by A. J. Smith
Towards the centre of the settlement, where the spire thrust upwards, a shape darted across his vision. Utha froze, pressed against a domed building, and drew his sword. The blade felt somehow inadequate.
‘Show yourself,’ he snapped, stepping cautiously towards the central minaret.
It loomed over him now, rising from a narrow base to a bulging blob of coloured glass and amber with strangely angled tubes emerging like arteries. It was huge, but had no windows or identifiable entrance.
The figure moved again, slower this time, stopping in front of him. It was Voon.
The Karesian was pale and his eyes were hollow. He wore the same robes, with his spear, Zarzenfang, strapped across his back, but his hands shook. The humming noise accompanied him; dull and sonorous, it came from all directions at once.
‘Voon? Are you unhurt?’
The exemplar was unfocused. He looked right through Utha, his face twitching as he opened his mouth to speak.
‘You must come with me,’ said Voon, his voice dry and croaky with a barely audible buzz behind his words.
Utha squeezed through the last narrow gap and entered the open space beneath the minaret.
‘You must come with me,’ repeated the Karesian.
Utha lowered his sword. The open space was large, but languished in the shadow of the building above. The moonlight barely penetrated, but still there was a strange red glow.
‘What’s happened to you?’
Voon didn’t answer. There was no life in his eyes. When he spoke there had been no texture to his words.
Utha was surprised to see more figures appearing silently from between the buildings. A dozen or more figures, mostly Karesians but also two Kirin, all with the same dead eyes. They wore robes of black with red embroidery.
‘You must come with us,’ they said in unison.
He spun round, sizing up those encircling him. None were armed.
‘You try and coerce me and I’ll make a hell of a mess before you succeed. The threat of twelve men doesn’t intimidate me like it used to.’
‘Calm yourself,’ replied a female voice.
Utha looked upward. From an opening, ten feet or more above the ground, stood an old woman. She wore red and she gestured to him with cracked and wrinkled fingers. The opening had not been there a moment before. It was halfway up the spire, just beneath the minaret.
The matron mother could have been a hundred years old. Her skin was tight and deeply veined.
‘You have no respect,’ rasped the old woman. ‘You are a primitive piece of flesh, walking in the Footstep of the Forest Giant. You are ignorant of how powerless you are here.’
At her words, the blank-faced acolytes closed in. Utha raised his longsword and gritted his teeth, preparing to kill anyone who got too close.
‘Is this the best you can do?’ he asked the matron mother. ‘You were the Queen in Red a few hours ago. Now you’re just a frail old woman with empty people doing your bidding.’
The humming got louder. From every tube and every building, the sound echoed.
‘This is no city of men,’ said Utha in a whisper.
Each of the dozen figures now opened their mouths wide and a cacophony of buzzing filled the air. Utha winced as the sound became high-pitched and painful. Their jaws cracked slightly as something tried to squeeze its way out of each mouth. He looked at Voon, and saw two antennae snake their way out of the Karesian’s mouth. Then two large eyes and a segmented body. Insects the size of large birds emerged from every mouth. They fluttered on three pairs of wings, wriggling their grotesque, furry bodies into the air. Each creature had a curved sting on its abdomen, mottled in shades of green and red. They surrounded him.
‘Rejoice, Old Blood,’ said the matron mother. ‘Death is not the end. You are welcome in the Tyranny of the Twisted Tree.’
The torpid men remained still and lifeless as the insects left them, scratching at the air around him. Utha raised his sword with a guttural growl.
More of the creatures appeared from the domed buildings, buzzing out of openings and filling the air. The matron mother held her arms wide and laughed, a whip-crack cackle, edged with insanity.
‘Rejoice! Rejoice!’
‘I am Utha the Shadow!’ he roared.
He tried to focus his mind, to push them away, but the buzzing of the swarm drove him to his knees. He could feel their hairy bodies against his skin and their fibrous wings beating against his face.
He screamed as the insects stung, their barbed abdomens piercing him in the chest, neck and legs. As his screaming trailed off, an insect began to force its way into his mouth.
***
Shub-Nillurath, the Dead God, the Forest Giant of pleasure and blood. Utha now understood what had driven Jaa, the One and Rowanoco to war against him. They had allied to stop him returning to the world of men. The Forest Giant was losing his ages-long war with Jaa and had tried to cheat. But once a creature has truly ascended, he can never go back. For a creature of such might to re-enter the world would mean the destruction of all. It would have ended the Long War. The other Giants could not allow it. The One found him, Rowanoco fought him and Jaa stole his power. But Jaa was greedy. The Fire Giant of Karesia used the divine energy he’d stolen to empower his followers and he let the echo of Shub-Nillurath fester at the corners of his land. He never cut down the darkwood trees, he never questioned the loyalty of the Seven Sisters and his eyes did not see the Builders of Oron Kaa. His hubris would rule the fate of all.
It was Utha’s last thought.
***
‘Awaken.’
He turned in his bed and looked at his mistress. She wore a red robe and fingered a grotesque token that lay around her wrinkled neck. It was a bulbous spider with a golden abdomen and spindly legs.
‘Yes, matron mother,’ he replied.
‘You have slept long enough. The Builder is happy with the merging.’
‘I am complete?’ he asked.
The old woman flashed a euphoric smile, licking her cracked lips.
‘You are a new being, part Old Blood, part Builder. You will be a revered servant of Shub-Nillurath. Perhaps even a Tyrant one day.’
She’d visited him every day since he was born. Each day they had spoken of eternity and the empire to come. The Tyranny of the Twisted Tree was already growing and he knew he had an honoured place in it. Many beings had already given their might to the new world, and many more would soon kneel at the altar of pleasure and blood.
‘I am ready, matron mother. I no longer feel like two beings. I am one, though I have no name.’
‘That will come later. For now, follow me.’
He was eager to learn more, to see the world he had heard so much about. One day, he would see the heretical men of Ro and Ranen, but for now Oron Kaa was his home. It was the city of insects, the footprint of the Forest Giant, and the holiest place on earth. The Builders of Oron Kaa had maintained it for their master, showing the patience of centuries as they feigned allegiance to Jaa.
The minaret was segmented into regular chambers, each the same size. The walls, mottled in dark crystals of blue and black, reflected no light. Orbs of yellow shone in each chamber, but the rest of the minaret was in perpetual twilight. It was impossible to determine the time of day until the Builders returned, when he’d know it was evening. He’d only seen the world, inside and out, in twilight.
‘How are the girls?’ he asked.
‘Only two needed flaying today. The rest are progressing nicely,’ replied the matron mother.
They walked through a curtain of darkness and into the girls’ residence. Sitting round an oval table, wearing bloody rags, were ten identical young women.
‘Where do they come from?’ he asked, glaring at the potential enchantresses. They didn’t look up from their soup. Each girl had been tortured into compliance and owed their life to the lord of pleasure and blood.
‘We claim them from towns and cities. It has ever been the way that
we can take whoever we wish. I cut and twist their faces, until they look as they should. They are flayed and healed and flayed again, helping them to reach a transcendent state and catch the notice of our lord. If he favours them, they are given the power of the Seven Sisters. For centuries it was thought that they caught the notice of Jaa – until I revealed the truth.’
‘Your patience is admirable, matron mother. It must have sickened you to serve the Fire Giant.’
She glared at him. Her mouth was wide and her lips thin, slightly parted, revealing teeth that looked like gravestones. ‘I did what was necessary. Shub-Nillurath needed much time to regain his strength. I told the Seven Sisters only what they needed to know... but when I told them the truth, they rejoiced. When they left Oron Kaa and forgot the Builders, they moved through the lands of men with a new purpose – to conquer the lands of men in the name of the Twisted Tree.’
Around the girls moved servants, each one a mindless shell for a Builder. They were taken from ships or kidnapped from trade caravans, and given the gift of compliance. They cared for the girls and served as necessary, giving their bodies until they could no longer serve. The Builders lived long lives and could merge with hundreds of different mortals before they themselves entered their death cycle, to be reborn from a black chrysalis.
His merging had been different. The Builders had fought to merge with the white-skinned creature, knowing that great power dwelt within. A demi-god with no power of belief, a titan cowed. A rare treat for the slaves of Shub-Nillurath. The creature was powerful enough to survive the joining with an intact mind. Mortal creatures could not keep their wits when merged with a Builder. The Old Blood was different. The creature he had become, the joining of Old Blood and Builder, was unique. In time, he would be the mightiest of beings. For now, he had much to learn.
‘I wish to see the footprint, matron mother. I wish to feel the power of our lord.’
‘Of course,’ crackled the bent old woman, a rippling smirk flowing over her face.
They left the young girls and moved to the edge of the minaret. The dark glass walls were cold to the touch and cast dull, fractured reflections over his face. He didn’t like his white skin or his pink eyes. Bright light made his face itch and his eyes sting. The Old Blood had been deformed. A hereditary defect.
An opening appeared in the mottled glass, and a platform rose to meet them. He stepped on to it with his mistress and saw the sun for the first time. It was hotter than he had expected, but his pale skin did not blister as it should have. The Old Blood had strength, such strength. The creature had barely begun to recognize who or what he truly was. Exploring his power would be wonderful.
‘The mountains hide the true majesty of Oron Kaa,’ said the matron mother. ‘They are merely the ruins of an ancient altar. Flesh and strength turned long ago to stone.’
The platform took them to ground level and the old woman led him away from the minaret. The city of insects was empty. A hundred globed buildings in a circle round the minaret, but no inhabitants. Mountains ringed the settlement, giving only a small portion of land to the sea and a bare harbour. It was the edge of the world, a place the servants of the Twisted Tree could live in peace, away from the heresies of men.
They’d suffered much, been persecuted, hunted, killed – and ultimately forgotten. It was only the great wisdom of the matron mother and the loyalty of the Builders that had saved them from extinction. She’d known the truth, that Jaa had stripped power from the greatest of Giants. He’d gifted his faithful with stolen energy, energy they could now bask in, as the truth gave them might. She had rebuilt his altars, woken his Dark Young and decried the treacherous Fire Giant. Shub-Nillurath infused her being, seeping back into the world as a beautiful virus of pleasure and pain.
‘Come with me,’ she demanded, striding away despite her bent back and wrinkled frame. ‘The caverns are a distance.’
***
The mountains had not always been mountains. They did not rise from the earth over the passage of millennia. They were formed from broken pieces of a form too colossal to imagine. Under the abbey, through layers of black rock, they walked deep into the earth, down tunnels hewn by the Builders of Oron Kaa. Few creatures ventured to the Footstep of the Forest Giant. Few creatures could remain sane when viewing a spectre of true divinity. He was different. He could feel the power calling to him, dragging him further from the lands of men, and deeper into his destiny. Only the matron mother was strong enough to accompany him, to join him as the divine power began to wash over them.
‘It is close now,’ he said, striding down rough-hewn rocky steps, lit only by torch-light. ‘It calls to me. I feel it flow into the world. Tell me the story, my mistress.’
‘The cowardly Giants did their work well,’ grunted the old woman. ‘While Rowanoco fought our lord, the One touched its mind to a tentacle, turning a limb into broken stone and creating the mountains. We walk within the fossilized remains of that limb. It took the Builders centuries to unearth the tear, and centuries more to rebuild Oron Kaa, all the time fawning over the Fire Giant. The arrogant god accepted their prayers, until we revealed ourselves and severed his power. Every scrap of energy Jaa gave into the world came from Shub-Nillurath, so he was powerless to stop us.’
At the bottom of the stairs, a swarm of Builders clustered on the bare stone, crawling over each other, a vibrating mass of hair and legs. Beyond them, sending waves of green light across the buzzing insects, was a tear in reality, a hole to the halls beyond, bubbling with the seeping life-force of Shub-Nillurath. Over the centuries, the Builders had gnawed at the tear, widening it and allowing more and more power to return to the world. They had been the first slaves of the Forest Giant, created out of his malevolence and only partly corporeal. As long as they stayed close to the tear, they were all but invisible until they desired to be seen or wished to meld with another creature. Anyone that left Oron Kaa forgot about them within minutes and they had been easy for Jaa to overlook. They endured as slaves to the last tendrils of their master, forced to comply as strongly as if he had succeeded and returned to the mortal world.
He filled his lungs with the beautifully rotten air and approached the Footstep of the Forest Giant. ‘If you would give me a place in your Tyranny, my lord, I would serve you with every ounce of my flesh. I desire to be your slave.’ The Builders fluttered into the air, swarming around him like a mantle of fetid divinity. They joined him, basking in the light of their god, as a euphoric laugh erupted from his mouth.
CHAPTER 8
SAARA THE MISTRESS OF PAIN IN THE CITY OF RO WEIR
IT WAS TIME for her to emerge from isolation. A week had passed, slowly and with little sleep, but she was still alive and she was still sane. The door had opened each day, nothing more than a crack and a sliver of light, for her to receive food and written notes. She’d eaten barely half the food and read none of the notes. She had matched strength with a Gorlan mother and lost. Her last reserves of energy were needed just to keep her ageless body from withering into that of an old woman. But her strength had now returned.
Maybe it’s over, she thought. Maybe they’d already won. Maybe the Red Prince was dead and their enemies were defeated, torn to shreds along the King’s Highway and on the muster fields of Weir. Maybe Fjorlan was secure, controlled by the fool Ursa. Maybe her Dark Young were planted in every corner of the Lands of the Twisted Tree.
No. This news would have reached her. Someone would have shouted through the door; yelled and banged on the wood, maybe even demanded she answer. The circumstances would have allowed it.
Her normally lustrous black hair was greasy and tangled. Her purple dress was stained and torn. The washbasin was replaced daily, but she used it only to remove the vile taste from her mouth. Soaps for her skin and oils for her hair had piled up, unused, in the corner. The only thing she waited for, the only thing she craved, was drugged oblivion. Each day a fresh supply of rainbow smoke was delivered and each day it was smoked in a few
hours. Stronger and stronger drugs were becoming necessary to keep her focused during her battle with her own mind.
She had one sister left. Chained to the floor in a locked vault was Isabel the Seductress. Saara had used her mind to shoulder some of the burden, but she was now hopelessly insane, unable to deal with the flood of memories and desires from her deceased sisters or the crawling assault of the Gorlan. When her mind finally broke, she would free Saara from the torment of those she’d enchanted. Until then, they shared the burden.
But there was something else. Some reason that she should rise now, at this moment. Something had happened in Oron Kaa. A shadow and a buzz gnawed in her mind. An old power spoke to her across leagues of deserts, mountains, plains and seas. Geography and distance were no barrier to the Queen in Red; she spoke and the meaning carried. Some new power, or rejuvenation of an old one.
Awaken, girl.
‘Matron mother. I... struggle to focus.’
You will do as you are bid... as the Twisted Tree wishes. Your focus is not relevant. Neither is your comfort.
Saara pushed back her greasy hair and closed her eyes. The bent and cracked old woman was a world away, but her words still cut like a kris blade to the heart. Each thought carried with it thousands upon thousands of hours of torture, perversion and cruelty. The Queen in Red spoke with a cacophony of screams behind her.
‘I am awake,’ muttered Saara. ‘I am awake. I will wash and rise.’
You will listen to me! We have gained new power.
She grasped the sides of her head. Pain behind her eyes made her cry.
Do not whimper, girl.
‘No, of course not. I am listening, matron mother.’
Listen well, for our cause is strengthened. A creature has risen; an enemy felled, and an ally gained. The Old Blood is now mine. As we speak, he kneels at the Footstep of the Forest Giant. We have also removed the exemplar of Jaa. His mind is gone.
