Scars of Mirrodin: The Quest for Karn

by Robert Wintermute

  “Where are the living things?” Elspeth said.

  “I too would have expected to have encountered a border patrol by this point,” Koth said.

  “Perhaps the situation on this plane is not as dire as we had thought?” Elspeth said.

  “Do any of these suns ever set?” Venser said, gazing upward at a low red sun. “I mean, one falls and another rises, and so on and so on.”

  Koth glanced up at the sky. “They pull into alignment, and then fall. This will happen soon and quickly—and by that time we should be in the safety of my village.”

  “Why?” Venser said.

  “It is not safe to wander through the Chain at night. The dangers of falling into something sharp or striking metal is enough.”

  “But there are creatures, as well?”

  “Oh yes, there are many creatures.”

  Venser let the comment hang in the air before turning to Elspeth.

  “What is Bant like, fair knight?” Venser said to Elspeth, with only the barest lilt of jest in his voice.

  The corner of Elspeth’s mouth turned down.

  “It was beautiful,” she said.

  “But there is sadness, now. Is there not?” Venser said.

  Elspeth was looking down the canyon. She did not shift her gaze at Venser’s words.

  “There used to be only honor, bravery, and perfection,” Elspeth said. “In my dreams it is still as it was, and people serve for the greater good.”

  Koth let out a gruff laugh. “Service?” he said. “I have never heard something so …” he stopped and turned to Elspeth, who was staring at him intently. “I have never heard of anything so … foolish. The strong lead. The weak follow or die.”

  “Foolish?” Venser said. “Strength comes in all forms. Sometimes working together is the only way to achieve an end. You may be required to cooperate to save your precious Mirrodin, by the end.”

  Koth growled at Venser before gliding away on his rock.

  The suns lined up in the sky as Koth said they would. They fell in a line toward the craggy horizon. Their light was almost extinguished by the time the village came into view. Sunset found them floating above a high precipice looking down on the quiet village.

  “It is too still,” Koth muttered. How could a village that had been bustling when he left Mirrodin be completely still now? Where are the fires?

  The suns sank still farther in the sky. It would be dark soon. Almost all the light had drained from the sky, and their view would be in question.

  Except for the wind, the silence that lay on them as they floated through the village was unbroken and total. They glided along the road that passed between a rough huddle of huts made of rolled-up lengths of metal hammered into tubes. Some of the tubes were wide and some were narrow enough to fit only a body. Elspeth noticed some structures composed of rolls piled together into triangles. There were metal mesh curtains that acted as doors, but most curtains were thrown back to reveal the darkness within the tubes. Many of the curtains whipped and snapped in the wind.

  They stopped above the well that marked the center of the village. An iron bucket that acted as the village dipper creaked on a chain in the wind.

  “This is a warm reception,” Venser said. “Are vulshok homecomings always so lively? If so, I have to make a point of attending more of them. They remind me of home on Dominaria.”

  But nobody laughed. Even Elspeth did not chuckle. The white warrior had droplets of sweat on her top lip, Venser noticed. Her right hand, resting in what she undoubtedly hoped was a casual pose on her sword hilt, was clenched in a fist.

  Koth closed his eyes. Lines began to glow red along his ribs until his whole body was as an ember might be. His eyes popped open suddenly, as red as the tracer lines on his body.

  “Be ready,” he said.

  Elspeth, at least, was ready. She drew her sword in a clatter of steel, her eyes wide. “I smell something strange,” she said.

  Venser smelled it as well. It could be anything, but he knew what it was just as he knew a million compounds from their smells alone. One could not be an artificer without knowing the smell of things. How could you tell old oil from new or solid metal from corruption without smell? No, he knew corruption when he smelled it, and called deeply to siphon mana from the lines he could feel pulsing deep under the metal surface of the plane. Oh, there was mana in this place. Much mana. Hopefully we will not need it. Hopefully we will find Karn easily and leave Mirrodin to its own devices.

  “Something is watching us from the huts,” the geomancer said.

  From behind them came the sound of metal scraping metal, coupled with a low moan. The scraping sounded like many fingernails dragged across flaking iron. It had been some time since the hairs on Venser’s back stood, and he was not altogether happy to be visited by that feeling again. “I think we should move,” he said.

  “Yes,” Koth said. “I think that is a good idea.” Venser and Koth’s slabs moved forward.

  But Elspeth did not move. She had put one of her feet on the iron ground. Her wide eyes slowly narrowed.

  “Elspeth? This is the time now to find my friend on the outskirts of the village. He will be able to tell us what is happening here.”

  “The knights of Bant do not flee, ever.”

  “Of course they don’t,” Venser said. “Nobody would ever ask you to do that. To flee. Koth here is suggesting we visit his friend.”

  Koth nodded.

  “Do not patronize me, artificer.”

  “How do we know there are enemies out there?” Venser said. “And if they were, don’t you think our position here is not the best? Strategically, I mean. We are as vulnerable as plucked pullets, and whatever is making that noise has many in its party.” You only just kidnapped me here. I can’t die yet, he added to himself.

  Elspeth blinked.

  “Yes, this is low ground. Let’s repair to a better position,” she said, taking her foot off the ground and putting it back on the slab, which floated to catch up with the other two.

  “A wise choice,” Venser said, when she was floating next to him. If she’d waited more than a second longer he would have snapped a submission spell on her.

  They moved very quickly after Koth who led them over more tube huts.

  The scrabbling sound they had heard earlier continued behind them. Elspeth was reminded of another time she had heard a similar sound: fleeing a certain prison as a child. When she had run, the beasts had screeched and clawed at their own bars. She remembered the smell of them in that moment and brought her gloved hand up to pinch her nose as she floated along on the slab.

  Koth moved them over the land. They saw not a single living thing, except a strange mechanical bird which alighted on the ground and turned its one good eye to stare at them as they passed. Soon the huts became fewer and fewer, and they were away from the village. Elspeth sheathed her sword.

  Soon a different type of hut came into view. It was composed of a series of large tubes welded together and nestled in the valley between two vast iron hills that leaned toward each other.

  “Is this your friend’s house?” Elspeth said.

  Koth said nothing for a time. He glided his slab to a stop near the entrance of the hut.

  “We’ll stop here a moment. This is where I was raised. My family has gel-fruit orchards,” Koth stepped off his slab. “And beds.”

  “Good, I think I might fall down,” Venser said. He had taken his helmet off sometime earlier, and had it under his arm.

  “You will watch your mannerisms around my mother,” Koth said to them. “She has yet to meet one such as yourselves.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “A being of only flesh,” he whispered. “Flesh is distrusted by many Mirrans. You must do your people credit.”

  “My people?”

  Elspeth eyed the house surrounded by its low, metal trees. The noise that had been behind them seemed to have disappeared, and she felt more at ease. The dark was on th
em, and she could see lights in the window of the large hut and smell roasting meat. The night was silent. She realized suddenly that she did not like this plane for its utter silence.

  “What is your opinion, my lady?” Venser said, the half smile that played frequently across his face in evidence. Koth was already moving past the twisted metal tubes that made up the gel-fruit trees around the hut.

  Elspeth nodded as she watched Koth, thinking Venser was talking about the vulshok. “I watched the vulshok fight in the pits at Urborg. I fought him there as well.”

  “And what is your impression?”

  “He is as good a fighter as I have ever seen, and a strong mage, but …”

  “But?”

  “He is given to the foolishnesses of all men, and one of those is impulsiveness.”

  Venser straightened a bit. “Excuse me? Am I not a man?”

  She looked back at him. “Yes, and what of it? I am sure you are as thickheaded as the rest of them.”

  Venser bobbed his head in agreement. “You are probably correct.”

  “Now that that is settled,” Elspeth continued, “we should follow him before he does something foolish that gets us all throttled.”

  And they did. They caught up with Koth just before he reached the house. The smell of roasting meat was strong. And there was something else in the air as well, Venser thought. Koth pushed the mesh aside and walked headlong into the largest tube of the dwelling.

  The interior was brightly lit with sconces welded to the wall and holding globs of what looked like bright molten metal. A fireplace cut out of a chunk of iron stood at one end of the room.

  “Hello,” Koth said. He walked to the hearth, turned, and looked around the room. “Hello?”

  Elspeth put her gloved finger to her lips. “I am not sure that we should …”

  “Look who has arrived at long last.”

  The voice came from the dark doorway next to the hearth. A woman’s voice, made by a woman who sounded as though she needed to clear her throat, Elspeth thought. A form moved in the shadow and Venser found himself sucking mana through his eyes and temples in anticipation of an emergency teleport. He wasn’t the only one concerned—he noticed that Elspeth dropped her hand to her sword’s pommel when the woman spoke.

  “Mother?” Koth said. “Is it you? Come from the shadows, Mother.

  “It is I, Son. None other.”

  There was more shuffling in the shadows but nobody came out. Koth took a step closer.

  “Mother we were being pursued … by something making strange sounds. We must leave this place and take to the mountains. Mother?” The vulshok took another step closer to the form in the darkness. Venser snatched a deep breath and thought, do not step any closer.

  The figure in the darkness shifted and stepped forward a bit. “You always were a coward. Afraid of shadows and sleeping alone.”

  “But Mother.”

  The figure in the darkness stepped forward and into the flickering light from the sconces. Elspeth’s hand left the pommel of her sword. The being standing before them seemed as harmless as could be: a vulshok mother in a simple robe, with spiky silver hair and forearms of alloy that glimmered in the dim light.

  But Koth seemed bothered. He cocked his head at the woman. “You have changed, Mother. You are thinner. Your hair is different.”

  The mother’s expression did not change, though. Her face remained impassive, plain somehow, as though emotion had never occurred to her.

  “You have nothing to fear, I am the same as I have always been. It is I, your mother.”

  But Koth’s unease increased by the second. The tracer lines along his wide chest began to glow red, as did his eyes.

  “Where is Father?” Koth said. “Collect him and we must flee.”

  “It is not time for that,” she said.

  The woman went to the hearth. She snapped her fingers and a lick of flame ignited in the firebox. The smell of food, of roasting meat, was suddenly overpowering. Venser’s stomach turned as he realized he had not eaten in days.

  “Perhaps she’s right,” Venser said. “Surely we have time for a snack before we flee.”

  Koth set his teeth together and scowled at Venser.

  Just then someone screamed outside. The cry echoed off the mountains. It came from far away, Elspeth thought, and was soon cut short, but it was a cry of utter fear and despair.

  “That cry will have to do with whatever is pursuing us,” Elspeth said.

  But Koth was staring at his mother, who was looking into the fire she’d created in the fireplace.

  “There is no need to fear,” she whispered to herself. “No need to fear. No need to fear. No need …”

  Elspeth felt a tug on the sleeve of her tunic. She looked and Venser pointed at Koth’s mother’s feet. It was hard to see in the dimness of the room, but there seemed to be a snake on the floor at her feet. The smell of roasting meat was strong in Elspeth’s nostrils, too. She squinted and looked again at the thing on the floor. Venser leaned in close, so close that his helmet touched her ear.

  “Tube,” he hissed.

  Tube? Elspeth looked again, and now the shape she thought was a snake looked more like a conduit that went from under the woman’s robe and into the dark doorway she had stepped from.

  “Koth,” Elspeth said casually.

  The vulshok turned to her.

  “Let us be off, we will come back for your mother as soon as we’ve found a secure place in the mountains.” It was a desperate move, but worth trying.

  Koth’s mother remained unmoving. Her expression had not changed since she came from the doorway.

  “Come give your mother a hug,” she said, and lurched toward Koth with stiff knees. “Then we will go eat your father, he is roasting in the other room.”

  She opened her mouth wide and something shot out with an audible snap. Then a metal mouth was clamped on Koth’s face. The event only took a fraction of a moment and the vulshok was rolling on the floor pulling at the writhing metal creature attached to his face. A thin tube extended from it and lolled in a wet loop into the mother’s mouth.

  Elspeth drew her sword and in a decisive slash severed the tube. Koth’s mother stood still next to the hearth, her eyes staring blankly ahead. A moment later a crease appeared on her forehead and down the middle of her nose and chin, down her throat and farther. Then a click and blood appeared at the seam, and in the shocked silence her skin suddenly peeled back to reveal dark sinew. Jagged bones began to push out, followed by a great maw of serrated teeth and the mandible that held them, and then a whole face of jags and two black eyes unfolded itself from within.

  As the creature opened up like a puzzle to stand as high as the ceiling, Elspeth felt the blood in her body drop a degree. The creature unfolded more, sloughing off the body of the vulshok like the peel of an eaten fruit.

  It was huge. A grotesque, irregular, twisted skeleton of barbed bone and pitted metal shot through with bands of stretched sinew and muscle. An amber glow emanated from deep in its rib cage and then it opened its alloy mouth to reveal rows of chipped teeth.

  The lunge came suddenly. Elspeth manage to sidestep the strike, but the force of it knocked her off her feet. She was up in a second. With numb fingers she hoisted her greatsword. The blow caught the creature between the eyes, but the bright blade glanced off, and Elspeth had to fight to keep it from flying out of her hands. The creature lunged again. Elspeth twisted away. She regained control and whispered the words she knew so well. White fire leaped momentarily from her sword’s tip. Elspeth stepped forward and brought her blade down in an overhead sweep. The moment before impact a white light filled the room and thousands of flashing blades blurred the air. The strikes seemingly came from all angles at the same time. Venser rubbed his eyes and looked again at the creature’s body where it lay hacked as though by one hundred swords.

  Venser would have asked Elspeth about her sword right there and then if not for Koth. The vulshok ran to the we
t rumple of his mother’s skin and dropped to his knees. His tears smoked as they ran down his cheek. “Mother,” he wailed, holding the skin in his large hands.

  But there was no time for grief, and less for tears. A shadow moved in the next room. Venser sensed it first, of course … the creature from the dark doorway, the one who had been controlling Koth’s mother through the wire she dragged with her. But no sooner had he detected its brain movement in the next room than it exploded through the wall. A hulking creature with long, filthy claws and a dark metal head shaped like a gigantic, battle-chipped spear tip. Most of it was grown of black, chipped metal and burned bone, and its jaw extended well past what was typical on any plane Venser had ever traveled to, and only the end of the jaw was toothed and vicious. It brought its head down and charged Elspeth, who swept up with her sword and caught the creature in the jaw, slicing it delicately in half.

  The horrific thing reached up and took hold of its bisected jaw and tore the parts loose with a wicked chortle. The black blood ran down its stretched muscles and soon a torrent of fluid was splashing from its gullet. It tossed its jaw pieces aside, turned, and charged Venser. The artificer waited until the creature was almost upon him before disappearing in a sudden blue flash and reappearing on the other side of the room. Meanwhile, the creature continued in its charge, running headlong into the house and driving its head blade halfway into the metal of the structure. Thus trapped, Elspeth ran, screaming at the beast, chopping it until it breathed no more. She kept hacking with tears running down her own cheeks and froth collecting at the corners of her mouth, until Venser’s yelling stayed her hand and she stood blinking in the flickering lights from the magma lamps.

  “I think you have done him to death,” Venser said. What was left of the thing was gashed and raw and lying in a clump of black reek on the floor of the house. Venser glanced at Elspeth as she wiped her eyes. A disturbed individual.