Wh-what is this? Kellen dared to ask of her. Who are you?
The Mother of Masks gave him no answer, but her mutterings continued in a harsh, foreign tongue that Kellen held no knowledge of ever having heard before. When she touched him again, a seizing, cold fit wracked his body.
What’s happening to me?! He demanded to know.
Again, the Mother of Masks refused him.
The answer came from another in attendance; a descending demon from the above that Kellen had not previously seen watching him from the shadows between the doors.
Kanaloa, Kellen cried out as the elderly Sancul came to rest at his side. Help me.
We are, favored one, said Kanaloa. Soon the true Doom-Bringer shall finally awaken within you to lead us in the prophecied ascendency with body and mind both newly renewed and restored, the elderly Sancul patted him upon the shoulder. All thanks to your noble sacrifice, Kellen Shore-Walker.
Don’t . . . Kellen begged, understanding both the betrayal and the truth by the look in Kanaloa’s eyes; how the elder Sancul had known all along that Kellen had never been the Moros he pretended to be. Lost with the understanding that Kanaloa would no longer aid him, Kellen imagined his doom soon to come. His lip quivering, he reflected back on the last, weeping song of the Ancient beast that the Sancul had slain in Mnemosyne to heal his broken body. Please. He begged of Kanaloa, knowing it for a lost cause. Don’t do this.
We must, child, said Kanaloa, smiling. But fear not. Soon, all your pain shall be ended, the blight upon your memory banished forever as the pain of remembrance works through you in full.
Kanaloa dug his fingernails into Kellen’s shoulder, then. Each of them skewered his flesh as if they were nails meant to pin him against the stone.
The pain that came after was worse.
Kellen screamed with the wracking wave of it flooding through him. His back arched in aching agony upon the white-marbled bed, even as he held no control over the movement.
When Kanaloa’s hand struggled to keep Kellen pinned upon the stone bed, the elder Sancul used the full weight and strength of his tentacles to press and hold his captive down again.
Kellen’s mind swam once more, his vision alternating between stilted colors and darkness. Please . . . he begged to any that would listen, knowing none of the Sancul would. Help me. I-I don’t want to die.
No, child, said Kanaloa. Cease your worries and your fears . . . He motioned for Phantasos to reposition Kellen’s head once more, again forcing him to look up at the pair of opposing doors above. For death holds no power over those who have discovered its secrets, favored one, Kanaloa purred. Truly, it is a new and better life awaiting you now on the Other side.
Kellen’s eyes stung with warmth when the last of the poison overtook his face. In his last moments, Kellen’s gaze narrowed upon the doors and beyond them too.
The mated pair swam together atop the highest shadowed ledge, their expressions as opposite as the manner in which they conversed with Kellen since he came among the Sancul. Wrapped in her husband’s strong embrace, Kellen looked into the face of his earthly mother, losing himself in the concern laced in her emerald eyes. For all that he saw from Nyx, Kellen understood then that it was more curious intrigue she held for all that lay ahead, not the true worry he remembered from his mother ashore before she too had abandoned him.
You’re not her. Kellen understood the deeper truth, then. You were never her.
The Salt soaked up his tears as he submitted himself to the grief of abandonment he had long held and kept buried deep within. Through blurred eyes, he looked away from Nyx, not wanting to see his mother again in any form; neither the real one, nor the memory of her that Nyx pretended to be. Instead, Kellen Winstel found himself using his final moments to stare into the truer concern and apologetic gaze of another that he had always imagined as his enemy.
Erebus . . . Kellen wept. You were right! H-Help me. Please!
For all the wrinkling of his brow, the likewise suffering that Kellen witnessed living upon the face of Erebus, the mammoth Sancul would not budge from his position, or his wife.
It is too late for you now, Kellen read in the marbled gaze of Erebus. Far too late for you, Creature . . . and I did warn you.
The Sancul poison overtook his body and mind in full, then, casting him into true and utter darkness, and all that Kellen Winstel knew in life was stolen from him.
28
SYDNEY
Sydney trembled when Solomon and his Orcs led into her dungeon cell. This is it, isn’t it? Today is the day they’re going to execute Mom. She closed her eyes, then, imagining her mother’s face and that of another mentor too.
Be brave, Sydney . . . the quiet voice of her fallen godmother, Yvla, whispered from memory. Be brave.
Help me to be strong, Yvla. Sydney prayed, swallowing another breath of Salt water when Solomon ordered the others to remove her from the tank. Help me to be brave for Mom today.
She continued the mantra with every step taken on the same path that the Orcs had led her down all the previous days of her mother’s trial. For each and every dungeon door passed by, Sydney wondered if still more of her friends resided inside their walls, trapped in darkness, unknowing that she traipsed by their doors. Are you alive, Ellie? She wondered. Garrett? Where are you now? Her eye stung with the thought of their faces and names, the knowledge of all to come.
Sydney banished all thoughts of them with the idea of what Yvla, or her brother, Quill would say. Stop crying! She squinted her eyes closed to fend off the tears and weakness surging through her. Don’t let them see you weak and afraid. You have to be brave now. You have to be brave for Mom and Owens and Amelia too. They’ve all suffered far more than you.
Though she attempted to hold some bravery in the face of her captors and circumstances, Sydney could not hold off the flood behind her eyes. Drowning in grief for all that she knew to come, Sydney numbly walked the tunnel and ventured into the cell where the Silkie handmaidens awaited her. She scarcely felt the frigid water of her bath and the hard scrubbings from the handmaidens preparing her to again wear the role of a New Pearlaya princess. Be brave, Sydney, she repeated over and again, even as her body trembled with the cold and her fears. Be brave . . .
When all was done, Solomon and the other Orcs marched her onward through the Nautilus tunnels, Sydney again dressed in the royal part of a princess with an armed escort flanking her on either side. Unlike in the previous days, Sydney found no one waiting for her at the tunnel’s end. No more Rupert to stand between her and the Orcs. No sight of the king, or Blackfin, to torment her either. Solomon and the Orc guards continued in their escort of her across the threshold and remained with Sydney on her silent march through the Nautilus stands too.
The awaiting crowd rose and cheered at the sight of her, but Sydney gave them no acknowledgment, or reason to continue. Still, the audience applauded her arrival as Solomon and his Orcs brought Sydney to the king’s pavilion and entered in.
Rupert awaited her there. The mask of sternness he wore dropped when Solomon handed his charge of Sydney over.
For a moment, Sydney thought Rupert looked as she had remembered him from their shared days of training and riding in the royal stables. She banished those memories too, a moment later, flinching at his soft touch upon her arm. Still, she did not resist him, Rupert’s grip being far gentler than Solomon’s or any other Orcs’.
She allowed Rupert to lead her further in to take up her chair beside the king’s, but Sydney refused to look at her former friend again as they walked together. Instead, she chose to watch Solomon and the other Painted Guard carry on down the Nautilus rows, then cross over the makeshift bridge to join their fellow soldiers already waiting upon the barge. With Solomon’s arrival and their ranks swelling for his company added, the Painted Guard soldiers fanned out in ten-feet intervals to encircle the barge perimeter and stand watch over the prisoners.
In the Merrow cage, Amelia huddled close to her father, Ja
ck. Both had gathered toward the middle of the cell to keep away from the bars and beyond the reach of the Painted Guard soldiers outside.
In opposite of the Merrows, those imprisoned inside the Orc cages were standing along the bars of their cages, each appearing as ready as the next if any Painted Guard thought to try and reach them. At the forefront of all, Owens and his father had gathered alongside Makeda and still others that Sydney did not recognize. Each had fanned out along the bars and jail door in shared defiance of the other Orcs who stood guard over them.
At the center of all loomed the glass tank that Sydney had originally feared was meant to reveal her Nomad secret to the awaiting crowd.
Sydney’s pulse quickened at the memory of the dead Nomad who had been cast inside in place of her to convict the queen. The anonymous corpse that the Orcs had placed there in lieu of Jun Gao was thankfully removed, the waters re-filled to the brim with clean water and stilled within.
Sydney shuddered in knowing who would inhabit the watery prison next.
The master of ceremony and executioner stood atop the tank, Malik Blackfin perched upon the surrounding scaffolding like a giant, armored crow in patient wait of the condemned queen’s arrival.
Be brave, Sydney. She reminded herself again when Rupert guided Sydney to her chair beside the king and forced her to sit. Though she did not mean to look on him, Sydney’s eyes widened at the momentary glimpse of the king.
Dark circles had swelled beneath Darius’s eyes and he sat slouched upon his makeshift throne, his violet cape covering him as if he were cold. The sharpness in his gaze softened when he noticed Sydney watching. For a moment, she feared Darius meant to engage her in conversation, but the king’s focus shifted when a series of horns sounded from the center of the barge.
Her attention called by the noise also, Sydney looked to the tunnel opposite her.
The crowd was rousing too. A company of Painted Guard marched free of the tunnel, their visors drawn to shield their identities as each surrounded Nattie Gao in armored escort. Despite the crowd’s cries against her, Nattie held her head high in quiet defiance of the slurs that were hurled against her as she walked.
Then, came more than words from the crowd.
Nattie Gao staggered when a rotten melon, expertly thrown, struck the side of her head and burst upon the landing.
Sydney yelped at the blow to her mother, bits of the smashed melon and its juicier insides running down her mother’s brow and cheeks. A wave of further expired produce, fish, and worse came raining down in succession thereafter. Sydney turned toward the king. “Stop this!” She reached for him and was quickly yanked back by Rupert. “Please!” She begged of Darius. “Stop them!”
The king ignored her cries, even as Sydney continued to wrest against Rupert’s control.
Collapsing against Rupert’s strength, Sydney’s body shook at the continued onslaught against the queen. Be brave, Sydney . . . she told herself, weeping at her mother’s continued attempts to rise against the filth heaped upon her. Be brave like Mom.
At Nattie’s continued struggling against the wave of garbage, the Orcs raised their shields and then converged around her. Creating a shield wall to fend off the onslaught rained upon them and the convicted queen, the Painted Guard carried through in their escort. They did not remove their protection of the queen until crossing over the makeshift bridge, beyond the reach and throws of the booing crowd.
The Painted Guard paused a moment, one among their number roughly wiping the filth from Nattie’s eyes so that the condemned queen might see where to walk of her own accord.
Her face and garb besmirched, Nattie Gao carried on toward the water-filled tank and ascended the scaffolding steps without the aid of any Orc. The queen’s face carried a sternness that Sydney had come to recognize when Nattie scolded both her and Jun too. Despite the brave showing, however, Sydney could not help but notice her mother’s trembling, shackled hands and the white-knuckled grip the queen held upon her chains as she lifted the ends of her gown to climb the scaffolding steps. Reaching the top, facing the Blackfin and watery cell, the queen’s shoulders began shaking too. Nattie’s chin dipped to her chest also when the Blackfin guided her to step out onto a single wooden plank lain across either tank end. Like an over-sized dunking tank with its victim positioned several feet over the water, Sydney saw there was nothing for her mother to grab hold of. Nothing to keep her from falling inside if, or when, she was pushed off the beam.
Nattie hesitated to walk the plank.
The Blackfin nudged the queen to traverse it anyway.
Sydney choked in watching her mother’s trembling hands as the queen stood at the end of the plank, awaiting the drop to come.
The Blackfin reiterated the queen’s crimes, conviction, and final sentencing to the crowd. That the penalty for high treason was death and the judgement would be carried out immediately, unless the king saw fit to give his queen a merciful stay of the execution.
Sydney turned to Darius, pleading in her eyes, even as she knew it all for naught with every moment passed. “Please,” Sydney found her voice, reaching for the king, grabbing hold of his hand and squeezing with all the strength in her. “Please, don’t do this. You can stop this all right now.”
His eyes already glazing, Darius shook his head. “Would that I could, child,” he said softly. “Aye, if only I could.”
“But you can,” Sydney cried. “You’re the king.”
“Aye,” said he. “And the people require justice.”
Sydney released him then. “This isn’t justice. It’s payback for how Mom hurt you, just like you’re hurting us both now.”
Darius looked away, ignoring Sydney’s continued pleas, giving a nod to the Blackfin instead.
Sydney startled at the sound of her mother’s immediate yelp and the splash that came after. Wheeling toward the tank, she saw Nattie thrashing underwater, her momentum and chains carrying her to the tank bottom amid a swirled churn of bubbles.
Even as she descended, Nattie’s feet and legs began shifting into a dolphin tail. The queen stopped her morphing efforts when the fetters around her ankles cut off her attempt. In failure, Nattie coughed up a stream of bubbles, her gaze looking toward the surface and kicking with human legs in another failed attempt to reach her goal of escape.
The Blackfin stole those hopes away too, ordering his Orcs to pull on a pair of heavy chins that then slid a weighted, stone lid over the top of the tank and locked it down.
Sydney flew to her feet at the sight of Nattie flailing away, her fists banging away at the glass walls of the tank as if the Blackfin and his Orcs might rethink their royal orders. “Stop!” Sydney screamed, turning her hate and fear on the king, striking at him several times before Rupert pulled her away. “Please . . .” Sydney cried through her tears. “Please! Stop this and save her!”
Then, Sydney heard the overwhelming gasps from the crowd.
Rupert’s grip too had relented for the moment.
Sydney shrugged free of him, only to feel the seahorse-lord taking hold of her again before she had taken two steps forward. “Let go of me!” She fought against his pulling her close once more, stopping when she saw that which had drawn the outcry from the crowd.
Nattie was no longer flailing inside the tank . . . and the water inside had been reduced by half.
Sydney’s brow furrowed at where the water could have gone and vanished so suddenly too. What the . . .
Atop the scaffolding, the Blackfin was raging at his soldiers. “Get this lid off!” he yelled at those sharing the landing with him. “Under!” he cried to all those guarding the barge. “Dive! Dive! They’re underneath, you bloody fools!”
Underneath? Sydney wondered, looking to the water that surrounded the barge, finding the water choppy with the movement of all those scrambling to obey.
Most did not reach the barge’s end.
In keeping with the Blackfin’s orders, one among the Painted Guard ran to dive off the edge an
d swim below. He was stopped when another of his Orcish fellows armored in black plate caught him by the wrist. The glint of silver came near faster than Sydney’s eye could follow, and she swore that the second of the Painted Guard soldiers had run the other through.
The reality of what she saw cemented in her mind when several of the other soldiers upon the barge also began to fall. Blood spewed forth from the mortal wounds given the Orc soldiers by others who had stood beside them as brothers-in-arms not moments before.
Anarchy ensued upon the barge as the Painted Guard turned on one another, each warier than the next at who was truly friend or foe, and all with their visors down to shield their true identities and intentions of the others.
The Unwanted! Sydney thought when a war broke out among them, remembering back to her time with Quill and Yvla. How her mentor’s lover, an Orc named Fulcrum, had once smuggled Sydney and Yvla away from Anchor Alley and then come to them again disguised in soldier’s armor on the night she was taken by the Blackfin.
One among the Painted Guard confirmed her suspicions a moment later. Stumbling in an attempt to reach the prisoner cages, the supposed soldier’s helmet fell off and skittered across the barge. The soldier within was no Orc, nor even Merrow, but a Silkie face that was far more familiar and welcomed by Sydney Gao. Ellie?!
Though burdened by the weight of Orcish armor and the blood-slicked footing upon the barge, Ellie climbed to her feet again. Ignoring the ongoing fight all around her, Ellie carried onward across the chaotic barge. She lumbered toward the prisoner cages as the other Painted Guard pretenders fought on against the Blackfin’s soldiers.
Sydney pounded the railing in front of her, watching her Silkie friend run toward the Orc prisoner cages. Come on, Ellie! Come on!
Salt Storm: The Salted Series: Episodes #31-35 Page 44