Conqueror

by Isaac Hooke

  When it was done, he had Eddy kneel, and Abigail and Weyanna took their places on its shoulders.

  He sensed Abigail flagging from the lingering Eldritch magic, and gave her some endurance: she perked up immediately. Weyanna meanwhile simply lay her head on the creature’s neck, too tired for anything else. He was starting to wish he could give her endurance, too.

  He reached out experimentally, wondering if he could Break her, and found he could wrap his will around her mind. He squeezed gently, and she struggled within his grip. She glanced down at him accusingly from her perch on Eddy.

  “Sorry,” he said.

  Weyanna looked away, saying nothing.

  “Do the other gobling parties from your tribe have basilisks with them?” Xaxia asked the gobling as they set out.

  “Only us,” Sark said. “But some parties possess worse creatures. Have you ever heard of scallions?”

  “You mean the onions?” Gwen said. “I eat them all the time.”

  “No wonder your breath is so bad,” Xaxia commented.

  “Not onions,” the gobling said. “They are a type of lion. Their bodies are covered in scales instead of fur, and with their long canines they drain the lifeblood of victims. They’re capable of absorbing both magical and physical attacks. And they’re immune to basilisks.”

  “Sounds like my kind of creature,” Ziatrice said. “I do like a challenge when it’s time to dance swords.”

  “But you have a halberd,” Gwen said. “Not a sword.”

  “I meant it figuratively,” the night elf told her. She sighed. “Never mind.”

  As they advanced, Malem noted that the basilisk moved with an amazing silence for its size, its wide feet padding almost inaudibly upon the ground.

  That would explain why I didn’t hear it when it was running directly for me. Well, at least until Khaan decided to announce its presence with that shrill shriek.

  He heard wild barking coming from the north, then.

  “That would be the small group of goblings with their ferak dogs you chased away,” Ziatrice said.

  “That would be them,” he agreed. “Khaan?”

  The basilisk positioned itself on the northern perimeter of the party. The barking grew in volume with each passing moment, until it abruptly cut off.

  Malem strode past the basilisk until he could see the statues of several dogs and the goblings that held their leashes.

  “Nicely done,” he said.

  “You know,” Xaxia said when they were on the move again. “Other monsters are going to be wondering what’s up with the highly detailed gobling statues we’ve been leaving in the area.”

  “They’ll know that whatever caused it isn’t something good,” Ziatrice said. “In the wild, basilisks usually surround their territories with the statues of those it hasn’t eaten. As a warning sign.”

  “Very good,” Khaan told her in that booming voice. “We also sometimes use the statues we create to practice when our mates are gone.”

  “Practice, what do you mean?” Xaxia asked.

  “Practice mating,” Khaan clarified.

  “Eww, thanks for that image,” Gwen said.

  Sark came alongside her. “Hello.”

  “Go away,” Gwen said.

  “Okay,” the gobling told her. It paused. “Why do you follow him? Is the Tall One your master, too?”

  “I am no one’s slave,” Gwen said angrily. “And I follow him because it pleases me. Why are you still talking to me?”

  The gobling looked down dejectedly, and increased its pace to walk beside Rathamias.

  “Git!” the orak mage said.

  Sark walked even faster, taking up a position next to Eddy ahead.

  Now was probably a good time to have that discussion with Gwen.

  Why do you treat the creature like that? he sent her. It’s not an orak. And it’s intelligent. It has feelings.

  I don’t care what it has, Gwen said. It represents everything I hate about myself. My monster half.

  But your monster half is your source of power, he said.

  You mean it’s the source of your power, don’t you? If I wasn’t half monster, you wouldn’t have been able to Break me.

  While that’s true, you can’t discount the power your monster side gives you, he told her. Your strength. Your endurance. He paused. Your sexual prowess.

  She gave him a piqued look. You really mean the latter?

  Of course I do. Normal women are a bore compared to the untamed sexual beast you become in bed.

  Her nostrils dilated with sudden arousal, and when she spoke, her voice sounded raspy even though it was inside his head. I’ll remind you of that later, when it’s time to make camp.

  Whoops.

  He wasn’t sure if his little talk had made a difference, but hopefully she didn’t hate her monster half quite as much anymore.

  You know, she said without prompting. When I was a little girl, growing up in the village, my differences were so obvious, even then. Well, of course there was the skin color. But I was also bigger, and more muscular than the other children at that age, especially for a girl. The older villagers didn’t care… they treated me like their own daughter, let me stay in their houses and showered me with love. But the other children…

  She shook her head, and took a moment before continuing.

  Children can be so cruel. No child should have to go through what I went through with them. The teasing, the practical jokes… for a while, I’d have my clothes ruined at least once a week. Sometimes they’d just be stolen while I bathed, and I’d have to run naked to a neighbor’s house. Other times, the jokes were nastier. A favorite was a tar bucket strategically placed over a door, and when I triggered it and dumped the contents over my head and upper body, giggling children would rush in with buckets of feathers to further humiliate me. I became very wary of doors for a time…

  I always kept my monster side suppressed during all of it. But one time I couldn’t hold it back, and my monster side reared its ugly head. A boy I used to know, Darren, was hiding in an alley with a pie. When I passed, he stepped out and smashed it in my face.

  I just exploded. I didn’t know what happened, but before I realized what I’d done, he was on the ground, his head a bloody pulp beneath me, and my knuckles covered in his blood. I ran away, crying, thinking I’d be kicked out of the village for sure. But Darren never told on me. He said big kids from another village had come by and roughed him up.

  The other children never bothered me again after that. For a while I bared my teeth in a feral grin whenever I saw any of them, to remind them of what I was capable of. But I stopped when I realized I had to make a choice: I could live my life as a bully and gain respect through fear, or I could live it as a normal person and gain respect through hard work, and by treating others like I wanted to be treated.

  I’ve always tried my best to live my life the latter way. But my monster side is always there, tempting me to bully my way through life. Tempting me toward the violent way out. The easy way. And I take that road sometimes, I admit. I explode, and my monster side breaks free. These days, that happens mostly when I see an orak. The front lines were a sort of purge for me, in that regard. I let my monster run loose.

  Here, I hold it back on a thinly stretched leash. I still smolder whenever I look at that orak mage. You’re the only thing keeping Rathamias alive. If you weren’t here to restrain me, that creature would have been dead the moment I laid eyes upon it.

  Knowing all of this, you can now understand why I don’t like my monster side all that much. To me it’s always represented the worst in me. The side that bullies. The side that kills. The side that fights. You can understand why I want to put it away in the far recesses of my mind and never let it out.

  Malem studied her. I can’t let you put your monster away just yet. I need it for the battles that come. We all do.

  She nodded. Then I will keep it out for a while longer. For you.

  He smiled sad
ly. It can’t be for me. At least, not just for me. I hope one day you’ll be able to accept that your monster is an integral part of you. Not something that you can just lock away deep in your mind and then toss the key. Without your monster, you would have never made it to where you are today, trust me. Because, you see, I, too have a monster inside. It’s the only thing that has pulled me through in the times of darkness. When things get tough, it refuses to give up and die. Accept your monster, Gwen. Let it free when it needs to be free, and keep it inside you when it needs to be inside.

  She stared at him for several seconds. You’re sexy as hell when you wax philosophical like that, you know. If we weren’t on the march, I’d jump your bones.

  He glanced at her shoulder, where the dragon scale armor had been torn away to reveal her bare skin underneath. He wasn’t sure where she got the damage from, but she seemed otherwise uninjured, and he felt no pain from her energy bundle. As he stared at the skin, he couldn’t help the slight arousal he felt.

  And I’d jump yours, believe me.

  She grinned mischievously. Maybe we should call a halt? We could say the basilisk has to use the washroom.

  He held back a laugh. I think we’d need longer than that. You would insult my stamina?

  Her eyes glinted. Oh no, I wouldn’t dare.

  “What are you two up to?” Xaxia interrupted. “You’ve been exchanging coy glances and smiles for the past minute or two.”

  “Yes, what?” Ziatrice said.

  Malem felt his cheeks growing hot. Gwen’s own face turned a nice shade of crimson.

  Suddenly he straightened, and called a halt.

  “We’ve got more monsters incoming,” he announced. He hated to admit it, but he was actually glad monsters were coming. Anything to distract the women from the embarrassment he felt. Then again, what he sensed out there didn’t seem all that good. “It seems to be a search party of goblings, spread out in a long line. But there are two energy signatures I’ve never felt before. I’m not sure what kind of monsters they are.”

  “Those would be the scallions,” Sark said, returning from his position near point. “They always travel in pairs. They share their fatigue, and damage.”

  “What exactly do you mean, they share their fatigue and damage?” Xaxia asked.

  “One tires, they both tire,” Sark said. “Hit one, you hit the other. It’s a side effect of the innate magic that links them, and gives them their immunities. They’re always born as twins.”

  “You said they can absorb magical and physical attacks?” Malem asked.

  “To a degree, yes,” Sark said.

  “And the basilisk won’t turn them to stone?”

  “That’s right,” Sark said.

  “Then we could be in trouble,” Malem said.

  15

  Malem veered the group sharply to the north and after two hundred yards, paused near a tight thicket of trees enclosed by rich, silky spider webs. The desiccated carcasses of squirrels and various species of birds lay scattered throughout that web. There was even what looked like a small deer caught in the silky mesh. Its rotting hide was completely flattened around the bones within, and its eyes and mouth were dark pits.

  “A colony of dhaarkan spiders,” Ziatrice commented. “The gobling search party won’t look here.”

  Normal spiders of the monster variety made their nests inside of trees, killing them off in the process. But not so with dhaarkan spiders, who nested underneath the trees. They actually helped nourish the root system once they were established, and thus were beneficial to the trees. That explained why the canopy was so luxuriously thick above them, and why so many trees grew here. Dhaarkan spiders usually lived in colonies, with multiple spider families residing underneath each tree that was part of the colony.

  “Then we hide here,” Malem said. He drew Balethorn and cut an opening through the outer shell of web. As usual, the blade remained completely quiet. He was actually enjoying its silence: on the front lines he had to listen to that hungry pleading for dragon blood almost constantly, but there were no dragons here—discounting Abigail and Weyanna, who wouldn’t attract the sword’s attention while they remained in human form.

  Blade in hand, he peered through the dark opening he’d created. The two halves of the web he’d slit wavered in the breeze like ghostly drapes. Beyond, the area was dim with the artificial twilight induced by the seamless canopy of the thicket.

  He stepped back and gestured for Khaan to enter first.

  The big basilisk imperiously strode inside.

  “Wait,” Sark said. “You don’t really want to go in there, do you?”

  “I’m not big on hiding in a colony of spiders myself,” Gwen commented.

  “The spiders will stay hidden, I assure you,” Ziatrice said. “As soon as they smelled the basilisk, along with the ettin and ghrip, they would have burrowed deep inside their dens. They won’t be coming out.”

  “She’s right,” Malem said. “I can sense them cowering underneath the different roots within. I somehow doubt they’ll make an appearance while we have Khaan, Hansel and Eddy with us, considering that all three monsters started chomping at the bit as soon as the colony was in sight, wanting me to release them so they could feed on the juicy treats within.”

  Gwen glanced at Ziatrice. “How did you know?”

  “I used to play with dhaarkan spiders as a kid,” the night elf explained.

  Xaxia snickered, and shook her head. “Allowing oraks to murder your family so you could secure the throne. Playing with dhaarkan spiders. You really were an odd child, weren’t you?”

  “The oddest,” Ziatrice agreed. “It takes more than a liberal serving of ambition to make a queen. Extreme eccentricity helps.”

  “Apparently…” Xaxia quipped.

  Khaan confirmed what Malem’s beast sense told him: the colony appeared deserted inside, with all the spiders hidden in their dens. He instructed Khaan to bury the openings to their nests at the bottom of the trunks as best as he could, and then had Eddy carry Abigail and Weyanna inside.

  He followed, along with the rest of the humans and smaller monsters. He instructed Hansel to wait about two hundred yards away to the north, outside the thicket, as the trees were too close together, and the big ghrip would only end up knocking them down to carve a path inside, making it obvious something had invaded the colony. He also told the bull to make itself inconspicuous, in case the couriers from the previous gobling party had shared the news that a large ghrip was part of Malem’s team.

  There were more carcasses of small animals inside. Or rather, skeletons of the disposed meals. Malem picked his way forward, trying to stick to the paths cleared by the heavy feet of the monsters that went before him.

  He hunkered down with the others inside, and they waited quietly while the gobling search line marched past. He sensed them the entire way; the closest gobling passed within fifty yards of the colony. He felt the creature pause as it walked by, but it must have noticed the colony then, because it immediately quickened its pace, not wanting to become spider food.

  The two bigger creatures he felt were near the middle of the search party, well away from the colony. Those would be the scallions. The creatures didn’t swerve from their course whatsoever. No doubt they had a strong sense of smell, but any scent produced by the monsters with him would be masked by the proximity of the spiders.

  As he waited there in the twilight induced by the thick canopy, he wondered vaguely what those scallions looked like. He considered releasing one of the monsters to Break a closer gobling to take a peek. Hansel, who was the furthest monster away and thus the least likely to cause any harm to Malem and the others, was the obvious candidate for release. However, he decided it wasn’t worth the trouble—and stamina drain—that would be needed to re-Break the ghrip after. He could also send out Sark, but again, not worth the risk. He wasn’t going to put everyone in danger just to satisfy his own curiosity. He knew essentially what the scallions looked like a
lready anyway, at least from Sark’s description.

  When the search party was well past them, Malem slumped in relief.

  Yet he knew that while they might have dodged this particular search party, there were more out there. It was still a long way through monster territory, after all, and he and the others might not be so lucky the next time two scallions were passing by. His beast sense might let him down. Or there might be no suitable hiding places. Or the scallions might catch their scent, and lead the goblings directly to them. It wasn’t a fight he was looking forward to, not against creatures resistant to magic and physical attacks.

  He had the humans and smaller monsters of the group abandon the thicket soon after the search party vanished from his beast sense. The moment he stepped out from under the artificial twilight and into the main forest, he commanded Eddy to lower Abigail and Weyanna, and then allowed the three monsters to tear down the trees and eat the spiders hiding underneath the roots.

  The dog-sized arachnids spilled out from the copse in waves, tearing through the surrounding shell of webbing and fleeing; they ignored Malem and the others entirely in their frantic flight to get away. Gurgling screeches and shrieks emerged from within as the bigger monsters dined upon the laggards.

  A few minutes later, the three monsters emerged content and well fed.

  “You’re such a good master,” Eddy told him.

  Malem smiled and inclined his head politely.

  The ettin allowed Abigail and Weyanna onto its shoulders once more, and the mixed human-monster party set out soon thereafter and continued eastward, using the sun as their guide.

  Throughout the rest of that day, whenever Malem sensed an approaching gobling search party, he ordered the team to take cover some distance away from the periphery of the sensed enemy. The goblings always passed them by without noticing their hiding places.

  “That beast sense of yours would have saved me years of watching my back in the royal palace,” Ziatrice commented. “Imagine, being able to sense where your enemies were hiding in the dark, and strike them down before they could attack you, or hide from them while they searched futilely… I would have been ten steps ahead of my enemies, instead of only one.”