“I don’t think that’s a good idea, Ricou.”
He placed his other webbed hand on the stone. He dragged it gently down the lines of the engraved star.
“Need to see,” he said, mostly to himself. “Love in her luminous eyes…”
“But—”
“Sai. Key.”
Sai wasn’t my full name, but it was the most he could remember. I wondered how long it would be before he forgot that much.
I reached into my pouch. Uplifting my finger, I held out a small loop of twine from which dangled the key. Ricou took it and clumsily undid the lock next to the engraving.
“Sadly,” I muttered, “this star I mistrust.”
The door opened and a strip of moonlight led us inside.
Ricou went straight to the coffin on the back shelf. He placed his hand on the lid. It seemed like he was thinking about opening it, but decided not to. I was glad he didn’t. We were there to jog his memory, not make him weep.
There were other items in the tomb, strewn about the floor or sitting on the shelves. They had been placed there by Ricou, long ago.
He started looking through them. He started to remember.
“They killed her,” he said.
“Yes.”
“When?”
“Before I was around.”
He made his way through the small structure, his webbed feet dragging over the dirt and crisped leaves that had blown in the last time we’d visited. He reached the thing that reminded him most of Ula and stopped.
He knelt before the loom. It was a simple thing, nothing more than a small wooden frame, but she had used it every day of her life, and that made it important.
When I looked at Ricou there in the moonlight, he seemed more human than ever. He’d always appeared as a young man—in his early thirties, I’d guess—but there was just enough fin-blood in his veins to give him a few unusual features: patches of scales on his arms and shoulders and neck; webbed fingers and toes; and those eyes, one shiny and black, the other ghost-white and blind, each with the potential to look horrifying or beautiful, as dictated by circumstance.
Just then, they were beautiful. Ricou was three-quarters human, and as he knelt before the loom, it was starting to show. I had to take advantage of the opportunity.
“You had plans,” I said. “Do you remember them?”
His brow crinkled in thought, but his eyes stayed on the loom. He could find nothing to say.
“The Banishing Wand,” I said. “I need to know where it is. Before you forget again.”
“The wand…”
“Yes, the wand. Please, Ricou—this is very important.”
His fingers moved toward the loom. “Ula…”
“Focus!” I shouted, and his mismatched eyes rose. He saw the moon behind me, shining through the doorway, and the fin-blood started to take over.
I backed toward the door. “Ricou,” I said warily. “Stay with me.”
His eyes fixed on me. He rose from his crouch and stepped forward. I’d seen that look, that movement, before.
“Ricou…”
His lips drew back. Most of his teeth were broad and flat like a human’s, but the others were like sharpened needles. It was those others that scared me.
He hissed and lunged, the moon’s insanity reflected in his one good eye. I leaned back on my tail, shot both feet out and struck his chest so hard that he rolled to the far end of the tomb.
Thankfully, I come from a long line of kickboxers.
I turned swiftly and hopped out of Ula’s resting place. If Ricou wanted kangaroo for dinner so badly, he’d have to try again later.
I escaped down the lane, the sepulchral roar of an angry beast resonating at my back.
I didn’t see Ricou for the rest of the night. Nor did I really want to.
The next day was October 31st. It was the day the world’s fate would be decided, in a winners-take-all ritual that would either banish the Old Ones to another dimension or allow them to keep terrorizing our planet for the next few decades.
Ricou was the only Player on our side of the struggle. He was the lone banisher against a trio of strong protectors. But if I couldn’t find a way to heal his diseased mind, he’d be useless to us. We’d lose. The Game would be over, and with the world’s human population being almost entirely eradicated already, we’d probably never get another chance to play again; the Old Ones and their tentacled horrors would remain unchecked indefinitely, and life as we know it would be a thing of the past.
I had until the moon was full in the sky to fix my broken master. Less than a day to save the world.
I had no idea what to do, and I was scared.
I’d been hopping aimlessly under the morning’s ashen skies, just trying to clear my head, when I realized I was moving in the direction of Auntie Sixgills’s place. I guess that made sense, because I always visited her when I needed advice.
Normally we familiars can’t speak to humans outside the witching hour, but Auntie Sixgills, like Ricou, was part fin, which allowed her to understand us at all times of the day. Her shack was a rickety old thing in the middle of a meadow, surrounded by tall, burnt-orange grass. There was a pond out back, which is a nice amenity for someone who spends most of her time underwater.
I’d just about reached the shack when I smelled something that made me hop to a stop. My nostrils flared, my ears twitched. I sensed movement a few yards to my right and turned toward it.
Rising from the grass, deadly and fearsome and full of sharp teeth, was a white wolf.
He came over and licked me on the face.
“Hello, Riss,” I said.
“Hello, beautiful. What brings you here this morning?”
“I’m not really sure. I guess I just needed to talk to Auntie.”
“She’s out, I’m afraid. Anything I can help you with?”
“Not unless you’ve figured out how to piece together a shattered mind.”
“Ricou’s getting worse, then?”
“Every day. I don’t know if he’ll be ready in time for tonight.”
Riss sighed, a warm breath gliding through his yellow teeth. “I suppose that’s it, then. How do you think we should spend our final hours?”
“Working. I’m not giving up until I know it’s over. And you shouldn’t, either.”
“I suppose that’s what Ricou would have wanted,” he said, nodding. “Although I’m not sure what I have left to do. My only assignment has been to keep an eye on the protectors’ activity, but they’ve never done anything noteworthy, and I don’t expect them to start now.” He shrugged his snowy shoulders. “After winning the last Game by default, I guess they’re not concerned with making preparations—as near as I can tell, they just plan on showing up and going through the motions.”
He was probably right. The protectors didn’t have much to fear from our side. In all likelihood, they’d just walk right up and use the Sealing Wand to make sure the portal didn’t suck their masters into oblivion, then turn around and go home.
Still, there was always the chance they’d make a strange move before the big event, and if that happened I wanted to know about it.
“Keep watching them,” I said. “If you don’t mind.”
“Sure thing, beautiful. Hey—have you heard from the birds lately?”
“No. Why?”
“I haven’t seen them in a while. I was getting worried.”
“Hopefully I’ll run into them when I talk to Iggy. They like hanging around his place.”
“When are you headed that way?”
“You said Auntie’s not home?”
“Not at the pond, either.”
“Then I guess I’m going now.”
“Want some company?”
“Thanks, but you’ve got some protectors to watch. Go keep an eye on the trio.”
“Aye-aye, Cap’n.” He tried to salute, but his arm couldn’t really bend that way. He settled on licking my face again. “See you around, beautifu
l.”
“Goodbye, Riss.”
I hopped through endless, empty plains, the tall grass transitioning into a field of blood-red wheat around me. I was glad I couldn’t see the position of the sun through the sober skies, because it would only have reminded me how close we were to the end.
I reached the point where the wheat no longer grew, and hopped to a stop. Before me was a perfectly round clearing, some hundred yards in diameter, with dirt the color of yellowed clay. In the center stood Iggy.
If you asked Iggy, he’d say that of all trees, he’s the best. And I’d have to agree. He was, after all, the only one in the world that was still green.
There was no grass or wheat growing in the enormous ash’s circle, and no one—not even Iggy himself—knew why. Riss’s best guess was that the corrupted plant-life of the world didn’t want to get anywhere near something so pure and beautiful, and that sounded about right to me.
I was just about to hop into the clearing when I saw movement across the way: clumps of wheat were shifting as if pushed about by a strong wind, even though there was no breeze to speak of. I crouched to stay hidden, and waited to see who might be paying Iggy a visit.
The red wheat-stalks flattened to the ground as though trampled by a grizzly bear. The trail being drawn through them opened into Iggy’s clearing, but nothing emerged.
I could no longer perceive any movement, but I heard something dragging across the yellow dirt of the clearing. I didn’t have to see the invisible visitor to know it was a servant of the Old Ones.
If the sound in my ears was any indication, the damned thing was making a move on Iggy. I wasn’t about to leave my friend to fend for himself, because despite his intimidating size, he was still a tree, not a fighter—his bark was definitely worse than his bite.
I burst out of the wheat and entered the clearing at full speed. I got halfway to the tree before I realized I had no idea how to fight an invisible monster.
There was a slobbering, guttural roar from somewhere to my left, and I made a quick hop away from it. Dirt shot out from the ground where I’d just been located, rising up in a cloud as though something long and thick had slapped against it. A vision of a tentacle entered my mind, which was worrying, because tentacles on the Old Ones’ servants tended to come in large quantities.
I hopped toward Iggy and circled his trunk, trying to put some sort of barrier between the thing and me. I heard my opponent give chase with its shambling, angry gait.
Seeing with my nose, I sensed it come around the right side of the trunk. On a hunch, I ducked.
Something wet slapped Iggy’s bark just above my head, hard.
I leaned back on my tail and fired a two-footed kick into what looked like empty air. I hit something and heard a grunt.
Before I could get another shot in, an invisible limb lashed out and slapped me aside.
I got up slowly, tasted the blood in my mouth. A tentacle started to wrap around my body, but I pulled away so that it was only able to ensnare my arm. The thing yanked me closer, and I smelled a foul breath coming from my future destination. I leaned back and tried to get away, but the thing’s pull was too strong.
I felt warm, fetid air exhaled over me, and heard the soft pat of drool dripping to the ground. I yanked away with my arm as hard as I could, but the thing’s grip held tight. In a final act of desperation, I lunged forward and bit at the area around my trapped wrist.
Green blood squirted from between my teeth, and the thing roared in pain. I was free.
I hopped away to recover. I turned and used my nose to find the thing as best I could, but I could only focus on a general direction. Its damaged tentacle was plainly visible, being the source of the dripping green blood, but the limb writhed about so wildly there was no way I could target my opponent’s central mass for a good kick. I didn’t have a chance of winning that fight, and I was just considering a retreat when Iggy’s branches started shaking as if in seizure.
A shower of leaves fell from above. Most of them hit the ground, but some came to a stop on what looked like thin air.
The thing, once wholly invisible, was now blanketed with the product of Iggy’s molting.
I hopped forward, leapt into the air and aimed my feet at the vaguely man-shaped monstrosity in the foliage gown. My claws ripped into what must have been its abdomen and spilled steaming black guts onto the ground.
The thing recoiled and grabbed at the wound with its half-dozen leaf-wrapped tentacles. I took the opportunity to throw another kick and drag my claws down its face.
It tried shambling away. I chased it and kicked its back some more. When it finally fell, it didn’t get back up.
Breathing heavily, I made my way over to Iggy.
“Thanks,” I said, and sat with my back to his trunk.
The response came in the form of a deep voice, which resonated from an indiscernible location: “Thank you, young hopper. I fear what may have happened without your intervention.”
“I’m just glad we’re both alive to talk about it.”
The fight had left me exhausted, and Iggy must have realized it: his branches shook overhead, and a moment later an apple fell next to me. I’d never known the old ash to bear fruit before, but I wasn’t about to look a gift-tree in the bark.
I picked up the apple and took a bite. It was juicy and crunchy and, in a departure from all other apples I’d experienced in my life, not rotten. I gobbled half of it down without pausing for a breath.
“I am glad that you appreciate my offering, young hopper. But you did not come here for fruit.”
He was right, of course. The wise old tree always seemed to know.
“The Game’s coming to a close tonight,” I said. “And Ricou’s still not well. Riss and I may end up having to pull this thing off by ourselves, and we don’t have a clue what we’re doing.”
“Then you have come for advice.”
“I’ve come because you’re significant to the ritual in some way.”
“You are certain of this?”
“Look at the facts, Iggy: Ricou’s the one who planted you here decades ago. You’re the only tree in the world to resist the corruption of the Old Ones. And now the very spot where you stand will be the location of the Game’s end? That’s too many coincidences coming together. Ricou had plans for you—it’s the only explanation.”
Something like a sigh rumbled through Iggy’s trunk, shaking the ground beneath me. “Yes,” he said, “it is likely you are correct. Unfortunately, my mind has fallen victim to the termites of time, and there is much I do not remember. If Ricou ever explained to me my purpose, it has been buried so deeply in my rings that I am wholly unaware of it.”
“Yeah, well—you’re not the only one in the dark. Ricou didn’t make a habit of telling any of us what was going on.”
“Secrecy was important to your master. Surely you can understand why.”
Of course I understood why. Ricou was worried about defectors. In the past, Players in the Game would each employ only a single familiar: the animal companion they could trust most, who would forever stick by their side. But Ricou was the lone banisher in that Game, and since he knew he wouldn’t be getting any other Players to join in his cause, he’d compensated by recruiting a small zoo.
Between Riss, the ravens and me, you’d think we’d have been able to piece together Ricou’s plans. But even our own tasks were a mystery to us, because Ricou had never explained why he was having us do the things we did.
I didn’t know what his grand scheme was. I didn’t know what he wanted us to do next. And I certainly didn’t know how he’d managed to predict the location of the final ritual back when he’d planted Iggy, because that’s a calculation that’s supposed to be difficult to solve even after the Game begins—let alone decades in advance.
I decided to ask Iggy about this last mystery, because if anyone would know, it would be him.
“I cannot answer for certain,” he said. “But I can say that your m
aster is a skilled sorcerer and brilliant plotter, and that this thing does not seem beyond him.”
The answer was no real help, but I guess I shouldn’t have expected it to be.
I stood and gave my body a shake from head to tail. Iggy dropped me another apple and a peach, and I put them in my pouch for later.
“What are we going to do about him?” I asked, gesturing at the invisible corpse under the layer of leaves. “We can’t just leave him lying around; I don’t want the protectors to know I took out their scout.”
“Could you drag him to the wheat?”
“Not if I want to get anything else done today.”
I looked around for some sort of tool I could use to make the dragging easier. My search was stopped by Iggy’s voice:
“I believe I see our solution.”
A pair of dark leaves fluttered high in the dull metal sky, soaring toward us without the aid of a wind. As they got closer I saw their true shapes, and realized they were actually two black birds.
“Pardon my pessimism,” I said before the ravens were within earshot, “but I don’t think Ginny and Ninny are strong enough to move that thing.”
“No, but they can feed on its entrails, and pick the leaves from its body while you tend to more important matters. The creature will remain in its present position, but should go unnoticed by prying eyes.”
I shrugged. “Good enough for me.”
The ravens landed on one of Iggy’s lower branches, which was still rather high. One of them had something in her beak. Her head twitched like a chicken looking for its attention span. That would be Ninny.
“Good to see you two again,” I said. “We were getting worried.”
Ninny squawked. She seemed surprised when she realized this would cause her to drop the thing in her beak.
I hopped over and picked it out of the dirt. It was a small blue bead.
“I told her it wasn’t important,” Ginny said. “But she couldn’t resist. It was entirely too shiny.”
I held the bead up between my fingers and looked at it with one eye. “Is this supposed to be…”
“A tool of the Game? I think not.”
Ninny made another loud noise.
Lovecraft Ezine Mega-Issue 3 Rev3 Page 52
