by Demetri Grim
“Sorry,” rumbled the monster’s deep, thickly accented voice. She could do nothing but blink dumbly at the creature. It was apologizing? For what? Trying to kill her? For frightening the hell out of her? For breaking free? Was it, no... he. Beka reminder herself, the one who just punched her? She was just about to ask at least one of those questions when the bovine monster reached down and nearly crushed her ribs in a single hand as it scooped her from the floor. She cried out in pain and clung to the thick arm of the beast as she was bodily lifted into the air. As if she were nothing. The fact the beast ripped free of half a dozen thick metal chains with ease meant she basically did weigh nothing to the thing.
“You are going to break her!” The same little girl’s voice complained from next to the monster. It was then that she spotted her. A tiny human girl smacked ineffectively against the beast’s leg. Her golden ringlets of hair bouncing as she wailed against the beast. Her clothing was nothing more than a tattered set of rags and strips of burlap hanging from her tiny frame. The child reminded her of Lizzy when they had first met, covered in rags and soot, having just climbed over the wall behind the smithy in an attempt to flee a guard who caught her pickpocketing. Lizzy had fallen into the ash pit and knocked over the shovel. The noise had drawn the attention of her father and uncle who, after finding the cursing streetrat scrambling from the hole, they offered her a bath and a meal. Thus beginning an era of mischief and petty larceny the market district still talked about years later.
“Stop. Pest! You are not to be here anyway.” The monster kicked back at the little blond girl. Managing to plant one massive foot in the center of the tiny girl’s chest with bone-shattering force. Blood sprayed out of the girl’s mouth and all over the thick furry leg of the monster, as the girl’s lifeless corpse bounced and flopped like a rag doll along the floor, coming to rest with a hard splat against the wall right next to the door.
“You gods damn monster! How could you!” Beka knew the girl was out of place. She knew that something was clearly wrong with the situation, but seeing someone that reminded her so much of her friend casually killed— and splattered against a wall— made her see red. She punched at the creature’s arm. His crushing grip not releasing in the slightest, making it hard to breath as she lashed out. Her boots battered into the monster’s thick chest with about as much effect as kicking a brick wall. In fact it was her foot that was starting to get sore from the assault. She was just about to reach for another chisel on her work belt when a shadow moved in the air behind the beast.
“Bastard!” screeched a loudly feminine voice seconds before a lean female shape landed on the monster’s back. A Primal. It was exactly as the mercenaries and adventurers described. The primal’s head was only describable as draconic but not covered in scales. Instead the creature’s entire body was covered with feather-like blue black fur that was slick with blood and bristled angrily in the flickering lights of the chamber. The long muzzle of the Primal was softer than she expected, shorter and almost elegant if not for being turned up in a vicious snarl of teeth. Blood seeped from its mouth as it growled and clung to the bovine monster, its incredibly long ears pulled back along its skull. The very feminine and generous curves of the monster becoming visible as she climbed right on top the horned creature’s head. Beka stared stupidly at the female monster as she lifted a second set of arms and unfolded a single razor sharp ebony claw from each forearm. The blade hinged in the middle and glistened with a dull sheen and wickedly keen edge. Her long shapely legs and taloned feet wrapped around the bovine’s neck as she hooked her second set of arms and the equally long claws under the monster’s horns, yanking its head upwards. Her tail, which was almost serpentine and far too long lashed the air behind her before coiling around the bulky monster’s waist. The enraged Primal started to savagely hack and slash at the bovine creature’s face and eyes with the razor sharp talons of its first set of arms.
Despite the formidable looking claws on the Primal she was having little effect on the thick hide of the bovine monster. This Primal must be the little girl. Beka was sure of it. The same strips of tattered cloth and burlap covered her at least enough to keep her modesty despite the woman’s generous chest and hips. How had she survived? Much less become the now-full grown primal. Her confusion was forced from her mind as she gasped again, the monster’s fingers tightening around her body as it was savaged by the Primal woman. Beka felt a rib crack and she cried out in pain. A stream of tears falling from her eyes, as she screamed. Though the sounds of her cries were easily drowned out by the roars and grunts of the enraged Primal and her victim. The distracted monster’s grip faltered under the assault and Beka finally fell free.
Beka’s heels hit the floor first, followed by her butt. Sending a jolt of pain through her side as the monster dropped her. Clutching her side she tried to push herself away from the fighting as the feral Primal dug its claws into the horned monster’s cheeks. Pulling up on the thing’s muzzle it exposed a pair of very long very sharp canines. The cow monster had fangs like a wolf! It was a meat eater! “It’s trying to carry me off to its lair and eat me!” Beka groaned as she tried and failed to get to her feet. Her eyes locked on the battle before her. The primal was clinging to the monster’s face and batting away the bovine’s grasping hands with its second set of arms. The ebony blades folded in the middle and the Primal began wielding the ebony claws more like a pair of long daggers. It slashed at the bovine’s grasping hands, leaving long bloody cuts along each palm as it grabbed at its attacker with bonecrushing fists. The beast roared in pain and anger before it shrugged forward and dropped onto all fours. The massively muscled monster bucked and stomped very much like the bull it resembled. Managing to tip the hissing primal into its grip as the woman slid over the monster’s head. With a roar and grunt a fist closed around the Primal woman’s head and yanked. Dislodging the monster’s powerful legs and tail with ease and driving her into stone floor with a sickening crunch. Beka blanched as she saw the Primal’s shoulder break. One of the beast’s second arms snapping in half as the elongated forearm bent naturally. The primal’s head caving in as its body was slammed onto the ground beside Beka.
With a strangled scream cut off by the pain in her side Beka pushed away from the corpse and the approaching monster. Its massive crushing hands reached out for her as it stepped over the body only to stop with a sudden roar of pain. The monster tipping forward hard onto its face, bloodying its nose with the force of the impact and digging a long furrow from the stones with the ivory horns, only a few inches away from Beka’s leg as she once again tried to stand.
Cringing and finally staggering to her feet she caught sight of what brought the monster down. A much larger male Primal was latched onto the bovine monster’s coven heel savagely shaking its head back and forth as it tore at the monster’s tendons. The graceful savage woman was no longer a heap on the floor but missing altogether. The pieces slowly coming together in Beka’s fear and pain addled mind. Whatever that thing was, it had died twice, in two different forms. Now its third form, this large male Primal was almost as big as the bovine monster itself. Where the woman was lean and graceful, this new male form was nothing but brute force and overwhelming power. It braced all six of its thick and powerful limbs on the stone floor of the chamber and savagely ripped a bloody chunk from the creature’s leg. “I have to get out of here! Before these things finish fighting over whatever it is they wanted to do to me!” She cried again in pain as she dodged around the flailing limbs and lashing tale of the massive Primal.
Staggering away Beka felt her rib shift, definitely broken, she nearly buckled with the pain before managing to get even half the distance across the room. The glow of torchlight flickering in the cell’s window called to her. A beacon of freedom in the darkness. If that shape-changing monster or whatever it is came in from outside it may have left the door unbarred. She had a chance. Just a step more and she would be safe. Her hand came out towards the iron ring of the door’s han
dle and was suddenly stopped. A gnarled pale old hand wrapped around her wrist. The frail wizened arm leading back to a tiny old man. He held her in a vice like grip, wispy white hair framing his wrinkled face. He would have looked like anyone's kindly old grandfather at first glance. If not for the fact his mouth was covered in smeared blood and his tattered cloth and burlap tunic hung ripped around his waist.
“Don't go. This one has not had a chance to play with you yet.” The old man croaked. Flecks of blood and spit dribbling from his toothless mouth as he smiled at her.
“Oh hells no!” She yanked her arm away from him. The spike of pain in her side robbing her of what little strength she had. The frail looking old man caught her other arm with his free hand and an iron grip held her in place.
“This one wants to play with you!” He said again with a bit of heat to...her voice? This time it was not the voice of an old man coming from her attacker’s thin bloody lips, it was her own. Beka’s eyes widened as the wrinkles of the old man's face smoothed away. The wispy white hair thickening and turning a familiar shade of red as it grew longer right before her eyes. The jaw and nose shrinking on its face as freckles spread across its cheeks under larger light grey eyes. In a heartbeat she was once again looking into a mirror. A blood-covered mockery of herself. The shape changing creature’s body rippled as its skin changed to match her own tones. Beka felt her cheeks redden as a copy of her body began to take shape, half-clothed in rags and strips of burlap, completely exposed save for what little cloth remained hanging from its widening hips.
That's when a spike of ivory suddenly appeared through her still forming chest with a spray of blood that covered Beka’s face. The shapeshifting creature was ripped away, its grip on her broken with such violence it sent her toppling onto her back with another pained cry.
The bovine monster roared as it charged forward, the monster’s overly long arms helping it run on all fours as it gored the shapechanger through the back and slammed into the door. The ivory horns piercing through the thick wood of the door as its massive skull crushed her false self against it. The timbers of the door groaned as they nearly buckled into the hallway beyond. Her mirror image screamed in pain. Her own stolen voice sounding weak and pitiful as she slumped against the door, limbs hanging limply on the spike of ivory. The bovine monster grunted and huffed as it tried to back up, its horns wedged through the door and likely the metal bands on the other side that had kept the door from buckling.
“Stupid... Pest, Now I stuck.” The monster grumbled and shook its head, the limp body of her corpse twitching as the horn severing its spine dug around in it. A pool of blood forming under the both of them made the beast’s hooves slick on the stone. How was she supposed to get out now? The monsters were impaled and stuck on the door! Her only exit! And no one was coming!
“So much for very good hearing!” Beka complained as she scooted on her rear backwards towards the forge. Perhaps she could find something there to defend herself with. Not that she stood a chance in hell against these things. How the hell was this safe? That damn elf was going to get an earful if she survived this. “To hell with the gold. To hell with the job. And to hell with all the murderous monsters in this gods damned Menagerie!” Her tirade ended as a low, deep rumble vibrated through the air. The same growl she could feel in her bones. The same one she had heard her first day here.
“Crap…” The stuck monster groaned and doubled its efforts to pull free of the door. Red! It has to be Red! He's here!
“Finally! Red! Help!” Beka tried to shout, but the pain in her ribs once again started, making her lightheaded. Her mind drifting away in a pained fog. All she managed was a wheeze and croak as words failed her. She slumped against the side of the forge. The cold metal feeling wonderful against the finger-shaped bruises that were forming along her back and sides.
“Ehh, hey there boss... This, not what it look like,” the monster protested. The door shook, wood splintered, and the beast fell backwards into the room. A chunk of steel and wood still clinging to his horn, the violence of what hit the other side of the door ripping the half-nude body of herself free of the monster’s horns in a spray of blood and gore. Her own lifeless corpse coming to rest a few feet away from her. Its blank dead eyes stared up at her, blood seeping from her own full bloodstained lips. The corpse seemed to be smirking slightly. Beka blinked away her horror and swallowed back her bile before she managed to pry her eyes away from her own lifeless gaze. Cold sweat beginning to creep down her back as Red came into the room.
“Grey, enough. You have had your fun. Leave her alone,” Red growled. The resonating echo made the hairs on the back of her neck stand up. Was he talking to her? Or the corpse? Was it still not dead? How is that even possible?
“Aww.” Beka her herself complain, and she jerked away with a start. Dropping her eyes back to the ‘corpse’. The life slowly returned to its eyes. Strands of blood-slick red hair turned a dull shade of grey before slowly withdrawing into its scalp. Beka’s own perfect copy of a nose and mouth withdrew into its face, leaving nothing but a bloody smear, where nothing remained, just flat smooth skin were a mouth and nose should be. Her stolen pale and freckled skin rippled and turned a sickly, veiny grey, as its eyes expanded into two almond shaped oversized black orbs of solid black. They were sunken into a bald skull-like head several sizes larger than a human’s. The pools of darkness within the sunken eyes glittered with the distant flickering candlelight in what could only be called a mischievous glint. Beka knew she must look like an idiot sitting there. Her mouth open, blankly staring, unasked questions lost to disbelief and pain as the monster before her stood. Its broken shoulder popping and flexing as its arms thinned and extended past the creature’s knees. Its body shriveling to near skeletal proportions as the gaping wound in its stomach and side sealed. The new frail body stretching out like pulled sickly grey taffy. Spindly legs lifting the creature up to what must have been over seven feet tall. Before the weight of its oversized head caused it to slouch unnaturally forward. Long spindly grey fingers she recognized instantly fidgeted with the remains of its clothing. The now androgynous grey monster, lacking nose, mouth or ears still managed to appear abashed and timid as it turned away, glancing back and forth between herself and Red as it slowly shuffled towards the exit.
Chapter 17: Books and Their Covers
“How in the bloody hell is it alive?! What the bloody hell is it?!” Beka shouted at Red. Managing to get most of it out through gritted teeth, her breath coming hard as her bruised and broken ribs protested her attempts to breathe.
“They,” Red stated matter-of-factly, just as he had early that day when they were standing outside this very room. The room she was clearly going to die in. He moved next to the large bovine monster. It was lying on its back with both hooves pressed against the plank of wood stuck to its horn, still trying to pry it off but unable to get a good angle.
“They... right... How the hell are they still alive?!” She screeched, fuming. She was hurt, scared out of her mind, and emotionally drained to the point she was starting to feel nothing at all. And here was Red, who promised she would be safe, casually strolling around correcting her on what to call the monsters?! She giggled a little, feeling more than a little delirious. “Unbelievable.” Beka groaned again and slumped against the forge harder than she would have liked.
“They are hard to kill,” was his only response. It made her eye twitch as she watched him move over the struggling monster. But any anger she was starting to feel drained away instantly as Red casually stepped on the bovine monster’s face and easily plucked the board from its horn as if it were nothing. The bovine creature groaned in pain and held onto its snout. The broken nose from its fall earlier leaking blood again from being stepped on. Another wave of pain brought spots to her vision and Beka clenched, unable to breathe.
“R-red, I think I'm hurt here.” She managed to squeak out, trembling as she took in a shuddering breath. She decided berating the unbeliev
ably strong monster was an unhealthy life choice given her situation.
Reptilian eyes turned her way as he approached. His gaze sweeping over her. He leaned in close and sniffed. Beka grimaced and flinched away, trying to cover her fear with a small smile.
“You will live. A Broken rib. It will not prevent your work.” He straightened himself, ignoring her shocked expression. His reptilian eyes watched her as she struggled to stand.
Long fingers suddenly wrapped around her arm, lifting her to her feet. The sickly grey creature pulling her up from behind. Beka hadn't even seen it move, much less approach to within grabbing distance. It turned to Red and gestured to her side before waving emphatically.
“They attacked me!” She groaned in pain. “I was punched in the stomach, nearly crushed, thrown around, and almost stabbed!” Beka shrugged away from the grey creature’s grasp, who bowed its head and slipped behind Red. It bobbed its head and tapped Red’s shoulder a few times before poking him hard in the arm when it was ignored.
“Who attacked you?” Red asked. Beka gave a half-shrug in response, she couldn't remember. She had been mostly unconscious at the time and everything that happened in the last few minutes was going hazy and dim around the edges.
“I was only just coming to when one of them punched me.” Given how strong the bovine creature was she doubted it was at fault. She would be nothing more than a blood smear if he had done so. “That thing I bet!” She glared and pointed at the grey shapechanger. “He already poked at me before.” The grey monster shook its head vigorously and pointed back to the mahogany bovine then stepped forward to poke her in the stomach. She recoiled and gasped in pain, another bruise to her tally of pains, this one from the first attack. The grey monster turned its head to the side and twitched. Regarding her like a faceless bird.