Clara Mandrake's Monster

by Ibrahim S. Amin

  "There are no other gods. Only the One Goddess."

  He stood, and held a pitchfork across his body as though it were a halberd.

  "Please, leave." The priest put one leg forward. His weight shifted onto the balls of his feet. "I don't want to defile her temple."

  Fahmaia went for him. He thrust. Four prongs shot at her face. The mawlana sidestepped and cut. Her blade sliced at his forearm, struck the sleeve, and clacked against it. Fahmaia's jaws clenched. Who wore armour under a nightshirt?

  The priest swung his weapon round. The side of the pitchfork's head bashed hers. Fahmaia's legs wobbled and feet danced. Lights bloomed before her. A blur flew between them. She threw herself sideways. The pew hit her hip and knocked pain through her pelvis. She hacked at him, to keep him at bay while her vision settled. Metal clinked on metal. He twisted his weapon, trapped her blade between its tines. The snap echoed through the temple. Steel clanged and clattered on the floor. Fahmaia blinked at a stub.

  Four spikes lunged to skewer her.

  The mawlana twisted. Cloth ripped, heat tore across her side. But the prongs went past and didn't impale her. Fahmaia's left arm whipped around the pitchfork's shaft, clutched it to her body. Her right darted. One of the priest's hands shot up, snatched at her wrist. But the broken sword bit into the side of his neck. Fahmaia twisted it, widened the wound. His fingers squeezed and scratched her skin. Crimson spurted, through the light and into the darkness.

  He collapsed. The priest's eyes trembled. A pair of dice shaking in a gambler's hand. Then they were still and the rest of him stopped too.

  Fahmaia squatted over him. His nightshirt was coarse between her fingertips, closer to sackcloth than silk. She pulled the sleeve back. An ornament of some kind? No… It had the texture of tree bark, but it grew around his forearm. As much a part of his flesh as the script which flowed upon her own.

  Above her, the idol gazed into nothingness. The mawlana's eyes narrowed. Djinn and demons had power. Sorcery, to reward the fools who worshipped them.

  Fahmaia stood. She placed her hands, threw her weight against the statue. Stone grated. It toppled. The false goddess shattered on the temple floor.

  ***

  Dark figure. Wardrobe door.

  Wardrobe door. Dark figure.

  But she wasn't alone with it this time. Shouts and screams. Feet pounded. The whole world was in chaos. Had the monster scared them all? Did it matter? They couldn't save her, and she couldn't save them.

  A bang shook her bedroom.

  Clara struggled, but it had her. Pinned her down. She couldn't sit up. Couldn't… Merciless limbs melted into a clump of bedclothes. Rayya turned beside her, murmured something, yanked the blanket and tightened it across her friend's chest. Clara's eyelids quivered. Dream fragments fluttered away like moths, but the noises remained. The wardrobe swam in the shadows. Still shut. But that bang… Boots stomped somewhere beyond her bedroom. The front door… It was the middle of the night! Who'd-

  "Clara! Run!"

  "Mum?" Clara wrestled with the bedding. "Mum!"

  "Huh?" Rayya grappled with it too. "What's-"

  Ella Mandrake's shriek tore through the house and her daughter's soul. Clara's limbs quickened. They shoved, kicked. Bone bashed bone and Rayya yelped. She had to help her mum!

  The next crash was so close it was inside Clara's skull. Firelight growled and threw redness into her room. A man and woman followed. His torch painted their faces, transformed them into demons. Both held swords.

  Rayya screamed and scrambled. She tumbled off the opposite side of the bed. Blankets and legs snagged Clara and she went over too. They fell in a tangle, between the bed and the window.

  "Mum!"

  Clara threw everything off. She stood and shouted and the Kharjis came. The woman put her boot on the mattress. Blood glistened on its toe. Ella's scream echoed in Clara's brain.

  "I'm sorry, child," the woman said.

  The Kharji's legs tensed to launch her. The man moved towards the foot of the bed. His torch roared and burned and their swords were made of fire.

  The wardrobe door opened.

  5

  Rayya Shimud knew she'd gone mad. The floorboards beneath her feet, the pain where Clara kicked her, the scent of burning, were too real for nightmare. So this must all be insanity. The Kharjis with their flames and bloody swords. Ella Mandrake's scream. Clara standing there, a statue-girl. Crazy Clara who believed in the wardrobe-monster. And if Clara was crazy, so was she. Because she saw it too.

  The man spun round. The woman turned, one foot on the bed, one still on the floor, like she was posing for a portrait. It squatted inside the wardrobe, stayed there for half a second. Then it sprang, all purple fur and spindly limbs. And claws. Bright pink claws.

  Swords slashed. The monster howled. Fingers raked.

  Blood and madness painted the room.

  But Clara didn't move, didn't even blink. And Rayya couldn't either. Mad statue-girls, watching murderers and monster fight. Rayya screamed. Clara Mandrake came to life and grabbed at the shutters.

  Claws tore the woman's face. The Kharji shrieked.

  "Rayya, go!"

  Rayya couldn't turn round. Couldn't even scream again. The Kharjis and the monster whirled in a tempest of salwars and steel, fire and fur.

  "Rayya!"

  Clara yanked her. Heaved her. Rayya was half out the window before she knew what had happened. She pulled herself the rest of the way, dropped down. Leaves crunched and squished. Chilled her soles.

  Her parents! She had to tell her parents!

  Rayya ran. Down the path. Into the lane, where a stone bit her foot and she stumbled.

  "Rayya, wait!"

  But she couldn't. She needed to get home. Her mum and dad would protect them. They'd know what to do. More stones dug and gouged. She didn't slow down. She ran towards the brightness and the crackle-growl noise. Towards the bonfire that didn't make sense, because it wasn't the festival…

  She stopped. Her insides sank. They fell through her body and the earth below.

  Her house burned. Fire blazed across the roof, hurled smoke into the sky, and cast its devil light over everything. The garden. The gateposts. The two heaps that lay beside them, at the Kharji's feet. Her sword was almost black.

  Clara screamed in her ear, but the words bubbled. Underwater sounds that made no sense and never would. Fingers crushed Rayya's hand. They pulled and her arm shot after them. The rest of her followed. Her legs worked on their own, and she ran with Clara. They hurtled off the lane, over the leaves and grass, towards the trees.

  Towards the shadow that became a Kharji.

  Rayya's arm jerked and she staggered. The Kharji charged. Clara turned and spun Rayya right round. They ran back towards the lane. Where the woman waited with her sword.

  The girls stood there, between the woman and the footfalls that pounded behind them. Rayya's fingers hurt. She didn't know if she squeezed Clara's hand or Clara squeezed hers, but she couldn't let go.

  That black sword floated towards them. The footsteps slowed, but they didn't matter anymore. There was only the sword.

  It wavered. The edge tilted. The woman screamed. The monster roared, and slashed her again. She fell onto her knees, cut at it to fend it off. But the monster mauled her and half her face flapped.

  Clara whirled Rayya around again. The other Kharji was in front of them, but he stared over their shoulders. They ran and he did too. He stormed past, towards the monster and the shrieks and the butcher shop sounds. The girls sprinted for the woods.

  Rayya's foot landed on a root and it should've hobbled her. But the pain was dull and faraway. So was the cold that lashed her through the nightshirt. Her legs too. They pumped and so did her lungs, but she felt neither till her chest crunched inside and she stumbled instead of running.

  Their hands parted. Rayya heaved air into her body and Clara gasped too. They both shook. Somewhere, a dozen yards or miles away, things shouted and crashed and blazed
.

  "Need… Need to hide," Clara said.

  She dashed off and Rayya groped after her. But Clara didn't disappear. Her nightshirt flitted through the shadows, this way and that, until she cried out. She took hold of Rayya again. Her hand burned. Cold throbbed through the rest of Rayya's flesh.

  "In there. Go on!"

  She drove Rayya to the ground and scrabbled beside her like a dog burying bones. Then Rayya saw it, in the mound at the foot of the tree. Among its roots. A gap. Clara pushed her and Rayya scrambled. Wood scraped her skull. The bottom half of her face gouged the earth. Dirt and grit smeared her lips, invaded her mouth, her nose. The taste of soil smothered her. She tumbled into a space, bigger than she'd expected. Things caught in her hair, tore at her nightdress.

  Clara slithered in and swept her arms outside the hole. Leaves rustled. She drew a heap of them towards her, then another. The moonlight faded. Darkness enveloped them.

  They huddled and Rayya clung to Clara's heat. Her jaw shook. A million things burst in her brain and her eyes burst too. She bawled, but strength flooded out with the tears, drained her in seconds. Sobs racked her body. Water stung her cheeks.

  Clara held her.

  ***

  The moan carried far. It reached Fahmaia even amid the exaltations to Allat, the fire's roar, and the last of the screams. A human throat cried animal pain. It twanged inside her heart, drew her footsteps. The mawlana grimaced and vowed she'd find whichever warrior had done this. These villagers must die. But that didn't mean the One Goddess' followers should leave them to suffer. Fahmaia took out her knife.

  She rounded the burning building and the moan came again. This time it mangled the first words of a prayer. Fahmaia's knife slid back into its sheath.

  The air reeked of blood and waste. Two lumps lay on the grass, and for a second she couldn't tell which still lived. Wounds lacerated their flesh. Gore littered the ground around them. No blade did this. Fahmaia crouched and her gaze swept the trees, but there wasn't any sign of a bear or other beast.

  "…lana…"

  Red fingers groped at her face. She took them. He tried to grip her but his digits trembled. She squeezed so they wouldn't slip away.

  "Girl…" The warrior's other hand quivered, pointed, then slapped back down. Something squelched beneath it. "Gir…"

  His lips widened, closed, twisted. He tried to talk again but breath, blood, and soul came out together. Fahmaia set his hand down.

  "Allat welcome them both," she whispered.

  The mawlana looked around. One warrior's sword had fared no better than her own, and half a blade glinted in the grass. The other weapon lay intact. But the woman's bowels had spilled across its handle, and she couldn't bring herself to touch it. No matter. Fahmaia doubted the blade could overcome a bear's savagery. She'd have to trust in the One Goddess.

  The mawlana entered the forest. She imagined the young woman blundering among the trees while fear drove her on, scrambled her thoughts, hammered her heart.

  Fahmaia Hashad's knife would grant the girl a swift end.

  ***

  The girl was close. Her scent hung amid the aroma of dead and dying leaves. His claws tingled. Fur bristled along his forearms. His wounds widened. A dozen slits vomited blood onto his purple hide.

  Xerachus loped through the forest, but his left leg buckled and autumn crunched under his knee.

  The monster forced his senses beyond the pain, shut out the smell of girls and guts. He found it in a tree. An opening two feet higher than his head. Darkness beckoned, where the moon couldn't trespass.

  He climbed. His injuries howled, but he scrambled up the trunk and didn't gouge its bark. No sign, if anyone came. Xerachus poured himself into the hollow, among odours of bird and squirrel. The dark embraced him. It enveloped his essence and soothed his mind. He sloughed into slumber.

  Xerachus dreamt of meat that quivered beneath his claws. Of gasps and screams and slaughter. He dreamt of Clara Mandrake.

  ***

  Rayya's body was cold against hers. Clara clung to her. Their faces brushed and her friend's tears wet Clara's cheek. Rayya Shimud was a snow-girl, melting in her arms.

  Another girl wept too. Grief broke her bones, ground her organs to mush. But she was buried somewhere. No water fell from Clara Mandrake's eyes.

  The monster lunged through her brain, the only vibrant thing amid the numbness. Its claws sliced. Blood and bits rained on her bedroom floor. Her bedroom. Her bedroom in her home, where her mother…

  That faraway girl bawled.

  Clara tensed. Her muscles clenched, arms tightened. Rayya cried out but the yelp broke into sobs.

  "Shhh!" Clara said.

  Rayya groaned and wept and wouldn't stop. Clara put her hand over her friend's mouth. Rayya twisted, pulled away. Then she froze. Sobs still shook her, but the hand silenced them. And the other noises grew louder.

  Thuds. Rustles and crunches.

  Their hearts beat together.

  The boots stopped. Leaves choked the hole and blinded her, but Clara knew the Kharji was there, right outside. They were going to die. The Kharji would drag them out of their den, pin them to the ground, hack them to-

  More thuds. Rustles. Crunches. They faded into the forest.

  ***

  "Allatu Akbar!"

  The soldier saluted Barzik Khan, thrust her fist to the heavens, and belched. She blushed. Her face softened into one ten years younger. The warlord laughed.

  "The One Goddess provided for us." He accepted the wine bottle, glugged its sweetness, and passed it back. "Your stomach praises her generosity."

  He wandered through the square, where his warriors gathered. A few called to him and he returned their greetings.

  "Khan! Khan!" A youth held out a bloody blade. The boy looked barely old enough to shave. "See?"

  "Your first?"

  "Yes, Khan."

  Barzik ruffled the youngster's hair.

  "Remember them in your prayers tonight. The One Goddess judges them now."

  Some offered beer, wine, or chunks of roasted meat. He declined each with a smile and a shake of his head. Plunder was Allat's gift. Fighting earned refreshment. But a leader couldn't fill his belly or cloud his head just yet, and he'd already slaked his thirst.

  Barzik squatted in front of two girls. One had her salwar pulled up to her knee, while the other wrapped a length of cloth around the calf below.

  "Is it bad?" he said.

  "No," the wounded woman said.

  "Yes," the other said. "But she'll be fine if she doesn't put it through another door."

  "It was locked."

  "Next time, use this." The Khan clapped her on the shoulder. "But Allat bless your ferocity."

  At the edge of the square, a Kharji lay beside a villager. Four eyes stared at the stars. Barzik sighed. The man's family would have to mourn without a corpse. But the Goddess' edict was clear. Martyrs must lie where they fell, so she might gaze upon them in that state of perfect grace.

  "Barzik."

  "Mawlana?"

  He turned, and her breathlessness made him reach for his blade. But no enemies appeared behind her.

  "One escaped. Into the forest. A girl."

  She wiped her brow and swept stray hair behind her ear. The script quickened on Fahmaia's skin, rushed around her face.

  "The sentries?"

  "An animal attacked them. She must've got past while they fought it."

  Barzik spat. Saliva splatted on the toe of his boot.

  "Then the sacrifice…"

  "It isn't complete. The whole village must die."

  "I'll gather the warriors. We'll sweep the countryside and finish it."

  Fahmaia shook her head and pointed to the horizon. Reds and pinks bled into the blackness.

  "You should return to our brothers and sisters. Break camp, as we planned. If the infidels retaliate… Our leader and best fighters can't be spread across the fields and forests. I'll gather some warriors and find her mysel
f."

  She moved, but he caught her arm.

  "Mawlana…"

  Barzik Khan gestured at her waist. Her gaze followed his to the empty sheath.

  "It broke. I'll borrow a weapon."

  "Wait." He unbuckled his sword belt, brought the scabbard to his lips. "Take Allat's Earring."

  Her eyes widened. Her hand hovered above it.

  "This belongs to the One Goddess," he said, "not to me. And your deeds are her will."

  "Thank you." She fastened it at her side. "I'll pick my warriors and find her."

  "Allatu Akbar."

  "Allatu Akbar."

  They clasped hands, then she jogged away.

  Barzik prayed the Goddess would forgive them their failure. And he prayed for the girl, whom the mawlana would soon cut down.

  Part 2

  Orphans' Road

  6

  Silas straightened his shoulders, sucked in his gut, and clasped his hands behind his back. Minutes passed. Morning light drifted across the floor and wall. His posture threatened to give way, but Silas held it in check. When Katrina opened her chamber door, she wouldn't find him slacking and slouching like a wastrel.

  Another minute crept by. Silas' muscles ached. He gave in, and paced the corridor. But his footsteps echoed. Each one announced him to the world — Silas the trespasser, slinking through the girls' dormitory. He stood to attention again.

  Should he just knock? What if that enraged her? A trainee demanding a mistress' presence, as though her time belonged to him instead of the other way around. What if she told him to raise his hands, and punched him up and down the corridor for his impudence?

  Silas waited. The door waited too.

  What if he was supposed to knock? This could be a test. Katrina von Talhoffer wouldn't want a coward for an apprentice. A weak, snivelling wretch too timid to even announce himself.

  He cleared his throat. He cleared it again, just to be sure. An attack of morning mouth wasn't going to garble his words. Not today, of all days. He raised his hand. Paused. Maybe the door was about to open anyway…

  Silas Renshaw knocked.

  "Mistress von Talhoffer? I…"

  The door creaked. It gave way a few inches.