Cloudfyre Falling - A dark fairy tale

by A. L. Brooks

  RISE OF HOR

  1

  LONG after the shockwave had swept away, Gargaron lay in the leaf litter moaning, unsure what had hit him. He opened his eyes and gazed up into the trees. His vision were blurred. He blinked and lifted his hand to rub his eyes but his arm felt as heavy as stone.

  After a while, and with great effort, he sat up, aching from toe to chin. Blood dripped down his face. He blinked, hoping to clear his vision. But his left eye were gummed up with some sort of warm sticky substance. He tried wiping it away but pain came back at him. Gently he fingered his eye socket. His eye were naught but mush, and the bone were shattered, crumpled, caved-in.

  He looked around. Uncertain where he were. Gargantuan woodland trees rose up about him, so tall he could not see where they ended. He took his gourd from his belt only to find it bashed in somehow and without its lid. It held but two or three sips of water. Which he tipped into his mouth.

  He took some deep breaths then staggered to his feet. Weak, he stumbled. One of his legs shot up with excruciating pain. He grimaced. Using trees around him for support he managed to stay upright. He strained his good eye, hoping to focus his vision. It did not matter, the world around him remained a haze.

  2

  Absently clasping his empty gourd, he vacated the tree against which he were leaning. He held his arms out in front of him. He stumbled into another trunk. And held himself to it as if to let go would mean falling down and never getting up again. He steadied himself, took long breaths, tried focusing his good eye. Blood ran down his face.

  He slid down the tree to his rump and sat there panting. He smudged the blood from his face. There were a hundred other bleeding wounds across his body. They itched and stung. He reached for his pack, not even sure if it were still clung to him. He sighed with relief when he felt it there, strapped across his back. Unhitching it took tremendous effort. The strap were caught on his shoulder. He hung his head, panting, spit swinging from his lips in bloody tendrils. Eventually he wrestled the pack into his lap. He did not notice that Drenvel’s Bane were missing. He were concerned only with fetching out his medicinal satchel. From inside he took a small black-glass jar. He screwed the stopper with his thumb and finger back and forth until it came free. Dropping the cork he upended a handful of miniscule primate like critters into his palm. None of them were any bigger than the Ladybird Beetles that his dear Veleyal liked to collect on spring mornings.

  He picked one up in his fingers and placed it as near as he could estimate to the gushing wound on his forehead. He had to do it by touch. Though his fingertips felt numb. Still, he knew once the scent of blood brought the critter from its stasis, the critter would need no help seeking the wound.

  He felt it move, felt it waking. Felt it clambering across his brow like an ant. Then felt it at his wound—a sensation like a mad bee sting and then a satisfying tingling sensation and a gradual numbing of pain.

  He placed others across his body. Through blurred sight he watched them awaken. They scurried about him in search of ruptured flesh. When they sniffed out a bloodied wound they opened their ravenous mouths and sunk their fangs in.

  Gargaron let the Zombeez cavort over his body, their rampant appetites driving them to his wounds, where they drank and ate. The giant’s physiology were no friend to them however. Their saliva stimulated Gargaron’s immune system and flaps of his skin folded over each of the undead creatures, absorbing them into his flesh thus arresting blood flow and sealing each wound.

  He sat back, moved to take another draught of water. None remained. He dropped the empty gourd and closed his eyes, grimacing, hoping, praying that he had not lost too much blood. Above him the two suns beat down through Vol Mothaak’s canopy, hot and oppressive.

  3

  Sometime later, once the Zombeez had done their business, Gargaron tried standing again. Using the nearest tree for support, he climbed to his feet but when he stepped forward his legs crumpled beneath him and he collapsed into the leaf matter. He lay there panting. Sweat ran into his good eye. He smudged it away with his wrist. He climbed to his feet again, gripping the smooth bark of the trees about him. He stepped forward, one foot at a time.

  He stumbled aimlessly, looking about, trying to gain his bearings. ‘Melai,’ he tried calling though his voice were reduced to mere croaks. ‘Hawkmoth. Locke. Where be you?’

  He were never certain which way he were heading. He thought of the tower. Where did it stand? If he could only glimpse it through the woods he might gather his bearings. Unless of course his friends had succeeded in pulling it to ground. His memory, his mind, everything were an utter mess. He were certain of nothing.

  There were little sound, little breeze; his footfalls were muffled. The suns remained directly overhead, beaming down hot and harsh, the glaring sunlight pained his eye. He ached. His bones hurt.

  Exhausted, he fell against yet another tree trunk, panting, spit running from his mouth. ‘Thronir, help me find a way from this nightmare,’ he whispered desperately, his bloodied lips pushed against the rough bark. It were then he heard a faint swishing noise. And a glooping liquid sound, something splashing, splatting.

  He grimaced as he turned himself about, slumping spine-first against the trunk. With his one good eye he peered out into the blurred realm before him.

  He saw… movement. Thirty yards away he judged. He could not tell however what he were looking at. But the swishing sounds, the splashing noises, seemed to come from that direction.

  ‘Hawkmoth?’ he croaked. ‘Melai? Locke? Be that you?’

  If it were, none answered him.

  He pushed away from the tree, again hands held out in front of him. The conspicuous movement ahead did not cease. He pushed closer. His vision could still not make out what it were. ‘Melai,’ he croaked. ‘Hawkmoth. Somebody answer me.’

  He saw those strange beings clung to tree trunks. The faceless ones, Star Angels as Hawkmoth had called them. And he gasped when he recognised the sorcerer sprawled across a twisted bed of roots. The angels had him surrounded. And though the scene were fuzzy, Gargaron realised what were happening: the angles were jabbing him with spears. Retracting… jabbing… retracting… jabbing… again and again and again, like knives into a hoardog.

  4

  Gargaron, alarmed, reached for his sword but it were not on him and could not recall when he last had it. He looked about, thinking it may have only recently fallen from him. But if it lay in his vicinity, such were his eyesight, that he could not distinguish it from stick nor branch.

  Without thinking, he shoved his way before these Star Angels, attempting to ward off their attacks with naught but his arms. He found himself amidst a flurry of spikes that pierced his clothing and his leather arm-guards, that punctured his skin and muscle. As they retracted from his flesh, pulsing jets of blood spurted into the air.

  He staggered backwards into the ancient gnarled bark of a tree, his boots splashing through thick pools of sorcerer blood. He watched the Star Angels with his compromised vision. They clung to the tree trunks around Hawkmoth, dangling upside-down, jabbing their long spikes at him still.

  They possessed no arms with which to wield weapons. And only tentacles for legs. But he saw upon their featureless faces a large obscene orifice that spat out a tusk as long and straight as his very own great sword. They stabbed Hawkmoth repeatedly and as they retracted, drawing fresh spurts of blood, these spike drew back somehow into heads no larger than Gargaron’s.

  5

  Gargaron crouched and grabbed the sorcerer. Amidst a flurry of spear strikes he hefted Hawkmoth into his grasp and hauled him backwards.

  Sweat drained into his eye. He wiped it off but it smudged with blood and made his eyesight worse. He reached again for his sword. It were not on him. He considered Drenvel’s Bane. He reached for it. But could not feel it in his pack. He searched the ground around him hoping maybe it had slipped out when he’d grabbed hold of Hawkmoth. There were lots of blurred objects. But nothing his
fingers touched were the hammer hilt.

  He grabbed the sorcerer by the wrists, gathering his strength to haul him into his arms and run off with him. But he realised the onslaught had abated.

  He looked up.

  The angels clung to their trees. Motionless.

  Gargaron waited for the attack to kick off again. But it did not come. Why would they stop? he wondered. Unless… unless Hawkmoth were finished.

  ‘Hawkmoth?’ Gargaron croaked. ‘Hawkmoth, do you hear me?’ He could make out no detail other than large blurred patches of red upon his friend’s body that were probably blood and flesh. When his hands found them, these areas they were pulpy and wet and warm.

  ‘Hawkmoth?’ Gargaron groaned. ‘Hawkmoth! Hear me now.’

  The sorcerer were unmoving. He were sprawled and his limbs loose and unresponsive. Gargaron lowered his ear to Hawkmoth’s chest, listening.

  It were faint, but there were a heartbeat.

  ‘Hawkmoth,’ he said close to the sorcerer’s face. ‘Stay with me. Do not leave. I be here at your side. You are not alone.’ He glanced up at the Angels. They were gone he realised. He looked about. The woodland were a blur but he saw no movement.

  He turned back to Hawkmoth, wondering if some tincture in the sorcerer’s sidepack might work to bring the sorcerer round. Yet he knew nothing of Hawkmoth’s peculiar potions. Even after spending so much time in his company. He did not want to administer something that might kill the sorcerer outright. Not if there were some small chance that he might recover.

  Gargaron considered his own remedies: his Zombeez, his skin grafts, and the various potions and ointments engineered by his village druids. Nearly all were giant specific. Meant only for his kind. And yet, there were Lyfen Essence.

  Will it work on Hawkmoth though? he wondered. It had failed to save the elven woman who had ridden Grimah to him.

  6

  He took it from his pack, identifying it by feeling for its horizontal bottle. He fished it into his grasp, and held it before his face, unstoppering it, sniffing it. Like some blinds truck soul, he felt around for Hawkmoth’s face, then his mouth. He brought the bottle to Hawkmoth’s lips and dripped in what he thought would be two or three drops.

  He sat there then, wondering what to do next. A thought came to him. He lifted the vial to his face and let fall a drop into both eyes. There proved no change in his left eye; it remained spongy, broken, pulverised, unseeing. Yet, more swift than he would’ve thought possible, his good eye began to clear; the blur of the woodland realm all about him coalesced into vibrant clarity.

  He gazed down at the sorcerer and gasped when he noted the extent of Hawkmoth’s injuries. The sorcerer were a bloodied mess of broken limbs and punctured flesh. The side of his head had been torn open, one ear entirely gone. His jaw were broken. Or horribly dislocated for it hung at a horrific angle. His eyes were shut but puddled in drying blood. His arms were twisted and bent. There were a huge rent up the side of his body where even the stone skin had cracked open like a foul egg.

  Dear sorcerer, Gargaron thought, if you come back from this, it shall be a miracle.

  Gargaron felt useless. The sorcerer had brought Gargaron himself back from death. All Gargaron could manage were some drops of liquid that may or may not work.

  He sat back with a hefty sigh, dispirited, looking about, wandering what to do. And though it tortured him, he could not take his eyes from Hawkmoth for many long moments. In the end he forced himself to avert his gaze. To gaze off into the woodland and work out what to do now.

  It were here he noticed something. Through the trees, a small clearing… Some crumpled mass lay on the leafy forest floor. He saw large crab legs poking from it.

  7

  He hefted himself to his feet. And set off, grunting as he stumbled forward.

  He reached the clearing and dropped to his knees beside a massacred body. Gargaron put his hand over his mouth, despaired, terrified. It were Locke. His body ripped open. Crab guts were dragged out behind him, tangled in the trees. The shell of his remaining legs were shattered. His head were bent at a terrible angle, the bones in his neck stuck through his skin, crab blood were everywhere. There were no heart to listen for. Locke’s chest were burst open and organs were spilt out across the grass.

  Gargaron slumped back, barely able to breathe. His eye watering with tears. ‘What am I to do?’ he whimpered.

  It were obvious now, it had all gone wrong. Their plans to save their country were terminated. He pushed himself back against a tree trunk, up against its lumpy roots. He sat there weeping. His belly ached. He realised he were bleeding again. Several puncture wounds dotted his body. The roots beneath him dug into his bones. He pushed himself from them. One shifted. He pulled it free and tossed it aside. As it flung away he realised it were no root. But Drenvel’s Bane.

  He eyed it from where he sat. He cared for it no longer. What use has it ever been? he thought. What use be it now?

  He were still processing the demise of both Hawkmoth and Locke when he heard a familiar sound. The sound of swishing spikes, the sound of splashing blood.

  He looked tiredly toward Hawkmoth who lay where he’d left him. But the sorcerer were free of those fiendish Star Angels.

  Gargaron stood as quick as his aching body would allow. He clutched his aching stomach; bleeding out it were. He turned slowly, searching through the woodland near and far with his good eye. He had rotated almost fully when he saw it. Through the trees, a cluster of Angels, stabbing something out of his view.

  He did not want to imagine what it were. But he feared the worst. Melai.

  And if it were he would tear down those Angels. Though this time he needn’t be their pin cushion. He stumbled forward, and fetched Drenvel’s Bane into his grasp.

  8

  Fighting exhaustion, he staggered through the woodland. Bumping into tree and branch, gripping each for support. He drew closer and closer to the Angels. Their assault on whatever they were attacking continued. And when Gargaron finally stumbled into a small shaded glade he saw her being speared, punctured, perforated.

  Dear little wood’s nymph Melai.

  His heart sank. ‘No,’ he yelled. ‘Leave her be!’ They might as well have been digging their vicious spines into his daughter, his wife, every soul he had ever loved.

  He gripped the hilt of Hor’s legendary hammer. And as rage surged through him he felt a mighty fire ignite in his chest. Suddenly he felt his fatigue abandon him. He felt no more pain. He did not bleed. He felt all the strength and power of a thousand giants.

  Once more, the mighty hammer head appeared at the end of the hilt.

  9

  If Melai had been conscious she would have witnessed a being of enormous stature rise to his feet before her, a being clad in dark steel armour, clad in a dark steel helmet, gripping a hammer that held a bluish iridescence.

  Here now, before her unconscious form, the figure turned and let the Star Angels have his wrath. Trees were obliterated, smashed and bashed, wood splinters flew off in a thousand directions, shaken leaves rained down, catching the sun as they spun and fell. The Star Angels were pulverised, each swing treating them as if they were naught but hollowed clay dolls, golden blood splashing across the woodland. Though they did not break apart themselves, nor shatter. They were rendered across the woodland as long shards of metal, stuck out from the very trees they clung to, like streaks of silver smeared across a canvas. And none of them ever moved again.

  But Hor were not yet done. For he had spied Dark Ones standing amidst the shadows, surrounding the clearing, watching.

  Laughing a deep sonorous laugh, he stomped toward them. They put their own hammers up in defence. But while he battered them all they made no move to counter his attacks. They simply parried his hammer blows. Still, he dispatched them all the same. Twenty of them; all matching him in height and bulk. And though they did not feel to be a physical part of this world, pockets of blackness embedded in the wall of reality with glo
wing white eyes, he bludgeoned them down with his magical hammer. Until they were pockets of blackness spilled across grass and fallen oak, like fallen shadows left with naught but their searing pale eyes.

  Hor marched back and forth, wanting more, arbitrarily swinging his hammer down a tree here, another there. Once he were done, once the leaf matter had settled, once the bodies of Angels were discarded hither and thither, once there were no further sign of Dark Ones, he saw her again… Melai.

  And his fury were replaced with sadness.

  10

  By the time Gargaron knelt at Melai’s side his hammer were again but a hilt and his pain had returned and exhaustion threatened to overwhelm him, to pull him down into sweet oblivion.

  But he would not allow it.

  He would see to Melai first before his life gave way. He would either help sustain her life. Or ease her passing. Neither had he been able to do for Veleyal or Yarniya. If the gods willed his death, then so be it, but not before he tended to Melai.

  She lay crammed against the root of a tree. As if she had been thrown and kicked and stuffed there. She were bleeding profusely. She were a mess. And unmoving.

  Tears filled Gargaron’s eyes as he stared down at her small, broken body. He saw she were without her wings. He saw her limbs were snapped. He saw that her ribs had cracked and her chest cavity caved inwards. He saw spike holes punctured through her. Her pale green blood were splashed everywhere.

  And yet unbelievably, there were a pulse in her neck.

  He crouched and lay his head on her chest. It were faint, but it were there. Her precious heartbeat. ‘Melai,’ he said. ‘Melai. Do you hear me? It be Gargaron. I am here at your side. Can you hear me?’