by Ryan Attard
When the dimensional rift between the two worlds was torn apart — thank you, Black Ring Society — some of the creatures from that world came over to ours. I distinctly remember the clean-up afterwards, me and Amaymon hunting these giant Wurms that suddenly swarmed anywhere with enough greenery to support their nests.
But here’s the thing about trauma. At first you can’t stop reliving the horror over and over again. You’re back in that hell all day. Then, without warning, life happens. Something comes up and you force yourself to deal, and suddenly there’s this chasm where your memories once were. It’s not that they’re gone — you still have enough juice for triggers and nightmares. But the details are grayed out. Names, faces, places get all jumbled up until all you get is pure crippling fear just by association.
Hence the journal. I went over to my desk, pulled open the second drawer, and extracted a notebook. Every time I remembered a new detail about that island I wrote it down. Details like the stripes on the back of the warring Sahuagin tribes, or the number of claws those little critters had that I used to hunt with.
Or the names of the Vensir.
The Vensir.
Whatever was holding my memory back was lifted and information came rushing in like a flood. Of course, how could I not see it?
I knew some of the Vensir — elf-looking creatures immune to magic — had made it through. There weren’t enough of them to rebuild the society they had back on the island, but there were enough to occupy a small colony at the edge of Trinity forest under the watchful eye of my sister, the current head of the Ashendale family.
Wordlessly, I strode over to Amaymon and plucked the black bone from his hands.
“This is a Vensir bone,” I said. My voice felt numb, distant. I looked Abi in the eyes. “You know what they are?”
She nodded. “I have access to your sister’s database,” she answered.
My sister, being a proper Warlock, kept an updated database of all known creatures, transferring knowledge from our old library onto a digital scale.
“The Vensir are harmless,” I said, probably saying what she already knew. “But they are deeply allergic to magic. Not the atmospheric kind. But if you were to apply specific spells against them, it triggers a change in their physiology.”
The memories of me fighting Vensir elders — venerable members of their society who spent way too much time in their magical hub and accidentally triggering their change — flooded my head. I could now picture every detail.
Giant, towering beasts, seven feet of muscle and sinew. Black bones jutting out from under their skeleton. Sharp teeth and wicked claws.
Hunters. Predators.
Everything the Vensir weren’t.
“So the skeletons we saw in the truck…” Abi began.
“Are exactly what triggered Vensir would look like,” I finished. “If they were skinned alive.”
The thought sobered up the room.
“What would someone want with Vensir bones?” Abi asked.
“Not someone,” I said. “Greede. He’s hunting them. Question is, why?”
“I got that one,” Amaymon said. He snatched the black bone from my hand, grabbed it tightly with both of his, and proceeded to apply all of his demonic strength.
The bone remained intact.
I raised my eyebrows. Vensir bones — hell, the Vensir themselves, when transformed — were tough as can be.
But I didn’t think they would be this tough. I’ve seen Amaymon break just about anything. This was one of the strongest physical beings in the known universe.
And he lost the battle with the black bone.
“This thing,” he said, panting a little, “is seriously tough. If I can’t crack it, then I doubt anything in this world can.” He tossed the bone back at me. “There’s your answer. Greede just got his hands on an indestructible material. Now, if you were a twisted evil genius, what would you do with that?”
I tried racking my brain around it. A nigh indestructible material. The possibilities were endless if you have Greede’s cunning and money.
“This is bad,” Abi said.
“Yeah, no shit,” the demon added.
“Erik?” Abi asked.
I put the notebook away. “I have to go to the colony,” I said. “I need to find out exactly where and how he got a hold of those Vensir.”
“Could be the same mole your sister’s been trying to worm out for five years,” Amaymon said. “You know, the one who keeps fucking her over.”
I grimaced. Amaymon was right. As resourceful as Gil was, she had a leak in her network, one that often cost us a clean win. And if Greede found out where the colony was, then it could have only been through the mole.
Which meant I was on my own.
Fine by me.
“Doesn’t matter,” I said. “Triggered Vensir aren’t that easy to take down. Greede would need a small army to get just one. If his men were inside Trinity, someone must have seen something.”
“Wait,” Abi said. “You’re leaving now? At…” She checked her laptop. “At three in the morning?”
“The colony is a few hours away,” I said. “I wanna get there just after sunrise.”
Sunrise and sunset were important to the magical community. Each reset the atmospheric magic around us; the sun cleansed away the effects of the night and vice-versa. If any Vensir were triggered during the night, they would be ‘reset’ during the day.
Which would make my job a hell of a lot easier.
“Amaymon, you’re with me,” I said. “Abi, I need you to scour the news for anything resembling a Big Foot sighting in the last two weeks. The bones in the truck looked fresh. I need to know if Greede is hitting multiple spots, and if so, how are the triggered Vensir venturing that far out.”
“Aren’t you forgetting something?” she asked.
I raised an eyebrow.
“She’s black, most likely naked in your bed, and likely has more than enough DNA of yours to make the strongest voodoo doll in existence,” she added.
Amaymon giggled.
“That was so not what I meant,” Abi said, frowning at the demon. “But seriously, what am I supposed to tell Akasha?”
I sighed.
Okay, so this whole dating thing was new to me. To be completely honest, I wasn’t a big fan of Akasha sleeping over. I have issue with intimacy. Don’t get me wrong, I love spending time with her. If it were up to me, we’d be a walking Nicholas Sparks novel.
But I guess I was set in my ways, because as soon as I went into mission-mode, I got tunnel vision.
Maybe that’s also part of my PTSD. Or maybe I’m just an asshole.
“Tell her I headed out to investigate,” I told Abi.
“She’s not gonna be happy.”
“We have a deal — neither one of us interferes with the others’ work,” I said. “I don’t intrude on the Grigori’s business and she stays out of mine.”
“Seems healthy,” Abi replied with a raised eyebrow.
“Just tell her,” I said, not wanting to get into the argument. I grabbed my gear on the way out.
“And if she insists on knowing where you are?” Abi pressed.
I rolled my eyes. “Just tell her I went to see Legolas.”
Chapter 4
The first rays of sunlight lanced from between the mountain peaks by the time Amaymon and I made it through Trinity forest.
It took us a while to find the actual Vensir camp. Gil piled about a thousand concealment spells around the whole area, thus ensuring that anyone — her brother included — would end up going around in circles, eat their protein bars, and have to pee in the bushes while their demonic familiar cracked incessant jokes.
Finally breaking through the enchantments, we arrived at a clearing, inside of which was a small village. Huts were constructed out of mud and branches, set around in clusters. Other buildings, some built out of logs like cabins, while others still were constructed out of stone and mortar, were scattered aro
und.
Vensir ventured from building to building, looking about as busy as anyone would in a regular city.
They were exactly as I remember them, indistinguishable from regular humans except for being exceptionally beautiful. Not just pretty; these guys had an otherworldly appearance to them that made them look simultaneously delicate and dangerous. Their large almond-shaped eyes ranged from incandescent blue to royal purple, while I occasionally spotted the odd green-eyed one. Long flowing hair swayed from their shoulders, tied to a variety of exotic knots. Overall, the Vensir were skinny and slender, with long delicate spider fingers.
Finally, jutting from their various hairdos, were the tips of their elven ears.
A Vensir boy of about ten stopped and looked at us, the two intruders. He pulled the hem of his mother’s skirt, drawing her attention to us. She gasped and backed away.
One by one the Vensir stared at us. They didn’t move or run. They just stared.
Watching. Waiting.
“I don’t remember you sayin’ anything about a creep factor,” Amaymon muttered from besides me.
I held both my hands to my side, palms facing out. “Maybe it’s something they picked up,” I told him, while still maintaining eye contact with the Vensir.
“Yeah, leave it to your sister to teach ‘em how to be paranoid.”
Something moved in between the Vensir, and a tall male emerged. I sighed in relief.
The Vensir male walked straight towards me, stopping mere inches from my face. His blond hair whipped around his face. A wisp caught me in the eye, making me forfeit the staring contest. Shame too, because I could have stared into his purple eyes all day long.
Legolas grinned. “Good to see you again, Erik.”
“You’re standing awfully close there, Legolas.”
The Vensir took a giant step back. “My apologies,” he said. “I am still learning the proper ways to greet your kind.”
“Yeah?” Amaymon interjected. “Which one involved a face-mush?”
Legolas cocked his head. The Vensir don’t do metaphors. “The one called kissing,” he replied, seriously.
“You were trying to kiss me?” I asked.
He cocked his head again. “Is that not the proper way to greet someone?”
“Nope,” I said. “Not unless you want a lawsuit.”
“How interesting,” Legolas said. “It seems my educational device is faulty.”
“Educational device?” I asked cautiously. “You managed to build the Sentinels again?”
Back on the island, every Vensir had a weird hovering robot called a Sentinel following them around. They did everything for the Vensir, from picking up heavy luggage to protecting them against the wild fauna native to the island, and my personal favourite, stunning them into a coma when they exhibited signs of turning into monsters.
Take it from me, the last thing you want is to go up against robots who can wield magical weaponry.
Legolas shook his head. “No. We have abided by Gil Ashendale’s conditions for our stay. The construction of Sentinels is forbidden, a rule that I myself oversaw as the new chieftain of this colony. The educational device I am referring to is actually a human invention.” He waved us over. “Come and see. Perhaps you are able to fix it.”
Legolas led us through the throng of Vensir and towards one of the huts. This one stood further apart from all the others and had some kind of bone decoration on the front.
A hut worthy of a leader, I guess.
I followed him inside and felt a flashback coming on. I’d lived in a hut just like this: tiny bed made out of leaves, a small rickety desk with a stack of paper written in the Vensir language, and a little box for personal belongings.
Legolas, I suppose by virtue of being a leader, also had a TV. An old TV, the kind you had to fiddle with two antennae on top.
He switched it on and a news channel came on.
In black and white.
“Dude,” I muttered, despite not being the kind of guy who uses ‘dude’. “That thing is ancient.”
Legolas smiled proudly. “Yes. The original owner had thrown it away. The insanity. Does he not know that age increases the value of such artifacts?”
Amaymon face-palmed himself.
“Be nice,” I warned.
“They think black and white is cool,” he said. “And this was the dominant species on Envy’s island?”
“I said be nice.”
“That was nice.”
“Is there something wrong?” Legolas asked. “Have I done something to offend your companion?”
I shook my head. “No, he’s just cranky. But, Legolas, buddy, you need better tech than this. I’ll ask Gil to hook you up with an internet connection. You’ll be able to learn all about our history, look up anything you want — like the databases back in your libraries.”
He smiled. “That would be nice.”
“Yeah. And a shit-ton of porn,” Amaymon said. “Hey, hook him up with a Tinder account. That’ll teach him real quick about humanity.”
“Shut up, Amaymon.”
“You’re right,” he added. “The last thing you guys need is to be in competition with the guy who looks more like Legolas than the actual Legolas.”
“I do not understand,” the Vensir said. “Am I not the actual Legolas? I believe that is the denomination Erik assigned me, since my Vensir name is unpronounceable in your tongue.”
“He’s talking about the actor who played Legolas in Lord of the Rings,” I explained. “You’ll get it once you actually watch the movies.”
He nodded, his brow furrowed with worry. “I do hope so. But why would I, a Vensir, pose any threat to you humans? This is not my intention.”
I groaned internally. Amaymon’s grin widened.
Asshole.
“It’s not a real threat,” I said, waving my hands about uncomfortably. “The actor is considered quite attractive by human standards and the Vensir in general look more beautiful than humans.”
He nodded. “I see. Therefore I am attractive in your eyes.”
“Um…” I wasn’t sure if he meant me specifically, or us as a species. “Sure, Legolas. You can be considered attractive.”
“Thank you,” he replied cordially. “I have never been complimented so on my physical appearance.”
“Happy to help.”
There was an uncomfortable minute before Amaymon said, “One of you has to say ‘no homo’ or this is gonna turn out way different than I anticipated.”
I sighed. “Why do I bring you places?” Before he could answer I turned to Legolas.
“We need to talk,” I said, the humor gone from my voice.
The Vensir furrowed his eyebrows. “Indeed we do. I have been waiting for your arrival, especially since you are friend to the Vensir.”
“You’ve been waiting for me?” I asked, crossing my arms. “Why?”
“Because the Vensir are under attack,” Legolas said, staring me dead in the eyes. “May I offer you some tea?”
Chapter 5
I watched as Legolas poured some sort of thick, syrupy, steaming liquid into a wooden cup and sipped. Watching him nearly made my stomach roil. If I remembered correctly, Vensir tea was made out of leaves, roots, and sometimes, tree bark. This particular version had a brownish tinge to it.
So, yeah, call me a rude guest, but I’m gonna refuse your hippie, leafy, muddy tea.
“What the hell do you mean, the Vensir are under attack?” I asked.
Legolas sipped his tea.
“In order for you to understand the extent of our predicament,” he said, “you must first understand how the Vensir changed when exposed to this plane’s magical atmosphere.”
“Oh goody,” Amaymon said. “A lecture.”
“Ignore him,” I told Legolas. “Go on.”
“As you are well aware the Vensir are highly susceptible to physical changes when exposed to magic,” he said. “On our home plane, magic was constrained to only one loc
ation, leaving the rest of the island barren. As such when the Vensir did come in contact with magic, it was often in violent waves.”
“Yeah,” I said, aware that I had been clenching my teeth this entire time. “I remember.”
“Magic here is different,” Legolas went on. “Here, magic is omnipresent, permeating the very air around us. It is however much less dense then that of the island. What this means for the Vensir is that whilst our transformations are less sporadic, we are transforming more often. But unlike our previous iterations, our current metamorphosis is more controlled. Transformed Vensir are able to communicate and retain their faculties, albeit to a lesser degree.”
“Which means you’re less Hulk and more Wolverine on a bad day,” I said.
His gaze remained blank, which didn’t come as a surprise. This guy thought a black and white tv was the apex of human technology.
“But I still don’t get how all of this has to do with the Vensir being under attack,” I said.
“Don’t you get it?” Amaymon interjected. He gave Legolas an accusatory look. “You’ve been wanderin’ outside, haven’t you? But rather than do it in your supermodel forms, you waited until the cover of darkness, put on your Big Foot costume, and scouted out the area.”
Legolas cocked his head. “Big Foot? I’m afraid you are mistaken in your assumption. While our mass and physiognomy does increase, it does so on a full body basis not just the feet.”
“Did you or did you not go outside your territory while transformed?” I pressed.
Legolas swiveled his head towards me and blinked. At first, I couldn’t read his expression — Vensir weren’t known for their vast array of non-verbal cues — but it dawned on me that he might be trying to express shame.
“Yes,” he said in a small voice.
“Goddammit, Legolas,” I said. “You knew the terms. You have this land for yourselves, protected by my sister’s magic.”
“You do not understand, Erik Ashendale,” he retorted, his face suddenly contorting into something resembling anger. Really controlled anger. “We went from one prison to another. My people were enslaved by the creature you called Leviathan. And once we were liberated — once you liberated us — you brought us here against our will and confined us to yet another island, one surrounded by trees, and magic, and fear, as opposed to an infinite ocean.”
