The Darkest Bloom

by P. M. Freestone

  “They’re waking each other!” Ash warns. “Get out of range. We don’t know what they’ll do!”

  I retreat another step, only to find myself backing up against a third giant cocoon.

  It begins to writhe.

  A heartbeat later, its occupant bursts from its casing. Mandibles stretch wider than my face, and it’s a sure bet that’s where they’re aimed. I heft Ash’s dagger in my hand and stab at the side of the insect’s head.

  Jarring pain shoots up my arm.

  I recoil with a cry of surprise, the blade scraping off without doing any damage. The thing isn’t soft and gooey as I expected, but covered in a hard casing, like it’s wearing armour.

  I realize I’ve dropped my knife. Stink on a reeking stick.

  It’s as if the creature senses I’m now defenceless. It looms closer and I edge further towards the tree. Rough bark digs into my back.

  With a hiss, the thing splatters ichor across my face. I squeeze my eyes shut and turn my head away.

  Fetid breath huffs against my cheek.

  I hope it’s a quick death.

  CHAPTER 26

  Ash

  The hissing monstrosity bares its fangs mere inches from Rakel’s face.

  I pull her back by the satchel strap and shove her behind me. My pulse quickens, hands and feet tingling as I bring my sword down on the snarling creature.

  It shrieks.

  This screech is different. Before it was rage. Now it’s an unmistakable cry of pain as the creature shrinks back on itself.

  I brace a foot against its carapace and wrench my sword free, the blade dripping with green-black ooze. Whatever these things are, they’re thick-skinned. Tough, too. The wounded creature gathers itself to lunge again and I barely avoid the snap of mandibles meant for my neck.

  “Come on!” I grab Rakel’s hand. “They’re all fully formed. We must be too late in their season.”

  More and more larvae are waking around us, roiling in their cocoons, as if their first instinct, no matter what stage they’re at, is to eliminate the invasion. Our invasion.

  Rakel tries to pull away. “There’s still one that’s not moving. We have to get to it.”

  “More like we have to get away from here!” I pull her out of range of another hissing monstrosity.

  But she’s got that stubborn set to her jaw I’m beginning to recognize all too well. She yanks her knife from the belt at her waist. I know she tends it well, but that thing is for harvesting flowers. If she couldn’t pierce the creature’s armour with my dagger, she’ll have no chance with her own blade.

  She rounds on me. “If we don’t get what we came for, we’re not just risking our lives, but Nisai’s, too!”

  There’s nothing that would let me forget that, but I also haven’t forgotten that Rakel saved my life in the sandstorm. She could have left me there.

  If we stay here, I’m not sure I can defend the both of us. But we both need this cure. And Rakel has shown time and time again she’ll make her own choices, regardless of what I think.

  I flick the ichor from my sword and square my shoulders.

  Then I stride past her and into the fray.

  More and more of the larvae nightmares have torn themselves free of their cocoons. They undulate across the forest floor towards us, hissing and spitting and gnashing their pincers. Periodically, one will let out one of those ear-bleeding screeches. Then the others rear up, slamming their front ends back against the ground in rhythmic thuds, as if they’re communicating with the pattern of the beats.

  I shudder in revulsion before bringing my sword down across the midsection of the closest beast. It glances along the thing’s carapace before biting deep where two plates meet.

  “If any get near you, go for the joints!” I yell. “They’re weak points!”

  At the edge of my vision, Rakel’s horse rears and brings her hooves crashing down on the closest monstrosity. Rakel lunges, slapping her hand across the black mare’s rump. “Go!” she shouts.

  The horse turns tail and gallops towards the river.

  Smart beast.

  Pivoting, I avoid the clutches of the next creature, though not quick enough to escape a gash from barbed horns across my forearm. It’s a flesh wound, but it burns like a heated blade. I mouth a silent prayer to Riker that these things aren’t venomous.

  I manage to slice my way through the next pair of giant larvae in our path.

  It’s replaced in the next breath by another.

  And another.

  My palms slick with sweat and I’m forced to alter my grip. I swing, only to have the blade snag in a carapace. I wrench it free, the shift in weight sending one foot sliding in the damp leaf mould. The closest creature hisses, spraying me with ichor. Then I’m regaining balance, snatching a breath, edging closer and closer to the one unmoving cocoon.

  Rakel follows in my wake. The forest floor is clogged with green-black blood, my boots slipping around lumps and chunks of insect. I’m breathing hard with the effort of the fight, sucking in air that reeks of death and bile and something overwhelmingly metallic.

  When I finally reach the right tree, I cut the mute cocoon down. It falls to the ground and splits on impact, contents exploding like too-ripe fruit. Viscous liquid and half-formed butterfly parts spray in all directions.

  I drag a hand over my face, wiping the bug guts from my eyes.

  “You’ll have to do the honours,” I say, blinking through burning tears. “I have no idea what I’m looking for.”

  “You’re too kind,” she snipes, dropping to her haunches and plunging her hands into the goo.

  “And you’ll have to be quick about it.”

  It’s no exaggeration. Further up the slope, the creatures are still ripping free from their casings, another wave screeching and writhing their way towards us. There’s still some distance for them to cover, but for all their seemingly ungainly bulk, they move fast.

  Rakel swivels to face the oncoming black monstrosities, her eyes wide.

  The first of the next wave reaches us, going for her rather than me, as if they’ve worked out she’s the easier target. I lunge to her left, cutting another creature from mandible to midsection. The impact reverberates up my arm, muscles protesting.

  I’m conditioned for close combat, but the training yard didn’t prepare me for this.

  How could anyone be prepared for this?

  “Hurry! I’m not sure how long I can hold them off!”

  Out of the corner of my eye I can see Rakel is elbow-deep in insect gore. The metallic stench of ichor is so strong now that between bouts with the creatures I’m swallowing hard to keep it together. I’m not surprised when Rakel doubles over to vomit.

  Finally, she retrieves an odd-looking chunk out of the mess, wipes it off with her sleeve and holds it aloft. It’s two barely joined discs of some sort of cartilage or chitin. Each is about the size of my palm but almost geometric in its perfect form, ridged in concentric circles like a section of sawn tree-trunk.

  I peer through the gloom. “Is that it? Please tell me that’s it.”

  Her grin is almost feral as she holds up the discs. “Looks like twin seeds to me!”

  “Then stay by me. There’s only one way out of this.”

  She grips her prize in one hand, brandishing her knife in the other. “Through?”

  I nod. “Through.”

  We run.

  Racing headlong into the valley, our boots skid and slide down the slope. Each time one of us loses balance, the other steadies them.

  By unspoken agreement we head for the river beach. It’s clear of cocoons on either side, and the forest is free of them some ways beyond that. Either these things hate light, or water, or both, because they don’t try to follow us beyond the treeline.

  Seems Rakel’s horse had already worked that out. She waits on the strand of river-smooth pebbles, eyes still rolling wildly.

  “Oh, stench of stenches. I’ve really got to wash.” Rakel’s fac
e falls from triumph at retrieving the ingredient to disgust at her gore-spackled tunic.

  “You’re thinking about grooming at a time like this?” I scan around us, up the slope where we fought off the larvae, and then to the other side of the valley, to where presumably hundreds more of the cocoons hang in the trees.

  Rakel flips her horse’s reins over her head. “They’re everywhere, aren’t they?”

  I nod. “Seems the only place clear is the river itself.” I set my shoulders. “If we stay close to the banks, we should be able to make it out of their territory.”

  “All right,” she says, rubbing at an ichor-crusted arm. “But we’re stopping as soon as we’re clear. This doesn’t just stink, it itches.”

  We walk in silence downriver, setting a good pace on the gently sloping banks. My eyes search the forest on either side but detect no movement. Rakel leads the mare and stares straight ahead except for when the rocks become too uneven to not watch her feet.

  After we’ve put a safe distance between us and the insect horrors, I start unbuckling my ichor-sodden armour as I walk. Rakel’s eyes go wide. Then they meet mine and dart quickly away, though not before I notice the colour in her cheeks.

  I remember her modesty at the desert canyon. She’s not a soldier. She doesn’t see a comrade engaging in a necessary routine, she sees a guy casually taking off his clothes.

  She coughs. “Ah, what do you think about here for a camp? I can build a fire.”

  One look at the way her nose is wrinkled, at how she scratches at her exposed skin, tells me she needs this far more than I do. The ichor had stopped bothering me once it dried.

  “I’ll make the fire. You have some time to yourself.” I gesture back to a low waterfall we just passed. “I’d bet it’s the closest thing to a bathhouse out here.”

  She nods gratefully and begins to pick her way back up the rocks.

  The one good thing about this forest is that the canopy’s so thick there’s quite a bit of almost-dry wood scattered over the ground. When I’ve a good blaze going, I head downstream so as not to disturb Rakel.

  I leave my clothes and the pack safely up the bank and splash into the shallows. The water is the coldest I’ve ever experienced. Not wanting to dally, I scrub at myself with my hands. But it’s not enough, the goo is too oily. It streaks and smears but stays irritatingly stuck.

  “You’ll need this.”

  I startle at the voice. Rakel stands on a rocky outcrop above the pool, her hair hanging in damp curls around her face. She wears a pristine tunic, much like that of the Chroniclers at the Library. When did she get the chance to ask them for a spare change of clothes? Then again, knowing her, maybe she didn’t ask.

  “Here,” she tosses me a bar of soap. It’s hard and translucent with a greenish cast, like an uncut gemstone.

  “Thanks.”

  “And … I’m just going to leave this here.” She holds up an identical tunic to her own, which she drapes over a dry rock. I give her a grateful smile, faintly amused at how she swings from caustic to considerate.

  She nods, and retreats towards the fire.

  The soap is gritty with sand and smells pleasantly of mint. Scrubbing my scalp, I notice my hair is growing out. Given present circumstances, it’s not the worst thing to have some of my most prominent tattoos obscured.

  I attempt sluicing the bug guts off my armour. I’d never usually wash leather but there’s nothing to be done for it. At least the soap scours most of the carnage away.

  As I work, thoughts of how close those monstrosities came to overwhelming us creep into my mind. Perhaps Iddo is right. I’m nothing more than a house cat, made soft by pampered palace life. Despite all those days in the training yard, the turns of running up and down the steep slopes of Ekasya until I thought my lungs would burst, I’m not suited for being out here, where I don’t know what’s around the next bend in the trail, what crouches behind each boulder.

  The thoughts make my pulse quicken. Heat flushes my skin and an itching sensation begins, not everywhere but in too many places to pinpoint, like ants crawling through my flesh, pinching and nipping, eating their way free—

  Get a hold of yourself.

  I force myself to count my heartbeats.

  One-two. Three-four. Five-six.

  The itching subsides enough for me to think. I’ve got to get a dose, and soon.

  I don’t know what’s to come, what shadows steal around us, but I do know one thing – there’s no room for losing control.

  Back at the fire, Rakel has made a makeshift drying rack out of fallen branches. I nod my thanks as I hang out sodden leather.

  “I found these.” She sits on her horse’s saddlecloth and tosses an apricot to me. “Seems they grow wild here.”

  Separating it into halves, I happily chew the fruit, then take the pit and crush it against a rock with the hilt of one of my knives, revealing the kernel inside.

  “Here,” I gesture for her to give me the pit from her fruit. I split it and hand her back the prize.

  “Never had them fresh,” she muses, holding up the kernel in scrutiny. “Only ever seen them dried and salted. They’re poisonous in large doses, you know.”

  “So I’ve heard,” I mutter, stirring unwelcome thoughts of the night of the fire, of Esarik trying to eliminate which toxin Nisai had been felled with. Talk of poisons is still too close for comfort. But after witnessing Rakel hold her nerve today, I realize I’ve been so preoccupied with the quest, that I’ve been underestimating her.

  It’s a realization that piques my curiosity.

  “How did you end up tied up in all of this, anyway?”

  She gives me a flat look. “You were there. You saw.”

  “I mean at the palace. You hadn’t been there long, had you?”

  “No, but it’s a long story.”

  “Rather like how you came to be in possession of a vial of dahkai essence?” I gesture to our slowly drying clothes. “We’ve got some time to kill.”

  “Short version? I was trying to be something I’m not. And other people had … different ideas.”

  “Go on.”

  She sighs. “I wanted a perfumery apprenticeship. I could have settled for something more realistic for someone of my … heritage. But no, I wanted a top spot. One that would lead to becoming a master perfumer.”

  I smile, hoping it comes off as wry, not sarcastic. “You don’t strike me as someone who would do that simply for the status.”

  “Ha!” She seems genuinely amused. “Pride did have something to do with it. But it was more, too. I wanted to make something of myself. Become independent. Find a place in the world from which I could make my own decisions.” Her smile vanishes, and she pokes a stick into the fire. “My father was – is – ill. I wanted to be able to buy the best medicine, to find income more stable than what I’d been scraping together.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “It’s not your fault.”

  “That doesn’t mean I’m not sorry for it. What ails him?”

  “It doesn’t matter. He’s dying.” She jabs at the coals, sending sparks flying.

  Understanding dawns. “The Affliction?”

  “Using a polite term doesn’t change what it is. But yes. He’s got the Rot. And yes, I realize there’s no saving him. But I could have bought him time. If we could afford the things that can slow the progress of the ulcers, he’d gain turns. Half my lifetime again. Maybe more. It was worth the risk.”

  “The risk?”

  “I made a bet with the wrong person. And I lost. And that’s how I ended up serving Sephine.”

  “You became the Scent Keeper’s apprentice because you lost a wager? Something doesn’t quite add up here.”

  “I wasn’t her apprentice.” The last comes out almost as a hiss. “I was just a fool who couldn’t smell the perfume from the notes. I was so intent on solving one problem I blundered into far bigger ones.”

  “Oh?”

  She heaves a sigh and
adds another branch to the fire. “I always thought my father so hard done by. He was a hero, you know? Military. Served the Eraz on the frontline for longer than I’d been alive. I thought he’d received an honourable discharge to reward him for his service, with a full pension. But once he became ill, his pension was barely enough to cover the essentials – bandages, basic salves, the incense to mask the stench of the ulcers. How were we going to eat?

  “So, I set about making money on the side. I learned the basics from the women in my village, and when I was old enough, I’d journey into the city and watch the traders at the night markets. With my nose, it wasn’t hard to learn what worked and what didn’t. What would sell.”

  Her voice swells with quiet pride. “And once I’d made a little money to buy ingredients, I started to experiment. Worked out better ways to produce things. It brought in enough, but it was always going to be tenuous. Who knew when the Eraz’s regulators would find out? When the imperial tax collector and his thugs would come knocking? Or one of my buyers decided I knew too much about their operations and…” She makes a chopping motion in front of her nose at that last.

  “But after my time with Sephine, I don’t know what to believe.” She picks up a stick and starts pushing river pebbles around. “Was Father dishonourably discharged? He was ejected from the Eraz’s army when they found out he had the Rot, but was that because he told them, or did he try to hide it? Could someone be that brave on the battlefield but so afraid of the consequences of his illness that he put his own soldiers at risk? Army camps keep people in close quarters. What if he had accidentally passed it on?”

  “But you said there was money coming in, at least enough for his medicine?”

  “A pension. I thought it was from his military service but maybe it was a caretaker’s pension.”

  “Caretaker of what?”

  “Me.”

  I raise an eyebrow at that.

  She gives a tight little shrug. “Sephine claimed my father was lying, that she was paying to ensure I had enough. That I had a guardian until I was old enough not to need one. What reason did she have to lie about that? What was I to her? Why take the interest she took in me?”