God Conqueror 2

by Logan Jacobs

  My self at the other end of the valley had obtained two flamethrowers by then and was felling even more Pyralians. On both ends, the surviving Shoraguans who had charged with me were backing down a little as they watched me, as they came to the apparent conclusion that I was more capable of fighting the Pyralians than they were or that it made more sense for me to risk death than for them to do the same, since the death of one body did me no lasting harm.

  My self in the middle of the valley stayed close to my five companions, with Polliver out and at the ready. I used that self as a base from which to regenerate each time another of my bodies received a serious injury that either killed me instantly or reduced my effectiveness enough that I was obliged to reassimilate and replace it.

  If I had been alone, I was confident that I could eventually have worked my way through the entire Pyralian force, flamethrowers or no. The problem was that I wasn’t alone, and every time I got roasted and had to regenerate, their line moved closer to the caravan members huddled in the middle in the time that it took me to race back from my central self to rejoin the fight.

  One positive thing about this situation was that the Pyralians had stopped shooting fire arrows at the caravan, since they were now facing each other with Danazar’s caravan in between, and arrows that missed their mark would have continued into their own ranks. But the caravan couldn’t attempt to climb the sides of the sand valley to escape, because that would have made them easy arrow marks, so they were forced to stay where they were.

  Based on the lackluster spear-wielding abilities and low aggression levels of the Shoraguans around me on both ends of the valley, who were the boldest of the lot since they had charged with me instead of staying with the rest of the caravan, I really didn’t like the merchants’ collective chances if the Pyralians reached them. Not one bit.

  Then Danazar’s unmistakable shrill tones rose up from the center of the valley as he shrieked, “Everyone stop! Everyone stop right this instant!” Everyone on both sides flinched in confusion. Then he yelled at an even more earsplitting volume, “Sandworm truce! We have disturbed its slumber! Be still or we will all be devoured!”

  I hesitated for an instant. From everything I’d heard, these sandworms were not creatures that I wanted to meet, nor wanted my friends to meet. But then I realized that maybe there was a way to turn that to my advantage.

  My self with Polliver in the center of the valley planted my feet, seized the reins of a few of the horses to stop them from stamping around, and took up Danazar’s cry. “Sandworm! Be still! Stop moving!”

  My selves on either end of the valley, however, yelled to the dozen or so surviving Shoraguans around each of me, “Pound your spears! Stamp your feet! Make the fucking earth shake!”

  Meanwhile I continued to beat Pyralians to death with their own inert flamethrowers, so that they were forced to stay in action to combat me, and create the same level of ground vibrations that seemed to have summoned the worm in the first place, even though they had started frantically screaming a word to each other in their native tongue that sounded like “Khalanargha!” which I had to guess probably translated to “Sandworm!”

  It was hard for me to distinguish between the vibrations caused by all the furiously contending human bodies and the other, deeper, more sinuous rumble that those more experienced in desert life were able to detect, so I was more shocked than anyone when out of the middle of one of the two knots of Pyralians, a gaping black hole opened up in the sand, and a massive, fleshy, grayish-pink, semi-translucent worm with no eyes and a ring of whirling teeth big enough to swallow a horse whole burst out.

  As the hideous worm surged up to the height of a siege tower and sprayed heaps of blinding sand from its circular jaws, which it seemed to use to churn through the ground and clear enough space for its segmented, rubbery body to pass through, Lizzy remarked to my nearby self, “Hmm. Looks kinda like a lesbian’s idea of a cock.”

  That perspective on the situation made it kind of amusing for me to watch as the sandworm proceeded to dive back down and swallow three and a half Pyralians in one mouthful, while the Shoraguans, and I scrambled to get out of the way. The screaming Pyralians tried turning their flamethrowers on the sandworm, but the fire didn’t seem to do much more than create the equivalent of a painful sunburn on the surface of its incredibly thick and resilient skin, and make it angry.

  The infuriated sandworm, of course, did not distinguish between the Pyralians who were lightly searing it and the Shoraguans who were just trying to get out of the way. I don’t think it had that capability, on either a mental or a physical level. It didn’t seem to have any eyesight, it just seemed to sense the presence of moving animals through the vibrations that they created. However, at this point it was thrashing around and gnashing its ring of teeth so wildly that simply staying still and hoping to pass undetected wasn’t an option.

  I picked up a spear that had been dropped by a slain Shoraguan and used it to try to defend the remaining Shoraguans and allow them to get clear, but sinking it halfway into the sandworm’s blubbery skin seemed to have no effect. I clung onto the spear as the sandworm whipped the upper portion of its body around, with the thought that maybe from atop the worm I could drive it in deeper or find a vulnerable spot or something, but instead, the worm clenched some kind of deeply buried muscle that caused the iron spear to snap in half and sent me tumbling twenty feet into the sand.

  I brandished the broken spear half that I had kept hold of and positioned myself to be right in the path of the sandworm’s gaping hole of a mouth on its next sweep. I ran, leapt down its throat into pure, pulpy blackness and suffocating humidity, and stabbed the broken end of the half spear into the worm’s interior with all my strength. The worm’s interior had a different texture than its blubbery outside. It was harder, like muscle, and provided more resistance against the penetration of the broken wood shaft. This time when the spear sank in, the worm bellowed in agony, and I felt two more interior rings of teeth snap closed around me and sever that body into three parts.

  Luckily, I had other selves from which to enjoy the show as the worm, in its dying throes, swallowed or crushed to death the few remaining Pyralians on that end as a black viscous substance leaked out of its circular mouth hole. Then it finally went limp and looked somehow even more grotesque than it had while still alive.

  “That’s gonna be one stinky rotting corpse,” Lizzy remarked. She was probably right. It seemed like it would take months for desert critters to consume the amount of sandworm flesh that was exposed, and I didn’t even know what portion of its entirety we had seen, since part of it remained buried underground.

  That left only the group of Pyralians on the other end of the valley to deal with, and I was confident that with two of my selves freed up for the job now, I could handle that without ever letting them get within flamethrower distance of Danazar’s caravan and all my friends. Besides, now that one end of the valley was open, the caravan was free to retreat. They’d just have to squeeze past the giant blubbery sandworm corpse.

  So for a minute or two, I was feeling pretty confident and pleased with my sandworm-killing maneuver.

  Then, as my regenerated third self ran toward the end of the valley that was still occupied by Pyralians, what I recognized instantly as Pyralis himself bloomed out of the sand from beneath me.

  I don’t know how else to describe what he did next except as consuming me whole. Pyralis wasn’t shaped like a human or a worm. He was just a fiery explosion that mushroomed up out of nowhere. For an excruciating, incandescent, surreal second, I was suspended inside the fireball. Then that body just didn’t exist anymore except as particles of ash so fine that they weren’t even distinguishable among the sand.

  I sent out a replacement from my self that was with the caravan. My replacement self grabbed a Shoraguan spear, as did my self on the other side of the fireball that was now hovering in midair like a small and very angry sun, that was still surrounded by Pyralians who,
however, had stopped fighting in order to drop on the ground and prostrate themselves before their god.

  The two of me sprinted at Pyralis with both my spears aimed at his core. Luckily, he didn’t seem to be able to expand his mass any farther, or he could have swallowed the entire caravan as easily as he had one of my bodies.

  My self that was coming from the center of the valley flung my spear with all my might, since even if it sailed straight through Pyralis, there was no one on the other side to strike except for me and the fire god’s facedown followers. My self that was running from the end of the valley inward kept my grip on my spear and went for a thrust instead.

  Both spears seemed to evaporate upon contact with Pyralis. My self that had thrown the spear wasn’t harmed, but such an intense heat spread from the spear that I had plunged into the fireball by hand that it spread up my arm and through my chest and roasted several of my organs. As that body collapsed half-dead I reassimilated it and sent out an unburned self to reinforce myself.

  But this time, it wasn’t just the two of me. I knew what I needed to do.

  “Guard them,” I said to Lizzy and Elodette.

  Then I ran forward to join my other two selves, and unsheathed Polliver as I went. If there was any weapon that could withstand Pyralis’ heat, it was the sword that bore the fiery curse of a martyred saint.

  Pyralis zoomed toward my self that bore Polliver. I ran harder to meet the fire god. Then at the last second before the heat overwhelmed me, I leapt and thrust with Polliver, which gave the sword enough momentum to sail through the center of the fireball at the end of what had been my outstretched arm even as I was incinerated.

  The last sensation that I felt in that body was not of heat. It was of the hard, familiar shape of Polliver’s hilt in my hand, which seemed for an instant to turn as cold as ice.

  My two surviving selves witnessed how the steel blade seemed to cleave the fireball in half, like the prow of a ship plowing through water. It left only air in its wake. The flames that composed the god Pyralis were sucked swirling into Polliver’s sharp point as if it were the wick of a candle from which he had originated, and then extinguished. Polliver fell gleaming into the suddenly empty sand.

  One of my surviving selves picked the sword up by its hilt, which no longer felt cold, nor did it feel hot, and sheathed him. Then I both stood there shakily as I tried to process what a close call that had been.

  My friends ran up to me, and I sent out my third self again in order to be able to embrace more of them at once, and then after that, the caravan members who also rushed me with happy exclamations and tears of relief.

  Meanwhile Danazar howled, “After them!” and pointed at the terror stricken Pyralians who had just lost their god.

  Some of the merchants obediently charged them with spears. The Pyralians raised their flamethrowers, but this time, the rods failed to generate the slightest spark. The Pyralians dropped them and fled. After a bit of a halfhearted pursuit, the spearmen returned huffing and puffing to the rest of the caravan.

  “Because of you, we will not live in fear of Pyralis anymore,” the nursemaid with the eye makeup exclaimed, and kissed me on the cheek.

  “Yeah, now we only have sandstorms and sandworms to worry about,” another merchant laughed.

  “He took down a sandworm too! I never thought that was possible. I thought those fucking things were unkillable.”

  “Yeah, well, you think you can pull that off?”

  “Like to see you try it next time one shows up.”

  “Thank you,” Kiki said with a radiant grin as she threw her wiry arms around me.

  “It was my idea to invite the gnome and all them along, knew they’d come in useful,” a large bald merchant was announcing to the rest.

  Then Danazar glided up to me and raised both arms with his palms extended to me. “First Amneli, now all of us,” he proclaimed. “What can I say, my friend, what can I say? What can I possibly offer you now? If you like, you may take one of my wives to keep as your own.”

  “Er, that’s very kind of you, but I could never take a woman away from her family,” I said quickly as I imagined how dreadful it would be to be saddled with the kind of woman who demanded to be carried around in a litter everywhere and never raised a finger to be helpful, no matter how enticingly she could dance.

  “Qaar’endoth’s rightful reward will be granted to him by the Fairlands,” Florenia said solemnly. “Where is the temple of Pyralis? Can you take us there?”

  Danazar’s brow furrowed in confusion, but he nodded. “Yes, if you so desire, so it shall be. It will add another day to our journey, but the location is known to us, although in the past, we have always steered well clear of the accursed place. Do you wish to go there in order to dance upon the grave of our enemy as it were? An understandable impulse. Such a triumph as you have just achieved warrants spectacular revelry.”

  “The reason is much more important than that,” Florenia replied. She turned to me, and her hazel eyes glowed brilliantly. “It is time for Qaar’endoth to claim what he has earned, a fourth self.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  First, we continued on to The Dromedary as planned and replenished our water stores and tended to the animals. Then we set our course for Pyralis’ temple in the middle of the desert. While Danazar led us to the site, Florenia obtained a chunk of soapstone and a chisel from some of the merchants and busied herself carving it into my likeness while she rode atop Chivalry. The little statuette turned out astonishingly exact, if not a bit idealized, just like the life-sized wooden version she had produced over the course of several days in Ferndale to install at Hakmut’s former altar.

  Although the sun was no less blistering, and the sand no less heavy to drag our feet and hooves through, the mood throughout the caravan was jubilant. And our pace turned leisurely, now that we no longer had flamethrower-wielding enemies to outrun. My three-part victory against Pyralis’ followers, the sandworm, and the fire god, which saved the entire caravan from certain destruction, elevated my status significantly among its members. In fact, after that, my popularity very nearly approached that of the caravan’s drinking and gambling champion, Willobee.

  When we reached the shrine in the late evening, it loomed up from the desert. The spot was marked by a golden column of about thirty feet tall. The column was surrounded by a half circle of palm trees, and there was a golden altar before it.

  “It has gone out,” Kiki observed as she stared up at the column. “There used to be a flame there, perpetually burning at the top, but it is no more.”

  As the entire caravan looked on, Florenia dismounted and carried the soapstone statuette up to the golden altar and placed it atop the altar.

  For a long moment, the awed silence held.

  Then Zembo said disappointedly, “Nothing happened.”

  “Well, guess it was worth a try,” I sighed.

  “Thanks anyway for bringing me over here,” I added through another of my mouths. “It feels satisfying to see the shrine and know for sure that Pyralis’ flame has been extinguished.”

  “Three bodies is enough for any reasonable person to ask, right?” I continued from another place among the crowd.

  “So this almost feels… excessive,” I concluded from where my fourth self had inconspicuously appeared.

  There was a moment of clamor and confusion. Heads whipped back and forth. I saw several people counting on their fingers.

  Then, the caravan burst out in cheers and whoops of disbelief.

  Florenia seized my brand new self and engaged me in a ferocious kiss which made the surrounding merchants cheer louder.

  They swiftly started setting up canopies, laying out food, and pouring massive quantities of the spiced honey mead that still, somehow, had not yet run dry over the course of our trek so far. The “spectacular revelry” that Danazar had prescribed commenced in full force.

  One of my selves joined Willobee in the game of Sandmaster that he presided over,
and the gnome sat next to me and happily instructed me in the intricate rules. After about an hour I finally started to understand most of them, and an hour after that, I had gained enough skill to start winning rounds against some of the merchants.

  But Willobee, of course, continued to destroy me.

  “Why, Willobee of Clan Benniwumporgan, are you cheating me, even though you claim to serve me?” I demanded playfully.

  “Master, how could you insult me so?” Willobee retorted indignantly. He gestured at his pile of winnings. “Do you imagine this could be mere luck? It is pure skill!”

  “Marvelous skill indeed,” agreed Danazar, who had just joined the game. “But surely, not superior to my own. I have been playing Sandmaster since before I could walk. I will stake one of my wives on the outcome of the next round, whichever one you like.”

  I began to suspect that the poor man wasn’t merely grateful to us, he was also somewhat interested in coyly offloading one or more of his burdensome wives by the time we parted from his caravan.

  “A generous wager indeed,” chortled Willobee, “but unfortunately, gnomes mate only with their own kind, so a human woman gifted to me could never be more than a domestic drudge which would be an unthinkable demotion for one who had previously enjoyed the lofty status of wife to a personage so distinguished as yourself.”

  Another of my selves was sitting with Ilandere and gazing up at the stars with her.

  “You know, Vander, every time I feel a glimmer of hope that I may someday become worthy of you, you achieve something else that no mortal could ever match,” the silvery little princess sighed.

  I laughed. “Don’t be ridiculous. Ilandere, you are as rare and precious and dazzling as if you were made out of starlight yourself. No matter what I accomplish, I will never be able to believe how lucky I am to have you as one of my consorts.”

  I cupped her little face with my hand and kissed her and savored the softness of her lips and the berry taste of her mouth.