The Undying God

by Nathan Wilson

  Hrioshango could faintly feel his magick like residue churning in his blood. He slowly regained control over his body, one limb at a time. He shut his eyes and concentrated on his power. He attempted to teleport from the arena and transport to a distant location. Colors began to swerve before his eyes, darkness ensued, and the voices of his captors cried out in dismay. He realized at once he had erred.

  Hrioshango teleported within the exact same space that the Zzirith occupied, effectively displacing it and tearing a brief rift in space. Hrioshango instantaneously teleported away, and in his place was an explosion of matter, presumably the creature.

  His opponent literally exploded into fragments, and the pieces halted within a field of space as if the particles struck a wall; suddenly, the parts recombined and imploded into oblivion.

  The slave leaped to his feet, having evaded death by only a split second. He gawked at the darkling that accidentally entered the arena. The crowd howled with excitement. Hrioshango spun around to survey the arena, shocked at this new and horrid development.

  “Damnation!” he cursed. Two Zziriths regarded the newcomer and circled him menacingly. One uttered several insectoid clicks from its head, possibly conveying commands to the other hunter or merely cleaning its teeth before a meal.

  Hrioshango hoped for the former.

  He looked down at the long sword in his hand and took comfort that he still possessed his weapon. A hoof slammed into Hrioshango and the world passed him by. He landed on his back and tumbled over the lip of the jawless mouth. He grasped its slimy edge, careful to avoid impaling his hands on the protruding fangs.

  “No!” he cried. “Hrioshango cannot be eaten!”

  To his surprise, the slave came into view and his arm lunged forward. He yanked Hrioshango out of reach of the cavernous mouth, and it gurgled in displeasure.

  Battlemaster Venexa bolted from her seat at the spectacle. The slave renowned as Sitzol had rescued a helpless creature from death. Nothing could surpass her anger in that moment.

  Hrioshango ogled the man with shock, utterly speechless.

  The man looked into his eyes with pity, as if in sorrow to see the darkling enslaved. Hrioshango, too, could not believe that he felt sympathy for the prisoner.

  The abyss of teeth gurgled again, a sound so unbearable that it briefly robbed Sitzol of his hearing. He almost preferred the permanent loss, deaf to the screams of the dying. Slowly, he began to approach the mouth to the wild roars of the crowd. They hungered for his death. With a cursory glance, he looked at the spectators. He was only a pawn in this debauchery.

  Again he approached the grotesque chasm, treading lightly over the bloodstained sand. Gripping a serrated fang with two hands, Sitzol looked over his shoulder at Venexa. It snapped from the membrane with a sickly sound and Sitzol staggered backward. The creature to which the fang belonged thrashed beneath the sands. To Sitzol’s credit, he didn’t fall flat on his back or keel forward into its stomach.

  He swerved to his right just as the tiers of seats quaked. Fissures branched through the marble tiers seating the savage spectators. His eyes widened as he followed the path of the widening fissure. He darted toward the edge of the living abyss again and seized another fang. Spectators cried out as they felt the shudder of the behemoth.

  “Stop him!” Venexa screamed, seizing her warhammer. A guard frantically turned a winch to raise a portcullis to the arena. “That bastard! Kill him!”

  Sitzol extracted another fang from the edge of the mouth. The behemoth groaned and writhed again. A tremor pulsed through the arena and several tiers of seats collapsed in a cloud of debris. Spectators screamed as they fell among the ruins. The guard worked furiously to open the passage. At last, the portcullis rose and guards filtered into the battlegrounds.

  To Hrioshango’s astonishment, dozens of spectators disappeared among the collapsing seats. He couldn’t help but admire the slave’s potential for mayhem.

  The sands shifted and a wave of earth spewed forth. Hrioshango almost thought he saw a tentacle slither among the sand, retreating to a hidden source.

  Sitzol watched as a dozen guards invaded the arena. Neither he nor Hrioshango could afford the guards to take them alive. They would face more than slavery for their insubordination.

  Sitzol turned on a nearby Zzirith without hesitation. The monster reared up and lashed out with its hooves. To Hrioshango’s surprise, Sitzol scrambled on top of its back as if embarking on a suicide mission. The Zzirith pounced to its feet and thrashed angrily.

  Sitzol reached behind his head and seized the tail as it thrust, crushing it firmly in his grip. He twisted it to the right, exaggerating the motion. His instincts paid off and the Zzirith darted in that direction. Hrioshango watched in awe as Sitzol maneuvered the beast by its tail.

  He steered the creature toward the slavers assembled at the perimeter of the arena. The guards scrambled to form a defensive barrier, adjusting their polearms to repel him. Sitzol gripped its tail like a vice. The animal swerved under the pain inflicted, slamming into the guards.

  Sitzol leaped from the beast and landed on his feet. He crossed his forearms in front of him as a spear thrust toward his neck. He barely trapped the polearm between the blades on his wrists. Something hard slammed against the side of his face, stunning him. A hot and wet feeling accompanied the scarlet that suddenly blurred his vision, and he registered the vicious wound to his temple.

  He slumped to his knees and a spear’s shaft pounded his abdominals. Several guards overwhelmed him as Hrioshango helplessly watched. Sitzol lifted his head and looked at the darkling, blood mingled with his defeated expression.

  Hrioshango felt an impulse to help the warrior, and he almost did so. He could defeat the guards with his chaos powers, but they would potentially destroy himself, assuming they responded at all. And if he failed, the slave’s sacrifice would be in vain and they would both perish. Hrioshango backed away like a stray dog. He ran far across the arena but he looked back again, startled to see the battlemaster approach the vulnerable man. In her hands, she bore a warhammer. The spectacle brought wild cheers to the audience.

  Hrioshango escaped into the underground cells so he could not witness the execution.

  Gratitude was an alien concept to Hrioshango, one he had never experienced before. He would not forget the slave’s sacrifice, sparing him from a public death. Again, he felt an impulse to return to the battlegrounds and somehow help, but despair wouldn’t let him budge. Instead, he searched for an escape route, anything to be rid of this place.

  He hoped the cells were carefully secured. Criminals sentenced to death were bound to be somewhere within these winding corridors. Yet, he could hear no voices, only the sounds of restless beasts.

  Suddenly, Hrioshango came to a stop. He peered through the bars of an immense prison cell where hundreds of darklings looked back at him. They fit the stereotype of wild darklings that the community was so accustomed to. The majority would never accept the fact that a darkling could be intelligent, nonetheless, integrate into society.

  They were specifically enslaved for the purpose of fighting in gambling arenas. Roguish men who craved a good show and gold hunted darklings and bred them among different tribes to combine the best attributes. In fact, they often described the breeding process as a “practiced art.”

  One of them looked entreatingly at Hrioshango, sensing his pity. The chaos magician felt drawn toward the darkling as though a racial bond called out to him.

  He reached through the bars toward the pit darkling, extending his hand. It shrieked and slashed at his fingers. Hrioshango quickly withdrew and observed the blood that seeped from his hand. His head bowed in sorrow and he slinked away from the cell.

  To see members of his race crossbred like animals evoked feelings that were foreign to him. He began to deny that he felt sadness, that he experienced sorrow of any kind. He walked blindly, not knowing whether he was escaping from the terrible beasts in the arena or the feelings he jus
t experienced.

  He stepped into a vaulted room where several torches burned. It would seem he happened upon a horrendous tomb, in the center of which was interred the siege machine. The darkling hesitated at the imposing sight. Hrioshango examined it with wonder, praising its ingenious design.

  Its black surface appeared as dark as any void or night he ever imagined, making it all the more mystic and terrifying. He should have felt fear looking upon this device, but he felt only awe.

  Hrioshango approached the spider golem by several steps, each one weaker than the last, subdued by its inanimate presence. A noise registered behind him, and he spun around to see a woman clad in armor.

  Venexa scowled in the dark, her warhammer clasped in her hand. Blood glistened on the deadly instrument.

  Hrioshango couldn’t tear his gaze away from the crimson on the blunt steel. She had ruined countless lives for the sake of entertainment, profit, and sadism, and she almost added him to a long list of casualties. She would never stop dragging more victims to her arena, only to degrade them and feed the masses with blood.

  Recalling the pained images of his brethren and the slave’s sacrifice, Hrioshango laid his hand against the golem. His unstable energy flowed into the machine.

  * * *

  Margzor walked through the streets of Azia-Nocti. So many humans passed him by, a vast sea of faces with unique characteristics. The situation was disturbing to him and he felt exposed in this social setting. So many eyes looking and judging, so many voices murmuring and crying out. They all looked the same, no matter the size, shape, or color. They were merely human.

  How strange it seemed that none of their kind acknowledged him. The people of Azia-Nocti seemed too busy and distracted to regard Margzor—or perhaps they ignored him.

  He noticed a woman staring intensely at him, and as soon as their eyes met, she turned away in fear. The beautiful woman disappeared, and anger entered his mind like a plague on his emotions. He sternly tightened his weapon hand into a fist as if he could crush the feelings of turmoil inside. He stared through the crowd of people as if they ceased to exist, as if they weren’t significant enough to merit his attention.

  He bore down on the temple that had come to represent everything he loathed. His passing sent ripples through the crowd, causing women to bristle with disgust. He could acutely sense their fear and hostility.

  He was ugly in their eyes, the voice in his head suggested. He breathed deeply and shut his eyes. He did not allow his emotions to control him there, instead focusing on the task at hand.

  Margzor approached the temple as his anger became a symphony of bestial rage drowning out the voice in his brain.

  Inside the temple, a guard leaned comfortably against the double doors. The disciples didn’t leave this structure because they lived here, as did the guards. He had no desire to leave this place for he had food and a pleasant bedchamber. He rarely smuggled a bottle of wine into the temple on those lonely nights. Perhaps his greatest motivation for staying was the view.

  He had spent the day roaming the temple corridors with the pretense of a civilized guard. In truth, he often strayed near the bathing chambers. There, he observed the female worshippers cleansing, talking excitedly to each other. The guard reminisced of the women wading in the warm waters, imagining what pleasures he could experience with them.

  His thoughts wandered to the woman who smiled at him earlier, not because she viewed him in any way as a potential lover, but merely to acknowledge him. She was a paragon of beauty, a woman of flawless form and rich, chestnut brown hair. These thoughts turned to fantasies that he was not married, that he could indulge his desire with her.

  He longed to corrupt her heart, so innocent and beautiful, to unleash his lust and—the door flung open and he sprawled to the floor.

  The horrified guard looked over his shoulder at the intruder. He tried to cry out in alarm but Margzor was faster.

  Chapter 14

  Crumbling buildings flanked Arxu on both sides, having fallen into disuse decades ago. The peculiar scent of ash whispered up from the stones.

  The architecture told a story all its own, sometimes catching Arxu’s attention with vivid hieroglyphics and mosaics. He knelt down to investigate a mural on the street, partially obscured by dust. His eyes swept across sacred carvings of humans, angels, and the offspring from different tribes. Even as he inspected the public artwork, a silhouette turned the corner and paused when she saw the man. She approached him from behind, her footsteps barely audible against the stone.

  “Arxu, what are you doing here?” He turned around as Nishka caught up to him. “You should be more careful in Azia-Nocti. You could easily lose your way.”

  “My chances of encountering danger in the city are highly unlikely.”

  “I didn’t say you would be in danger, Arxu. Obviously, you aren’t accustomed to large cities. How am I to find you if you’re running halfway across Azia-Nocti?”

  “I would eventually find you. Your route is predictable.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “You depart from the inn and linger around the market. When you finish conducting business there, you travel to the southwest to sit on the docks and watch the merchant ships.”

  “If you weren’t my bodyguard, I would say that’s really creepy. Actually, it is creepy.”

  “I thought only Hrioshango was creepy. You are comparing me to Hrioshango?”

  “Well, no. He’s on a totally different scale of creepy. In fact, he’s—” For the first time, Nishka noticed her voice was echoing through the vacant district. The wind howled to fill the uncomfortable silence. “Anyway, what are you doing here?”

  “Exploring.” Nishka would hardly consider this grim setting ideal for sightseeing. She suspected this road paved the morbid way to the slums. Perhaps its former inhabitants had been silenced by disease. A tremor nearly dislodged Nishka’s footing. She staggered and accidentally grabbed Arxu for support.

  “Did you feel that?” she said. A murmur seemed to emit from far below the streets.

  “Not particularly.”

  A jagged scream pealed through the air, chilling the blood in Nishka’s veins. They swerved toward the north end of the street. A man ran toward them, his mouth contorted in a scream.

  “It’s killing everyone in the temple! Someone stop him!” He fell to his knees in his frantic attempt at escape. “Get out of my way!” he cried, and only then did Nishka see the trail of blood.

  “The murders in Sepulzer!” she exclaimed. “It’s happening here, too!” She grabbed Arxu’s arm. “Arxu, can you stop it? Someone has to do something to end this!”

  Suddenly, the streets shifted under a violent pulse. Without warning, an imposing building shattered like glass.

  A hulking arachnid burst from the cityscape, staggering into the streets in front of Nishka. She halted in shock. A cascade of debris showered the streets as the siege engine reared its hideous head. It swerved to regard her.

  Twelve red orbs were affixed to its head, several of which studied Nishka. Words escaped her as she took in the full form of the demonic-looking device. Eight spindly limbs stretched forward to thunder against the stones. It looked like a horror conjured out of the hells, a wretched contraption compiled of forbidden magick. Perhaps more disturbing, the machine moved like a living beast.

  Arxu lifted his staff and gestured frantically with his hand. His incantation failed to affect the gargantuan creature, leaving only one solution left.

  They fled in the opposite direction. The mechanical spider immediately flung itself forward, hobbling over the uneven streets. For a split second, Nishka feared it was related to the temple murders. She glanced at Arxu, and she knew even he couldn’t protect her from this. That thought made her stomach clench with despair.

  They tumbled out of the narrow street and emerged into the city square. They were surprised to find the plaza empty. Arxu and Nishka didn’t realize many of the city’s inhabitants attended the amp
hitheater games at this hour. With a groan, the siege machine burst from the slums, sending Arxu slipping forward.

  “Arxu!” Nishka cried out. An enormous fissure splintered through the streets and a tremor almost cost them their balance. The crevice widened and branched off into several smaller veins.

  “South!” Arxu commanded, cutting to the right.

  “What are we going to do?” Nishka said as she caught her breath. “We can’t destroy it!”

  “We have to keep moving. We can’t stay in Azia-Nocti anymore.” With those words, he took hold of Nishka’s hand and plunged into an alley. They barely glimpsed the oligarchs’ palace beyond the narrow passage. Suddenly, the buildings overlooking the alley tilted. A snarling fissure blistered under their feet.

  Nishka and Arxu raced into the plaza and spun around as the buildings collapsed.

  A sudden crash sent them spinning on their heels as the arachnoid siege machine landed behind them. Nishka screamed at the unexpected appearance of the spider. It stood still for a moment, taking in the environment. Two mechanical appendages overlooking its mouth wriggled.

  It lashed out and tried to impale Arxu with a barbed leg. The Nightwalker leaped back and swung his staff in vain. The mechanical spider skittered backward excitedly.

  Its fangs suddenly retracted, folding inward. A jutting drill studded with curved blades slid out from between its mandibles. With an anguished sputter, it began to revolve. Soon, it was turning fast enough to shear through more than just the chainmail Arxu wore beneath his shirt.

  He threw himself to the streets as the siege machine scrambled forward. He desperately crawled out of the path of a pointed leg, tucking his body at the last second. The spider released a mechanical scream like needles burrowing into Nishka’s cranium. It was a sound of harsh disappointment, outraged that Arxu had somehow escaped.