Lod the Galley Slave (Lost Civilizations)

by Heppner, Vaughn

  Above the mist and the alleyways where beggars shivered and lepers huddled, above the squalid parapets where wary sea rovers patrolled, higher even than the towers stained with seagull guano, arose a vast, blunt acropolis. It rose like a shark’s fin over the sea of dwellings, and like a deadly Great White, it made even the blood thirstiest reaver blanch. For on the acropolis was the dread Temple of Gog. The edifice was unlike any in the city. Marble imported from afar towered twenty stories high in a cyclopean cathedral of evil. It was gargantuan, a symbol of megalomania, arrogance and will to power.

  The city’s largest canal led past the acropolis. The canal’s thickest mists vomited a lone five-oared boat ablaze with lanterns. A boy beat a warning drum, the oars moving rhythmically and fast. The instant boat-wood scraped against stone, a brute leaped out and hurried across the wharf onto the Temple plaza. He passed man-tall tripods where braziers smoked, their scented coals throwing off a dying glow. With the dawn’s light, the attending priests had departed, taking their stepladders, skull necklaces and bags of costly incense.

  The brute—he wore a black jacket, black leathers and shiny black boots—hurried up broad marble steps. Huge, massively built, he had thick simian shoulders and an elephantine neck. Only partly human, he had a long black ponytail bound by golden rings and a trident tattoo red on his forehead. The forehead was much too wide. His hands were outlandish, strangler-sized, and his baleful eyes swirled with promises of death. A notorious killer, he wore a finely tempered blade in a gruesome scabbard. He was Kron the Enforcer.

  His sire had summoned him, the reason for his haste—and his fear.

  None but a fool entered Gog’s presence without a twisting of innards. Gog the Oracle, Firstborn, child of Magog the Accursed. Kron’s skin crawled. Forbidding secrets surrounded that last name, horrible legends. There had been a time when the Old Ones had walked the Earth and ruled like tyrants, like gods. Their true name was bene elohim. Kron bared horse-sized, viciously strong teeth. Magog the Accursed was a fallen star, a rebel angel driven from the heavens and one who had dared cloak himself in flesh. Kron’s baleful eyes shone with dread. A day had come, a frightful moment when shining ones from above had dragged Magog down into Tartarus. There they had bound him in adamant chains for the day of Elohim’s wrath. So told the grimmest legends.

  Kron growled a curse. Did he wish to damn himself? It was ill luck to think such thoughts. He concentrated on the present as he wiped perspiration from his tattooed brow. Why had Gog summoned him? Had his sire swept aside the mystic veil and peered yet again into the future?

  Each child of the Accursed, unto the third generation, had a gift, an ability uniquely his own. Gog could peer into future paths that might be…if enough blood greased the way and the stars aligned themselves just so.

  This particular gift countless people craved, countless petitioners begged Gog to grant them a favor. They seldom saw the First Born directly. Gog lived apart in the catacombs below. Petitioners pressed parchments and rolled scrolls into the hands of his priests. For his favor, they brought gifts and promised Gog servitude or an alliance. With this prophetic power and countless favors granted, Gog had welded together a spidery empire, striking down those who might trouble him.

  Rumors abounded that the king of Pildash and crafty merchants of Dishon had made the trek, as had many around the Suttung Sea eager to know the future. In the past a giant from the Kragehul Steppes had come, and Gibborim from faraway Poseidonis. From Larak, Eridu and mighty Caphtor itself they had trickled in dark pilgrimage. Even proud sons of Cain, Jogli nomads, had begged an audience with Gog.

  Kron took a deep breath, attempting calm. He strode toward the Temple entrance where awaited thirteen shaven priests bearing torches. He didn’t fear them. They were only men. Men were animals, like jackasses or oxen, some reminded him of wolves or even panthers, but they were all still just beasts. They carried none of the blood of the high. They had no lineage to the Old Ones.

  On the darkest nights, when gloom bit his heart, he pondered his diluted blood and his sire’s pedigree. Gog was First Born. He, Kron, was merely a Nephilim, half that of his sire.

  “You’re late,” the chief priest said, his silken robe of funeral purple.

  If any other man had spoken to Kron so, he would have smashed the leering face with a single blow, breaking the eggshell brittleness that made a human skull. Instead, Kron’s innards clenched and his dark eyes tightened.

  “You have composed yourself?” the chief priest asked.

  Kron sought the calm he needed, dipping his head.

  “Follow me,” the chief priest said, slurring his words, betraying a mind gripped by the black poppy of Poseidonis.

  Only so intoxicated, realized Kron, could mere men serenely enter the inner chamber of Gog.

  The thirteen priests lifted their torches, guiding him past towering marble columns. They seemed like mice in a great house. The Temple dwarfed them, dwarfed Kron, making him feel insignificant. He loathed the emotion, warred against it in the darkness of his soul. Gog, Gog the Oracle, Sire and Lord, Suzerain of his Nephilim. The Temple blackness drifted around the knot of crackling light. The swollen dark seemed like clammy fingers. Kron massaged his throat as he increased his pace, keeping among the vacant-eyed priests. He glanced often at the tiles, expecting vipers, scorpions or centipedes to slither into view. The place had that feel.

  Huge bronze doors loomed before them, massive doors bigger than a giant or a great sloth. When closed, the portal looked strong enough to halt a rampaging mastodon.

  As they neared the titanic entrance, halting before it, the place seemed as if a black pit yawned before them. It sucked the warmth from Kron and stole his courage. He began to quake.

  “Gog,” the chief priest said.

  “Gog!” the others chanted.

  “Come.” It was a single word emanating from the depths of the darkness. It rang heavily, vibrantly and terrifyingly deep.

  The priests resumed their drugged march. Kron stumbled after them, entering the inner sanctum. The darkness increased its weight the farther they trod. The gloom pressed down so the flickering circle of visibility shrank. It was an awful phenomenon. Dimly, Kron perceived monstrous idols looming along the path. They were colossi of the Old Ones in bronze, iron and granite.

  Now a vile stench arose, a mixture of sulfur, putrid carrion and a reek Kron couldn’t place. The radius of torchlight weakened even more, until the priests seemed like a tiny oasis in a surging sea of blackness.

  Kron trembled, for he sensed a vast being before him, one who cloaked himself in darkness. He heard a rattle of chains and a dreadful moan. Torches blazed and the swirling dark parted to reveal a gargantuan ebon altar. Blood trickled down the altar’s sides. Then—before more could be taken in—a slippery thing, like a giant eel or tentacle, slid into view as the shadows congealed and thickened.

  Kron felt an unblinking solitary eye upon him.

  “Gog!” the priests chanted.

  A grunt sounded, an impossibly low noise. It came from a mouth higher than Kron could reach.

  He dropped to his knees and then lay on the tiles. “High One,” Kron intoned, hating the ritual abasement. “I crawl before you. For you are the master and I am the worm.”

  “You are my son,” rumbled Gog, in a voice like a two-ton gong. “You are flesh of my flesh.”

  The words pierced Kron, each syllable a vibration felt in the bones. He strove to maintain his equilibrium even as he heard breathing like a monstrous bull.

  Wetting his lips, Kron said, “Instruct me, Oh High One. Command your son that I may obey my sire’s wishes.”

  “One—whom none shall name in my presence—has found a willing vessel in Shamgar.”

  The twist in Kron’s guts was as a dagger thrust. Surely, Gog could not mean…that one. Kron pondered the implications, and because of the continuing silence, he knew that he was supposed to cringe and cry out. No! He refused. He was Kron, the mightiest of his father’s
sons.

  The audible breathing grew heavier, and the drugged faces of the thirteen priests became fearfully pale as they cringed and slid away from the looming First Born.

  “I have pierced the mystic veil,” Gog rumbled at last. “I have seen a future unattractive and unyielding. In it is a man with eyes blazing fire. He carries a sword of vengeance and is a breaker of teeth. He is a man of pain, of suffering and torments, and…” A foul curse tolled through the darkness. “I have pierced the mystic veil. I have tracked this one through many paths, through many maybes and might-bes. He is slippery and indistinct, the mark of those who serve the one whom none shall name in my presence. Men compare him to an otter, and he is loose in my city. He will probably meet today or the next a chariot lance. Those futures are the worst.”

  “I don’t understand,” Kron said. “What significance is there in a chariot lance?”

  Silence reigned. Kron knew why. He had interrupted Gog. Worse, he had queried his sire. Yet…he was Kron, and he refused to cringe like the priests around him or ask his sire for pardon.

  The silence lengthened, until… “I have pierced the mystic veil and teased out this single clue: my foe’s affinity with otters. Is he a Nebo tribesman who traps freshwater otters in the swamp, or a trader of furs who sells his wares in the city? I do not know. Maybe he fights like an otter or travels in their manner. The chariot lance is easier to read. I deem it represents a chariot warrior, a champion of great valor.”

  “High One, are not chariots useless in the swamp and too bulky for Shamgar’s walkways, to say nothing of the canals?”

  “You are dull. A dullard. He is probably a plains warrior, a merchant’s mercenary-guard or an outlaw who has cast his lot with the reavers.”

  “O High One, if the otter is a trader of furs and the chariot-lance a merchant’s guard, how can I stop their meeting?”

  “I have dimly pierced the mystic veil. That denotes strength in my enemy. Yet I have seen you clutching a severed head that bears two fiery eyes. It is in your power to slay my foe-to-be, to cut down a weed that might choke the plans of the mighty. You must sharpen your blade and keep alert. I deem you the most likely to find success if you work as usual, retaining only the use of your attendants.”

  Kron let that sink in. Gog needed him! He felt a moment of victory, wondering how to use this to his advantage, how to extract greater rank from his sire.

  “Worm!” Gog rumbled. “You are my son, flesh of my flesh. But you must not become too bold.”

  Before Kron could react, a slippery something whipped into view. It clutched the hilt of Kron’s belted sword. With a hiss of steel, the blade left Kron’s human-skin scabbard. Kron froze. Had he gone too far?

  The sword streaked toward him.

  Kron knew an instant of bitterness, yet even still, he refused to beg for mercy.

  Then the blade swished over him. It sank into the nearest priest, brutally cutting him and sweeping the human off his feet.

  “I baptize your sword,” Gog said, “giving it an enchantment of blood.”

  The blade clashed onto the tiles before Kron. Thick crimson droplets struck his cheeks, causing him to flinch.

  “Abase yourself, worm!”

  Kron hugged the tiles, trembling in fear.

  “Even though your foe is cattle, a mere man and possibly a youngling, he has the power to thwart our gift of the Accursed. Now go! Begin the hunt.”

  -3-

  Lod surfaced between splashing oars and a melon barge’s hull. Slave rowers grunted. A drummer pounded the beat. A whip cracked.

  Lod grasped a slimy length of cordage. Black marine grass and barnacles grew out of the bottom of the barge. Despite that, Lod rested, catching his breath.

  A lantern followed out of a smaller canal. Mists swirled around an old hunter with crooked shoulders as he swept his gondola’s long oar. The man tried signaling the barge, waving a thin arm. Then the mists thickened and the hunter’s reedy voice failed to pierce the thump of oars and the incessant beat of the kettledrum.

  No grin twisted Lod’s lips. The stakes were too high. Except for the iron collar and loincloth, he was naked. He had tied the eel-rope formerly binding his hands to the hilt of his stolen dagger and to his left wrist. The blade trailed him underwater.

  Fortunately, no slaver had ever branded him or notched his ear. As bait—a disposable slave—men had deemed it unnecessary to mark him. If he could tear off the iron collar…his eyes narrowed. Most rat hunters knew him. In passing, they had often touched him for luck. Simply because he had kept alive all these years, he had become legendary. Once word reached them that he had slain his so-called master…they would scour the canals just like that old trailing hunter.

  He had to escape the pirate city.

  Unfortunately, sunken bars rising up like a fence guarded the canals leading into the swamp, and the moment he set foot on a pier or dock, sailors, fishermen, any rat hunter would recognize him as bait. Dare he turn brigand?

  Lod shook his head. He had heard of galley law. The reavers of Shamgar were a clan unto themselves. Each stronghold boasted itself independent, secure in its own might. Storm one bastion in bloody battle and the rest would simply bar their gates, saying it meant nothing to them. They were the original denizens of Shamgar, scoundrels hiding from honest men, using the depths of the swamp as a den.

  Lod re-gripped the rope affixed to the barge as the kettledrum-beat increased tempo. The steersman above grunted as he threw his weight against the broad-bladed oar. Slowly, the heavy vessel turned.

  Mists parted into wispy vapors. A rat boat became visible, not the one trailing the barge, but one mid-canal, with a boy playing dead, drifting in the water. Lod noticed telltale ripples approaching the bait. He wanted to yell out, to warn the poor lad, probably no more than nine or ten years of age.

  Lod turned away, unwilling to watch a tragedy he had witnessed a thousand times. In that moment, he knew the answer. He must take the barge to its probable destination.

  The reavers of Shamgar lived by the sword, by the fist and axe. They plundered those weaker than themselves and burned out whoever fought too hard. The only law they recognized was someone who hit harder than they did. That someone was Gog and his terrible sons, the Nephilim, and his priests, beastmasters and soul-snatching necromancers.

  Yet Gog had not attempted to rule the city, had not stormed the reaver citadels one by one. Instead, through his minions, the First Born had carved out neutral territory and there allowed merchants to set up booths and stalls. Bazaars had grown, prospered, and the reavers had soon realized that it was easier selling stolen loot in their own city than having to risk it elsewhere. Over time, Gog had begun a different sort of conquest, winning adherents to his Order. He initiated them into ghastly rites as he accepted worship and gave rewards of prosperity. Gog taught his initiates the joy of inflicting pain on chosen weaklings. Many rat hunters belonged to the Order, although most never advanced beyond Whip Rank.

  Lod decided that he must risk entering neutral territory. There he must steal coin and buy passage on an outbound merchant vessel, or perhaps try to stow away on such a ship.

  A shrill scream from the canals told him of the rat bait’s end.

  Perhaps before his capture many years ago Lod might have shuddered at that high-pitched scream. He might even have sweated in panicked fear. As an animal, a thing that had survived many years, he didn’t even shrug, so great had become his disinterest in others. But because of his visions, anger burned in his blue eyes at the young boy’s death.

  -4-

  Kron loathed the milling throng, the clink of traders accepting coins, the endless shouting and the bickering of the bazaar. Was it truly possible that Gog feared one among the humans, this otter?

  Two reavers approached him. He had enforcer duty today. They probably wanted to complain about stale beer or something equally useless.

  Kron scowled at them, radiating menace.

  The two reavers—blade-carr
ying fighters—hesitated. Then they turned abruptly and strode away.

  Kron had no time for useless chatter. That the two had succumbed so easily to his gift—that of mentally inflicting his will upon others—proved that they were not the one he must find. His attendants combed this neutral territory, looking for former chariot warriors, checking fur traders and interviewing Nebo tribesmen. His attendants were hardened cutthroats, noticeable by their brown leathers, boots and peculiar hooked swords. Yet they were mere men, cattle, without a drop of the blood of the high.

  Kron brooded. Priests normally kept the peace in neutral territory, backed by a complement of spearmen. He caught flashes in the crowds of priestly red robes and the glitter of spearmen’s polished shields.

  In the past, unruly reavers had tested the resolve of the priests, and on more than one occasion Kron had been near enough to wet his blade and put a quick end to any riotous looting. Those days had unfortunately passed. He relished the idea of drawing steel against this hidden one, of severing his head and handing it on a platter to Gog. Man or madman, this otter was still just cattle.

  And yet…Gog had shown fear of this one, had openly admitted that the entire web of his secret kingdom was on the hunt for this man. Surely, that could not mean that others were being held in reserve here in case he, the enforcer, failed.

  Kron eyed the vast throng. He was the enforcer. No mere mortal could match him in a fight. Among the Nephilim—his brothers—he feared only two; and then only because of the deadliness of their gifts, not because of their skill at arms. Would his sire insult him by stationing others nearby? That seemed inconceivable, and yet, if Gog truly feared this hidden one such a move would only be common sense.

  How much did Gog fear? Kron felt unease in his gut. The desire to topple his sire and rule the secret kingdom in his own right burned strong in him. He swallowed a knot out of his throat. Such thoughts were unwise. Gog could read the future. Yet if this hidden one remained cloaked from Gog, if even only partially…