by Kyle West
“Yes. Except the training is different. Obviously. We are never trained to touch the Xenofold itself; that would be impossible for us. Instead, Aether is immediately administered as soon as a candidate is identified. Most die from it. Three out of four. You see, they take anyone who they believe has a smidgen of potential, and of course, mistakes are made. A lot. Even those with potential often can’t stand up to the dosage they receive. All who join the legions are pored over by the Hunters. I was simply…chosen. I didn’t know what to expect, but it was Valance who found me.”
“If that happened for you, then why not for me? They wanted me dead as soon as they laid hands on me.”
“You’re too strong to be of use,” Shara said. “As I said, you would have manifested naturally. I need Aether to unlock my potential. But a case like yours is rare indeed. It’s been decades since another like you was found, and it was for those like you that the Hunters were originally created at the Founding.” She shrugged. “Since then, the Hunters have moved into other arenas. Politics, mostly, but also missions like this, where a few well-trained soldiers are of more use than an army. But always, our primary purpose for existence is to eradicate the Elekai wherever we can find them within our borders. The irony, of course, is that each of us has a little of their ability. It is for that reason that we can’t have children – not that we would ever want any – and it is justified in saying that Annara can make all evil things good. In this, we find our redemption.”
Shara was saying far more about the Hunters than I had expected her to – especially when she had prefaced it by saying that she couldn’t say much.
“It sounds as if you don’t believe that,” I said.
Again, she shrugged. “It’s a story we’re told. I believe it as much as the rest.”
Which I took to mean that she didn’t believe it at all. “What do you believe in, then? Anything at all?”
“I believe in results. And I believe what I can see with my eyes. In a way…not having to deal with emotions as much is freeing. You see things for how they are, but even so, I’m content. I always will be, so long as I have Aether.”
“Where do they get it from?” I asked. “It’s not something that is easy to obtain.”
Shara smiled. “Now that, I can’t tell you. Perhaps what I have said will help you to understand…provided you believe even a single word of it. This is who I am, now.” She smiled, a bit bitterly…although maybe that was just me imagining the bitterness.
“You were so good before. I don’t think you’re responsible. Anyone who listened to your story, as I have, wouldn’t think you were. I just ask you to try to remember what it was like before. Maybe something will come back if you do that.
“Save it. This is me, now.”
Shara tersely removed the spits from over the flames, signaling that the conversation was over. She handed me one of the spits with a rabbit while keeping one for herself.
“Those two can each have a squirrel,” she said. “Even if I’m an emotionless monster, I have a certain liking for you.”
Being liked by a “monster” wasn’t especially appealing, but at the same time, oddly flattering. As changed as Shara was, old parts of her would still come through, in a twisted sort of way.
Despite what Shara said, I decided to save half of my rabbit for Isa and Isaru. It wasn’t long before they were both awake, and each gave no sign that they had heard our conversation. Then again, perhaps they were just good at hiding the fact.
We ate the rest of the food, even as Isaru and Isa told Shara not to burn xen again; they didn’t buy her explanation that it was already dead, especially when the surrounding xen was mostly intact.
Once done eating, we packed our things and continued on our way.
* * *
Three days passed and the Withered Waste lived up to its name. After the first day, there were as many dead or dying plants as there were living. Half of the xen was gray with death, the other half a pale, sickly pink that showed it had been dying for a long time. And so the infection would spread, south across the plain, unless something was done to stop it. If it could be stopped.
Despite witnessing the slow death of the Red Wild, there was still life. There were the frogs, of course, and insects, and on the second day, we chanced across a muddy nest built among the reeds of a shallow pool, filled with eggs that were far too large to be a bird’s. Luckily, we didn’t meet the creature that had made it, but I couldn’t help but think it might be a dragon. Isaru mentioned something about giant, swimming lizards, which seemed almost as bad.
The nights were especially lonesome and cold. We always had a fire to burn, as there was plenty of dead xen now, and we dumped what was left of the venison two miles behind, as it was no longer edible. Frog stew was on the menu most nights. It didn’t taste bad, but there was never enough of it. Not for four people. So, we supplemented what we could gather with whatever was in our packs. They lightened considerably.
Shara seemed to pass a sort of test with all of us. Apparently, not murdering anybody for a few days was good enough to just travel together. It was far more convenient, and if we ran into trouble, having her nearby was more useful than having her too far away. Besides, having her close meant it was easier to keep an eye on her. Isa might not have liked it, but even she could see the sense of only having to build a single fire and cook a single meal for the four of us.
Isa knew some plants to eat – starchweed was one, and it was inedible raw, but cooked up, it produced a thick, tasteless porridge that was so gummy that it was difficult to swallow. There were valaberries, which were plump, large, and red, with silver spots that looked sweet to the taste, but in reality tasted like bitter poison. They were edible, though. There were plenty of crawling things to eat – worms, grasshoppers, crickets, and beetles that we roasted over coals. Once the wings were removed, they were hot and gooey, with a crunchy outer shell. They were largely tasteless as well, but of everything we ate, they were the most plentiful and did the best job of staving off hunger. We did have to set aside a good hour to make sure we had enough, though. Isaru caught an eel, somehow, with his bare hands in a murky pond, but its stench was so foul as it squirmed in his hands that it nearly caused us all to heave, Shara included. Later, we learned it had sprayed something on him, which made being around him very difficult the next day.
The Waste was easily the strangest place I’d ever been. A land half-dead, yet still teeming with life – mostly the kind of life that was deemed unclean by the majority of humanity. Basically anything slimy, crunchy, or generally considered a pest. The mosquitoes in the cool mornings flew in clouds, and were so bad that my arms would be covered with dozens of red bites, and those mosquitoes wouldn’t go away until the sun had risen well above our heads. One day it was cloudy and they didn’t go away at all.
It was under these conditions that we headed directly east. The land never truly got drier. It was a constant slog through mud and decaying plants, and we were there so long that the stench became almost unnoticeable. I had thought there were drylands in between, as Isa had mentioned, but apparently we missed those, because it was nothing but swamp as far as the eye could see.
And then, one day, the land began to slope upward, and the swampland was left behind. Once we were a mile or so away, we looked back to see a patchwork of glinting pools, interlaced with xen and bogs, stretching all the way to the horizon.
“It’s finally over,” I said.
Everyone seemed to be too tired to respond. But while I was looking west, they were looking east.
“You might not want to look this way, then,” Isaru said.
Dreading what I would see, I turned and saw, at the bottom of the hill, the same stretch of swampland just as vast as what we’d left behind. Perhaps even more vast. It seemed it would never, ever end.
Shara continued on, unflappable as ever, and only turned when she was about twenty steps in front of us. There, she waited patiently.
“How
much more of this, Isa?” I asked.
She took her time in responding, as if she were so crestfallen that even trying to think of that was enough to break her spirit. “I don’t know. It probably doesn’t end until the Red Mountains. No one I know of has ever been this far. There has never been any reason to go this far. Not for over a century, when the land was still livable.”
That was hard to imagine, yet I still did. This land had probably been forest, once, similar to the forest we’d left behind near Northold. Now, the landscape was alien. A world I did not recognize.
Shara stared back at us, clearly impatient to move on. I wanted to shout at her for not having mercy. We weren’t as strong as she was; she had Aether, and all we had was whatever food we could find to feed ourselves. After one’s hundredth night crawler, potatoes were starting to taste like candy. And there were precious few of those left.
In the end, we did move on, and we marched across the soggy ground without further complaint. That night for dinner, we had toads, bugs, and whatever plants Isa said were safe to eat – but the further east we went, the less of that there seemed to be. Even the animals were starting to taste different, with less flavor and tougher meat. Some Isa told us to outright avoid, one being a purple toad that looked more like a rock than an animal, with wicked spikes that Isa said were laced with a neurotoxin that would have us twitching and dead within seconds. Shara nonchalantly mentioned the poison might be good to coat on the tip of her bolts. As if a person wouldn’t already be dead from them alone.
That night I was on watch. The fire didn’t do anything to keep away the swarms of biting bugs, and it was almost pointless to even slap at them. We were well-hidden in the thick rushes that grew in stagnant water, and our campsite was relatively dry, especially around the fire. Still, there might be something out there. I felt as if there was something out there. There were splashes, chortles, and unexplainable clicking. And the occasional, pained yowl of something being killed.
Well, that was life for you in the Withering Waste.
The others were so exhausted that they slept through it all…and I could have, too, given how tired I was.
That was when I noticed that two cinders had floated from the fire and were staring back at me like a pair of eyes from the rushes. The cinders blinked. In my hazed state, it took me a moment to realize that those weren’t cinders.
They were eyes.
I bit back the scream that came to my lips, instead choking out, “Get up!”
Instantly, everyone was awake and reaching for their weapons, but already, the thing – whatever it was – was heading right for me, long, slithery, and dark as night. It was like a snake, if a snake had short, stubby legs. And it was so much bigger than a snake, its body as thick as any of ours.
There was little time to notice anything more as it let out a horrible shriek with its mouth opened wide to reveal rows of needle-sharp teeth. A horrible stench permeated the air as it lunged for me. By instinct, I reached for Silence and found it instantly, and even as my mind entered Battletrance, I was already dodging – narrowly – the creature’s first attack. Shara already had her blade out, and was bringing it to bear on the creature’s long, slithering form. She struck, hard, but the blade didn’t bury itself in the creature’s flesh. The blade bounced off, as if it had struck rock.
Isa drew her bow, having time to nock one arrow before the creature’s long body tripped her up, sending her sprawling to the ground. And just like that, it started smothering her, wrapping around and around while Isa screamed – screams that were cut suddenly short when the monster’s inky, black form covered her mouth, and shortly after, the rest of her body.
I rushed forward and stabbed with my sword, but as with Shara, the katana’s sharp edge couldn’t pierce the creature’s side. That skin looked as vulnerable as any flesh might, except it seized up and became like stone right where the blade was going to strike.
Isaru, Shara, and I swung madly, attacking the thing now coiled around Isa while its tiny feet flailed in the air. I decided to chop at those feet, which seemed to get cut off easily enough. The monster shivered, apparently in pain. But even then, those short legs only regrew within seconds, something that seemed impossible.
What came next should have been even more impossible. The coils that had wrapped Isa began to coalesce and form a single substance, a black cocoon completely surrounding Isa’s body. I could neither see nor hear her, and despite trying to cut it open, it was having no effect.
I was getting desperate. I didn’t know what caused me to do it, but I reached for a log. The part of the log outside the fire wasn’t yet burning, but still incredibly hot. I yowled as I hurled the log at the monster, a trail of sparks marking its path through the sky. As the glowing-red part of the log made contact, the effect was immediate. The black shell quivered and loosened.
“Attack it now!”
Shara and Isaru didn’t waste any time. They cut at the creature’s shell, carving off bits of formless, black goop that writhed and fell to the xen, each individual piece quivering without direction. A small hole had been formed in the cocoon’s side, just enough to see one of Isa’s legs covered in black film.
I dropped my sword, and with both hands, yanked as hard as I could. Shara and Isaru cut the breach wider, causing a vile smell to issue from within. But I was able to drag Isa out, who, once free, was gasping for breath and covered head to toe in the black ink the creature seemed to be made of. Even now, that film seemed to be constricting her neck in a feeble attempt to choke her.
I grabbed at that part of the black film, wriggling my fingers in and pulling…hard. It stretched like gum, refusing to snap no matter how far I pulled. Meanwhile, Shara continued chopping up what remained of the creature while Isaru got out his ichor-infused knife and carefully cut the cord around Isa’s neck.
Whatever wriggly bits of the creature were on the xen seemed to be trying to reform, like water droplets joining. But before that could happen, Shara and I threw whatever bits there were into the flames, which roared as if we were throwing in oil. Isaru continued to cut it off of Isa while Shara and I threw whatever fell into the fire.
Isa was wracked with sobs, even as she tried to catch her breath, and every part of her shook. She coughed, hacking up black bile. It had gotten into her lungs, but besides that, there didn’t seem to be any lasting damage. None that was evident, anyway.
As most of what used to be the creature burned in the dancing flames, the rest of the bits that had yet to be burned grew still. There were some that were still clinging to Isa, until they slid off like dead leeches. She shook herself to be rid of them as Isaru and I checked to make sure they were all gone.
By the time it was all said and done, I had an arm around Isa and the flames were leaping twice as high as Isaru was tall. It was hard to feel relieved, though. Not when twenty more of those things could be out there.
Isa coughed again, and finally seemed to have caught her breath. Her eyes were still wide. When she spoke, her voice was quiet.
“A mimic. I used to think they were only in stories. It’s said they can emulate any being they’ve killed.”
In the past, it might have killed a snake, then. A rather large one. The cocoon, however, I couldn’t guess. Perhaps that was the mimic’s natural state.
“Will there be more?” Isaru asked.
“I don’t know. Very few have been this far, so I can’t say how common they are. I would guess not very common. Something like this would be an apex predator.” She paused. “There can only be so many of those.”
“My guess is the same,” Shara said.
“It didn’t like the fire,” I said. The flames had only abated a little in the time the mimic had been dead. Whatever it was made of, it made for good fuel. “We should build our fires much larger in the future.”
Shara and Isaru nodded their agreement; Isa was still too shaken to react.
We gathered what dead xen we could to keep the fire going. I
saru didn’t complain as Shara cut still living xen to feed it in addition to the dead xen. We gathered fuel for the next hour or so, until there was enough to last until morning.
“I’ll stand watch,” Shara said. “I have less need of sleep than you three.”
No one argued with her about that…not even Isa. It seemed as if sleep should be the last thing on my mind, but at the same time, I was exhausted.
More than sleep, though, I wanted out of this horrible place, but that was an impossibility given the darkness.
Escape would have to wait for the light of day.
CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
WE BROKE CAMP AT FIRST light, heading toward the sun rising in the east. The reeds were thick here, and often had to be hacked with our katanas. The land was growing wilder with every mile. Thunder sounded in the north, and the usual chorus of frogs and nameless creatures lessened, until all that was left was a heaviness in the air. Lightning slashed through dark, billowing clouds dominating the northern sky. The southern sky, in stark contrast, was clear and blue.
“I can’t help but feel this place knows we’re here,” Isaru said. “It feels sort of like the Forest.”
It was a gloomy prospect. I didn’t sense the familiar absence of feeling that was characteristic of a reversion, but there did seem to be a certain pall hanging over everything. It felt dangerous more than empty, though.
Thunder again emanated from the north, like the growl of an angry beast.
“The ground is already so wet,” Isa said. “We’ll be up to our necks in water.”
Laden as we were, fighting through water that was even knee deep would be tiring. Anything more and we might be in danger for our lives.
“Do you know of any high ground?” Isaru asked.
“All I know is that the mountains are east,” Isa said. “With mountains come foothills, often days in advance of the actual range.”