“It lies,” Wren hissed.
“What did it say?” Stuart asked.
“It said that Kestrel has no powers here, not in daytime, probably not even at night,” she answered.
“I have no powers – I have them but I can’t use them,” Kestrel corrected himself as he admitted that the monster was correct. “I tried to use them just now, and I can’t!”
“What does it want?” Kestrel asked Wren.
She whispered and rattled his question to the mist, then listened to the reply.
Then she stood still, and Kestrel saw her eyes narrow in suspicion.
“It says it wants to help us,” she said in disbelief. She spoke to the monster again, and listened to its response, then the group watched as it suddenly darted into a nearby door way and disappeared from view.
“It says,” Wren had unconsciously dropped into a defensive crouch, but she straightened her back and stood upright as she spoke, “it says it is the enemy of the Viathins too, and if we can kill them, it will help us. But for now, it cannot stand the sun, so it has left.
“It says we will see it again,” she warned.
Kestrel translated for Woven and then Stillwater, as the others looked around uneasily.
“Why don’t your powers work?” Lark asked Kestrel. “It seems like we could really use them now.”
“It’s not by choice,” Kestrel answered. “I’d like to have them. I don’t understand it myself,” he admitted.
“Let’s move on,” he said.
“And stay away from the doors and windows; watch out for any place that smoke could come out of,” Stuart added.
The group proceeded to advance through the city, staying in the center of the largest boulevards, and maintaining a direction towards the far side of the city, though they did not know where they would go from there.
The strange blue sun sank into the sky, the sky that must be the west for the strange land, and as it settled down towards the hills behind the travelers, it began to turn from blue to green, casting long shadows by the tall buildings, and spreading an unhealthy green pallor over all the lands. The squad of travelers from the Inner Seas moved forward, and as they came to the eastern edge of the abandoned city, they found that it ended as abruptly as it had begun, with an unseen boundary beyond which there were no buildings whatsoever.
As they reached the boundary, three things happened.
First they slowed down.
“What do we do now?” Gates asked. “Are we going to go out into the wilderness at night?” he asked.
“I think I’d rather be out there than in the city with that mist when the night falls,” Kestrel answered.
“I agree with Kestrel,” Stuart agreed, and so they started out into the scrubby desert.
After only a score of steps, one of the human guards suddenly fell to the ground with a cry of pain, and frantically grabbed at his leg. He was the guard who had suffered the bloody insect bite upon their arrival in the land of the blue sun, and he held his leg at the spot that had suffered the bite. That unseen bug, Kestrel momentarily thought, was the only living thing they had encountered in the new land, other than the frightening mist creature.
The man screamed again.
“Jaxom, what is it?” Gates asked with concern, kneeling next to the man, and pulling his trouser leg up to look at the injury.
“The pain! That bug bite – something’s happening,” the guard said, then gave another scream. Gates grabbed the man’s arms to support him, then suddenly fell back away from the man, falling and sitting on the ground as he stared in horror.
The angry red spot of the insect bite was terribly swollen, and the man’s flesh moved rapidly and sickeningly. The center of the wound suddenly erupted outward, and a swarm of black insects spewed out into the air. They were small black flies, making loud buzzing sounds as they rose into the air.
The others in the group gasped in startled horror, as the man with the terrible wound whimpered, but then the insects began to settle back onto the man, landing on any portion of exposed flesh, and as they did they bit him.
The man cried out in agony, while the others gagged in horror. Each insect seemed to immediately begin to suck copious amounts of blood from their victim, visibly swelling instantly as they gorged themselves.
Lark reacted first, pulling out her small belt knife, an ornamental weapon that Kestrel had not seen her wield, and she began to stab and slice at the insects. Some were knocked loose, while others were popped or sliced open, creating multiple small bloody explosions; as they were attacked, the insects gave out high-pitched shrieks of distress. Gates saw what the duchess was doing, and he followed her lead, attacking other insects on Jaxom.
The sounds of the attacks and the deaths of the insects provoked the rest of the flying creatures to rise off their victim, and rise into the air above the party of travelers, a cloud that circled and buzzed in the air.
Jaxom lay on the ground, his eyes closed.
Kestrel reached for his energy desperately, instinctively, despite the failure he had suffered earlier in the afternoon. He felt the power inside him, and – just as the sun set behind the hills – he felt the barrier that separated him from the power seem to materially wane, so that he could weakly reach through it.
Kestrel grasped the power, and focused every ounce of effort he could call, so that he pulled the power into his grasp, and pulled it out into the world, then erected his glowing blue shield over himself and his party.
One of the insects dove suddenly down at the travelers below, but as it struck the energy dome it exploded, while the weak dome suffered a green spotting that did not return to blue. Another dove at the same spot, and it too died, but the green spot turned yellow. Two more of the insects dove at the dome, and other portions of the fragile protective shield also began to weaken.
Kestrel fell to his knees as he focused solely on the shield, trying to maintain it, praying for any help he could have to allow him to have access to the power within him. He knew that the insects were numerous enough to soon be able to break through his scant protection.
I hear you. I hear your prayer, friend, a voice whispered.
Kestrel imagined he felt a boost in his ability to utilize his powers, and the dome did strengthen. The yellow spots turned green, and the green spots turned blue.
“You can do it Kestrel!” Wren said.
“Instead of keeping them out, what if you wrapped your power around the biters, and threw them away from us?” Woven asked.
“Woven! That could work! We have nothing to lose at this point,” Kestrel said as he remained on his knees, one hand also on the ground to hold him up as he focused on power.
Even talking to the gnome disrupted his concentration, and he felt the energy shield start to weaken. He closed his eyes to visualize the results he expected to achieve, then flipped his energy, letting the edges rise up instantaneously and then curl around to close in upon themselves, forming a closed ball of blue light, with the swarm of insects trapped inside. And then he hurled the ball away, sending it soaring high in the air in the direction of the setting sun, a blue point of light in the sky, that grew smaller and then disappeared from view.
“Well done, Kestrel!” Stuart said, looking up to watch the threat disappear. He turned around to look at Kestrel, then gasped at what he saw. Kestrel had passed out, his energies totally drained by the effort to defeat the unlikely threat.
Stuart and Wren and Woven all dropped to their knees to check on their unconscious companion, while Lark and Gates and the other human guard all gathered around the man who had suffered the attack by the insects.
“He’s dead,” Lark said with tears in her eyes. “Jaxom is dead. I remember when I was a little girl, he’d always give me a sugar treat when my mother and father weren’t looking. He was a good man, and a reliable Uniontown man.
“I hate this place already, for having killed him,” she hissed with emotion.
“How is the heroic elf?” Gates
asked, rising from the dead man’s body, and turning to look over the shoulder of the other group.
“Beware!” Stillwater warned as he dove down from high above them. “The shadow is coming from the city, moving towards you.”
“Take positions in a circle around the ones on the ground,” Stuart commanded. “My duchess, you get in the center with Kestrel. Wren, you take the front spot, since you can speak to it.”
The shadows in the deepening green nightfall were dense, but the approaching darkness was visible against the less dense darkness around it, and they all watched with wary eyes as it arrived at a spot in front of them, then paused in its motions and began to speak.
Wren listened closely, then stood silent.
“It says,” she hesitated, but spoke, “it says we are not safe out here,” she translated.
There was a sudden roaring growl, far off in the distance. The sound frightened them all, for they all recognized what it was – the sound of a Viathin venting its hatred.
The mist spoke to them again.
“That was the reaction of the Viathins; they responded to seeing Kestrel’s blue sphere of power fly in the sky. They know we are here now,” the mist says. “They know Kestrel is here.
“The mist says it can help us hide,” she said.
“What’s wrong with Kestrel?” Lark asked.
“I do not know,” Wren answered. “He doesn’t seem to be able to use his powers here.” She looked up at Stillwater, and spoke to him. “Do you know why Kestrel’s powers are weakened?”
“I think it is the sun here,” Stillwater answered. “Just like back in our world, the sun can change, and affect the imps and sprites, I think that this blue sun must have an effect on Kestrel. His powers are blue, just like the sun, and so far he can only use his energy when he is not in direct light. Maybe the blue sun’s rays absorb or interfere with his powers.”
Wren translated the imp’s hypothesis to the others.
“So in the blue light he’s just like us?” Lark asked, from where she still knelt by the body of the dead guardsman.
“No, he’s not like you,” Wren said quietly.
The creature began to hiss and shush again, causing Wren to focus on it. The sky was growing dark as the sun completed its departure, letting the sky overhead fill with extraordinary clusters of stars and nebulae that glowed yellow and red and blue with such brightness that faint shadows fell on the ground.
“The mist says we must hurry; the Viathins will come soon,” she explained.
“Where will it take us?” Stuart asked cautiously.
“Where do we want to go?” Wren translated its question to answer the question.
“Tell it,” Stuart said. “Tell it we are here to set our own gods free, and to kill the god of the Viathins, and then go home. Let it know we do not plan to stay here.”
Wren spoke again with the sibilant sounds that twisted and exercised her tongue.
The mist squeaked once, then sat silently, its edges restlessly rolling down beneath itself, and welling up again within its center, making it appear to be a constantly erupting volcano. After a pause, it whispered.
“It says it knows where the captive gods are. It can help us to go there,” she said.
They heard another Viathin roar, closer than before, though not uncomfortably close.
“How can it lead us? What route? Will we be safe?” Stuart quizzed.
Wren curtly nodded her head as she listened to his questions, then turned and repeated them in the language of the mist. It replied, and she turned to the others.
“The captive gods are in a prison in another city. There are caves and canyons that will take us there, but it will be two days journey. The way will be dangerous, but if we trust it, it will deliver us inside the gates of the city,” Wren said.
“And we must promise not to help any other gods,” she added. She spoke to the mist, and it responded, its cloudy substance moving with greater agitation. “We absolutely must not help any other gods, or it will punish us for betraying it.
“It says it will hunt and slay Kestrel,” she said solemnly.
The Viathins roared again, and a responding roar came from the other side of them, out in the desert wilderness they had planned to travel through.
“We have no choice,” Gates said.
“What does it get out of this deal?” Stuart asked. “Why is it helping us?”
Wren translated again. “It says Ashcrayss and the Viathins are killing the world. Soon there will be nothing left. They have taken the water, they are taking the lives, soon they will consume everything, unless our gods can kill Ashcrayss,” she gave the answer of the mist.
“That is just how Kestrel has described the other worlds that he saw the Viathins plunder,” Wren added.
“My lady,” Stuart looked at Lark, “I recommend that we accept this unholy offer of help, and we follow this creature to some place of safety, and then to the place where the gods are held captive.
“Kestrel will know the rest of what we need to do when he awakens,” Stuart asserted.
“We’ll do it,” Lark agreed.
“Let me talk to my companions to see if they also agree,” Wren spoke up, and she began to speak in the language of the gnomes, explaining the proposal to Woven, as the mist moved back and forth across the road like an impatient child.
“We cannot trust this thing, but we have no choice,” Woven replied, and Stillwater had a similar answer after Wren told him. “But I hate the thought of going into caves again,” he added.
“Woven, you pick up Kestrel and carry him,” Wren told her gnome companion.
“We’re ready to go,” she told the others, then told the mist.
“We have to bring Jaxom’s body with us,” Lark said, as the humans gathered together.
“My lady, it will be a heavy burden to carry for two days,” Stuart spoke up.
“He was my body guard, and I will not allow him to be left behind like this,” Lark said heatedly.
With a sigh and a gesture, Stuart signaled for the other guard to bring the dead man along, and as the mist started to move back towards the city, the small group began to follow along.
“Why are there so few Viathins around here?” Wren asked the mist as they heard one roar up in the high hills beyond the city.
“They only come here to use the cave that you arrived from. There are not many of them, and they do not like this city otherwise,” the mist answered. “They are afraid of me; I have killed a few of them.”
“They may stop using the cave soon,” Wren said. “Kestrel closed the other end in our world, so they will no longer be able to use this passage between the worlds.”
“He is a great power?” the mist asked.
“He is,” Wren answered.
“What are you talking about?” Lark asked as they trudged back towards the town.
“The mist asked if Kestrel is a great power in our land,” Wren told her. “I said that he is.”
“He is, and we didn’t even know about him, really,” the girl agreed in a pleasanter tone than Wren had expected. “Except the Viathins spoke of ‘The Destroyer’ like some kind of mythical adversary, but I expected The Destroyer to be so much more frightening.”
The group crossed the boundary again and re-entered the city. They stalked along the broad central road in the path of the mist, until it turned aside at a particular building and entered the low door.
“Stop,” Stuart said, “Wren you wait and stay with the duchess, in case anything happens, I want you to be with her to translate, and take care of her. I’ll go in first,” and so saying, he drew his sword, then stooped very low and entered the dark building. The guard carrying the body of his companion grunted as he also stooped low, finding the burden to be an awkward one to maneuver with. Stillwater flew in, then Woven dragged Kestrel behind him, and the two females entered last.
The interior of the building was completely dark, and they all moved at an extremely slo
w pace, until there was a shout from the front. Moments later, Stuart’s voice drifted back, “Watch out for these steps going down,” he warned.
After half an hour of travel, they were only a little beyond the bottom of the stairs, and Wren called out to the mist in the front of the group. “Why is this so slow?” she asked.
“We are waiting on the pace of all of you. I would be much farther along if I traveled alone,” the mist told her.
“Stuart, why are our people so slow?” she called forward.
“It’s because of me,” the guard interrupted. “I can’t do more than spare one hand to drag Jaxom along, and it’s slow going,” he explained.
“Lark,” Wren spoke up, deliberately choosing not to use a title.
“I know,” the nobleman’s daughter answered. “We have to go faster, but it seems so cold to leave a friend here, where he’ll have no burial or respect.”
“You can respect his memory, and honor him in the afterlife,” Wren answered.
“Leave him, and move on,” Lark’s voice was emotional as she gave the command.
“Woven, how are you doing? Any signs of Kestrel awakening?” Wren asked a few minutes later, as they all began to crawl along at a faster pace.
“He’s not said or done anything so far,” Woven answered.
“We’ll want to take a break sometime,” Wren called forward to the mist. “Will there be a good place to do that?”
“We can go farther, and reach a canyon before the great light in the sky arrives,” the mist answered. “You can rest there. We must go faster though,” it added.
Wren passed the information along to the others, and listened to the groans as they heard the news, but they continued on with their journey.
It was long and slow and grueling, as the various races from the Inner Seas moved through the low-ceilinged passages of the land of the blue sun, but after painful hours they reached a spot where the mist began to hiss and seethe.
“It says we can stop here to rest. The sun will come up soon, and then we can walk through the canyon to the next set of caves,” Wren told them all.
There were groans of relief as all the members of the group settled down onto the ground. As they did, the mist spoke to Wren briefly.
An Unexpected Deity (Book 7) Page 16