Starfall (The Fables of Chaos Book 1)

by Jackson Simiana

  The creature stood silent too, the rags hanging from its twisted body dripping with water and its pale skin pulsating. The creature had a huge, rusted ship chain in its hand, the end of which was still submerged.

  “Can… can it see us?” Arthus whispered to Katryna.

  Katryna was unsure if it could see anything at all- its head was bony and deformed, with jagged sheets of metal and dead plates of coral sticking out from where its face should have been. There were no eyes to be seen, no nose or ears, or any other facial feature.

  “That thing is not natural! Creator, help us,” someone shouted.

  “What’s it doing?” a guard asked.

  The monster began to reel in the heavy chain it wielded with both hands. The metal groaned and the creature howled and sputtered from an unseen mouth.

  Arthus took a few steps forward, sword at the ready, with his body poised for attack. Dozens of guards had taken position around the thing while keeping a gap of a few metres around it.

  The agony of waiting for the monster to do something was intensifying. No one was brave enough to charge it, not even all the men together.

  A few seconds later, the monster had pulled in a huge ship anchor at the end of the enormous chain. It gripped the shank of the anchor within its misshapen hand…just like a weapon.

  The hunchback leapt from the wharf, violently landing on the cobblestone road, leaving it shattered and smashed. Katryna felt the ground shake and nearby windows vibrated in their frames.

  “Close the portcullis,” Katryna said blankly, unthinking.

  Arthus gasped. “What?”

  “Close it, now!”

  Katryna pulled Arthus by the arm, trying to convince him to follow her back the way they had come through the gate to the harbour.

  The guards surrounding the enormous creature shouted and hollered, swords and spears drawn, rushing the approaching monster as one large force.

  The monster roared as it became surrounded before lifting the thick chain above its head, pulling the anchor up with it. It swung the anchor through the air and crashed it down onto several of the guards.

  Katryna heard a sickening splat. She turned as she ran, seeing a cloud of dust and blood exploded from the impact. Body parts were splattered across the stones as men cried out in agony, their bodies crushed and broken.

  Arthus was now running with the princess while barking orders. “Close the portcullis! Everyone into the city, now!”

  The city guards who were already engaged did not falter, however, as the rest of the townspeople remaining around the harbour fled for the gate.

  Spear-wielding men ran at the creature, stabbing through its thick legs with all their strength. Its height made things difficult for the attacking guards. The spears penetrated its thick thighs but didn’t seem to do much damage.

  Some guards along the battlements atop the wall had bows and crossbows, peppering the hunchback with arrows and bolts. Few of them managed to penetrate, creating a sort of collar of splinters around its upper half.

  The hunchback wrenched the anchor up from the pile of broken bodies and stone, ready to attack once again. It lunged forward towards the city as if suddenly propelled to do so. Any spectator remaining after seeing such a sight was then fleeing for their life. The guards covered their retreat as best they could.

  Katryna and Arthus rushed through the gate, stopping in their tracks to turn and watch the scene unfolding.

  “Close the portcullis, that’s an order!” Arthus demanded, seeing that they still had not done so.

  “But High Sword, our men are still out there!” a young guard atop the gate said fearfully.

  “Close it now or the entire city will be in jeopardy!” Katryna shouted.

  The hesitant guard bit his lip, crippled with uncertainty. His colleague, however, decided to act, grabbing a nearby hammer, and smashing it into the latch in the gatehouse.

  The ping of metal on metal sounded as the grill-like portcullis dropped from its resting position up high in the open gate.

  Katryna breathed a sigh of relief, knowing that the city wall and portcullis now stood between her people and that creature. Yet, she could not avert her gaze as the guards on the other side bravely kept up their defence.

  A guard rushed the hunchback, stabbing its foot with his sword. It barely flinched, lowering its head down to the courageous man and swinging its free hand down to grab him.

  The guard shrieked as giant fingers enclosed around his body, squeezing so tight that his insides exploded out from every orifice in his body. His limp, bloodied corpse was finally thrown into a wall with a splat.

  The hunchback staggered forwards again towards the gate.

  “That gate will stop it…right?” Katryna said to Arthus, taking in sharp breaths.

  Arthus looked to the princess and back at the creature without saying a word.

  The hunchback lunged into the portcullis, barely shifting the metal grate despite the creature’s size. It roared before attempting to headbutt it unsuccessfully.

  Then, it began to kneel.

  “What’s it doing now?” Katryna gasped.

  The hunchback stuck its enormous fingers into the grate portcullis and began to lift the entire thing. The gate groaned as the metal warped and shifted from the intense force being exerted onto it.

  The hunchback barely winced as it began to rise, bringing the portcullis up with it!

  “No way,” a guard shouted in dismay.

  “Time to run!” Arthus ordered the princess.

  Katryna did not argue this time, and most onlookers saw that they were not out of danger yet, following the High Sword and the princess.

  The hunchback roared, pushing the portcullis back up into the gatehouse with all its body weight underneath it. The mechanisms within which controlled the portcullis groaned and twisted. The entire metal shape became displaced as the hunchback gained enough space to walk beneath the broken portcullis, lumbering through like it was nothing.

  The thing must have been immensely strong, Katryna realised.

  The hunchback dragged its chained anchor behind him, taking the anchor into its hands again and swinging it through the air.

  “Watch out!” a guard screamed.

  Onlookers shrieked, Katryna dropped to the ground, covering her head.

  The hefty anchor smashed into the upper storey of a house along the side of the road right by Katryna and Arthus. The hunchback’s reach with the weapon was enormous.

  The outer wall ripped open, sending and a collection of broken bricks, stone, and wood onto the street below in a cascade of debris.

  Katryna got back up but covered her head as she fled, debris flying down around them. The creature was gaining on them.

  The hunchback roared once more, tugging on the chain to free the anchor from its new resting place. It dragged with it shattered furnishings and the rest of the building’s façade, plummeting down in one solid piece.

  The noise was deafening as the structure collapsed; a heap of dust and rubble was all that remained.

  Katryna went up the road with Arthus by her side into the denser part of hightown. The muscles in her legs screamed from the incline as she willed them to run faster. Thankfully, they could easily outrun the lumbering creature.

  They stopped to catch their breath, turning to see the hunchback still lumbering towards their direction. Guards were trying to fight the hideous creature off to no avail. It was far too big for them to have a decent effect on it.

  One young man attempted an amazing feat, lining up a spear throw and launching the weapon at the creature’s head. The spear, however, simply bounced off the plates of metal and coral, barely scratching it.

  Townspeople around Katryna and Arthus were horrified, watching the hunchback attack down the street. The four-way intersection they found themselves in was surrounded with wattle and daub buildings, some three-storeys tall.

  People’s homes, on a bustling thoroughfare, Katryna realised, looki
ng about at all the people who would soon be in danger.

  “Arthus, we have to get these people out of here,” Katryna said, gesturing to the men, women and children who had been going about their daily business but were caught watching the horrifying yet astounding sight of the giant monster attacking their city.

  At some point in the fleeing, her hair had fallen out and was now a mess over her sweat-covered face. She tried desperately to catch her breath.

  “Not to worry,” Arthus said reassuringly, “my men can handle this.”

  A group of guards down the road cried out as the anchor swung into them like a battering ram, launching them off their feet with incredible force. A pair of men approached cautiously, but the hunchback screeched at them before stomping down on one with its tree-trunk-like leg.

  The other guard stabbed at the back of the creature’s ankle, severing its tendons. Black blood began to pour from the deep gash like tar. It roared, reeling the anchor back in.

  The hunchback went wild. It swung the anchor like a flail, smashing through upper storey walls on either side of it. The guard, shocked, dove for cover but was flattened beneath collapsing rubble.

  The hunchback shambled up the hill towards hightown, roaring like some rabid animal and attacking anyone who approached it.

  Katryna did not want to wait. She had to trust her gut. “Everyone needs to get out of here, right now! Flee for Castle Bower. You must go, now! Go! Run!”

  The many onlookers heard her shouts and began to run away, finally realising they too were about to be caught up in the attack themselves.

  All they needed to hear was some instruction, apparently, Katryna realised, relieved that they were listening.

  She waved them on, pointing uphill towards the castle as she called out directions.

  Arthus appeared at first to be disapproving. He stared at the princess with concern, realising she was now in the line of danger as the creature stumbled uphill towards them. However, he could not deny that she had made a good decision, lending his voice to help direct the townspeople.

  “Surround that thing! Gather up, and work together, for fuck’s sake!” Arthus commanded to the guards, his voice booming out over the sounds of destruction, before running towards the fleeing crowds and shocked bystanders. “Move! You heard the princess! Get to the castle! Grab your families and go!”

  Debris rained down with each swing the hunchback took, levelling multi-storeyed walls and rooftops. Alleyways between some of the tenements and rowhouses became ravines of shattered bricks, tiles, wood chips and dust.

  There seemed to be no stopping it. It drew closer, merely a dozen metres away.

  Katryna could feel the thunder of its footsteps shake the ground beneath her as she helped a struggling mother carry her three young children to safety, taking one in her own arms.

  “Katryna, get out of here now!” Arthus shouted as the hunchback roared above him.

  She screamed for him to follow, but before the words left her lips, Arthus turned and charged at the creature with his men.

  What’s he doing?!

  Katryna knew there was nothing she could do to help. She instructed the mother to run, each of her hands carrying an infant, racing alongside her with the third child in Katryna’s arms.

  The High Sword and his guards counter-attacked, keeping enough distance between themselves to not be hit by each other’s swings, yet forming a sort of barrier of bodies between the hunchback and hightown.

  The hunchback slammed the chain and anchor down, crushing two guards into a pulpy mess of blood beneath the rusted metal. Arthus dodged out of the way before leaping up and driving his sword into the creature’s exposed knee.

  The guards worked in unison, driving spears into any part they could reach. The hunchback stumbled and became distracted enough that it stopped swinging its anchor, though it quickly regained its footing. It seemed nothing would work against it.

  Katryna looked back as she ran, praying that Arthus would order a retreat and get his men away from the unstoppable monster.

  Then, from the distance, came the sound of roaring thunder.

  Three distinct booms from the direction of the harbour, so loud that both Katryna and the mother beside her stopped to turn back and see what it was.

  Immediately upon spinning around towards the hunchback, an enormous explosion blew up the road just to the creature’s rear in an immense cloud of smoke and broken cobblestone. The guards were all knocked over from the force of it.

  Another two explosions then occurred, this time through the hunchback’s body itself. A cast iron ball blew through the chain-wielding arm of the hunchback, ripping it off from its body. Black tar burst from the wound as its severed arm crashed to the ground with the head-sized metal ball.

  The third ball blasted a neat hole through the hunchback’s chest from behind. Bone and tissue came spilling out with the flood of black blood.

  The iron ball that had shot through its chest landed right next to Katryna up the street, before rolling to a stop in amongst some debris.

  All went quiet as those still left alive looked upon the creature, in awe of what they had witnessed.

  Arthus and the guards backed away from the hunchback as it swayed. Its wounds were smoking, dripping with tar-like blood, before it fell to its knees, and then face-first to the ground with an all-massive thud.

  It lay motionless.

  Katryna breathed in a deep breath of the fresh sea air, feeling the tightness in her stomach loosen ever so slightly.

  But what had killed it?

  Katryna put the child down and handed her back to the grateful mother, before walking over to the equally stunned Arthus Medonia.

  The pair looked down the street towards the harbour where a colossal ship was sitting out on the open water directly in line with them. Its golden sails hung from tall masts, shimmering like jewels in the sunlight.

  It was the largest ship Katryna had ever seen.

  The side of the ship facing them had plumes of white smoke coming from it, as if the explosions had initiated from the hull.

  “What just happened?” Katryna asked, still trying to catch her breath.

  Arthus shook his head in disbelief. “Whoever they are, they just saved the city… and our lives,” he huffed, concluding that they had somehow fired the giant iron balls into the creature.

  The City of Stars had on that day descended into panic and destruction.

  Arthus wiped the black blood from his face as the guards around him clambered through the debris to help the wounded, making sure to keep their distance from the dead hunchback.

  It was then Katryna noticed the flag swaying in the wind at the top of the tallest mast upon the ship. She squinted, trying to make out the details.

  “Is that…a snakehead?” Katryna said, pointing out to the ship in the harbour.

  Arthus nodded, seeing what she was seeing. “Aye, I believe it is.”

  A snakehead sigil on a flag and golden sails. There was no denying it.

  The ship where the explosions had come from, the ship that had saved their lives and city, belonged to the Kingdom of Ember.

  Chapter 42 - Brittlepeak

  The descent down Mooncrest Mountain was a lot faster than Tomas had initially expected. The pipes he slid down were, thankfully, broad enough for him to fit through, and were so pitch black that it made the entire experience both terrifying and mesmerising.

  Closing his eyes did nothing to dull the fear. Each sudden swerve up or down, left, or right, threw Tomas into one of the surfaces enclosing him with a bang.

  The fall was made easy though, thanks to decades worth of slippery slime, grime and melting snow along the bottom of the pipes. The smell was horrendous. But he knew it was not to be forever.

  I’d take this over dying to those monsters any day.

  He hadn’t heard Lynn screaming for a while now, which made him worry. Had they gone down the same pipe? Were there branching pipes? Would they be separa
ted and lost?

  It only took a minute or two for a speck of light to appear down the length of the piping. Given the terror and disorientation of the descent from the Grand Repository, the blue-white glow was a relieving sight to see.

  Almost there.

  The circle of light from the exit grew larger, brighter, as he continued his speedy descent. It was still night, and Tomas guessed the light was coming from the glow of Rea and Ixo.

  As he slid closer to freedom, a black silhouette suddenly appeared at the end of the steep pipe. The shape of the tricorn hat was unmistakable- it must have been Lynn.

  Tomas thought he heard her screaming something, though given the rush of air and the slick sounds coming from all around he could not make out a word.

  Closer he slid, almost at the end of the horrible journey down the pipes. Suddenly he could make out some words.

  “…Tomas…stop! Stop!”

  It was too late for him to react. In a split-second, Lynn appeared standing right in front of him, but he had gained so much momentum from the downhill fall that he could not slow himself.

  She held her hands out as she shouted for him to slow down, standing by the edge of the pipe.

  The edge of the pipe.

  Fuck.

  Tomas screamed out. He tried slowing down, but there was nothing to grab onto and he was going way too fast. The two were winded as they collided. Tomas, sliding on his back, knocked Lynn off her feet and they both went tumbling out from the end of the pipe into open air.

  The rush of sliding down the pitch-black pipe was quickly replaced with a burst of fear as Tomas felt the openness of nothing beneath him for several seconds.

  Tomas saw Lynn throw her satchel as she fell.

  They were free-falling.

  Tomas and Lynn cried out in a panic, swinging their arms and legs wildly to try and grab at something.

  Then, everything went silent.

  He couldn’t breathe. Tomas was enveloped once again in blackness. His body felt a cold shock wash over him. Then it hit him- they had landed in water.

  Tomas immediately began to swim for the surface, heading for the direction of the shimmering moonlight. The water was freezing, with sheets of ice covering parts of the surface.