Shortly after breakfast on the third day, a face appeared over the lip of the pit- one I knew very well. She was strange, in the way of all Stormcallers. Her dimpled, pale cheeks were covered with fresh blue paints, in a pattern that I didn't recognize. Her hair dyed in a similar hue and her eyes were black and huge in their sockets. Through it all, I knew my sister's face well. Shaman or no, Nissikul would always be the baby of my family, and as I narrowed my eyes in a smile back up at her, I recognized the omnipresent twinkle of mischief in her gaze. "Nissi!" I called up, not moving from my reclining position against a mound of furs. "What are you doing here?"
Nissikul disappeared for a moment, and then, just when I thought she had gone, a coil of spun vulyak hair rope came, flying over the edge. The end of the wound rope fell to the hides right beside my head. Nissi’s face reappeared at the edge of the pit. “I’m getting you out, obviously. Climb the rope you silly ranger.”
“Vassa put me in here,” I answered. “There might be trouble if I just leave; especially if anyone saw you come in already.” I tapped the rope with the back of one hand, making it sway. “Some of us aren’t actually above the law, mageling.”
Nissikul giggled at this. “Well I would have broken you out the second day, but Master Lot caught me putting the guards to sleep and told me to wait. He wants to talk to you today, so he ordered you released. Vassa is off visiting the Perimeter, so the old goat couldn’t interfere.” She pulled at the rope, coaxing a ripple into it so that the end near me flicked over and tapped me on the side of my head. “So climb the rope, ranger boy.”
I snorted and flipped up to my feet with one move. Then I narrowed my eyes to gauge the distance, took a deep breath, and stepped to the wall furthest from the rope. Before Nissikul could ask what I was doing, I took two quick, sprinting steps and jumped. Pushed off the wall at the apex of my leap, twisting and spinning so that I soared across the pit and caught the stone edge. As I rolled myself over the lip of the pit and then got to my feet, Nissi came over to me, doing some subtle maneuver with her left hand and causing the rope to coil itself about her arm like a deep-viper. “If you could do that the whole time,” she said, not in the least bit put out, that I’d refused her rescue. “Why did you stay in the pit?”
“Because unlike you,” I said, gripping her shoulder and giving her a hard squeeze of affection. “I am not above the law, little sister.”
“Well,” said Nissikul brightly, “I’m not really above the law either. I just don’t obey the commands of you puny mortals, ‘big brother’.” She lifted her chin towards me in mocking amusement. “Now come along, my master wishes to see you.”
I grimaced in protest, but not wide enough to show her my fangs. Our people viewed such a display as something of a threat, and though she was my sister, it was never wise to openly trifle with a Stormcaller. Though she might not be at her full strength here, touching the stone of the buried mountain, Nissikul, the least of her sisters in strength, could tear me to shreds. I might be able to stop her, physically, but unless her attention was fully focused elsewhere, I would have little chance of ever laying a hand on her. She was my baby sister, and I loved her, but Stormcallers were very, very strange- and twice as dangerous.
We made our way from the prison out onto the main surface of the mountain. It was a great stone peak, stretching up from unknown depths, utterly entombed within Ravanur’s icy skin except for the icy cavern that surrounded the peak. It wasn’t a very large world, but it was the center of mine, the home of my people, the Erin-Vulur. I blinked a little at the comparative brightness of the great cavern. It was lit by tangles of glowing moss that grew from the ceiling of the cavern, unharmed by the cold of the ice. The temperature within the cavern was comfortable enough for me and most of my people and barely cold enough to freeze water. If anything, the Stormcallers, like my sister, actually found the place too hot. But then again they were the lunatics who would wander the Outer Skin of Ravanur utterly naked. So perhaps they weren’t the best judges as far as temperature was concerned. Thank Palamun and Ravanur both, that Nissi was too young to go on walkabout. I was not looking forward to the day when the other rangers would start whispering about my sister, wandering about skyclad when they thought I wasn’t listening. Several of my brethren had expressed interest, and my threats of extreme and merciless violence wouldn’t hold them back forever. Nissi was objectively pretty, witty, and funny. Stormcallers weren’t always single, take our mother for example. But they were always crazy. I shuddered thinking of what would happen the first time that one of those luckless rangers would wound Nissi’s heart.
Nissi led me around the terraces and farms that surrounded the prison tunnels. Through the fields of giant fungi and lichen grown to feed our livestock, past the dukkar seals in their wallows, and the small herd of Vulyak goats that we maintained to harvest their valuable hair. We skirted the village properly, avoiding its cluster of stone, chitin, and hide huts- as well as the inevitable presence of one of Vassa’s priests. I raised an eyebrow, but I did not comment. Perhaps Elder Lot’s summons was not entirely ratified by the other members of the council. Neither he nor the Deepseeker was especially liked, since their powers and knowledge were uncomfortably similar to dark alchemies of the enemy Beneath.
I quickly turned my thoughts away from what lay Beneath the skin of Ravanur. That way lay madness, and worse. Additionally, even thinking about it sometimes made it stronger, according to the old stories. There was nothing good Beneath the ice. Mother Ravanur had been frozen for a reason.
We cleared the edge of the village and passed through another expanse of fungal fields Each of them was covered in a wide array of mushroom caps, with rows from every variety I could possibly name. Past them lay the glowstone pools, and beyond those- the ancient, solitary hut of the Elder Stormcaller. Lot had been alive for as long as anyone could remember, and seemed to have stopped aging sometime in his seventieth decade. Palamun alone knew how long ago that decade was. As such, his hut was a patchwork of never-ending repairs and patch-jobs, some done by the old man himself, some by his first-year acolytes as part of their training in humility. He had always lived in the old hut, and he probably always would. He only left to attend council meetings or to train his small army of shamans. He was as crazy as all of his kind, made strange by the depths of his power- but amongst all of them, he was certainly the strangest.
Nissikul came to a halt beside the hanging fur flaps that served as a door to the short, squat building. I frowned. “Aren’t you going in?” She smirked and shook her head. Right. Elder Lot had called for me, not my sister. She was just a messenger in this. I placed an affectionate hand on her shoulder, then slipped past her and pushed the furs aside, ducking the low doorway and standing within the musty dimness of the shaman’s hut.
Elder Lot was sitting in the center of the room, surrounded by scrolls made of precious mushroom-cap parchment, evidently lost in his studies. He didn't even look up as I entered, merely gesturing with one gnarled, nearly skeletal finger to the pile of furs opposite where he sat. "Sit down, ranger. I'll be with you in a moment." His eyes, black as fresh pitch, seemed overlarge in his gaunt face. They were identical to Nissikul's, except for their emptiness. Those midnight orbs carried none of the warmth of my sister's gaze- instead, they were endless pits in which a man or woman might be lost, swallowed up and digested in a single glance. I chose to examine the room rather than risk some kind of obscure madness, so I glanced all around me and noted the ritual tools and totems that the old master of the Stormcallers had amassed for himself. Several staves leaned here and there about the small space, fashioned from some kind of long, narrow bone, each length a little longer than I was tall. Each staff was covered by an intricate pattern of sigils and runes, and where each one touched the floor of the hut, it was surrounded with its own circle of burug fat candles. Scrolls of parchment were piled everywhere, with seemingly little regard for the burning candles. Indeed as I glanced around, I saw that some of the scro
lls bore telltale spots of char where corners or edges had gotten a little too friendly with flame.
When I looked back up at the master, it took every bit of my will to restrain myself from flinching. Elder Lot was staring right at me, his pitiless blank eyes boring into mine. I felt myself drawn forward, felt myself leaning toward him, as a sensation I could not quite describe, scrabbled at the edges of my mind. Like the insectile legs of some kind of spider. All at once, the sensation vanished, as quickly as it had come. "Your mind has not been altered, Ranger Volisssssstad. Do you know what that means?"
What was going on here? I wasn’t sure what the correct answer was, and I was suddenly acutely aware that if the master argued with me, he could kill where I sat, most likely without lifting a finger. “No, Elder. I suppose it means that I’m lucky to have escaped the false god’s notice.”
Lot waved one knobby-knuckled hand at me and let out a snort of derision. “Donnnnn’t worry, boy, I’m not so closed-minded as that farrrrrrce of a meeting would have had you believe. I am, however, cautious. As much as Vassssa is a fool, he had a poinnnnt when he spoke of the Eater-King. Gods have come downnnnn to Ravanur before, and many of them have been ennnnnemies to our people. Thissss one, however, interests me.”
I felt my brow furrow. “Does that mean that the metal god isn’t dead?”
“On the contrary,” the Elder answered, grimacing, his fangs peeking out from between his lips. For a split second, something like grief crossed his face. “I sent one of my better Sssssstormcallers out there to kill it, and she has not returned. I believe her to be dead. In addition, other rangers have reported that there is a ssssstrange storm raging at the location that you reported to be the god’s campsite. It’s massive, larger even than one of the usual sssssurface blizzards, and it isn’t moving.”
I just sat there with my mouth open, struggling to process what the Elder had told me. A Stormcaller was dead, the god I had seen was still alive, and there was a super-storm just sitting there on the surface? Finally, I got my voice to work properly again and asked, “What does this have to do with me? You had me released from prison- I doubt you would have done so, much less summoned me here, without reason.”
Lot's thin lips peeled back from his gums in a corpse's smile, revealing uneven, chipped teeth. The expression was deeply unsettling to behold, and I swallowed hard and struggled not to look away. "I already told you, my boy. I need more information about thisssss metal god. One of my children has already died, and I cannot afford to ssssend another. You will go, and learn all you can about this god and this stormmmmm."
I felt my face grow pale. I was a hunter, and a good one. I could track anything across Ravanur, above or below the ice. But this was outside of my expertise. Gods were another thing entirely from mortals. According to the stories, they were proud, vicious, and vengeful. Their strength and power made them cold to the suffering of mortals, and they killed as easily and thoughtlessly as one of my kind might breathe. I wasn’t afraid of death at any rate, but I did not feel qualified for this. A Stormcaller or maybe a priest. However, a Stormcaller had already died, and Vassa was an idiot. This was going to be my task, whether I liked it or not. I squared my shoulders and stood, taking the lithe, ready posture of a warrior, driving the doubts away from my mind. “I will do this, Elder Lot. Count on it.”
“Of course you will,” Lot said, absentmindedly, already back to reading the scroll in his lap. The interview was clearly over. I turned to leave, but just as I reached the door to the hut, the Elder spoke, stopping me with my hand on the lintel. “Avoid Vassa’s priests. Go see the Deepseeker for the proper equipment and leave the village as unobserved as your arts will let you manage. And if you learn something important, come right back to me. Don’t report to the council about this again.” I didn’t answer. I simply swept through the door, expecting to come face to face with Nissikul. However, she wasn’t there, as I emerged into the fungus-lit expanse of the village. See the Deepseeker and get out of town unobserved- now that would be something of a challenge. I loved it. Challenge accepted.
…
Getting my hands on my furs, pack, and gear was actually the hardest part of the task. Normally, I would have simply walked into the Huntmaster’s Longhouse, found the alcove where my equipment was stored, and left, all the while exchanging pleasantries and the latest gossip with the other rangers. This time, however, I was to avoid being noticed, so I had to take a different approach. I ended up crawling through the smoke-hole in the longhouse roof and creeping through the rafters. I stayed shrouded in the haze until the place emptied and most of the other rangers left to attend to their various duties. It took me only a few minutes to don my armor and gear, and then I was back in the rafters and slipping out amidst the smoke. After that, getting to the Deepseeker’s hut was a simple matter of leaving the village and circling its edge in the reverse of the route that Nissi had taken to lead me to Elder Lot.
The Deepseeker's hut was as isolated as the Master Stormcaller's home. Unlike Lot's house, however, the Deepseeker's residence was as scrupulously neat as if it was seemingly new. Fresh, even glistening hides had been expertly cleaned, tanned, and stretched to cover the structure, which was built with the same kind of geometric perfection that I had only ever seen in the grain mill. This made sense since the Deepseeker had constructed the mill as well. The hut looked purpose built, fashioned with exacting detail in accordance with some plan I couldn't grasp just by seeing it from the outside. I approached the hut, and I noted that there was a small bone post beside the door. An iron hook was implanted in it. A little silver bell hung from the hook and a tiny, fur-headed mallet to strike it with. I lifted the mallet with my thumb and forefinger, while my gloves made my moves clumsier than usual, and struck the bell twice. It let out a piercing chime with each strike, though the second one seemed to hang in the air longer than it should have. A moment later, the Deepseeker's gravely, amused voice rumbled, "Get in here, boy, before someone sees you."
When I entered the Deepseeker’s hut, I found him bent over a sturdy, immaculately constructed workbench, made from a smoothed block of stone, with legs shaped from burug chitin. He had a pair of spectacles on his nose, though these had far too many lenses attached by various articulated brass arms. The magick he was manipulating today was larger than any blessing of his I had ever seen. It seemed to be a breastplate, made from a metal that seemed too dull and too dark to be copper, but too red to be anything else. It was etched with strange, branching symbols, as all of his work was. Some of those sigils, particularly those surrounding the stylized heart embossed over the plate’s left breast, seemed to glow with an inner light, lit by a power I did not understand. “Elder?”
The Deepseeker met my eyes, and gave a wide, threatening grin, revealing fangs as long and sharp as mine, even yellowed as they were with age. “It took you long enough to get here, ranger, though I suppose old Lot did set you a pretty challenge. That man always did like his theatrics, eh?”
Pretending that the elder didn’t deeply unsettle me, I shrugged noncommittally and said. “It wasn’t a difficult task, just something of a tedious one.” Suddenly curious, I continued. “Do the Elder’s disagree so much about the metal god that this sort of subterfuge is necessary?”
The Deepseeker grimaced and gave a half-shrug of his own. “Palamun only knows what goes on in Vassa’s thick skull. If he doesn’t know about what happened- about that storm sitting still on the surface- he will soon. And when he does, I can’t guarantee that he won’t declare a holy pogrom on the metal god and all its creations, whatever those might be.” The Elder seemed to shudder at this, and his face twisted, changing all at once from bemused calm over to an incandescent rage. His eyes now burned with inner fire, his lips curled to display his fangs and his expression clenched into a mask of hate. I didn’t react. The best way to handle the Deepseeker’s strange rages was to wait for them to calm down, and not draw attention to myself or them. The Elder continued speaking through cl
enched teeth. “One of our Stormcallers is missing, probably dead. We cannot risk another attack on that thing until we know what it can do. You are going to find out what it can do, find out how we can kill it, and you’re going to keep this whole thing a secret from Vassa and anyone else until you know all of these things. Do you understand boy?” The last word was accompanied by a spray of spittle, and a glare that could have boiled the flesh from my skull.
I stood very still. The Deepseeker’s rages could very easily become violent. “Yes, elder. It will be done as you command.” The elder snarled and snatched the breastplate he had been working on off of the worktable, turning on his heel and flinging it at me backhand as he stalked away. The armor struck me in the chest, painfully, but I caught it and kept the pain of the blow off of my face.
"Take that and get out," the Deepseeker growled. "It will keep you warm for two months. Don't break it, or I'll break you," I didn't say anything in response. I simply fled the hut with the elder's latest blessing and then put as much distance between him and me as I could, in just a few moments. When I was far enough outside the village that I could no longer hear the sounds of the crazed Elder smashing things in his tent, I crouched behind a boulder a short way down the slope and rearranged my furs so I could put the armor underneath them. To my surprise, it wasn't actually heavy and didn't really impede my movement at all. Even though the elder had made it, it was of unbelievably high quality. Judging by the lengths to which the two elders had gone, this mission was of critical importance. The Erin-Vulur needed to know more about the god now living within a whirling storm on the surface of Ravanur. It might be another predator, like the Eater-King, but then again it might not. If it were benevolent- even slightly so, it was important that we learned what it wanted- why it was here, on our world. If Palamun had sent this god as a messenger, its mission could be of vital importance. It could change everything about the future of my people.
Alien Romance Box Set: Alien Former: Sci-Fi Alien Romance (Books 1-5) Page 6