Absence_Mist and Shadow

by J. B. Forsyth

  Ormis regarded him with atypical patience. But just as Kye was thinking how to communicate this sense of imminent danger, it left him - just like it did in the game, when he opened his eyes. He shook his head in the end, deciding it was just his imagination running riot – a symptom of being in such a dark place so far underground. Despite this Ormis continued to interrogate him with his eyes and it was only when he shook his head for a second time, he seemed satisfied. He turned away and they started moving again; sloshing gently forward through an ever increasing depth of water.

  The surface crept up their legs and when it breeched the top of Kye’s boots, it poured into them like a slurry of ice worms. He cried out in revulsion and flailed backward, yanking out of Ormis’s grip as the sound echoed around the cavern walls. The others were quickly around him, swishing their light over the water as they searched for the source of his reaction. When nothing was found, Ormis grabbed his shirt. ‘Out with it now!’

  ‘The water… Can’t you feel it?’

  But before the exorcist could reply, the water began running away from them and they were forced to brace against the flow; poised like four paddlers in the retreat of a spent wave. In just a few seconds the cavern floor was bone dry and they were left listening to the frothing rush of gathering water.

  The cavern lit up, revealing an enormous foaming claw that covered most of the far wall. At its centre was a ten-foot glowing fish eye. Its golden iris was alive with crimson capillaries that streamed in from the edge and emptied into a merciless black pupil. The eye clenched, focusing on them for a few seconds before it blinked out of existence.

  ‘Run!’ Ormis bawled. But the water was already crashing down and it struck them like a thunderous waterfall, hammering them into the cavern floor. Kye went head over heels in the turbulence, losing all sense of up and down. The vileness he had felt in the water was all around him now and it was like he was brushing past a huge fish covered with millions of crawling parasites. And he sensed another presence trapped between its scales – a man with a screaming face who seemed to be reaching for him…

  He swallowed some of the water and coughed it out, but the parasites were inside him now and they were squirming into the membranes of his nose and throat. His chest tugged for air and he knew that in a few seconds, he would be forced to take the foul liquid into his lungs.

  The water fell away just in time and he dropped to the cavern floor on all fours, gasping for air and soaking wet. But he didn’t stay wet for long. The water began to separate from him; coming together in a network of trickles that raced down his body and sped away in rivulets. What little he had taken into his throat slipped from the corner of his mouth like threadworms and he jerked back, slapping at his face.

  He heard coughing – a series of deep breaths and explosive expirations that could only belong to Kring. He looked around for him and saw a succession of green lights flickering on in various places. The water had washed the fieraks from their blades and now they were returning to feed on them. He went to the nearest light, found his dagger and swished it through the air. Ormis stomped out of the darkness and grabbed his shirt again; his hard face apple green in the weak light of his own blade. ‘What about the water? Quickly now!’

  ‘There’s a big fish in it and a man too – like with the spiders.’ He swatted himself as he spoke; some part of him refusing to believe the parasites were gone and sending crawling sensations all over his body: the corner of his eyes, behind his knees and between his toes.

  Ormis seemed to accept this and he turned away to stare after the departed water. Another green flame approached and Kring’s hulking form materialised beside it.

  ‘Suula?’ asked Ormis, and when the giant shook his head he whirled away and called her name. But there was no answer. ‘It’s got her!’

  They ran to the rear of the cavern and discovered a twenty-foot-high barrel of frothing water, rolling backwards against the wall.

  ‘It’s drowning her,’ Ormis shouted over the roar, thrusting an arm in and hurrying along its rolling face. Kring joined him, plunging his two left arms in shoulder deep and searching in the opposite direction. Kye stepped forward hesitantly, wanting to help but afraid to reconnect with the parasites. But then, in the widening space between the exorcist and the giant, Suula’s arm appeared at the base of the barrelling water and began to rise. He leaped forward to grab it, but he wasn’t quick enough and she arced away and disappeared over the top.

  ‘She’s here! I saw her!’

  Ormis and Kring ran back and plunged their arms in either side of him. The giant took a quick side step and lunged, his entire top half disappearing in a huge froth. He jerked out with Suula’s spindly wrist gripped in his thick fingers. Her head appeared with a gasp, but her body continued upwards with the flow and when she finally came out, he had to step back to catch her. As she collapsed into his arms the eye ignited on the under surface of the barrel. It rose like a merciless sun and this close Kye could see the thread like parasites squirming in its iris. They had taken its prize and its liquid focus seared them with a promise of imminent reprisal.

  They turned from its brightness and ran for the glass tunnel; Kring throwing Suula over his shoulder and sprinting ahead. But half way there Ormis shouted them back.

  ‘Not the tunnels! It’ll drown us… If there’s a spirit in the water, it must be purged.’

  The eye blinked out, leaving them clustered in weak flame light. In the darkness to either side the water rushed by and came together somewhere in front of them with a thunderous clap. The eye reappeared in what was now an encircling wall of water and it was traveling anticlockwise; causing their shadows to rotate like a runaway sundial. After several circuits Kye turned to Ormis with a dreadful verdict.

  ‘It’s looking at me.’

  ‘Why you?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  Ormis watched it come around again. ‘You saw the man in the water and he saw you. Now he’s unsure what to do.’

  Kye looked into the eye and saw the exorcist was right. There was a waxing and waning of its terrible glare that suggested uncertainty. But when its light became steady and the ring of water began to tighten on them like a glistening noose, he knew its mind was made up.

  ‘Prepare yourself,’ said Ormis, striding away as he tracked the eye. He broke into a run as it appeared over his right shoulder and dived in, extinguishing its light and plunging the cavern into darkness.

  Water Skin

  Kye stared after him, listening to the ring of water as it tightened around them. When it appeared in their flame light, its curved face had grown so high he couldn’t see the top. He stepped back and bumped into Kring.

  ‘Steady lad,’ said the giant, placing a firm hand on his neck. ‘Save your breath ’til the last second then swim out as hard as you can.’

  The water drew ever closer, whipping up a cold breeze and spinning like a tube of black glass. They bunched together in what was now a tight column of air; watching their reflections grow larger and closer. Kye got a good look into his own horrified eyes before the water hit him like a wet slap; ripping him away from the giant and drawing him into its powerful vortex.

  It rolled and twisted him, making it impossible to do anything that resembled swimming. The water was dark and cold, but there was no sign of the giant fish and no sign of the man trapped inside it. He bumped into something that could have been one of the others and when he reached for them the water collapsed again, dumping him on the cavern floor.

  He saw Ormis staggering through the water, holding his throat. The eye was a fiery puddle beneath him; the water above it domed up to his knees and covering the rest of him in a transparent suit that appeared to be drowning him. Kye splashed over and started swatting at his face; trying to channel air to his mouth. But it was like trying to make a dry spot on a shallow river bed.

  Ormis stared out of his watery mask without seeing him. His focus was turned inwards – engaged in something more important
than his lack of air. Suula and Kring were soon helping - the little tracker pawing the water like a burrowing rabbit and the giant swiping at it with paddle sized hands. But the eye was generating a steady current to replenish what they splashed away and their combined effort was to no avail.

  Kye felt a sudden net-like sensation around his shins and jerked back in reflex, high stepping out of the water in fear of becoming caught. But when the net began to move, it passed straight through his legs. It drew in toward Ormis and the eye domed up until it hung off him like a blazing skirt. Another tug on the net and the eye disappeared. The water poured off the exorcist and he collapsed to his knees, gasping for breath.

  Suula retrieved a flaming sword and Kring pulled Kye away. ‘Give him space lad, he’s not finished yet.’

  Kye understood then that the net-like sensation had been Ormis’s draw; its Membrane tension somehow confined to the water. And the sudden tug, the moment it won out – pulling the presence from the water like a tablecloth yanked from under dinner plates. Now Ormis was fighting the spirit as he fought for air, coughing and thrashing in a screed of water. This exorcism was in a different league from those he had seen before and he began to feel like a spectator to a schoolyard brawl. He had taken an instant dislike to Ormis that had only deepened over the last few days. But as he watched the struggle unfold every fibre of him willed him to victory.

  Ormis became still and Kye took another step back; fearing what it meant. The battle was over, but the outcome was yet to be revealed. There was no way of telling if the exorcist had bested the spirit and as the seconds ticked out he was imbued with a terrible certainty: that he was about to turn his head and glare at them with a pair of glowing fish eyes.

  But to his relief Ormis braced on his hands and knees and began purging the spirit in a fiery blast of red and gold light that streamed from his face and fanned out over the wet floor. When it ran beneath Kye, a series of images flashed up in his mind: a dark dungeon where splayed fingers were reaching for his face; a group of men standing in a jungle choked ruin; and a putrid swamp with shallow waters that barely hid its scaly resident. These were the burning memories of the man in the water and they ran through his head with context and meaning. He was seeing the moment Izle took control of him; his arrival in the ruined city of Joebel; and the monster to whom his master bound his soul. Stitched into every scene was his pain and a bitter sense of betrayal. Kye’s heart had cheered when his purgefire erupted from the exorcist, but as it dissolved into the Membrane, he hung his head in shame. He had celebrated the exorcism of a man whose only fault was misplaced trust - another victim of Izle Rohn.

  Ormis sat back on his heels and drew several deep breaths. His damp hair hung over his face and his wet clothes dripped into little puddles beneath him; giving him the look of an exhausted sailor after a shipwreck. ‘Ceppra was his name,’ he said between breaths. ‘Izle bonded him to the water and the creature living in it.’ Then he fell onto his hands and sagged.

  Tragic Canvas

  Without the spirit to tame it, the water drained away into cracks and fissures, leaving only the odd pool where the floor held a depression. Kye remained with Ormis while Kring and Suula searched the far end of the cavern. The exorcist was sitting back with his eyes closed now. He seemed to be practicing some kind of recuperative meditation and in the green light of Kye’s fully restored sword flame, he looked like a graveyard monument. When he finally opened his eyes and got to his feet he did so in the manner of a man twice his age. He had beaten the spirit, but had spent something of himself in the process. Kye watched awkwardly as he stripped, wrung his clothes out and dressed again. When it was done he stood there damp and dishevelled; lacking any of the arrogant rigidity that usually defined him.

  ‘There’s another tunnel,’ said Suula when she returned with Kring. She led them to a circular opening in the far side of the cavern where the floor sloped down – a tunnel with the same glass lining as the one they entered from. Kring took them in with his sword held horizontally – creating a low fierak flame on his blade. Ormis took the rear guard, but he wasn’t up to it. He was swaying as he walked and his eyes were glassy and fixed – like someone trying to stay awake after a week without sleep. Kye looked back several times in concern, but to his increasing dismay the exorcist didn’t seem to be getting any better. His plan was to run away from him as soon as they got back over the mountains; but right now, here in the darkness of this underground passage, he wanted to see the return of the exorcist he hated.

  The tunnel curved and they discerned a faint light coming from somewhere around the bend. A little further and the sound of heavy footsteps brought them to a halt. Kring lifted a hand in a stay gesture and continued alone, pressed tight to the inside wall. There was a short silence followed by a whine of metal and a loud clang. The giant turned back to them and mouthed a single word: Karkus. Then he repeated his stay gesture and disappeared from sight.

  Kring stepped into a small cavern lit by two wall mounted alushia torches. Along the left wall was a stockpile of barrels and beyond them two wooden doors. In the centre of the space was a crude oak table, attended by three stools and covered with dirty pots and utensils. On the right wall, four feet above the ground was a hole in the rock - its iron cover wide open on its hinges. Karkus was bent in front of the opening with something under his arm. He squinted – trying to make sense of what he was seeing. But then his brother shifted and the light illuminated the face of the kidnapped girl as he fed her to the hole.

  ‘Karkus!’

  His brother spun, drawing a sword and letting go of Della’s legs. They fell limp, bending at the knee and hooking over the rim. ‘Kring!’

  ‘They told me you’d broken your oaths and that you were in league with a renegade. They said you murdered gaolers in cold blood and kidnapped a girl… I told them it couldn’t be. But now I see the truth of it with my own eyes.’

  Karkus took a step towards him, a tight lipped smile splitting his stubbly jaw. ‘I did all they say and more.’ His words were flat and cold – a blunt confession served on a platter of ice.

  ‘What’s happened to you?’

  ‘We’ve been fooled,’ he said, his eyes bright with passion. ‘The people of the Westland are not our allies. They would see us destroyed and our great city taken for themselves. The spirits that plague us were loosed by the same exorcists they sent to rid us of them. Izle challenged them and they chased him out. We must return him to power so the spirits that scourge our land can be expelled forever.’

  ‘Is that what he told you? Is that all it took to drive you to this wickedness?’

  ‘Wickedness?’

  ‘You murdered unarmed men, kidnapped this girl and cut her finger off.’

  ‘She’s a witch with a black heart!’

  ‘She’s a child!’

  ‘More like a weapon of the Caliste. She killed Rox – lifted him off his feet and smashed his skull against a tree,’ he said, stepping back to the hatch. ‘Sound like a child to you? She’s a witch and you’re too late for her.’ He lifted her legs and she slid from sight.

  Kring took a step forward. ‘Where does it go? What’s down there?’

  ‘A fate she has earnt.’

  Kring stared at him aghast. ‘What did he do to you brother? You were a man of honour! A man of renown!’

  ‘I’ve chosen my path.’

  ‘But it’s over for you. Soldiers from Rockspur are on the way. You’ve got to give this up.’

  ‘Must I?’ he said, drawing a second sword.

  ‘You would fight me over this?’

  ‘You and all that follow,’ he said and lunged, his huge frame galvanised in a split second, his twin five-foot blades scything the air.

  Kring was taken by surprise and was barely able to parry his vicious barrage. Metal clashed and their layered echoes knifed off the walls. The swordplay was so rapid the fieraks couldn’t keep up and they chased their energy source, creating spirals of glowing green light aro
und the blades. Kring was no match for his younger brother and was soon forced back to the tunnel where a flurry of blows put him off balance and dropped him to one knee. It should have been over then. Karkus broke through his defences and drew an arm back to deliver a blow meant to lop off his head. But before he could swing, Suula rushed from the tunnel and leapt onto his chest, stabbing with her dagger. He reeled back and crashed into the barrels; sword arms flailing as his lower arms prized her free and hurled her across the table. She crashed through the clutter of filthy pots and slid off the other side, cracking her head against the wall and settling in a motionless heap.

  Kring got to his feet and stepped into the cavern again. An appalling sadness flooded his heart. The brother he knew was gone and any hope of returning him had evaporated during their exchange. He had seen into Karkus’s eyes and there was nothing in them he recognised. He looked over his shoulder and saw Ormis behind him – sword drawn and ready to fight. But the spirit in the water had drained him. He looked fragile and weak and if Karkus got the chance, he would make short work of him. He pushed him back into the tunnel with a broad stroke of his arm. ‘Go. Take the boy and run.’ Ormis started to protest, but his patience was now as short as the exorcist’s had ever been. He shoved him again – sending him staggering against the tunnel wall. ‘Go now! Get the lad safe.’

  He looked at Karkus and knew only one of them would leave this place alive. Whichever way it went; he couldn’t win - the outcome for him was either death or insufferable grief. But if he died the boy and the exorcist wouldn’t be far behind. They had a head start, but Karkus would soon hunt them down.

  Not for twenty years had he bested his brother in combat. Not since Karkus’s first entry to the Zilgar games had anyone bested him. His chances were grim. But if he was to have any chance at all, he needed to fight with conviction. So, as his fingers tightened on his swords he hardened his heart, locking away all thoughts of the brother he loved and mustering his blood lust. He took another step into the cavern and glared at the other toruck whispering, ‘You are not my brother.’