“But the research, the fertility problem…”
“If they’re not breeding, that’s a bonus,” replied Ash coldly. “I know this is harsh, but it really is us or them. That means we can’t leave the slightest clue that they ever created a Wraeththu here.”
I had to concede he had a point.
An hour later I stood on the front steps of the Calcutt Institute, watching the flames beginning to take hold. The evidence was burning, all the files and disks thrown to the hungry flames.
I pulled on one of the backpacks that we’d looted from the CGS barracks. It wasn’t going to be easy on foot, but I felt relief to be getting away; away from the all-pervading medical stench of the Institute, away from the dead with their accusing eyes, away from my human past.
I couldn’t help thinking that there would be consequences, despite the removal of the Nayati. The deaths had been too easy and something in me said that there should be more to it, like karma or something.
“If they know we’re alive they’ll expect us to head for Unneah territory in Chicago,” Ash said. “But I think it’s time we spread out to the smaller towns. We need to start tribes everywhere we can reach.”
I nodded in agreement.
Another dream flowed into my mind, far sharper and more precise now that I was fully Wraeththu.
Running through the trees, pine needles tickling the soles of my feet, twenty of my best hara running with me…
“We should head south,” I said with absolute certainty. “My dreams never made sense to the old me. That’s all changed now; I totally get it. I’ve dreamed all my life, wonderful dreams, Wraeththu dreams. My future is filled with mountains and the scent of pine. Starting from here that means we go that way.” I pointed.
“South it is, then.” Ash replied “A wise har always pays attention to his dreams.”
You Can Never Go Back
Christopher Coyle
I fled. I had no choice. My skin felt too tight for my body, a fire burned in my stomach and my head pounded with a violence threatening to send me spiralling into oblivion at any moment. I turned from the terrible tableau unfolding before me and pushed my way through the teeming mass of bodies, uncaring of who saw my face or who I had to push aside. The stench of their enjoyment mingled with the sickly-sweet scent of viscera and squeezed its way past my clenched fingers to fill my nostrils with its cloying perfume.
The heavy door to the room was only a temporary impediment. A jerk of my wrist, the application of my shoulder against the door, and I was outside. The cold, moist air hit me like a fist, but it was a welcome relief from the oppressive heat in the examination room. I inhaled deeply, my hand falling from my face so that I could breathe in the night air. But, even outside, I could not escape what I had seen. Even as the door slammed shut behind me, I could still hear them talking excitedly about the body they were examining.
The stranger had stumbled into our village shortly after midday. He mumbled something before he collapsed, but his words quickly suffered as all such does from the wagging tongues. He lay there, untouched, for almost an hour after he fell, for my people were too afraid of approaching, mistrusting that the demon had truly fallen. Then they descended upon him like vultures, swiftly carrying his body to my father’s house. Besides being the village’s leader, my father also tended to the physical woes of the villagers. That was when I first caught sight of the demon, when they carried his limp, unresisting body through the door and laid him down upon the table.
My curiosity drew me over after the others had left to find my father. At first glance, the stranger looked dead, except for the occasional, shallow rise and fall of his bare chest. Only a pair of tattered, ripped pants covered his lower body, showing a map of burns and bruises crisscrossing his torso. It looked like he had been struck repeatedly with a burning brand.
It seemed impossible to me that a demon could be burned, much less be as badly wounded as the stranger had been. Once, he must have been truly beautiful, for behind the bruises and scorched flesh of his face, you could still see the ghost of his former grandeur. His hair had escaped the plaits it had been braided in, tangled with twigs and leaves and hanging wildly about his injured features. Immediately, it was apparent that he was one of them. One of the demons from the south.
Hesitantly, I reached out a trembling hand to touch him, to see if he was flesh and blood. Before I could touch him, however, the door burst open and my father stood there.
“Get away from him, Jarren,” he barked in a tone that brooked no disobedience. Pulling my hand back so quickly caused me to stumble backwards, leaving room for my father and the men who had carried the stranger to crowd in around the table.
My back against the wall, I watched with morbid fascination as my father began to work upon the stranger. The stranger’s pants had to be soaked in water before they could be cut off of him, for they become crusted with blood and ichor from wounds that had not been apparent before. The moment that my father had removed the stranger’s pants completely, it became immediately apparent to them that the stranger was truly different when my father stumbled back with a startled exclamation and one of the others yelled out in disgust. Apparently, I had realized far more swiftly what the stranger was before they had.
The demons are built differently than people. Their bodies are different, somehow combining aspects of male and female anatomy to create a set of genitalia that was fascinating, at least to my gaze. It was obvious the others in the room did not share my fascination, except my father.
He took the other three men off to the side, gathering them together as he whispered something urgently in a low voice. I probably could have listened in, and looking back, I wish that I had, but I could not tear my attention away from the fallen demon before me. No, he wasn’t a demon. If anything, I thought of him as an angel who had been through hell.
“Jarren, stay here,” my father’s voice broke the glamour I had been caught in. As I looked over at him, his face was serious, but there burned a strange, curious light in his eyes.
“Watch the demon until we get back,” my father continued as he and the others left, leaving me alone once again.
Bemused by my father’s rather abrupt disappearance, I stood there against the wall, unsure of what to do. I probably would have stayed there until my father returned if the demon hadn’t groaned out loud, his eyes fluttering open as he looked around in confusion.
“Where am I?” he mumbled softly as his pale, pale eyes finally settled upon me. I felt trapped by those eyes. They were a translucent jade and surprisingly sharp for someone who had been unconscious moments before.
“You...you’re in Kreslow,” I stuttered, unable to look away from the stranger’s eyes.
His brow furrowed in confusion, but the stress upon the burns on his face caused him to grimace in pain instead. He tried to push himself up, but even before he raised his torso, he groaned in pain and slumped back against the hard wood of the table he was laying on.
I reached forward, pressing my hands lightly against his chest, trying not to cause any more pain than he must already be in. “Please, rest. My father will be back soon. He can help you.”
The stranger shook his head, “No, he cannot...” Suddenly, the stranger’s voice broke off as he was caught by a fit of choking. The blood flecking his whitened lips frightened me, but I tried to smile reassuringly as I brushed his hair out of his face.
“You’ll be fine,” I tried to reassure him, but I don’t think that he heard me before he slipped back into unconsciousness.
I tried to make the demon, the angel, more comfortable, using a cool cloth to cleanse some of the crusted gore from his flesh. Before too long, my father returned. I heard him at the door and I dropped the cloth guiltily, backing away from the table as he came through the door. Whatever I was about to say, the excuses that were ready to spill from my mouth, was silenced by the crowd following my father. On all of their faces, I could see a grim determination fixing thei
r faces into rictus masks.
They ignored me as they pushed into the room, my father leading the way to the body upon the table. He was dressed in all black, the clothing that he wore only when he was about to use his knives to bleed someone of the sickness within their body. My suspicions were confirmed when he pulled out the black leather bag that was his most valued possession. The black bag that held his knives, his needles, and the other tools he used for physicking.
What happened next will haunt me for the rest of my life, a nightmare I shall never be able to free myself from. Using an extract from a rare weed that rendered those who breathed its fumes in a sleep that bordered upon death, my father ensured his “patient” would not awaken. Rolling up his sleeves, he opened his black bag and pulled out one of his knives and began his grisly examination upon the demon.
The rational part of my mind realized that my father and the people of the village were terrified of the demons that had been increasing in numbers over the last decade. Where we lived, far in the north, we only heard occasional rumours from the southern cities and the news was frightening. My father and the other village leaders must have determined that this was the best way to find out about the demons, to learn what makes their bodies work and perhaps to find a way to fight them. To them, the stranger on the table was a monster that had to be studied and analyzed. To me, it was something surreal, a scene that one would expect to see only in Hell.
I had witnessed my father work before. I had even assisted him on occasion, but this time, I could not detach myself from what was happening. This time, something was different. It bordered on sacrilege and my heart cried out at the injustice unfolding around me. I looked around, desperate to see if there was anyone else there who I could turn to for help, who might understand. In each face, I saw something that scared me almost as much as the sight of my father elbow-deep in viscera and blood. Eagerness, anticipation, and an almost sadistic satisfaction at seeing a demon brought low gleamed from every face. That was when I knew that I had to escape. I had to get out of there. Let them believe that I was a coward, that the sight of so much blood had sickened me.
After I left the room, I wandered aimlessly along the street, not truly caring where I was going, just eager to put as much distance between myself and the others as possible. I had always felt like an outsider in the village, but no more so than at that moment. Right then, I just wanted to get away from everything and everyone.
I don’t know how long I walked. I know I had left the boundaries of the village some time ago and I hadn’t bothered grabbing my coat. The chill night air was sharp, even with the moisture of the coming snows, but the fire still burning within me was still hot enough that I did not feel the cold, at least not consciously. I wrapped my arms over my chest not so much as to try and ward off the cold as to try and keep my heart from bursting from my breast.
I suddenly felt a harsh hand upon my shoulder, my already pounding heart leapt to my throat as I was spun around to face two alien figures. They were tall, taller than anyone in the village, but possessed of a slenderness that bordered on gauntness. Yet, there was a certain lushness about them, a sensuality that transcended human definitions of masculinity or beauty. It did not take me but a few moments to realize that they were demons, like the one in town.
The taller of the two, whose hair was intricately plaited with ivory tubes and beads, leaned down until his face was close to mine. In a low voice that sent a shiver along my spine, he growled out, “Where is har? Where is Mendal?”
I knew he meant the other demon, the one currently lying helpless on my father’s table, beneath my father’s blade. When he shook me, I shattered. It must have shocked him to suddenly find the young boy in his grasp shaking like a leaf as he sobbed everything out. The demon’s dark eyes, so different yet so alike those of the jade-eyed demon back in the village, were wide in disbelief as the words spilled from my throat in a relentless torrent that unburdened everything knotted up inside of me.
“Stay here with the boy,” the demon holding me demanded of the other silent shadow before he released me and faded into the darkness. I was suddenly enfolded in a surprisingly strong pair of arms and wrapped in a heavy cloak of dark leather as I was pulled back against the demon’s chest. I felt his breath warming the cusp of my ear as he suddenly chuckled, “Do not be afraid, little one. We are not demons, not all the time. We just take care of our own.”
I didn’t understand what he meant then. I almost wish that I didn’t understand when he meant now. But at that moment, I felt warm and safe. When the other demon returned a few minutes later, his face was grim, but he offered me a slight smile before he looked at his companion, “Come, it is time for us to go. We must return to the others and tell them that Mandal has passed to the next life.”
I felt the demon holding me begin to shake, as I had shook earlier, but it passed quickly. My chin was grabbed in a hand and I was forced to look up into the piercing, dark eyes of the demon. “First, child, as Kalen told you, we are not demons. We are Wraeththu. Second, you are coming with us. We have lost Mendal tonight, but I believe we have found a new spirit to join us. Third, I am Halcoln and we’ve a long journey ahead of us. We must go. Now.”
I didn’t question Halcoln’s words as he and Kalen led me away from the village. My mind was muddied, my senses confused. I never saw the plumes of smoke twisting up into the night behind us, as I never looked back. It was many years before I found out what Halcoln had done while he was in the village. He told me that the remains of Mendal’s body had to be purified by fire for his spirit to be freed. When I eventually returned to Kreslow, all I found was the ruined remains of a village that had been burned to the ground decades ago.
It’s true what they say. You can never go back.
The Conservation of Momentum
Fiona Lane
“…Some vows are made when you are very young, personal vows that might never be spoken. I cannot go back on promises that I’ve made to myself, whatever others might think of my beliefs.”
– The Bewitchments of Love and Hate, Storm Constantine
Winter came early that year, sweeping down from the high mountains like an empty-bellied predator, bringing first the metallic tang of snow in the air, and then a heavy blanket of white and silence to the wide plains of Megalithica. Generations unborn would number this year Ai-Cara-Less-40, but for the ragged army of hara shivering as they rode, marched, trudged and stumbled across the bleak landscape, it was a year only of cold and of death.
Terzian reined his horse to a halt, waiting for the stragglers to catch up. They numbered upward of a thousand now; several small tribes, his own included, had banded together, realizing that their chances of survival were increased along with their numbers. Still, it was an uneasy alliance as yet. They were strangers to each other, too used to owing loyalty to none but their own small circle. Eventually, Terzian knew, they would bond, their common danger and common kinship uniting them against the dual threat of the elements and of humankind, but for now it was a period of transition as they realigned their hierarchies and reassessed their loyalties.
The same could be said of Terzian. Until ten days ago, he had been an autocrat. True, his sovereignty had been modest – scarcely three hundred hara had looked to him as leader – but it had been absolute. Now, compromise was the order of the day. His own tribe and another from nearby had joined forces with that of Ponclast, another tribe leader from the north. Ponclast’s band was by far the largest, numbering some five hundred or more hara, and perhaps in Ponclast’s mind that gave him an edge of superiority, but he never said so aloud. His talk was all of alliances and councils and co-operation.
Terzian did not believe this talk for one minute. Ponclast was not a har who compromised. Terzian could see that in him – he carried his authority with him like a visible aura. Ponclast was a natural leader, a trait that Terzian could recognize well enough from his own personal acquaintance with it, and therein lay a potential source
of conflict, with two rival generals vying for the top position. A long time ago, they had met briefly in the madness of the earliest days of Wraeththu. They had both changed a lot. Terzian had not known Ponclast then – even his name had been different – and did not know him now. Proximity might bring acquaintance, but not real knowing.
Terzian looked at the rag-tag band of pathetic creatures stamping and shuffling in front of him and snorted in disgust. Delusions of grandeur! This was no army, and there was no status or prestige to be gained by leading them. Merely surviving the winter would be an achievement for this lot. There was nothing to fight over. That aside, Terzian was intelligent enough to realise that with the rise of Wraeththu, the age-old power struggles of humankind were rendered if not exactly irrelevant, then at least somewhat obsolete. There were other, less destructive ways of engaging with potential rivals.
He watched the other har surreptitiously. Ponclast was mounted on a large black horse which he was riding at a smart trot along the untidy ranks of exhausted hara, encouraging them to pick up the pace. Terzian noticed that his high, leather riding boots had metal spurs at the heels, and these Ponclast used quite enthusiastically to keep his mount motivated. The bright metal of the spurs was reddened with blood from the animal’s flanks.
Ponclast was a tall har, physically imposing, yet not heavy-set or muscular. His body was slender and attenuated, with long, graceful limbs and an almost regal bearing. He was dressed elegantly in what appeared to be military uniform, although not the utilitarian garments of the modern soldier; his garb seemed to belong to an earlier, more formal era. He wore a long black coat, high-necked and fastened with polished metal buttons, which flared out at the waist and draped over the haunches of his mount.
Paragenesis: Stories of the Dawn of Wraeththu Page 22
