by Davis Ashura
A full moon waxed over the Hunters Flats, lighting up the savannah and the humped and sloped shapes of the Chimeras slumbering all around Hal'El Wrestiva. These were the warriors of the Eastern Plague of the Fan Lor Kum. These were the dread beings spoken of in hushed warnings to misbehaving children. These were Humanity's greatest enemies.
These were Hal'El's only allies.
He bit back an oath at the notion, especially because it was all too true. In all of Arisa, there was no other place where he would find greater safety, where he would be better protected, and where he would find no enemies lurking behind every tree or beneath every bush. The truth of his situation rankled, and his jaw clenched with impotent fury as he remembered the glorious adulation with which he had once been viewed.
Hal'El's had once been a life for others to hold up in admiration and awe, where the young had emulated him, and where his every action had been fêted.
He snorted in self-contempt. Fêted? More like fetid. Others would now judge his life to be a swampy ooze, a sulfurous sludge with all his grand desires and dreams buried in a stink that might never wash away. His glories had been cast aside like wilted flowers and the bloom upon the rose of his life had withered away.
It was all because of Dar'El Shektan and his miserable, low-born House.
Hal'El shivered just then when a mournful wind, warm yet somehow chilling, clutched at his clothes and caused the fire to flare. The breeze brought with it the thick, cloying stench of burning peat and the unwashed odor of the nearby Chimeras. The reek moved about like an ill-winded miasma. It was as foul and malodorous as a barn left festering for unaccounted months. Just being here amongst such a fetor made Hal'El feel dirty. He could almost feel his body and soul imbibing the stink.
“Fool,” a hateful voice began speaking from the recesses of Hal'El's mind. “How can your soul grow more rank when it is already bloated with pus and leaking filth?” The voice laughed. It was Sophy Terrell.
“The smell is not nearly as gruesome as the ugliness of your heart,” another voice added in a silky, smooth whisper. Aqua Oilhue. “You are nothing more than rotten flesh masquerading as a man.”
Two other voices laughed in the recesses of Hal'El's mind. Felt Barnel and Van Jinnu.
Idiots.
“It is you who is the idiot,” Sophy countered. “You and your Rahail lover, Varesea Apter, were the jackholes who brought the Withering Knife to Ashoka. Tell me. How has such a decision profited you?” she asked.
Hal'El grimaced. Of all the people in Ashoka, why had he been stupid enough to kill the Hound with the Withering Knife? Other than rendering her incorporeal, her passing had done nothing to transform the woman. She was the same in death as she had been in life: remorseless, focused, and driven in the pursuit of her goals. And apparently, her goal now was a ceaseless devotion to hectoring Hal'El's every waking moment. The woman was a malignant phantasm, unrelenting in her mocking, grating comments.
And the others—Aqua Oilhue, Felt Barnel, and Van Jinnu—followed her lead. Before Sophy's arrival in Hal'El's mind, the other three had merely shrieked their fury at their fate, yelling and crying at their cruel death. It had been easy enough to ignore their mewling whines, but now they echoed Sophy's actions. They whispered continually in Hal'El's mind, berating him, needling him, deriding his every decision. It left him in a constant state of anxiety.
He waited a breathless moment for one of the four to say something more, to pick up where Aqua had left off. The moment stretched on, but they remained silent, and Hal'El exhaled in relief. He needed quiet in order to think, to plan out his next move, especially now.
Following the disaster in Ashoka, Hal'El had found himself uncharacteristically uncertain of his future and his role in the world. For a time, weeks in fact, his once unwavering self-confidence had been shattered, rendered mute and sterile.
No longer. Time had Healed his concerns and his fears. Once again, Hal'El was filled with surety of his awaiting glory and acclaim.
After all, miraculously he'd managed to make good his escape from the funeral pyre his city had become for him. Then, all alone in the Wildness, he'd survived its dangers and made his way to this place, the Eastern Plague of the Fan Lor Kum where he'd found sanctuary. Who else could have accomplished what he had?
No one.
Which to Hal'El's way of thinking meant that his survival had to have a deeper meaning than the merely personal, that Destiny still had a greater role for him to play.
And while his road to the Eastern Plague had been smoothed by the Sorrow Bringer and he had come here on Her orders, such happenstances were immaterial. All the important decisions had ultimately been his. He was not some meek, little slave or a brainless brute who unquestioningly obeyed the Queen's every command. He was here of his own volition because in this one instance, Suwraith's desires and Hal'El's were in alignment: they both wanted him alive and well.
Of course, their reasons for why they desired his ongoing survival were vastly different. His were obvious, but the Queen claimed Her rationale was because She treasured all who served Her and that She wanted to see Her servants prosper.
It was a farcical lie. The truth was far simpler, far more prosaic, and far more believable. The Sorrow Bringer needed him. She needed his link to the Withering Knife. She needed him to return to Ashoka and find his way to the city's heart. There, he would be expected to stab the source of the city's Oasis and murder his home.
It would never happen.
Hal'El Wrestiva was many things—almost all of them immoral in the eyes of every Human of Arisa—but Ashoka, the city of his birth, was still the home he loved even more than his own life. He would never betray her.
Thus, came this moment.
The Queen planned on attacking Ashoka this summer. She had said She would, and Hal'El believed Her. She had the bulk of a Plague transporting over from Continent Catalyst to Continent Ember and the western breeding caverns were producing more and more Chimeras with each passing day. Add in the Eastern Plague, and in a few months, the Queen would be able to attack Ashoka with a minimum of two Plagues at Her back. The city might not stand a chance, even if the Oasis remained unharmed.
In addition, there was a hard truth Hal'El had discovered during his time with the Eastern Plague. It was one Ashoka might have forgotten given the soft, seductive fabrications told by Rukh Shektan about the Baels. The horned leaders of the Fan Lor Kum were deceivers. All of them. Since Rukh had first encountered them on the Hunters Flats, they had been lying to him, telling him tales meant to earn the boy's trust, and through him, the open arms of all of Ashoka.
They claimed to honor Hume's teachings, stating that fraternity was their highest ideal, and that brotherhood was a sacrament. They even claimed a secret alliance with Humanity, one so hidden that it had been unknown to anyone else until just a few years ago.
All of what they said were lies.
Hal'El had spoken to the Baels, these so-called pious adherents to Devesh. While they mouthed the proper words, spoke the correct phrases, and even wore expressions of suffering and empathy, their utterances were a sham—nothing more than a wicked pretense. They didn't believe any of their sanctimonious statements. It was something in their bearing, a subtlety to their speech that told Hal'El that all their holy posturing was nothing more than a playact meant to win his confidence.
The truth, as Hal'El was beginning to discover, was that the Baels were very effective commanders of the Fan Lor Kum. He had witnessed their exemplary work this past winter in bringing a chaotic situation to order. The Eastern Plague had been a mess—full of poor discipline, lack of motivation, and lax training, but not anymore. The various breeds of Chimeras would never have the unit cohesion and impeccable skill of Humanity, but they no longer sniped at one another, ready to rend and murder for the mildest of reasons. They were learning to fight as a group.
Hal'El still wasn't sure what had instigated the disintegration of the Eastern Plague in the first place. P
erhaps it had been due to Ashoka's strike against their breeding caverns. Maybe the expeditionary force had done more damage to the Chimeras command than they had realized.
It certainly couldn't be this ridiculous fable about the Queen striking down all the eastern Baels all at once. It made no sense. Rukh Shektan had made the claim, but he was an easily misled boy. It was more likely that whatever had occurred to the Eastern Plague was merely part of whatever ruse the Queen had planned for Ashoka's destruction. Rukh Shektan had simply been the unwitting dupe who had fallen for Her scheme and carried the wild tale back to the city.
There was much Hal'El still didn't completely understand, such as why the Baels had hidden their abilities and their intelligence for the centuries since Hammer's fall, but what he did know was this: the Chimeras would come in force against his home, and they would be led with daring and great skill.
Ashoka needed to be warned. His home needed to be rescued. And Hal'El was the only one who could do it. He knew how the Chimeras fought in a way no warrior in all of history likely ever had. His time here had profited him well, and by extension, Ashoka. He knew how the Chimeras would be arrayed. He knew the strengths of their various formations as well as their weaknesses. They could be exploited. The Fan Lor Kum could be bled and defeated.
All he had to do was find a means to approach the Magisterium and pass on his information. Even after he did so, he likely would still be killed, staked out on the Isle of the Crows, but if that was his fate, then so be it. As long as Ashoka was safe. That's all that mattered.
“What a sly cretin you are,” Sophy said. “You truly believe you can make right that which you've contaminated so thoroughly?” she asked with a disdainful chuckle.
Hal'El winced. She was back, which meant the others soon would be as well. He did his best to ignore her. Sometimes if he pretended he hadn't heard her words, she would leave him in peace.
“Peace! We should leave you in peace?” Sophy cried, her anger rising higher and higher with every word. “You murdered us, you fragging coward! You will never know a moment's peace!”
Hal'El blanched as her diatribe washed over him. She was soon joined by Felt, Van, and Aqua, all of them berating him with vulgar language and coarse comparisons. Eventually, they wound down, and blessedly, his mind was his and his alone once more.
None of what the four fools threatened mattered. None of the falsehoods told by the Baels mattered either. In the end, Hal'El knew he had a chance—a meager one—to recover his standing. People would once again sing his praises. And most importantly, Ashoka would be safe.
But first, he would have to lie to Suwraith. He would have to deceive the Great Deceiver, the Queen Herself. He would have to promise Her his aid and hope She didn't see through his deception. If he was successful, the Sorrow Bringer would be left railing against Ashoka's intact Oasis while Her Fan Lor Kum was slowly whittled to death. She would then have to fight Her own battles.
Just as Hal'El would have to fight his own. But first, Dar'El Shektan had to die.
Lienna soared high above the Hunters Flats, racing past languid clouds and fleetly flying flocks of birds. The world passed beneath Her steady gaze. To the north were the gray-shouldered Privation Mountains with their shadowed glens and deep lakes of stillness. Directly below and to the south, east, and west was the golden savannah of the Hunters Flats. The fields were decorated with scattered copses of trees lifting their boles skyward like heavenly spires. The young grass was already knee high, and their heads swayed randomly in the breeze.
It was a gentle scene, but Lienna knew better. Down below, a never-ending battle raged between hunter and prey. The thick, bloody streams and rags of meat weren't easily discerned, but they were there. They always were. It was as it should be. Arisa's law was iron: fight for life or be prey.
Lienna shook off her blood-red thoughts. This majestic morning wasn't meant for such morbidity. She focused instead on the glory of the world spread out before Her. From on high, Arisa was serene and lovely, and as was so often the case now that Her mind was clear, Lienna was able to enjoy it. She found Herself laughing, thrilled with the glory of the morning and the joy of flying. Had She a corporal form, She would have embraced the open sky, licked the moisture from the rain-bathed clouds, and ridden the buffeting wind as it whipped across Her skin, through Her hair, and billowed Her clothes. Few experiences would have provided Her greater happiness. To race free and fly would have been to laugh and live without reservation.
But it was not to be.
The world had required a savior. The forests, fens, deserts, and the very sea itself had needed salvation. Arisa couldn't survive Humanity's ever-worsening depredations. The damage done by the pestilence of Lienna's birth race threatened all the growing things, all the animals and all the trees. Lienna could still recall the cries of the forests as the axes cut into their woody flesh. The trees had been amputated, their bodies bisected as roots were severed from trunks and uplifted branches. She could still hear the fearful pleas of innocent animals as they prayed for a great one to rise up and save them and their defenseless children from the murderous arrows of hunters. Who next would feel the piercing chill of cold iron biting into their hearts?
Lienna had walked amongst the murdered trees. She had sorrowed for the small animals who'd lost children to an arrow's flight and had done Her best to ease the suffering of those caught in agony's wasting grip. She'd comforted all She had come across, but in the end, it hadn't been enough. Offering sympathy and condolences had been a near-worthless errand. It had done far too little to soothe Arisa's hurts. Action had been required. Lienna had to save those who couldn't save themselves, give voice to those without speech, and offer Her own life for those whose lives had already been stolen.
Lienna had to surrender Her Humanity, sacrifice all that was good and decent in Her life, murder in the name of peace. She had to do that which was necessary, and She felt a swell of pride in Her accomplishments. To be worthy of the potent power She now possessed, Lienna had first been required to humble Herself through agony, to suffer in ways no one had ever experienced, to live through Her own burning death. It had been a seemingly unending torment, but Lienna had borne it with eyes lifted proudly. To this day, She would do anything to serve the greater needs of Arisa.
“You command and order,” Mother said. “But You have never served.”
“The Baels do not serve You either,” Father intoned.
Lienna's good mood faded. After the battle at the city of the UnCasted Humans . . .
“It was a massacre,” Mother interrupted in Her typical critical fashion. “All those murders. How does Your conscience not wrack You with thorns of pain?”
Lienna didn't bother responding. The shades of Her parents no longer caused Her upset or concern. Now that She could pour Her madness down into the Plagues, Her mind was almost entirely lucid. She could ignore these faded shadows who had once been Her Amma and Nanna, the First Mother and First Father as Humanity reckoned them.
“And You were the wickedness who murdered Us,” Mother reminded Her.
“Yours is a lonely, empty existence,” Father warned. “There is no one who loves You.”
Lienna was surprised by Nanna's comments. This was the most He had spoken to Her in the past few months. In fact, in the past half year or more, Nanna had hardly spoken to Her at all. More often, He was quiet now, letting Amma do all the talking for the both of them, including the eternal warnings about the Baels. At times, He almost seemed entirely absent from Her mind.
Strangely, Lienna missed Him. Over the millennia since the death of Her parents, She had grown used to Their continual, if annoying and interfering, presence. Now, Nanna was more often silent than not, and while She had long since grown tired of His perpetual dire predictions, He had been a comforting source of predictability.
Lienna thought back to when His silence had first started. Had it been when She had sensed His Jivatma by that small pond in the Privation Mountains?
Had that truly been Him come back to life? If it had, then it spelled disaster. When They had worn flesh, Nanna and Amma had both been far more powerful than Lienna. And if Nanna truly had returned, what then? He would almost certainly create His own Withering Knife and become like Lienna, except He would have more power, more knowledge, and more skill in the use of Jivatma. Witness the creation of the cursed Oases that still stymied Her will. It must have been Nanna who had breathed life into those wretched constructions even as He had been breaths away from dying.
Lienna shivered in fear.
“Well isn't this just splendid?” a vicious voice whispered.
Lienna's swift passage across the sky came to a sudden stop.
Mistress.
“With all Your power, You are still a mewling coward.” The voice laughed. “All things come through Me, You great Idiot, or did You forget that lesson I taught You all those centuries ago? Your power, and that of Your accursed Nanna comes through My blessing. I can take away all that I have given with a simple whim.” Mistress' voice deepened in promise. “And I tell you this now: Your Nanna will never again be a power upon this world.”
Lienna's mind was filled with panic. After She'd taught two Plagues of Her children to imbibe the poisoned drink of Her insanity, there had been a blessed period of time when She had thought She was rid of Mistress Arisa forever. For months, it had seemed so, and Lienna had rejoiced. But then, during the battle with the UnCasted Humans, Mistress had reappeared, and ever since then, She had remained. Thankfully, not as frequently as She once had, but still, Lienna hated the visitations of this most fearsome of spectres. They terrified Her.
“You think me a product of Your delusions!” Mistress Arisa cried out in shock and outrage.
Lashes lanced into Lienna's mind, shredding it, tearing it apart. She screamed.
“I am who I am! Separate and alive. And I am Your Mistress!” the dread voice thundered. “And You will obey Me in all things, You mewling Fool.” The rending ended as suddenly as it began.
