Meliu

by L. James Rice

  She took a satisfied breath and dared a legitimate smile meant for no one but herself. Way she figured, she’d done good.

  “Choerkin at the gates!” A chime sounded and to the east her ears made out the grind of a portcullis.

  She glanced toward the temple, just now visible to the north, but curiosity had seized her soul. She trotted down the street until she found a view of the East Gate. The portcullis stopped, and the dark of the arched entry illuminated as doors opened.

  Five bedraggled riders road into the city, their horses flagged. She gasped with recognition, even if she didn’t know all their names. One Lash and Ivin Choerkin, the Rat, plus a man and woman she’d seen the day of Ulrikt’s rising. Blood in the Forge, this can’t be good.

  A sixth rider trailed in priest’s robes, but she recognized the face soon as he looked up. Holy Heavens! Tokodin. “He is alive.”

  The urge to run to him, to hug her old friend, tickled her fancy, but as the gates swung shut and portcullis descended, the Forges defeated the Heavens. In her mind she heard Tokodin’s words from that day beside the Crack of Burdenis: The hells are coming.

  And she knew it was true.

  The time for reunions would wait for another day.

  What she needed was a pony, a keg, and another stupid monk to get her off this Shadow cursed island.

  5

  Sisterly Love

  Spin the wheel, feel the spiel;

  will misstated lies find truth?

  Are truths unspoken lies?

  With how many wings does the Craven Raven fail to fly?

  For how many years must a man be dead to die?

  —Tomes of the Touched

  The pitch of the scream was inhuman and seized every nerve in Meliu’s body. Her muscles refused to move, and for a flicker it felt time had stopped.

  Then the voice came. “What the Forges was that?”

  She blinked as a deer shaking off the stare of a starving wolf, and all her blood pumped at once. Her heart beat to explode. The pony stood nearby loaded with ale. Jinbin’s smile was one of terror.

  “No time. There’s no time. Get to the Luxun ship, swift as a falcon.”

  “What the hells was that noise?”

  The urge to slap him brought a twitch to her fingers. “A Shadow. They’re here. Now go! Go!”

  He took the pony’s lead, hands shaking. She’d taken two steps toward the temple before the question came. “Where the hells are you going?”

  “High Priestess Adelin. They need warned. I thought I had time.”

  If Jinbin replied she never heard his words. She fled the stables and as she hit the middle of the courtyard a second demonic scream echoed through the city; it was distant, and she didn’t bother to look. She slammed past temple guards at a full sprint, but they paid her no mind, their eyes locked somewhere behind her.

  Adherents scurried through the temple’s halls, hustling without running. Meliu grabbed a priest by his arm and spun him to face her. He was a big man and wrinkled by years, a priest already by the time she’d been a bare foot postulant. He deserved more respect than she gave. “Where the godsdamn is Adelin?”

  Another time he might have struck her for speaking such, but on this day he answered before wrenching his arm free. “The Theater of Sol.”

  “Where?”

  “Straight ahead and climb the horseshoe stair, central arch and you’re there.”

  She nodded and ran, not wasting her breath on a thank you. Her sprint down a granite hall ended as doors opened into a broad room, its ceiling held aloft by a dozen ornate pillars. Stairs carved with vines and trees stood to either side of the room, leading to a balcony. She took the right stair and by the time she reached the top her lungs gasped. She took the central arch, and as promised, found High Priestess Adelin.

  Meliu had met the woman several times over the years. She’d aged since last they’d met, her ruddy brown hair showing strings of silver, but there was no mistaking her.

  “High Priestess…”

  But she wasn’t alone. High Priestess Sedut stood by her side; the women were still as two brooding hens as they stared at her.

  Meliu swallowed a rock. “The Shadows, they’re here. But you knew that.” Meliu addressed Adelin, but her eyes couldn’t escape Sedut’s tranquil gaze.

  “Meliu?” said Adelin. “What are you doing here, child?”

  “I thought I was here to warn you. To make sure you flee Kaludor.”

  Adelin smiled, awkward for a priestess so stern. “We will not flee. We will fight the Shadows and lead our people to the sea.”

  Sedut said, “It is you who should’ve fled. Your prayers are worthless here.”

  True words, but it was their honesty that wrenched her gut. Her voice came soft. “I will.” Then she gathered her courage, straightening to stand as tall as nature allowed. “Do we fight the Shadows, or do they fight for Ulrikt?”

  Sedut took a step toward her, but Adelin’s hand on her shoulder stopped the scornful gaze from gliding closer.

  Adelin said, “Your suspicions are misplaced, and forgivable considering your experiences in the north.”

  “What the hells do you know about my experiences? To hells with that, what about dead Choerkin?”

  “The clan has many enemies. Would the Church stoop so low to knives? May as well use poison.”

  Her smile wasn’t out of place now, Meliu thought it sadistic. Treading further was walking on crackled ice.

  Meliu nodded and shrugged her shoulders. “You fight, you lead, I guess. I’ll sail for the Watch.”

  Sedut said, “I wish you fortunate journeys.”

  Meliu bowed. “To the both of you, as well.”

  She turned and strode for the exit, but Adelin’s voice halted her for a flicker. “Meliu. Never doubt Lord Priest Ulrikt.”

  Meliu tucked her head and walked fast. “Never doubt,” she muttered, but spoke no further in case someone listened. Not sure I trust myself anymore, let alone that bastard. But she’d said not to doubt him, it was Meliu’s interpretation to insert trust in him. Are those truly the same? Maybe not. Why the hells am I quibbling over a word? Because it’s what you do, fool.

  She snorted at herself as she reached the bottom of the stairs. There wasn’t a soul in sight, which set off her nerves and erased the semantic debate from her head. With lungs recovered she bolted for the temple’s front doors and burst into the walled courtyard.

  Empty.

  The guards were gone, and not a single adherent stood in view, but she heard screams and shouts from Lantern Street beyond the walls. She took a couple rushed breaths then beelined to the gate. People streamed by as chaotic as trout battling their way up a waterfall, making her wish she were a bear to knock a few from her path.

  She slipped into the flow, thankful the docks stood not so far from the temple, but once in the thick of the human swarm she couldn’t see where she went without hopping for a view. “Shittin’ me? Godsdamned shittin’ me?” Her direction was at the mercy of the mob. “Burn the bellows!” An oaf-footed man clipped her heel, and she fell, rolling and bouncing to her feet to keep from a trampling: “Molten Forge be damned!” By the time they reached the wharfs she scraped the barrel of curses. “By the Dancing Bastards! Just let me through!”

  She could see the crown and moon banner of the Luxun ship over the heads of the dolts in front of her. So far away she needed wings. Luxun honor wouldn’t demand they die waiting for their patron; she needed to hurry. She squeezed sideways toward a wall and spotted a cart. Weeping children huddled beneath its boards clutching their knees to chests, but there wasn’t a damned thing she could do for them or anyone else. Didn’t seem she could do nothing for herself, but a desperate plan formed when she spotted urchins atop the buildings.

  She climbed into the cart. The drainpipe lay in the street, but a gutter remained. Three steps and jump. Three steps and jump. One, two, the cart teetered on three and the valiant leap she imagined instead sent her careening
into the crowd.

  She bounced off a giant man’s back.

  Struck the cobbles.

  Curled into a ball as boots kicked at her ribs and head. Curses flew at her soul from a half dozen voices.

  She screamed and prayed; the Light came intense, and she unleashed its power in a blinding flash, her own eyes squeezed tight and covered by her hands.

  Screams and more curses, but the blows stopped. She rose to a crouch and ran, hands still covering her face and ears, bouncing off a score of people before tumbling into open ground between two guardsman whose pikes pointed at the shouting mob. A third guard’s sword leveled at her eyes.

  “I’ve passage paid on the Entiyu Emoño! I must get there, I’ve a message for Kotin Choerkin!” She held forth Ulrikt’s scroll, praying the man wouldn’t take time to check her story.

  His sword rose. “Go!”

  Meliu scrambled to her feet and ran. Laymen crowded the docks, but they weren’t as thick with desperate folk as the streets leading here. A chill swept her spine; a flicker later an energy surged behind her. She didn’t want to look, and cursed herself for a simpleton as her head turned.

  Broken bodies tumbled through the air, and the head of a gigantic Shadow appeared over the throngs. Guards didn’t or wouldn’t hold the tide of terrified at bay. Hundreds of people roared toward her and the docks. People fell and were trampled, and she’d be next if she remained in their path. She sprinted for the ship, diving, dodging, and shoving. Her heart cried out but her lips were silent as she realized the Entiyu Emoño was drifting from the docks, its deck filled with people.

  Folks were jumping, a woman thudded from the hull to splash into the bay, but they didn’t have her running start. She would make it, she had to. She didn’t survive the Crack twice to die here and now. Four more strides and leap.

  Ivin Choerkin.

  He stood by the rail, helping those who reached him. His face stymied her stride, and she stumbled, slid to a stop grasping a man’s shoulder. Would he shove me into the bay? The question was moot in flickers; the jump was too far now, all she could do was stand and stare as others tried and failed at the leap. He never even saw me. And there stood One Lash, and Jinbin.

  Hope deflated from her body with her breath. It was her ship, not theirs. She’d negotiated passage. Self-pity turned to terror when her gaze swiveled back to the city. The great Shadow plowed through human soil in a trough of broken bodies, and Taken leaped into the masses. Abandoning hope, some folks jumped into the frozen waters while the desperate shoved others. Standing at the edge, it would be her turn for a swim soon.

  Meliu took her coin pouch in hand, kicked her boots off, then stripped her robes over her head and stuffed them in her pack. Her silken smallclothes, which had cost her so many songs, were all she wore when she dove.

  She prayed for Heat before hitting the bay but the answer from the gods wasn’t enough to save her from the pangs of crashing into icy waves. Her breath fled her lungs as she went under, and it took all her will and strength to cling to her pack and flail to the surface. Gasping, spitting, taking in more water to spit and gasp again. Heat seeped through her veins and with it strength. She’d never learned to swim more than to paddle and keep her nose above water, and that was hard as all the hells with waves risen by the rain of people tumbling into the bay.

  A hand grasped her shoulder with fingers stiff and turning blue. Meliu stared as the woman submerged, thankful this stranger’s fingers were too stiff to take her with her, but the meager heat of her prayer would only keep her afloat so long.

  A shrill scream from the dock and she dared look up; the great Shadow stood above her, and she swore it glanced her way, and that she felt its mouthless smile. The jarring sensation of its gaze kicked her arms and legs into furious motion, a final, desperate will to survive.

  Sol, I have failed you, but I beseech you don’t fail me.

  The warmth arrived first in her chest then spread as never before. An intensity greater than when as a child she’d grabbed a hot pan, but somehow this Heat didn’t burn. It brought not only comfort, but power and determination. She looped her pack over her shoulder and stroked the water as she’d seen others do in the past. Her outreached hands struck the water and steam rose where they met.

  She raised her head and spotted the shore beneath the wharf. And a flailing child a few paces away. With a confidence born of the Fires of Sol, she swam, grabbing the boy, and dragging him to the promontory with her.

  She heaved her pack to shore, then drug the boy with her onto cold stone. He was alive in the clutch of her steaming arms, but unconscious, and she wrapped herself around him as best she could, willing the Heat of prayer to thaw the child’s body.

  A few flares later the child breathed easy, and her body no longer steamed, but not from a lack of warmth. Her skin, even her hair and silks, were dry. Sol had favored her prayer with a strength she’d never imagined. Would he provide her with a power to battle the Shadows and Taken still killing in the streets above?

  She sat in relative comfort and safety, rocking a boy of maybe six years, but every sound traveling through the planks which blocked the sky were of horror. When she raised her eyes to the dock she’d escaped, she saw the giant Shadow who broke instead of taking. The thing stood at the end of the pier, arms outstretched. A hundred Taken swarmed behind its black mass.

  “What the hells are you conjuring?” she muttered to herself. She glanced to the boy in her arms, her own near nakedness, and pulled her robes from her pack. They were soaked. She eased the boy from her lap, pillowing his head on her pack, and slipped into clinging wet wool. Staring at her bare feet brought choice words to mind; her socks must’ve slipped off in the swim.

  A peculiar lull in screams from above, then the crackle and thunder of lightning. Prayer. Men shouted commands, and desperate, helpless cries turned to pleas for help. Priests and Choerkin. Sedut may not have lied after all. The great Shadow ignored whatever force was behind it, and the Taken turned in unison to stare back to the island. A grotesquery of breathing statues, many mutilated and oozing black blood. It was the first time she noticed the Taken breathed; another difference from most Wakened Dead.

  Meliu stood and lifted the boy, taking him higher on the rocks. He was too much to carry far, but she needed to see what battle brought above. “I’ll be back, child.” She shoved her songs into her robe but left him her pack to rest his head, then hop-walked with ginger steps across the stone. A sliced foot or a turned ankle would push the boundaries of her creative curses.

  There wasn’t a dry way out of this place, so she hiked her robes and stepped into shallow waters. Steam rose from her feet as they slipped and slid on slippery rocks, but she kept her balance until she reached a piling with a crisscross of boards she climbed as an awkward ladder. Her head poked above the dock to find people huddled as recalcitrant lemmings, and she doubted a one noticed her squirming up the edge and hoisting her feet to the dock by a rope thick as her arm.

  She didn’t blame them, their attention was rapt in the battle for their lives.

  Fire, lightning, smoke. Spears, arrows, javelins. Boards, stones, bottles. Whether priest, Choerkin, or commoner, everyone did their damnedest to kill and survive, and Meliu watched in distant, disconnected awe. Many of these folks in the front lines were simple people, but when faced with death, instead of blinking they grabbed whatever the hells was nearby. Men, women, young and old. Do I possess the will and courage to fight, or just enough to sneak and survive?

  An arrow struck a Taken in the forehead, and black blood erupted from the wound; it fell from the dock, landing amidst bobbing bodies. The Shadow escaped its host, but shrieked with a sanity shirking wail. Waves struck, and the demon dissipated, leaving only an echo as a reminder of its evil.

  Water. Pound my brain in the Forges… Water.

  She ran through the gathered masses into emptier streets. Horrific screams from above, and her eyes raised in time to see a roof urchin’s arm ripp
ed from their body, and a Taken eyeing a pack of children.

  A barrel for collecting rainwater stood on the edge of the roof, a sliver of hope if only they knew the creature’s weakness.

  Meliu bolted through the building’s broken doors and ran up the foyer’s stairs, bursting onto the roof in time to see a small girl streak toward her. But the Taken moved faster, snatching the girl’s arm. Meliu lowered her shoulder and bowled straight into the monster’s ribs. She caromed straight for the barrel and nearby bucket, diving for its handle. With a quick bounce to her feet, she dunked the bucket.

  The Taken grasped the girl by her ankles, holding her high to split her like a wishbone. The child screamed, Meliu screamed, and at a dead sprint she heaved water at the thing.

  The Taken dropped the child in an instant, wailing. Meliu grabbed the girl and pulled her away from the thing. Six children clustered around her, and they all stared as the monster slapped at its face and arms, howling in anguish.

  But the godsdamned thing wasn’t dying.

  “The stairs! Run!” The little girl limped and Meliu lifted her to a shoulder until outside. “You can run?” The girl nodded, and they ran as fast as they could, taking a narrow street southwest toward the docks and the fighting. She glanced back; the Taken man loped on all fours behind them.

  The group rounded one corner, then a second, and damned near ran down the points of spears. They screamed and ducked, the men raising their weapons to let them in the perimeter. The Taken didn’t slow for a flicker and leaped, its body sliding down the length of a pike with a wail before striking the crossbar.

  The warrior dropped his weapon, and swords flashed, slicing the body into chunks they kicked aside. The gore was horrific even if black-blooded rather than red, but the tendrils of Shadow creeping from the carcass suggested their reasoning.

  She cast her eyes along the street, spotted another rain barrel, and ran to fill her bucket. Warriors stared at her as she stood panting over the scattered remains and the wisps of Shadow stretched thin between pieces of muscle and bone. A quick prayer passed from her lips and she tipped the bucket to pour over exposed Shadow.