NeverSleep

by Brindi Quinn

  Thank you, Azurian.

  Following his call, Mael places her hand to the draggar’s skull and two evenly sized spears eject from its mouth. The witches of the mount, accustomed to slinking the shadows, are quick.

  The power of the UNSPOKEN is quicker.

  It happens too rapidly to be seen. I know only that Hamira and Gorma are hit by the foul hissing that erupts in the air. At the same time, the pressing hand dissipates, and the cords around me release.

  I am free! Free to return to Awyer’s side!

  “WAIT, GWIM!” the zombie’s frantic voice finds me from some cranny of rock. “DON’T LEAVE ME!”

  I feel a tearing at my chest.

  I must return to Awyer.

  But the ex-zombie, my friend, requires my aid. Awyer is most important. He is most, most important . . . yet . . . without Pedj, my voice would have been lost following the separation from Techton. Without a new confidant to replace the old, I would have been nothing more than a vapor.

  I do not wish him to be sacrificed.

  I am too weak to do anything for him, though, and while I stand, caught between wants, the draggar alights. Upon great wings, it comes to the edge of the rammed rock.

  BOOOOM!

  The impact of its front claws meeting the mountain’s edge sends the whole place trembling.

  The sky trembles. The rock trembles. Pedj trembles.

  Count Bexwin takes no notice. He easily hops from the creature’s claw onto the platform of rock. Mael taps her pet’s head and the hellbeast responds by lowering its neck, creating an exit for lady and witch.

  Meanwhile, Ark lies fallen with a spear of golden light through his chest. The spear pins him in place. He is not dead. He does not appear to be dying, either. His voided blood protects him from the Gold. It does not recoil as normal blood would. It fights the Gold in his place. No, the gray man is not dying; he is merely stalled. Even now, he writhes and pulls at the spear in his chest in an attempt to remove it.

  “Struggle all you want.” The Count gloats over the state of his half-brother. “You’re weak compared to that monster.” Cloak sweeping, he approaches Ark’s wounded form, wearing a sneering, curling smile of satisfaction. “Suffer.”

  Elsewhere, there is another suffering.

  “Gwiiiiim?” A whimpering voice calls for me from a crevice of rock. The zombie believes himself to have been deserted.

  “I am here,” I speak to him. “And it is all right. I do not think that there is need for fear! Your cousin appears to have gained great virtue!”

  It is no use. Pedj’s fear keeps him from revealing himself. Not that he is difficult to find. Mael easily looks to the rock where he hides. She sends a silky string of dancing Gold toward him as an offering of peace. The Gold twists and curls in a most hypnotic way. “Not gonna get on hurtin’ you, Pedjram. Just got to say somethin’ before we part.”

  Part?

  Part.

  Her eyes, formerly so strong, glimmer with water.

  The word also catches Pedj’s attention. “Part . . .?” he repeats, eyes wide. “Meanin’ . . . HOOP!” He shuffles further into the rock. “GWIM! YOU SAID YOU BELIEVED HER! SAID THERE WERE SOMEFIN’ IN HER EYES! SEE?! SHE’S SMACK STRAIGHT GONNA MURDER ME, HER OWN FLESH AND BLOOD!”

  Be still, zombie. Indeed, there is something in her eyes. There is sorrow masked by strength and duty. There is pain.

  She raises a hand to the heavens, and on her call, the hellbeast ascends.

  WHOOOSH!

  In one sweeping motion, it flies over us. Its scales gleam golden, though there is no sunlight to reflect. A terrible, gruesome, amazing creature. It settles in the air above us, wings wide, the underside of each colossal span imbued with sharp-angled symbols of gray and purple.

  Pedj cowers. I am pained for him, for he does not possess any great strength. “It is all right, Pedjram,” I say again, reassuring. “I sense no malice. Mael’s aura is not one of danger.”

  Queen Necromancer sashays to the hole where her cousin hides. Her chest bounces, her hips sway, and from behind, Techton eyes her with lust. His neck remains collared in Gold as Mael leads him along as she would a wolf.

  I was correct: That choker is such that he cannot attack. It is not for lack of want; his dark eyes bore into her with the utmost hunger.

  “The moment I saw your shininess, I knew,” Mael speaks to shying Pedj. “I saw it in my mind what I needed to do.”

  From over us, the draggar releases an incredible cry. Its teeth open wide, and from its throat, a terrible shrieking plays. I move to cover my ears. Pedj and Techton do the same. Only Mael stands strong.

  Radiant and regal, she stands.

  “I’s gonna be Queen,” she says with born confidence. “I’s gonna keep the color out for good. The Vessel can’t take it no more. I’s gonna use the magick of the world to repair the crack, and then I’s gonna make sure it won’t ever be cracked again.”

  Ludicrous!

  But . . . the confidence of her voice sounds so certain.

  “Mael . . .?” Tepidly, Pedj peers from around the side of a rock. “What’re you . . .?”

  “Watch!” Her voice snaps through the air, alike a whip, and commands us to obey. I wish to return to Awyer’s side, but I am petrified. Not from fear, but from fixation.

  In the interim, the Count has taken it upon himself to hold the golden spear in place through Ark’s middle. The brothers exchange words, though I cannot hear them over the shriek of Mael’s pet.

  As the wrenching sound continues, an alteration begins to occur in and around Techton. From the draggar’s underbelly, a beam produces. Magicks, the same unnamable color as the great beast’s bones, ray downward, surrounding the dark-veined witch.

  “AAARGH!”

  Backward, arches his spine, as out throw his hands and the hair on his head stands up straight toward the sky. So, too, do the clothes on his body. His shirt lifts at the waist, revealing his stomach, and his sleeves ruffle and whip. His skin drags upward against his bones, as though he is being pulled upon by a mighty suction. I feel no such suction, though. Whatever the beast is doing, it is doing only to Techton. Starting at the top, the Azurian’s coloring begins to change. He begins to pale.

  “Had to do it here,” Mael explains. “Here’s the only place dark enough to trigger this kitty’s drive.”

  Kitty?

  To Mael, the massive scaled creature is nothing more than another one of her bonemen.

  “Kitty was born a long, loooong time ago. Was born by the Mother Colors, so that someday, when they was tired, they could go to sleep. Must be reeeally tired by now. Anyhoo, for a long time, Kitty rested on the other side of the Great Sea, but then, lots of years ago, Kitty was woke up by a dead-raiser what wanted to find the Amethyst City. Kitty’s job was somethin’ else. Kitty wasn’t made to break into lost cities. So Kitty ate the man.”

  ATE?!

  And yet she still deems it appropriate to call it ‘Kitty’?!

  Out of horror, Pedj eyeballs the beast.

  As the sound continues, Techton’s coloring continues to change. His hair moves from dark to slate to tan. Likewise, his eyes shift from black into brilliant blue to a tamer shade of blue.

  The color . . . it is draining from him!

  Mael continues, “Gotta do this first, or Techt can’t come with.”

  “Come . . . with?” Pedj watches everything unfold with confusion. His eyes dart from Techton to Mael to the hellbeast to Bexwin and Ark. Lastly, they fall upon me, and at last I understand.

  Someone will not make it, and you cannot stop it.

  Ah. So we had it wrong. Pedj was never meant to die. He will sacrifice something, that much is true, but it will be neither his life nor his sun.

  All at once, the suction over Techton ceases. The beam around him disappears, and his hair and clothes fall back into place. But everything is not as it was. No longer is Techton marked by Void, but neither is he marked by Azure. He is completely cleared of magick
s. He is free. The addict, forced at such a young age to exert enchants, is FREE. For the first time ever in his life, his hungry veins do not thirst. His blood seeks no power, for it is reverted to a state of innocence, untainted by power.

  Techton looks down to his hands. He clenches them, turns them over, and flexes his palms. Then he breathes a deep, relieved inhale. Showing small joy through her sadness, Mael bids the golden collar to fall. It clinks upon making contact with the rocky ground and from its core, particles of Gold shoot. In the aftermath, the collar is dulled to steely gray. Techton rubs the whole of his face. His head is clear. His eyes are soft.

  He lets out a raspy, good-natured chuckle. With tenderness, he places a hand atop his lady’s head. “Thank you.”

  “My confidant!” I call to show my delight over his new freedom. My happiness wells.

  But it is only so for a moment.

  Without Void fueling his veins, Techton can no longer see or hear me. His gaze does not follow my cry.

  Fear strikes me. How could I have forgotten!? To be eternally unheard and unseen, that is the truth of what it means to live without magicks!

  “Master!”

  I do not have time to dwell on it. Urgency strikes as one of the agents calls out from the cloud of dissipating Gold. It is the lead agent! She who hates me more than the rest! And she is followed by a handful of others. Though disarrayed from the attack of Gold, they will very soon gain lucidity! And that is not the only enemy movement. One of the twin witches, movement too rapid to identify which, zips from some dark corner to another, leaving a trail of hissing smoke.

  Damaged but not dead.

  We have not won yet.

  “You really did it.” Pedj is now halfway out from his nook, and his mouth gapes with disbelief. “YOU WEALLY CWANKIN’ WEMOVED COLOR FWOM HIM?!”

  Mael nods and her ponytail swings. “We’re gonna do the rest now. But to do that . . . I’s gotta leave.”

  “Mael . . . what’re you sayin’?!” Pedj shouts. Because he is answered with naught but a smile, he turns to magick-less Techton. “What’s she goin’ on about, TECHIE?!”

  “Heloõs brolee, aquis brolee,” Techton says with a sad grin. “Don’t worry, brolee; I’ll look after her for you. A queen . . . needs . . . a . . . king . . .” Techton’s words trail, and his eyes become heavy. He is no longer mythic, and the sleepness has begun to make its mark.

  “Techt!” Sensing his slumber, Mael raises again her hand to the sky, and the draggar, finished with its first task, makes a swoop at the lady, catching Techton in its menacing claw. As the creature passes, Mael gives a springing Gold-infused hop and lands upon its golden back. How sprightly she is with her newfound powers!

  Pedj completely runs from his hiding place now, and spreads his arms open. “Mael! W-why’d you get back on that thing!? GWIM, DO SOMEFIN’!”

  “Grim?” Sleepy words come from within the beast’s grip. “Tell . . . your . . . Ame . . . thyst . . . boy . . . he . . . owes . . . me . . . one . . .” The words fall into slumber.

  “I–!”

  But I do not know what to say. Time is moving too quickly to keep up!

  “WAIT, MFAEL!” The ex-zombie’s cry is distorted by the darkened crystal. Many days he has held the crystal in his mouth, but now he deems it as an enemy, getting in the way of what might be his last pleas with Mael. In an action of frustration, he spits it out.

  “PEDJ! DO NOT!” I watch in horror as my only source of communication hits the ground and rolls away.

  “MAEL! WAAAIT!” His cry rings true.

  I make haste to flit after the stone, but the lead agent, now fully emerged from the cloud, comes snipping through the air. I make a dive, but she beats me to it!

  “Aha! Hahahaha!” Mocking, she holds it in her paw and encircles me, extending the voided thing with wicked taunting.

  “Do you not think your time would be better spent caring for your master!?” I shout because I am desperate.

  Without Techton . . . without Pedj . . . without even Feligo to sense me . . .

  I will be nothing.

  But Pedj does not seem to care what his action may do to me. Waving his arms like a frenzied chicken, he gawks upward at the to-be queen. “Mael! MAEL?!”

  Her tears roll freely now. Even from where I hover, I see them – the glistening beads that fall down her face. And if she wishes to speak, she cannot. All that she musters is a shaking of her head.

  Pedj understands but he does not accept. He begins to laugh, crazed and fraught. “I get the feelin’ you’re leaving for good or somefin’?” His high-pitched guffaws rattle through the space. “But that can’t be right! You ain’t leavin’ the Vessel! That’s loonsie!”

  “I’ll still see you Pedjram,” Mael says shakily. “Maybe even hear you, too. You can talk to me. I’ll listen. But I’s gonna be busy. Gonna care for the rest of the world, too, Pedjram, not just you. So I can’t play favorites, oka?”

  “W-wha . . .” Pedj stops all motion in disbelief. “What’re you sayin’? That you’ll be like a god?”

  “Naw.” Mael swishes at the air. “Just gonna be a protector.” Her voice cracks. She is holding back from her emotions. I understand it, now that I, too, contain emotions. “Bye, Pedjram.”

  She motions to his side, where I am not, in an attempt to guess my position. “Bye, Grim.”

  “No! Wait just a skosh, Mael! You can’t just–! You crankin’ can’t–!”

  But though he puts up a fuss, the end comes in a moment smaller than a blink.

  WHOOOOSH!

  The draggar turns upward to the sky, and in the way it shot through the air when leaving Yel’ram, it shoots upward, upward, upward.

  Speeding rapidly away, the creature soon shrinks into the distance.

  And with that, they are gone, leaving us with dumbfound. I cannot believe what I have seen. Mael and Techton and the golden UNSPOKEN have just flow straight into the lightning-laden clouds?!

  BANG!

  The sound of something very large making contact with something equally large comes quaking over the sky.

  “How?!” I ask the mountain. “How has this happened?!”

  “Silence!” The lead agent yet circles me. Ah! I had widely forgotten about her! But now she begins striking at me with balls of Void!

  I make haste to dodge her attacks.

  “You know what this means,” I hear Ark say. “You’re going to perish too, Bexweth.” His voice is unnervingly even for someone with an arrow through their chest.

  “Counting on it, Arkraine,” is the Count’s singsong response.

  “Father would be so disappointed,” says Ark.

  “Father was an idiot.”

  An attack of Void whizzes past my ear. There is naught else to do.

  I turn and flee. Away from Ensecré. Away from the witches. Away from Pedj and Bexwin and Ark. I will use whatever power I have left to escape the place. If Pedj has sense, he will do the same. While the rest of the emerged agents rush to tend to their master, the lead agent takes chase. Over the fallen relics, she follows me.

  I must make it to my pactor’s side. I do not know what will become of us, but if our pact is to end for good, I wish to spend my remaining moments in his arms.

  Overhead, there is a second wave of noise.

  BANG! BANG!

  This time, it is even louder than the first. I do not know if it is truly possibly to exit the Vessel, but Mael and her beast have accomplished something, at least, in the far reaches of the sky, for soon to follow the earth-shaking sounds, the sky directly over the mount begins to turn. From black to daylight blue, the sky melts, starting at the point where the draggar made contact, and from there begins to spread outward.

  Speeding now, I attempt to make it over the sea of relics, to where my sphinx waits, but as the daylit sky spreads, my hover begins to dip. It becomes increasingly hard to stay afloat! From behind, I hear the agent’s pursuit. The rushing of her body through the air makes a heart-pounding s
ound.

  She is at my back!

  I am heavy; I do not have an ounce of remaining power to spare, and Mael, the only one who may help, is gone. None of that matters. Against any odds, I must make it to him. I WILL make it to him. Before the agent catches me and before the effects of Mael’s purpose reach fruition, I will touch my pactor once more.

  . . .

  All of a sudden, the sky goes quiet.

  . . .

  In the distance, the blue of day spreads.

  . . .

  The effects of Void are gone.

  Left in their place is a pain-filled cry from the mouth of a wild-haired zombie. Pedj’s agony shakes the Vessel.

  And the felion, upon seeing his might,

  Will follow him, o’er the course of days.

  He will be her quarry, and she will be his pain.

  The ex-zombie’s pain is apparent.

  With his sacrifice, the draggar will rise,

  And the felion, birthed in sun,

  Will be Queen of the colorless age.

  Yes, Pedj must make a sacrifice, and it is neither his life nor his sun.

  It is his felion.

  All along, Pedj’s sacrifice has been Mael.

  I cannot see what else transpires on the mount, as I race to beat the spread of colorlessness, but from the hissing sounds, I know well enough to know that a witch or two is sizzling. Hamira and Gorma, wicked sisters, have begun to burn.

  They will fall. Just as everything reliant on magicks will fall. Just as I will fall.

  At my back, the whole of the mountain begins to crumble.

  Pedj!

  I worry over the zombie, and so I look back at him, but he is too distant. There is something strange there, though. A silver light comes from his direction.

  I cannot dwell on it. Turning to look shows just how closely behind the lead agent is.

  I must make it to Awyer. Before the world falls, I must make it to him!