by EM Kaplan
Deni tapped her arm and pointed to another outcropping of rock above them. On it perched a small, horned cabra, rounded in the belly, lighter in color than the ones she knew from around their home. Deni reached behind him to draw an arrow from the quiver on his back, but she tapped him back on the arm and shook her head. She would take this one down. They could not miss their chance at their first meat in days, maybe weeks. And she was the better shot.
She nocked an arrow into her light bow and drew it back. With just the slightest hesitation to adjust her aim, she let it fly. The arrow struck the goat behind its shoulder, a direct heart shot that felled it. The body tumbled off the rock and landed not too far from where they stood. Deni grinned at her. She knew he would have preferred to tease her, but they both knew it had been an excellent shot. And now they had meat.
As they approached the goat to pick it up, a shout sounded behind them from the girls’ tents. More alarming than the cry itself was that it was a man’s voice—the only male in their group was Deni. Their felled prey abandoned, they dashed back to camp.
A man in a yellow striped robe was carrying Yanna across the river at its most shallow point, where it was only calf high to him. Zunee’s youngest sister, slung over his shoulder, kicked his back and punched his midsection. The little hellion screamed her loudest—enough to make him flinch and shake her. Unfortunately, not enough to make him release her.
Deni sprinted after the abductor, splashing into the water with long steps, lifting his knees high. Zunee, prepared to go after him, halted in mid-step when she heard tent fabric ripping. Another shout came from their makeshift settlement—it might have been Lena this time. With a grimace, Zunee headed that direction. The bright yellow tunic with the up-and-down stripes meant the man was Chok, one of their rivals and that her family was under attack. Cursing, Zunee dropped her bow in the dirt and sprinted for the tents. For this, she would need her fists.
Chapter 24
With gentle hands, they shook Jaine awake so she could take Mel back to the Uptdon River in the velowagon. Vern had taken them back to his house and amassed a large sack of supplies—though not as many as Mel’s group would need should she find them. And she absolutely would find them, she thought, trying to feel determined while reassuring herself at the same time.
The morning sun was low in the sky as Jaine pulled back the shed doors of the velowagon stable. Rubbing the sleep out of her eyes, Mel said, “It seems like a waste to drive that enormous carriage for just two people. A single trip must use a large amount of agamite.” If the two of them sat up top again in the driver’s cabin while the entire passenger bay remained empty, the cost would make it not worthwhile.
“Don’t you worry,” Jaine said, walking to the far, darkened corner of the shed beyond the behemoth wagon. “While we can afford the agamite thanks to the fares people pay us—and it does cost a small fortune to import here—I have something much better. Meet the velocycle.” She pulled a tarp off a shadowy form. Underneath sat a three-wheeled cycle—one wheel in the front, two in the back—with a high storage compartment in the back. Two seats rose up from a wooden floorboard, a narrow one for the driver, and a wider bench toward the rear for passengers.
Mel’s heart pounded with anxiety…and excitement. She studied the structure of the machine, wondering if she could persuade Jaine to let her drive it. “I imagine it goes even faster than the velowagon.”
“Oh, yes. Much.” The girl’s voice rang with an amusing fervor.
However, Jaine’s delight was cut short. Behind them a shadow blocked the light of the doorway. A large gust of air brought in both a smoky odor and Vern, who was out of breath. “The library,” he said, panting. “It’s on fire. I need to get back to it.” The fear on his face was more than evident, the anxiety drawing tight lines down his forehead. Mel’s stomach quaked, too, as she thought about all those books, that wealth of history.
“I’m coming with you. I should help,” Jaine said. She threw down the tarp that she clutched in her hands.
While Jaine had been sleeping, Vern had whispered a bit of the girl’s history to Mel. In confidence of course. A street waif, he’d said she’d been, without even the ability to speak language. She’d been left to her own devices to survive—thieving and fighting, scrabbling for daily survival. He’d taken her in though he was aware of her feral ways, her instinct to steal and to forage. Looking on her sleeping form, a certain amount of pride had shined in his eyes as he spoke of the great strides she’d made since becoming his ward, his daughter. Now concern marred his avuncular face.
“No, though you rarely listen to me, you must stay out of danger. You need to accompany Mel. There are greater things going on here than we know. We’ll get this fire under control. Help is on the way. I’ve already heard the bells of the water brigade. I need to get back to see what we can salvage. Take this book, Mel. And take this other thing. It belongs to you and your people. You should have it. Take it back to them or what have you. But I must get back now.” He thrust a book and a heavy object into Mel’s hands.
The book was the one that discussed elementals, the tome from which he had been reading. “But I can’t take the book from your library,” she protested. “I don’t know when I’ll even bring it back.”
“Doesn’t matter now,” he said, face flushed, hair plastered to his head with sweat. “It’s all burning anyway. It may be of more use to you than to any of us at this point.”
All those precious books. That wealth of knowledge. Mel exchanged looks with Jaine—the girl had a strange glint in her eyes and a flush of excitement slashing her cheekbones. But Mel couldn’t think about that now. If the library were destroyed, what would it mean for the Academie?
Mel stared at the other item in her hand. Vern had given her the Mask medallion, the one that had belonged to the exiled Mask, the man who had come here and died in Tooran. The medallion that Mel had worn when she was a Mask was stored in a chest up north at the big house along with some of Ott’s belongings. While hers was pounded iron, silver and gray in parts, this one was poured metal with chunks of polished green agamite embedded in the outer edge like studs. She flipped it over in her palm. The circular form, intricately fashioned like a wheel with six spokes, covered the entire width of her hand, large and imposing.
Someone had attached a thick silver chain into the top piece of agamite stone by hammering in the last loop, connected metal to mineral for decades, maybe even centuries. Hardly thinking, Mel lifted the chain over her head and let the heavy medallion slide down her front—it was so long, clearly not meant for her, that it almost reached her belly. She frowned—Masks, male and female alike, were of a similar height. Had this man been even as unusual in appearance as behavior?
“Are you all right?” Jaine said. Poised on the toes of her buckled boots, her head stuck out the door, she peered down the street. “I can’t see the fire, but I think I can hear it. There’s a roaring coming from over there—good God above, is that what fire sounds like? What should we do? Stay or go? I think we should stay. I want to see how bad it is.” Her excitement bordered on the ghoulish, but it could have been the fever of a street child wanting to see the destruction of the busy, heartless thoroughfares that had birthed her.
Sick to her stomach, Mel floated for a minute, her head swimming, as dizziness threatened to overcome her. Her first instinct was to right her mind using her abilities, but she found with the old medallion around her neck, she was unable to dispel the miasma.
“We can’t help. We’d only get in the way. We need to do as Vern said.” On stiff legs, Mel climbed up on the back seat of the cycle and sat straight-spined, keeping her head forward.
Though the fire wasn’t before her eyes, she could see it. The rage, the all-consuming hunger licked through her mind and swelled with the force of an inferno. Tongues of flame flickered, tasting the wood of the buildings, the delicate, curling papers of the books that disintegrated, leaving her hunger unquenched. Yes, she could see i
t, feel it. She became the flames, reaching for sustenance, delicious fodder. She wanted more and more, felt the feral glee of searching and finding fibers, materials, the flesh of wood and man to eat. But consuming it enflamed her hunger, making her crave the taste of the walls, the floors. She jumped to the next structure, her laughter a crackling, snap, her roar echoing across the city streets, catching the anxious attention of all creatures in her path.
From wooden wall, tasting upward, jumping from shelf to shelf, she ran, danced. Decades of work incinerated. Centuries of markings on paper charred. She laughed again. Burn it. Burn it all.
She gasped. Clutching the ancient Mask medallion around her neck, she could see the raging inferno that was now engulfing the library of the Academie. And like the whirlpool on the Uptdon River, she knew this creature would not be stopped until it had consumed its fill. Before it was appeased, it would burn the library. It would consume half of Tooran, taking both buildings and human lives, turning centuries of industry to ash.
Part 3
Windswept
Chapter 25
The morning light dawned, and Ott’s berserker rage faded as they made their way deeper into the forest south of Navio. They’d limped and dragged themselves far enough into the woods that the only evidence of the continuing explosions were the faint trembles he could feel through the damp ground. Gods, what a night. He never thought he’d live to see the day when half of Navio was reduced to mud and rubble. All those tens of pubs, inns, and marketplaces—no matter if fancy or drab—destroyed. All those people, displaced, burned, or taken underground. Broken arms and legs. Burned faces. Just like at Cillary. It was happening all over again, except larger scale. Lutra on a spit, Navio was under seige.
Another boom sounded in the distance. None of them cringed. They’d grown used to the percussions and they were too tired to flinch. But he hated to think what his dreams would be like now, if he ever managed to sleep again. First Cillary, and now this—all chance of peaceful slumber banished. Maybe for the rest of his life.
His knees gave out first as he crashed to the ground, dropping the still-unconscious Harro down on the forest floor. The man landed hard, without making a sound, not even a weak groan of protest. Not a good sign at all. He’d need more than Lady Lutra’s luck to make it through the day. More than the perseverance of Dovay, the stubborn bear god. He’d need a lift from the gods—all of them—to tell the truth. Treyna was by the man’s side in an instant, her dirt-streaked face close to his as she checked for breath.
“I’m all right,” Ott said with a weary flap of his hand. “He’s heavy as a woldenboust, but I’m fine.” He may have been exaggerating, but his strength waned as his rage faded. Feeling as weak as a newborn foal, he longed for a hot meal, a warm bed, and Mel. Mostly her. More than a distraction from his immediate fears…he didn’t feel like a whole person anymore without her nearby.
Treyna didn’t spare him a glance. She ran light hands over Harro’s chest, feeling for places where he might be leaking his life’s blood out onto the ground. The splints on his legs were pathetic, half-falling off, not doing their job—but Ott wasn’t about to tell her so. If he remembered anything about her, she had a sharp tongue, a bitter view of men, and a mercenary survival instinct. Anything he said now in half-dead stupidity would be ferreted away in her mind for future use against him. And for as little as he understood about women, he knew enough to keep his quiet now. Three quarters of the job of getting along with a woman was keeping his mouth closed.
Sinking all the way to the ground, shoving the dual straps of his axe holster off his shoulders, he let the heavy weapon fall with a thud on the forest floor, he rolled over on his back. He took long breaths, not minding the fecund smell of the loamy forest floor beneath him. At least it wasn’t smoky or foul—he was glad to get the filthy stench of Navio out of his nose. Lutra on a spit, he could live a thousand years and never get the stink of the trogs out of his head. That burning odor like the worst underground poisonous gas was also burned into his memory, no matter how many times he wanted to snuffle it out of his nose. A fern tickled his face, and he brushed it away though it sprang right back to him. Too tired to bother, he let the leafy stem stay this time.
He needed to rest, to get a measure of his strength back. Whether it be for slicing the heads of trogs from their thick necks or digging a grave for the ailing man beside him, he wasn’t certain.
Bookman, nice fellow that he was, crawled over to Ott’s side and gave him a drink from a pouch. The water was warm and the lip of the water skin might have had Bookman’s own spit on it, but Ott didn’t care. He appreciated the thought. Rav sat with her back against a tree, wee babe clutched to her chest, watching him with wary eyes…as if he might leap up and roar at them all. She’d married a trog, for the love of Lutra. Well, a former one at least. Ott sighed, staring up at the dark canopy of leaves. Nothing he could do about his own inner beast. The berserker was part of him. No, more than that—it was him.
“There were trogs,” Bookman said. Ott had gotten used to the owlish cant of the man’s head. Every thought was ponderous and considering. Bloody unnatural state of existence. But more power to the little man. This time, Bookman was stating the obvious, Ott thought with a snort, but was too exhausted to mock Rav’s mate at the moment, even in jest. Bookman’s scratchy voice sounded…confused. Apologetic. Maybe even irritated. He sat off to the side now, and Ott had to turn his head to see him. The smaller man had gotten into the habit of tapping his chin while he was thinking. Ott was certain it wasn’t an inborn trog gesture.
“Yes. Trogs. I did notice that.” Ott rubbed his eyes. The red tint had almost faded from his sight, but it had left an itchy burn in its place. To be sure, he wasn’t certain whether it was his colored vision or exhaustion that made his eyes water. He missed Mel. The inquisitive cant of her head. Her long, lean legs. Her golden-tipped hair. The freckles on her nose. The way she seemed to glow when they were together. She would have brought him a cool cloth or whatever she could find in a forest. Or she’d lay a hand his head and he’d feel better just from feeling her touch. He allowed himself to wallow in a few more seconds of general self-pity while he lay on the ground, waiting for his rate of breathing to return to normal.
“Trogs came upon us, but I didn’t know they were coming,” Bookman explained, rasping his repetitive words close to Ott’s ear. Ott always expected Bookman to smell bad. Lutra knew the trogs stank to high heaven. Even Ott’s ancestors, floating around in their spun gold robes up in the cealo weren’t immune to the stench of trogs. Anyone with a nose could smell those bastards hours before they arrived. And that was only a mild exaggeration in Ott’s opinion. But in reality, Bookman just smelled like any other person. Ott took an experimental sniff of his own arm. Correction—Bookman smelled a lot better than he did at the moment. But based on the sound of trickling water, there was a stream nearby where Ott would be able to clean up. Oh, in about a dozen years or so after he’d rested up.
“Don’t blame yourself. Even I should have known better. A building of that size collapsing. The only reason could have been that the ground was gone underneath it.” Ott swung a heavy arm over his eyes. Then he cracked his eyelid, casting a furtive look at his arm muscle, assessing it for added bulk—not just out of vanity. He still never knew when changes to his stature from his berserker moods were going to remain permanent. Relief coursed through him when he detected no change from the day before.
“You don’t understand. I should have known something. I should have sensed something.”
“How would you’ve known there’d be trogs?” Ott asked, first with confusion, and then with mounting anger. “You know when they’re coming? This whole time we’ve had a trog detector among us and you didn’t tell us?” He had wondered how the trogs communicated with each other when they were unable to speak. Mel had told him the trogs used hand gestures, but that only went so far. A few flips of the fingers didn’t coordinate a well-planned siege. Complica
ted hand signals with hooves for hands. To plan a complex siege on a legendary stronghold. In the dark. And now to learn that Bookman could have alerted them to potential attacks?…Ott gritted his teeth together. Would they have been able to save any of those unfortunate Navians?
Bookman spoke in a thoughtful, measured tone, unaware of Ott’s rising urge to pound him. “It’s similar to hearing voices in your head. But not exactly. There are no words for what I felt when I was…one of them. It wasn’t as if I heard commands. It was more as if…I felt an urge to do something. A compulsion. Do you understand what I’m trying to say? As if you were walking down a steep hill and you cannot stop.”
Ott ran a hand down his face. Voices in his head? An uncontrollable urge to commit violence? The sensation that he was not in control of his own actions? Waking up looking as if he’d taken a bath in his enemy’s blood? Yes, Ott knew all about that. He glanced at Bookman’s smooth face, reconsidering him, this mild man who had experienced all these horrifying things as well. Perhaps they had more in common than Ott wanted to admit.
“But I’m trying to tell you I didn’t sense it tonight. Nothing. I’m truly not one of them anymore. I’m cut off from them.”
The man sounded relieved, and Ott could hardly blame him. Here Bookman was, a year after coming above ground, chatting with the rest of them—a family man, for the love of Lutra. Ott cast a glance at Rav and the babe. He wondered if the little girl would have any lingering trog traits… But no, Bookman had been cleansed before he and Rav had bonded as partners. Ott lolled back on the ground, trying to find a comfortable place to put his head. Now that he was breathing more slowly, his aches and pains were beginning to alert him to their presence. “Glad you’re not a trog now, aren’t you? Well, you’re your own man now.”
