An Ill-Fated Sky

by Darrell Drake

  “Figures,” it replied, cheeky but agitated. “You stomp all over me, even hear me cry underfoot, but never bother getting to know me. And here I have gotten to know you well, what with you and your kin frolicking through me for generations.”

  “I don’t under—” It hit him, and his jaw went slack. A yazata.

  “Pick up your chin,” it said with a hint of humour. “Surely this form cannot be that tantalizing. All crackling and dry and pah, pah, pah.”

  A yazata. He planted his forehead on the ground, praying he hadn’t seriously offended it. Unlike divs, the champions of Truth and order were few and far between. Powerful as they were, yazatas were outnumbered one million to one in the realm of mortals. They could cut swathes through a div host, but losing even one would be a severe blow. So they generally avoided the light, working instead from the shadows, ironic as that was.

  “Zam, by the way. Not that your family has cared to ask even with all its tramping. Well,” it paused to consider, “a part of Zam. Cannot rightly fit all the planet into one incarnation. But you may call me Zam. And do stop prostrating. Dagnabbit.”

  Tirdad lifted his head obediently, but stayed on his knees and kept silent. His tongue was dry as the Lut, and even if it weren’t he was deathly afraid of saying the wrong thing. Yazatas were as just as just gets, but this one did not seem pleased with him.

  Shkarag charged by, or would have if a tangle of roots didn’t catch her mid-stride, winding around her so completely only her head was visible. “I’ll wipe my shit with your face, you šo-crunching bird sympathizer!” she hissed. “I’ll start a forest fire!” Shkarag gnashed at the air, fangs flared and whipping back and forth, slinging a spray of what he mistook for saliva until it landed just short of his hand to sizzle through the ground.

  Venom. At that, he backed away, giving her a wide berth. In all his years with her she’d never so much as hinted at having venom.

  “I’ll piss in your mulch!” she seethed.

  “This is the company you keep,” said Zam. “This is a div. I cannot fathom what it did to coerce you into trusting it, but this is their true nature. Its sorcery would have ended you then and there had I not intervened. Then and there.”

  Tirdad furrowed his brow. “Sorcery? I’ve never known her to use sorcery. She was terrified.”

  “An act, surely. Have you forgotten the wiles of divs, Tirdad?” Zam wagged a leafy finger. “Tsk, tsk. I promise you it was her doing. How well do you think you know something that has existed longer than the dynasty you have pledged allegiance to?”

  “I’ll fill your hollows with honey!” cried Shkarag.

  The planet-reckoner shook his head. He may not know her past, but he knew her. “She befriended me, even took care of me when I was ill.”

  If Zam had facial expressions, its disappointment would have been plain. “I have known you since you were a fledgling, Tirdad. Your soul has always impressed me with its resilience, so pah, pah, pah, I forgive you. But you need to look. Really look at it.”

  Tirdad obeyed. Shkarag snapped with what was surely unchecked bloodlust at the yazata, at the roots, at existing, at nothing in particular. Streamers of smoke unfurled from the earth directly beneath her chin, where her venom had eaten a hole in the ground.

  “When you strip away all the lies, the manipulation, the play at humanity, the . . .” Zam’s tone took a knowing turn. “The attraction . . . this is a div. Hate. Destruction. Chaos. Pah, pah, pah. Recently, this one led a company of divs in felling one of my forests for no other reason than to upset my master, Amurdad. Just to deal a meagre blow to the grand guardian of plants and good health.”

  “I didn’t—”

  “Dagnabbit. Of course you did not know. Just as with the sorcery. Divs deceive. That I need to remind you of this at all . . . How many lives has it ruined? How much discord has it sown? All without your knowing or before you sprung from your father’s loins.”

  “I’ll masturbate with your šo-wretched sap!”

  Tirdad turned a crestfallen stare on his hands, which he wrung nervously.

  “Good,” said Zam. “Never been fond of disciplining. Makes execution less of a hassle, too.”

  “Execution?” asked Tirdad. “You don’t mean . . .” The light that had cosseted the forest hardened, retracting its touch and gathering like squalls into a glowing spear with eddies at its head. He sprung to his feet, palm reluctantly finding the ram’s head pommel. “Don’t,” he begged. “Please! She’s half human! She’s my dearest friend!”

  Zam brought its arm level with its shoulder, and the spear came to hover by its open palm. “All the more reason to be rid of her.”

  Until recently Tirdad had been a man of honour—a man who lived by it. Ethics vary by upbringing, personality, society, so it is only natural that forsaking honour would be an experience unique to the individual. Tirdad hadn’t reached that impasse until now.

  He drew his sword.

  Jupiter, mightiest of the planets with its bands of thousand-year storms, ransacked the Bull constellation. The seven stars of Pleiades flashed across the heavens to intercept, trailing bright blue streaks. They were too late. Jupiter turned the most fearsome of its storms on their approach, and from that Great Red Spot flashed the evil eye. The stars it charmed turned on the others; the chaos began.

  This time Tirdad watched from the fringes of the conflict. A confidence coursed through him—a newfound intimacy with the celestial theatre—and with it the many calculations of a planet-reckoner drawing a lot.

  He knew at once that Jupiter was the only planet above the horizon, and therefore his only ally. Constellations, conjunctions, exaltations, falls, detriments, oppositions, dominions, elements, aspects: it all raced through his mind. Equations and star charts came to him as if they’d been branded onto his psyche. Most of it was superfluous, as planets below the horizon were out of reach, which rendered aspects and conjunctions null. Jupiter didn’t occupy any windows of the sky with notable reactions, and its predilection for corrupting life meant it’d do well with any element. The Bull was a patron of earth, so he had some manifestation of crumbling, heaviness, sensuality, crops, or black bile to hope for.

  Tallying the factors, he determined that his odds of success were a cosmic coin flip. All things considered, he respected Ashtadukht’s boldness. To have cast so many lots when such risks were involved.

  “Jupiter stands victorious bestride the Bull,” Tirdad breathed, strangely silvery as he disrobed his sword. The die of earth rode the furrows of his mind, its six faces caressing wherever they touched, until it settled comfortably into one such furrow. His lot had been favoured.

  Arousal washed over him, graced his soul. Every conceivable fetish was laid bare and him turned on by the whole display. Then it was gone as abruptly as it’d come. He wouldn’t know the outcome until it reared its lascivious head, so he gripped his long sword in both hands and aimed the starling-black blade at Zam. “You won’t hurt her,” he growled. “I won’t allow it.”

  The yazata lifted its palms defensively, backing away. “Woah, woah, woah, woah, woah. Put that away, you stupid, stupid boy. You cannot fathom the . . . you cannot fathom that blade.”

  “You first,” said Tirdad, matching its steps by marching forward. “Give me your word you won’t harm her.”

  “Dagnabbit! Can you not see how unreasonable you’re being?” Zam looked from one to the other as if considering his offer. “Really putting me between a div and a hard place here. Annoying. I guess my only option is to—” Zam shoved a palm toward Tirdad, which commanded the blindingly bright spear to dart in his direction. “—be rid of you both!”

  Tirdad shifted his blade a fraction of an inch to the left, and miraculously, it caught the spearhead square on the tip. His muscles bunched, he roared like a lion, and it was all he could do to halt its progress. The eddies took on iridescent currents wherever they touched the blade; starling-black sparks cold as winter littered his face. Across the way, Zam had it
s palm out, only marginally invested in the struggle. The yazata was winning, and they both knew it.

  “In way over your head,” said Zam. “Pah, pah, give up, pah, pah.”

  The planet-reckoner set his jaw. Surrender was not an option as long as the threat to Shkarag’s life remained. He side-stepped, and the spear rocketed past, trunks exploding behind him until they were too far off to hear. “I’ll defend her to the death,” he said. “So please just fucking let us go.”

  “Tsk, tsk. No can do,” Zam replied, sounding genuinely sorry. Three more eddy-tipped spears materialized, this time drawing from the light in its chest. The yazata flicked a hand, and one after another they queued to fire at Tirdad.

  He made for a desperate parry when his planet-reckoning finally bore fruit. The sensuality of earth had beguiled the yazata’s roots; now, they served Tirdad. They encircled him entirely, and where his reflexes would have failed, the roots maneuvered him around the spears with inhuman dexterity.

  Zam snarled, or what passed for a snarl in leaf vernacular—it rustled, but aggressively. Then it abandoned its nonchalance in favour of throwing its arms wildly.

  Spears flew at Tirdad as if an army were behind them, so bright and numerous that he could no longer see the yazata. Thanks to his planet-reckoning, they all passed harmlessly by, the root system coordinating a veritable dance through the volley.

  The light grew more and more intense, until it seemed as if he were wading through a star. The whir of spearheads had become constant. An iridescent afterimage trailed his blade where it gorged on the eddies and squalls. When he was beginning to wonder whether he was covering any ground at all, he emerged directly in front of the yazata. The roots withdrew, leaving the rest to him.

  Tirdad stepped in just behind a swing, and before the yazata could retaliate, he thrust his sword into its core. The tip clinked against resistance, but it had the desired effect. The spears winked out of existence. Zam slumped to its knees.

  It looked up at him, twitching. “Please d-d-donnnnnnnnnnn—” Zam’s failed plea stretched in search of its remainder, and likely would have continued its feeble droning had Shkarag not collided with the yazata, plunging her fangs into its crown even as she bowled it over.

  Tirdad watched, not entirely sure what to feel. A flick of her head, and the half-div tore off what would’ve been its face. The spray of leaves sizzled on its way down, and the body seized violently. Shkarag was too far gone to stop at that. She bit with ravenous abandon, the acrid stench of her venom mingling with burning leaves and underscored by her hisses, the sound of tearing parchment, and breathing like a saw over wood.

  Having shredded the head beyond recognition, she moved to its chest. There, Shkarag rent and clawed, no longer seeking to mutilate but to get at the shining core. Once she’d opened a large enough cavity, she posted on its torso, squatting and taking purchase on the core. It took only a single tug to dislodge the thing.

  “What’re you doing?” asked Tirdad, which elicited a warning hiss. He swallowed hard at the image of her bared fangs, caustic venom still dribbling generously from their points. He’d only witnessed that unhinged, predatory glint once, but once was enough. “Never mind,” he said, giving her some space.

  Yazatas and divs were natural enemies in the cosmic theatre, so he supposed it was fanciful to have hoped for a peaceful outcome. At least this div had prevailed. The single div who mattered. It occurred to him just how sacrilegious this was: his thoughts, the scene, his part in it—all of it.

  But looking on as Shkarag compressed the pearly core between her claws, fissures spreading through the light and over its surface, the one thing he did not feel was wrong.

  A strained creaking arose in the core, ominous and disquieting as if he were hearing it on a frozen lake. The fissures approached a breaking point, and the glow all but vanished, leaving only a dimly lit, glassy sphere. Shkarag stopped there.

  She turned an inquisitive stare on him, free of that pernicious glint. Her arms dropped by her sides, and her scrutiny flitted over their surroundings, ending where it started. “Don’t know sorcery,” she said, retracting her fangs but coming off as defensive. “Don’t know it one bit. It . . . she hounds me because . . .” Shkarag lifted the core beside her head, meaning for it to be a claw. She canted at it, eyeing it curiously, then glanced sidelong at Tirdad. A faint whine of a hiss bled through her lips.

  He saw her fear and uncertainty plain as day—not of him, but of what this meant for their friendship. What the yazata’s accusations meant. What their slaying it meant. He didn’t need the paltry light thrown by the core to see as much. Even so, the half of her face that wasn’t lost to darkness was fraught with the harsh basins of worry.

  Tirdad put his blade away, taking care to apply a gentle touch in doing so, which recalled her condescending lesson in the proper handling of glass. He started over, wearing a disarming smile, and drew up in front of her. With that gentleness in mind, he had intended to hug Shkarag, but reconsidered. Instead, he chose a more light-hearted approach.

  “Can you hear the sea?” he asked.

  She blinked.

  He nodded to the core. “You’re listening, aren’t you?”

  “The . . . sea?” Her eyes darted to the orb and back. “Don’t . . . the sea?”

  His disarming smile became more genuine. “Isn’t that what you listen for? Although, I suppose we’re in the forest, so you’d be listening for a lake instead.”

  Shkarag tilted her head by only a few degrees. “Not a shell. A yazata’s . . . I just . . . in front of you like some pearl diver with the find of a lifetime that won’t stud the bravest brocade. Not a shell. Can’t hear the sea. Can’t hear a lake.”

  “Oh,” said Tirdad. “Thought you might be listening since you sure as fuck can’t see them.”

  It took a moment of contemplative silence for it to register, but once it did, a small grin tempered her features, and more importantly, flushed the worry away. A bout of further quiet followed before she responded. “Thank you,” she said with earnest sincerity. “For . . .” She appeared to be concentrating on her stare, making sure it didn’t falter, which spoke for how difficult this was for her.

  “Don’t mention it,” he said, saving her the trouble. “I’d never betray you.” Tirdad only glimpsed the shift in her expression before she lowered the core—not long enough to make anything of it.

  “To fell a yazata,” she awed. “To fell it something fierce. Planet-reckoning’s out of this world.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Out of this world,” Shkarag said again, more insistent this time.

  “Yeah,” Tirdad repeated, all too aware. Even now, the celestial theatre hummed at the furthest reaches of his senses.

  Once awakened, it never slept. He’d become a planet-reckoner.

  VI

  Everything was dead. The mountains wore the bone-dry still of an ossuary where a stale air prevailed. The ironwood were pale; most were shattered. Not even a breeze creaked through the aftermath. It was as if winter had rushed in overnight, as if the sun had forsaken this one valley, though it still blazed high on the ecliptic. Tirdad turned a slow circle, gaping as he did at the desolation. “What happened?” he asked, rubbing the drowsiness from his eyes.

  “. . .” said Shkarag.

  He faced her where she sat beside a campfire, one leg out and focused on the pan in which she fried an omelette. “You made a fire,” he said, disbelief plain.

  “. . .”

  Somehow it hadn’t occurred to him until now that she’d been using fire to cook his meals all along. Divs were extraordinarily weak to fire, turned by it if not killed outright. This was why the divine glory of the sun had such a profound effect on them. Indeed, he’d noticed she was weakened during the day, but never forced into the underworld like most of her ilk.

  “Although I really wish you wouldn’t use green wood for it. You must know that’s profane.” He gestured at it. “Does it not hurt? The fire?”
<
br />   Shkarag shot the pan a glare. “Wood is wood. Don’t go out to gather morning wood like some arborist all sniffing bark and asking if they’re virgins or underage, squinting and trying to count their rings without looking up their skirt. Šo-itchy wood is šo-itchy wood.”

  Tirdad gave her a knowing look. Of course it hurt. He cleared his throat, eyeing the omelette and breathing in its pleasant aroma. “Everything’s dead,” he half observed, half asked.

  “Not us,” she answered, maintaining her focus. She canted. “I think.”

  “Yeah,” said Tirdad. He had a sinking feeling he knew the cause, but he needed to hear it from her. “Why?”

  At that, she looked up at him without moving her head, which had the all too appropriate effect of rolling her eyes. “Can’t just fell a yazata and . . .” Her attention darted back to her cooking, which she bored into with a creased brow. She tried again, notably mild this time around. “Can’t just fell a yazata without complaint,” she said. “Fell the heart and you fell the dell. More effective than some tree-hugging lumberjack who . . .” Shkarag trailed off, her maundering replaced by the hiss of the omelette as she flipped it to fry the other side.

  Just as he suspected. Tirdad blew out a sigh, and took in the breadth of the valley. It seemed as if a forest fire had swept through overnight, sparing nothing and devouring all colour. The few trees that weren’t snapped in half had withered to thin lines so black they appeared to be cracks in the scenery.

  “This is my doing,” he declared. “Rarely are the consequences of your actions laid out with such brutal clarity.” He directed his gaze back to the half-div, who had taken the omelette off the fire and dropped the pan by his boots. “It bothers you, doesn’t it?”

  “. . .” Shkarag kneaded her thigh, wearing the same strained countenance as usual.

  Tirdad took a seat in front of the pan, but refrained from eating just yet. “I meant what I said last night,” he added. “I would’ve said more if I weren’t so spent after, well, all that happened. As much as I deplore what I’ve done, I don’t regret it. Honestly, you’re the only one in all—”