Ambrosia

by Aaron Lee Yeager

  “If I have to keep using my magic to save you guys every time, I’m not going to last much longer. You guys need to pull your weight.”

  Agaprei left Storgen’s ankle and walked up to Philiastra with a fresh bandage.

  “Don’t touch me, siren,” Philiastra snapped. “I can heal my own wounds.”

  Erolina inspected her ruined sword as they fixed themselves up. The acid had eaten it down to a pockmarked core.

  “Awww. That was my favorite sword.”

  She tossed it aside as she sat down, pulling out her water pouch for a good long draught.

  Storgen held out his hand. “Wait, don’t!”

  Erolina spit out her mouthful, black tar splattering on the quivering floor. “By the fates!”

  “I forgot to tell you. Time can flow in weird ways here. It can be hard to keep things fresh.”

  Agaprei and Philiastra took out their packs, and found all the food they had brought was rotten and rancid.

  Storgen fished in his pocket and pulled out his half-eaten snake. “Lunch, anyone?”

  The girls all groaned.

  ~

  Storgen led them farther and farther down, until they reached the edge of a giant chasm. It seemed to go down forever, only the faintest speck of light at the very bottom betraying its true depths.

  Above them was a great collection of brass and lead pipes. Like a bundle of serpents, they twisted and intertwined with one another, jets of blue steam escaping from pressure valves, and traces of green, alchemic energies running over their surfaces.

  “This is good,” Storgen commented as he looked at the pipes. “We’re directly above the city of Apelpisménos.”

  The girls peeked over the edge and looked down into the darkness.

  “Not much of a city, is it?”

  Storgen prostrated himself and placed his ear against the smooth black rock, listening carefully.

  The girls all looked at one another doubtfully.

  There was a small tremor, and suddenly Storgen secured his pack and flipped up into a handstand. “Everyone stand on your hands.”

  “What?”

  “Stand. On. Your. Hands.”

  “You can’t be serious.”

  “I mean it, hurry.”

  They watched him as he walked on his hands to the edge of the cliff.

  “He’s lost his mind.”

  “I knew it was a mistake to eat that snake.”

  “If you don’t you might break your necks!”

  Reluctantly the girls flipped over, and not a second too soon. When a third tremor occurred, the ground fell away before them, and they found themselves falling up towards the pipes above. They flailed their arms, trying to get their bearings as the world seemed to instantly reverse itself around them.

  They landed hard on the pipes, Philiastra nearly slipping off before Storgen caught her. The cliff and chasm were now above them forming a ceiling, the pipes below them forming a floor.

  “Perfect,” Storgen said, dusting off his hands. “Now we can descend into the city.”

  Erolina looked around. “We were upside down that whole time?”

  “Yup.”

  Agaprei pointed up. “So, that light we saw…?”

  “That is sunlight from higher up,” Storgen explained. “This is one of the few places in the tower where it can be seen. There’s a window waaaay up there, but it’s way too small to crawl through. Believe me, I’ve tried.”

  “How can you know all this?” Philiastra wondered.

  Storgen reached into his belt and removed a worn book cover. Inside, was the faded piece of parchment, where as a child he had drawn his first picture of Agaprei. Carefully he flipped it over, revealing an intricate and detailed drawing on the other side, the lines so fine and close together, it looked almost like a giant fingerprint.

  “You made a map,” Erolina realized.

  Storgen nodded. “Every time I escaped, I explored farther and farther, adding a little bit each time. And every time they caught me, they mounted this drawing again opposite my cage. They never once looked at the back.”

  “That’s brilliant.”

  “How many times did that take?” Philiastra wondered.

  Storgen put the map away. “It doesn’t matter. Come over here, there’s a pressure door we can use.

  “Hey,” Agaprei pressed. “How many times?”

  Storgen paused. “One hundred and four.”

  All the girls looked at him sadly.

  “But hey,” he said, trying to sound cheerful. “On the hundred and fifth time, I got out, so silver lining, eh?”

  He opened the pressure door, and led them down into the city.

  Apelpisménos was a city in name only. It was more like a sprawling refugee camp built amid the countless pipes. Dilapidated structures constructed from garbage, build haphazardly one on top of another, crushing those below. Trickles of glowing polluted water, catacombs of filthy walls, a realm of grey, splattered only occasionally with the colored accents of blood and bile. A light rain of autumn leaves fell from above, but when Philiastra allowed one to land on her hand, she could see they were not leaves, but falling scales of rust from deteriorating pipes far above.

  The people were utterly silent, so filthy that only the whites of their eyes made them distinguishable from the piles of black garbage around them. They looked out fearfully as Storgen and the girls passed, their brutal and short lives having taught them nothing but violence. They didn’t speak, even when Storgen greeted them, skulking away as if expecting some deception. When he held out his hand, they flinched away, as if anticipating an attack.

  Storgen led them silently through the maze of streets, starving people huddled against the pipes for warmth, gnawing on the remnants of a rat, a centipede, or in many cases, a fallen comrade. They didn’t even seem like humans, more like starving wolves. Their long, unkempt fingernails like claws, their rotting yellow teeth like fangs. Even their eyes seemed wolf-like somehow.

  Storgen turned a corner and stopped in his tracks. Everything before them was in ruin, massive girders snapped like twigs, stone foundations as big as a building collapsed in a heap.

  “Oh…great!”

  Storgen held up his fist to punch the stone, but managed to hold back.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “We may have a slight problem.”

  “Define ‘slight problem.’”

  “As in this whole section of the tower has collapsed. Probably when the upper spires exploded.”

  “And I’m hoping the problem is slight because we can use an alternate route?” Erolina suggested.

  “This is no alternate route. Or if there is, I don’t know it. This was a pinch point.”

  “So by that you mean the problem is slight because we’ll have to go off the map?” Agaprei asked.

  “We go off the map we could be lost for years. Or even decades.”

  “Then why is the problem slight?” Philiastra demanded.

  Storgen pointed his thumb behind them. The girls turned to see that most of the city dwellers had vanished. The few that remained were slipping away through cracks and scurrying into holes.

  “The people of the city betrayed us. They alerted the Efarmostís.”

  Shambling on strong sturdy legs, four giant figures pushed their way through the streets, pipes snapping and houses crumbling as they brushed past. Easily twice as tall as a man, they were a gross amalgamation of flesh and machine. Brass cables protruding from grey, necrotic flesh, green alchemic energy pulsing through copper tubes running through dry slabs of muscle and sinew.

  “Ugh, what are those things?”

  Storgen turned around, trying to put on a brave face. “Apelpisménos is the eastern edge of Master Kynigó’s domain. Those are his agents. The Ptóma.”

  “So the problem is slight because…”

  “Because if they kill us, it won’t matter if we’re lost.”

  Erolina took out a silver handle, and with a quick flip
it extended into a long spear. “Ever the optimist.”

  Red pupils burned in sunken eyes as the monsters caught sight of them, howling like gorillas as they broke into an ambling sprint.

  Erolina held her ground at the point, the lead ptóma rearing up and smashing down at her with both fists. She dodged out of the way, moving so fast she seemed to simply vanish as his fists crashed down, shattering the concrete and sending out a shockwave that nearly threw Storgen and Agaprei off their feet.

  Erolina appeared behind him, stabbing him square in the back with her spear. The silver tip pierced the pallid flesh and dug in deep, but the creature didn’t even seem to notice, turning back and slapping at her with a giant rotting hand.

  “It’s like stabbing a brick wall.”

  Erolina ducked below the clumsy attack, digging the spear deeper as she turned aside, just in time for the next creature in line to take a swing at her. Deftly, she lifted her spear handle, lining it up with the incoming fist, then leapt away. The second ptóma punched the spear, ramming it straight through his companion, the tip punching through his chest in a splatter of brass cables and green fluids.

  The third ptóma shoved past its companions and ran at Philiastra on all fours, beating its chest with its knuckles and breathing out a gout of fire from his festering mouth.

  Quick as lightning, Philiastra loosed two arrows, the living wood burrowing deep into the beast’s putrid knees, then jumped high in the air to avoid the flame. At her command, the arrows grew within the creature, powerful roots sprouting out of the rotten flesh and digging straight into the concrete. His feet rooted in place, the ptóma came crashing down, nearly crushing Storgen as he jumped out of the way.

  Philiastra deftly landed atop his back and fired an arrow directly into the base of the monster’s neck, green electricity sparking out of the wound as the creature grabbed hold of the roots and tore them free. With frightening speed for its size, the ptóma flipped over, trying to squash Philiastra beneath him, but she back flipped atop a brass pipe and fired two more arrows into his neck.

  Storgen dodged a fist like a pile driver from the fourth ptóma, then grabbed the arm and hit the joint with the flat of his palm, breaking the moldering joint with a snap.

  Unfazed, the monster threw a kick with his rancid foot, smashing a giant pipe to pieces as Storgen rolled out of the way, kicking his knee hard against the side of the ptóma’s ankle, breaking the joint.

  Without even so much as a whimper, the ptóma grabbed Storgen and picked him up with both hands.

  “These things are practically immune to pain,” he cried out, the vice-like hands squeezing down harder and harder on him.

  A bag of sparkling sand hit the ptóma in the face, and it howled in agony, dropping Storgen as it pawed in anguish at its eyes.

  Agaprei adjusted her spectacles.

  His hip is misaligned by seven degrees, his shoulders have tilted to compensate. Blinded, he will favor a sliding backhand strike. Slide underneath, then sever the Achilles tendons. He will follow up with an elbow strike. Disengage until it passes, then sever quadricept tendons. Unable to stand, he will catch himself with his arms, forcing his chin down and fanning out his spinous process. Insert blade between first and second cervical vertebrae, severing spinal chord. Total body paralysis and cessation of heart muscle: instantaneous. Brain death: six minutes.

  Agaprei charged in, sliding on one hip as the ptóma’s massive hand swatted out at her, passing so close it knicked the tips of her hair. Drawing her daggers, she made two quick slashes into the back of his ankles, then rolled away just in time to avoid his hardened elbow as it passed by with enough force to decapitate her.

  She dug her feet in and charged straight back, slashing the tendons in his knees with deliberate surgical strikes.

  The mighty ptóma collapsed under its own weight, its ruined legs folding and popping as Agaprei grabbed Storgen and pulled him free before being squashed beneath the floundering wreck.

  “Holy cow. I thought you couldn’t use magic,” Storgen commented, amazed.

  “I can’t.”

  “That looked pretty darn effective to me. If it wasn’t magic, then what was it?”

  “Crushed glass.”

  Storgen stared at her. “You threw crushed glass into his eyes?”

  “Well, it worked, didn’t it?”

  “That is so brutal.”

  The ptóma tried to prop itself up on one elbow, lashing out blindly with one arm, but Agaprei leapt up onto his hand and ran the length of his arm. Jumping up into the air, she came down hard, plunging her dagger right between the vertebrae of its spine. With a sickening whine, the construct of metal and flesh collapsed and fell silent.

  “She really is like you, isn’t she?” Philiastra commented, firing three more arrows into her opponent before jumping away, the pipe she was standing on engulfed in flame as the ptóma vomited another jet of fire at her.

  Philiastra fired one last shot as she flipped through the air, striking the ptóma through the eye and burrowing deep into whatever putrid organ existed inside its skull.

  “Not too shabby, eh?” she boasted as she landed atop the falling creature.

  With one last reflexive flick. it smacked her off its head, sending her careening into a shanty as the ptóma tumbled lifelessly to the ground.

  “Yes, you combine the grace of a concussed cow with the fortitude of a sickly child,” Erolina teased as she continued to fight a pair of ptóma at the same time.

  “Give up,” came a mechanical voice from within the throat of the ptóma as it swung. “You are surrounded.”

  Erolina held up her hands and caught the giant fist, the concrete cracking beneath her feet as he stopped his punch cold. “You don't have me surrounded, you merely have put me in a target rich environment.”

  She yanked hard, tearing the monsters arm clean off, alchemic lighting vomiting forth from the stump as she spun around, clubbing the second one in the head so hard it was lifted off its feet, cartwheeling into a trio of buildings.

  A spear through its chest and grasping the bloody stump of its arm, the ptóma turned and fled, dripping a trail of green ooze on the ground behind it.

  “I got it.”

  Philiastra climbed up atop the wreckage of the shanty and fired an arrow, but as it sailed past Erolina, she held up her shield and deflected the shot into a wall.

  The fleeing ptóma turned a corner, and then it was gone.

  “What is wrong with your brain, Scythe?” Philiastra spat as she drew near.

  “I let him go.”

  “Yeah, I saw that. Now he’ll bring back twice as many with him.”

  “Yes, but before he does, he’ll return to Kynigó to report on what just happened.”

  “So?”

  Erolina pointed to the trail of bile. “So, Storgen may not know the way around the collapsed section, but that thing does.”

  Storgen’s eyes lit up. “He’ll lead us around it. That’s brilliant, Erolina.”

  “And if we lose the trail?” Agaprei cautioned.

  “Not a problem.”

  Erolina took out a small cube and shook it. The liquid inside began to glow, revealing a small, spinning gimbal suspended in the fluid. “This is paired to my tracking spear. No matter where he goes in the tower, this will point straight at it.”

  “That’s amazing.”

  “Well done, Scythe,” Agaprei praised.

  The wreckage of the garbage began to stir behind them.

  “Yeah, well, I don’t think it’s that amazing at all,” Philiastra noted. “It’s not like she invented those devices. If anything, we should be praising the alchemist who made her kit, not her…”

  The injured ptóma burst up from the wreckage and grabbed Philiastra by the legs. She fell to the ground, trying to scramble away as he lifted up his fist to crush her.

  Erolina heaved back and threw her shield, hitting the monster in the throat and decapitating it wholly. The dead body crumpled away a
s Philiastra pulled herself free from the now limp hand.

  “You…you saved me…” Philiastra gasped, her green eyes wide with fright.

  Storgen folded his arms. “You threw your shield. I thought that wasn’t what shields were for.”

  Erolina gave him a little wink. “Well, you see I once knew this street fighter, and he taught me the value of unorthodox attacks.”

  Philiastra tried to catch her breath. “I nearly died…”

  She looked up at Erolina. “Thank you.”

  Instead of the usual bravado, Erolina looked sad to hear it. “You should not be thanking me. I was only doing my duty protecting a member of my party.”

  “All the same…thanks.”

  Philiastra stood up and offered her hand warmly. Erolina looked as if as if she wanted to take it, her hand even began to rise up of its own accord, but then became a fist as she turned away in shame. “We should get going, while the trail is fresh.”

  The others looked at one another in confusion as Erolina grabbed her things and took off after the injured ptóma.

  * * *

  Storgen hefted himself up the rope and grabbed hold of the stone ledge. Above them was a horizontal staircase, and below them was a river of blood winding through the air like a floating serpent. The trail of drips they were tracking vanished beneath a stone wall. As the girls climbed up behind him, he carefully inspected the stonework.

  “There doesn’t appear to be any switches or levers…”

  Erolina cracked her knuckles. “You might want to stand back.”

  With a titanic crack, she punched the stone wall, shattering it inwards.

  “Okay, since when can she punch through walls?” Philiastra griped.

  Erolina stepped into the wet corridor beyond, a wet sludge trickling along the floor, having washed away the trail. “What are you talking about? Amazons have always been stronger than the rest of you.”

  Agaprei crossed her hands. “That doesn’t add up, I’ve seen your fights, you’ve never been this strong before.”

  “Has it ever occurred to you that maybe I was holding back all this time?”

  “No way, I don’t buy it.”

  Erolina pulled out her gimbal, the arrow pointing straight ahead, what they figured was more or less north. She leaned back and punched through another wall, spattering her comrades with bits of stone and masonry. Beyond was a twisted hallway, the floor slowly becoming the wall, then the ceiling, as they walked through it.