Tainted Garden

by Jeff Stanley

  Where was the stranger?

  The creature had seized him, flaring hatred and . . . and fear? Something had been in its eyes, blazing forth like lightnings. Remembering it, Rian shuddered. The power of the thing was astonishing. It had tossed him about as if he weighed less than nothing, dragging him here, into the very fabric of the landskin.

  They had traveled through it, Rian knew this. The sensation of movement was unmistakable, though direction was undecipherable. Up? Down? Certainly they could not have gone deeper. The landskin blanketed the world, true, but not to such thickness. Rian knew that the landskin the Elders used in their experiments had been lured deep into the Enclave.

  “Where am I?”

  The landskin walls remained silent, throbbing. Its musky scent bathed Rian. He coughed up a wad of phlegm and spat.

  The landskin reacted. It heaved, rippling away from the spittle. A narrow corridor stretched away, pinching to a close a few yards deep. The walls around him shivered, twitched. Pores gaped open in the flesh, belching out fine tufts of sinuous tendrils.

  Rian stared at the narrow aperture. Delicate plumes of stinking smoke curled up from the landskin. Its edges blackened. Startled, he rose and moved toward the pinched tunnel.

  Slowly, Rian smiled. He searched among the ruins of the throat tube, kicking aside smaller, useless fragments. There. An almost perfect piece with a jagged, almost serrated edge, the chitin wrapped tight around a central core of fibrous muscle. Hefting the makeshift weapon, Rian turned back to the narrow tunnel, the gap in the landskin beckoning.

  Rian coughed and spat into the narrow cleft, watching as the landskin retreated further, opening the way a bit more. He stepped into the gap, following the oozing tunnel. The landskin closed behind him, sealing him in.

  In more of a tube now than the sphere that had kept him captive, Rian paused to rest, leaning against the squirming landskin. By a great deal of trial and error Rian had determined that he could cause the landskin to retreat at a slight upward slope by spitting high on the heaving walls. The landskin flowed away, continuing to open the way before him.

  A slow-going, painstaking process, and Rian still had no idea where he was, in which direction he traveled, or even how far he had come. Periodically the landskin’s retreat flowed around a rocky outcropping or abutment. When such segments of rock presented hand- or toeholds, Rian scaled the wall. Taking his makeshift knife in his teeth, Rian climbed, and the massive wall of flesh flowed away, erupting with twitching, writhing tendrils that shook at him ineffectually.

  He yearned for sleep, but dared not give in to the desire. The fear that the landskin would close over him, absorb him, kept him moving, always upward. The landskin could only be so thick. When he tired he paused, keeping close watch on the pulsing walls. Neither hunger nor thirst were a problem; the shard of chitin proved effective in slicing dripping slivers of tough, fibrous flesh from the landskin.

  Never terribly palatable, the landskin tasted odd. Its usual pungent, almost rancid flavor seemed dulled, muted. And it sat in his belly like a lead weight, making him sluggish. His fingertips and toes tingled and his stomach seemed to churn. For a while after swallowing the flesh he felt dizzy, and squatted while a wave of nausea passed through him. It faded, leaving in its wake a curious palsy in his limbs. He forced himself to breathe deep until the trembling passed.

  He swallowed and turned in a tight circle, watching the walls of his fleshy prison. How long would it be before the landskin contracted, crushing him? He put one palm flat against the wall. A thousand tickling filaments emerged from the landskin, tasting him, then jerked back as if pained. There. Did it tremble? Was that the slightest contraction within the wall? Stretching out his right arm, he touched the other wall and stood there, waiting. Within a few moments he felt it; pressure on his palms forced his arms inward. No more than an inch or two, but that was no comfort.

  His progress was too slow. As if sensing his purpose, his determination to escape, the landskin threatened to smash him to a bloody pulp.

  He fought panic, knowing it would do him no good. Sweat beaded on his forehead and dripped down into his eyes. He swiped it away with the back of his middle hand. The walls moved a bit closer, a barely perceptible shift. His tongue was a dry lump in his mouth.

  Calm. He must be calm.

  Rian raised the makeshift knife and stared at its broken edge. It had proven capable of cutting into the landskin. But how long would its integrity last if he were forced to use it to hack his way through to the surface—however far that might be?

  As the walls moved another fraction of an inch closer together, he dropped his hands, turned, and plunged the knife into the landskin. The flesh pulled back slightly, then collapsed, clutching at the crude blade. Rian sawed at the fibrous tissue, his hand covered with ooze to the elbow. With his other hands he pulled at the edges of the narrow gash, widening it. The landskin tore raggedly, the thin filaments twisting through it like veins popping, snapping, spurting warm juices. He ignored the slick liquid, tearing at the gap. Bathed in slime, Rian wormed his way into the tear. Though his tongue was fat and dry in his mouth, he worked up enough saliva to spray the walls, causing them to twitch and draw slightly back.

  He thrust the knife into the tough flesh above his head. His toes dug into gashes filled with writhing tendrils and he levered himself higher. Reaching upward, he tore chunks of landskin away, digging with torn nails at the flesh of the world. Tiny, needle-tipped threads erupted from swollen pores, stabbing at his exposed flesh. Coated with blood and slime, Rian gritted his teeth and did his best to ignore the hundred thousand small pains, concentrating on tearing through the landskin, striving for the surface.

  Below him, his hacked path squeezed shut, strings of flesh lashing out across the gap and drawing closed the wound. A bulge of stinking fluid welled up beneath him, burning the bare skin of his foot.

  Rian seized flaccid, dangling arteries within the landskin and used them to drag himself up through the tightening gash. The walls pressed close, and now other, fatter, tentacles bulged outward, striking him. Others twined around his torso, and he spent as much time hacking these grasping appendages from him with the knife as he did cutting his way upward. A great gush of hot fluid spurted from a severed vein overhead, showering him. He gagged and spat out a mouthful of biting liquid.

  The collapsing flesh closed on his left foot, clamping down with brutal solidity. Crying out, Rian tugged on his foot. Sucking ooze clung, resisting his efforts. A dozen vinelike tentacles emerged from the landskin wall and wrapped around his leg from ankle to crotch. With tears of panic and agony Rian stabbed at the tentacles, which vomited up purplish, caustic juices. His knife caught on a loop of tentacle and was ripped from his hand. The tendril coiled, crushing the shard and dragging it away.

  Rian stared at his now empty hand. He blinked away slime. Unbidden tears sprang from his eyes and dripped down his cheeks.

  The walls pressed closer, squeezing against his ribs, his shoulders, his pelvis. He screamed as he felt his bones grinding together.

  Flailing, his hands grasped at chunks of landskin. His fingers dug through tough, warm flesh, burrowing like thick worms through gooey tissue as the inexorable pressure built on his ribs. His breath came short and gasping, wheezing from his lungs.

  “Please,” he gasped. A flood of vile liquid washed down his throat. The landskin bulged overhead, and a thick tube of oozing flesh slammed into his mouth, flowing past his teeth. It gushed over his tongue and caught in his throat. Thin streamers of landskin surged down toward his stomach. Thrashing, Rian clamped his teeth down on the slimy mass, moving his jaw back and forth, cutting.

  The landskin heaved. Rian felt like his head was being torn from his shoulders as the tentacle jerked from his mouth, whipping up and rearing like some vast, hooded serpent. In the dim glow of the pustules dotting the landskin Rian saw the ravaged surface of the tentacle; it boiled, its outer skin bubbling as huge blisters arose and burst, spilling a
thick white mucus.

  Something—some vestigial remains of the landskin—squirmed in his belly. Intense pain flared through him, pain that caused his body to convulse. He clamped his teeth shut, straining against the undeniable urge to vomit. The landskin squeezed.

  Vomit spewed from his throat in a thick stream, a tremendous surge of burning fluid and hunks of ill-digested landskin. Choking, Rian twisted in the grips of the vise-like landskin, knowing he was dying, knowing he could do precious little to save himself.

  He heard the splash as his risen gorge struck the landskin, felt the heated backwash cover his face. He closed his eyes against the burn.

  A sudden, excruciating contraction rippled through the landskin and Rian knew he heard ribs snap. He choked down a scream.

  The tentacles holding him snapped back, dropping him to the pinched floor of his crevice. Around him his own vomit dripped along torn landskin, smoking, sizzling. The stench of burning flesh choked him.

  Dizzy, he tried to climb to his feet, but stumbled on the uneven surface and pitched, face first, into the landskin wall. His stomach heaved, and he vomited again. Hot bile splashed his face.

  The landskin surged, rippling away from the pool of waste. A thick tentacle lashed out, wrapping around Rian’s waist. It jerked him from his feet. Above, the landskin poured away like running water, opening a widening corridor straight up. Rian rose through clouds of smoke that stank of burning tissue, borne by the squeezing tentacle. Drool, thick with his own digestive juices, dripped from his chin, spattering on the outer skin of the tentacle and eating into the fibrous tissues.

  Blinding light struck him from above. Twisting within the undeniable grasp of the tentacle he squinted against the glare. Bright blue, dotted with puffy white, and directly overhead a blazing ball of yellow-orange.

  Outside!

  He had time to wonder for only a moment before the tentacle whipped forward and released him. Shot from the bowels of the landskin like spores from a sporelance, Rian windmilled in midair as the ground receded. He flew ten feet into the air, bathed in sunlight, caressed by a stiff breeze from the north that smelled of the boreworm fens.

  The ground rushed up to receive him. Rian braced for the impact, trying to twist his legs to break his fall.

  His right foot slammed into the landskin, quickly followed by his left. He tumbled, his shoulder smashing into an upthrust stone as he rolled down a steep slope. At the bottom of the slope he crashed into a low ridge and lay still, as the landskin retreated beneath him, leaving him on barren, cold stone.

  Chapter 26

  The sound struck Dersi first as the door hissed down into the floor: a raging, turbulent cacophony, the glaring crackle of lightning, the moaning of vast winds rising like a thousand haunting souls crying out in desperation, in loneliness. And below it all, barely heard, the steady thrumming of powerful machinery at work, clanging, grinding, heaving. She put her hands to her ears and took a step backward.

  The chamber beyond the doorway beckoned to her. It towered. Dersi stepped through the opening, mouth agape, and stood on a railed platform protruding out into empty space. An arch of shimmering metal covered with blinking, twinkling lights stood in the center of the platform. Dersi avoided the arch, stepping around it and toward the railing. Across from her position, a hundred feet or more away, a matching platform jutted out from the opposite wall. A thin, swaying catwalk connected the two platforms. Above, rose the metal-walled shaft, disappearing fifty feet overhead into a thick, churning fog that shimmered with a silvery light. Far, far below, the vast black eye of a raging maelstrom confronted her. Howling winds pulled at her garments as if to seize her and drag her down, down into its violent heart. Sudden vertigo nearly overwhelmed her, and she gripped the cold metal tubes of the railing with white knuckled hands. The sounds paled in comparison.

  Within the black eye of the storm, a depthless obsidian orb drank in the ambient light, consuming it like some ravenous beast. The thin braces that shot out from the sides of the sphere and into the gray winds seemed incapable of resisting the power of the storm, yet they held, vibrating. Jagged bolts of lightning danced along the struts, lanced into the turbulent clouds, and shot upwards, crackling against the metal walls. Dersi’s hands tingled on the metal railing, and the hair at the nape of her neck rose.

  Dersi pushed away from the railing and backed toward the doorway. The metal grating beneath her feet trembled, crackling with numbing energies. Her joints ached. Her teeth rattled in her gums. A queer nausea bubbled up within her.

  Her eyes on the shaft beyond the railing, she stumbled and reached out to gain her balance. Her hand brushed against the cold metal of the arch.

  Harsh crimson light washed over her, blazing from panels set in the walls. The churning fog overhead took on the eerie taint of shed blood. A glaring, bone-jarring siren sounded, echoing in the turbulent shaft.

  “Warning! Unauthorized entry in Primary Interface. Please state authorization code to access Interface Core.”

  Dersi jerked her hand away from the arch. She pressed her back against the railing, feeling the queasy tingling lash through her skin, sink into her bones. Eyeing the arch warily, she edged toward the open doorway.

  “Warning! Unauthorized entry. Please step into Interface Arch and state authorization code.”

  The voice came from all around her, echoing out of the bloodred mist above, rising from the turbulent maelstrom below. Cold, dispassionate, the words tumbled over her with clipped precision, without inflection, penetrating even the titanic rumblings of the storm. It sent a tremor of fear rippling through Dersi’s core.

  “Security protocol initialized. Please stand by.”

  Dersi watched in horror as the door slid up from the floor. She flung herself toward the rising partition, her fingers hooking over its edge. It rose, carrying her upward. Her bare feet scrambled on the slick metal, seeking purchase. She threw her arm over the edge, dragging herself upward. The massive door continued its smooth rise, the distance between it and the ceiling shrinking. Her right foot slipped and her chin slammed into the metal, jarring her teeth, biting her tongue.

  “Step away from containment door. Please stand in Interface Arch.”

  Dersi screamed and heaved herself higher. She threw her left leg upward, her toes tickling along the edge of the door before falling back down. Blinking away stinging sweat, she pulled, her arms straining, her fingers vainly attempting to dig into the hard metal. She slung her leg up again, catching her heel on the upper edge of the door, and dragged herself up. The ceiling touched her back, undeniable solidity.

  Expelling her pent breath, attempting to make herself as small as possible, Dersi rolled over the edge of the door. She fell toward the hard, cold metal floor on the other side. The door slammed shut, the booming sound ringing through the narrow corridor. The edge of her frayed wrap caught in the door, jerked her to a jarring stop. The cloth ripped. Dersi tumbled free, slamming into the floor.

  “Standby for security detail. Security protocol engaged.”

  Dersi’s mouth dripped blood and her shoulder flared in agony. Her breath wheezed from her lungs, thick with discharge. Every inch of her body screamed in pain. She rolled to her stomach and stared down the corridor, toward the lift. But the hallway ended in the smooth, blank metal of a closed door.

  She closed her eyes tight, willing herself not to cry. Frustration battered at her emotional defenses, threatening to spill the pent-up tears. She had no time to wallow in self-pity, could not give in to the strength-sapping emotion.

  “Elevator disabled. Security detail to Primary Interface access. Repeat: security detail to Primary Interface access. Unauthorized access.”

  “Shut up,” Dersi whispered. She pushed herself to her hands and knees and looked toward Erekel. Her eyes widened. She jerked around, gasping, and scanned the blank expanse of the corridor.

  Erekel was gone.

  Lhedri paced the small room, his fingers playing along the knobbed shaft of
his appropriated acidrod. His men, as if sensing their leader’s agitation, stayed well back from him, pressed against the vibrating walls. They glanced at one another with anxious expressions on their faces. A few swallowed repeatedly. One man scratched continuously at the stubble on the side of his face.

  Lhedri tried to ignore them. He reached out and touched one of the smooth walls. Beneath his hand the wall throbbed. Every few seconds there was a subtle thump. The sensation of movement was undeniable.

  Cadrin cleared his throat. “What is this, Captain?”

  “A lift, I think. Like a throat. Only mechanical.”

  “A throat . . .” Cadrin glanced at the floor and shifted his feet. “We’re going down.”

  Lhedri nodded. “I think so. I think these thumps I’m feeling through the walls are different levels of this place.”

  “How will we know when to stop it? And how do we stop it?”

  “I . . .” Lhedri bit his lip. A good question, the first. If each thumping indicated the passage of another floor, how were they to know when Lady Dersi and her abductor had exited? He had ten men with him. Judging by the thumps, they had descended more than twenty levels. Assuming each had an access point, they could spend forever searching this complex before locating the fugitives. And that assumed Lady Dersi and Master Erekel had holed up rather than continuing to flee.

  “Captain?” Cadrin raised one eyebrow.

  This search had turned futile. “Take us back up, Cadrin.”

  “Of course, Captain. How?”

  Lhedri stared at him. How? How. Lhedri pushed soldiers aside and approached the shallow niche in the wall. He had done nothing other than press his hand into the niche to start the lift. There were no buttons, switches, knobs, or latches. Just the niche, sized to fit a flattened palm. The tingling that had risen from the cold metal had started the lift moving.