by D. P. Prior
He tried to twist around, tried to swim against whatever sorcerous current had caught hold of him, but he was pulled relentlessly down. He shut his eyes as he struck the bars of light and felt… nothing. Nothing, besides a warm tickling sensation.
And then he was standing upon a tongue. It was rough-textured, slick with frothy spit, and black as coal. It retracted sharply, and he lost his footing, landing plumb on his backside.
The tongue carried him toward an aperture that pressed wetly about him, and then he was falling again, or rather sliding deeper and deeper into the gullet of whatever leviathan had swallowed him whole.
The descent leveled out after a few seconds, and he was able to rise to his feet on a squelchy, viscous floor. Goo stuck to the soles of his boots, trailed him when he took a step toward… toward… What was it, a door?
Right in the middle of the sinuous tube of flesh and slime he stood within, was a round portal made of wood. It even had a brass handle, which he clasped and twisted.
Greenish light spilled through the crack, and then the door opened onto a spherical chamber with a gilled ceiling, like the underside of a mushroom. Clusters of wriggling uvulae dangled from above, and the floor was alive with hundreds of purplish lips, opening and closing, as if holding some silent conference.
Opposite the entrance, there was a vast circular window with a dark spot at its center. There were fish outside, darting in and out of coral and seaweed. Nameless gasped as he realized this was the creature’s eye, seen from the inside. A single, gigantic orb that must have been set in the middle of its head.
Before the eye-window, there was a stool that seemed molded from fungi. Seated upon it was a tiny humanoid with ropey, gray dreadlocks and olive skin.
A homunculus.
It spun to face Nameless.
“Abednago is my name.” The homunculus tapped the tips of his fingers together, almost as if he were giving a sarcastic clap. “Why so surprised? You’ve seen homunculi before.” He stood and approached Nameless the way you might approach a wild animal. “Come, Nameless.” Abednago put a hand on his arm and led him toward the eye-window.
“How do you know my—”
“I was a close observer of the chief events in your… how shall I put it?”
“Downfall?”
Abednago took hold of a tuberous nodule in the wall and twisted it.
Another mushroom-like stool rose up in front of the eye. He gestured for Nameless to sit, and took the other stool himself.
“Story,” he said. “You have heard of the pride before the fall? Well, is there not a tradition of the subsequent rise?”
“Don’t bother, whatever you’re going to say next,” Nameless said. “I’ve endured enough trickery from your kind for a lifetime.”
“Who said anything about trickery,” Abednago said. “My point was really a matter of observation. Of patterns. Heroes fall. Heroes rise again. It’s just the way of things.”
“Ah, then perhaps you are not familiar with dwarven tragedy.”
“Perhaps,” Abednago said.
“How long have you been following me?” Nameless asked the question with a degree of trepidation, but he already knew the answer in his gut.
“Since Arx Gravis.”
Nameless hung his head and waited for the black dog to make its move.
“It was not your fault,” Abednago said.
“Rubbish.”
“You believe you are too clever to be deceived? Too strong?”
Nameless felt every muscle in his body tense. When he spoke, it was through gritted teeth. “I was neither.”
“Then what choice did you have? How could you have done things differently?”
“I didn’t have to enter Gehenna. Didn’t have to bring back the axe.”
The homunculus sighed and closed his eyes. “Maybe you did. Maybe it was written in stone.”
“Why me? Why me and not someone else?”
“The Demiurgos knows you are special. He wants you for his own.”
“Then being special is what makes me dangerous.”
“It is what gives us hope,” Abednago said. “It is what may yet save your people.”
Nameless scoffed at that. “Save them? I’m the one they’re running from.”
“A beast beaten will recoil from a raised hand, even if the intention is to stroke. The dwarves of Arx Gravis would have been killed with or without your help. It is the lot of your people. It was the lot of your ancestors who once dwelt in the most powerful citadel in all of Aethir.”
“Arnoch? That’s just a myth. And besides, they destroyed themselves.”
“Ah, but did they have a choice?” Abednago cocked his head. “Nameless, there is something I wish to show you. Will you allow me?”
Nameless shifted uncomfortably on his stool and wiped the sweat from his brow. “Is it hot in here?”
The homunculus shook his head.
“I’m feeling nauseous,” Nameless said, pinching the bridge of his nose and belching. “Laddie, anything you want to show me is likely the start of an elaborate deception.”
“We are a people divided, Nameless. Yes, our nature is deception, but there are some among us who would play our father at his own game.”
Nameless raised an eyebrow. “The Sedition?”
Abednago gave a slight smile. “Even within the Sedition, we are divided. Divided upon the issue of the dwarves.”
“Why—?”
Abednago raised a hand. “Later. Let’s just say it concerns the experiments of Sektis Gandaw.”
Nameless’s brain was flipping somersaults trying to fathom what on Aethir the homunculus could mean.
The Technocrat was often credited with the creation of the dwarves. The Annals said he’d altered the basic makeup of humans he’d kidnapped from Urddynoor. They were engineered for mining scarolite—useful tools and nothing more. When that usefulness ceased, the dwarves were discarded as easily as the Ant-Man and his pets.
“Don’t dwell upon it now,” Abednago said. “Some things are better shown than told.”
He stared straight ahead through the great eye of the fish-ship, and a ripple passed around the chamber. The view outside shifted as the craft began to move.
SILAS
“I tell you, I don’t bleedin’ like it,” Nils whispered, tugging on Silas’s sleeve.
Silas was starting to agree with the lad, but what could they do? They’d followed the cyclops through acres of woodland, and now they could be anywhere, for all he knew. He couldn’t even tell which was east and which was west, so dismal were his wilderness skills. And as for Ilesa—
“And what about Ilesa?” Nils continued in his whinging whisper. “What do you suppose happened? I mean, did she fall like Nameless? Did the fog take her?”
“Maybe she just took the chance to save her own skin.”
Nils looked dumbfounded. “Nah, she wouldn’t do that. Would she?”
“She was quite prepared to leave Nameless, remember? We have no reason to trust her.”
The cyclops ceased his mile-eating strides and turned to tower over them. He made a show of counting them with his fingers and then frowned.
“Thought there were three of you. What happened to the other? You know, the female with the succulent… in all the leather?”
Silas shrugged and turned his palms up. “No idea. One minute she was there, the next she was gone. That’s two companions we’ve lost today.”
“Two?” the cyclops said, looking out through the forest.
“Yes,” Nils said. “We were traveling with a—”
“So have we arrived yet?” Silas said, clapping his hands together.
“We have.” The cyclops pushed through the last of the trees, until they stood before a cave set into a craggy bank. “Welcome to my home.” He ducked inside the opening then poked his head back out. “Coming?”
Silas looked at Nils, and the lad merely shrugged and went into the cave.
Nils’s conditio
n had worsened during the trek through the woods. His skin was ashen, his hair slick and matted with sweat. He seemed to be having difficulty breathing, the air rattling in and out of his lungs with a worrying wheeze. It had to be the zombies. Had to, otherwise, how come Silas was the only one not to be infected?
If the blasted cyclops hadn’t come upon them when he did, Silas felt sure he could have found the reference to zombie bites in Blightey’s grimoire. He’d only seen it in passing, during the casting of whatever spell had cut a swath through the cadavers. He probably should have paid more attention at the time, but the book had unnerved him. Damned thing seemed to have a life of its own. Even now, he had the nagging sensation it was whispering prompts at the back of his mind, not loud enough to be fully discernible. Messages below the threshold of awareness, although not quite so deep that they didn’t ring alarm bells.
He should have listened to the warnings back at the Academy. Maybe it was for good reason Blightey’s grimoire was off limits. Then again, so much in Silas’s past had been off limits, but he’d always prevailed in the end. No, he wasn’t about to let the scaremongering of a bunch of ivory-tower academics keep him from his research. He was onto something here, and the book’s obvious power only confirmed that. Magic was like anything else worth knowing. You had to proceed with caution, one step at a time; had to get to know each stage thoroughly, harness it to your will, and then move on only when ready. Had to show it who was master, that was all. Fear was for the weak and the ignorant.
Silas followed Nils inside.
The entrance bore into the rocky bank some way, then converged on a tunnel mouth, where Nils and the cyclops were waiting.
The three of them descended half a dozen natural steps, until they reached a far larger cathedral cavern. The skins of different animals covered much of the floor, their bones stacked in piles upon ledges at various heights. Two massive ensconced torches shed their guttering glow across one corner of the cavern, and this is where the cyclops led them, gesturing for them to be seated on a fur hide so large, it could have belonged to some kind of elephant.
“Do you have any food?” Silas asked. “Only, my friend here is sick. He was bitten by a walking corpse.”
“Only what I brought back with me,” the cyclops said.
“Don’t want none,” Nils said, curling up on the rug. “Just need to sleep.”
Silas shook him by the shoulder. “Wouldn’t do that just yet, Nils. Let me look for that page again.” The instant the words left his mouth, he regretted it.
“Oh, yes,” the cyclops said. “I was meaning to ask you about that book you were looking at when I happened upon you.”
Happened upon? Hardly. The giant had virtually stalked them. How long he’d been standing there by the gate while they struggled along the clifftop path was anyone’s guess.
“It’s just a book,” Silas said.
“I like books.” The cyclops fixed Silas with a stare of his single great eye. The pupil was the size of a saucer, the iris amber and resembling nothing so much as a crocodile’s. “What’s it about?”
Silas swallowed, did his best to improvise. “Flora and fauna, you know the sort of thing. Boring, really. Stuff about mushrooms and insects.”
“And it will help with the boy’s sickness?”
“Maybe,” Silas said. “If I can find the right page.”
“Let me look,” the cyclops said. “I’m good at finding things. Big eye like this has some advantages, you know.”
Silas covered his satchel with his arm. “It’s all right, thanks. I think I can find it now.”
“I said let me look.” The cyclops held out a big meaty hand and tilted his head, the great eye suddenly feral and predatory.
Shit, shit, shit, Silas thought, racking his brains for a spell that might help. If he could shock the thing and grab Nils, they might be able to make a run for it.
The cyclops twiddled his enormous fingers impatiently.
Shock! That was it. The words of the casting danced through Silas’s mind, his lips moving as slightly as a ventriloquist’s as he reached over and grabbed the cyclops’s thumb. A sparking charge of static shot down Silas’s arm and burst into blue fire that consumed the giant’s hand.
Consumed, but did no harm.
“Oh,” Silas said.
“Uh uh.” The cyclops wagged his finger. “You’ll have to do better than that.”
He leaned forward, pushed Silas gently back with one hand, and took the satchel from him with the other.
“Well, well, well, what have we got here? A grimoire, if I’m not very much mistaken. A grimoire of the eleventh degree, no less. Now, what’s a pusillanimous whelp like you doing with something so puissant? No, don’t say anything. You can tell me after dinner.” The cyclops let out a malevolent chuckle. “Well, maybe not. Remember, I said I only had what I brought home with me?”
Silas gulped, and wished he’d been able to do something to stop Nameless from plunging to his death. He’d have given anything to have the dwarf waltz in and take command of the situation.
“Now, be a good little wizard,” the cyclops said, “and use that poxy magic of yours to rustle up a fire. Can’t remember the last time I had cooked meat.”
NAMELESS
At first, Nameless thought it was a coral bed, but then he realized that was an effect of the distance. As they drew nearer, he could see enormous spires crusted with barnacles, towers swathed in weeds, minarets green with algae, and buttressed gatehouses decked with brightly-colored anemones. It was as big as an island, an impossible structure encased in a vast bubble of either water or glass. This was something far beyond the architectural abilities of any race he’d come across on Aethir, outstripping even the magnificence of Arx Gravis. There could be no doubt in his mind what it was they were approaching. This was no mere legend. It was looming right up in front of him, a citadel at the bottom of the ocean, the prehistoric capital of the Dwarf Lords.
“Arnoch,” he whispered.
“Legends are like dreams,” Abednago said. “Most are based on truth.”
“But Aethir itself was dreamed,” Nameless said. “By the Cynocephalus. So none of this is real, if you look at it that way.”
The homunculus gave him the sort of smile a parent might give a child that was just starting to find its way in the world. His eyes sparkled, as if within they contained the brightness of a thousand stars. “The dreams of a god are of a quite different order. Quite different.”
Nameless didn’t like where this conversation was going. Already, his head was pounding. His brother Lucius had been the family philosopher. Nameless was more for strong drink and the thrill of battle. Didn’t mean he wasn’t a thinker, only he preferred more tangible concepts.
“So, the dog-head is a god, then?”
That hadn’t been his impression when he’d snuck into the womb-like chamber in the bowels of Gehenna and found the Cynocephalus asleep beneath its shield. It had been bestial, a giant baboon that looked to be formed from organic scarolite. It was a dangerous memory to indulge. He knew that as soon as he caught the echo of the knight Galen’s screams, the crunching of his bones.
Abednago shrugged. “Some say so. Others say there is only one true god, and that a dog-headed ape falls short of the definition. As do his parents, for that matter.”
The craft shuddered as it passed through the bubble surrounding the city, and they turned toward a round stone door set between two towers.
Nameless clutched the sides of his stool. They were going to crash, he was sure of it, but at the last moment the craft slowed.
A sucking, gurgling sound rolled through the chamber. There was a whir and a click, and then they were still.
A hairline crack split the center of the circular door, which filled the eye-window. It swiftly drew wider to reveal a short corridor that ended in an identical portal.
“Stay seated,” Abednago said. “Then you won’t have to go out the way you came in.”
“Thank shog for that, laddie. I was—Aaagh!”
The stool fell through the floor and came to a jolting halt directly below in the cavernous maw Nameless had entered by.
“Aren’t you coming?” he hollered up to the homunculus.
Abednago peered through the hole left by Nameless’s stool. “Remember the courage we were talking about? This is definitely something you need to do alone.”
“Do what?” Nameless said, feeling his hackles rise.
“We’ve docked at the Royal Passage. There was once a time this entrance would have been so heavily guarded, uninvited guests would have needed an army to get inside. Come to think of it, that’s exactly what some tried. None succeeded. Head through the far doors and keep going straight till you reach the throne room. From there, pray to whatever god you believe in and hope for the best.”
Nameless grunted and stood. “Sounds encouraging.”
“And Nameless, be on your guard. The evil that destroyed the Dwarf Lords of Arnoch may be impossibly old, but it could very well endure.”
“Now why doesn’t that surprise me? Don’t suppose you have a spare axe, laddie?”
“When the mouth opens,” Abednago called from above, “hold your breath.”
“What?” Nameless said, taking a step back. “But I can’t swi—”
The jaws of the fish-craft parted, and water rushed in.
Nameless gulped in a last breath of air and held it.
The tongue poked out, carrying him into the corridor beyond the round opening. As soon as the tongue withdrew, the door snapped shut behind him.
The passageway was completely submerged. Salt water stung his eyes and blurred his vision. Froth bubbled around his head, and debris rose up from the floor—ribbons of cloth, dust and weed. Something larger shifted across the bottom—a skeleton. It was dwarven and draped in rusty mail.
Nameless’s lungs started to burn. He needed to breathe. His heart was thumping and whooshing in his ears as he turned back to the entrance and scratched at the stone, seeking purchase, seeking a way out before…