by Matt Khourie
He would never go back.
A tiny voice called to him. The Beast lowered his head, ears straining. His heart thumped steadily in his temples. He dropped to all fours, squishing cool wet sand between his toes. The voice beckoned again.
He stalked his way through columns of dusty light, stifling dry coughs into his cloak. Twenty paces ahead, glimmering droplets of moonlight fell in reverse, climbing from floor to ceiling. The Beast halted his advance, unnerved by the bizarre scene. More of Urda’s magic?
Urda’s whisper danced in the shadows. “You know this place, Beast of Briarburn, no?”
The Beast’s head swiveled to the gypsy’s voice but found nothing.
“You are indeed alone, my boy, but fear not! Urda is watching. Now think. Force those rusty works of yours.”
The Beast wracked his mind, willing memory to come crashing back and fill in the blanks. A forest... Stars... cobblestone... Nothing before his awakening on the Great Road. He shook his head, unable to conceal the disappointment in his voice. “Never in my life have I seen this pit.”
“Ah, as truthful a reply as there ever was,” Urda chuckled. “But have you considered that perhaps you’ve had more than one?”
The Beast relaxed to his haunches. “One what?”
“One life, Beast of Briarburn.”
More than one life? Had the old woman gone mad? The Beast knew full well that a being lived and died only once. You were only dealt one hand. The Beast exploded to full height and rumbled through clenched teeth. “I grow tired of riddle speak and parlor tricks.”
“Ah, patience, my boy, patience. We have come to a forgotten place. How deep is for you alone to decide. I have merely forced a stubborn door.” Urda’s jovial tone became grim. “From here, you journey alone. Beware, you may not like all you discover. Some memories are best left behind.” The gypsy’s words trailed off. The Beast fancied not the prospect of searching for answers in a dungeon. Let alone an illusion forged by his fragmented mind.
A weak sob echoed. The Beast leaned toward the muffled sound, reluctant to charge ahead. In the wild, many a wily predator used calls and cries to bait their prey. The cry echoed again. Familiar, he thought. His eyes narrowed against the near pitch, studying the walls. And there it was: The faint outline of an egress. The cry had to have come from within.
The Beast took a step and the moonlight poured into the sand, collecting in a buckler sized puddle. The liquid filled the passage’s mouth, swirling like a whirlpool. He clenched his massive fists, hoping the gesture would prove unnecessary. He stalked the puddle, drawing long even breaths of the stale air. The swirling light rose like a storm funnel, undulating like a cobra. It darted forward, probing the intruder.
Just as I thought.
Despite the ominous dance he remained unafraid. He was hesitant to trust in Urda’s illusion, but she had delivered much with little effort. He would dare to believe. The serpentine light lashed out like a whip. But the Beast was quicker and dropped his heavy fist like a mace, shattering the light into crystalline shards. He stepped over the puddle and cast a wary eye at the dissolving fragments.
The low stone ceiling forced him to hunch and the tunnel narrowed with each step. Halfway through, the suffocating passage smeared slimy mold onto his cloaked shoulders and scraped at his curved horns. The coffin-like tunnel spilled into a round chamber of shining obsidian walls. Several crackling braziers dotted the room’s periphery. The Beast traced a smooth wall with a clawed digit. Overhead, an oculus of ruby and onyx blocked an unseen sky.
A boy of no more than five winters sat by a brazier. His knees were tucked under his chin and waves of stringy hair caked with grime clung to tear stains. A filthy tunic did little to hide welted limbs. His eyes darted to the menace of dancing shadows and widened when the Beast’s giant form filled the entrance. The Beast awkwardly gestured for calm, thinking himself the cause of the child’s fright. “Be not afraid.”
The boy shivered into his knees and leveled a finger. His raw lower lip quivered. The Beast extended an outstretched palm. “I will not harm you.” He struggled for a re-assuring tone and crept closer, fully expecting a shriek sure to shatter the oculus. The boy remained still, as though carved from stone. The Beast realized then the power of Urda’s enchantment. He was indeed merely a visitor.
The Beast was waving a paw before the boy’s eyes when a faint clicking sound ebbed into the chamber. His skin crawled at the awful noise. He snapped to the narrow tunnel, finding nothing in the deep dark. He rushed to the boy and scooped him onto his back. He tore the closest brazier free and hurled the burning sculpture overhead... A rainfall of shattered glass tossed glints of fire over the walls of obsidian mirror. The Beast spun around, shielding the boy. “Hold tightly, boy.”
The Beast mustered his strength and leapt into the newly ventilated ceiling. He found his mark and clamped down hard. His brawny legs dangled, building momentum. His grip slipped and he slid back. He gouged the stone and pulled. A moment later, he pulled himself through. The Beast rolled to his back and gasped for breath. The boy.
His stomach somersaulted and he crawled to the ring of broken glass.
The boy was back beside the brazier, knees to chest, finger leveled. The Beast blinked, checking against his disbelief. He shouted for the boy to hide. Still, the boy remained motionless.
The sea of clicks drowned out his calls. And then it arrived. A rust tinged wave swept through the tunnel, rolling against the chamber’s walls. The Beast told himself that he had done all he could, but a foul pit in his stomach dissented.
The reddish brown flow filled the room, climbing the walls, dousing the braziers. A writhing swarm of spiders and scorpions clicked and crawled, snapping at him as it continued to climb. The Beast backed away from the oculus and scanned for an escape route. A cover of grainy darkness stretched into forever. There was only one option.
Run.
He sprinted down the dome, looking back only once. He instantly regretted the decision. The swarm of stingers and fangs had crested the breach and spilled over, surging like a poisonous tide. The dome’s edge raced closer. The Beast leapt and sailed through the grayish murk of his forgotten memory. Crashing sounds of waterfalls and a piercing white light suddenly surrounded him. His head throbbed between his paws. He squeezed them into his ears, trying to silence the deafening roar. His vision cleared.
And his heart sank.
He sat surrounded by burning braziers in a round room with shimmering black walls. Overhead, an intricate stained glass oculus reflected the fire light. The Beast was quick to his feet. He lifted an arm to brush himself off, but was thwarted by the sight of a child-sized, human hand. His child-sized, human hand. He gasped at his reflection and traced the round features of a fleshy face. He ran his hands through grimy hair, stopping where his horns were supposed to be.
It couldn’t be...
He fell back to the safety of a brazier’s warmth. A faint clicking squelched his astonishment. The swarm was coming and there was no chance of repeating the escape. His human legs lacked the strength. Thankfully, his wit remained intact. He tore off a greasy piece of tunic and wrapped it around a scrap of loose wood plucked from a brazier. The clicking built to a sinister roar. He ignited the torch and barreled into the passage.
Dancing torch light cast an amber glow over the sea of carapaces as the Beast-child’s spindly arms swept the torch in wild circles. Arachnids sizzled and scorched into black dust. He skidded into the memory-scape’s first chamber, driving the swarm into full retreat. The clicking mass piled against the Troll’s Breath’s door. A shaft of silvery moon painted the latch. He need only put the swarm to the torch and be done with it.
A ghostly light rose from the floor and drew the swarm’s burnt remnants to its luminous center. When the last scorched carcass was consumed, a flash ignited the room. The shock wave blasted the Beast-child into a jagged crack in the wall. His vision clear
ed in time for the memory to morph into a nightmare.
For something horrible crawled out from the glob of pulsating light.
The Beast-child’s chilled blood slogged through his quaking body. He bit down hard on his lip, desperate to silence his chattering teeth. He tried desperately to push deeper into the crack. The creature’s name eluded him in his fright, but he remembered well the terrifying visage. Its eyes numbered eight and glowered with pale fire. A mottled humanoid torso sprouted grotesquely from a giant spider’s body carried by skittish, bluish-black legs. A muscular left arm ended in a wicked serrated pincer.
The Beast-child clamped his mouth. He was sure his heart would freeze any moment. And then the monster spoke with the chilling midnight wind of a cemetery.
“Say it. Say my name.”
Icy rails pierced the Beast-child’s heart. He choked down a parade of gasps, clinging to fleeing breath. The demon beckoned with its human hand and smiled a hideous mouthful of hooked fangs. “You’ll never be free of Arak-jai.”
A shrill scream shattered his consciousness and the Beast-child lapsed into darkness.
Chapter 6
Without warning, he was back. He clutched the table’s sides, tension building in his forearms. The Beast slumped in his chair, vaguely aware of the fire’s warmth upon his face. Never in his life had he felt such exhaustion. Urda summoned the crystals back to her side. They flashed home, hovering beside the carved headrest of the high back chair. She probed the hearth with a poker.
The old gypsy smiled in the dancing light. She had indeed delivered a rare gift. The Beast now possessed a kernel of truth. His origin had long been an elusive dream. Now it was as certain as the dawn. The image of his childish hands was imprinted upon his mind. Human...
“I remember...” The words fought through his throat. “I remember the dark. I remember when he first came.” A shiver climbed the Beast’s spine. He remembered the stinging, the biting. He remembered hiding from the horrible eyes.
“Ah yes. The Prince of Stingers, the Arachnomancer himself,” Urda said, slipping back into her chair.
The Beast uttered the once forgotten name scorched forever on his tongue. “Arak-jai.” He wondered why the brutal memory was the first to reveal itself.
“Because it was he who ignited the burning desire within you. The desire to fight. The desire to live free of fear.”
The Beast sprung upright, unnerved by the intrusion into his private thoughts. He started to issue a complaint but Urda found words first.
“Peace, Beast of Briarburn. Yours was an obvious question. In fact, it was the most obvious question. Everyone who travels inside questions why they see what they see.”
The Beast sensed truth in her words. Inside of that frightened boy a glowing ember had been born. That boy would mature and face his crawling fears in the darkness. The works of his mind turned, creaking slowly as rust fell away. The Beast remembered that boy. He survived, found his way to a new home... A castle. He would grow up to be...
The memory faded. It was only a fragment of a fragment. But it was something. It was a start. The Beast studied the lines around Urda’s eyes. The fire in her milky orbs hinted that old age had done little to dampen a strong spirit. There was no trace of dishonesty. He fumbled for the medallion and then lifted it over his head. The firestone gleamed, soaking up the fire’s warmth. With a gentle push it slid across the table, splitting the narrow spaces between bone-filled plates and empty mugs. Urda cupped her hand beneath the table’s edge just as the medallion slipped off.
The medallion spun, dangling from Urda’s bony fingers. She let it dance at the end of its chain, then traced a thumb over the inscription. “I’ve never seen anything quite like it, my son,” Urda lied. “It is dazzling piece. Certainly there is magic within the stone, that much is obvious to even the thickest dullard. Very old. Originated beyond our realm.”
The exhausted Beast missed the subtle shift in Urda’s tone. Layers of flowery talk about magic and distant realms provided ample concealment. It was the stuff of children’s fantasies and old maid’s tales, the Beast thought. Fantastic tales for hopeless fools. Then again, he had experienced Urda’s magic firsthand. Maybe there was something to her claim? He leaned onto an elbow and extended an open palm. The medallion drifted from Urda’s fingers and settled around his tree trunk neck. The Beast stifled a chuckle. Urda’s mischievous nature was growing on him.
The Beast allowed a minor breach of his guard, dressing his words with a hint of sarcasm. “Parlor tricks are one thing, gypsy, but what real help are you?”
“Yes, yes, faerie fire is one thing. Showing you the nature of true magic is another entirely. Your quest, your very existence is grounded in more magic than you care to admit, Beast of Briarburn. It surrounds you though you deny it, fueled by the brightest stars in our nighttime sky.” Urda’s eyes sparkled with the rising passion in her voice. “Magic is the very life-blood and soul of all creation. It stretches beyond the land of the living, binding all of the realms in a delicate master piece.”
The Beast was speechless. He had no rebuttal for Urda’s passionate words. Had he arbitrarily dismissed magic’s importance as the world of Men had so callously dismissed him? He thought of the cold iron shackles that had bound him after the last time he had trusted in men. Summoning all courage, he stood and bowed his head. He crossed his heart with a wide paw.
“Please, help me.”
“Of course Urda will help you. There is much to learn from your past, yes. But a glimpse into your future will provide guiding star.”
The Beast fell back into his chair, expecting the crystal balls to resume their dance. Urda slapped the table with a freckled hand and laughed. “Silly boy. One cannot divine the future by scouring the fabric of memory. Come, we must go outside.”
Much preferring the hearth to the freezing wind, the Beast hesitated. “Why is that?”
“The stars, Beast of Briarburn. If there are answers for us to find, surely they will be amongst the stars.”
Urda snapped her fingers and the door leading outside swung open. A second snap dismissed the flickering crystals. Urda offered her arm to the Beast. Again, he hesitated. Urda scoffed and picked up her old bones. “Heaven forbid a gentleman help an old woman from her chair. Especially when she means to wander into the cold on his behalf.”
The Beast flushed and looked sheepishly at his feet. Urda patted him on the arm and strolled to the door, leaving him to embrace his role as shadow. The sky was a jumble of gray cotton. The moon peeked in and out of sight, but the stars were all but absent. The Beast grumbled, slicing a paw through a thick fog. “I can barely see my hand let alone the stars.”
Urda ignored the complaint. She pressed her palms together, fingers pointed to the moon. He heard a whisper, thinking at first it was the rustling wind. The whispering lasted a sparrow’s song and then Urda blew a kiss to the heavens. The stars shook their cloudy blanket free, for a moment illuminating the world with light brilliant enough to make the sun envious. The stars’ diamond encrusted mural promised that he was an important thread in a grand masterpiece. Humbled, he bowed his head.
Urda summoned the crystals with a snap, then threw an imaginary stick at the sky. The crystals shot off in pursuit of their quarry, climbing over snow-covered pines, then scattering in three directions. Positioned to her liking, Urda shouted. “Well then, go on. Show our friend what is to be.”
Beams of scarlet light shot from the crystals, forming a triangle against the starry backdrop. They carved the night, slowly draining away the color within the boundary. First went the cottony clouds. Then went the charcoal sky. The stars themselves faded last, leaving a pale triangle. The Beast’s jaw dropped. He eyed the gypsy, but only for a moment. There was a nagging sensation that her magic was dangerous. But, he had decided to place his trust in it and he would see the decision through.
“No harm shall come to you from the stars. N
ot ever,” Urda said softly.
The tension eased in his shoulders and the Beast released the breath he had been holding since the fiery shape appeared. A speck flashed in the triangle’s center. It danced erratically, leaving tracers of light in its wake. The speck raced about, bouncing among the scarlet boundaries, filling in the empty space with a familiar image.
His portrait...
“You’ve out done yourself,” the Beast said, impressed once more by the gypsy’s magic.
The sketch suddenly vibrated. A writhing tail of wicked barbs burst through the triangular frame, knocking the Beast-effigy from his feet. A second whip like appendage wrapped around its throat.
The Beast jabbed a talon at the morbid image. “Jahana’s blaze! What was that?”
Urda did not answer, only solemnly nodded upwards, trying to focus the Beast’s attention.
The Beast snarled and looked as commanded. Fanged jaws appeared, snapping and salivating. He watched helplessly as the effigy was flayed by the writing serpents. The jaws stalked forward. With a crunching pop they unhinged to a grotesque angle. He heard a child’s cry from above. Familiar somehow, like an echo. He didn’t know how, but he was certain it was not the scream of the cringing boy.
The image vibrated again. The speck sped about, etching a small figure behind his effigy. Not until the Beast noticed the curly hair did he realize it was a child.
A girl.
The fanged jaws snapped like a bear trap, swallowing the scene. A cruel laugh leaked from the dying portrait. And then there was nothing. The sky breached the crimson triangle like ocean tide through a sand castle.
“No!” The Beast paced a circle around Urda, snow and ice crunching underfoot. “I must know more. Is that to be my end? You said no harm would come of stars. What then is that?” The furious tirade left his muscled chest heaving. He clutched at his medallion, pulling the chain taut.