Dear Muse (Those Whom the Gods Wish to Destroy Book 1)

by Shawn Mackey

  A few heard rumors of Yod and his band of just foragers, and when the opportunity arose, they fled the city gates in search of their benefactor. They were welcomed on the condition that their conduct met certain expectations. Many small towns had been erected between the larger excavation sites and were the targets of most raids. Aggripa was exceptional at converting the fearful into Yod’s company, bargaining protection in exchange for loyalty.

  Gar was universally branded a tyrant outside Nemesis. Yod’s charity had left the Kel hoping for more than slave labor, or at the very least, a pardon from failure to fulfill draconian rules. Aggripa pointed out that their leader held no regard to any other than himself, being a relic from their brutish ancestry, remaining content with working his kin to death.

  Their numbers swelled to a notable level. Gar did not flinch from the news of a potential revolt, neither to halt its progress nor allow it to rise out of amusement. His reaction kept most inside the city, for they feared their leader could singlehandedly destroy the resistance, even if they managed to breach Nemesis. The city had grown tenfold since its occupation, and it showed no signs of decreasing. The walls were lined with towers nearly as high as the ivory citadel.

  Yod possessed the intention to overthrow Gar for some time. Much like the city’s inhabitants, he could vividly recall his strength. Of all the clan leaders, his was exceptional, rivaled only by Ennok or Karkrak. He had suffered a terrible blow from Narg during the war, after the surprise attack massacred most of his clan. The chieftain nearly crushed his skull, stopping only to chase Floon. Yod joined Lug’s clan with the other survivors and had guarded the city’s ramparts throughout its production. He witnessed the final battle. Gar had slaughtered Narg like a newborn Kel. During the sneak attack on the city, he did nothing to stop the opening gate, even as his brothers threw themselves against the enemy swords to garner valuable seconds. He followed the charge for the citadel, unsure if he held allegiance to any of the chieftains.

  Yod was confident in his followers’ zeal. They would certainly attack the city until the very last. Without Kay to replenish their numbers after engaging, his forces would quickly diminish. Unfortunately, every last one of them was locked up in the citadel. Rumors spread for quite some time that a community of Kay inhabited the thicker parts of the forest, guarded by an army of monstrosities. Kel had been discovered on the outskirts with their bellies scraped open and their insides thoroughly gnawed. Yod decided to explore the forest, seeking out the aid of Kay or monster, for either would surely help his cause.

  The vegetation had become so lush, it was difficult to navigate through heavy vines and thick canopy. Yod thought it a good sign when the trees blotted out the sun, making it impossible to distinguish night and day, other than the occasional thin beam of light that managed to pierce the forest’s top layer. The leaves were larger than a Kel’s hand, and their trunks were twice as wide as a torso. He had gathered a small army to scout the territory, yet the alien surroundings left them unnerved, including Yod, who became increasingly suspicious the forest contained nothing.

  The first attack came during a brief encampment. The lookout was later discovered with his throat open and entrails lay out, which would account for the lack of warning, though several of the Kel confessed to being awake, neither seeing nor hearing the beasts pour into the camp. It was an incredible feat on their part, for they nearly outnumbered the Kel.

  An assortment of shaggy and striped four-legged animals pounced from every direction, letting loose guttural growls only when they managed to wrap their hungry jowls around an unsuspecting Kel. They were initially struck with horror at the sight of these beasts devouring their kin, gnawing strips of flesh and splitting their bellies to lap up the insides. The concept of hunger was foreign, and the eating of flesh seemed utterly profane.

  When they gathered the courage to retaliate, the beasts fell swiftly, though not without killing a few more Kel. The easy victory was not celebrated. Despite their weak bodies, their ferocity was unequal. These Kel had known combat their entire lives, some before the Clan Wars, and not a single one was undisturbed by the slaughter. After burying the deceased and tending the wounded, Yod commanded they cull the forest of these beasts before their business was finished with the Kay.

  They had numerous encounters, none as devastating as the first, but increasingly terrifying. A massive snake hung from the canopy, snatching a Kel and retracting out of sight in an instant. Many confessed to seeing an upright lizard with a head bigger than their bodies stalking the outskirts of their camp. They feared an attack from a group of these monstrosities would make them easy prey. The strangest of all were a cackling pack of wide-eyed dogs. Though the beasts did not attack, their eerie laughter kept many sleepless that night.

  They eventually discovered the river, traveling the opposite direction of its rushing waters towards the lake. Agrippa, oldest among them, told the story of its formation. Yod was too young to recall it vividly, but he did remember hurling corpses into a bottomless ditch. Panagon elaborated on the story, how his clan dug the river to empty the brimming waters into the ocean, else the lake would overflow and sink the continent, according to Lug, who had been advised by one of the surviving Kay. The river continued to flow rapidly into the ocean, even though the lake certainly was not bottomless, yet constantly expanding.

  The expedition wandered into a large dirt clearing with a blazing bonfire and small mud hut. They warily circled the crude structure, expecting some form of a trap. Yod announced himself and encouraged his allies to sheath their weapons. They did so, and after a long silence, a Kay crept out of the hut.

  She was nearly unrecognizable as such from an initial glance. With wild green hair, big red eyes, and an almost skeletal frame, she rose, towering more than a head taller than the Kel. Though she resembled the other Kay more than not, there was certainly a hint of menace in her gait, which caused a few to tremble. Much like the beasts of this forest, they could strike her down in a single blow, but the monsters that could potentially spawn in place of her corpse made them shudder.

  The Kay introduced herself as Matralina. She had belonged to Gar’s tribe prior to the Clan Wars, lost during the mass slaughter of her sisters. Tossed into the pit of dead, she managed to climb through the corpses, nearly suffocating from the weight of them all, claiming to have been saved by a divine force that caused her to see visions, such as a city of bone and steel, ruled by a single Kel seated on an immense throne.

  Agrippa confirmed her vision, and asked of her original name, since Matralina was generally a title given to the eldest Kay. She had inherited the name from her mother, meaning she had likely been considered old even during the massacre, since the title stopped being passed through inheritance long before that period. This would explain her appearance. Green hair was common among the Kay, but it was normally mingled entirely with black or blonde. Matralina’s was a deep verdant with strands of radiant lime.

  As Yod held counsel with Aggripa and Duncan, Matralina knelt by the bonfire and extended her palms up to the blaze. A clear, oily substance dripped copiously from her fingertips, dropping into the flame and sizzling. Matralina explained the Sap, waste material which began excreting from her hands shortly after her separation from Gar’s clan. If not disposed into the fire, it would seep into the soil and sprout life, such as the animals and the very forest itself. She said this was due to abstaining from birthing, and if her sisters did the same, they could also create the Sap. On the condition that the Kay in Nemesis were spared and allowed to live near the lake thereafter, she would assist Yod in overthrowing Gar by his means.

  Yod agreed to ally with Matralina, despite the protests of many Kel, who thought her a greater threat than the tyrant. The main consensus was to cut off her hands. Yod scarcely managed to calm the others through negotiation. If another Kel were to fall to one of her beasts, he would personally lop off both hands. Matralina explained they were docile in her presence, so as long as she remained close,
they had nothing to fear from her little pets.

  This did not stop them from hunting down and exterminating most of the wildlife. For two months, Yod and Matralina stayed in the hut. Laine and Panagon kept the other Kel busy with bloodshed to avoid discontent. They prevented any talk of mutiny, but a universal feeling of impatience spread at the end of the two weeks. The group returned to the camp to find their numbers swelled. Matralina and Yod had twenty offspring, ten Kel and ten Kay. Duncan and Aggripa were each given five Kay, creating another ten Kel and ten Kay. These were split among the camp, and within a year, the army had substantially increased.

  Matralina continued to produce Sap, though it was less effective. She managed to populate many of the forest’s animals, not quite matching the rate of the Kel’s slaughter, but enough to prevent annihilation. It was enough to develop a dose of contempt for her guests, including her new daughters, who cared little for their mother and her strangeness. The Kel assisted in sowing dissent, realizing her plans for the future were contrary to their leader’s. Only Duncan protected Matralina from their slurs out of an inexplicable fondness for the Kay. Agrippa noticed this sentiment, and through his friend’s kindness, realized it was better to have her as ally than potential enemy, even after unseating Gar.

  When their numbers increased to a suitable amount, they left the forest for Nemesis. The army was an incredible sight to the labor-weary Kel outside the city. Most joined their ranks, and a few returned in fear to notify Gar. They pleaded for him to crush the resistance before they sieged their home. He responded with his usual silence, awaiting the army’s arrival atop the throne of his ivory citadel.

  Yod took note of Floon’s ingenuity. Since burrowing was no longer a possibility, he ordered the construction of catapults. These needed to throw with massive force, due to the height of the walls, leaving few Kel strong enough to withstand the drop beyond the city gates. Even if this failed, they had plenty of objects to hurl at the ramparts and that could ease the advance on the gate. It would be a long and arduous war. They were prepared to camp outside Nemesis for an eternity, as long as the ivory citadel fell, and the leader with it.

  The ramparts were lined with troops during their arrival. Many Kel volunteered to launch from the catapult, including Yod and Duncan. The first group, Yod and five others, landed on the ramparts, and all survived. They massacred the unsuspecting archers and spearmen, making easy work of the initial wave. While the reinforcements climbed the battlements to fight the invaders, the second group prepared to launch.

  Of the second group, Duncan and five Kel, only Duncan survived. He massacred the guards at the gate, but could not find the switch. Fresh soldiers ran down the streets to the gate, charging the lone Duncan, who continued to frantically search for a means of letting his allies inside. As corpses rained onto the ground from Yod’s wrath above, Duncan cut through the endless waves of enemies like a scythe reaping crop. His objective faded into a frenzied bloodlust, intent on reaching the citadel and toppling it with his bare hands.

  Yod waved a signal that the gate was lost and to launch more at the ramparts. A total of fifteen Kel were sent to reinforce Yod, while the majority charged the gate and thrashed away undisturbed. A few catapults were brought closer to hurl boulders onto the streets. Matralina gathered Sap to create animals for launching. Even if they did not survive the hurtle, the sight would surely horrify the unexpected.

  The streets had swelled to such a degree that it was no longer possible to sustain their hold on the ramparts. Countless Kel climbed the battlements and annihilated all but Yod, who scarcely managed to avoid being overrun. The gate’s siege needed to yield, though the constant barrage had resulted in no damage. The army fell back to the hill, discouraged by their lack of progress, but enthralled by the body count—their losses, in comparison, being one of them to ten of the guards, though losing Duncan had been a heavy toll.

  Workers were lined up to expand the walls. Rather than make them higher, Gar ordered the construction of a massive roof. This did not go unhindered. The catapults hampered the workers for quite some time before Gar himself destroyed the equipment. Planks from the ramparts down to the ground allowed more troops to hold back the Kel while their leader caused havoc. He merely toyed with his enemies to balance and prolong the conflict.

  Shortly before the roof had been finished, one of the soldiers on the planks seemed to have gone rogue and tore through his allies. They were relieved to find Duncan, blood-soaked and half-mad, limp his way to their camp. He had been wandering the streets, murdering and setting fire to every sort of structure, until he found himself back at the entrance. He thought himself missing for a day, as if he were a man awoken from a life-long coma.

  The possibility of breaching Nemesis seemed less and less likely, gradually eating away at the offense’s morale. Some left for the city, some left the city for Yod, and some left both sides to wander the land until the war’s end. The exodus opened the possibility for scheming. Matralina smuggled Sap in excavation caravans, letting loose all sorts of bizarre creatures, whether harmless or hungry, but always terrifying. This left the populace in a constant state of fear and, coupled with Yod’s reputation for leniency, helped bolster their army. It did not stop them from realizing Nemesis was still impenetrable, and their leader more powerful than all the Kel combined. The city’s opinion was split into two sentiments: Gar was cruel for prolonging the war, enjoying the suffering of his subordinates as much as the enemy’s, and the other, that Yod was far weaker than Gar, merely rousing the order and returning the Kel to a perpetual state of war. Nemesis was a testament for both of these sentiments, for it provided security and a haven for malcontents, even before these malcontents had set their sights on war. It garnered a holy status among the populace, something sacred that needed to be defended, even if it did not require defending. With this in mind, Gar seemed more like a silent guardian than cruel tyrant.

  No particular event resumed the combat. One day, Yod commanded Panagon to rebuild the catapults and order a constant stream of materials to rebuild when necessary. Not a single Kel voiced discontent, for the despair of their inevitable deaths did not compare to idle despondency. They recalled Agrippa’s comment, how they had begun to mourn the living due to possibility of defeat. They may have lost the strength of their ancestors, but were every bit their equal in courage, if they could merely get up and act.

  So Yod was the first to free himself of this molasses. As the catapults were constructed, the Kel armed for war. Not one among them thought they would live to see the gates of Nemesis fall; perhaps some future generation would make the first dent in its impenetrable wall of bone. They would not know of the Clan Wars, and how the cruel tyrant, perched on the ivory citadel, had won his throne through a victory once considered glorious. When Gar finally deigned to engage his enemies, they would witness strength incomparable to the living, one rivaled only by day and night, the sun and the wind, the waves and the tide. They would never know that the invincible fortress was built from the bones of those even stronger than its king.

  This began the War on Nemesis, a conflict far longer than the Clan Wars, and according to the few survivors, an event spanning longer than the first epoch. No account is truly believable, for the erosion of time claimed the memory of all. Small breaks in battle, such as a lucky arrow striking a worthy combatant dead or a noticeable scratch in the gate, served as more of a sobering experience, like waking from a particularly bizarre dream, than a moment to celebrate.

  Yod claimed to have one of these experiences. A young Kel, a recent son of his through a Kay named Megarella, assisted him in blocking the leftmost plank on the battlement. He was extraordinarily young, having not yet finishing the Death Sentence, a weeklong period where the newly born Kel learned combat. One out of one hundred survived the trial, though it means little, since there was no discernment between the seasoned and unseasoned warriors. All were fodder for the siege.

  A sword point pierced the throat of Yod’
s son, who stumbled a step to the left, bumping and knocking over his father. A spear tip split his belly and sent him sprawling on top of Yod, allowing the enemies to break the meager defense and charge the nearest catapult. Hundreds of feet trampled him and the fresh corpse, bursting it several times over and soaking Yod in warm blood and innards. He did not try to flee, though he could have easily barreled through the march and made escape. Instead, he endured the pain and found himself in a sort of respite, seized by a strange feeling of confusion akin to déjà vu.

  His mind wandered to countless questions in an attempt to sate this sensation. He could not recall how he ended up under the boots of his enemies or to whose innards he desperately clung. The whole ordeal occurred a mere moment ago, yet it could have been in the war’s first days. He stopped considering it a war long ago, but rather saw it as something as eternal as the sun. There would be no victor or conquered. It was a brief moment of clarity, which nearly prompted him to act out drastic measures, a plan that had begun to form, but promptly died by a foot to the nose. Yod rose to his feet, his own blood trickling from nostril to chin and his son’s from shoulders to knees. With a bestial growl, he struck down the nearest Kel and rejoined the fray.

  Such moments occurred to all whenever Gar deigned to leave his throne. He watched, silent as a statue for long periods of time, confusing many of the new Kel, who assumed he was either some decorative corpse or a god. He would leap from the citadel to the battlefield in a single bound, slaughtering any in the direction of his warpath, picking apart limbs like a cruel child dissecting a fly, or squeezing a head between his fingers like a bloated pimple.

  The collected awe would be forgotten when he returned to his throne to oversee the battle. Duncan recognized his posture as a meditative state similar to Ennok’s, his former clan leader, who claimed to gain immense power from the restive periods. He did not tell his peers, for he knew Gar was not becoming stronger; the Kel were becoming weaker and weaker. Some thought a time might come when they could no longer raise their weapons.