
Sienna looked back at me. “She’s waking up now.”
9
The lycanthrope’s eyes sprung open, the yellow irises somehow already locked onto mine.
Then she leapt up, knocking Sienna back, and before I knew what was happening she had me pinned to the ground, clawed hand at my throat.
“You’re welcome,” I croaked out. Her grip was incredibly strong.
“It’s okay,” Sienna soothed. “We only want to help you.”
The lycanthrope turned quickly and lashed out at Sienna, her clawed fingers slicing through the dryad’s bare abdomen.
The flesh didn’t bleed, but turned to vines which leaked a clear liquid, and which just as quickly reconnected, tightening together and forming a smooth, skin-like surface once more.
The lycanthrope growled. “What are you?” Her voice was high, but husky.
“A dryad. And your friend.”
The beast laughed. “You’re food, not friends.” She sniffed the air, then looked at the spot where the grogen had been swallowed by the soil, and where now only bone fragments remained. She looked to Sienna. “Did you do that to it?”
“I had no choice,” Sienna replied.
“Let go of me,” I told her. “I don’t want to have to hurt you.”
She looked down at me, snarled, and squeezed tighter.
She started to say something, but this had gone on long enough.
I drew on my own power, from within myself, and felt the darkness seep into me.
This was something I hadn’t done in even longer than seeing the colors of magic.
Something more dangerous. Something even when my father was alive I’d rarely done.
Her face registered shock as my body become incorporeal and I let myself get a little closer to becoming a Shade.
Her hand fell through my neck, hitting soil.
I dumped energy backwards, propelling myself up and phasing through her body.
Then I solidified behind her, grabbed her, and threw her down on the ground. She spun to land on her back and before she could begin fighting against me I pinned her down, pressing my body into hers.
She struggled, but I had her hands and legs immobilized with my own, and she couldn’t get free.
It was a close thing, and if she struggled long enough she might overpower me.
“Get off me!” she snarled.
“Not until you calm down.”
“I’m going to kill you!”
I felt a hand on my back. “It’s okay,” Sienna said.
I didn’t know which one of us she was talking to, which one she was trying to sooth.
“I’ll kill you too, dryad.”
“No one has to kill anyone. We’re friends here.”
The lycanthrope barked a laugh.
“It‘s okay Darthos, let her up. She won’t hurt us.”
The lycanthrope stopped struggling against me. “Darthos?” she asked.
I leaned up so I was sitting atop her hips, but still kept her hands pinned at her sides.
I could feel the fur above her sex brushing against my balls. “Why, do you know a Darthos?”
“Darthos, descendant of the First King, son of Varthos.”
“How do you know that?”
“If you are Darthos, I knew your father.”
I was shocked, so shocked that I released my grip on her.
She sat up, leaning on her hands as she studied my face. She didn’t try to push me off of her. “Yes, I can see the resemblance. Although I would’ve expected you to have more hair.”
I absentmindedly reached up and ran my hand over my stubbly scalp.
It would be a long time before it reached its previous length. “I’m going for a new look.”
“Trying to pass as a lowborn?” There was a hint of humor in her voice. “How is your father?”
I got up off of her, but she stayed there, legs splayed, looking up at me.
“Dead.”
Her face fell. “The god-king’s dead?”
“Yes. For a while now.”
“I’m sorry. I’m sorry for us all.” She looked away, out over the treetops at the Wall, which stood monumental, towering above even the tallest trees, though which in the dark was simply a darker blackness against the starry sky. “He was a great king.”
And an even better father, I thought.
I looked at Sienna, who for some reason was crying.
She had her hand to her mouth and tears poured from her eyes.
“What’s wrong?”
She shook her head. “I feel so much sadness in you. Loss. Anger.” She stepped to me and hugged me, pressing herself tightly against my body.
I felt the darkness that I hadn’t realized was still there recede, and I hugged her back, my eyes fixed on the lycanthrope.
Just because she knew my name, didn’t mean I was going to trust her.
Even if she no longer seemed like a threat.
“What’s your name?” I asked her. There was power in names, so I’d read. Whether or not that was true, as king I’d made a habit of asking. It was surprising how something as simple as remembering someone’s name without an advisor having to whisper it could ingratiate you to them.
“Vi. What are you doing in these woods? No man has been here for a very long time.”
I didn’t want to lie. Lies were trouble waiting to happen. I always found it best to tell the truth if at all possible. Nothing to keep straight, nothing to be found out and cock up negotiations with a skittish messenger who then goes back and tells his king you’re a liar and a thief and then you have to personally travel to this other kingdom—which is at the ass end of what will soon be Elaria—and explain that you didn’t lie exactly, only chose not to reveal something to a simple messenger.
Then you find out it wasn’t a simple messenger, but the queen’s favored son who didn’t like people treating him differently because he was royalty—a damn rarity.
Then you pay a pile of standards and give up a quarter of your own armory just to smooth things over.
So I wouldn’t lie to her. But if I was going to tell her the truth, I needed to find out more about her.
“How did you know my father?”
She smiled at this. “We were good friends.”
“He came into these woods?”
“No, we didn’t meet here. The only men who’ve come into the forest were the ones on the crashed zeppelin. It was day when they crashed, but…”
But they didn’t make it.
I remembered that. I had been just a child.
That was when there were still drakes in these woods.
Drakes were no dragons, but they could take out a zeppelin if there were enough of them.
That was long before Elaria, but still, everyone used zeppelins to get over the Wall, so a good many kingdoms and states had put in to pay for the Wizards Guild to come and eradicate anything which would be a danger to a zeppelin.
You always heard tales of the Guild, of their power, but standing in the safety of our keep, atop its tallest tower and watching them work, it was made real to me in a way simple words had never done, just how powerful they really were.
Only four wizards, and they had called out and rid the woods of hundreds of drakes.
It was a spectacle to watch them hover there in the sky—held aloft by nothing but magic—and dispatch drake after drake with apparent ease.
I had already been wary of magic, but that put the apprehension of it in me even more.
No one man should have such power. They were like gods.
&n
bsp; They weren’t, of course, and gods were perhaps the only thing they feared.
But the gods were long dead, and all that was left were the few divines scattered over the world. Though I had never met one. Wasn’t sure they were even real.
“I would have helped,” the lycanthrope continued, “but they crashed in the blight, and the things that live there…” she looked at the grogen’s bone fragments, “…make that look like a pup.”
“You would have helped men?” I asked. “Not eaten them?”
She growled quietly, but averted her eyes. “You didn’t answer my question. What are you doing here.”
“I was exiled. Now I’m headed to Este.”
“Este? Home of the priests… What is it you seek there?”
“Revenge.”
10
The lycanthrope, Vi, got to her feet. Her wounds had nearly healed now.
She wiped dried blood from around her mouth and spat on the bone fragments of the grogen. “Disgusting beast.” Then she looked up at us. “Well, good luck, son of Varthos. Dryad.”
“You’re leaving?” Sienna asked.
“What else would I do?”
“Come with us. Help us.”
The lycanthrope glared at her, her tail moving slowly behind her in small arcs. “Because you saved me?”
Sienna frowned. “No. We would have saved you no matter what; you needed our help. No, you should join us so we can be friends!”
Vi bared her teeth, though the gesture didn’t seem threatening. Like the way someone might stick out the tip of their tongue when thinking. “Friends,” she growled.
“Yes.” Sienna nodded eagerly. “We’re leaving here. Wouldn’t you like that? I feel you would. The trees tell me you’re lonely. They say you—”
“I don’t need trees telling me how I feel!” she snapped, looking around at the trees as though they’d betrayed her and she was deciding which one to devour first.
She chuffed, a harsh burst of air leaving her nose and lips. Looking at me, she asked, “And what say you, King?”
I shrugged. “It’s up to you.”
Vi stared at me for several moments, her yellow eyes somewhere between enchanting and unnerving. “Fine, son of Varthos. I’ll help you. For your father’s sake. I don’t know why you were exiled, but it must be wrongly.”
Curse of Magic Page 3
