A Bitter Brew

by Greg Curtis

  She started rolling. No longer attached to anything solid, she somehow began violently rolling and bouncing along the rocky ground. But at least she wasn't attacking him. She wasn't even rolling toward him. He suspected she didn't even notice him. Whatever was happening, it was entirely inside her and nothing else mattered.

  Over and over again she hurled herself against every outcropping of rock she could find while she continued to scream. Was she trying to free herself? If she was, then it wasn't working. The only thing she was succeeding in doing was hurting herself. Bashing her head against rocks until clear ooze flowed from the cuts. Doing the same to her leg.

  How long could this continue? As it carried on, Hendrick found himself asking that question repeatedly. Surely she couldn't keep this up forever? But she didn't seem to be slowing down.

  And then the horror grew worse as he saw the remains of the ghostly creature inside her, start to emerge from her flesh. But not like before. It wasn't just a head on a sinuous long neck, or some limbs extending from her stumps. It was the whole body of it starting to push its way free of her.

  It was then that he finally understood. She was giving birth! Except that he doubted that ‘birth’ was the right term. But whatever it was, the dead baby was ripping her apart as it was being born!

  “Sweet Tarius!” Hendrick started praying as he realised what was happening. And then he released the restraints. They were only holding the creature inside her, and he wasn't in any danger just then. The creature was dead and she had no awareness of anything around her.

  Little by little the dead creature was being expelled from her body. The most solid looking part of it – its trunk – seemed to be being forced out of her flesh, ripping her dress as it was pushed through that as well. The creature wasn't completely solid. But it was solid enough that he knew it must be doing her some terrible damage as it came free.

  At least it was going to end, he thought as he saw most of the ghostly creature's long sinuous trunk finally come free. Badly perhaps, as she was surely going to die. But it was going to end and with it her suffering would be finished – one way or another. Hendrick had to cling to that as he stood there, watching.

  It took time. Even when the body was free the limbs remained inside her, and still had to be expelled. Slowly they inched their way out of her stomach. She was lucky though. The ghostly creature only had two limbs left, and though they were almost larger than her, they still somehow slid out.

  And then finally it ended. He watched as the final taloned foot emerged from her stomach, and then fell to the ground. As it did Sana collapsed to the ground, lying beside the remains of the creature. Her baby as she thought of it. Finally the screaming stopped.

  Was she dead? Hendrick didn't know. Certainly she wasn't moving. But he couldn't tell if she was breathing. And he didn't know how bad her injuries were. All he really knew for the longest time was that she had finally stopped screaming. Hendrick knew relief at that. No one should suffer as she had.

  It was a long time before he worked up the courage to approach her. And even then he once more secured her body inside a barrier of dimension before he got too close. Once he did, he almost backed away in horror.

  The woman had no blood. Only the pale ooze that was her version of it. But there was a lot of it, more than ever before. It had soaking through her clothes and was covering her. The material of her dress had torn open and he could see a huge gaping wound across her stomach. And yet despite that she was still breathing.

  How? Anyone else would surely be dead with a wound that large. He was sure of it. And yet she continued to breathe. He knew that he had to do his best to keep her doing that.

  Hendrick did his best to bind her wound with a bandage made of dimension, another manacle of a sort. And even as he feared the results of his next actions, he picked her up in his arms.

  She was so light! That surprised him. But with an arm and a leg gone he supposed that was only to be expected. And it was fortunate in a way, as he knew what he had to do. A heartbeat later they were in his world, not far from his broken house. From there he raced back to the camp still set up outside Styrion Hold, bending both time and space to make the journey as quick as he could.

  And it still took too long.

  Ten or fifteen minutes later he arrived at the camp with her and started calling for the healers. He didn't know what they could do for her. But it was certainly more than he could.

  When they arrived he released the bandage he'd created, though he made certain to keep her manacles on, and let them work. He also reminded them again of what she was and her impossible strength. Then he collapsed to the ground and watched as they did their work.

  All he could think of as he sat there watching them casting their magic into her flesh, was how he could have just done that to her. First he had torn her limbs off. Now this. And still she was only an eighteen year old pale skinned waif.

  She might have had a monster growing inside her, but it was beginning to look as though he actually was one.

  “Now there is someone I never wanted to see again.”

  “Hello Mother.” Hendrick didn't turn around. He kept his eyes firmly on Sana and the healers working on her. “I freed her from the creature inside her.” But was that a good thing he wondered? Death might have been a welcome release.

  “Why did you save her? Her value as a prisoner is small. I doubt she can tell us anything of the great beast's plans. And let’s not forget that she's dangerous!”

  Hendrick thought about that as he sat there watching. He knew his mother was probably right. What she could tell them would probably be little. The behemoth clearly didn't confide in her. He had deceived her and used her, even though she didn't seem to understand that. And it wasn't because she was family either. He felt no kinship to Sana. He'd only seen her a couple of times until recently, and each time had been unpleasant. It had been his feelings of guilt and the fact that she was just a girl that had made him do it he realised. Of course when he told his mother that she wasn't impressed.

  “Men!” She let out a somewhat heavy sigh. “When are you going to learn to think with something other than your phallus'?”

  Hendrick didn't respond. He didn't know that he even wanted to. In part because he suspected there was some truth in her words. Would he have worked so hard to save Sana if she had been a middle aged man? He couldn't be sure, but he thought not. Was that any reason not to try and save someone though?

  His mother was also right in that she was dangerous. Which was why he called for the people standing around watching her to find some manacles. Proper steel ones that would allow them to work without having to get around the clumsy magic ones he had fashioned. Strangely enough, this young woman, deeply unconscious and with a missing arm and leg, was probably the most dangerous patient they had ever treated.

  After that though he returned to simply sitting and watching them work while his mother muttered something under her breath and wandered off. And to wondering how this slip of a woman could have had such a monster growing inside her.

  At some point though, as he sat there looking on, it occurred to him that there was still hope. She was alive, and the creature had been expelled. She was free and she had a chance. That was as much as any of them seemed to have lately.

  Chapter Thirty Eight

  It was a slow journey to Burbage. Slower even than the exodus from Styrion Might. This time instead of hundreds of thousands on the roads there were just three hundred or so. Three hundred gifted, most of whom were walking, and three wagons loaded down with supplies and the precious barrels filled with pieces of magic metal.

  At the rate they were travelling Marnie thought, they could be a week on the journey. And that would be a very long time to spend in the wagon. As well as pot holes and fissures, the ungraded road was riddled with tree roots. And because of that the wagons kept bumping and banging as they were pulled along it by the teams of ever-placid horses. But if the horses were calm as
the wagons they pulled bumped and banged behind them, Marnie was anything but.

  They had only been two days on the road and already her backside was bruised from the constant bouncing on the hard seats. Her nerves were also constantly on edge as she worried that their cargo would spill and all the barrels of magic metals would be lost.

  Most of all she worried that their passenger would wake up.

  She had no idea as to how Sana still lived. The healers claimed it was her own gift of regeneration saving her. That while she'd had the creature inside her it had fought her magic as it had grown inside her. Now that it was finally gone, her magic was starting to reassert itself. Still, the “how” didn't matter. What mattered was that Sana was dangerous even without an arm and a leg. For the moment the former tenth wife of the King was deeply unconscious; they just had to hope that she remained that way.

  Why had Hendrick saved her? That was the question that kept plaguing her as they rode. Why couldn't he have just let her die? It would have been the smart thing to do. And after everything that Sana had done, it would have been a just end. As for this strange belief he had that she could tell them something useful, Marnie doubted that she either could or would. The woman was simply evil. After all, she had gone to the great beast willingly. And even Hendrick's sage friend had said that that was because there was darkness in her.

  But the pillock never seemed to want to do the smart thing. She was beginning to think that his mother had been right when she'd once asked him just how much of the ale he brewed he was drinking.

  “Stop fidgeting! You'll spook the horses!” Tyrollan told her off. “She's not waking up.”

  “And you're not supposed to be listening to my thoughts!” she retorted. They'd agreed on that. Now that he'd acquired that ability, like several others with Luminite in their blood, there had been some rules laid down. And not listening in on people's private thoughts was one of them. Not that she really cared. She trusted him.

  “I'm not. I don't need to. Not when you keep spinning around in your seat to stare at her every few minutes!”

  “You're sure she's not waking up?”

  “Fairly much. Her thoughts are confused and violent but are mostly just fragments of dreams. And when she does finally wake up –.”

  “If!” Marnie interjected. She was still hoping the woman would die.

  “Alright,” Tyrollan continued calmly, “if she wakes up, she'll be much easier to control.”

  “She'd better be! You didn't see her in Styrion Might. That is not a woman we want to fight.”

  But she thought he was probably right. The healers seemed to think so. They said that now that the parasite was out of her and the poisons were being washed away, she was beginning to return to her human self. There was more colour in her cheeks because her blood was slowly becoming red again. Her heart no longer beat twice as fast as it should. And her muscles were no longer always tense as if they were in spasm.

  But did she believe the healers? Marnie didn't have a true healing spell of her own to double check. And even if she was slowly returning to her human form, that didn't mean she would lose her great strength or her hatred of people. For all Marnie knew the woman might well wake up, kill them all and then return to her master.

  “And we are three hundred gifted,” he reminded her calmly. “We can handle whatever challenges she brings. Plus she's manacled!”

  Marnie would have told him that that meant little, save that she suddenly had to pull on the reins as half a dozen Mythagan appeared in front of them without warning. There was no danger of hitting them though, because the horses were travelling very slowly and they were able to pull up quickly.

  “Any thoughts?” she asked Tyrollan as the newcomers approached. She hadn't been expecting to see the Mythagan again. In fact, since the evacuation of the Hold, no one had seen them. Marnie wasn't sure why.

  “None at all. You know I can't read their thoughts,” he told her quietly. “I don't trust that.”

  “Greetings. Miss Holdwright, Master Dan. I'm Darnial Marn.” The woman leading the group greeted them with a polite nod.

  She was tall and straight and she might even have been beautiful if it wasn't for the severity of her features and the seriousness of her expression. This was a woman who seldom smiled.

  Something about the woman reminded Marnie strongly of Lady Peri. The air of authority perhaps. Of always being in control. Or in the way she held herself. And even though she knew little of the Mythagan she realised that this woman was no commoner.

  “Greetings to you too.” Tyrollan managed a polite nod of his own. “To what do we owe this visit?”

  “A gift.” The woman gestured at her companions and they presented a large white burlap sack they were carrying between them.

  “Prince Mountforth told us of your troubles some time back – the ones you don't want to reveal to your people – and we have been thinking about them ever since. Discussions were held among the Senate to see if there was a way we could help. Or if we should. Sometimes as we have found out to our cost, when we try to help it results in unfortunate outcomes. And given we managed to start a war among your people simply by offering our aid, we were reluctant to get involved again.”

  “But we finally decided that this could help and we could see it causing no trouble.” She gestured at her companions and they raised the sack up to her so that she could reach in and draw a polished white stone from it.

  “This is a Stone of Ga. It is a simple device we use. A tool that we give to our children when they start to grow into their magic. We have been giving them to all of your people who have accepted our offer of sanctuary. There have been no problems.”

  It is nothing more than a rock with a minor enchantment of focus on it. We use it with our children to help them control their spells. We think it will also help any of your children who have been gifted in the same way.”

  “But those of your people who used it when they were practising their meditations – a clever approach to your problem by the way – found that it helped with that too. The stones allowed them not just to bring focus to their casting, but also to bring focus to their will. To separate what is their will from what is borrowed from the ancients.”

  “It's not a cure. We're not certain that there is such a thing. But it helps. And many of your people who have been using them these past weeks, have reported not just that their magic is more controlled, but that their markings have also begun to fade. In time, we believe that using these stones while meditating will allow your people to free themselves completely from the fragments of the souls that have infected them.”

  “We have brought enough with us for all of your people here and can bring more as you require them.” Darnial Marn gestured to her companions and they immediately stepped forward to place the sack of stones on the back of the wagon.

  “Thank you.” Tyrollan smiled politely. “Your offer is most generous.”

  “I'm glad that you find it so. It is always our wish to help.” She returned the smile.

  “But we must return to our duties. Call us as when you require more stones and we will bring them to you.”

  With that she and her companions disappeared and they were left sitting in the wagon on the road by themselves.

  “That was unexpected … and brief!”

  “Robberies usually are,” Tyrollan responded glumly.

  “What?!” Marnie stared at her friend and saw the look of resignation in his face. And then she turned around hurriedly in her seat to stare at the back of the wagon. But the barrels of magic metal fragments were still there and she breathed a sigh of relief. But then she realised what was missing. They'd taken their prisoner.

  “Sana's gone!”

  “They took her when they left. I felt her dark dreams vanish with them. I had wondered why they'd brought us those worthless trinkets.”

  “Worthless trinkets?!” Marnie was shocked all over again. And she'd just been beginning to think there wa
s hope on the horizon.

  “I sensed the enchantment on them when her companions opened the sack. The focus spell was far too weak to be of any real use. But I didn't want to say anything until I held one in my hands. I thought maybe there was something more to it that I wasn't aware of.”

  “So she lied to us?”

  “No.” Tyrollan turned to face her. “She told the literal truth. The stones will help us, in exactly the same way that throwing a single fragment of magic metal off the wagon, will make it lighter and allow the horses to draw it that much faster. In short, not very much at all.”

  “They traded us a bunch of nearly worthless rocks for a prisoner who might have been able to tell us something useful in time.” He shook his head sadly. “I told you I didn't trust people who shield their thoughts from me.”