by A. Giannetti
Cautiously, Elerian approached it, wrinkling up his nose, for the creature stank. It snarled at him and coughed up more blood onto its filthy tunic front.
“Why did you attack me?” asked Elerian in the common tongue.
“Meat, eat man meat,” growled the creature, its pain filled eyes gleaming with a sudden, hungry light.
Elerian stared at the unlovely creature in disgust. “What are you?” he asked. “Tell me and I will help you.”
“Mutare,” said the creature. “Goblins changed us. Later we escaped into the forest. Hide from Goblins so we can be free. You help me now. We are friends then, no more enemies.”
Elerian guardedly moved closer to the wounded mutare. Having promised help, he felt bound to give it, but he saw the treachery in the creature’s yellow eyes, and he was not surprised when it lunged at him as he leaned over it.
Once again, he was amazed at the speed of these creatures. He just caught its hairy, right wrist in his left hand before it could rip out his throat. Striking in reflex, Elerian buried the knife in his right hand in the creature’s throat. Tenaciously holding on to its life, the mutare struck at him with the claws on its left hand. Elerian heard his tunic rip, and lines of fire burned down his right shoulder and arm as the creature’s sharp claws tore through his flesh. The mutare struggled violently to rise for a moment, before falling back once more to lie motionless on the ground.
His heart racing, Elerian drew out his knife and straightened up. “You were a fool to keep your word to a treacherous creature like this,” he admonished himself softly.
After a careful look around assured him that there were no more mutare to contend with, Elerian took the time to heal the wounds on his face and body, all of which were bleeding freely. The claws that had raked his face had come within a whisker of taking out his right eye. Thinking back to his childhood encounter with creatures such as these, he realized how lucky he was to have escaped them. They were quick, deadly adversaries, not the clownish creatures he had thought them. “I will not take them lightly ever again if I encounter more of their breed in the future,” thought Elerian ruefully to himself.
He made a cautious, thorough search of the ruins nearby but found nothing else alive. Back where one wall had fallen against another, he found a shallow cave, which the mutare had evidently used as a den. There were piles of leaves for beds, and bones and other trash were piled by the entrance. Elerian walked back to the bodies and stared down at the mutare for a moment. The creatures looked smaller in death and oddly pitiable. For the first time, Elerian noticed that their fur was sprinkled with gray and white hairs. The mutare were much older than he had first thought. He wondered if one or even two of their number could be the same creatures he had faced as a child.
Remembering the mutare’s claim that he and his companions were changed by Goblins, Elerian cast a shape-changing spell similar to the one he had used on Drusus on each of the dead mutare. As he watched, their outlines flowed and changed. In place of the bestial forms of the mutare, Elerian was horrified to see the bodies of three men. Two of the men were tall and dark eyed, with black hair liberally marked with gray. They were easily recognizable as Ancharians. The third had blue eyes and fair hair turned almost entirely white. Elerian had never seen anyone who looked like him before. He stared at the third man for a long time, wondering what far land the Goblins had plucked him from. The faces of all three were degraded by the brutal life they had led, and Elerian wondered if they had chosen to serve the Goblins willingly or whether they had been forced into their brutish existence. After using a spell to carry away the earth from the base of a ruined wall, Elerian buried all three bodies in the large hole he had created. The battle with the mutare and the use of so much magic left him feeling weary, but he decided to go on rather than rest for a while. ‘“There may be more of these mutare about,” he thought to himself. “I would hate to have them find me asleep.”
It was full dark now, but the starlight gave Elerian all the light he needed. He continued north through Esdras, alert to every sound, traveling only on the side roads that paralleled the Via Magna. “If there are more mutare about, they are more likely to be found on the main road,” he reasoned to himself. “That is where they are more likely to find human prey.”
At the city limits, Elerian stepped back on to the main road where it passed through another ruined gate. Outside the city walls, trees had grown up on either side of the road, and after traveling a short distance, Elerian entered a small grove of ash trees growing several hundred yards to the right of the road. Climbing into the largest tree, he curled up in his cloak in a small hollow formed by the junction of several large branches and the main trunk. Nothing disturbed him, and he woke several hours later from his light half sleep refreshed and ready to go on. After a bite to eat from his pack, he descended to the ground and followed the deserted road north for another half mile. At that point, Elerian stopped, for the road entered a wild, forbidding swamp that stretched endlessly north, east, and west.
THE SWAMP
The swamp was an unexpected obstacle, for it had not appeared on Tullius’s old maps. Most at his ease in the forest, the fen before him gave Elerian an uneasy feeling. Thickets of tall reeds, which might conceal any sort of danger, rose up on both sides of the roadbed, and beyond the reeds were stretches of open water covered with mists that sent out white tendrils to the height of a man. A noisome smell of rot and decay was wafted to his nostrils by the night breeze. Elerian deliberated for a moment, trying to decide if he should go on. Barely fifteen miles to the north, Tullius’s maps had shown another large city, named Arstis, which he wished to explore. A large river, spanned by another bridge, flowed through it, making it a likely route for anyone seeking to reach Esdras.
“It would be a shame to turn back now for fear of getting my feet wet,” thought Elerian to himself by way of encouragement. Despite his aversion to entering the swamp, he finally decided to venture on at least as far as Arstis. “I can always turn back if the water becomes too deep,” he thought to himself.
He decided to cross the swamp at once, instead of waiting for morning. After cutting a stout branch from a tree to use as a walking stick, he followed the road into the marsh. The roadbed remained mostly dry, and he made steady progress. The land on either side of him remained flat and featureless. Tall stands of green reeds covered all the shallower pools and often advanced right to the edge of the roadway. Where the water was deeper, the reeds gave way to dark, still pools of water, thick with waterweeds and lily pads. The air was filled with the calls of the countless birds that lived in the swamp and the croaking of myriads of frogs. Swarms of biting insects flew around Elerian, but he kept them at bay with a shield spell.
At first, there was no sign of any larger animals, but as Elerian progressed deeper into the swamp, he began to see large, v shaped ripples moving across the surface of the deeper pools near the road. Whenever a reed bed broke the surface of the water, Elerian heard furtive rustlings from inside them, as if the creatures causing the ripples were following him under cover of the reeds. The stealthiness of his unseen pursuers was unsettling. Unsure whether they were just curious about him or whether they meant him harm, Elerian constantly looked from one side of the road to the other, trying to get a glimpse of the creatures.
Adding to his difficulties, the road began to sink until it was covered ankle high with mud and water. Elerian felt his way with the tip of the improvised staff that he carried, trying to stay as near to the center of the hidden road as possible, for the ripples following him were coming closer and closer to the roadbed before veering off. When the water covering the road crept up above his knees, Elerian’s determination to go on began to waver, for the deeper water seemed to embolden the creatures causing the ripples in the water. They now began to make short rushes at him, veering off just before they reached the edge of the road. Fearing that the unknown creatures around him were gathering their courage for an attack on him, Elerian began to strike at t
he ripples with his staff, hoping to drive off whatever lurked below the surface of the water. His blows only seemed to agitate the creatures. They began to roil the surface of the water around him, and Elerian caught the glint of wet, scaled skin in the starlight. He was tempted to escape by taking to the air in his hawk shape, but that would have meant abandoning his pack with all his food and gear, for he lacked the power to send everything off to the place where he kept his spell book.
“I will leave my pack and weapons only as a last resort,” he thought to himself as he waded through the water covering the road with all the speed he could muster. He was so intent on watching the threatening ripples around him that he was taken by surprise when he looked up and saw ruins ahead of him. Eagerly, he splashed his way into the drowned city in front of him, the water covering the road dropping until it was only ankle deep, as if the city had originally stood upon a rise of ground before sinking into the swamp. When Elerian looked back, he still saw ripples in the deeper water outside the city, but nothing emerged to pursue him. Hoping that he was at last free of his mysterious pursuers, he continued on into Arstis.
The buildings on both sides of the road were badly deteriorated, with only an occasional remnant of a wall rising above the dark pools and mats of green water plants that surrounded them. Elerian waded through shallow pools to look inside some of them, but there was little to be seen. Whatever disaster had overtaken this place had occurred long ago, and the contents of the buildings had long since rotted away. He wondered what had caused the land to sink. “Was it some natural event, or was it something that occurred during the Great War?” he wondered to himself.
In the midst of his explorations, a deep, booming roar in the depths of the marsh caused Elerian to start. The menacing sound died away only to be answered from several other places in the swamp around the city. Wondering what sort of beast could make such a fearsome noise, Elerian resumed following the road through the center of the drowned city. Halfway across, he came upon a stone bridge that just cleared a great pool of water, which extended both to the left and the right of the bridge.
“This must be the river that flows through Arstis,” thought Elerian to himself. “When the land sank, it must have spread out to create the swamp.” Halfway across the bridge, Elerian paused to look over the side. The only sign that remained of the drowned river was the slow moving current that flowed beneath the bridge. On the far side of the bridge, Elerian received an unwelcome surprise. The road before him vanished beneath a wide pool of still, dark water. V shaped ripples moved back and forth across the surface of the water on either side of the drowned roadbed. His mysterious pursuers had found him again.
For a moment, Elerian considered turning back, but the greater part of Arstis lay across the bridge, and he still wished to explore the rest of the city. “I will chance the pool, I think,” Elerian decided at last. I would hate to turn back now after traveling all this distance,” he thought to himself as he stared at the ripples, trying to see what sort of creature was causing them. “After all, it may only be large fish or harmless water creatures that are disturbing the water.”
His mind made up, Elerian left the bridge and ventured into the dark pool, determined to turn back if the water became more than knee deep. By watching the ripples on either side and by using his stick to feel for the bottom, he was able to stay near the center of the submerged road. He was encouraged to find that the water on the road bed remained shallow, reaching only to his knees at the deepest part of the pool, and Elerian began to hope that he would make it across unmolested, for the creatures creating the ripples seemed reluctant to venture onto the road. As he neared the far side of the pool, the level of the water dropped to the height of his ankles. Breathing a sigh of relief, Elerian quickened his steps, eager to leave the water behind. On his right, another wake made a rush at him, but Elerian paid it little mind, expecting it to veer off when it reached the roadbed. Instead, the surface of the pool suddenly exploded into a fountain of white water that drenched him from head to foot.
Through the spray emerged a dark shape, nearly three times the length of a man. Slender bodied, covered by fine blue-black scales that gleamed wetly in the starlight, it moved with an eel like grace. A long, sinuous neck lifted up a narrow horned head level with his own, the large, dark eyes gleaming silver with reflected starlight. Jaws agape, the head lunged at Elerian’s throat, and he glimpsed white, serrated teeth as he thrust the end of his stick into the creature’s mouth, jamming it against the sensitive area at the back of its throat. The water beast gave a strangled roar and clamped down on the stick with its jaws, shaking its head vigorously. The power of its sinewy neck tore the makeshift staff out of Elerian’s hand. Releasing the stick, the creature reared on its hind legs, raising its savage head above Elerian’s. With widespread jaws, it lunged down at him.
Quick as thought, Elerian seized its slick, scaly throat with his left hand just below the head, fending off the snapping jaws. Drawing his long knife from its sheath with his right hand, he thrust it into the hollow formed by the creature’s left leg, where it joined its body. The scales covering the hollow were small and weak, allowing the keen, tempered blade of the knife, driven by the strength of Elerian’s arm, to slide in almost to the hilt. Bellowing in pain, the water beast wrenched its throat out of Elerian’s grasp. Pulling his knife out of the creature’s body, Elerian stepped back as his attacker crashed down into the water in front of him, soaking him from head to foot with spray as it thrashed the water with short, muscular legs that ended in webbed feet tipped with long, hooked claws. A powerful tail, edged with a row of sharp, triangular plates, beat the water behind the creature into a white froth.
Then, as suddenly as it had appeared, the water beast was gone, slipping back into the depths of the pool. Elerian was not sure how badly he had wounded it, but it did not reappear, and the other ripples around him kept their distance. Knife in hand, heart pounding in his chest, Elerian retrieved his stick, which was floating nearby, and crossed the remaining distance to the far shore of the pool as quickly as he could.
The ground began to rise at the margin of the pool. Shallow puddles and mud covered the ground between the ruined buildings on either side of the road, instead of open water. “I am safe for now,” thought Elerian to himself as he stepped from the pool. Before he could take another step, however, something surged out of the water to his left, and he felt a searing pain as his left ankle was seized in a viselike grip. A moment later, he was yanked off his feet, and the creature that held his ankle in its jaws began dragging him back into the pool. It was much smaller than the first beast that had attacked him, but even so, it dragged him inexorably toward the water. There was nothing for Elerian to hang on to, and every time he tried to stand, the creature tugged powerfully on his ankle, causing him to fall into the water on his stomach. Water and soft mud filled his eyes, mouth, and nose, making it difficult to see or even breathe. Desperately, he raised his head above the surface of the water and shouted, “Lumen.” The tugging stopped, but the pressure on his ankle continued unabated. Elerian looked back over his left shoulder through blurred eyes and saw a ball of intense yellow light hanging above the water beast’s head. The creature had its eyes closed tight to shut out the glare of the mage light, but it was still refusing to let go of his ankle. He tried to pull himself free, but the creature clamped its jaws even tighter, sending waves of agony shooting up his leg. Frantically, Elerian twisted around to his right and, reaching back, plunged the knife he was still holding in his right hand deep into the creature’s right eye. Water and mud suddenly sprayed everywhere as the water beast thrashed about; beating the water into a white froth with its whipping tail, but it never ceased grinding his ankle between its jaws. A fresh explosion of pain shot up Elerian’s leg, and he feared that his foot was being torn off by the creature’s death throes.
After an endless time, the water beast lay still, but incredibly, it still retained its hold on his ankle. Using h
is arms and his good leg, Elerian pushed and pulled himself out of the water and away from the pool, dragging the water beast behind him. The road was now covered with only an inch or two of water, and the light, which still hovered in the air behind him, was keeping the rest of the creatures in the pool at bay. Elerian turned to the beast he had dragged out of the water and tried to pry its jaws apart with his hands to free his ankle, but they remained locked together, as if the creature was still alive. Elerian finally gave up the useless struggle. Taking several deep breaths to clear his mind, he cast an opening spell instead. At once, the jaws clamped over his ankle relaxed. He was almost afraid to look at his wound, fearing that his ankle might be half severed from his leg. When he removed his leather boot, however, his skin was bleeding freely from a line of deep puncture wounds on both sides of his ankle, but to his joy, he found that the tough leather of the boot had kept the beast’s teeth from cutting down to the bone. After crawling a safe distance from the edge of the pool, he soon set the wound to rights with a healing spell. When he pulled his battered boot back on, his ankle was sore, but he found that he could walk on it.
Elerian now had time to examine the creature that had attacked him. It closely resembled the first beast that had assaulted him, but its slender, sinewy body was only about twelve feet long, half that length taken up by its neck and tail. Its small scales glittered with a blue green fire under the rays of the mage light hanging over it. Except for its size, Elerian thought that it was quite similar in appearance to the anguis that had attacked him near the sunken galley.
“Is it a different kind of anguis,” he wondered to himself, “or is it the young of a larger beast?”
The last thought was unsettling. Remembering the roars he had heard in the swamp, Elerian pictured an enraged anguis thirty feet long on his trail, seeking vengeance for its slain offspring.