The Root

by Na'amen Tilahun

  He was barely off the ground because it was so short, only four-and-a-half-feet tall if that. Its whole body was a deep midnight black with a sickly yellow sheen to it. The coloring reminded him of some of Yaga’s bloodline but they were mystics, wisewomen—Angelic or Blooded—they were not fighters.

  Its face was the most disturbing, a double-hinge jaw flung open far wider than looked natural or pleasant. It had four sets of fangs on the top and bottom and the gums between the fangs looked serrated and sharp as stone. Its nose was flat and easy to miss; only the wide slits of its nostrils and the bright yellow membrane within gave them away. What he assumed was its eye was a faceted streak of black that took up the top half of its face.

  Matthias kicked out and his right foot smashed something between its legs and he did mean smashed, he heard the shatter, felt the crack under his steel-toe boots, but the thing only shook him and roared in his face. The hand around his neck tightened and Matthias felt its claws puncture his neck on either side.

  Then he was flying through the air, slamming into the roof, something in his leg snapping, and his whole body on fire with pain. He blacked out just as he saw two shadows tumble over the edge of the roof.

  ERIK

  Erik was having a surreal dream.

  Then jerked awake at a growl. And saw something that just looked wrong, dark black and chitinous, inhuman, and hungry.

  Correction. He was having the most surreal day.

  He chose to ignore the answering growl building in his chest. He remembered the thing he’d been fighting before but not how it had ended. The memories of the fight were there but stretched oddly in his mind, recollection jerking from one scene to another lightning fast or lingering over some details entirely too long. The memories skittered and changed the harder he tried to hold on to them, to twist them into some recognizable shape.

  Rushing forward to attack seemed natural and he felt his mind slip back into that place, suddenly processing a million different facts at the speed of thought. He could feel the people in the houses all around them but was focused on the two figures in front of him.

  Erik hit the creature in the knees, knew exactly what angle would launch the thing’s victim to safety on the other side of the roof. He winced, knowing it would also cost the man a broken leg and a couple of cracked ribs, but better than any alternative. As he slammed into the creature the odd slickness of its skin became clear, as did a miscalculation.

  His intention had been to angle the thing so when it fell, its neck would land on the small upraised edge of the roof, the force causing it to break. Erik didn’t know exactly what the thing was, but he refused to believe that most things wouldn’t die if their necks were broken.

  However, the slickness of the thing’s skin meant that instead of falling back, it slid, then fell back. The angle changed enough that instead of hitting the edge of the roof, it fell over the edge and took Erik along with it.

  He struggled with the thing as they fell, its claws sinking into the soft skin of his chest. Erik wrapped his own arms around the thing’s chest and tried to crush it. More importantly he kicked out at the wall as they fell, using that momentum to turn the thrashing body toward the ground so it would cushion his fall.

  There was a sharp shattering sound as they hit. Erik’s body flared with a vibrant, all-over, pins-and-needles feeling. Every sense lit up and he could see nothing but white, hear nothing but his gasping breath, smell nothing but his own fear-sweat thick in the air.

  As his senses returned he realized he was alive, flat on his back in the street and unable to stop gasping, but alive. Even as he realized this, the details from the fight dimmed; he remembered what he had done but all those little reasons that had factored into his decision-making were slipping away. He turned his head to the side, trying to catch sight of something besides the streetlight above him. Had he breath, he would have screamed at the monstrous face that greeted him, mouth open, prepared to take a chunk out of him.

  Erik scrambled and slithered back, groaning. He had managed to struggle a couple feet back before he noticed the large crack down the center of its face. He glanced around and realized he was lying among the cracked remnants of his opponent. Jagged pieces of black surrounded him, some of them leaking a thin pink liquid. Even as he watched the pieces shrank and began to disappear. As soon as the realization of his winning penetrated, the pain hit twice as hard and he whimpered as he fell back to the ground.

  People were moving around him; he could hear the soft murmur of voices but was too wrapped up in the pain that permeated every fiber of his body. His pained moan turned into a shout as a pair of hands grabbed his shoulders and pulled him into a sitting position.

  “Kid, can you walk?”

  Erik opened his eyes and focused on the smoky blur in front of them until the woman crouched in front of him came into focus. Her skin was a warm golden tan and her thick dark hair was shaved to stubble on the sides but stood tall and thick in the center. She snapped two large fingers in front of his face.

  “Hey, you in there?”

  There was a huff of laughter from his right and Erik tilted his head. A young Asian man stood next to her, his hand on her shoulder. His paler skin was dripping sweat, drops threatening to extinguish the cigarette clenched between his lips. Erik took stock of his body, and yes, everything hurt as he tensed and released his muscles, but there was no sharp pain.

  The woman pulled his face closer and rubbed her finger across his lips. Erik jerked back.

  She turned to her companion. “Doesn’t look like he swallowed any of the blood, thank god. This is going to be hard enough with him being high on Angelic blood.”

  He stared at the woman. She turned back to him.

  “Can you walk?”

  “I think I can walk.” He didn’t know who they were but he didn’t feel in a position to turn down help from anyone right now.

  “Good, cause we got to get out of here before Elliot’s power fails or more Suits show up.”

  She helped him to his feet and he stumbled into her shoulder, leaning against the solid strength of her form. She was maneuvering him down the street when a memory shook loose and he stopped.

  “Wait. What about that other guy?”

  Both of them stopped to look at him.

  “What guy?”

  “The one that monster was trying to kill, the guy on the roof.”

  The woman’s head snapped around to the man.

  “We have time, right, Elliot?”

  “Yeah, Patrah’s still getting the girl, but we need to move out of the street. Shielding all three of us from this much attention is draining me quick.”

  His voice was strained, cigarette long since fallen away.

  The woman pointed at the fire escape on the side of the building Erik had fallen from and Elliot nodded in reply, chuckling.

  “Probably an easier way down next time, man.”

  Erik frowned at the man but the words didn’t seem to hold any actual malice, just good humor.

  “You might be right,” he acknowledged with a small smile as he reached the foot of the fire escape with the woman’s help. Over the last year he’d forgotten what it was like to be teased by someone who wasn’t actively trying to hurt him.

  The man climbed the ladder to the first stairway easily but Erik struggled to climb in tandem with the woman. He slipped, taking them both back to the ground twice, when the woman finally swore in frustration. Erik yelped as his world spun and she flung him over her shoulder in a fireman’s carry. He thought about complaining but she was climbing the ladder quickly and smoothly, plus the position was easing some of his pain. She was steady as she scaled the three stories of neutral-painted metal and Erik barely felt a thing, until his world was spinning again and he was set down on the roof with a thump.

  Erik sank down to his haunches immediately next to the silent form already lying on the roof. He was exhausted and wanted a closer look at the man.

  The body was
still breathing, which was good. His dark hair was a full curly mass, held back by a simple metal band. His face was young in unconsciousness; he was in his early twenties at the latest, maybe twenty-two. His skin had a dark Mediterranean cast. Before Erik could observe more, he was interrupted by the woman and Elliot cursing almost in unison.

  She broke the silence that followed. “Matthias.” Her tone was odd, it shook, but Erik could not tell what she was feeling. “Of course.”

  “So, what do we do?” Elliot’s voice held the same odd quality as the woman’s. As if they were happy to see him and also scared by the fact. “No way I can carry one of them and maintain the shield, and no way you can carry both, even in full-blood, Daya. Not without hurting one or both of them worse.”

  The woman, Daya, glared at Erik and Matthias. Erik did not flinch, fairly sure she was frustrated at the situation, not him. Daya did not seem the type who liked to be told she could not do something. She also didn’t seem the type to strike out in frustration, but impressions were deceiving, so he stayed on guard.

  Finally she turned to face Elliot again. “You’re right. We’ll wait for Patrah to retrieve the girl and call for an extra vehicle.”

  “Up here?”

  “Yeah. Can you hold the street-wide shield while I go check on Patrah?”

  “On just you two? Yeah, sure.” He bit his lip. “Hurry.”

  Daya nodded and took off for the fire escape briskly. Erik took the chance to rest and lay down on the gravel roof, still keeping his gaze on the man he’d just met. Rocks dug into his back, but the relief on his aching muscles was worth it. He looked up at Elliot.

  “So what is all this?”

  Elliot looked at him, hesitated. “How much do you know?”

  Erik considered lying but only for a second. He didn’t know what these people could do. The strength coiled in Daya, the speed with which she moved, could be natural, could be the result of training and conditioning, but considering what he had seen? Considering all this talk about shielding directed at Elliot? They could do things, things like what he apparently could now do. Maybe they could tell when someone lied.

  Maybe he could. That thought stopped him cold.

  Best to tell the truth. Only enough to get by though.

  “I went for a walk, and suddenly I’m living in a Joss Whedon series. Monsters but no cute bumbling sidekick to make it worth my while.” Erik caught Elliot’s eyes and allowed his lips to turn up into a smirk. “At least not yet.”

  It was a risk, flirting with the strange man; he might be straight, but Erik got the reading that even if he was he wouldn’t react with the typical dude-bro fear.

  Erik’s intuition was right. Elliot chuckled at the comment and a slight blush lit up his sweaty cheeks.

  “So you don’t really know anything?”

  Damn.

  Erik was sort of hoping he wouldn’t focus on that. His frustration built and his tongue slipped the leash he was keeping it on.

  “That’s what I said. Is this one of those shows where you’re cute so you’re not that smart?” Elliot wasn’t really Erik’s type but it wasn’t the first time he’d flirted with someone he wasn’t actually interested in to get something. He’d been raised in the Hollywood machine, for god’s sake—using your body as currency was lesson one.

  Anyway, Elliot wasn’t unattractive. He was a little shorter than Erik and had that stocky without being a muscle-head thing going on. His nose crooked definitively to one side and his practically nonexistent top lip looked anemic next to its Cupid’s bow bottom partner. It gave his face good character.

  Erik’s ambivalence had more to do with the fact that he read something weak in Elliot’s posture—in his obvious reliance on someone else.

  Elliot flushed at the compliment. Or the insult. “So how do you know Matthias?”

  Erik rolled his eyes at the evasion and shrugged. It hurt but not the sharp pain he’d experienced on the ground below. Instead it felt like the ache of sore muscles, a couple-days-after-hard-workout ache.

  “Woke up and he was being slammed into the roof. Took a wild guess that it wasn’t a good thing. Didn’t even know his name until the two of you said it.” All true. No need to mention his fight earlier today or that his mom had mentioned a Matthias before he’d fallen asleep this afternoon.

  “So you attacked and killed an Angelic to save someone you didn’t know?” The suspicion was thick in Elliot’s voice.

  “An Angelic? Didn’t remind me of any angel I’ve ever heard of.”

  Elliot snorted at his answer. “Not a fan of the Bible, I take it?”

  “I know all the dirty bits.” He did; they were the best parts.

  “Well, next time you get the chance, look up the actual descriptions of angels in Ye Olde Testamentito. The whole pretty blond, white people thing is fairly new. The last thing people who actually saw them would call biblical angels is pretty. Awe-inspiring, yeah, but pretty? No. We’re talking burning wheels of flame covered in eyes, four-headed beings with goat feet, things that had to hide their true appearance because a glimpse would drive humans mad.”

  The descriptions sent a shiver down Erik’s spine. The two things . . . Angelics . . . he’d seen tonight had been weird looking but more like human forms stretched out of shape, made into mockeries of humans. From what Elliot was saying, though, they were far from the worst ones.

  “Well, fuck.” Erik cursed as another wave of relaxation ran through his frame, the same one as earlier in his room, and he again sank into unconsciousness.

  ZEBUB

  LIL

  “Form the word slowly. Take your time. There is no rush.”

  Lil frowned at the admonishment but nodded. First she thought of the word “light” in the common language of Zebub, then she built the idea around it, the soft glow, the gentle warmth, then she held her tongue ready and began.

  Mayer’s hands were a physical anchor on her shoulders as she brought the word—bent into a new strange shape—into the forefront of her mind, ignoring the way it struggled, the way in which it did not want to be spoken, did not want to be brought into this world. She tamed it on the flat of her tongue.

  The first syllable snapped too fast, she could not slow it down, but she forced it into the correct shape at least. The second syllable dragged its proverbial feet. It refused to come quietly, it dug hooks into the softness of her tongue and the ridges of the roof of her mouth, it screeched and fought, yet still she drew it forth. She flung it after its brethren and as the first and second syllables met each other in the air, fire flashed before her eyes.

  The fire passed through the leaves of the white plant bulb but did not set it on fire. Instead the bulb began to glow. She turned to her mentor with a large smile. The answering smile he wore was small and lopsided but there.

  “Good job. It is very easy to set things afire with that word, harder to bend it to your will and whim.”

  Her tongue throbbed in her mouth and she knew that when she finally got to a mirror it would look red and have a blister or two upon its surface. Still, Lil smiled as she replied.

  “Thank you, Holder.”

  “That is enough practice for today. You have shelving to do before the doors must be opened.”

  “Yes, Holder.” She said it with such force that one of the blisters on her tongue burst, spilling sour sweetness into her mouth.

  She hurried from the room. As soon as the door closed behind her, she turned her head to the side and spat the foulness into the corner. A clump of shadows formed a fist and caught the glob of spit before it could hit the floor or wall.

  “Thank you.”

  The shadow bent at the wrist, as if replying, before it disappeared. She had no idea which of the Athenaeum Nif it had been but she would leave out a choice book for them as reward.

  She turned another corner and opened the door to the office. All three of the shelving carts hurried forward, eager to be of use. They squeaked and squirmed and tried to get more an
d more pats from her. However, only one was loaded. She calmed the other two down, promising them both that they would be of use soon and led the ecstatic one out of the office.

  Only the top shelf was filled, so Lil quickly rearranged the books by location. She only had a few minutes to sunset. She was sorry she had to rush; Lil actually liked her shelving duties, though she was aware most others would find it boring. She loved handling the books, familiarizing herself with their covers, the dents and stains, everything that made up their history.

  The shelving cart squeaked in excitement as it followed her and she reached back, caressing the rough wood of its skin as she picked up a book. She glanced at the pages as she placed it on the shelf; she’d read it before. A collection of letters between sisters, women raised together and ripped apart by politics. Four of them disappeared in the Under Hive and were of course never seen again; the other two left Zebub immediately after.

  She passed one of the high windows and noted the bronze cast to the sky that turned the normal pink to the color of old blood. She was almost late.

  She hurried, ignoring the playful growls of the cart behind her as it matched her pace. The rest of the shelving was done quickly and then she made her way to the front doors. It was rather a new duty of hers. Only in the few moons since crossing her eighteenth threshold had she been trusted with opening the doors. Technically they were always unlocked for visitors to enter, but the doors were kept wide open during the darkest times at night, when the smallest delay could lead to death.

  As she turned a corner, a Nif broke away from the other shadows, in their general star-shaped form. It ran alongside her, whistling and chattering. She smiled as a couple others joined it.

  When she’d first been given to the Athenaeum, after crossing into six, everything about the place had scared her—the dark corners, the books that leapt out, eager to be read and held, the shelving carts that chased her about wanting a pat, the room of scrolls and bones, but the Nif most of all. The little creatures of shadow that served most public buildings terrified her. She had been a poor ’dant. What had she known of living shadow?