Mantivore Prey

by S. J. Higbee

As I approached Ajene Stitcher, she thrust a plate of cadia cake into my hands, and gently stroked my face. “Bless you, child. You’ve done her proud. And while I was fond of your mother, no one could claim Mai treated you properly. So you now find a corner to grieve in your own way – you’re the Brarian Overlord, when all’s said and done.”

  She’s right! Suddenly I needed to be elsewhere. It took three goes before Crayler realised I was signalling we were about to leave. Something that wouldn’t have happened if Helston had been in charge. “Take us out the back way to the Nodery. Quietly,” I murmured to him.

  While my so-called quiet exit was far too clumsily executed, we got away with it because most of the villagers were intent on eating at least their own body weight before they left the Meeting House.

  I stumbled up the steps to the Nodery, feeling as if I belonged for the first time that day. Unlocking the door, waiting for Crayler’s guards to announce it was safe for me to enter and finally – finally walking into the bubbling, womblike space brought back too many memories. Shutting the door behind me, I turned to the tanks, flaring into life, strobing with vitality. Though there were two less vibrantly active than the others. So I leant against them, putting my face in my hands and wailing like a fresh-smacked toddler. The Nodery filled with the sound of bubbling and gurgling and the air turned sweet with the smell of gusting organi-packs as they pulsed along with my sobbing cries, soaking up my grief as I called to her. Not that it did any good. Mother didn’t come to see what the matter was. I was howling as much because I couldn’t remember her ever once comforting me, as for her stupid, pointless death.

  When my storm of weeping wound down to hiccupping sobs, I heard a gentle tapping at the door and Seth’s voice asking if I needed him. So of course, I opened the door because I always needed him.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  Vrox hoots, his impatience beating a tattoo against my skull—

  YOU SCALY LUMP OF USELESSNESS! SHE BURNED HER MOTHER ONLY A HANDFUL OF HOURS AGO.

  Felina? Please, make it stop! Being yanked from sleep by her MindYell wasn’t doing much for my headache. Groaning, I buried my sore head under the covers, desperate to get back to sleep.

  SORRY, RAINDROP, YOU NEED TO HAUL YOURSELF OUTTA BED AND COME WITH US.

  What for? I didn’t care that my Sending was drenched in self-pitying whininess.

  YOU’RE FLYING BACK TO GLORIOSA LATER TODAY. THERE’S STUFF WE NEED TO SORT OUT BEFORE YOU GO.

  And you can’t meet up for a chat over brekkie?

  NO, WE CAN’T. PICK UP THE PACE, RAINDROP. WE WOULDN’T HAVE WOKEN YOU UP IF IT WASN’T IMPORTANT! Felina’s bristling impatience washed through me, darkened by angry sadness.

  Something’s up and just for a roaching change, I’m probably gonna hate it. I slid out of bed, shivering in the sharp pre-dawn cold and hurriedly got dressed, not bothering to so much as drag a comb through my hair.

  I pulled on my heaviest over-robe and dragged on my boots, having had a sense from Felina’s Sending that we were going beyond the village wall.

  I would request that you make for the small escape door, which is only guarded by two sentries, my Queen, Jessob Sent.

  The fire door?

  That’s right, Raindrop, c’mon, hurry it up! Jessob’s gonna pull his invisibility trick to get you outta there, but every nanosec we’re hanging around, we’re liable to get caught.

  My gut clenched at the tension in Felina’s voice. Last year, when she’d planned my escape from Cnicus, she’d treated the whole thing like it was a Gathering Day jaunt. So what’s tugging at Felina’s airline over this business? It couldn’t be anything good.

  Remember when we MindMelded during the Battle of the Scarlet Horde Cave, my Queen? Jessob, on the other hand, seemed so relaxed as to be almost horizontal.

  I do.

  Can you open your mind, as you did then, an’ Share? I vow that I’ll not discommode you in any way.

  I closed my eyes, breathed out and relaxed. The one thing I’m good at is MindMelding, as I’d been sharing my head with Vrox since I was a toddler, so it was as easy as breathing. Particularly as Jessob slid into my head, alongside me, so very softly that I scarcely felt him.

  Until he Sent, Please imagine you are no longer standing at your door, ready to sneak past the sentries. Please imagine that you are back in your bed, fast asleep. Warm under the covers…

  I stumbled, suddenly dizzy at finding myself lying in my bed, cocooned in my blankets. Sucking in another breath, I relaxed into the Sending. After all, it wasn’t so different from abruptly finding myself in Vrox’s burrow surrounded by his brothers and sisters, and I’d been jack-knifed into that scenario more times than I’d had a mouthwhacking from Mother.

  Oh, very good, my Queen!

  I grinned in the dark, warmed by Jessob’s shocked admiration.

  With the correct training, you could become a mighty MindWarrior, my Queen. Remember, you are lying in bed, enjoying the rest…

  Imagining sheets tucked around me… Turning over, seeing the vari-patterned lights on the walls I use to lull me to sleep… In the meantime, I pressed the button and the door slid open.

  The sentry by the door spun round and peered into my sleeproom, as I tiptoed past him, still imagining the warmth of the mattress… the softness of my pillow…

  He cursed under his breath about the door glitching, as he shut it again and returned to pacing the short corridor outside my room. I had to flatten myself against the wall to avoid touching him as he passed me. But the moment he wheeled around and marched off in the opposite direction, I crept along the passage towards the fire door, hoping Jessob was able to send visions to places he hadn’t seen, when I heard a commotion outside.

  “Come on, folks,” said a sentry wearily. “It’s way after curfew. You should be in your beds.”

  “That an invite to come an’ keep me warm?” called Vesta Fieldhand, amongst a lot of rowdy laughter.

  One of Mother’s slow dirges was still being sung. Clearly the village had chosen to stay awake throughout the night, which probably was just as well, given there weren’t enough beds for all the visitors.

  Vesta’s raucous comments to the sentries posted outside Felina’s home created enough diversion to allow me to open the door, slip through and shut it, breathing in the smells I’d normally associate with Cnicus in the middle of the day, rather than at night.

  The spiderbot skittering along the village wall jinked sideways to avoid cannoning into Vrox, who stepped from behind a clump of bamboo, closely followed by Felina and Jessob.

  Vrox churrs a welcome to his Queen. This is a fine pre-dawn to Parley.

  Parley? Not sure I like the sound of that.

  Jessob took the lead, with Vrox and Felina flanking me and the inevitable spiderbot marching on behind us as we edged around groups, some drunkenly happy and others weeping desolately, up Main Street heading towards West Gate.

  Think small and shrinking, Raindrop. Like you’re not really here, instructed Felina, her hand brushing my arm.

  I concentrated on the wind ruffling Jessob’s hair… the sentries replying to Felina’s called greetings… Vrox’s happy anticipation at roaming around outside the village… so that I almost cannoned into Jessob’s back as he suddenly stopped at West Gate.

  “You’re later than usual,” greeted the sentry.

  “What with all the fuss after the funeral, it’s a wonder we’re here at all,” returned Felina.

  “You going to be back before sunup?”

  “Depends on how good the hunting is,” she replied.

  The sentry opened the gate, and briefly gazed into the darkness outside the loom of the security lights, before adding, “With all the carryon in here, wouldn’t think there’d be much out there tonight. Stay safe.”

  “You too,” said Felina.

  And with that, the gate shut behind us.

  Jessob continued marching up the road with Vrox, Felina, me and the spiderbot following closely
behind, until the bot abruptly wheeled off across the cleared area towards the nearest clump of vegetation.

  I waited for Vrox to haul it back, or at least overtake the lurching bot. But everyone simply followed behind it in single file, with Felina and me in the middle and Jessob now bringing up the rear. The roaching thing wasn’t hanging around and while I could easily see thanks to my silvered night-vision, the going underfoot was rutted and uneven.

  I stopped. “Where are we going? Wherever it is, we’re moving way too fast. If there’s a veinworm colony on the move, we’ll be in the middle of it with no chance of avoiding it.”

  Felina spun round, solid and reassuring. It’s shady, Raindrop. Old Vrox has progged Leggsie, here, to scan for the likes of veinworms an’ palmleeches. That’s why he’s taken the lead. But we do need to get going, before you’re missed…

  Reluctantly, I started walking again, realising I needed to trust these folks, cos they weren’t anything like Ellern Healer. Though I wish they wouldn’t make such a mystery of this expedition…

  Vrox snickers complacently at his Queen’s confusion.

  And exclusion. Not so long ago, it was only me and Vrox sharing headspace. When did I get to be the one on the outside, playing catchup? And who called the roaching spiderbot Leggsie?

  That would be me, oh my Queen. My profound repentances if the name displeases you. What would you rather I called the mechie creature? Jessob’s Sending was genuinely anxious.

  While Vrox was snidely amused at my petty burst of jealousy.

  It’s shady. Leggsie is a good name. I winced at the shame and awkwardness washing through my Sending. I sounded like a petulant child, rather than a queen worth the name.

  We’d crossed the strip of cleared vegetation and were now winding through the network of paths bordering fields and irrigation ditches that stretched between Cnicus and the River Salamander, until we came onto River Road leading to the small jetty where the village picked up and delivered goods brought in by the cargo boats that regularly plied the river. Not that anyone was sufficiently reckless to travel at night. Maw sharks, always a danger, became a lot more aggressive in the dark and had been known to launch themselves onto the decks of riverboats, their huge mouths gaping to grab any available crew.

  I’d travelled along this road with Seth and Felina, just over a year ago, when fleeing the village. Though these days, it wasn’t the rough, rutted track it had been back then. Now it was paved with proper drainage gullies either side to take the occasional downpours that used to regularly wash the road away.

  Leggsie once more abruptly skittered sideways into the reeds. Following, I found myself in a small clearing, where the reeds had been trodden flat and ringed with logs for seats. Vrox lunged forward, his bioluminescence in full Threat mode, snarling and Sending bloody visions of what he’d do to anything he’d catch. A family of jaspers streaked through the reeds squealing in panic, to find somewhere else to rest up during the approaching day.

  May we be seated in your presence, my Queen?

  Of course, I stuttered, wishing I’d thought to mention it before being prompted.

  It’s shady, Raindrop. Don’t you fret – you’ve done nothing to be ashamed of. “And now, we need to have a bit of a chat, where no one’s gonna be listening in,” Felina continued aloud, radiating the same angry sadness I’d felt earlier, though this time around it was also backlit with excitement and hope. “Thing is…”

  Looking at her silver-flecked gaze I caught a Sense of what she was going to say.

  That’s roachbait! I jumped to my feet. “You’re leaving. That’s why you’ve brought me here without my guards. To tell me you’re going.” My gaze slid across to Jessob. “And you’re going with her.”

  He inclined his head with that weirdly fluid grace of his. “Even so, My Queen. We need to seek out more vore hordes, or find any surviving fragments an’ bring them together. Before it’s too late. Before the race of mantivores are gone from the world.”

  “I understand why you’re going on this quest. You’re young and tough. Used to living off the land with all kind of vore tricks to keep shady. But you…” I swung around to Felina. “What in roaching hells are you thinking? You’re not young, or tough. All you know is storekeeping. You’ll be holding him up.” I jerked my head in Jessob’s direction. “And next thing, you’ll fall sick with no healer nearby and he’ll have your death on his conscience. As for you…” I turned to the mantivore, hands on hips. “Don’t know what voredrug root you been gnawing on, but you’ve gotta come back with me to Gloriosa. The Codes, remember?”

  Vrox rears up, his muzzle wrinkled, his neck crest erect, full of angry guilt…

  But I was beyond taking any notice of his roaching tantrum. Nah. You take your vore bluster and shove it where the sun don’t shine! The plain fact is that we’re stuck with each other—

  “I beg your pardon, My Queen. But Vroxsept Jennezdecabrood of the River Horde, all Tribute to their Memories, is trying to convey his full-flowing repentances for the wholly great wrong he did you in MindLinking with you before you were old enough to ask or know of what it entails,” said Jessob, sounding even odder than usual.

  I waved his nonsense away. “Vrox and I have already been through this, and I told him that it’s shady—”

  “Whereas it’s nothing of the sort. An’ Vrox full well knew this, even as he leapt into your mind without your yayso,” said Jessob, his expression both appalled and pitying.

  “He’s explained it!” I snapped, suddenly furious at this smooth-spoken boy busy trying to turn me against Vrox. Well it won’t work! “He was trapped in Osmar’s head after the brain-damage, needing to get out as fast as he could.”

  “But there were plenty of choices. Saul Priest regularly visited your uncle an’ knew how Osmar had forced Vroxy to learn the codes, as did old Healer Drigel,” continued Jessob, pouring out secrets Vrox had shared with me, as if he was discussing the roaching weather. “Truth was, he wanted to go on MindClawing at Osmar for what he’d done an’ if he’d MindLinked with someone else, he’d no longer be able to do so.”

  “But… he really liked me. He chose me!”

  “An’ ensured you grew up too different to be accepted within your brood.”

  “He couldn’t know that! He was only a cub when he was captured. It was horrible… the slaughter…”

  “Indeed, it was, My Queen. But he was old enough to know certain absolutes. No MindLinking with any creature other than an enemy you intend to kill without their full, informed Consent. Ever.” Jessob’s voice, though not loud, managed to convey a multi-toned finality that rang through my head. He was Sending and speaking aloud at the same time.

  Feeling sick, I turned to Vrox, who stared back at me emptily as I replayed the scene he unspooled in my head, when telling me how it happened, another lifetime ago as I cleaned his vermin-infested scales for him…

  Osmar is lying in the infirmary, paralysed and brain damaged. Mother is standing by his bed beside Auntie Hesta, who is crying and holding a three-year-old me.

  Vrox desperately paces his cell. Osmar’s mind is alternately blank, or full of fractured images so intense and disturbing they physically hurt the mantivore. He cannot stay MindLinked here…

  Auntie Hesta clutches me too tightly as she sobs.

  I struggle. Auntie, finding it hard to hold me, sits me on the bed alongside Osmar. Wanting comfort from the one family member who generally spoils me, I crawl closer to Osmar and put my pudgy hand in his.

  Osmar – my father – grips back. For an instant his mind clears as he recognises he is holding his daughter’s hand.

  In that instant, Vrox slips across into my mind. Everything is different. Sensations are sharp. Emotions are keen. A dozen sights, sounds, feelings are examined, absorbed and discarded in the space of a minute. Vrox is enchanted, reminded of his family burrow all those years ago…

  “You know what? If I had the choice – right now – between not having Vrox in my
head or being MindLinked – I’d choose to be MindLinked!”

  “We’re not saying that it was necessarily a bad thing, Raindrop. We’re saying that Vrox shouldn’t have done it and knew it at the time,” said Felina, putting her hand on my arm, so the angry sadness radiating off her nearly buckled my knees.

  “What it means is that in addition to no longer MindLinking with you, he’s forfeited the right to those Codes,” continued Jessob.

  I flung my arms in the air. “And how’s that gonna work? You do know that Osmar forced him to memorise all those Codes during a powerplay with Uncle Trislen. And that they’re the Command Codes that run the Prime Nodery, which is at the heart of the Node nexus.” I locked looks with the mantivore, who regarded me through half-closed eyes. “He doesn’t want to hand them over.”

  Jessob glanced across at the old vore. “That so, Vroxy? You hung onto these Codes cos you feared your Queen would seek rightful revenge, once she had gained control of them?”

  Vrox uttered a rasping snarl, which had Jessob lifting his eyebrows, a cynical grin crawling across his face.

  While Felina muttered something under her breath, before adding, “There’s times I reckon you and Osmar thoroughly deserved each other. And now’s one of them.”

  I clenched my fists, furious at once again being excluded from the conversation like some know-nothing.

  Vrox flicks a look in my direction, openly goading me.

  So I folded my arms, pressing my lips tightly together. This whole sorry business was one long humiliation. No point in adding to my misery by making some wet-headed scene.

  Vrox churrs to his Queen, a complicated mix of fond exasperation, as he tells her that she already has the Codes. Has had them since she proved she was worthy of taking control of them…

  Although I knew the old vore was playing with us, excluding first one and then the other, that didn’t stop my stab of satisfaction on realising that neither Jessob nor Felina could hear our conversation. They didn’t like it any more than I had, judging from Felina’s cursing and Jessob’s snarling grin.