The Dragon Writers Collection

by DragonWritersCollective

  All manner of strange creatures flitted into, and out of, the dim green view of the depths as he stared out, mesmerized. Gennevera held onto him for support as the two looked out together. Various small fishes appeared here and disappeared, followed by a very strange looking blob with tentacles. Then Carym saw something he did recognize, a shark. All sailors knew well the dangers that giant Rock Sharks posed to ships and their crew. Voracious predators, they were known to stalk ships waiting for something, or someone, worth eating to fall into the waters. Among many seafaring folk, a death penalty sentence imparted upon a crewman usually meant being thrown overboard in waters where Rock Sharks thrived.

  This particular creature drifted lazily alongside the ship, its giant eyeball seemed to be peering inside. He hoped the beast hadn’t taken a notion to ram the ship with its rock hard skin and razor sharp spines as they were known to do to smaller vessels. But, just as suddenly as it appeared, it was gone and Carym let out a breath he hadn’t realized he was holding.

  He felt as though his life had spun so far out of control that he just wasn’t going to worry over the details anymore. He had begun to approach this whole affair with a cavalier attitude. He was committed to this quest now and had resigned himself to a danger filled and arduous journey; despairing over details and worrying over danger just wasn’t worth the effort. Even if he was surrounded by water and should, by rights, be drowning.

  “Isn’t it beautiful?” she leaned close to him. Her attraction to him powerful and deep. She knew the rules, and she knew her mission. Still, she always felt out of place in the convent, among her sisters, yet she stayed because she knew no other life. Carym’s presence energized her, made her feel like she was important, not like a lowly Keneerie but a lady in a royal court. Which made the choices before her that much more difficult. Carym leaned closer to her, the loneliness of these long years finally caught up with him. Carym put his arm around Gennevera’s waist and pulled her close to him. She leaned her head on his shoulder and the two quietly watched until nothing but the faint green glow of the porthole illuminated the cabin.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  The Pack Hunts.

  The Cost of a Cure.

  The massive black wolves padded quietly through the forest toward the human encampment. The pack leader, distinguishable by the streaks of silver trailing from her eyes to the back of her head, stopped to sniff the air. Sensing the nearness of prey, she continued on, leading the other three wolves. Her quarry lay beyond the next hill top, a small camp inhabited by the nomadic people of the region. The massive black wolves were driven by an instinct deeper and darker than that of any other creature alive. Their instincts drove them to feed on the two-legs, satiating their thirst on the blood of the upright walkers. Her hackles rose, her ears lay back and she padded along low to the ground, saliva dripping in anticipation of the kill.

  Fresh blood soon, she thought. The others heard. Hungry, must strike. The others did not respond. To disagree with the pack leader meant death in a most unpleasant way. This pack leader was very strong as each had found out to one degree or another, thus confirming her status.

  A thought drifted to her mind from her right flank with urgency. Wolves! The thought was followed closely by the scent of Ooktook’s pack. Anger and frustration drifted among the black wolves. As massive and powerful as they were, four black wolves were no match for a pack of thirty timber wolves.

  We wait, commanded the pack leader. Ooktook’s pack must have them surrounded by now. The timber wolves had far keener senses then those of the black wolves and could usually find and out-maneuver the dark beasts easily.

  Ooktook herself padded silently into the clearing where the lead black wolf stood, tail twitching like an angry cat. Ooktook had a beautiful silvery blue coat with black and gray patches on her flanks and back and stopped with her head held aloft, her tail straight, her ears up. She was at ease and in command. In a one-on-one match the black wolf could kill Ooktook easily, but her pack would not allow that. Ooktook was something of a queen in this part of the wood, and was respected by most of the woodland creatures.

  You must not kill these upright walkers, ailing kin. “Ailing kin” was what timber wolves always called the black wolves. These are not prey.

  Why? demanded the black wolf, angrily.

  You know why, ailing kin. We do not harm these uprights, they help the land.

  The pack leader growled in reply, tail quivering, her head still low and ready to attack. Ooktook acted as though she had not noticed the other’s state and calmly circled her.

  We do not wish to harm you, ailing kin. There are many dark upright-walkers coming this way to attack. If you help me destroy them, you may have their meat. It is not suitable for my kind, but you will find them preferable, I think. Ooktook commanded respect but never did she try to humiliate the black wolves, she was above this. She considered the great black wolves to be wolves who were possessed of a sickness, and it was the duty of her kind to guide them.

  After a few tense moments, the pack leader resumed a stance indicating acceptance of the Ooktook’s status. We kill for you.

  Then the black wolves turned and loped in the opposite direction, toward the approaching evil upright walkers who the black wolves could now sense. The four black wolves closed in together, making a diamond shape with the pack leader in front. As the scent grew stronger the black wolves picked up speed, out pacing their timber wolf counterparts who were fanned out behind them in yet another larger diamond shape formation. Faster and faster they ran, the smells of woodland creatures fleeing in fear wafted into their nostrils. Deer, elk, foxes, squirrels, raccoons, and others all hastily avoiding the blood-rage of the black wolves. As the pack leader neared her prey, she identified the source of their scent and growled evilly. Former masters!

  The others picked up on this too and silently thanked Ooktook for delivering them to her and allowing her first strike. By the strength of the scent, and her knowledge of these upright walkers, she guessed there to be nearly thirty. And by the way the scents overlapped she correctly guessed them to be walking in to columns.

  The pack leader snarled as she burst from the forest, in an explosion of teeth and fur and flying branches. She leaped from a boulder and into the center of the column. Down she went to the ground with the neck of one of her prey in her mouth, blood spraying everywhere as she tore out her victim’s throat. She dared not let herself taste more of the blood than what her tongue took in at that moment; there was more killing to do. Just as quickly, she leaped from the body of her first victim, leaving him to die, and attacked a second, slashing so fast with her claws and teeth that he didn’t even have time to swing his sword. She noticed that the other three of her pack had each done about as much damage as she, taking down two of the uprights each. Shouts of panic and orders from leaders filled the air as the prey tried to reorganize and face the black wolves. Just as the uprights formed a line the black wolves launched themselves again, while thirty timber wolves rushed from the trees and exploded in a fury of teeth and claws from the opposite flank. In moments it was over. Thirty of the uprights lay dead, the scent of their blood intoxicating the pack leader.

  Ooktook sought her out again, blood stains matting her fur. Well done, ailing kin. May the blood of these cursed uprights hold your ailment at bay for another moon.

  My thanks. The black wolf lowered her head in a quick, modest, show of deference and promptly turned her back on the smaller but more powerful timber wolf and began to feed. The timber wolves withdrew to hunt for their own food leaving the black wolves in peace. It irked the pack leader that she was always outsmarted by the smaller wolves, and she was glad that even with their larger numbers Ooktook had never tried to take them into the timber wolf pack. That would end badly for her and her pack, she knew.

  She lost track of time as she gorged on the blood of her makers. She and her kin would be well for a time, but the need to feed would strike again and certainly lead to another confron
tation with Ooktook and her pack of timber wolves. She knew that as long as Ooktook led that pack there would likely not be many problems. Yet what if one of the younger tried to replace her? The pack leader did not like the way many of the timber wolves had looked at her.

  As the sun began to set and its rays cast their golden beams at the red and gold and yellow leaves, the pain returned. The pack leader and her kin howled in agony and began to writhe on the ground. She hoped the timber wolves were gone, she could not smell them anymore, but that didn’t mean they were not watching from somewhere far away.

  Slowly the pain receded, and by the time darkness had replaced the day Alyksandra lay naked on the ground covered in blood. Slowly and painfully she opened her eyes, even they hurt badly. She struggled in agony to her knees and looked through her blood matted black hair, streaked with silver, to see Karl, Calepo, and Aura naked and laying amidst the filth and blood and entrails of their deed.

  “It is done!” she shouted hoarsely. When Calepo did not move, she kicked him in the ass with her big toe.

  “Move, before we are discovered!” Calepo lay there covered in blood with his eyes closed. The look of pure ecstasy on his face reminded Alyksandra of how he looked when he was high on mountain-leaf. She admired his outlook, and at the same time, it disgusted her that she did. While Alyksandra detested herself for her actions, Calepo reveled in his.

  She left him there to check on the others. Aura’s ordinarily raven hair was matted to her breasts with dried blood. How long had they lain in the carnage? The moon was high now, but she couldn’t recall what the phase and path of the moon should be now anyway. She also envied Aura in some ways. She was beautiful and womanly in every way from her blue eyes and supple frame to her slender thighs and hips curved just right. And she was a very capable fighter, skilled in the art of Ni Doh, a deadly form of unarmed combat practiced by the deadly warrior-assassins of the Far West.

  Alyksandra, however, considered herself rather frumpy and boyishly shaped. Her hips were narrow and her body boyishly wiry and strong. She kept her hair short too, and she always felt like her breasts were just something to get in the way of her armor, when she wore it. With a sigh she found that Karl was up too.

  She despised Karl. He had challenged her authority on many occasions and was far too reckless. She often found herself hoping that Karl would find his way over a steep cliff. The Society was waiting on them now, she knew. It was time to get back to business.

  “Up!” she shouted viciously.

  “There could be another patrol coming!” The urgency in her voice drifted through Calepo’s stupor as he forced himself to his feet, completely oblivious to his blood covered nakedness. Sickened by Cal’s state and her strange attraction to it, Alyksandra got down to business. She moved about the bodies of the dead and quickly found the corpse of a hurkin soldier of about her height and weight and took his clothing and armor. From her peripheral vision she was pleased to see the others doing the same.

  “Move it, Calepo! Karl, go scout the road behind us. I want to know the minute you smell another patrol coming,” ordered Aura.

  For all her jealously of the woman’s beauty, Alyksandra still respected Aura for her loyalty. Aura was second in command of the small pack. As Karl ran swiftly and silently off, the other three moved among the bodies picking up what little valuables they could find and bagged them in a backpack taken from the standard bearer.

  In another phase of her life, so long ago she barely recalled it, Alyksandra had been an avowed pacifist. She had been an acolyte in service to a church devoted to some god or goddess whom she couldn’t even now name. She vaguely recalled that she’d had a family; a husband, two daughters, parents. They were long dead and almost forgotten now. The fact that she could even care enough for someone to marry and raise children was so alien to her now that she couldn’t even understand that emotion. And that was what pained her most; the emptiness. No matter how much she tried, she could not fill that void in her soul, she could not make herself love anyone or anything anymore.

  She felt no remorse at the bloodshed here. She knew in that other life she would have been moved to sickness by the gory scene before her eyes even though the dead were wicked hurkin. The woman wondered if the pacifist self of her past would have considered the dark lives that these hurkin led and measured that against their demise. She laughed heartily at the irony of her thoughts. She knew her own dark life was every bit as sinister as that of these terrorizing rapists. She took small pleasure in the fact that, in her own dark and despicable way, she had performed a measure of good for the world.

  She recalled a saying from one of the Society Elders, “The Society does not involve itself in worldly conflicts unless there is profit from such involvement.”

  One day her victims might be vicious hurkin warriors, the next a refugee shelter in Arnathia. The only thing the Society frowned upon was sport. She recalled what had happened to one of her counterparts from the Assassins’ Section who had been captured practicing his technique in a schoolyard with no purpose. Morghal had personally rescued the man from the city prison and returned him to the Society Lair. Then the Society’s Elders flayed the flesh from the man’s body, keeping him alive while exposing the delicate layers of tendons and muscles and bones beneath the skin. The offender was kept alive for days until the Elders were satisfied that their point was made. Morghal did not care that the man had targeted children. What angered him and the Elders was that the fool had done it for fun and been captured, risking exposure of the Society which had remained hidden for centuries.

  After fifteen minutes of thieving from the dried out husks that remained of the hurkin soldiers, Karl came running back to the group, bounding inhumanly on hands and feet not unlike a four legged animal. Karl slid to stop and took an upright posture in front of Alyksandra and said, “Another patrol is coming this way at double-time. We must fight or flee.”

  “We go!” said Alyksandra, as she bounded away toward the wood with that same inhuman gate and impossibly silent speed. The foursome moved so quickly and quietly through the wood that they were two miles away within minutes of fleeing the scene. They were long gone before the patrol arrived.

  Running at that speed drained them terribly and the foursome was forced to stop for a brief rest. It was Karl who spoke first:

  “Judging by the stars, and by the movements of those patrols, I believe we are on Hell’s Rail.”

  Alyksandra frowned, trying to look angry rather than surprised. How fast had they moved during the day after the curse struck? She vaguely remembered their encounter with Ooktook and the events that transpired, but it was like looking at your reflection in a foggy mirror.

  “We will have to run the entire way to reach Dockyard City by dawn for our meeting.”

  The silent grimaces of the others meant they understood this would be a dangerous undertaking. Running at that speed in the dark and unfamiliar territory had its risks. They could easily find themselves facing a physical obstacle at too great a speed to stop. But that wasn’t the worst they could face. A sudden encounter with unfriendly raiders or a hurkin patrol would be disastrous and they would be in no condition to fight anyone.

  “Karl, you lead. Aura, left flank. Calepo, right flank. I will bring up the rear. We all know the risks, but it’s our best shot at a cure. And the Society would destroy us if we brought the hurkin army down on their heads. Any arguments?” Of course there were none. These four were members of the Society of the Damned.

  The foursome loped over the harsh terrain of Hell’s Rail. This land was part of a natural land bridge that linked the Eastern Kingdoms of Eagle Forge and Gaylenburg with the Wastes and Hurkromin. Hurkin patrols guarded the borderlands and hurkin raiding parties forayed along the Rail and into the Wastes and the Eastern Kingdoms to pillage, loot, and gather slaves. Massive fang-like jutting rocks, forests of black and twisted trees, and sudden sinkholes gave way to open plains, and the foursome knew now that the worst was behind t
hem. Now they were passing over the northern part of the Wastes; Gaylenburg and Eagle Forge lie ahead. These heavily forested lands provided excellent cover for the group as they covered incredible distances.

  Finally, with dawn looming, golden rays of the sun began to peak over the terrain to the east behind them. The foursome slowed as they crossed into Imperial Hybrand. Karl led the group to a cave in the woods where they had hidden supplies. Dripping with sweat, fingers and hands bloody, and muscles burning with fatigue, the group dragged themselves into the cave. Each found their bundle of supplies. They almost never knew what state they would awaken to find themselves in, therefore they always kept well supplied lairs scattered across the land.

  Alyksandra looked at her brethren, and knew with a disgusted certainty that all they had obtained from the previous day’s assault had gained them little; they would need to feed again, soon. They weren’t recovering from their ordeal quickly enough. They would be walking or limping when they went to meet with Morghal. Shaking her head, she stalked out of the cave, saying nothing, knowing her pack was following her to Dockyard City.

  Morghal sat outside the Inn of the Serpent, lazily sipping his urzo tea. As the sun reached its zenith the foursome strode down the dock way that served as a “street” facing the bay and arrived for their meeting with Morghal. Anywhere else, this group would have stuck out in a most obvious way. Anywhere else they would have been accosted by city guards, Imperial troops, sheriffs or marshals. Yet here in Dockyard City, none of these existed. There was a silent code of conduct here that struck Alyksandra’s funny bone with its irony. The concept was laughable yet, surprisingly, it was well adhered to.

  Alyksandra and Aura seated themselves at the table with Morghal. He was a decrepit old man with hollow sunken eyes, mere patches of brittle white hair on his head, and liver spots everywhere. Yet, as decrepit as he was, Alyksandra knew not to tangle with this man who had been alive somewhat longer than she, yet was vastly more powerful. She was convinced his secret of longevity was not so different from her own, and neither was his secret source of power.