TERRA

by Adrian M Ferguson

  ‘Where is the grove sorceress?’ hissed Agrona.

  ‘Patience, my commander, patience — the sorceress will arrive in due time. While we’re waiting, please check the perimeter and ensure all is safe.’

  Agrona fell to one rocky knee, sinking substantially into the loam.

  ‘As you wish, my king.’

  Standing, she closed her eyes, lifted her face up in concentration and sank feet-first down into the earth, like she was in fast-forwarded quicksand.

  ‘Wow! That's a neat trick,’ I observed, shaking my head in wonder.

  Ghob smiled. ‘Deirdre, do you know why I asked you here tonight, into this place of Tree and Earth?’

  ‘No, though that's a question I have burning on my lips right now.’

  ‘Tonight you are to be tested, Deirdre. I have been watching you from afar since the untimely death of your mother.’

  I eyed him, steadily, feeling my blood pressure rise. ‘How do you know of my mother and her death?’

  The past was still a knife in my heart and I knew I had not even come close to healing. But finding out what had happened to her was still something, however unlikely, that I clung too.

  So to say that this was a delicate subject for me was the fucking understatement of the century.

  ‘Please, Deirdre, calm yourself. Your mother was a Warder, a person who had elemental magic running through her veins, abilities that made her a very special person. Her unfortunate death has left an unprecedented void in the balance of Earth.

  ‘I have been watching you, but it wasn't until the banshee attacked you that I had proof of your potential abilities. My presence and the supernatural attack awoke Earth’s symbol on your palm.’

  Rubbing my palm, I asked, ‘And my mother could do what I did the other day — kill and blow up shit?’

  ‘Deirdre, your mother was a full Warder, who had many, many years of practice. She could use a vast array of elemental magic and not just Earth’s.

  ‘The void she left must be filled, Deirdre. In the time that I've been waiting, unclean beings and elementals of dark nature have finally realized that Earth and its people have no warder, so inevitably they are starting to cause havoc, as you experienced with the banshee first-hand. Your mother would never have allowed an abomination such as that tumulus to be created.

  ‘So I have led you to this point, this nexus where you have a choice: follow in your mother's footsteps and protect Earth and your fellow humans or … carry on living here and lead a normal life.’

  I stepped back, stunned by the bombshell that he had dropped, oh so gently, into my lap. Though in retrospect, something had led me to Ketchum, apart from the stunning vistas. And protecting people was what I did, well when I was a cop, which deep down had never changed — it still was part of my psyche.

  I gasped, becoming choked up. My mother died being this thing called a Warder. Was this the piece of the puzzle I’d been missing all those months? Was this something she would have wanted me to carry on for her, a legacy of protecting humankind and Earth, using this incredible power I now seemingly possessed?

  I looked up at Ghob. His face was impassive and stern.

  ‘What do I need to do to be tested, Ghob?’

  ‘You need, Deirdre … just to be you. You have already shown remarkable resilience when faced with an attack from a paranormal creature. You not only fought valiantly, you also accepted that such a creature could exist. And you also managed to enter this grove — the wards, enchantments and misdirection curses were not lowered before your arrival, as Agrona told you, and they are immensely powerful. For a human to be able to enter and not get caught or wander off from madness into the woods indicates great mental fortitude.

  ‘But it will not be me testing you; that will be up to the ancient grove sorceress, Hulda.’

  ‘And what about this other scar on my left hand then? Why has it appeared?’

  ‘What other scar?’ he asked, his brow creasing in confusion.

  As if on cue the faint rustling of the trees surrounding the clearing abruptly fell quiet, and a brooding hush settled on us.

  Agrona smoothly rose from the ground near me to the left, face statue-like and grim. ‘She comes, master,’ she hissed.

  ‘We will discuss that later, Deirdre. The grove sorceress arrives.’

  I threw a questioning look Ghob’s way. His face didn’t change, though it did look like he was slightly bracing himself. If I had not just heard him utter words, it would have been easy to mistake him for a stone statue.

  ‘Oh shit,’ I breathed.

  I saw movement out of the corner of my eye and spun to my right. A spider, the size of a large cat, was dropping down slowly from the foliage above on a thick silvery drag line of web. Its multifaceted eyes looked upon us as it lowered itself, its back legs working in tandem, pulling the gossamer thread out of its bulbous shiny black abdomen and spinnerets. It looked at us and chittered loudly, working the sound out from a very impressive set of fangs. It stopped and hung there mid air, motionless, waiting.

  In concert I heard the curtain of foliage above us rustle while ahead of us in a semi-circle encircling the massive stump in the center, midnight black spiders in various large sizes all started to descend gossamer lines from high above; they all chittered at us, chelicera working furiously creating a deluge of ear-splitting noise, thousands upon thousands of glittering eyes all looking in our direction. They stopped midway and hung there like a wall of death. Many had started to drip venom from their fangs, lending a truly nightmarish icing to the scene in front of me.

  ‘What the fuck, Ghob?’ I whispered out the corner of my mouth, not wanting to attract their attention directly.

  ‘Stay still, Deirdre. They will not harm you, though make any sudden moves at your own peril,’ he cautioned.

  CHAPTER 6

  To say that I didn't suddenly feel an immense urge to bolt in the opposite direction was the second biggest understatement for the night. I fucking hated spiders. I could handle any sort of snake, bug, even charging, wailing banshees it seemed — but spiders, why the hell spiders? I had a definite issue with spiders.

  I was perspiring, though the sweat just seemed to freeze to my body. I think my body was confused. It was crying out, Run, Deirdre, run, just get the hell out of here, but Ghob's warning echoed in my mind, so I froze and pretended to be Agrona over there, who hadn't moved an inch since she had appeared out of the earth at her feet.

  The furious noise from the arachnids stopped, and all those heads of curving fangs turned towards the cleft of the massive tree trunk in the center of the clearing; the oppressive quiet was palpable. I held my breath, straining to see into the depths of the charcoal-encrusted opening.

  Tendrils of vapoured darkness erupted silently out of the cleft, writhing in an obscene parody of a dance. They boiled out, groping into the damp air, some slithering through the thick loam undergrowth. So intent was I on watching these tentacles that I almost missed the flash of pasty white at the edge of the stumps dank opening.

  I looked as a gnarled small hand, topped with diseased-looking, black-curved talons, gripped one side of the cleft opening; another followed, both latching grimly on, nails sinking into the hardened wood, crunching audibly into the silence.

  A wheezing cackle escaped from the darkness, and a small bent-over figure floated serenely out of the gap supported by the dark vapor. I spotted flashes of putrid white skin, but most of her was enveloped in darkness, which hung like a cloak around her. The figure came to a hovering stop a few meters away.

  ‘You rang?’ she enquired, amused by her own joke. Her head thrust forward, showing a wrinkled pasty face. Her opalescent black eyes bored into me.

  ‘Greetings, oh ancient sorceress of the grove, we have arrived. We have come as promised for the first Testing in a half millennium,’ said Ghob.

  ‘And whom,’ she whispered sibilantly, ‘are we testing? Surely not this frail little human you have so delicately presented before
me? Surely you wouldn't be as foolish as to waste my time, Earth King. My powers are absolute, here in the grove, in the dark, and I am not in the mood for jokes on this eve.’ The spiders started a frantic writhing and screeched in accompaniment to her increasingly frigid tone.

  ‘My shadow spiders have not feasted for sometime and human flesh is quite a delicacy for them.’

  The largest of the spiders, off to the sorceress’s right, suddenly dropped to the ground, legs moving forward in anticipation.

  ‘Hold, my servant.’ Hulda halted the spider with a small movement of her claws. ‘Ghob has never been known to be foolish, though, has he?’

  ‘No,’ said Ghob, ‘and to insinuate that is in itself foolishness,’ he countered, his voice like mountains clashing together.

  ‘The human is the spawn of the late warder, and I have witnessed possible potential in her. She destroyed, albeit with my indirect assistance, the tumulus that you had voiced concern over previously.’

  The sorceress raised one wispy black eyebrow, surprise evident on her face. ‘The tumulus, you say? And what of the banshees? They were starting to get out of control as well, and you know how much I detest that species.’

  ‘Destroyed, eaten by Earth, at the human’s direction,’ he said, pointing at me.

  ‘Okay, that's enough,’ I interrupted. ‘I’m getting tired of the condescending use of the word “human” here. My name is Deirdre, and as frail as I am that's how I'd like to be addressed.’

  Hulda whipped her face back to me, hissing in displeasure. All the spiders simultaneously dropped to the ground and immediately raised themselves high and aggressively on sharp, spindly legs. Shadows seemed to boil off their abdomens. They advanced, cloaked in a shroud of haze.

  The ancient crone's voice boomed throughout the clearing, ‘No one has dared to speak to me in that fashion for eons, paltry human,’ she cried, her instant surround-sound volume rising in decibels and echoing around me. ‘I have a mind to let my servants drain you dry right where you stand. What say you, human?’

  I paled — my goddamn mouth, always getting me in trouble. But damn it if Octo-witch here was going to silence me, not after learning that my mother had this secret life, and now I had the opportunity to step into her shoes and make her proud.

  ‘Because,’ I said, trying to sound respectful, ‘Ghob needs me. As he has indicated, the Earth seems to need me and if I'm not mistaken the rest of those paltry humans need me,’ throwing her words back into her face. ‘So if you need to test me, then let’s get it over with.’

  The grove sorceress screeched with what I think was delight because she rose a half meter in the air, clapping her gnarled hands in maniacal glee. The noises made me cringe, grating on my nerves like rusty nails down a chalkboard. She dropped down, the darkness writhing in confusion around her, obscuring her features momentarily.

  ‘Oh my, your mother was just as amusing and spirited at her Testing five hundred years ago.’

  My jaw dropped, ‘Five hundred years?’ I repeated in disbelief.

  She slyly looked at Ghob. ‘You naughty elemental, you haven't told her yet, have you?’

  ‘There's been little time, hag,’ he spat, and as much emotion as I have ever seen crossed his face.

  ‘The Test changes you, human. If you indeed have elemental magic coursing through your weak little body, you become shall we say, long-lived, not immortal mind you, but close, very close,’ Hulda explained.

  ‘We can't have a warder die as quickly as a human would … now, can we?’

  I looked down, thinking furiously. This was going to change everything, my life, even my very humanity.

  ‘Are we scared yet? Because this Test will not be at all easy; in actual fact, it will be a matter of life and death.’

  ‘No … I mean, yes, I'm ready.’

  My mother's kind eyes were swimming through my mind. I couldn't fail her a second time, which for me would be unthinkable. I calmed my breathing, centering myself, just like what was taught to me when I was training many years ago at the Academy: breathe in, release tension and fear, calm the mind and ground yourself in the moment.

  ‘So,’ I said, with a nonchalance I was far from feeling, ‘let’s do this, witch.’

  The spiders silently rose up around us and resumed there motionless hanging, quietly repositioning themselves from some unspoken signal from Hulda, mandibles twitching spastically.

  ‘As you please, brave girl. I will give you one more word of caution, though, and only because I like your spunk … as you humans say. Once I start, there is no turning back; you change your mind and try to interrupt the Test and you are food. Are we crystal clear?’

  ‘The night’s not getting any younger,’ I brazenly countered.

  The grove sorceress hissed, ‘Very well then.’

  She spread her skeletal arms with a flourish, exposing the absolute darkness held within her cloak. The night residing inside sighed and moved, twitching, thin black legs appeared from in its depths in a macabre sea-urchin-like mat, sharp and bristling outwards. Her cloak chittered quietly, almost questioning this open invitation to emerge. Then, without warning, out from the dark, swarmed a miniature tsunami of pea-sized spiders, raised up on thin, black hairy legs, giving them the illusion of greater size and height. The tide broke at my feet, and I braced myself, now understanding that earlier look on Ghob's face. He knew exactly what was coming, and he wasn't bracing himself so much as he was, I think, scared … for me?

  The tiny arachnids paused, raising hundreds of legs in front of them into the air, sensing the air currents and my frozen presence. They all chittered amongst themselves and as if reaching an unspoken agreement, in one sooth movement flowed up my legs.

  I felt immediate sharp spikes of pain from their sharp tipped legs, piercing my double-layered clothing, and still they kept coming, circling around my body. I squeezed my mouth and eyes as tightly closed as I could, resisting the instinctual urge to start swatting and screaming. They reached my neck and, in a mass of tiny pinpricks, enveloped my head.

  The tips of their long legs were very sharp, and I could instantly feel my face start to bleed. The legs pierced my exposed skin with every movement they made. I inhaled tiny sips of oxygen into my nostrils, thanking all the stars that the spiders’ legs were too long for them to be able to enter those orifices.

  ‘Human child, can you hear me? Nod slowly if you can.’

  I nodded as slowly as I dared.

  ‘These spiders are very special to me, so do them no harm. You fail the Test and lose your life if any of them are harmed in any way, do you understand me?’

  I nodded again with a slight inclination of my neck.

  ‘These are chaos spiders, and they are the Test. They are special because they have two qualities about them that make them unique animals. Firstly they will test your strength of will, tasting your mental endurance and fortitude and testing if you're worthy of the Warder mantle. They do this with their other particular characteristic: their venom. They are without equal in the spider world. Their venom is so potent that just one small bite from the smallest of the small can and will kill you almost instantly. There is no cure and no compromise: one bite and you die. Your Test, human with the brave tongue, is to survive all their bites … at once.

  And as she uttered those last words, and with almost surgical precision, hundreds upon hundreds of chaos spiders drove their tiny needle-like fangs into me injecting me with a full dose of their implacable venom. I screamed into my mouth, not daring to open it. The venom hit me instantly; it was excruciating. There were almost no words to describe this pain. It was akin to my being shot in the arm years back when on duty when some perp had surprised me by jumping out from a dingy alley dumpster. Multiply that bullet by a thousand bullets — coated in deadly venom while also at the same time on fire — entering your body simultaneously. I fell to my knees, the spiders thankfully moving out of the way, though not leaving my body surface.

  I leaned for
ward, hands bracing my body, my back arching in agony.

  At the moment that I felt their venom take affect, I felt thousands of minds enter my mind, tasting, probing, feeding on my emotions and testing my mind for strength and formidability. I clamped my teeth together, realizing that I only had moments to survive this. I felt the scar on my hand stirring, the contact with the earth and my focusing on it awakening its power. I felt a stirring in the earth and realized that below me there was this untapped potential for growth and healing and it was my only chance of somehow coming out of this alive and intact.

  I pushed back the agony into the recesses of my mind, compartmentalizing it as best I could. I felt my heart skip a beat. The venom was killing me. I centered my mind and imagined inhaling the energy below me through my scar and into my body. My heart missed another beat slowly and faltering, and then I felt a hesitant surge of power as if a floodgate had been breached. The full strength of Earth came flooding into my body, a dry cold wave of energy, which neutralized the venom in one single sweep.

  I howled, opening my mouth regardless of the spiders, and my hair rose up into the air, chaos spiders jumping and riding the strands with ease. I pushed myself up off the ground, the energy still entering my body in a deluge through the soles of my feet. The dam had been broken and now Earth wanted to be one with me. I stood, my back arching in a different type of agony, one now mixed with the ecstasy of power. My feet left the ground. The spiders attempted to drive their fangs in again, wanting to taste perhaps the power I now possessed, but their fangs were ineffective. My skin had become impenetrable, stone-like, foiling their attempts — Earth was protecting its new child.

  The chaos spiders raised themselves up and sprung into the air, turning with grace to land back in front of the sorceress and scurry into the folds of her night cloak.

  I hung there, the elemental magic entering every fiber and cell of my body. I now felt complete. The energy was now part of me. This was what it was like to be fully alive. My senses seemed to awaken and suddenly I was aware of every sound and movement in the grove. Turning my head slightly I could sense the connection that Ghob had to Earth and how he was a master of its dominion — absolute power was a part of him and he a part of it.