by Jen Ponce
“No one has seen his spawn for thousands of years. Not since Ravana locked him away. If they’re rising—”
“We can figure out why by asking. The. Spawn.”
Tytan narrowed his eyes. “Do you want me to pat you on the head and call you a clever little Skriven?”
The Skriven dropped his hands, defeated. “Why not! Would it kill you to say thank you?”
Vasili’s pet human put herself between him and Medusa-Head, a palm on his chest, a palm on the other’s. “All right gentleman. Let’s focus our aggression in the right direction, shall we? This is Oren and he was recently awoken from slumber by his Originator. He is linked with his fellows in a way that would, I imagine, make both of you shit your breeches.”
Tytan sat on the rickety chair by Vasili’s front door and crossed his arms. “Linked?”
“Hive mind. What one thinks another knows.”
Tytan turned his gaze on Oren, the pale, lanky Skriven suddenly more interesting. “What are your brethren doing right now, Oren?”
The Skriven’s stare might have scared a human, he supposed. The blank expression, lidless eyes, pale skin. It was a bit too obvious, really. He liked his evil hidden, not flopped out for all to see.
“Oren, answer Tytan’s questions.”
The Skriven snarled. “They are returning to our home to make something for our master.”
A minute stretched to two, to three. “Well, go on. What are they making?”
Oren’s lip curled. “Rippers.”
Would the thing still be able to talk with broken teeth and smashed lips? Tytan thought so. He itched to find out. “And what are rippers?”
“The way that Gaius travels through time. He has asked us to make more and scatter throughout the Slip to find the right time rip through to, to find a younger version of the one who thwarted him. Find a younger version of you, too, one with less weakness.”
Tytan did grab him, then, and slammed him through Vasili’s wall.
“Hey!” This, from Vasili.
Tytan ignored him, walking through the hole, stepping over wood and shattered things. Oren was sprawled before him, laughter in his blank eyes.
“You are a broken thing, Skriven. Ravana should have unmade you.”
“And instead, my maker is the one unmade and here I stand as Originator.”
The Skriven scoffed. “You? You don’t have your soul and yet you still bleed emotion. You’re pathetic.”
“And you are bound to a human woman because of a flower,” Tytan said and casually kicked Oren in the side. It had been hard enough to kill a human, but the Skriven on the ground at his feet just grunted. “Get up. You’re going to help us find the other Skriven and tear them all limb from limb.”
“You won’t stop us,” Oren hissed, and Tytan sighed, then picked up his foot and dragged him back into Vasili’s hut.
“Give him an order not to convey any information to the others, Elizabeta. I’ll go gather everyone who wants to help.”
“Help with what?” Vasili asked. “Fixing my hovel again?”
Tytan fixed it with a wave of his hand. The power was vast and so easy to access. He would have to be careful not to lose himself to its siren call. “I don’t know why you couldn’t do that. She gave you leave to use your power.”
“She’s dead,” he said quietly.
Right. He’d forgotten. Again. “Same rules apply now that did when she was alive.”
He bowed his head, his tentacles waving low and slow. “Thank you.”
Tytan didn’t answer; he left before anyone could see the pain on his face. He’d always known Devany was trouble, he just hadn’t known she would remain trouble even after she died.
Kali crossed all four sets of her arms. “You want me to take you to the fleshcrawler’s lair and drop you off?”
Nex bobbed in front of Kali, his entrails dusting the floor and leaving ribboned tracks in their wake. “Yes, that is exactly what I wish for you to do.” He had been thinking a lot about what his next move might be. With the house full, Tytan bent on vengeance, and Vasili occupied with his human, Nex found himself at loose ends. He wanted to do something, wanted to help, but he wasn’t sure what else he could do that was useful other than talk to the Slip fleshcrawlers and discover what had become of Devany. The more he thought about it, the less he believed that they had killed her and eaten her flesh. His people were a pragmatic bunch and knew power when they felt it. Eating her would have given them a boost to be sure, but a short-lived one. Why take a piece of the treasure when you could have the hoard?
He hadn’t said anything about it to Tytan or anyone else, not wanting to get hopes up or worse, have the Skrivens descend upon the fleshcrawlers and destroy them. He knew Kali had returned from her sojourn into their territory torn up, but she hadn’t been there to kill them, only to search. If even a few dozen of the Skriven under Devany’s command decided to tear apart the fleshcrawlers and kill them all, they would succeed.
It did no one any good not to acknowledge a superior force.
And for all he knew, the fleshcrawlers had taken the piece of the treasure and eaten her flesh, body, and soul.
“You will not find her. I tore that place apart. She’s gone.”
Nex didn’t wish to do her ego any harm, so he did not say what he was thinking, You are an ignorant, arrogant Skriven who couldn’t find compassion in the dictionary. It was an insult he’d picked up from Devany long ago when they first met. They had said many things, but this one had come to him now and so he used it. As a rule, those with a lot of power often overlooked the deviousness of those they thought beneath them. They only looked in obvious places without a thought to those clever hidey-holes where smaller, less powerful things might hide treasure. These Slip fleshcrawlers had lived here for millennia and knew their foes well. They would know how to conceal their secrets from Skriven and Originators alike. “It is time for me to announce my presence to them. They are my people, however removed from my kind on Midia.”
“You would treat with they who ripped your friend limb from limb and consumed her flesh?”
“I wish to learn what happened to her.” She looked disinclined to take him. He didn’t know who else he would turn to if she said no. He knew few of the other Skriven well and disliked the vast majority of them. They were too black and white when he was a full range of greys.
“Fine. I will take you. It will not be on my head if you are torn to bits and consumed.” She didn’t wait to hear his response, but instead hooked him directly over Gaius’s prison and dropped him.
He didn’t allow himself to just plunge into the water; that would have been undignified. Neither, though, did he allow the imprisoned Originator a chance to snag him. Nex was under the surface before that one had time to do more than turn and stare as Nex sank out of sight in the dark water.
They were on him almost immediately as if they had set watch on the hole—and probably they had. Nex used his magic to keep himself steady as the Slip fleshcrawlers approached him, teeth bared, claws extended. They did not attack him as he had assumed. They could see he was one of them or had once been. Their kind had lore aplenty about pegnon. It wasn’t something to aspire to—being one meant another fleshcrawler had torn his head from his body—but it wasn’t something to mess with, either. He was a soothsayer and could prophesize when needed.
A thought occurred then, one that made his hope that Devany was alive flare brighter. If she had truly died, he would no longer be her Archaeon Tesyrio. He had felt no such rending of their agreement. Did that not add another layer of evidence that she was not dead?
“What do you here, pegnon?”
He inclined his head. “I was former King Nex of the Midian fleshcrawlers. Now I’m come to bid your queen or king hail.”
The fleshcrawler guards circled him, tasting the water for his scent, examining him from every angle to make sure he wasn’t some sort of Trojan horse—head?—come to wreak havoc in their midst. When they wer
e as satisfied as they could be, the small-eared one hissed at his fellow to go get an escort.
“We do not leave our post for any reason, pegnon.”
Ah. So they thought him some shill working for the Originator in the cell? “I would never lower myself to working for one of them,” he said, inserting as much derision into his voice as he could. He and Devany were friends, so their relationship did not count in his mind. He was not her dogsbody nor she his master. They were friends. Still were because he planned to find out where she’d been hidden.
“We shall see.” The fleshcrawler looked amused, as if it had caught him out.
He merely stared back at it without expression until a contingent of three fleshcrawlers arrived to take him to the royal chambers. They gave him the same thorough look-over before directing him down, down, ever down, into the darkness of the lake.
These Slip fleshcrawlers had a lot more space than his clan had, but it wasn’t suffused with Source as his home. He supposed there were drawbacks and rewards to each and whichever one preferred probably had more to do with where one had been born and raised rather than any other reason.
They swam to the bottom of the lake and then further, entering a narrow-mouthed tunnel that eventually widened to reveal a vast chamber that glowed with orange light.
They were close to a magma chamber, the water almost uncomfortably warm.
There was no way Kali had found this place, not if the fleshcrawlers hadn’t wanted her to see it. A simple push of the boulder by the entrance would seal it up with no one the wiser, especially not one angry, bumbling Skriven.
At the far end of the cavern sat a gigantic rashn, bigger than any he’d ever seen. It pulsed with the energy it contained and Nex understood the power these fleshcrawlers had at their command.
An older male fleshcrawler sat on the rashn, his pale skin kissed with orange and glittering from tiny plankton that sparkled with power. A crown of seaweed sat upon his head, this decorated with amethysts and gold. When Nex neared, the fleshcrawler exposed his teeth, though not in a threatening manner. “Ah, a pegnon! I have not seen your like in many-a, many-a.” He swam to Nex and circled him, though this wasn’t a search for secreted weapons—this was curiosity plain and simple. Strange, that. Kings weren’t supposed to be curious. They were supposed to be warriors. “Who made you thus?”
“My queen, Anyang, gone these long years past to make way for the new queen.”
“Nephele. Yes. I have heard tales of this.” He circled once more. “Do you mind if I touch your entrails?”
“Not at all.” Nex did, indeed mind, but thought it best to keep his qualms about being groped to himself. He wouldn’t find Devany by antagonizing the king.
It was strange, unnerving, even, to have someone fondle his entrails. When the king had finally had his fill, Nex said, “Can I be of use to your Majesty?”
“Hmm.” The fleshcrawler gave one last tug and then retreated to his throne. “I have been hearing stirrings of Gaius’ children. They are creatures of great abhorrence to me. Five upon five centuries past did they come to free their master. They did not win out, but I lost two score of my children. What say you to this?”
“I am deeply sorry for your loss. It has been said that they are rising again, even now, to that wily old one’s calls.”
The king waved that part away, then leaned forward. “Do you think you could give me a bit of that far-seeing?”
Nex didn’t like being considered a plaything used for the amusement of another, but he reminded himself this was for a greater good. He settled himself inside his own head, inside the grey matter that powered his intellect and found the shiny, silvery core. When he grasped it, everything in his skull lit up, heated up, until light was all he was and ever would be. Then words poured from his mouth, words he couldn’t control, couldn’t guide any more than a current washing through the Swamp.
When he finished, the king was staring avidly at him. “Interesting.” Around him, other fleshcrawlers hissed with interest, anger, and giddy hope. “What can I give you in return, pegnon?”
“I come looking for my friend. Her name is Devany and she dropped into your realm. A foul-tempered Skriven followed soon after trying to find her.”
The king’s expression didn’t change. One of his retinue, however, shifted his gaze to the left and back. A young one, not yet good at the art of deceit. Nex tucked away that bit of knowledge and returned his attention to the king, who said, “I believe she made us a good meal, that one.”
It would have been the very thing he said, had he been in the king’s position. He’d started wrong, had forgotten the courtly dance of lies and now he would never get the truth from the king. Knowing this, he said, “I’m glad you honored her with such a death.”
The king’s self-satisfied smile annoyed Nex, a new emotion that had entered his repertoire only since getting to know Devany. It wasn’t a productive emotion, but it felt good. In an annoying way. “Would you care to sup with us this evening? We have fine cattle cultivated from our own stock.”
It was the last thing he wished to do, but the one thing he knew he could do to ferret out the truth. If Devany were here, she would be secreted in the fleshcrawlers’ dungeons. And that youngling by the king’s side had the information Nex needed. Despite his lack of desire to dine on docile cattle, he inclined his head. “I would be honored.”
The Slip fleshcrawlers’ kingdom was much bigger than the Swamp. Nex was given the grand tour before the feast, partially to give them time to prepare the meal and mainly to overwhelm him with their numbers. Perhaps they thought he was planning to lead the Midian fleshcrawlers to war, never mind the logistics of such a feat. Whatever the reason was for their show of strength, Nex noted it, and filed it away for later use. After all, while they preened and paraded, they also showed their weaknesses, the breaks in the security where one might slide through unnoticed. They were arrogant, these fleshcrawlers, in their numbers. They thought it made them invulnerable, which meant they were ripe for invasion. He almost wished he could lead an army here. When he was king, he would have destroyed them all.
Ah, those were the days.
Now, though, he could be an assassin like the chythraul that once lived in Devany’s head.
He would keep to the shadows, he would watch and observe, and above all, he would find out the truth of what happened when Devany fell into the watery depths of the fleshcrawlers’ domain.
“So, what do you think of my kingdom?” The king’s lazy gaze fell on Nex, smug, self-satisfied and utterly fatuous.
Nex counseled himself to be diplomatic. It would do him no good to let the king know that he was foolish and weak, nor would it do any good for Nex to flatter him. Even these fleshcrawlers, so far removed from his own people, would fall upon him if he showed weakness. “I think it is very large,” he said.
The king eyed him. “Larger than yours?”
Nex inclined his head. “Indeed.” He said nothing more. And the king did not press, for he could hear in Nex’s voice exactly what he hadn’t said, and he did not want to know more. A young fleshcrawler announced that dinner was ready, and the royal retinue followed the servant into the main dining hall.
To an outsider it wouldn’t look like a dining hall at all. Nex could only imagine Devany’s reaction to the chaos inside. The food was chained to the walls, to the floors, to the ceilings. There were humans, witches, wild beasts of all sorts, Wydlings, and one unlucky Skriven. That one looked like he had been here a long, long time. The fleshcrawlers had kept him and taken advantage of his regenerating flesh. There was no hope left in those eyes, and Nex almost felt sorry for him. Devany would have saved him, of course. Perhaps if he did not find her, he would rescue this poor, pitiful Skriven in honor of her memory.
“What would you like to eat?” the king asked, swimming over to one of the humans trained to the wall. The trembling woman was covered in grizus, a type of flavored oil that was to fleshcrawlers what catnip was to c
ats. A fleshcrawler floated nearby her, maintaining the bubble of air around her head in order to keep her alive long enough for someone to eat her.
“I find I do not need to eat in this form,” Nex said. He did like to eat in this form, especially once Devany told him it was gross to see the food fall from his mouth to the floor. Sometimes it would squish its way through one of his dangling intestines. That was particularly disgusting, and Nex enjoyed every minute of it, especially when Devany made a show of gagging and carrying on about how gross it was.
“Ah, what a shame,” the fleshcrawler King said. He used one of his taloned fingers to brush the hair away from the woman’s trembling cheek. And then he struck, his fangs sinking deep into her neck. She screamed, of course, but the sound was muffled by the water and the bubble of air around her head.
It did not take long for the women to be stripped of her flesh. Blood, bits of gristle, and other effluvia soon tainted the water inside the dining hall. Drums beat through the water, their muffled sounds like a heartbeat in the womb.
This was lazy. They were no longer predators. Not the fleshcrawlers in this room. In his kingdom, every fleshcrawler hunted his or her own prey. Even his queen found her own meals. Any fleshcrawler unable to hunt was killed. Any fleshcrawler unable to hunt wanted to be killed. His people would tear these weaklings apart.
After the frenzy, the King retired to an alcove full of sinuous arms of lake weed. Nex was not invited, and that was all right with him. The king knew what Nex thought of him, thought of his kingdom, and he was showing his displeasure by ignoring him. He would have to be careful, but he did not mind that because danger was better than this civilized show of blood and teeth that signified nothing.
All he needed to do now was slip away and find the dungeons. That’s where Devany would be if they still held her. He had made it into a long, dark hallway when a fleshcrawler appeared before him. This one was a warrior, Nex could tell from the muscles in his sinewy arms and the light of death in his eyes. “What are you doing here, pegnon?”
