Beastly

by Matt Khourie

  Lia’s hazel eyes opened wide while Pandora’s narrowed to the snake-like slits. The child bolted as quickly as her little legs could manage. The Liche Queen snatched at the fleeing girl’s hair, but Lia was too fast. The Beast started forward, allowing the child to collide with his leg. Lia squeezed his massive thigh and then looked up into the familiar eyes that she had never seen before. In this lifetime...

  Lia choked back a sob. “I knew you’d come.” The Beast clutched his daughter against his leg. “I will always find you, star-shine.”

  He maneuvered Lia to his flank and regarded the Liche Queen. A forgotten lifetime’s worth of emotions flooded through him, threatening to burst his mind’s fragile dam. They had been repressed in silence, locked away for too long, and now demanded their freedom.

  And their vengeance.

  A million words trampled the Beast’s tongue. He raised a black talon and growled pure fury.

  “You...”

  The deathly still of the Garrison cringed at the Beast’s chilling damnation, sending the shadows into hiding. The Liche Queen’s jaw all but unhinged as she stepped backwards, colliding with the altar. She reached slowly behind her back for the ceremonial dagger, still dripping with Malachai’s blood. Her icy fingers closed around the hilt. The mistake was more than loud enough for the Beast’s keen hearing.

  “Don’t,” he growled. “It will take more than that.”

  Pandora released the dagger and half-hid behind the arbour of blackened stone. She was no fool. Another tactic was in order. She would call upon another skill, one she hoped still applied to such a fearsome creature. The Liche Queen peered around the arch, caressing the runic etchings, regarding the Beast with a curious eye. She flashed a kittenish smile. “Well then,” Pandora purred, “aren’t you the mighty titan?” She giggled a coy giggle, casually stepping around the arch’s base. She abandoned the arbour’s safety and dropped her dark robes to the floor. She stepped free of the pile, covered by little more than bands of black silk.

  “Not another step.” The Beast’s roaring command shook the cavern. Lia jumped at the thunderous clap, but remained relieved beyond measure to be standing at her father’s side. “If you believe for a moment that the sight of you does anything but boil my blood...”

  “Oh come now. Surely the fabled Beast of Briarburn is not without certain appetites.” Pandora let her fingers trace the soft skin of a pale thigh. Waves of long, dark locks fell over her shoulders, glistening in the emerald light.

  Years before, when they were young and she yet untouched by the Blight, he would have crossed the deepest seas at Pandora’s whim. Indeed, once he had. He had been wrong aboard the Reaper’s Song. The craven look in the Liche Queen’s eyes told him everything. There was nothing left of the woman he loved, nothing left of his princess. Not even a breath of hope. The Beast snarled at the pitiful advances.

  There was no bringing Pandora back.

  The Liche Queen’s lip quivered. Then her hands and naked arms up to her shoulders. “How dare you!” The Liche Queen rattled the Garrison, clanking the steel of the unseen Wakeful legions slumbering below. Pandora convulsed. “How dare you!” She balled her hands into alabaster clubs, tension chewing her muscles. The air about her shoulders sizzled and warped the darkness. A tempest of black magic forever brewing now boiled over.

  The skin around the Liche Queen’s eyes melted away, burned by the Blight’s unseen flame. Her flesh spoiled, rotting the creamy porcelain into a putrid shell of mottled grays that few had had the terrible privilege of seeing. “How dare you!” The banshee-like wail exploded from the hanging skeletal remnants of Pandora’s jaw. Her luxurious raven shaded locks faded to tufts of grey and then crumbled, taking flight on a sinister breeze. The Liche Queen’s primal scream rocked the foundation of the Nekropolis, setting the whole of the castle to tremble.

  Her neck cracked backwards as she summoned strength from the arbour’s incandescent runes before wailing into the unknown.

  “Malachai!”

  ***

  The Reaper’s Song silently hovered above the Nekropolis, cloaked from view by Death’s own magic. Two hours had passed since the Beast disappeared over the side, setting the plan in motion. Poogs hoped it proved better than a fool’s errand.

  It had only taken ten minutes of those hours to drive the pirate below deck to the calming sanctuary of his work station. Poogs sat at the bench, tinkering with a gadget under the glow of amber lamp-light. He set a prototype model down after a few twists of a hand tool and turned to a half-finished blue-print. Tension gnawed the base of his skull. The loathsome sensation vibrated between his ears. Beads of sweat dampened his temples. He swiped at the blue print with a stylus, leaving rough strikes behind on the parchment.

  Not right, not good enough.

  Poogs threw the stylus down in disgust and turned back to the model and his tools. “Now where the hell have they gotten off to?” The pirate knocked aside a stack of rolled parchments. “I just had them.”

  “It does us no good to worry, Captain,” Polaris said softly. She held the object of Poogs’s obsession in her palm. “And it does you no good to keep getting in your own way.”

  Polaris playfully tossed the tool to the pirate. She strolled around the sprawling work station, inspecting blue prints, manipulating models. “In all of my lifetimes among mortals I have never seen their equal. You should be proud.”

  “My lady is far too kind. Apologies for the outburst,” Poogs said with a bow.

  Polaris returned a tiny model ship to the bench. “The ideas consume you, like any magic consumes its vessel. Your world is only just realizing the natural sciences, yet you speak their languages fluently... when you allow yourself to listen.”

  “My lady?” The pirate’s brow creased, displaying the etched lines of a burdened mind.

  Polaris gestured for him to sit. Poogs did as commanded, returning to the simple wooden stool by the bench’s side. The North Star stepped behind him and placed her hands on his shoulders. “Now breathe.”

  Poogs breathed in staggered bursts. They were the breaths of a caged animal: restless and agitated.

  “No, no.” Polaris shifted her hands to the pirate’s chest and back. “With me now. Breathe.”

  Poogs inhaled, drawing in a steady stream of air as the North Star pressed against his chest wall.

  “Out,” Polaris commanded, releasing her grip.

  The calming exchange repeated for three soothing, centering breaths. At the end of Poogs’s final one, Polaris spoke.

  “Draw.”

  Poogs needed no further instruction. He grabbed the discarded stylus, dipped it to ink, and sketched feverishly at the blue-print. Five minutes of scratching later he was finished. He put the stylus aside and pushed away from the work station, inspecting his work.

  “When you are ready to listen, the entire world will sing its secrets to you,” Polaris said with a smile.

  Poogs held the sketch at arm’s length, astonished. Aided by the North Star, he had completed in minutes a design that had haunted his dreams for years. He proudly pointed at the various angles and edges of the sketch as he explained his theory. The fervid speech faded away, replaced by a sincere humility. “I hope one day all may enjoy seeing the world as I do. As the stars do. Maybe this design will someday unite us.”

  Poogs flattened the sketch onto the work bench. “I don’t know how you managed to make the voices speak in turn, that I may hear their knowledge,” the pirate said, daring to take Polaris’s hand, “but I thank you, my lady.” The pirate suddenly blushed at his own brazen action. The mere presence of the North Star was an honor to any sailor. But there was more. Her presence stole the words from his lips before he had opportunity to trip over them. He wondered if there was even the slightest chance she felt the same.

  “You are welcome, Captain,” Polaris said, slipping her hand free.

  For a moment his hear
t sunk, and he thought himself a fool for assuming such a ludicrous idea. She was the North Star: Timeless and constant. She could never see him in the same light. Not in this life. Polaris brushed a lock of hair from the pirate’s face and kissed him on the cheek. In that heartbeat, time froze and Poogs was certain that he saw a very human sparkle in the North Star’s eyes.

  A thunderous boom violently rocked the ship. Parchment and gadgetry crashed from their shelving. The work station, made of solid oak and carrying the weight of Poogs’s equipment fared no better and skittered across the floor. Poogs caught the North Star by the arm. “What in the name of the gods?”

  A worrisome look crept over Polaris’s face. “I believe Donovan and my daughter have been re-united.”

  Chapter 28

  At first the Beast heard naught but his own tepid breath. Then came a rapid click clicking. Somewhere in the darkness, it quickened. And grew louder. Something wicked was fast upon him. Them. Lia’s safety was paramount; even if it meant sending her away. Again.

  The clicking was nearly on top of father and daughter, tapping like angry rain on steel. The Liche Queen levitated and then eased backwards, relishing the surging doom. The menacing storm of clicks built to a terrible crescendo. Lia pressed her palms to her ears and burrowed her face deep into the Beast’s side. In a ragged breath he repeated his life’s most agonizing decision, tearing his heart in half all over again. The Beast clutched Lia by the shoulders at arm’s length. “Run. I will be right behind you.”

  Lia’s mouth opened to protest, but was silenced by a warding paw.

  “Go! Now!”

  Malachai’s twin writhing tails whipped and thrashed behind the hovering Liche Queen, just as Lia bolted for the entrance. She forced herself to focus on the flapping black veil, promising herself she would not look back. A grotesquely lengthened, horse-like skull, glowing with ten fiery orbs reared over the platform’s side. Malachai dug in with his hooked claws and pulled his bulk up to his waiting queen. The long talons of his hind legs looked like hand scythes and chewed at the petrified surface for purchase.

  Malachai greeted the Beast with a fell howl. It was the call of a rabid wolf on a patch of forgotten tundra. His tails darted back and forth like dueling cobras, dancing above his columns of burning eyes.

  “Now this is more like it.” The Liche Queen’s voice was a hollow cackle. She swept an arm between the two titans, welcoming them to her personal arena. “Do not disappoint me again, Captain.”

  The Beast had only a second to wonder if that parting barb had been meant for his benefit. Does she know who I am? The barbs of Malachai’s tails flared and fired towards the Beast from across the platform. He dodged to his right and rolled clear, leaving the twin tails slicing through shadow. Malachai charged in the next breath, jaws snapping open, revealing hundreds of eager teeth. The Beast caught a glimmer of the rotten fangs from the corner of his eye and rolled a second time, treating Malachai to a frustrating meal of empty air.

  A flurry of the Beast’s battering ram punches pounded wicked Malachai’s side and the Liche Queen’s dark champion reeled. The Beast grunted, pushed himself upright and dove onto Malachai’s back. He hammered an avalanching fist into Malachai’s skull, seized the greasy mane and smashed the glowing nest of eyes into the floor. The Beast dismounted the twitching body. His mind’s levees cracked further and rage began to freely pour. Around his eyes a red haze crystallized. Three steps to the Liche Queen and the nightmare would finally end.

  A barbed tail flashed to life, slashing the Beast across his face, cutting deep into flesh. The savage strike missed an eye by mere inches. He threw an arm up in anticipation. On cue the second tail lashed out from the shadows, coiling around the limb, carving a crisscross of slashes. The Beast jerked away from the sudden sting, rending at the lethal appendage. Malachai pounced on his snared query, pinning the Beast to the floor.

  “I grow weary of this,” the Liche Queen said, floating to the arbour. Her bony finger danced in the eerie green glow, struggling to select a rune to play with. “Ah, this one shall do.” She jabbed a vermillion rune that swirled with the agony of her favorite curse. It was a magic near and dear to her frigid heart; the first of many such curses she had crafted. One she was saving as a special gift.

  The Beast struggled under Malachai’s weight. One arm was torn and lashed, the other clawed and pinned, leaving precious few options. The rune’s power siphoned like syrup into the Liche Queen’s hand, charging her cadaverous digits with a ghastly red afterglow. The king of fools himself could understand the need for action. The Beast lurched forward, freeing an arm. He grabbed Malachai by the throat and drove his crown into Malachai’s long mandible. Stunned, the wicked creature released the Beast’s bloody limb, stumbled backwards and collapsed. His tails twitched like angry snakes and then fell motionless.

  “No matter,” the Liche Queen said, shoulders slumping ever so slightly. The rune’s power set the air to hum as it gnawed at her hand, begging for release. “I will have the girl. I will finish what I began long ago in Adella’s cursed ashes. I will burn it all.” The Liche Queen’s glowing hand reared overhead. The Beast scanned around. No cover, nowhere to run, no weapon in hand. He dug in and squared off his shoulders. The Fated Sorrow soared like a vengeful shooting star, leaving a trail of volcanic reds and coppers.

  “No!” A tiny voice shouted. Tiny, but never for a day in her life insignificant to the world. Or to her father.

  Lia had crept back onto the shadowy platform, undetected by the combatants. With a steady wave, a golden barrier of gusting snowflakes materialized in front of the Beast just before the curse struck. The venomous magic ricocheted from the magical shield and sailed instead for a sweeter target. The Fated Sorrow struck with a branding sizzle.

  The Garrison froze. The emerald shadows dancing beneath its dome bit their lower lips and froze.

  Lia stood perfectly still. A curious look spread over her round face as the Fated Sorrow claimed its victim and spread through her body. She looked at the Beast, struggling in vain to speak. Her eyes spoke for her paralyzed lips. Faday... She clutched her side. Staggered once…

  And fell.

  The Beast felt it first in his chest; the ripping away of his soul. The red haze swallowed his eyes, tinting the gloomy dark with a lens of crimson. Pure hatred, the very essence of violence finally broke the shackles in his core. He bellowed a horrible sound, one unfit for any but a soul tortured by the most loathsome demon: the sound of parent’s infinite torment.

  No amount of pain would stop him. Not hellish fire nor the grimmest poison. The Beast stormed at the Liche Queen, leaving spurs of cracked stone underfoot. He grabbed at her, meaning her the very worst of what she deserved.

  The Liche Queen vanished from between his swiping claws in a stream of indigo vapor. “A pity, Beast of Briarburn.” Her disembodied voice rolled through the Garrison. “A pity you had to interfere. Now she will die most painfully. Alive or dead, either shall suit my needs perfectly.” The Beast’s teeth ground as he battled to sort grief from fury.

  “My children shall see to her,” the Liche Queen’s fading voice called, “after they see to you of course.”

  Legions of Wakeful answered their queen’s summons, filling the Garrison with an empty drone. Armor and weapon alike clattered as thousands of the Queen’s own marched on the spiraling ramps rising from the depths to the altar. A glowing emerald haze climbed the walls, growing closer with each locked step of their approach. The Beast stepped to the platform’s edge, ready to render judgment and justice to the whole miserable lot, when the gentlest of murmurs provided distraction.

  Lia lay on her side, chest barely rising, life draining away. She straightened an arm, and reached out with trembling fingers. The rage in the Beast’s heart fell away. Lia’s needs far exceeded his thirst for Wakeful blood. He had to move quickly, had to get her to safety, to Polaris. The first of the Wakeful reached the platform and s
ealed off the lone egress. The forward row of black-armored drone drew their weapons, challenging the Beast as their ranks yet swelled.

  The wall of blades pushed closer to the altar, filling the tier shoulder to shoulder with hooked armor. The vicious wave of obsidian advanced, filling the Garrison with the sounds of echoing war drums. The Beast bound to his daughter, relieved to find her fragile body still clinging to life. There was no doubt in his mind her soul’s shine remained ablaze with the Breath; only doubt for the limits of her mortal form. The Beast cradled the child, his child, into his arms. How slight she felt. To him she was no bigger than a newborn laying comfortably cradled in his elbow’s crook.

  The thunder drummed closer, nearing its end. Fury swelled at his temples but failed to silence a whispering question. Scores of Wakeful began to suffocate the modest platform. The passage above was beyond his prowess to reach. A question came from a dark corner of his heart. Maybe it was enough simply to be with her at the end?

  “Be still starshine, I am here.” The Beast’s whisper was unhurried. He brushed Lia’s hair from her forehead. The Fated Sorrow was fast spreading its evil. Her brow was drenched of sweat, burning to the touch. Lia shivered and raised her arm into space. For a moment the Beast thought her delirious of fever. To his surprise, Lia summoned strength and spoke, each word growing weaker than the last. “It can hurt... them.”

  The Beast realized at once her meaning, what Lia had been reaching for. The altar stared back at father and daughter, mocking them with a grisly laugh of silence. In a flash, the Beast hated the Liche Queen’s grim artifact more than any despicable thing he had ever laid his weary eyes on.

  He swung his evergreen cloak free and swaddled the tattered garment around his daughter. He squeezed her gently and kissed her forehead. “Don’t leave me... please.” An icy dagger stabbed at his heart. His place was by Lia’s side. He wanted nothing more than to hold her, to make up for the stolen moments. Instead, the Beast placed the bundled child upon the floor and lowered his horn crowned head.