by Nelson, J P
Amused at me as if virginity was something to be scorned, she got up and tried to sway her hips in a seductive manner. It was apparent she was utterly convinced of her own sexuality. I would hate to be the one to tell her there was no temptation there at all. As she stood and attempted to sensuously open her gown, her revealed torso and legs were covered with long, stringy hair. This made her overall visage rather appalling, unless of course you were a drunken human or an org.
Repulsed, I actually cringed for a moment, and she did not like that. Snarling she contorted her face and hissed, “Do you not like women?”
What made me say it, I don’t know, but I responded, “Not ugly ones who smell like a toilet …”
She opened a hand with fingers that suddenly transformed into a claw and reared back, her face contorted as canine fangs grew from her teeth …
“Hold, Cielizabeg!” Entering into the room from somewhere off to the side, a mature, female voice commanded. This voice was used to being obeyed, and although smooth, was as cold as ice, “He’s mine.”
This female moved without hurry and her actions flowed without effort. Her skin’s color was pale as if untouched by the sun and her hair was an ordinary brown. The robe she wore was snug upon her body, and she obviously had curves where curves should be. In my mind I heard a subtle and seductive voice, brushing through my thoughts with a silky caress, [Hello … I am Meidra. You are very lucky ...]
Meidra, I thought, so this is the witch. She doesn’t look so much like a … aren’t Meidra and Cielizabeg supposed to be goddesses, or something like that? What was going on? Where was I? Was I about to die?
As Meidra slowly glided across the floor toward me, she spoke to Cielizabeg in a voice that made you want to listen, “You may leave now. This young stallion and I have much to discuss …” She looked at me with a sly sideways and suggestive smile. Again, I heard only in my mind, [… don’t we?]
I didn’t see Cielizabeg leave, as my eyes were only on Meidra. She looked so inviting, there was nothing evil here.
Her dark robe hung loosely about her perfectly proportioned body, just barely closed together at her waist in a teasing fashion. Little was left to the imagination in the way of her shape, and I could see a tattoo of a butterfly on her left breast and another on her right thigh.
Walking to me in a swaying, hypnotic fashion, Meidra untied her robe with a seductive smile. But as it opened, something from my earliest memories rose quickly to the front of my brain, Succubus. I could hear songs in the distant recesses of my mind, songs of protection, Bardic Magic.
Turmoil within me gave rise as my mind argued this beautiful creature, this, this woman of warmth with promise of pleasure was here to … to do what … to release me. Why had that thought come to mind … release? It sounded so sweet, so inviting.
Yet from a memory long suppressed, something instilled through unrecalled hours of repetition until it had become instinct rather than conscious thought rose up and a barrage of music I did not remember, yet which felt so natural, and pressed from within to be let go.
I tried to whistle so as to engage the protective powers of the songs, but couldn’t. So I tried to hum, to weave the song which was intensely trying to rise to the surface of my mind.
What about Meidra had triggered this thought? How could anyone so beautiful …? As the robe was slowly dropped from her shoulders, then down and around her shapely hips and thighs, I saw a glimmer about her form. Rather than a beautiful female, for an instant she seemed to have small goat-like horns on the top of her head, her nose was upturned like a pig’s, fangs lined her teeth and her body was covered in an ugly mat of sparse hair. A long, boney tail moved snake-like behind her and her eyes were bloodshot with orange-yellow irises.
The glimmer lasted only a moment, but it was enough. Meidra instantly knew I had seen through her veil, something she did not expect, and she became furious. I apparently had some training in mental disciplines of the Dsh’Tharr Bard, never realizing it until now, and still I was unsure how much … Momma, she hadn’t just schooled me in history and song … she had …
Like a scream in the center of my brain, I heard Meidra hiss, [What? How DARE you? He is MINE! You are MINE, boy, do you HEAR?!] I thought, ‘Who is she talking to?’
Meidra’s own power was based on what is called psionics, powers of the mind, and it wasn’t like I came upon the thought by contemplation, I just suddenly knew without knowing why. A thousand lights seemed to explode in my head, wracking my psyche with pain I could have never imagined.
To this day I have not been able to remember exactly what happened. For what seemed an eternity my inner self felt as if it was floundering in a sea of black flame. Repeatedly I heard the words, whether in my mind or with my ears, or even both, I still don’t know, “You belong to me … I own you … give yourself to me … you are a child of perdition … accept that you were born to please me … give to me what is mine …” Searing pain shot through my body as she raked me with her claws.
Repeatedly she slapped me in an endless savage fury. Upon my neck, back and shoulders she beat me with clenched fists and cursed my soul; at some point she slammed me over and over into the walls with all of her might. Each blow, each rake, laced with snarls of rage as she tried to conquer my body and mind.
I held on as long as I could and fought with my fledgling skill. As she tried to consume and seduce my will, I was able to briefly see within her own subliminal thoughts. Never before had a male of any species been able to deny her, and it was now a matter of ego and vanity; she saw herself as a goddess, and she needed, demanded all males bear her obeisance. But with me she wanted more than to place me into her submission, she needed my blood. More specifically, she needed my seed.
Meidra needed a child by someone with strong elvin blood; an unholy child she could control and attempt to overthrow her father, Eayah. The Abaishulek she found to be weak, and those from Ch’Hahnju? Something was wrong there, but I couldn’t tell what it was. And then I suddenly knew she saw my ancestral lineage. I felt her astonishment, but only for a moment, then her hunger renewed with fervor.
Unable to fight no more, I, who had distained anything with regard to powers that be or any form of deity worship, in a plea for mercy cried out in my mind to Jh’Rhohai, he who the ancient elves revered as the Creator.
Suddenly the door burst open and the lock on my mind released. Cielizabeg half ran into the room in a panic yelling, “The priest, he’s located us. Meidra, we’ve got to do something!”
Did Jh’Rhohai hear me? Was it a coincidence? Did fate roll the dice and choose to intervene? All I knew was the onslaught on my mind and body stopped.
With my brain still on fire I could tell I was being held in the air by her left hand, my back against the wall and blood all over her claws. Meidra’s face was livid as she looked to Cielizabeg and then back to me.
Dropping me as one might release a soiled rag, she sneered at me and said in an embittered tone, “The men of the hall will teach you your place! By the time they have broken you to the saddle, I will be back. And by that time,” I could feel the evil radiating from her, “you will LIKE it. You …” She hissed her words in dripping scorn, “WILL … belong to me!”
Yelling for guards to come get me, she turned to the frantically pacing Cielizabeg, “Come with me, we will lay a plan for this Logan of yours. I will teach him to cross paths with me.”
The guards came in and dragged me, still naked, from the chamber and into a hallway. They were still dragging me when I passed out.
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Lying on the dirty straw and rubbing the back of my head, I tried to move my left leg up into a half crouch. If I could just make the room stop spinning … looking about everything was a blur. Okay, iron bars. Lots of iron bars. That meant several cells.
The air was damp and the smells were of stale sweat, rotting straw and human waste. I must be in a dungeon.
Two, no, three big humans males �
� all inside my cell; how could it get worse? No … that was not a question I wanted to ask.
Sitting up, even a little, was a chore. I needed to heal, badly. At the moment, however, more important matters were at hand. My vision was starting to focus and I realized these humans had a depraved, smiling expression on their faces. One stood up, and with an exaggerated motion removed his scant clothing. The other two followed suit and it became obvious what these sons of pigs had in mind.
One said to the others, “Hold him get away so he can’t do.”
‘Huh?’ I thought. The language sounded Shudoic, but badly butchered.
I realized my manacles had not been replaced. `Not that it was going to do me any good, right at the moment. Looking around for something I might use as a weapon, I saw only dried pieces of dung here and there in the straw.
The humans were enjoying themselves and posturing as they slowly circled around me. The one closest to my feet said, “Holiness her wants you for to know, train you do we will. Grow to soon like you will …” He spoke more but I couldn’t begin to follow what he said. I already had gotten the idea of their intentions.
My memory went back in time and I remembered the rat, I mean the two rats, both of them. The one had heard me.
Trying to keep self-control in this most precarious of conditions, I endeavored not to panic and breathed … and attempted to *S’Fahn Muir* to any creature out there who could help … I felt something was there, but what was it … [Help me] I asked to anything that, who would listen.
My cell had a small hole where the wall met the floor, I didn’t realize this at first, but it is where my assistance came from. Just as one of these humans was reaching down to grab me, this snake crawled through the straw and immediately struck up, twice, and bit the inner thigh of the brute at my feet.
The Di’Yamohn Viper often reaches lengths of sixteen to seventeen feet long and has the most potent venom of all vipers. When my new buddy surfaced and bit human number one, you should have seen the panic. Here were these three humans jumping around a fourteen by eighteen feet locked cell, all naked, all desperately running from this snake.
It was only a moment until this angry serpent caught the second human on the Achilles tendon. By this time human number one was crying tears, holding himself and begging for help. He was already starting to get wobbly as the other two were at the locked door screaming for help.
One guard came to the edge of the cell, and then backed away with hands in the air as he saw the viper.
Human number three cornered himself as he started to wet the straw, trembling before the viper as it rose up and poised in front of him. Entranced, I watched the creature deliberately wait until the human was in just the right position, then it struck twice so fast it seemed to me only a blur of motion.
Slithering through the straw the viper coiled itself in front of my feet and I started to get concerned. Then it rose up slowly and just looked at me. It was still there when two guards came running to the cell, and it turned around and stared at them, opened its mouth and hissed. I have no idea how long my guardian stayed there, because I simply passed out. But when I awoke the next morning, the snake was gone and the dead humans were still in my cell.
Chapter 24
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EARLY ON THE second morning after we drove Stagus’s old wagon into Kynear, René was having breakfast at Gertrude’s Diner. The sun had not yet risen when he walked in, but a few locals were already gathering for hot griddle cakes, eggs, overnight stewed chunks of beef and bowls of grits smothered in butter. If you asked for it you could get local made cheese grated into those grits.
Waking up early was not new for René, he used to say he was the one who got up to wake the rooster at home. Growing up as the sixth of eight children on a mountain valley farm, he was doing chores since he was old enough to walk. His great-grand pap on his pa’s side, a former sailor named Moureen, immigrated to the Jutte Range territory because he heard it would be a good place to raise horses.
Bringing a band of twenty mares and one stallion from Lychiwal, a country north of Vedoa, Moureen and a few kinsmen left the east coast, followed the Pihpikow Road all the way through Dahruban and into the Plains of Shudoquar. From there they continued down the Norder-Sau Trade Route and around the Jutte Range, before finally laying claim to fourteen thousand acres in an area now known as Gustav Valley. Along with these horses they brought goats, milking cows, chickens and their families. These people had come to stay.
Sure, they had endured their share of battles, but these weren’t city folk with a hope of migration. These were hardy folk from the rocky northeast coastline of Aeshea. Conflict with thieves and marauders was not unusual, and they had learned to handle attacks from the gorinel.
René said the gorinel were a nasty species of goblin. Hunter-scavengers covered in coarse hair, these were creatures of the night that shun the light, regenerate lost limbs and who fight with razor sharp claws and fine pointed teeth. In their own way, the gorinel were as dangerous as the orgs.
Moureen’s kinsmen were mostly of the sea, as well. More than that, the word was they had been pirates, and Moureen himself had been captain of a successful pirate ship. It boiled down to a hardy band of travelers who lost no one on their trek to a new land.
Following a rough map drawn by an old shipmate, Moureen led the way to an area seen only once by a man in his youth. But this is the way of pioneers and wilderness travelers, explained René. Drawing paper was a rare commodity among wildermen, a descriptor for anyone who lives and thrives in the wild. And learning to observe the most minuscule, as well as obvious landmarks, was a bread and butter practice if you want to survive in nature, let alone keep from getting lost.
A big two-story building was constructed straightway for defense, and still stands in the settlement of Rooster. Nowadays it’s called the Lazy Tom, or Lazy Tom’s Place. Since then it’s been built onto, has battlements on the roof top and René told me there are even levels underground. How they were built he never said, but the place had fended off many attacks and those sailors turned wildermen had yet to be been bested.
Once the families started building their own places and moving out, the structure had been used as a trading post, hospital, school, church, inn and tavern. When René left it was being run by his uncle on his ma’s side, twice removed, who goes by the name of Statler. Once the settlement was established, one of the kinsmen, a woman named Bridget, headed off to the southern port city of N’Ville to do some ocean voyaging. It seems she remembered this huge llama like critter, called a ponshiu, she thought would do well in the new settlement. She came back two years later with four pairs of these things and a baby boy named Jack.
René said they stand equal to a sixteen-hand horse at the shoulder, look a lot like a long haired llama from a distance, but have long floppy ears and clawed toes rather than a hoof. Of course, I had to use my imagination, llamas can be found in the Kohntia’s, but I had never been there. To watch them move they seem to just shamble along, but they can actually step out in a fast walking pace and seemingly can go forever.
Ponshiu are just as sure footed as a goat, can eat anything a goat can eat, and produce milk that tastes better a goat’s. But their meat is stringy, tough and almost rancid tasting any way you cook it. When René recounted his memory of eating ponshiu he would make this horrible face and remark, “I swear I’d rather eat skunk meat.”
As big as they are, they’re so gentle a small child could lead one with a string. And protective? René swore they were better than a nanny and watchdog put together.
One night when we were still Mahrq’s prisoners, I heard René tell the story, “My Aunt Posy had always been a headstrong sort, and not given to listen as a youngun. When she married into our family, her old man, my Uncle Rachet, warned her about trottin’ off alone into those hills where they lived. When her firstborn, my cousin Tawd, was just startin’ to toddle, she took him up into the backwoods huntin�
�� sourberries to make some of her famous pie.
“She sat Tawd down and told him to stay put while she climbed some rocks to get to a loaded bush. In no time at all Tawd had scuttled clean out of sight and down next to a crik. Next thing you know there was a ponshiu cutting a rusty with that loud moose-like call of theirs. Aunt Posy took note that Tawd had gone and she dropped her berries and made the ridge over the crik, just in time to see a catamount about to jump on the little feller.
“It must have been one hungry cat, ‘cause they don’t generally hunt folks, but this ponshiu jumped clear out of the brush and hit that catamount just as it was jumpin’. That there ponshiu tore up the varmint like so much gunnysack. It used its teeth and claws like it was a cat itself.
“Tawd had done fallen over another little hill tryin’ to get away, and as Aunt Posy ran up the top and looked over, you’d never believe it, boys, but there was a second ponshiu carryin’ the little tyke back to momma. It was carryin’ Tawd like a dog would carry its pup. ‘Stead of a scruff, that ponshiu had caught Tawd by the back of his shirt.
“That was seven younguns ago. Aunt Posy is still headstrong, but she listens a mite better, now.”
Bridget raised those Ponshiu into a good-sized herd and braided the hair into the strongest ropes that can be found. One of her younguns makes the best cheese out of Ponshiu milk you ever tasted, and when some of the older folk go out into the mountains they take a Ponshiu for a pack animal. René said they’re gentle rides, but using them as mounts just didn’t catch on.
When Jack grew up he founded a good copper mine and named it the Sally-Jack. A few folk migrated in to work the mine, set up a shop or two and the town of Tin Horn was born. The name started as a joke, but it stuck and now anywhere in the south the town is well known.