The Python of Caspia

by Michael Green

  The ryle scoffed and stepped forward. “Like this!” he twisted his own wrist in an awkward way. The purple blade fluttered and lost definition. “This is where you’re at; you need to find the hone. Without it you might as well be committing suicide,” The ryle said derisively.

  Andy’s eyes nearly bulged out of his head. The ryle’s blade was unhoned.

  Hit him! Now! His blade will fly away, like mine did!

  The ryle saw his mistake too late. Andy swung his own unhoned blade at his foe’s. Another burst rang out, and, this time, they both went flying.

  “His armor’s down!” Martin called from above. “Clang! Throw everything!”

  Andy groaned, and rolled away in the mud as a volley of projectiles rained down. After a moment, the ryle looked like a pincushion. He struggled to his feet and stood there, silent, waiting for his foe to rouse, but he never did. The purple orb lay a few feet away from his. They had both lost their weapons in the blast. The ryle’s armor had vanished with the blade. He wondered if they were connected.

  Unable to figure it out, Andy let himself fall backwards into the mud. He shut his eyes and tried to get comfortable.

  “Martin!” Andy called out, “Leave me down here for a few hours, maybe throw me something to eat. Take a break, and then we’ll tell her Mistressness about the victory.”

  “You most certainly will not!”

  Andy’s eyes shot open. A furious Pythia was standing on the battlements, looking down at him and shaking his abandoned cloak.

  “Look what you did to your cloak—are you lying in the mud?”

  Chapter 14

  The Ossuary

  Andy rolled his eyes as a dozen grubby hands pushed and pulled in an effort to brush all the mud and gunk from his clothes. He winced as a goblin, who was standing on his shoulders, yanked on his hair.

  “Rollin’ in the mud? Poor choice, Master,” a goblin muttered in his ear as he worked a muddy pebble out of Andy’s hair.

  “Being climbed on will only make me dirtier,” Andy muttered.

  A goblin from behind called out, “Turn ‘im round!”

  Andy turned and barely had his hands up before he was hit with a bucket’s worth of water.

  Gratefully, and after a few more volleys, the cleaning wound down.

  We took the fortress. Why does she care if I got muddy in the process?

  Pythia fretted and paced, a foul bent to her mouth. Martin and Clang eyed the walls nervously, neither keen on being noticed. Andy endured the cleaning as Pythia stomped around the massive foyer, staring for long stretches of time at plain walls. Finally, her gaze fell on him and his dripping clothes. With her raised brow pointed his way, he felt unsure of her intentions.

  She has what she wanted, but she’s still looking at me like I’m a problem.

  He knew that he had to say something, anything to get her talking. “We captured the fortress—that’s good news,” Andy said, stifling a wince as another hand pulled at his hair.

  Pythia gave a noncommittal, “Hmm,” before stepping forward to reattach his cloak. “Off! Off him, you beasts!” The goblins rushed away. “We may have taken the fortress, but that was just the beginning. Now your real work begins. It won’t be force of arms—” she looked over to Clang and Martin, “—or low cunning, that wins this time.”

  Andy mulled over her words but stopped at the appearance of a specific cloak. It looked freshly repaired.

  “How? That cloak has been unraveling and tripping me up all night.”

  Pythia attached the clasp at his neck. “Just a little trick. To help me keep track,” she intoned with a grin.

  So, the cloak snagging was deliberate. Andy sighed. Tracking me is bad enough, but why yell at me about the damn thing, if it was made to fall apart in the first place?

  Andy scowled, but kept his mouth shut.

  Sensing his annoyance, she chuckled and rolled her eyes dramatically. “Well, I wasn’t about to let you run off without a lead, was I? It was dangerous—it still is. Hmm,” she trailed off, suddenly distracted. “Mirror!” she snapped.

  Andy heard grunts of exertion. A team of Goblins had been standing nearby with a large round mirror and its frame draped in sheets. They seemed ready for the command, and quickly assembled the mirror.

  Pythia dusted off her shoulders, removed the pith helmet, and tapped it against her wrist. It morphed into a tiara, which she carefully positioned on her up-swept hair. “I suppose we can stand some celebration,” she whispered as her clothes lengthened and transformed into a series of gowns. One gown morphed into the next, colors and patterns changing every second.

  The show went on and on, and everyone present allowed themselves a collective sigh of relief as Pythia was too busy finding an outfit, to be angry at them. But as the moments wore on, that relief disappeared as she became visibly frustrated.

  “Is something wrong?” Andy asked.

  Before she could answer, he noticed the assorted goblins grimace at his question.

  “This bloody fortress! The lighting is absolutely wrong—never mind the color!” Pythia snapped without looking away from the mirror.

  Andy hazarded a recommendation, “Maybe a dress that glows?”

  “Please keep your bloody foolish—” she paused, and her morphing clothes ceased their shifting with her. “A glowing dress?”

  “Maybe, dark red?”

  “Hmm.” Her gown was suddenly blood-red. Then dark silver trim snaked along the collar before coiling itself in bands around her wrists and hem. Letters of deepest violet blazed here and there, illuminating the room more than seemed possible as they burned their slowly-vanishing trails across the fabric. The effect was eerie, as smoldering letters carved one way, then the other.

  She pondered her appearance quietly, before muttering, “One more detail.” Her tiara grew into a tall onyx crown. Barely visible black flames ran up the jagged spikes, before lapping carelessly down her fall of hair. The aggressive look on her face softened as she ran a hand over a course of the burning letters at her waist.

  Is she blushing?

  She looked over at Andy suspiciously.

  Why is she looking at me like that?

  Before Andy could ponder an answer, she snapped her fingers and the two useless marshals, who moments ago were cowering in a corner, rushed forward.

  “Yes, your Mistressness?” they both stammered over each other.

  The new appearance made her more ferocious than she had been moments ago, and they couldn’t bring themselves to look her way. Even the harder and more veteran Goblins under Clang were preoccupied with imperfections in their blades.

  “Have every goblin on the beachhead moved inside the walls. Spread out and settle down—keep the looting to a minimum, and clear that pile of trash from the hall. Consider plugging up the cave with it. We don’t want anyone using our own tricks against us.”

  “Of course! Right away!” The two marshals saluted and bowed nervously as they backed away.

  Andy heard them rush off, yelling orders at the top of their lungs. The goblins in Clang’s group ignored them, and they, despite their supposed superiority, weren’t surprised.

  Pythia snapped her fingers and pointed towards a blocked door in the foyer. She motioned for the debris, including the chandelier that Martin collapsed, to be moved out of the way.

  Andy approached Martin and Clang. Before he could speak, Martin rushed forward and clasped his arm. “You saved me back there—with the ryle—he had me.”

  Andy shook his head. “No, you saved us. You brought the chandelier down.”

  “Distraction doubled our strength,” Clang agreed, “but there is no victory without strong arms.”

  Martin nodded and spoke, “Or keeping a level head in the thick of it. For these reasons, today, the laurel is yours.” Martin gestured for something to be brought forward.

  Andy felt confused as Clang took a bundle from a nearby Goblin. Something in the bundle glinted, betraying a metallic surface.


  “We all owe one another. This is how it should be in war,” Martin said, his color mellowing from blood red to scarlet, “but without you, there would have been a sorry end for us, almost certainly. That ryle was skilled with the Counter. His armor was impervious to anything in our arsenal. If not for that trick, he would have slaughtered us.”

  Andy felt a little ashamed and stepped back as Clang handed Martin a roughshod laurel circlet. The leaves were perplexing. Most of the circlet’s surface was covered in a rich, non-reflective green, but minute scratches revealed a deep orange gleam underneath.

  Clang cleared his throat for attention. “We had the lads hammer one together while you suffered cleaning. It’s rough working, even for the Teeth.”

  Andy stood awkwardly, not knowing what to do or say.

  Clang coughed and gestured for him to take a knee. Andy did so.

  Martin placed the laurel over his hair, and it rested on his brow.

  “They found metal leaves at beachhead,” Clang said.

  Martin had a fey look in his eyes as he spoke, and Andy felt himself listening closely. “The metal reminds me of you. Dull on the surface, but when scratched, it reveals something different.”

  Clang grunted, slapping a hand on Martin’s midsection, which nearly knocked the breath out of him. “Give it here,” Clang said as Martin stepped aside.

  Andy carefully took the circlet off and held it out to Clang.

  “Look—” Clang gestured to writing inside the band. “The gobmarks speak of your victory and armaraderie to our clan. They who know Broken Teeth ‘right and friendlike will see with different eyes if you show them these gobmarks.”

  “Armaraderie?” Andy asked, confused.

  “You have been born in combat,” Martin interjected. “The more heroic a birth, the higher they will value you. Sadly, we don’t have the time right now—” Martin gestured to an impatient Pythia, who was waiting for wreckage to be cleared.

  “Lysander!” Pythia called to him. The path was almost clear.

  “Quick—do either of you know what she means when she said I still have work to do? Apparently, I haven’t started yet.”

  Andy grimaced at the horde of goblins clearing the last boulder from the doorway. Pythia was tapping her foot anxiously.

  Clang and Martin looked back and forth between themselves before Martin spoke. “We’ve been on that beach for ages, but no one’s ever told us what’s so important about this place.”

  Clang grunted. “Our Mistress is powerful, like sea, but is not power she hunts.”

  They stood in silence, considering Clang’s words.

  “If not power, then what? What could be worth all this?” Andy asked.

  Before Martin could answer, he was interrupted by Pythia herself, “Lysander, the way is clear.”

  Martin and Clang shared a look of concern as Andy turned to go.

  “Don’t forget the laurels, boy!” Blue’s high-pitched voice nearly made Andy jump out of his shoes. He had only been a few feet away, on a pile of fallen stone. “Who do you think swam through the wreckage to find those damned heavy leaves?”

  Andy took the circlet and gave a quick nod to his friends before leaving.

  It took a mob of goblins to open the double doors. Pythia waved Andy forward, and a few dozen armed goblins took this as a sign and moved to catch up.

  “We won’t be requiring your company,” Pythia said, looking down the vaulted hall. “Enjoy yourselves, but don’t make this place any more of a mess while you do. Any cooking must be done under chimneys—I don’t care if you cook in the kitchen or in the dining halls, but I will not suffer smoke stains on the ceilings!”

  The goblins nodded their small heads as they tripped over one another in a collective attempt to escape her wrath.

  After a while, the light from the Goblin’s torches became too distant to see by, and only Pythia’s magnificent gown lit the way. It wasn’t enough and Andy’s shoulder smacked into a door frame.

  Pythia made an amused sound before speaking, “Do you know how to make light with that Argument of yours?”

  Andy grasped the marble gently and a clear light filled the hall to about the same degree a lantern might have.

  “Very good,” she said. “You know, you would make an above average pupil in Caspia.”

  Andy was silent.

  “You have already made friends and I’m considering you for a leadership position.” She pondered for a moment before continuing, “What do the rats call their war leaders?”

  Andy thought back to his short time with Titus and the Dextra. “They are called expeditious, or expeditious extraordinary, I think.”

  “Expeditious extraordinary? Hmm—I don’t like it. A mouthful of pointless assonance. How about strategos? Or maybe legate? The Greeks were fond of archon.”

  Andy made to speak, but she continued right over him.

  “No, there’s a better way. I’ll let you structure the military. You can use whatever nomenclature you like, but no attempts at coup d’état please,” she laughed, but Andy sensed that she was serious about the offer.

  I’m not going to stay in Caspia, even if I get to play general. I have a family and school to get back to. But maybe if I—

  Andy took a long while, to affect serious deliberation, before answering. “If I stayed, would I forget about the rest of my life? Would I forget my friends and family?” he asked.

  Pythia was taken aback by the question. “No—not at first—and not if you don’t want to.”

  “It’s just that when I found Letty, she didn’t remember me.”

  “Ah—she was still under the effect of Ziesqe’s serums.” Pythia answered.

  Serum?

  Andy struggled to understand. “But once it wore off, she would regain her memory, and return to normal? The serum doesn’t do anything permanent?”

  Pythia nodded. “You spoke with her a few hours ago. I assume she has always been a shrew?”

  Andy cracked a smile. “A bit. But don’t the others want to go back home too? How is it that Ropt brings you all these children and they just choose to stay in Caspia?”

  Pythia struggled with a sour expression.

  She doesn’t like all these questions, but she wants to keep me happy.

  “Well, if you stayed in Caspia for enrollment and birth, you would learn a little more about their perspectives. Here is a quick taste of reality for you: One day, those eyes of yours will finish developing and, unless you do something to hide it, they will take you. You might avoid it for months or years even. You will begin to see them up there, and the extent of their power would terrify you. Eventually they would capture you. In hours, you would find yourself living a nightmare you can’t begin to imagine. Only then would you realize your immense good luck in finding me. All of my pupils come to understand this. I can count on one hand those who have left and not returned.”

  She’s trying to scare me.

  Andy changed the subject, “When I met Quill, he didn’t know how to shake hands.”

  Pythia was silent.

  “At first, I wasn’t suspicious of this, but then I learned how you find your students. This means that Quill is from the surface, like me.”

  Pythia narrowed her eyes.

  “How is it that he didn’t know how to shake my hand?”

  Silence.

  “Would he know his parent’s names if I asked him? Would he remember where he went to school?”

  Finally, Pythia laughed, though it was sad. “This is a tragedy, Lysander. You are loyal to a reality so abusive that it surprises you to learn that, those who have escaped, learn to forget.”

  Quill did say how grateful he was to live in Caspia. He seemed normal otherwise; he talked about girls, was annoyed by Somni, and he helped me at dinner too.

  Andy struggled with his doubts until Pythia suddenly stopped. They had arrived at a wide set of stairs. Pythia stared for a moment before raising an eyebrow at Andy.

  She wants me to
guess.

  Andy shrugged. “What are we looking for?”

  “Inside the Ossuary is a special space, well-hidden and unopened for some time. When we finally find it, it might try and trick us by looking particularly unimportant, but there is something different there.”

  “What’s so special about this place?” Andy asked, nearly biting his tongue. He had grown too comfortable asking questions.

  But she didn’t seem all that bothered as she spoke. “I expect we will find a little piece of history, tucked away safe from the conflict, though I am hoping for much more.”

  Andy felt uncomfortable at hearing that.

  “Well, since it’s in the Ossuary, which is where they keep bones, I’d guess down.” Andy pointed at the downstairs.

  “That’s fair logic, boy—but no. We are already down, very down, at least to common sense, but we can save my theories on interspaciality for another time. All you need to know is that we are heading to a place where your world and mine overlap.”

  “So—up?”

  Pythia laughed as she approached the upward stairs.

  Andy was huffing and puffing after a few dozen flights. “This doesn’t make sense, I don’t remember seeing a tower like this from the outside.”

  The climb didn’t bother Pythia, who almost floated up the stairs. Andy saw her feet take soft, yet precise, steps. She was tireless, and spoke with a clear, calm voice, “Of course there was no tower to see from the outside. The keep itself is embedded in the cavern ceiling. It might make more sense for you to think of where we are as down a deep well, and now we’re climbing up and out.”

  I’m dying here, and she’s not even breathing heavily.

  Andy’s face scrunched with confusion and fatigue. He was torn between falling to his knees to take a breath and keeping up to continue the discussion. In the end, he chased after Pythia, breathing heavily between every few words, “So—my world—is above this world—the Nether—Netherscape?”

  “You can think of it that way. The people who built this place certainly did, but no. At least I’m fairly certain that the two realms only appear to join in this fashion. Of course the name Netherscape implies that it lies beneath the realm-without-a-ceiling, or your surface world, as you call it. I dislike going myself, the ryle have the place firmly under control. I suppose that’s something I regret.”