by J K Ishaya
"I saw Kvasir dodge a strike, heard a shout, more screeching that bounded off the passage walls, painful to the ears, and he almost backed into me as he dodged again and threw a punch at the creature. Then I shoved him aside and dove into his place, claws already extracting to full lethality. The n'gai tried to tear at me, but I caught its boney wrist in my hand, squeezed and curled my claws to sink into sinew and lean muscle. It bit into my other shoulder and I seethed as I tore it free and brought up the fist that held the gem and bashed the creature on the forehead. It bobbed back, stunned, and I repeated, slamming fist and stone, breaking into bone. I continued to pound its head well after it had gone slack, my other hand still holding it up by the spindly arm, and there was a large dent in its skull and an eye socket caved in and drizzling pulpy white flesh and jelly. I dropped it and turned to look to Kvasir and halted, caught a breath and spit out a gob of the n'gai's blood that had sprayed into my mouth, the taste too putrid to tempt me.
"As hurried as I had been to flee the trembling mountain, I gave him the moment I saw before me. He was on the ground, cradling his brother, checking Lyrr's breath as I had done. But as I had not thought to do, he glared as he pulled the scarab diadem from Lyrr's forehead and threw it back down the passage where it would surely be crushed if the rock caved in this far. Then he looked up at me, and I halted yet again. There were three long claw slashes running diagonally across his face, oozing fresh blood, his beautiful features forever marred by the injury."
Howard looks at Kvasir quietly, his gaze examining the scars anew before he looks away.
"Stare all you like, Howard," Kvasir comments. "I am not easily offended."
"I felt I should have stopped the n'gai attack before it had gotten that far," I say, "but too much had been happening around me, and now I smelled fresher blood that was tempting. Then, no sooner had I opened my mouth to start barking orders for us to get moving again than she was there behind me. I heard her speak, but it was still in the Borean language, and Kvasir responded as he tried to give his brother a lift, and I thought he was going to actually get Lyrr's whole bulk up into this arms, but then he started to collapse. Having been imprisoned for weeks, his strength was diminished, and again I took Lyrr over my shoulder and Kvasir stayed closer now. I turned back but again only glimpsed the Borean queen as she moved ahead again, pausing then before a soft pale hand raised and gestured fluidly toward the right.
"And then there it was, a whiff of pine, of fresh air, pushing back in my face. 'Smell that?' I asked, and my companion nodded. 'Follow it.'
"Behind us, the quivering mountain gave with an ear-piercing crack as the temple, now far deeper down, collapsed, forcing us to run faster, past small, torch lit pockets and darker, narrower passages. We did not return to the area where Malorix and I had slaughtered so many n'gai. The draft that led us to freedom veered away and we found ourselves in a small, rocky chamber where, at the top of a series of unintended natural steps, was an opening into the very air shaft that we were looking for.
"It was a long climb, the path uneven, and my burden finally beginning to feel heavy on my shoulder, while the gem clutched in one hand had grown cooler and my palm began to heal. Beneath us, the growls and shivers of the inner mountain grew further away, and when an opening appeared up ahead as a pinpoint of light, it stung my eyes and I kept them cast down, watching my steps instead. The hunger stirred in me, and I moaned as I clenched my jaw shut and fought it.
"We emerged to midday sun on a rocky incline dotted with pines. The light disoriented me, and I squinted, attempting to focus past it as Malorix had insisted I should learn, but in doing so I miss stepped, came down on a loose rock, and stumbled, nearly pitching my load forward as I thrust my free hand to stop my descent and my mind blurred again, as it had during the confrontation with Nyarlathotep. Suddenly the body I had been carrying was lifted from me, and I collapsed into a crawl as I held out my other hand, coated with n'gai blood and dust, and opened it to reveal my plunder. The gore-smeared gem fell away and clacked on the hard ground and the last of a reddish burn faded in my palm. A series of gasps went up around me along with a creaking-stretching noise that I recognized since long being a warrior and standing upon the walls of Sarmizegetusa. Bows being drawn.
“Then I heard Kvasir’s voice shouting. It was in their language, but clearly an objection and, I hoped, a further explanation as to why I had emerged from the cavern along with their rescued comrade.
“I looked up and blinked rapidly to focus against the glare, seeing the sharp end of a serrated arrow head aimed directly at my forehead. At its end was the glaring gaze of one of the young Borean males. I could not suppress a snide chuckle. ‘Shoot all you like, it will aid you nothing.’
"The heat of the sun on my back was not unbearable, but I certainly did not like it. Paying the man little more mind, I rose, aware of the other figures skirting around me also wielding bows and arrows, as well as the gleam of a sword, and backed away, seeking the deepest shade I could find on the edge of the incline where a copse of pines grew. I drew between two of the trees and finally found perspective.
“There were the four survivors who had raided the prison cavern, including the one who had lost an eye. He already had a tear of cloth tied across his forehead and over the empty socket, but a bright crimson stain had oozed through and still dripped below the makeshift bandage. On the ground, Kvasir was kneeling, holding his brother’s body, while the other young woman—the one who had cast the fiery spell that destroyed many n’gai—was beside him, and then amidst them all, I finally truly got a look at their queen.
“She was actually the tallest of them, this detail now clearer than it had been when she was in the cavern fighting the gargantuan monstrosity that Nyarlathotep had become, and while her face was as smooth and young as the others, her eyes told differently. They held the gaze of a thousand ages past, and I shuddered to look at her, felt my legs give so that I dropped straight down, not into a kneel that showed any kind of respect, but an ungraceful collapse in shock. Quickly I looked away, but within my periphery I saw her gesture for the others to lower their bows and swords.
“‘He is right,’ she said calmly and in perfect Dacian, ‘no weapon will hurt him.’
“If I were a religious man, I might say she had the voice of an angel. Cliché, no? It was a courtesy to me that she chose to speak my tongue, and I began to slowly raise my eyes to look at her more squarely.
“One of the others asked rather loudly and obnoxiously, but following his queen’s lead in Dacian, ‘What is this creature, Kvasir?’ but no answer was given.
“She remained quiet as she approached, surefooted on the rocky ground, and entered the shade with me where she eased to the ground as if not to provoke me. I cannot describe the effect I felt looking into her large, almond-shaped eyes with their emerald centers, at the slopes of her cheek bones and her small, thin mouth. Her ears were longer, narrower, than the younger ones under her, especially resembling that face I had seen looming in the distance on the peak of Ngranek, and I wondered if it was a sign of her age.
"In some bizarre way, in some deep eternity of my mind where time stretched out such as it does in dream, I lost myself for a moment. It was the first time my mind slipped just slightly from the grief it held over losing everything from my wife and family to my people and my humanity. This was her. Reading my mind, my thoughts and memories. So gentle was the intrusion that I barely noticed, given I was used to Nyarlathotep prying me open aggressively with psychic claws.
“After a long moment, her eyes widened, and she drew a long breath before whispering incredulously, ‘You have seen the Daemon Sultan.’ For all of the ancient wisdom contained in her eyes, now her voice sounded almost childlike with both awe and concern.
“‘Yes,’ I replied, and then, as a gauzy silence seemed to envelope me and her, I began to weep. It had nothing to do with her studying my thoughts. The weight of my experience, the mention of Azathoth, simply came down upon me
, crushing mind and heart in a wave of torment. That part of me still human began to truly acknowledge what I had seen and done, what I had been through, and there at its core the presence of the dark substance within me, Azathoth’s blood, which would never, could never, be purged from my body. It had been there from the moment I was conceived, latent and slumbering like the cosmic nuclear source from which it came, and all Malorix had really done was jostle it awake. I sobbed that there was nothing I could do about it. I would live—exist—for eternity. I sputtered and sobbed like a child myself, and around me I felt her arms, offering what comfort they could, and I heard her whisper in my head that I did not have to be alone in my personal trials and tribulations. I wondered how a being like her could accept a thing like me. I still do not understand how she accepted me. How she even chose me.”
“Chose?” Howard asks, astutely noticing greater implications in my word use.
I smile a little. “That is also a story for another time, Howard.”
“Oh.” He looks at Kvasir, hopeful that he will perhaps shed some light, but my companion only offers his own wry grin.
“In that moment, I silently, in my mind, found myself declaring allegiance to her if for no other reason than she was against Nyarlathotep. When all was calmer, when my head cleared, and the heartache ebbed, my new acquaintances had all come to understand that I had no intentions of harming them. I told them everything that I knew of Nyarlathotep’s intentions for myself and Malorix, of our connection to Azathoth and what it could mean for the world… worlds… were more of our kind to thrive and surrender to the Daemon Sultan. I sensed that some of the Boreans would never quite trust me completely even while their queen apparently did, but I had no qualms over this. I would not trust me either.
“I learned all of their names with greater emphasis on the other surviving woman, who was Freytha, Kvasir’s twin sister. She stepped aside with me to express gratitude that I had saved both of her brothers. Well, I said, I at least aided in saving one.”
On this note, Kvasir nods and rises to pace anew, his mind sending me a gentle hum of tension that morning is near and his hold on Mrs. Lovecraft will soon dwindle and neither of us wants to be here when she wakes.
"We attempted to destroy the stone. With so many specimens of granite around us, I positioned the gem in a hollow to keep it steady while I raised a larger rock between my hands and slammed it down upon the piece. Only an ear shattering ring sounded that echoed across the lower Alps. We all cringed, and I tried again, but this time the gem only jarred from its cradle and clanked down slope where it came to rest. My efforts rendered not a single chip on its surface. Even a normal ruby would have broken into many pieces, but this… not a scratch.
“Lyrr,” I continue, “remained comatose. He would have to be removed to somewhere safe to be cared for until further assessment was made. The gem was collected into a light silky material through which light still diffused enough to keep its power dampened, but we all knew that when night fell, there was still the risk that Nyarlathotep might regain his hold on Lyrr. There was a growing debate over how to deal with it, how to store it in such a way that total darkness would not touch it again. Quite a conundrum.
“We left the mountain and travelled down into the alpine gorges that led out onto the Roman Provence of Pannonia, what is now the Vienna Plains, where we set up camp in a grassy meadow. My new queen, powerful as she was, easily cast various illusions to deter the curious who might be venturing through the area. Her mental capabilities were such that she could touch minds around her with so little effort and make them see whatever she wished. A band of human travelers might see another simple human camp, while a Roman contubernium on patrol might only perceive a herd of grazing deer, a sudden copse of trees. Whatever would disinterest an observer the most, he or she would see it and move on. This was all very well, for at the center of the camp, the gem could remain more easily exposed to light during the day, and, taking a cue from my solution in the cavern, was set in the middle of the camp fire at night.
"As for myself, a grudging consortia of sorts was held to piece together new clothing for me since I was still wearing little more than the disgusting trousers from the last days of my humanity and my beginnings as a monster. I accepted a tunic and sash, new trousers and boots that were a soft cream color and whose design reminded me of the clothing I had worn in the Dreamlands, thus further reminding me that my world was forever changed and to call myself a Dacian now felt completely out of place in a way that further broke my heart. I accepted that only time would balm that wound as I bathed and trimmed my beard back into a short, neat angle and braided my hair into rows away from my face. Once washed and reclothed, I hoped that I was at least a little less offensive to those who remained tense in my presence.
"That first night, after I determined myself finally presentable again, I sat alone before the camp fire and gazed past its flames into the center where a sort of platform had been created and the gem was situated upon a flat piece of iron so as to keep flame glow around the notorious device at all times. Suffering some restlessness, I had volunteered to be the primary sentry to sit up with the stone and keep the fire stoked. One-eyed Sten offered to relieve me, but I brushed him off and maintained my post. After all, I had discovered the gem's hiding place—albeit incidentally, with my body—but I had also discovered how to manipulate it against Nyarlathotep, so I felt the most capable of handling it thereafter even if my attempts to crush it had failed. I stoked the fire, watched its light dance upon and through the trapezohedron's angles, and the black striations almost appeared to move within like smoke.
"'Gazing into it is most unwise,' a now familiar voice said as Kvasir came to sit adjacent to me and, to my surprise, put down a bedroll.
"'I have gazed into far worse,' I said dryly. Still, his warning did stay with me, and I looked down to brush a thumb over Decebal's ring which had survived the entire ordeal that brought me here. It was scratched up and pocked, but still recognizable as the king's ring.
"'So I have heard,' he said. 'I think I have yet to thank you for what you've done. You saved my brother.'
"'That is not certain yet, is it?' I replied.
"'No, but your attempts to bring him out of darkness are what matter. For that, I will be forever in your debt.’
"I looked at him squarely then, and the slash marks running across his features startled me all over again. They were now scabbed and puffy around the edges and gleamed with smears of some greasy herbal balm. 'I am sorry for that,' I said.
"'It is only a face.' He huffed and echoed my words. 'I have had far worse.'
"Somewhat awed that he could have any humor over it, I said quietly, 'So I have heard.'
"The gashes aside, I examined what a difference in his face now versus when I first met him and he had given me such a distrustful glare while calling me an abomination at the same time. In earthly time, only a matter of days had passed for him, while for me there was still the gap left by my first Dreamlands experience which placed that moment further away. His eyes were still tired, but their green gaze soft and at ease, not hard and suspicious. To achieve that look from him felt gratitude enough for that moment, but still he spoke.
"'You…' he whispered and then chuckled.
"'What?' I asked, gratitude suddenly turning to annoyance.
"'I am just baffled,' he said. 'In a good way.’ He gestured at the fire and its charge. ‘I only told you of the gem once, and yet upon first sight of it, you had the mental capacity and the balls to use it against Nyarlathotep.'
"'Yes, well, until that moment, Nyarlathotep had me by the balls, so I had to pry him loose somehow.'
"There was a pause before we both were chuckling, so much that my companion snorted and elicited a few curious glares from across the camp where others were gathered. After that, we settled into good-tempered silence, listening to the fire crackle for some time before he spoke again, quietly, cautiously.
“‘I do not like
what you are,’ he said. ‘But I can accept and appreciate who you are.’
✽✽✽
“Kvasir became the one whom I trusted most to tend the gem's new prison when I needed to step away. We were not far from Rome’s long-time settlement of Vindobona which had grown into a city. I broke away from camp on several nights to hunt the fringes, and all of my new acquaintances were well aware of it. They looked the other way, knowing there was no other solution to my new nature, but certainly they could not ignore it when I returned, clean but ever smelling of fresh blood. I grew uncomfortable, concerned that I might cross too much of a line somewhere given that my mortal enemy before Nyarlathotep was situated so close by.
“It was after one such feeding, on a clear, star-filled night that I stepped into the tent where Lyrr’s body lay on a cot under a fur blanket. It was not just that he was unconscious that made him look so different, the scarab diadem gone, his hair brushed out by Freytha and spread elegantly over a pillow. His face, which before had been so animated, beautiful and ugly at the same time with the Crawling Chaos behind it, was now strange to me in its stillness. At his head, Freytha was kneeling, her head bowed and her flaxen hair spilling forward around her delicate face, and I stared momentarily at the gentle point of an ear peeking up through the locks. I had learned that she was Queen Nara’s apprentice, learning to tap and control the currents of her own power, and they were constantly working together. I mostly stayed out of their way, but this evening I wished to see for myself if any progress was being made at all.
“Centered over Lyrr, my new queen was meditating, humming softly under her breath as her long, graceful hands hovered above his body. I remained quiet, leaving her to her assessment, but then she spoke up in that dulcet tone, not at all stern that I had intruded.
