The last Reaver held the door to the whorehouse shut while the others dragged Chris Kenny away. Yarek drew up beside Wodan. Another pimp joined the first around the corner, this one dressed in a long red cape, a purple velvet suit glittering with emeralds and chains run through with sapphires and diamonds, and his reptile-leather shoes came to a point nearly a foot-and-a-half long. His head bobbed wildly as he conferred with the other, angrily proclaiming his inability to take any shit from anyone, ever, and how he would kill anyone who messed with his girls and then kill his own girls and then unleash on the world a new string of girls he had waiting on the sidelines. The other pimp agreed, then elaborated.
“See them?” said Wodan.
Yarek nodded. “Ridiculous.”
“I made them.”
“How’s that?”
“When I destroyed the Ugly, the institutions of slavery and prostitution fell to anyone who would bother to pick them up. And since both institutions are illegal, they had to be run by those willing to work in the shadows. Looks like these clowns inherited the job of selling other people’s bodies.”
“I’ve got a suppressor for one of my sidearms,” said Yarek. “You want me to air these guys out?”
“Gods, no!” said Wodan. He clapped a hand on Yarek’s shoulder and turned him about. “Kill those two idiots, and two more idiots will take their place. I’ve already learned that the hard way. They’re parasites. Best thing to do is starve them out. We’ve already taken Chris Kenny away from them. Next, we’ll take the world.”
Wodan laughed at his own words, but when he looked over at Yarek, he saw that the son of Sevrik Clash was looking ahead with a deadly, grim expression.
“Get Chris and his rifle back to the camp,” said Wodan. “There’s one more thing I need to do, and I need to do it alone.”
* * *
“Of course I won’t go,” said Miss Oliver. “And I won’t allow any other Businessmen to go, either.”
They stood in the darkened, vacant meeting room where the Businessmen usually met. Miss Oliver looked out a window, away from Wodan. She was disturbed by his appearance, his bony face, his lank and greasy hair, his broad shoulders concealed by his filthy wolfskin cloak. She was exhausted, drained spiritually and financially, by the negotiations that had saved Pontius from the wolves and handed her over to the Smiths.
“You wasted your time coming here,” she added. “I know you came back for more supplies. But there’s nothing left.”
“We’ll find plenty of food soon enough. I came because I want you to join me. I’ve got fighters. Soon I’ll have farmers and other people willing to work. Now I need administrators, managerial types.”
Miss Oliver laughed, then turned to look at him. “I told you I’ve already tried the Black Valley. It’s no good. It’s too dangerous. Wodan, I… I know you’ve been there, and you survived. You’re good at surviving. And I know you’ve got an impressive “army” with you now, and I know you’ve suffered and I know you think you’ve finally gotten what you deserve. But it won’t last.”
“Why not?”
“Because those dogmen are savages. They’re animals, Wodan. They only follow you now because of an absurd technicality in their playbook. But they’ll catch on, Wodan. As soon as times get hard, they’ll catch on, and they’ll be done with you.”
“You know what I think?” said Wodan. “I think you’ve been making money by signing contracts and shaking hands and ordering other people around for so long that you’ve forgotten what it’s like to really work at something, and maybe even succeed at it. You’ve been in Pontius for so long that you think Pontius is the world. It’s not.”
“And what is the world, Wodan?” Miss Oliver sighed and turned away again. “Why don’t you tell me?”
“It is whatever we make of it. I came here because I hoped you could make it… well, something better than this.”
Miss Oliver stood in silence. Wodan turned to go.
“The river,” Miss Oliver said finally. “It runs all the way under the mountains. From the valley, under the mountains, and all the way to Pontius. That means you can chop trees and send us raw lumber.” She turned to Wodan, and said, “If you can get us that wood, we’ll send airships with supplies.”
Wodan nodded. “We’ll do just that. Better work out the details with the Law and the Smiths beforehand. If you get too greedy, a war could break out as soon as the Smiths realize what’s coming to Pontius.”
Miss Oliver smiled sadly. “You’re either going to make us all rich… or we’re going to end up killing ourselves over your scraps.”
* * *
At the end of a week, dogmen rushed about finishing their preparations, manhandling donated mules onto donated covered wagons that they filled with donated supplies. There was not enough fuel for the airships and tanks that the Reavers had stolen from Haven, and Wodan did not want to risk jeopardizing their plans by raiding the oilfields newly acquired by the Smiths, so the Reavers stayed busy stripping the machines of their heavy guns and dousing the empty hulks in the remainder of the fuel. Yarek Clash stood atop a tank and calmly smoked a cigar while syphoned fuel splattered onto his boots.
Wodan climbed atop one of the covered wagons and watched the dust kicking up under the fading light of their last day in the land of Pontius. Just then he looked into the distance and saw a great gathering of people coming from the far side of Pontius. He raised his binoculars and saw Zach at the front, bleary-eyed and exhausted. The farmers had their belongings packed on skinny horses and donkeys. The men, women, and children all looked stern, and many were armed with rifles. Wodan felt his blood race at the idea that his philosopher friend had walked around the entire rim of Pontius and gathered her most valuable outcasts.
Before Wodan could go and greet them, he heard jeering and angry voices from one of the city’s entrance gates. He leaped from the wagon and jogged toward the commotion. Naarwulf joined him and ran alongside. They drew near and saw a great crowd of people leaving the city, pale-faced and guilty-looking, and Wodan could just make out Lawmen struggling to hold back a larger crowd of people throwing stones at the deserters. Among the outcasts leaving the city there were fighters in motley armor cursing loudly and threatening to draw steel, there were laborers with fat backpacks who stared down at their boots or passed around tiny bottles of rotgut in order to forget the women and children left behind, there were fat men in undeniably expensive clothes designed to look “rugged” who were most likely wealthy merchants, and there were even a few whores, some of which had Adam’s apples and stubble on their chins and walked in a caricature of feminine movement. Still more people poured out of the gate, and soon they became impossible to classify.
I’ve done it! thought Wodan. I’ve just recruited the best people that Pontius has to offer! And the only thing Pontius can do to entice them to return… is throw stones!
All of them were shamed by the compulsion that forced them from the city - save one. Jarl the Entertainer marched at the front, tall and decked out in a black cape and red scarf and a pointed black hat, and his long hair swayed dramatically in the wind. An assortment of fancy guns jangled on his low-slung belt, and he carried a walking staff whittled especially for the occasion. He raised a fist in greeting as Wodan approached.
“I was hoping I’d get at least one Entertainer out of this damned city,” said Wodan, smiling.
“One, at least,” said Jarl. “How could I stay behind? I’d heard you were planning on making quite a story.”
“It’s going to be written in blood, though,” said Wodan, nodding to the wolves in the distance. “Are you sure about this, Jarl?”
Jarl looked at Wodan. He was at least a head taller than he remembered. He remembered meeting Wodan over a year ago in Sunport, when he was dragging a gang of primitives along on some insane quest. He remembered seeing him again in Pontius, hanging out with a drunk prince just before the Secret Bacchanal, when he… and he remembered hearing the tales of how Wodan, li
ttle Wodan, was the one who drove the Ugly into a deathmatch with the Coil. Wodan had left hardly a month ago with a group of ill-prepared boys to stop an army, and now he was back with an army all his own… and he planned on facing impossible odds against an immortal foe.
“Am I sure?” said Jarl. “As if you had to ask.”
* * *
When nightfall came, Khan Wodan ordered that anyone who could move, should move, and so the frantic, unorganized packing became a frantic, unorganized traffic jam. Wodan approached his large tent, which had to be abandoned as it was too unwieldy for transport on a covered wagon.
As he approached, a Reaver intercepted him with two bundles.
“Khan,” said the Reaver, “I got that cat back for you.” Wodan took one of the bags, opened it, and saw his misshapen cat looking back at him. He was so angry that Wodan considered shutting the bag once again.
“That cat,” said the Reaver, pointing. “I almost had to beat that old detective to get it from him.”
“You didn’t hurt him, did you?” said Wodan.
“No, but it was close. He’s got a rough mouth on him, you know? Figured he’d be grateful he didn’t have to watch after that old thing anymore.”
Wodan took the other bundle, then left and approached the tent.
“Ladies!” he shouted. “Women folk! Time to move!”
Wodan’s two slaves brides, inherited from the former Khan, rushed out. They glanced about, always unsure of the dogmen. They did not know that he always kept a close watch over their tent; in fact, they knew next to nothing about one another, as Wodan had interacted with them very little. The other human slave brides had already escaped, most likely fled into the relative safety of Pontius. Wodan wasn’t exactly sure why these two had remained, but he aimed to protect them as best he could even though he did not consider them to be his actual wives.
“I got you some presents,” he said, opening one bundle. He handed over a stack of clothes, smiling stupidly.
Skinny red-haired Freyja ignored her gift and stared at the other bag that Wodan clutched at his side. “It’s a kitty?” she said.
Wodan nodded, but moved the flap to obscure her view of its misshapen head. They already had enough to worry about. “It is,” said Wodan. “But you can’t see him just yet. Sorry. He’s… ah, in a bad mood.”
The women unfolded the bundles and found heavy pants, square boots, and dark nondescript jackets. Both women seemed nonplused.
“They’re more practical than those rags you’ve got now,” said Wodan. “But I had one of those military-types pick them out. Looks like he doesn’t have an eye for fashion.”
Sullen, dark-haired Nilem said, “Thanks.”
Wodan was not sure what to say. Naarwulf usually accepted Wodan’s judgment on all things, but when it came to the women, Naarwulf was an unending fountain of advice. He was deeply concerned that Wodan had not yet exercised his right to sleep with the women. According to Naarwulf, it was a well-known fact that a woman who was not regularly bedded could fall victim to psychological maladies, even to the point of hurting herself. There were physical health dangers as well, such as tumors developing due to lymphic sap-buildup, which could lead to a reversal of the bloodstream and even instant death, all from sexual frustration. Wodan’s neglect was an act of abuse, as far as Naarwulf could tell, and the oncoming danger was already apparent if one noted that the women were starting to speak even when not ordered to do so.
I’m sure they’ll be fine, despite what Naarwulf says, Wodan thought. If they stayed with us, then this journey must be important to them.
Finally Freyja smiled at Wodan, and said, “Thank you. I’m sure they’ll come in very handy!”
Wodan nodded, blushing slightly. “Let’s get in the wagon, then. We’re done with Pontius.”
While Naarwulf shouted at a donkey somewhere in the distance, the women climbed inside the wagon and Wodan leaped on top. He signaled to the old dogman who sat the front. As the driver flicked the reins and the thing jerked to life, Wodan held his cat close and surveyed the horde advancing by fits and starts. He saw a river of torches under starlight making their way toward the nameless river in the northeast.
It’s begun, thought Wodan. I’ve worked so hard just for a chance to do something like this. Just one chance, an opportunity to create a sanctuary of my own, and make something good out of this tired world!
Just as joy crept into his heart, Wodan felt something deep inside of himself come awake. Something dark and dreaming looked about, and it laughed because it did not care who or what Wodan brought with him into the valley. Wodan tried to suppress the alien presence, but before he did, it let him know that it did not care about his dream of creating a new home. It was on its way to its old home, the place where it was born and buried, and that was all that mattered.
Chapter Two
The Mule in Her Image
I show them a field of ice. A randomized roof of stars, so that those knowledgeable about the constellations realize, horrified, that they are on another world. The wrong world. Of course I drape the world in darkness. Then - flashing lights, disorientation. They imagine that they hug the ground but it is cold, meat-locker cold, and so there is no comfort there. In the flashing light I let them catch a glimpse of moving forms, a hint of tentacles and blubbering mouths. Then darkness again, and the imagined position and intent of the gibbering beasts takes on nightmare proportions. My imagination is never as keen as that of the tortured; they do the majority of the work in this nightmare.
I force them to imagine drowning. This I never do to a fresh brain, still soft and new. But when a brain and its personality grows old and senile in my stomach cavity, when it tries to resign itself to death, I withdraw some of my tendrils that provide oxygen. This torture damages the brain, and the attached personality feels submerged in viscous fluids or an airtight chamber. The personality panics, the personality creates a god and prays to it and begs for life. Then I provide oxygen. The brain works again for a while, calculating for me, sustaining my thoughts.
I force them to imagine heat. Usually cooking, their own bodies on giant skillets, or roasting on spits, and since I have smelled cooked human flesh and burnt hair, I provide this sensation to the tortured. They have no bodies to burn, only a set of nerve endings that can be turned on, and on, and on without mercy, reporting pain without end. The pay-off of this game is that when the personality invariably imagines screaming, I provide a link between all the brains in the mass - so that they can hear one another scream.
This is the only way to keep the fractured personalities that dwell in the mass of brains in my stomach cavity from either dissolving or rising up against me. This distraction is necessary. One irony: If they rose up and lashed out against me, the host body, where would they go? Their individual bodies are long since dead. Another irony: The games of Hell that I play - I, also, must endure. The mass of brains that rest in my stomach cavity, which I use as tools, also make up no small part of my own personality and experience-set.
But there is one Hell that my host of minds can never know. One that is mine alone. I was made in Her image, too close to Her in form and in function, and for this sin I was despised.
Even those that I call brothers - they are, in truth, my uncles. Most of them are younger than me, duller than me, weaker than me. But at the end of our kin wars I cried out “uncle” and I spat out all the brain tissue that gave me strength. I renounced the daughter of the Queen who was my mother and by those craven acts was I banished into eternal life.
Out from the warm earth. Banished to this Black Valley, this Hell.
Even now, all my plans, all my grand little contrivances… even these are but shadows of Her vision.
I am not even allowed to sink to the level of my kin. Imagine them. All of my kin, so wonderfully connected. So intertwined in their thoughts, in their brotherhood. Taught from birth to despise the Other, to kill and eat the Other, to torture the Other without end. By this exile
they think to convert me, the penitent, into the great Sameness that they enjoy. But my cursed gifts prevent such union. I, who am without eyes but can see through the eyes of others - I, who can only see myself through the eyes of others - am cursed to see even myself as an Other. Once I was worshipped and saw myself through the eyes of worshippers as a god. Now all I see is my tentacles that I use for locomotion and manipulation, horns there for no reason, a bulging sack of a body full of brain tissue, and an oral tube that I use to feed. Disgusting, all of it shriveled and ugly, and so it is better to sit and dwell alone and to see nothing near but only trivial events far away.
I am the Blind King. I am called Blindness, and my true name is Zamael. I am the Lord of the Black Valley.
And even for these thoughts will I be punished.
Chapter Three
The Tribe of Carpe Diem
As the sun set one day before they set out, Khan Wodan and Naarwulf were drinking coffee together by the nameless river when a host of shouting dogmen gathered around them. One dogman pointed to his split lip and shouted, “I have been beaten! I have been wounded by the dogs of another tribe!” The accused dogmen threw their hands in the air and scoffed at the ridiculous accusation.
Demonworld Book 5: Lords of the Black Valley (Demonworld series) Page 2