Back to the Vara

by John Kerry

  Hami and Calven appeared at ground level. Calven went to help the other Marzban unpack the karkadann. Hami made for Narok. Both men distanced themselves from the rest to hold their conversation.

  Narok stole a glance up at Sammy.

  Hami was making plans for her again. Just like he had last time. Why wasn’t he including her in whatever they were discussing? It was because he wanted to send her home this time and knew she didn’t want to go. She wouldn’t go back. There was nothing for her to return to. She felt harsh on her mum, thinking that way, but it was true. The woman cared about her, but Sammy was in the way. If she stayed in Perseopia, her mum wouldn’t have to worry about her grades, wouldn’t have to feel guilty when she inevitably kicked her out of the house. Her mum could enjoy a stress-free life with Jerry, without the financial burdens of feeding and housing a young adult. They could go out to dinner, take romantic walks in the country, visit a spa or whatever. The boring stuff old people enjoy.

  The only thing that got to Sammy was that she hadn’t said goodbye, but then time had technically stopped back in the Mother World, like it had the last time. Her mum was frozen in time. If Sammy ever went home, then she would pick up right where she left off. Which was a depressing thought. The argument with her mother would be a distant memory to her, but to her mum it would be like it’d only just happened. That wouldn’t be much of a reunion. The portal pearl had gone, though. Hami couldn’t send her back.

  Leiss joined her on the balcony. He hobbled over to the railing and gripped it with his big hands. “When you head down to get some food, can you bring me some up?” he asked.

  “Sure,” Sammy said. She paused. “Do you think I’ve made a stupid mistake, coming back here?”

  Leiss shrugged. “Mehrak and I both risked our lives to send you home to your family. And look what I got for my efforts.” He held up the arm he had in a sling. “You came straight back, throwing our efforts back in our faces. I’d do anything to keep my family together, but you’ve left yours twice now. I suppose people from the Mother World have different priorities.”

  Sammy hadn’t had different priorities two years ago. But since then she’d learnt you couldn’t rely on anyone. She remembered that Leiss’s wife had walked out on him, and recalled him breaking down in front of her. So why did he still want to put himself through the pain of being part of a family again? A small part of her was jealous that he could nurture such child-like optimism. She’d love to indulge a similar naivety and she had done once. She’d believed her father had been a hero, a tough, strong man, but he wasn’t any of those things. He was angry, abusive, and had even beaten her mother on several occasions. The signs had been obvious, but somehow Sammy hadn’t noticed at the time. It was amazing, the extent to which you could fool yourself when you didn’t want to believe something. She felt her face burn with the shame of remembering it. Her father was scum. And Leiss was a fool. Families were messed up. If he wanted to indulge himself in silly fantasies, that was up to him.

  Sammy left Leiss at the railing. “I’ll grab you some food,” she said, and tossed the curtains out of the way as she entered the tower.

  –TWENTY-EIGHT–

  THE PLAN

  Baxter dismissed the messenger and rose from his bed. He pulled on his clothes, picked up his satchel and was soon hurrying through the darkened streets towards parliament square. He deeply regretted his former aversion to the purple hue that had once saturated his city. The colour he’d previously found so abhorrent would’ve been a welcome respite now that everything was dark.

  He ran through the black centre of a square where the streetlights no longer penetrated. The city’s dim gas lamps were no longer sufficient to fully light up their surroundings and would have to be turned up. More gas would be needed. Taxes would go up.

  Fear had taken hold of the people of New Ecbatana. This wasn’t the city he’d grown up in, the safe, optimistic capital of their realm. Seemingly overnight it had become a ghost town, absent of the vitality and hope that made him proud to be a resident.

  The minister was already dressed and sitting at the desk in his personal quarters when Baxter arrived. Grand Master Aegis was pacing.

  Baxter bowed to the men, then took up a stool in the corner and fetched some parchment from his bag.

  “And this demon of smoke and bodies is heading north?” the minister asked.

  Baxter looked up. “Demon?”

  “We’ll fill you in on the details later.” The minister was clearly in no mood to recap for his benefit. “Master Aegis?”

  “Yes, Master Piruzan’s unit is tracking it,” answered the magus. “He is of the opinion that this demon is travelling to the Naziarabad Monument at Ameretat to escape Perseopia and gain access to the Mother World.”

  “As Lord VorMask was attempting with his black column?”

  “Indeed.”

  “But surely this demon would need the key,” the minister went on. “The item you told me is needed to leave Perseopia.”

  “Perhaps it already has it. Or perhaps it’s powerful enough to open a portal without the need of one. We know next to nothing about it.”

  “Where’s Hami?” Baxter asked.

  The Grand Master paused. “He’s allegedly coming here.”

  “Allegedly?”

  “He’s left the magi network again and has not re-joined.”

  Sammy lowered herself onto Louis’s tail as she exited Golden Egg Cottage’s back door, and kept her balance admirably on the way down to the forest floor. She strolled around the side of the cottage and into the campsite with a spring in her step, happy with her disembarkation.

  The camp effort was already in full flow. Calven and Eva were digging a fire pit. Hami, Harz and Jokram were erecting tents. Mehrak was off somewhere still hunting and she couldn’t see Sasan or Rougetta either.

  “Is Leiss coming down?” Eva asked as Sammy approached.

  “I don’t think so. He asked me to bring him some food up.”

  Calven kicked at a scrawny root sticking out of the fire pit wall. “It’s because I’m here.”

  “Give him time,” Eva said. “He’s been through a lot. And still blames himself for Borzin’s death.”

  Calven shrugged. “I know.” He picked up his shovel and continued to dig. “I still can’t get over what happened to Borzin. And I wasn’t even there.”

  Eva put a hand on his shoulder. “He’ll come around,” she said. “I’ll go check on him in a bit.”

  Sasan and Rougetta appeared then, carrying armfuls of twigs and bits of dead bush. They waited for Eva and Calven to vacate the pit, then tossed everything in. Sasan set about lighting a fire using a flint and steel type contraption. Sammy wondered if she should light it for him using her powers. But she didn’t want to show off or emasculate him – if he happened to be the kind of man that got upset at such things. Instead, she watched and waited.

  Mehrak returned from his forest expedition with five rats hanging from a stick. He took a seat on a rock nearby and began filleting the little animals. Sammy tried not to watch, but the speed at which he turned the animals inside out and gutted them was impressive. She still wasn’t a fan of blood and guts, but she was slowly becoming desensitised to it. Which may or may not be such a good thing.

  Hami came over with Dirty Santa and Jokram, left them by the fire pit, then wandered off towards Golden Egg Cottage. He returned not long after with Leiss in tow, nodding for the big guy to join everyone else around the fire, then he cleared his throat to get everyone’s attention.

  “Sammy, Mehrak and I are heading north,” he said.

  No one said anything in reply to that. Mehrak seemed not to be paying attention. He brought his rats closer to the fire, which was now beginning to take.

  “I have asked a lot of you ladies and gentlemen,” Hami was heading into formal speech mode. “Although you didn’t know it at the time, you were fighting for the realm. And because of your efforts,
we won that battle. You should be proud of yourselves.” He gave everyone a moment to reflect on this. “You all helped destroy Ramaask. He’s at the bottom of the Cataclysm thanks to you and I want to apologise for dragging you all into this fight. But also to thank you for putting your trust in me. Especially when none of us knew how this would end.”

  Mehrak carried on preparing the rats and threading their disgusting skinless carcasses onto a spit.

  Narok was the first to speak. “We were going against the magi’s orders,” he said. “And you’re going to ask us to do it again.”

  Hami looked him in the eye. “I did what I thought was right.”

  “But what you thought was right has killed many of my guards and jeopardised the other people of Perseopia. It might even have doomed us all.”

  Hami dipped his head in what appeared to be silent acknowledgement. “That’s why I need your help now more than ever. I may not have always been honest, but this thing we’ve released –”

  There were a few murmurs around the campsite, and a few raised eyebrows.

  Hami held up his hands. “I apologise. This thing I’ve released – I take full responsibility.” He took a deep breath. “This thing looks to be a worse threat than Ramaask. We’re talking the fate of the realm again. But this time I’m not ordering anyone to do anything. I’m asking you.”

  “A favour?” Narok sounded sceptical.

  “You’re free to say no. Your debt to the magi has been repaid. You can go home if you wish.”

  Sammy watched Hami. His shoulders were stooped, his eyes were red. She remembered him as being much more forceful and demanding last time.

  “What exactly is it you want from us?” Leiss asked. “Are you asking us to follow you into battle again? To join Master Piruzan and engage this demon that can raise an army of the dead?”

  “No.” Hami paced around the fire. “I’d like you to travel north with me to Ramaask’s snow base in the Atrabiliars.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I believe it’s the real location the demon is heading to. There’s a portal there that it intends to use.”

  Mehrak put his knife down. “How does that corpse monster know of the snow base?”

  “The tall thin figure knows about it. It betrayed Ramaask to release the demon.”

  “Betrayed Ramaask how? It was trying to kill Sammy for him.”

  “That was an act. It was chasing her towards the Fire Temple so she would cross the seal to release this demon, its master.”

  “It was trying to kill me,” Sammy said, but she didn’t truly believe it anymore.

  “It wasn’t trying to kill you,” Hami said quietly. “When it found you in the Fungi Forest, it chased you without catching up. Remember? It shepherded you towards Mehrak and Louis knowing you’d be safe with them and that they’d take you out of the forest. It also scared us into leaving Honton Keep earlier than planned, knowing I’d try to draw Ramaask out of Aratta. And then it led you to the Temple of Paths.”

  “That sounds like a bit of a stretch,” Mehrak said. “Why didn’t it just drag Sammy to the temple instead of using an elaborate plan that could’ve easily gone wrong?”

  “I don’t think it can. It comes from the same place Ramaask does, but it’s not like him. I overheard them talking in Aratta. Ramaask entered the realm whole. This other creature didn’t. It exists in some kind of half form. Maybe because Achaemen Mantis called Ramaask here via an incantation. I don’t know. But Ramaask refused to return the thin creature to his true form because existing on multiple planes and in multiple dimensions allowed it to find Sammy. I’m guessing that also means it can’t physically touch you, Sammy, hence having to herd you. It might not be able to control its heat either and might’ve accidentally killed you if it got too close. Think about it. It killed Borzin right in front of your eyes, even going so far as to torture him until he begged Leiss to help you get home. I know it’s been two years, Sammy, but I bet you haven’t forgotten how Borzin acted when you found him. He didn’t sound like himself when he made Leiss promise to help you, did he?” He looked to the big man. “That’s right, isn’t it, Leiss?”

  Leiss nodded without making eye contact. “Yeah.”

  “You were listening to the thin figure’s voice through Borzin. The whole time he was guiding Sammy towards the seal of the Ahriman so she could release his master.”

  “That’s why it missed us with the fireball,” Mehrak said.

  “Excuse me?”

  “I wondered how it managed to miss us right outside the Temple of Paths. It shot a fireball over our heads and caved the roof in. I figured we’d been lucky at the time, but it left us no choice but to continue along the tunnel to cross the seal.” Mehrak put down his rat. “And it lifted the floor tile in the back hall of the Fifth Azaran. We would never have figured out how to get to the temple if it hadn’t shown us the way.”

  Sammy had nothing to say to that. She’d been convinced they’d outsmarted the thin figure. But it had been one step ahead of them the whole time.

  “If you truly believe this monster is heading to the snow base,” Narok said, “then why did you send Master Piruzan to the white column in Ameretat? You’re putting the realm at risk again.”

  “Because I didn’t want him to know about the portal.” Hami looked away. “It’s a gateway to the Mother World.”

  Mehrak stood up. “You knew there was another, safer way home for Sammy and you took her to the Fifth Azaran instead? You used her as bait, risked her life and everyone else’s in the realm?”

  “We’ve been through this already. I told you my reasons.” Hami spoke through gritted teeth. He opened his mouth to continue, stopped himself, then took a deep breath. “This time is different,” he said at last.

  “And how’s that?”

  “Because this time I’m putting Sammy first. I promised that if I survived the battle outside the Fifth Azaran, I’d help her get home to the Mother World. I tried to send her home in the Temple of Paths but she refused to use the pearl.”

  “You’re still putting the realm at risk by deceiving the magi,” Narok said. “You’ve sent them to the wrong location. I want Sammy to go home as much as the next person, but you can’t risk the very existence of the realm for her.”

  “I’m not. I’ve informed Grand Master Aegis about the portal. He’s bound to figure out that’s where the demon is actually going, if he hasn’t already. When that happens, the magi will travel there and shut it down. We have a narrow window to get there before they do. Now that the Mother World portal pearl has been taken, we have no other option if we want to return Sammy home.”

  “Perhaps I don’t want to go home,” Sammy said.

  “Hold on,” Mehrak said. “Why doesn’t the demon use the portal pearl instead of travelling to the snow base? The thin figure presumably stole it for his master.”

  “That is a very good point,” Hami replied. “And one I don’t have the answer to. My best guess would be that it can’t use the Temple of Paths and that the portal pearl has been stolen to stop anyone else using it.”

  “Sending the magi to the wrong location at a time like this is still incredibly reckless,” Narok said.

  “This is the best way,” Hami said. “The monument at Ameretat is directly in the path of the snow base. Piruzan and the magi will engage the demon outside the city to protect the civilians that live there. If they can’t hold the demon back there, they won’t be able to hold it back at the snow base. At least this way the people of the citadel will get the full might of the magi to protect them. And it will buy us enough time to get to the snow base, to send Sammy home and destroy the portal so the demon can’t use it.”

  “But there are only eleven of us. This portal is going to be heavily guarded. What chance do we have of getting Sammy home and destroying it?”

  “The snow base is way up on the freezing slopes of the Atrabiliar mountains. Which means crabmen can’t survi
ve up there. It’s desolate. Security shouldn’t be high.”

  “They could have domesticated karkadann like ours,” Narok said. “Or manticores, banded wolves or silverback bears.”

  “They may have some of them,” Hami said, “but you have me. And you have Sammy.”

  –TWENTY-NINE–

  INTO THE DARK

  They followed the edge of the Fungi Forest north. On the left, mushrooms and glittering light. On the right, nothingness, the end of the world. Each time they stopped to make camp, Sammy would test her nerve by walking out into the darkness. And each time, she would be unable to sense anything ahead of her, no life and no structure. Occasionally there would be other mushrooms that had grown apart from the others. Single beacons of light out in the black. Sammy would walk out to these islands of light, these safe havens in the sea of shadow, and stand under their luminescent canopies, allowing their glittering spores to drift down on her. The further from her companions she ventured, the heavier the sense of dread became. She’d not witnessed the corpse demon Hami had told her about, but she could tell it was out there. She couldn’t feel it exactly, but there was a cold emptiness left in its wake. A vacuum devoid of life.

  She experienced the emptiness each time she strayed from camp, yet something drew her to it. A curiosity maybe, or a nihilistic urge to approach the abyss and plunge into its depths. She wanted to leave everything behind, embrace the nothingness.

  She had no tangible purpose in Perseopia other than for Hami to babysit her to the portal in the mountains. To him she was little more than a burden. Someone he felt obliged to help after making rash promises to send her home.

  That didn’t bother her. Perseopia had Golden Egg Cottage, lightning staffs and excitement. It had Mehrak too. Even if she didn’t want a relationship with him, he at least cared for her.