by Kyle Spencer
“Bullshit.”
***
I let go and Susi flies through the air with a look of ‘if we get out of here alive I’m killing you anyways’ plastered on her face. One of the cait na bienne underneath tracks her motions through the air while the other two crouch down, ready to pounce and carve me with those ridiculously huge swords of theirs. Welp, it was a good run, but now I’m going to be diced to pieces by half-naked cats right after being sacrificed by psychotic villagers in the middle of a haunted forest.
I guess there are worse ways to go.
Just as the two spring into action, the are yanked to a halt midair and left dangling with hackles and tails all fuzzy. Vines like entwined rope dotted with rose thorns are wrapped about their ankles. The one who was tracking the airborne Susi is gasping for breath and clawing at the vines constricting his neck. All their eyes are the size of dinner plates and pleading mews gurgle in their throats. Suddenly one is flung through the air like a ragdoll. He crashes into the blackness and out of sight. Another instant and the other two are whipped back in the opposite direction into the forest. Their yowling and screaming echo off the gargantuan trees but suddenly stop with two quick snaps.
Without hesitating I run to where Susi sits rubbing her butt and nab her by the scruff of her neck. Without missing a step I throw her on my shoulders. “Time to run. Time to run. Don’t look back.” I hurdle a thick root, almost tripping over it. “Don’t look back. Don’t look ahead. Keep your eyes closed.”
Those sacrifices the villagers were making weren’t for nothing; there’s something powerful in this forest. And I really, really don’t want to meet it.
Silence surrounds us as I hightail it through the forest - the same silence that greeted us when we first entered Ivywood. My own heavy breathing joins the crunching of leaves and snapping twigs. As I rush blindly through the night, another sound starts out far behind us, quiet at first but growing louder…and closer. Muscles scream and burn as they’re pushed to go faster.
“Bow!” Susi yells. “Bow something’s coming!”
Before I can retort with a ‘No shit’, fangs dig deep into my ankles and wrists and I’m lifted high into the air. Susi tries to clutch my neck as I’m raised by vines but she loses her grip and tumbles to the ground. The thorns bite deeper into my flesh as my arms and legs are stretched to their furthest, leaving me suspended in the air like a criminal on the rack. Glancing around frantically I see a faint object emerging from the dark mire in front of me. The writhing mass of vines glides along the forest floor until its within spitting distance. Slowly the spiked tendrils unravel to reveal gnarled tree branches underneath.
No. Not branches. Horns. But covered with bark and leaves.
The vines continue their strange burlesque show to reveal the pitch black head of a deer. His eyes glow a bright summer green that slowly turn to a swirl of oranges, reds and yellows. As the vines drop below his bare chest those eyes turn to a smattering of brown and white, then bright pink. The vines stop at his waist and his eyes repeat the pattern in this mesmerizing melding of colors. The deer spreads his arms wide and glides until he is face-to-face with me. I stare into his eyes…those lulling eyes…forever changing seasons. He reaches out and gently grabs hold of my chin. Turning my head this way and that, he inspects my face.
“Do you know” His voice hurls me back to my childhood, where I would sit under the cherry trees and watch the gentle breezes carry blossoms out and over the pond, “Why you are here?” His breath is as soft and warm as his voice and his touch is like lying on a bed of moss.
“I think I have a pretty good idea.” I say. He pulls his hand away to reveal that it actually has become moss, or at least grown a layer of it. Tiny glowing mushrooms sprout on his chest and his whole form takes on a more plant-like appearance. Mossy fingers grow long and twisted as they stretch out towards my chest. Thin green lights zip up in streams from his elbow to the tips of his fingers.
“Bow!” Leena calls to me, her voice high and panicked. “Bow don’t let him touch you with that don’t let him touch me with that!” Her blue light pulses with distress through my robes.
The thing across from me is taken aback by the fox spirit’s voice. His gaze veers down to the where my vial still pulses. “I am very sorry.” His finger tendrils snake down towards Leena midst her cries of nonononono! Just as the first fleck of glowing moss reaches her stopper, the deer - no, it only looks like a deer - lurches back with a scream. A scream that cracks and shrieks like a tree felled by lightning or a woodsman’s ax. A black scar carves its way up his side, burning and curling his skin and withering the various plants growing from his body. My joints pop back into place as the vines holding me in place suddenly let go. I drop like a rock to the soft, leaf-covered ground below. Not soft enough though; as I land a sharp snap and jab of pain strikes the middle of my tail. Well shit, that’s one more thing to worry about.
As the thing writhes in agony above me, Susi runs up from my left. In Leena’s dim light the tiny maus looks especially haggard. She adjusts her delicate pink gloves and grabs me by the sleeve. “Time to go.” Her voice is hoarse and raspy.
I don’t argue. I don’t ask questions. I just get up and get the Hel out of there.
Braving one look back I see the strange plant/deer thing standing high in the air. The black scar glows like a firefly as it fades away to nothingness. Those shifting eyes track us as we rush out into the night. There is no longer any bemusement or curiosity in those ever-changing eyes.
Only fear.
***
“I really don’t know why he let us go. Honest.” The maus’ voice quavers a bit and I decide to let it drop for now.
“Okay, I get it. We both have secrets and that’s okay. Just promise me one thing.”
“Hmm?”
“Whatever you’re hiding, I think it’s big. And if it looks like it’s about to bite us in the ass let me know before it does. ‘Kay?” I really hate not knowing things, especially things that would give a forest god pause. But I’m not about to sit a child down and interrogate her.
Susi smiles a little and nods, relieved that I’m not being a dick about it.
“So where is this place?” Leena yawns. “And does it have ice cream?”
“You’ll know it when you see it.” We step out of a particularly narrow alley into a ghost town. Or at least a ghost neighborhood. Surrounding this block on all sides are four and five-story buildings, cutting this relatively small area off from the rest of the city and leaving it largely forgotten. Nobody save one lives here anymore; all the small homes and shops remain as battered artifacts from an earlier Aquarian. It’s all for the best, considering this quarter’s single resident.
Our footsteps echo through the streets and rattle around inside the old buildings. Susi grips my tail tighter as she shuffles along behind me. Fortunately, that fall in the forest only sprained my tail. And considering the spooky atmosphere, I think I can withstand a little soreness from Susi’s tail-grabbing. Slowly we make our way over the torn up cobblestones and overturned streetlamps, always keeping an eye on the gaping doorways for vagrants. Most of the city’s homeless know to stay the Hel away from this area. Only three types tend to venture into Old Town: the lost, the unstable, and those trying to hide. Sometimes all three.
“Your friend lives around here?” Susi whispers. She shrinks when that whisper is sent back from a open shop to our left. Just an echo, but the acoustics make it sound creepy as Hel. “Why?”
“You’ll see.”
As we delve deeper into the center of this ancient part of the city the buildings begin to grow farther and farther apart and the cobblestone streets become less…cobbled. The walls are pockmarked and scorched, if they’re standing at all. The path ahead of us twists around craters both large and small. Anyone who first steps foot in this godsforsaken area would think that a great battle for this city, nay, for the entire country, was waged here. But for me, that battle is known as ‘Tyrsday af
ternoon’.
The damage intensifies as we reach the central plaza. All around the dirt square the buildings are crumbled and wrecked. In the center though, stands one lone shop. The tiny shack looks like its made of tar; the bricks are so burnt and blackened. A thin trail of greyish-green smoke rises into the blue sky from the crooked chimney. A sign made from glued shards of wood hangs above the thick metal door: Archeleus Zott, Alchemist Extraordinare; the ‘Extraordinare’ bit has been recently scrawled on with red paint. Susi cocks an eye towards the dilapidated workshop and looks at me questioningly. I smile and nod. She shrugs and heads towards the door. As her pink dress swishes over the dirt and mud something tugs at the back of my mind. While that thought continues to elude me a high shrill whine pierces through my ears. Susi stops as well. She listens for a second, shrugs again, and continues for the door. The whine rises higher and higher.
Oh fuckshit.
Pink gloves grasp the door’s handle as I kick up dirt in a full-tilt sprint to Susi. The whine continues to rise like a tea kettle stuck over a fire. Susi looks back at me and her hazel eyes grow wide.
Apparently, mausen give a squeaky little oomph! when you tackle them. But before she can slap or kick me for driving her half a foot into the mud, the metal door explodes out, carving a deep gash where Susi stood moments before. That slippery thought finally comes to me; never approach from the front. Acrid black smoke pours out of the newly made opening. From it emerges a colossus.
The bear is soot-black from head to toe with smoky goggles over his eyes. He wears drab overalls with thick workman’s gloves. Susi lets out a little yelp as the smoking giant trundles over to us and lifts us both up like we were mere dolls. The matte goggles shift from me to susi then back again. He draws me close and suddenly gives me a wide, shit-eating grin.
“Bow! You have made friend!” He flashes a quick smile at the maus and turns back to me and with a much more serious tone, “Did you bring back guns?”
“What’s a gun?” Susi asks shakily.
“Funny you should mention that, Archy. But they were kinda destroyed. By me. In a fire.” Before the last words escape me I’m falling back down into the mud as Archy groans.
“How am I to ever improve on design if you keep destroying my creations?”
“Well for starters you can make sure they don’t explode instead of firing.” I rub my right arm were the shrapnel had left small raised scars under my fur.
“How many this time?”
“Just one. But it-”
“Hah!” Archy slaps his thigh. “One is better than three, no? Or all six.”
“But not as good as zero.”
“Eh, details.” He waves me off and turns his attention to the terrified and confused maus still clutched in his left paw. “Please forgive me, child. I have yet to make proper introduction. My name is Professor Archeleus Zott. I am one and only true alchemist in city. Come, come. I will show you my workshop and will help get you cleaned up. I have also just finished making soup for lunch.”
“W-what was that explosion just now?” Susi asks timidly.
Archy turns around and smiles again, his canines the size of my fingers. “Is very good soup.”
Just Another Job
Try Professor Zott’s new and improved Love Potion! (Now with active ingredients!)
- Ad found in the Aquarian Gazette
“It’s bigger…on the outside.” Susi chokes on the smell that assaults us as we enter Archy’s lab. The acrid stench of sulfur mixes with thick smoke and cooked vegetables to create a noxious wave that only the most iron-clad of stomachs can handle.
Susi’s stomach is not iron-clad.
As the maus dashes outside to retch up her breakfast of ice cream and sweets, Archy gives me an embarrassed shrug. “I should open window, yes?”
“Archy, there are no windows.” I cough as I inspect the bubbling pot in the fireplace. A thick brown stew full of potatoes and carrots fights off the workshop’s other, less pleasant aromas.
“Then I shall make window.” The professor picks up a small bowl from a workbench in the corner and pulls out a huge glob of some thick black paste from it. He smears the sludge in a rough square shape on the wall. “You...might want to back up.” He says. I shuffle closer to the open door. “...farther.” Out the door. “...farther.” I nab a dry-heaving Susi and pace out thirty steps away from the workshop. The bear walks to the doorway, smiles broadly and gives a thumbs-up. He then turns back and ruffles through the satchel at his hip until he procures a shiny bead. With a flick of the wrist he sends the tiny thing zinging at the goop on the wall.
The results are...less than spectacular. A very loud pop!, like a rock giant cracking its knuckles, echoes around the empty square. Susi and I walk back to a defeated-looking professor, who is examining a fist-sized hole in the wall where the paste used to be.
“Where is earth-shattering kaboom?” He muses to himself. He looks back at us and tries to cover his disappointment. “Oh well. Just needs more work. But soup is ready!”
And what a soup it is! As long as I’ve known Archy he’s been able to cook up some fantastic things, food stuffs or otherwise. Before Susi and I even finish wolfing down our helpings he busies himself ladling more of the rich broth into our bowls. He then plops down on a stool by the fire and removes his goggles, revealing two ice blue eyes surrounded by rings of white.
“This is delicious!” Susi exclaims while wiping her mouth with a gloved hand.
“Thank you.” Archy beams. He leans in closer to the maus and with a wink says, “The secret ingredient is saltpeter.”
“Saltpeter?” Susi looks into her bowl questioningly. The professor is suddenly at the edge of his seat, enormous paws on his knees like a little cub ready to tell an exciting secret. He looks at me expectantly (as if he actually needs my permission) but I slowly shake my head. Get him started on alchemy and he’ll never shut up. His smile fades.
“I’ll explain some other time.” He sighs. Then his eyes narrow at me, “Κсати, do you have my cut from the last job?”
“Funny you should ask…”
Archy’s groan shakes the furniture. “How am I to keep workshop operational? Is simple arrangement: I give you weapons, you give me cash. Блядъ! You are lucky you are good friend...and good test subject.”
“Yeah well, you’re lucky that your guns actually fucking work. Most of the time. And besides, it’s kinda hard to keep track of money when you’re captured by a godsdamned leopard warlord.”
The air between us is thick with silence save for the frequent tiny slurps of Susi finishing her third bowl of soup. Archy blinks a bit and leans back, placing his large paws behind his head. “Warlord?” He asks. Susi and I take turns telling of our escape and journey to Aquarian, strategically leaving out most of Evershade. One fucked-up scenario per story is enough.
“Bow…” Leena speaks up after our story finishes, causing our host to whip his head around and stare at my chest. “Bow, may I...may I please have some of that delicious smelling food?” I almost laugh out loud at the strain in her voice, like trying to be polite is literally killing her. Hel, for all I know it actually might be.
“Looks like you made two friends.” Archy says with no lack of wonder. “I would love to inspect it...her? If you would allow, of course.”
“No.” Leena and I say at once, raising Archy’s eyebrows.
“Touch me and I will devour you.” She growls
“Yeah...she’s not allowed of her, um-”
“You were going to say cage.” Leena says flatly.
“Was not! I was going to say crystal palace of safety.”
“Cage.” Susi and Leena say together.
“Perhaps later.” Archy scratches his chin thoughtfully. “I’m assuming you are back in town for a while, yes? There is another job available if you wish. Is right here in Aquarian too!”
“I’m assuming that when you say ‘if you wish’ you really mean ‘that I’ve already signed y
ou up for’.” I chuckle. Archy smiles and shrugs innocently. “And I’m assuming you’ve got another set of guns ready for me as well.” Another smile and shrug. I sigh. “Fine. But I’m gonna need to find a new maul. An ogre broke the last one.”
“No problem.” A giant paw sweeps towards the far corner where hammers of all shapes and sizes sit propped against the wall. “Take your pick.”
“Sweet.” I go over and browse the selection of blunt force weapons. “So what’s the job?”
“There has been string of murders in northern part of town.” His voice is low. “Fifteen murders in two weeks.
“Get the fuck outta here.” I stop in my tracks. “That many?” My mind races to any conversation that I might have heard when we entered town about the news but nothing pops up. “Why haven’t I heard any word of it on the streets?”
“Because word has not gone out. The city guard is keeping this one very - how do you say - under wraps.”
“Then how did you hear about it?” Susi asks.
“I have many friends in low places. And a few in high ones.” He winks at her.
“Any leads?” I ask. The professor apologizes with a shake of the head. “Ugh. And what about a reward?” He throws out a number that is obviously a mistake. My jaw drops to the floor. So does Susi’s. “H-holy shit. Okay then. I’ll start investigating tonight.
“Ooh! Ooh! Can I come?” Susi scoots closer on her stool, eyes wide and excited.
“Absolutely not!” Archy folds his paws sternly. “Much too dangerous.”
“It can’t be that bad.” Her hazel eyes drift to the floor. “I mean, if you’re sending Bow to do it…”
“Ha!” The shack cracks with a giant knee-slap. “Little maus has good point.”
“Still too dangerous.” I grab a well-worn sledgehammer and let it swing like a pendulum. Good weight. Handle is nice and worn. Probably would last at least a job or two. Yeah, this’ll work. “We don’t even know what we’re up against.”
“I can handle myself.” She protests.
