Shadows Beneath: The Writing Excuses Anthology

by Brandon Sanderson, Mary Robinette Kowal, Dan Wells, Howard Tayler

  “It’s like a cannon,” Sixth said. “Like from one of the ships, only in your hands.”

  “Yes.”

  He turned back toward the beast. He had been wrong, earlier. It wasn’t dead, not completely. It twitched, and let out a plaintive screech. That was soft, though. He could make out the large hole in its breast as he walked around it; the weapon had fired a spear of some sort that had gone right into it chest. It quaked and thrashed a weak leg. It wasn’t dead yet, but it soon would be.

  “We could kill them all,” Sixth said, still feeling stunned. He turned, then rushed over to Vathi, taking her by the arm. “With those weapons, we could kill them all. Every nightmaw. Maybe the shadows too!”

  “Well, yes, it has been discussed. However, they are important parts of the ecosystem on these islands. Removing the apex predators could have undesirable results.”

  “Undesirable results?” Sixth ran his hand through his hair. “They’d be gone. All of them! I don’t care what other problems you think it would cause. They would all be dead.”

  Vathi snorted, picking up the lantern and stamping out the fires it had started. “I thought trappers were connected to nature.”

  “We are. That’s how I know we would all be better off without any of these things.” No more nightmaws. What a different world it would be.

  “You are disabusing me of many romantic notions about your kind, Sixth,” she said, circling the dying beast. “I wish we had time . . . Nobody has ever been able to study one of these up close.”

  “With those weapons, you should have plenty of chances.” Sixth whistled, holding up his arm. Kokerlii fluttered down from high branches; in the chaos and explosion, Sixth had not seen the bird fly away. Sak still clung to his shoulder with a death grip, her claws digging into his skin through the cloth. He hadn’t noticed.

  Kokerlii landed on his arm and gave an apologetic chirp.

  “It wasn’t your fault,” Sixth said soothingly. “They prowl the night. Even if they cannot sense our minds, they can hear us, smell us.” Nightmaws did not have good vision, nor was their hearing excellent. Their sense of smell, however, was said to be incredible. This one had come up the trail behind them; it must have crossed their past and followed it.

  Dangerous. His uncle always claimed the Nightmaws were growing smarter, that they knew they could not hunt men only by their minds. I should have taken us across more streams, Sixth thought, reaching up and rubbing Sak’s neck to sooth her. There just isn’t time . . .

  His body lay wherever he looked. Draped across a rock, hanging from the vines of trees, slumped beneath the dying Nightmaw’s claw . . .

  The beast trembled once more in what seemed a final way, then amazingly it lifted its gruesome head and let out a screech. Not as loud as those that normally sounded in the night, but bone-chilling and horrid. Sixth stepped back despite himself, and Sak chirped nervously.

  In the night, distant, other Nightmaw screeches rose.

  Sixth twisted his head to the side, stumbling backward, looking out into that deep blackness. At least five other beats sounded in the night. That sound . . . he had been trained to recognize that sound as the sound of death.

  “We’re going,” he said, stalking across the ground and pulling Vathi away from the dying beast, which had lowered its head and fallen silent. It might be dead. It no longer moved.

  “Sixth?” She did not resist a he pulled her away, though she did look over her shoulder at the monster.

  One of the other nightmaws sounded again in the night. Was it closer? Oh, Patji, Sixth thought. No. Not this.

  “Come!” he said, pulling her faster and reaching for his machete. He had thrown it. He did not go back for it; he took out the one he had gathered from his fallen rival and began to hack at leaves, only when necessary. He could no longer worry about brushing against deathants.

  A greater danger was coming.

  The calls of death came again. “Are those getting closer?” Vathi asked.

  Sixth did not answer. It was a question, but one he did not know the answer to. He released her head, moving more quickly, almost at a trot—faster than he ever wanted to go through the jungle, day or night.

  “Sixth!” Vathi hissed. “Will they come? To the call of the dying one? Is that something they do?”

  “How should I know?” he snapped, turning back on her. “I have never known one of them to be killed before.” He saw the tube, again carried over her shoulder, lit by the light of the lantern she carried.

  That gave him pause. Though his instincts screamed at him to keep moving, he paused. The weapon. He felt a fool. They had a weapon that could kill nightmaws! That such a thing existed still amazed him.

  “Your weapon,” he said. “You can use it again?”

  “Yes,” she said. “Once more.”

  “Once more?”

  A half dozen screeches sounded in the night.

  “Yes,” she replied. “I only brought three of spears this thing fires, and enough powder for three shots. I tried firing one at the shadow. It didn’t do much.”

  One more attack. So his instincts were right. He spoke no further, towing her into the jungle as those calls came again and again. Agitated.

  How did one escape Nightmaws? His Aviar clung to him, one on each shoulder. He had to leap over his corpse periodically as they traversed a gulch and came up the other side.

  How do you escape them? He thought, remembering his uncle’s training. You don’t draw their attention in the first place!

  They were fast. Kokerlii would hid his mind from them, but if they picked up his trail at the dead one . . .

  Water. He stopped in the night, turning right, then left. Where would he find a stream? Patji was an island. Fresh water came from rainfall, mostly. The largest lake . . . the only one, really . . . was up the wedge. Toward the peak.

  Patji was shaped something like a wedge. Along the eastern side, the island rose to some heights with cliffs on all sides. It was not terribly tall, but was elevated further than the rest of the island. Rainfall collected there, in Patji’s Eye, and could not escape except slowly. The river, his tears.

  It was a dangerous place to go, with Vathi in tow. Their path had skirted the slope up the heights, heading across the island toward the northern beach. It would only be a small diversion . . .

  Those screeches behind spurred him on. Patji forgive me, he thought, seizing Vathi’s hand an towing her a slightly different direction. She did not complain, though she did keep looking over her shoulder.

  The screeches grew closer.

  He ran. He ran as he had never expected to do on Patji, wild and reckless. Leaping over troughs, around fallen logs coated in moss. Through the dark underbrush, scarring away meekers and startling Aviar slumbering in the branches above. It was foolish. It was crazy.

  He did not fear death to insect bites or falling vines. Somehow, he knew. The kings of Patji hunted him; lesser dangers would not dare steal from their betters.

  Vathi followed with difficulty. Those skirts were trouble, but Sixth had to occasionally stop and cut their way through underbrush. Urgent, frantic, he did so. He expected her to keep up, and she did. A piece of him—buried deep beneath the terror—was impressed. This woman would have made a fantastic tracker.

  Instead she would probably destroy them.

  He froze as screeches sounded behind, so close. Vathi gasped, and Sixth turned back to his work. They were close. He hacked through a dense patch of undergrowth and ran on, sweat streaming down the sides of his face. Jostling light came from the lantern behind, clutched by Vathi, and the scene before him as he ran was one of horrific shadows dancing on the jungle’s bows, leaves, ferns, and rocks.

  This is your fault, Patji, he thought with an unexpected fury. Why must you try to kill us, those who protect you?

  The screeches seemed almost on top of him. Was that breaking brush he could hear behind?

  We are our priests, and yet you hate us! You hate all.
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  Sixth’s uncle had explained that Patji needed to be deadly to keep away the unwelcome, the unworthy. And yet, Vathi was nearly as good as any trapper, though she had not set foot on Patji until recently. Did that make her worthy? Did that make her welcome?

  Sixth broke from the jungle and out onto the banks of the river. Small, by mainland standards—he had once seen a river there so wide, no man could have jumped it. Still, this would do. He led Vathi right into it, splashing into the cold waters.

  He turned upstream. What else could he do? Downstream was to lead closer to those sounds, the calls of death.

  Of the Dusk, he thought. Of the Dusk.

  He led Vathi upriver. The waters came only to their calves, bitter cold. The coldest water on the island, though he did not know why. They slipped and scrambled as they ran, best they could, upriver. This passed them through some narrows, with lichen-covered rock walls on either side twice as tall as a man.

  They burst out into the basin, halfway up the heights. A place men did not go. A place he had visited only once. A cool, emerald lake rested here, sequestered.

  Sixth towed Vathi to the side, out of the river, toward some brush. Perhaps she would not see. He huddled down with her, raising a finger to his lips, then turning down the light of the lantern she still held. Nightmaws could not see well, but perhaps the dim light would help. In more ways than one.

  They waited there, on the shore of the small lake, hoping that the water had washed away their scent—hoping the Nightmaws would grow confused and be unable to track them. For one thing about this place was that the basin had steep walls, hidden as it was in Patji’s depths. There was no way out other than the river, and if the Nightmaws came up it, Sixth and Vathi would be trapped.

  The screeches sounded behind. The creatures had reached the river. Sixth waited in almost near darkness, and so squeezed his eyes shut. He prayed to Patji, whom he loved, whom he hated.

  Vathi gasped softly. “What . . . ?”

  So she had seen. Of course she had. She was a seeker, a learner. A questioner.

  Why must men ask so many questions?

  “Sixth! There are Aviar here! Hundreds of them.” She spoke in a hushed, frightened tone. Even as they awaited death itself, however, she saw and could not help speaking. “Have you seen them? What is this place?” She hesitated. “So many juveniles. Barely able to fly . . .”

  “They come here,” he whispered. “Every bird from every island. “In their youth, they must come here.”

  He opened his eyes, looking up at the rim of the basin. He had turned down the lantern, but it was still bright enough to see them roosting there. Some stirred at the light and the sound. They stirred more as the nightmaws screeched below. They had not left the banks of the river. They were searching.

  Sak chirped on his shoulder, terrified. Kokerlii, for once, had nothing to say.

  “Every bird from every island . . .” Vathi said, putting it together. “They all come here, to this place. Are you certain?”

  “Yes.” It was a thing that trappers knew. You could not capture a bird before it had visited Patji.

  Otherwise it would be able to bestow no talent.

  “They come here,” she said. “We knew they migrated between islands . . . Why do they come here? What is the point.”

  Was there any point in holding back now? She would figure it out. Huddled here in the night though they were, she would figure it out.

  Still, he did not speak. Let her do so.

  “They gain their talents here, don’t they?” she asked, looking to him. “How? Is it where they are trained? Is this how you made a bird who was not an Aviar into one? You brought a hatchling here, and then . . .” She frowned, raising her lantern. “I recognize those trees. They are the ones you called Patji’s fingers.”

  A dozen of them grew here, the largest concentration on the island. And beneath them, their fruit littered the ground. Much of it eaten, some of it only halfway so, bites taken out by birds of all stripes. Vathi saw him looking, and frowned.

  “The fruit?” she asked.

  “Worms,” he whispered in reply.

  A light seemed to go on in her eyes. “It’s not the birds. It never has been . . . it’s a parasite. They carry a parasite that bestows talents! That’s why those raised off of the islands cannot gin the abilities, and why a mainland bird you brought here could.”

  “Yes.”

  “This changes everything, Sixth. Everything.”

  “Yes.”

  Of the Dusk. Born during that dusk, or bringer of it? What had he done?

  Downriver, the nightmaws screeched. Then, those yells drew closer. They had decided to search upriver. They were clever, more clever than men off of the islands thought them to be. Vathi gasped, turning toward the small river canyon.

  I am trying to protect you! Sixth thought in anger, looking toward Patji’s fingers. I need to stop the men and their device. I know it! Why? Why do you hunt me?

  But he knew so much. Too much. More than any man had known. For he had asked questions.

  Men. And their questions.

  “They’re coming for us, aren’t they?” she asked.

  The answer seemed obvious. He did not answer.

  “No,” she said, standing. “I won’t die with this knowledge, Sixth. I won’t. There must be a way.”

  “There is,” he said, standing beside her. He took a deep breath. So I finally pay for it. He took Sak carefully in his hand, and placed her on Vathi’s shoulder. He pried Kokierlii free too.

  “What are you doing?” Vathi asked.

  “I will go as far as I can,” Sixth said, handing Kokerlii toward her. The bird bit with annoyance at his hands, never strong enough to draw blood. “You will need to hold him. He will try to follow me.”

  “No, wait. We can hide in the lake, they—”

  “They will find us!” Sixth said. “It isn’t deep enough by far to hide us.

  “But you can’t—-”

  “They are nearly here, woman!” he said, forcing Kokerlii into her hands. “The men of the company will not listen to me if I tell them to turn off the device. You are smart, you can make them stop. You can reach them. With Kokerlii you can reach them. Be ready to go.”

  She looked at him, stunned, but she seemed to realize that there was no other way. She stood, holding Kolerlii in two hands as he stepped back into the river. He could hear rushing downstream. He would have to go quickly to reach the end of the canyon before they arrived. If he could draw them out into the jungle even a short ways to the south, Vathi could slip out.

  As he entered the stream, his visions of death finally vanished. No more corpses bobbing in the water, laying on the banks. Sak had realized what was happening.

  She gave a final chirp. He started to run.

  One of Patji’s Fingers, growing right next to the mouth of the canyon, was blooming.

  “Wait!”

  He should not have stopped as Vathi yelled at him. He should have continued on, for time was so slim. However, the sight of that flower—along with her yell—made him hesitate.

  The Flower . . .

  Vathi ran up, letting go of Kokerlii, who immediately flew to his shoulder and started chirping at him in annoyed chastisement. Vathi pulled the flower off—it was as large as a man’s head, with a large bulging part at the center.

  “A flower that can think,” Vathi said, breathing quickly. “A flower that can draw the attention of predators.”

  Both of their heads turned toward the tube, her weapon, which lay sticking from her pack on the bank of the river. Sixth pulled out his rope as she ran for it, then he ripped the flower from its branch.

  He tried the rope to it as Vathi ran up with her weapon, the spear sticking out slightly from the end. Sixth tied the other end of his rope to it as the Nightmaw yells echoed up the cavern. He could see their shadows, hear them splashing.

  He stumbled back from Vathi as she crouched down, setting the weapon’s butt again
st the ground, and pulled a lever at the base.

  The explosion, once again, nearly deafened him.

  Aviar all around the rim of the basin screeched and called in fright, many taking wing. A storm of feathers and flapping ensued, and through the middle of it, Vathi’s spear shot into the air towing the rope and with it the flower. That arced out over the canyon into the night.

  Sixth grabbed her by the shoulder and pulled her back along the river, into the lake itself. They slipped into the shallow water, Kokerlii on his shoulder, Sak on hers. They left the lantern burning, giving a quiet light to the suddenly-empty basin.

  The lake was not deep. Two or three feet. Even crouching, it didn’t cover them completely.

  Nightmaws stopped in the canyon. His lanternlight showed a couple of them in the shadows, large as huts, turning and watching the sky. They were smart, but like the meekers, not as smart as men.

  Patji . . . Sixth thought. Patji, please. She is right. The secrets cannot remain secret forever. Not with the way the world changes. They will get out.

  I will carry them, and do what I can with them.

  The Nightmaws turned back down the canyon, following the mental signature broadcast by the flowering plant.

  Sixth counted to a hundred, then slipped from the waters. Vathi, sodden in her skirts, did not speak as she grabbed the lantern. They left the weapon, its shots expended.

  The calls from the Nigtmaws grew further and further away as Sixth led the way out of the canyon, then directly north, slightly downslope. He kept expecting yells to turn and follow.

  They did not.

  #

  The company fortress was a horridly impressive sight. A work of logs and cannons right at the edge of the water, guarded by an enormous iron-hulled ship. Smoke rose from it, the burning of morning cook fires.

  Sixth sat on a rock a short distance from what appeared to be a dead shadow, its mountainous corpse draped half in the water, half out. He did not enter the fortress. Better to stay out here, near the dead shadow, even though his skin prickled as he looked at it.

  His own corpse lay in the shallows beside it. Sak rested on his shoulder, dozing, and Kokerlii trilled from a branch closer to the forest. He seemed in good spirits.