by Sam Sykes
A good question, he thought, as he stared at her. He had no family to go back to, and while, technically, his ‘people’ were in no short supply, he had no particular group of humans he wished to call by that name. She stared at him expectantly, as though waiting for his eyes to offer an answer his lips could not.
‘To a place where I don’t have to kill anymore.’
Her expression was unreadable. It might have been, anyway, if he had been staring at it. Instead he met her eyes, the same eyes that he had squirmed under, that he had shouted at her over, that he had turned away from, feeling the chills that followed the stare, hearing the voice that followed the chills.
Turn away now, he told himself. Better to not know her answer. Even if she doesn’t kill you right now, even if she doesn’t say she’ll go back to the killing even after all of this, you can’t live with this. Not the staring. Not the question if she ever really means what she’s going to say. You can’t live with this, just as she can’t live without the killing. Better to turn away now.
Drums thundered. Her ears twitched. She didn’t blink.
Better to turn away.
Fires smouldered. He breathed deeply. He stared back.
Turn away.
Her lips twitched. He held his breath.
She smiled at him.
All at once, heat seemed to return to him, his blood turning to mangwo again. He smiled back, strained to smile harder than she was, to show her he felt the same as her. Of course, he thought, if he could read past the pained smile and know exactly what she was feeling, that would have been helpful, too, but he resolved to make do with what he knew.
He knew he wanted this bloodless moment, this voiceless silence, this stare he could not turn away from to last for the years to come.
And as he stared at her – at the sad, pitying smile she gave him – he knew he had only one more night.
‘So!’ she said swiftly, lids drooping, smile widening. ‘Why aren’t we still drinking?’ If that.
‘It’s a party, right?’ she asked with a quavering laugh. ‘We’re going to be at sea for who knows how long by tomorrow. Best not think about anything but tonight, right?’ She jerked a nod on his behalf. ‘Of course right.’
He said nothing as he followed her farther over the ridge, her eyes furtively searching for any sign of the drink. Any drop visible, however, was fast disappearing down gaping, green gullets. He noticed that her ire seemed to rise with every moment her lips were left dry, a growl rumbling through her body. He could almost see the hackles rise on her naked back.
Denaos was probably right, you know, he told himself. She thrives on the violence. She can’t even go this long without getting angry. How long could you possibly take that in? It’s the right decision, then. Say nothing. Try not to even think about her. That’s wisest.
It occurred to him, not for the first time, that he rarely took the wisest course of action. And as he walked behind her, eyes drawn to her slender, sweat-kissed back, he began to develop a theory as to why that was.
Desperate to turn his attention to anything else, he glanced at the rapidly thinning throngs of various green bodies. The lizardmen were vanishing, either collapsing into dark corners or wandering off, leaving only the echoes of their laughter and their aromas behind.
‘Where the hell are all of them even going?’ he muttered to no one. ‘Is … is it us? Do we smell or something?’
‘Who knows?’ she said, chuckling. ‘Maybe there’s some ancient code of conduct for drinking with lizard-things that we’re not adhering to.’
‘Of course. Maybe if we ate insects we’d be fine.’
She laughed a long, obnoxious laugh. The very same noise that he had once loathed now put him at ease. Whatever he might be feeling, all the tragic and inconceivable thoughts he might have, she felt none of them. That much was clear by the ease with which she carried herself around him, how swift she was to laugh, how very much unlike him she appeared to be.
Good, he thought, glancing at a nearby fire, that’s good. If she’s not feeling anything, then there’s nothing to talk about. I mean, if she was going to feel anything, she would have done it with a lot of drink, wouldn’t she? The worst is behind you, my friend. Well done. Well done, ind—
His brief self-congratulatory mood was quashed the moment he collided with her. She had turned about, regarding him with an intent stare. Enraptured, he was only aware of their proximity as he felt their sweat mingle between their skin, the rise of her belly pressing against his as she breathed deeply. His pulse raced, far too swiftly for him to feel hers, as blood quickened through his body.
‘Sorry,’ he muttered and moved to step away.
He hadn’t made it another step before she lashed out her hands and seized him. The blood had rushed out of his head, leaving him far too slow-witted to realise what was happening, let alone resist it. Her nails sank into his skin with predatory possessiveness as she drew him against her body and leaned out to press her lips against his.
There was no patience in her embrace, no sense of tact and certainly no hesitation. Her tongue slid past his lips in hasty, urgent fury. His thoughts were left far behind as his senses raced ahead on a thundering heartbeat. He could taste the mangwo on her tongue, feel the need in her breath and hear the growl that welled up inside her, quaking through her body and into his.
Breathless and blind, his mind finally caught up to his senses, barely conscious of what was happening. By the time he realised it, however, his body had already acted. His arm had snaked around her, feeling the tension in her as he pulled her close. His hand had woven into her locks, pressing her lips farther against his, and a feral need that he hadn’t even realised was inside him burst out through his mouth. It matched her vigour, matched his pain, fingers clenching her hair where hers sank into his skin, drawing her firmly against him as she pulled at him with animal fury.
And when he finally had the space to think, it was without words: a short, fleeting sense of overwhelming satiation that threatened to bring him to his knees.
And it was made all the shorter when her hands snaked out, parting from his skin in an instant to come up between them. His chest nearly ruptured against the force with which she shoved him, sending him toppling upon his rear to the sand. He stared up, agog and slack-jawed, only to find the same expression staring back at him.
‘Hey,’ she said softly. ‘Sorry about that.’
‘No, it wasn’t—’
‘It was,’ she interrupted, shaking her head. ‘It … it really, really was. Sorry. Sorry.’ Her face contorted in agony as she whirled about, fleeing past the throngs of lizardmen, past the smouldering fires, into the night. ‘Damn, damn, damn, damn …’
And he, sitting on his rear, staring at the darkness into which she had vanished, finally found the time to think.
Well done, indeed.
‘Not fair, not fair, not fair.’
Dreadaeleon’s words churned into his mouth on acrid bile. His breath was clogged with the taste of acid; his mouth felt packed with a tongue twice its actual size. With every step he took as he scurried behind Togu’s stone house, his stomach pulled its knot a little tighter.
And he still spoke.
‘She was about to … about to …’ He collapsed beside the hut’s wall, gasping for air as he felt the nausea roil in his throat. ‘About to do something. And now this happens? NOW?’
His indignation was punished with a painful clench within his belly that sent his hands to the earth, his mouth gaping open with a retching noise that stripped his throat. Something was brewing inside him, fighting its way through his knotted stomach with thick, sticky fists. His eyes bulged, blinded by tears. His jaw craned open, stretched painfully wide in anticipation of what clawed its way out of his throat.
The vomit came out on a gargling howl, tearing itself free to douse the nearby shrubbery. Dreadaeleon knew not how long it lasted; his attention was focused on keeping all other orifices shut.
I
t did end, however, and Dreadaeleon lay gasping on the sand, the bile dripping past his lips to pool on the earth. The pain subsided in diminishing throbs, but not slowly enough to spare him from his own thoughts and his regrets and his anger.
This was something to be worried about. This was something to be terrified about. These reactions were not normal, not to anyone not suffering the Decay. Now was a time for prudent thought, careful concern. At any rate, he certainly shouldn’t have felt the rage that he did.
But he had been so close.
It had been a graceless exit, naturally; there was no graceful way to run away to spill one’s intestines out on the earth. He would have very much liked to have stayed, to discuss philosophy with Asper. She had been so open, enough to make him open, as well. He had told no one of his parents, of his initiation into the Venarium. She had listened so thoughtfully; she had looked at him so eagerly; she had touched him. He could still feel her fingers on his shoulder.
And then he had gone and ruined it all. She loathed him now, he was certain. How could she not? She had reached out to him, he had bared his past to her, and when she sought answers, when she recognised that he had them, he had run away to paint the shrubbery with his supper.
It was better that she hadn’t seen that, of course, but not by much.
He would have spared himself more thought for self-loathing if not for the pungent scent of smoke drifting up to his nostrils. He glanced up at what had started as shrubbery, now resembling some sort of half-digested salad. His vomit was hungrily chewing on it with a thousand tiny, semiliquid mouths, belching steam with every moment it reduced the plant to a brown, messy blob.
Suddenly, the days of fiery urine seemed not quite so bad.
His condition was worsening.
Whatever offences he might have committed were forgotten as that phrase echoed in his head. His body was acting, amplifying its functions, functions that should not be amplified, of its own accord. It had likely been that little display in the valley, pulling the Owauku from the puddle, that had done it. It was a stupid thing to do, he reminded himself.
But she had been so impressed …
A small compensation. Too small. As he struggled to rise, he found his muscles weak, even weaker than they had been moments before. His magic was going awry, applying itself to all his bodily functions, and he paid for it as he paid for any other exertion of power. Of course, flashes of lightning and fire were far more impressive than flaming urine and acidic vomit.
The stone … he had to retrieve it.
A violation of Laws, perhaps, but there was no other option. It was the stone of the longfaces – that chipped, red sphere – that had kept his body in check, that had kept it from being overwhelmed. He had to retrieve it; he had to return to the sea, search the wreckage, find the damn thing and return to normal.
But how? More scrying would mean more magic. More magic would kill him sooner than later, it was becoming clear.
Voices burbled out of the hut.
Togu.
Of course, he thought as he staggered toward the door. He would beseech the king, convince his companions to delay the voyage. He needed the stone; they didn’t need to know why beyond the fact that it gave him the power to move their ship. The lizardmen had trawled the sea for their belongings and found nothing, Togu had said, but that simply meant they weren’t looking hard enough. He could convince them. He could force them.
He would have believed it, too, if he hadn’t paused outside the king’s door to retch again.
‘What was that?’
He pulled himself up from his spewing, holding his nausea-soaked breath at the sound of voices burbling out of the king’s hut.
‘There is someone out there,’ Togu’s deep voice spoke.
‘Soon to be many more,’ another voice replied, a lilting, lyrical phrase that flooded into Dreadaeleon’s ears on a song that would be soothing if the recognition didn’t shock him into wide-eyed silence.
Greenhair, he thought. The siren … here?
‘The longfaces have just arrived, Togu,’ she continued from within the hut, ‘ahead of their master. He will arrive shortly and he will expect you to be there to greet him with the human offering.’
‘They haven’t arrived yet, Togu,’ another voice, this one gruff and hissing, spoke. ‘There is still time to avert this. The forests are dense and the longfaces are not given to caution. You can flee.’
‘And they will burn the forests down,’ Greenhair replied sharply. ‘They will find you, Togu, one way or another. Embracing this way means that your people live. Hongwe should understand this better than even I.’
‘I do understand this,’ the speaker identified as Hongwe snarled, ‘and that is why I know what it is you’re sending the humans to. I saw it happen on Komga, to my people. I will not watch you do this to others.’
‘You intend to stop this?’ Greenhair’s voice contained an edge of harmonious threat.
Hongwe muttered in return. ‘They are your people, Togu. I can only ask that you see the stupid villainy in this plan.’
Dreadaeleon, heedless of the vomit hissing on the sand or the lancing pain in his stomach, held his breath, listening intently to the long silence that followed. In the valley below, the sound of drums were dimming, the noises of jubilation quieting. In the quiescence, Dreadaeleon could hear the king’s body rise and fall with the force of his sigh.
‘I do what is best for my people. Do as you must to make the humans ready to give to the longfaces.’
Dreadaeleon turned, bit back a shriek as he stepped in the pile of his sizzling bile, dragged his foot on the earth as he made to run down as fast as his cramping body would allow him. The pain shot through him in great spikes that he forced himself to ignore. He had to get below, to warn his companions, or at least one of them.
He collided suddenly with a bare chest and looked up, frowning. This wasn’t the one he had hoped for, but still …
‘Denaos,’ he gasped, ‘we have to get below. Togu, he’s—’
‘Who cares?’ the rogue asked, on a reeking chuckle that sent him swaying. ‘Who gives a flying turd what’s going to happen anymore?’
He wasn’t sure how much the tall man had actually drunk to push him over the edge and he hardly cared. The man’s only purpose now was to perhaps stall Togu and his conspirators when they emerged. Thus, Dreadaeleon wasted no more words and tried to push his way past, only to find a long arm in his path.
‘You don’t see what’s going to happen, do you?’ Denaos said, laughing. ‘Not as smart as you thought you were, huh? Can’t see we’re all damned without Asper following us, without the Gods on our side.’
‘No one’s following anyone if you don’t get out of the way,’ Dreadaeleon growled. ‘The longfaces are—’
‘I said who cares?’ Denaos emphasised the question with a hook that sent the boy sprawling to the earth. ‘Don’t feel bad, Dread. I’ll be punished for that. For a hell of a lot more.’ He held a hand to his temple, pointing to eyes that had gone from sunken to two fevered, black-lined pits. ‘I can’t … I can’t stop seeing her. The whispering just doesn’t stop. I thought it was the demon, but … but it’s something inside me. Something I did, can’t you see?’
‘I can’t, and I don’t care,’ Dreadaeleon’s words were laced with wincing whines as he struggled to regain his feet. ‘I … I’m having a hard time moving. Denaos. You have to get down there and warn the others that—’
‘Not important,’ Denaos replied. ‘Asper’s leaving. She was going to hear my sins, tell me it was fine, but not yet, not now. She’d never forgive me now. Neither would They.’ He pointed to the sky. ‘Whatever happens now is just … just …’
As his voice crumbled on his tongue, the music sliding through them could be heard. He recognised the siren’s song in the same instant that Denaos did not. One clapped his hands over his ears; the other collapsed to the earth. Dreadaeleon spared a glance for his fallen companion before looking up
as he felt a presence beside him.
Greenhair’s alien expression was indifference laid thick to try to choke the pity in her eyes, to no avail. Dreadaeleon shot back a scowl intent on conveying all the curses and venom his mouth could not produce. The siren said something he dared not hear; an apology, perhaps, or a brief explanation, or an insult.
Though whatever she said could have only been half as insulting as the fact that she turned from him as she might a gnat and strode away, towards the mouth of the valley.
He snarled, reached out a hand to wrap about her pale ankle and pull her back, only to find the reason for her disregard. No sooner had his fingers stretched out than they were forced to clench. The pain that ripped through him was extraordinary, bludgeoning breath from his lungs, tearing vigour from his body, sending blood from his head as though it were split open. He collapsed into a quivering, curled position on the ground, unable to form even a sentence through the agony.
Through eyes vanishing into darkness, he stared at Greenhair as she walked down the valley, toward his companions, leaving him coiled in a pile of his own uselessness.
Drums dying with leathery gasps. Unseen liquor vapours wafting out on snores. Gohmns chittering to each other in the night.
‘So loud,’ she whispered, clawing at her ears.
Futility. Trees groaning, shedding leaves. Rivers muttering curses to those who defecated in them. Gonwa jaws clenching together in ire.
‘Shut up,’ she fervently whimpered, ‘shut up, shut up, shut up.’
The sounds were impossible to tune out, impossible to ignore. Every last one rang angrily in her ears, the soft ones intolerably loud, the moderate ones deafening. She couldn’t hear her thoughts, couldn’t hear her tell herself to breathe, couldn’t hear herself chant over and over.
‘It’ll pass,’ she was barely aware of telling herself, ‘it’ll pass, it’ll pass. It’s just a symptom, just a symptom, just a symptom.’
It was a symptom, she confirmed to herself, a symptom of the round-eared disease. It had to be, she reassured herself, because it had come from him.
She cursed him, spewed a torrent of verbal venom into the sand as she trudged across it. She didn’t hear her own curses. She hoped they were good ones.