Ascending Shadows

by Everet Martins

  They came out through the other side and into a wall of sound. Scales clattered, goats bleated, Tigerians roared, and Tougeres lumbered through a pressing rabble of living creatures. The street was broad enough to fit at least twenty carriages but filled with nothing but endless rows of merchant’s carts in no recognizable sense of order. The chaos inflicted her with a deep feeling of dread, making her want to stop and arrange the carts and their wares into sensible lines. She spotted another length of slaves being marched off, their flesh covered in dirt, far more haggard than their lot.

  A Tigerian stood on a table with sacks in either hand, red beans spilling from their tops, waving them about and shouting prices in common. The Tigerian nearest to him tried to pull him off and received a sack of beans to the face for his troubles. A merchant held a glittering emerald up to an eyeglass and shook his head, muttering curses at his customer.

  “This is madness,” Senka breathed.

  “This is commerce.” Scab looked back at her with an arched eyebrow.

  Tatlat looked back at the both of them, his expression hard. His armor was bright against all the neutral shades of men and Tigerians fumbling about. The rest of his men tried to form barriers around their captives, around his goods. “Follow me. No games!” he shouted, his distinctive gravelly voice carrying over the tumult.

  There were spots of brightness that her eyes naturally fell upon. Senka spotted a table of carrot-like vegetables, except their bottoms had snapping mouths that bit at each other like squabbling chickens. Another table had rows upon rows of potato baskets with skins of the brightest and purest blue. A merchant had tens of cages with the blood red carrion birds that had followed them during their march here. It seemed that everything that could possibly be sold was being sold here. A Tigerian beggar even tried to sell the rags from his back. Hunger and thirst made a man take desperate actions. She knew that before long, he’d be a pickpocket or back alley cutthroat.

  She could pick out the wealthier Tigerians in the crowd with relative ease. It seemed there was no notion of civilization without some sense of a caste system. Their fur was brushed clean and shimmered in chinks of sunlight as if oiled. They wore neatly pressed robes in fine silk, some ornamented at the shoulders and chest with swathes of shining gold. Some even had pairs of burly guards trailing at their sides brandishing cudgels, tapping their broad ends against their opened palms as if desperate for a chance to use them. Making your wealth known was a sure way to have it lost. A better way to protect their wealth would’ve been attending the market in beggar’s clothes, Senka thought. As much as things were different here, so much was the same as it was in Zoria. They were unable to stow away their pride and seemed to be incapable of the art of subtlety.

  Tatlat’s Tougere growled threats at anyone who stepped too close, carving a path through all the shifting flesh and exchanging materials. Someone raised a crate above her and handed it to a Tigerian behind her. Another tossed a bag of coins into the air at someone else, a furry arm reaching up to snatch it out of sight. A goat wriggled between her legs and Scab’s, its Tigerian owner scrambling after it, making sure to scowl at her first. Senka had to stop to avoid tripping over his back.

  Hovels were stacked on top of each other at least four stories high on either side of the way. Each subsequent dwelling was a bit smaller than the one below it such that the bottom most dwelling presumably had less weight to support. They were poorly constructed with all manner of materials from rusted iron to freshly hewed wood. Bright fabric hung across the road on crisscrossing lengths of rope. The linens swayed in the breeze and cast shadows on the passersby below. A few heads poked out of makeshift windows, shouting and waving at Tigerians milling among the crowd. A hand reached out a window and dropped a coin into an expectantly raised hand a second after a bright purple fruit was tossed up from the same body, caught in the Tigerian’s hand who had dropped the coin.

  “An efficient transaction,” Senka said.

  “What’s that?” Scab yelled back, grunting at a Tigerian clutching sacks of flour against each shoulder and shoving him out of the way. “The rudeness,” Scab said as if deeply offended, then broke off in a cackle and shuffled on.

  “Nothing.” Why she was speaking to him was a mystery to her. Maybe there was something about a shared misery that could turn even an enemy into an ally.

  “Oh, yes. Efficient! Businessmen are very honest here, much like myself. It is a pleasure to work here, it truly is.” Scab grinned, and Senka remembered how mad he was.

  Senka’s eyes fell on a cart brimming with baskets, and porcelain jars of herbs, spices, and edible flowers. There were enough elements to make at least two different poisons and a salve. She’d just need the right equipment and some time. She stole a glance at the shopkeep and saw she was in spirited conversation with another Tigerian with coppery fur.

  Had to act now. Senka started to reach for the Pyrus Pungens, pink flowers with long tendril-like petals and an oval shaped center of golden yellow. Theft of this petty sort was something Senka could do blindfolded. A bit of misdirection such as a wave and a smile at an unseen friend with one hand, the other sliding what you needed behind your palm, then deftly pocketing it. She waved at the crowd, smiled, and reached.

  Something caught her eye, made her sharply inhale, hand frozen for the instant that would ruin the deception. Beside the basket of bright pungens was a treasure trove of Angel’s Moss, cut in perfect green squares, some threatening to spill from the jar. The world around the jar blurred and faded away. Their opalescent edges shimmered against the sun, promising relief from the incessant nightmares and nagging pains. All she needed was a single concentrated drop pressed through her skin and into her pumping veins. She watched her hand resuming movement as if through mud, changing course for the Angel’s Moss. You’re not strong. Not disciplined. Never will be. Her father’s voice thundered in her head.

  “Humie whore! Thief!” the shopkeep glared down at her, started working her way around the cart. Senka darted her empty hand back to her side, slipped between a pair of bodies as more filled in around her. The shopkeep started to give chase for about five paces until she turned back, realizing she’d left her cart wholly unattended.

  “Damn it!” she hissed, her breathing gone shallow and frantic. What had she done? After all the struggle, only to break like glass against the siren call of temptation.

  “Who’d you piss off now, Senlick?” Scab cackled over his shoulder and walked into the man in front of him with a grunt from both of them.

  Senka gave him a scowl that dared him to go on.

  And on he went. “I think I know what’s wrong with you… you just don’t smile enough,” He shook his head, wispy sprigs of hair standing up in every direction. “Say. What do you think of all those archers?”

  She narrowed her eyes and looked up. There were, in fact, archers flanking the street, perched between the topmost hovels, still as gargoyles. She was starting to wonder if his madness was all an act. Only an astute observer would’ve noticed something like that in all this chaos.

  “Don’t like archers. Archers are a coward’s way of killing. Don’t get your hands dirty, don’t get to feel the warmth of your enemies’ spilled blood like you do with a blade. Isn’t that right?” Scab clicked his tongue.

  Senka turned away from his bloodshot stare and bowed her head. She had to stay focused, look for opportunities for escape.

  “Nah. You wouldn’t know that. You’re a filthy poisoner, no better’n these cowardly bastards.”

  “Quiet,” she said, tugging on her sweat-stiffened hair with both hands.

  “Poisoners,” he spat. “Should fill your blood with your own bastard chemicals, know how it feels to have your flesh rot from your bones, collapse before knowing what happened. The fucking coward’s way if I ever heard one. Sure, done some bad things in my time, but I’m not villainous enough to kill a man with poisons.”

  “Shut up!” She growled through gritted teeth, anger makin
g sweat prickle from her palms, armpits, and the soles of her feet.

  “Dirty poisoners. There’s a good reason why the Tower left you and your lot to rot in the sands of the Nether. The good Arch Wizard never wanted you around. Never wanted you inbred swine ruining the Tower’s good blood, spreading your children’s deformities to the rest of the realm. Scorpions, only good for stepping on. Only good for—” There was a loud pop and Scab cried out.

  Senka had feigned a stumble and rammed her heel against his Achilles tendon, her strike perfect. She did her best to stop the grin from forming on her lips, failed, and covered her mouth to appear shocked.

  Scab fell to the ground, whimpered, and clutched at his calf. “What happened? Was it my ankle? Oh, the pain! What is that?”

  “Up we go.” Senka helped him up, saw he couldn’t put weight on the leg she’d kicked. This man had been planning to sell her and her friends into slavery. She thought for an instant she should feel bad, but then thought better of it. She should’ve stomped on his throat when she had the chance. Empathy makes you weak. Her father’s words.

  The sky darkened, and the light faded around them. A wave of murmurings flowed through the crowd behind her and beyond. Black storm clouds shrouded the city in their blossoming forms, billowing out in fractals of themselves.

  “It comes!” someone shouted in common. Other shouts sprung from the horde of bodies in Tigerian. She caught a few that were in common.

  “The water of life!” a voice cried.

  “Get ready for water!” another said.

  “Hurry! Move!” A Tigerian shouldered people out of the way, making their way for a hovel. Senka watched the obsidian haired Tigerian push through a creaking door and emerge with a giant pot, setting it on the ground with a smile.

  Buckets, pots, mugs, and glasses came out from everywhere, poised to collect the incoming rainwater. She watched as merchant carts were frantically pressed back against the sides of the road, uncaring of the fate of their products. At least ten teams of six Tigerians grunted as they dragged enormous wooden cisterns on rollers and secured by ropes to replace the carts.

  “Well, isn’t that a lucky break? Looks like we’ll be getting two baths in one week, living like kings!” Scab snickered, putting his leg down with a wince. “That was a hard stumble you took, wasn’t it?”

  “Indeed,” she said flatly, furrowing her brow in a show of mock concern. “Someone bumped into me, pushed me straight into you. Sorry.” She shrugged.

  “Huh. A strange thing… my foot doesn’t seem to be working quite right.” Scab shook his unnaturally loose ankle.

  “Strange. Accidents do happen.”

  Scab grunted. “Maybe no more accidents should happen if you wish for my help?”

  “No one is coming to help you. That much is clear.”

  “We shall see, my young poisoner, we shall see,” he said, grunting with every hobbling step.

  She was surprised at how well Scab took her attack. Was it a symptom of his madness? Maybe he’d given up on hope entirely, or maybe he didn’t feel the pain yet.

  They followed this central artery for some time, maybe half of an hour before the carts and bodies started to thin. Senka felt like she could relax and breathe again without being pressed in on all sides. She didn’t know how Ashrath’s denizens could stand it. It was a cutpurse’s wet dream, a fertile ground for the spread of a new disease. Along the route, the street was filled with every sort of container that could hold water, though none of the sky’s payload had yet to be released. Empty wine and beer bottles littered the streets between buckets and pots. Tigerians stared up at the sky through parted windows with anticipatory excitement.

  There was no shortage of watchful guards, always traveling two at a time and with the hard looks of Tigerians not to be trifled with. She always wanted to refer to them as ‘men’ in her mind because they looked so much alike in bodily form, excluding their heads, but had to remind herself they were not men. They were beasts who ate men. She thought to label them evil, but they were no different than the Sand Wolf consuming prey. They each had pairs of broad-faced blades similar to what the Whisperers used mounted on sword belts. What they were guarding was anyone’s guess, certainly not the prevention of raiders plodding off to sell slaves.

  They passed into a section of fenced-in mansions, each with their own set of guards roaming behind the ornamented barricades. The transition from hovels to mansions was stark and unexpected. Each was built in an entirely different style of architecture, as if their residents were all from different parts of the world. Some were expansive with lush gardens, others were tall with winged spires and sharp-angled roofs. Some were built like castles, all stone and curving lines looking like they had taken on the Zorian style. Even these mansions had cisterns set out for catching the oncoming rain. It seemed that even the power of currency had its limitations.

  Senka wondered how they had accumulated so much water to keep their gardens looking so green. She passed a mansion with an iron gate made up of all coiling lines similar to the vines that hung down from every limb in the jungle. A man scrubbed the gate and regarded her with the look of a man who’d forever lost the sparkle in his eyes. He looked away from her after a long moment, drowning himself in the task of scrubbing a length of iron.

  She reminded herself that with the proper amount of coin, one could buy just about anything. The notion of trading shiny coins for things of value, never mind men, was still a hard concept to get used too. Within the Scorpions, all was freely shared among the clan.

  She spotted something odd on a nearby Whisperer’s leg. The skin was bulging up, a boil she realized with a gasp. He’d been bitten, must’ve not told anyone. A violet light flickered under its skin. If they infected the city, there’d be no way to stop the Shadow’s touch. She had to tell him, he’d make it right.

  “Tatlat!” Senka shouted. He’d stopped like he had out on the plains. A quick chop of his blade and the disaster would be averted. “Tatlat!”

  He turned to face her and raised his hand for the sign she had come to learn as his demand for silence. She soon saw why.

  They were approaching a wooden platform with at least twenty noble Tigerians surrounding it. The platform was set in the center of a cross-section of two streets, its wood polished to a bright sheen, mansions filling the space on each corner. Upon the platform were three human captives, pressed together with nervous expressions. There was one woman in the center, two men at her flanks. The platform was raised off the ground by about four feet, giving a clear view of the haggard men, stripped bare but for their chains. A few had weeping wounds from whips. The woman was badly scarred all over as if she had been cut hundreds of times.

  Senka projected her voice, trying to hide her panic. “This can’t wait. One of your soldiers, he—” Senka cut off as Tatlat whirled upon her, Tougere growling, blade drawn and held over his gleaming shoulder. Senka froze, wide-eyed. There was nowhere to go to dodge his strike. She closed her eyes tight, bracing herself for death’s kiss.

  “Speak not. Speak, lose head.” He tapped her on the top of her head with the flat of his blade. She opened her eyes, breath hissing out of her tight lips and furiously nodded. He almost looked to be smiling back at her, fat feline lips curving upward. Upon his mount, Tatlat sauntered over to the side of the platform.

  A Tigerian whose long brown hair had been coaxed into a mohawk stood beside the slaves upon the platform. He wore a high-collared double-breasted jacket with lace around the sleeves, four golden buttons running down the front, the fabric pressed and without a single wrinkle or smudge of dirt. He looked preposterous beside the ruined shells of the captives. “Do we have one hundred claws? One hundred claws for these able-bodied men?” He called out and peered over the crowd. “Today is a lovely day to add to your stables, is it not?”

  “They’re auctioning them,” she breathed. She was going to be sick, had to cover her mouth and look away.

  “Yes,” Scab snorted. “I
t seems luck is not on my side this week.” He peered about as if looking for someone.

  “Your friend is amiss?” Senka wanted to laugh, but the terrible reality of becoming a slave struck too hard. Senka raised her head, forced herself to watch it, mastering her churning stomach.

  “One hundred claws!” the auctioneer flashed a grin full of feline teeth. “Do we have two hundred claws?” His bright yellow eyes seemed to glitter at the prospect.

  “Two hundred,” a voice casually said, and she saw who it was by the nod. It was probably the most absurd image she’d ever seen. The Tigerian was wearing an ornamented robe of gold and ruby, its head covered with a cylindrical hat with a set of three aqua feathers fluttering in the breeze. A nearby Whisperer’s Tougere growled at the man, his rider sneering at the noble. The noble shifted towards the center of the crowd, snapping an order to what must have been his guard, given the blade on his back. The Tigerian guard sighed at his noble employer, he and the Whisperer sharing looks of discontent.

  “Two-fifty? Do we have two-hundred claws for these strong-backed men? Look at their bold muscles, strong backs, and fully developed hands. They’ll tend to your gardens, clean your manors. This one might make good eating, some fat still on his bones.” The auctioneer poked a gaunt man in the gut, his eyes distant as a corpse. “The woman still has at least ten years left, strong legs, able arms. Do well in the garden and with your babes, all her holes fully functioning to meet your darkest desires.”

  “With your babes…” Senka repeated and trailed off as something wet hit her cheek. She raised her clinking chains up to feel it, found a drop of water on her finger. The sky rumbled, and she tilted her head up to peer at it, shades of gray boiling over each other. Warm droplets pattered on her face. “Rain!” She stuck out her tongue and closed her eyes as drops cascaded down her face.