by Prax Venter
"I am truly sorry, my Queen, that my son attacked you. A caravan from the north comes but once a month to trade with us. It's mostly wild beasts sniffing for food that we see from the vast desert to the south. Allow me to make amends by providing a simple meal and some water."
Ahnix looked over at Mark, and he gave her a half smile. He knew she was quietly reveling in this Queen business he started. She deserved it. She looked back at Donovan and nodded her consent to be served.
The older man yelled out, suddenly, "Dreya! Can you come out and meet our guests?"
There was a muffled commotion from the tent they were sitting near. One of the flaps at the entrance opened with a flourish, and a tall, dark woman with long and mostly gray hair stepped out.
She was holding a large sewing needle and a piece of leather in her hands, but they fell to the dried dirt at her feet the second she saw Ahnix.
The regal cat-girl regarded the newcomer with her standard, disinterested resting-bitch-face. Mark stood up and smiled and nodded a greeting, as he was taught to do when a woman entered the room.
Dreya looked from Ahnix to Mark, to Donovan, and then back to Ahnix.
Donovan spoke up and introduced everyone. "This is Dreya, my beloved. Dreya this is Mark, a Collector. And Ahnix, a Queen from the desert. Please fetch us some water and a few skewers of meat and onions for our guests, won't you?"
Dreya nodded slowly and backed away from the group never taking her eyes off of Ahnix.
Mark was getting the feeling that people around here weren't used to seeing Enthralled. He was no expert and had only seen one other small town, but the world did seem to have changed a lot while he was asleep in that tomb. Mark sat back down after the woman had left.
Ahnix asked her question again, "Tell me, where is the river?"
"The Vull is blocked to the east, deep in the Jungle, by a tear in the world. Its sparkling waters bringing life to this land is yet another of my grandfather's grandfather's stories. It is said the world is dying. Every ten years or so, fueled by another generation's courage and desperation, the village sends out an expedition to divert the mighty river's flow with the sweat of our brow and the strength of our backs. If we could encourage it to move around the tear... but the task is truly hopeless. There are residents, vicious savages, deep in the jungle that will kill and eat you. The work alone would be nigh insurmountable. The dangers make it impossible."
Mark took that as his queue, "Donovan, I am a Collector, sent here from beyond the borders of this realm on a quest to heal your world. I am blessed with the ability to heal tears like the one you mentioned. I will go and bring the Vull back to Auxuma Village."
As soon as Mark finished what he thought was a truly heroic speech, Donovan’s son, Fayit threw his head back and brayed with laughter.
"Goatshit," he said. "Can you turn the sands to sugar, too?"
Mark could feel Ahnix bristle next to him. Her claws came out involuntarily, and she focused on the young man whom she had almost eviscerated.
"Mark will do the things he says," she said, in a low voice.
"I'm not afraid of you," he said, clutching his magic crossbow to his chest.
Mark saw an opportunity here.
"I'll make you a deal, Fayit. If I bring the sparkling, clear waters of the Vull rushing back to your little village, you give me Myriad, your crossbow. If I can't do it, Ahnix and I will never show our faces in your lands again."
Fayit looked over to his father, who just nodded solemnly. With his father behind him, he felt empowered.
"Ha! Deal. When do you leave?"
Mark stood and walked over to the young man who cowered slightly at his approach. Mark offered his hand to Fayit, to shake on their deal. After a moment of hesitation, the young man reached up and shook his hand. Mark made sure to catch his father's eye. He wanted to make sure everyone knew what the agreement was. Donovan gave Mark a nod as well.
"We leave in the morning. That is if your father here will let us spend one night within the shelter of your walls?"
"Of course. I will have a tent made ready for you."
Mark flashed a grin, "Excellent."
The ocean of stars spilled out across the darkening sky above as they feasted on charred goat meat and fresh water. Mark asked where the water came from and Donovan explained that the villagers had to walk a seven-mile round trip to get it.
Donovan told them more stories his grandparents had told him and spoke of the tears in the land and how they came to be. The firelight danced on his old, weathered face as he spoke.
"A long time ago, one man disavowed a powerful Enthralled after promising her he would stay with her forever. Her sorrow was so great it shattered the Crystal Heart into three shards and sent the pieces careening through the land, and where they touched, a rend was torn open. After a time, the shards had finally come to rest, scattered to the ends of the world."
Ahnix was rapt during Donovan's telling of this story, nodding along as if she lived it herself.
Later, in the privacy of their tent, Ahnix held onto him tightly while he stroked the soft fur on her back. She fell asleep, purring contently, with her head on his chest.
Mark was exhausted and wished dearly for the blissful darkness of sleep, but he couldn't stop contemplating how he was ever going to tell Ahnix that the legend about breaking the heart of the world was actually about him.
- 7 -
They woke with the rising sun and made ready to leave the village. Mark handed Donovan one of the silver pieces they found at the ruined outpost in exchange for a few strips of dried meat and a refill on their waterskin. At first, Donovan said a silver was far too much, but Mark insisted. They thanked Donovan and his family and then exited the village through the south gate.
All they had to do was follow the riverbed to the east, and they should run right into the tear. He hoped it would be that easy. If he squinted, Mark thought he could actually see the trees of the jungle, far ahead of them.
They were ten minutes away from the village when Ahnix turned to look at Mark as they were walking.
"What?" he asked, a smile growing on his face.
"Thank you, Mark. What you said back there on the watchtower- about taking orders. You are an honorable man."
"Hey, I try. And you are one badass cat-girl."
"Girl?" she said, tilting her head slightly.
"Woman?"
"Queen," she corrected him. He saw the edges of her perpetual frown curl up just a little, showing off her tiny fangs before she returned her gaze forward to scan the path ahead for danger.
They walked until the sun was at its zenith in the middle of the sky before they started to see the jungle spring up around them on the sides of the dusty riverbed. The transition happened very quickly, and twenty minutes later they were flanked to either side by towering, vine-covered trees.
Before long, Ahnix pointed out that she could see the tear up ahead and that it looked enormous. Mark's senses weren’t as finely tuned, but he eventually saw the chaotic mess of static and visual corruption spread across their path. All he had to do was climb up one of the sides of the riverbank, shove his hand in and, presto change-o; raging river.
He thought perhaps it would probably be a good idea walk around the edge of the tear to see precisely how far the corruption went. Mark still had no idea how this all worked, and there might be a limit to how big of a tear he could handle.
His thoughts were scattered when Ahnix whispered next to him, "Mark, we're being watched. Too many. Just keep walking."
He did what he was told. They kept walking, and Mark tried to perceive the danger she was talking about without looking like he was trying.
All he could see or hear were the brightly colored birds in trees that he had just been ignoring as ambient background. Should they have been so bold as to just walk in the open along the riverbed?
A spear hurtled from the trees and impaled the dirt a few feet in front of them, and they both stopped, scan
ning the tree line. Ahnix was in full battle mode, swiveling around for anything to maul.
"Be calm. It was a warning shot. Let's not start something we can't finish," Mark whispered, thinking that they really needed to stop walking into ambushes.
A gargling voice called out from the trees. "The King of the Jungle demands to know what you and your Enthralled are doing trespassing on his domain!"
Mark tried to think quickly. Maybe he could get another quest out of this if he played his cards right- well, maybe at least he wouldn’t get them skewered.
He yelled back, not sure where to direct his voice. "I have come to solve the King's problems- if he will let me."
A short time passed, and then, all along the treeline, figures emerged from the dense foliage and dark shadows. There were about ten on each side. When Mark saw exactly what it was that came crawling out of the jungle, it was hard to not show disgust on his face.
They were giant, snot-green slugs with beefy, human arms. Their mouths were dripping gashes, and they had two eye stalks with bulbous eyes at the ends near the tip of their pointed heads. Stringy mucus covered every inch of their long bodies.
The ones to the right all started to slide their way down the embankment of the dry riverbed. They all had wooden spears with sharp, stone tips and were mostly pointing them at Ahnix.
When they got close Mark could see how truly repulsive the slug-men were. Warts or pimples (or both) covered their slimy bodies, and their pupils were like a sideways hourglass. They each also had two, fleshy antennae that shared the top of their head with their eye-stalks, and were constantly moving around, as if searching for something. Sometimes they would bump into their own eyes, causing them to blink in response.
Mark put his hands up and spoke, "We're not here to fight. Take us to your Leader."
The closest one studied Mark with his bobbing eye-stalks and then gargled out orders to some slugs nearby, "You two. Go to the King, and tell him what we've found."
They dipped their eyes and slithered across to the other embankment. The slug Mark considered the one in command spoke again, jabbing his spear at him.
"You, move."
He didn't see the need to start anything with these burly armed slime monsters, so he caught Ahnix's eye, nodded that he had everything under control and started walking. Her tail flipped around angrily, but she followed his lead.
They climbed up the northern slope of the riverbed and joined the rest of the slug-men hiding in the shade. They all looked similar but for different shades of puke-green skin and pimple placement.
Mark and Ahnix were marched forward along the treeline, right up to the edge of the corruption. The slug-men forced them to turn left and walk alongside the unsettling wrongness of the tear. This one was definitely much, much bigger than the one he had cleared at the outpost, and Mark wondered what would happen if he tried and failed to heal a tear this big. Fayit's annoying laughter echoed in his ears.
They were marched at spear tip until the corruption came to an end and then they changed direction around it, always keeping the chaos of white noise to their right. It bulged in places, making them adjust their course, but it seemed like they were heading around towards the other side of it, back towards the riverbed.
Eventually, they passed under a wooden watchtower that was built so close to the tear it was almost inside it. There were other slug-men up in the tower, looking down on them.
Shortly after the watchtower. he saw a wooden city sprawling before him, hidden under the canopy of the jungle trees. In the distance he could see the rushing waters of the Vull river, just beyond the town, disappearing into the tear in the world. He heard Ahnix swiftly draw in a breath when she saw it, too.
Two unique-looking slug people wriggling toward them drew his attention. One was obviously the king he had heard about as he was much fatter than the other slug-men and had a crown made of stone around his head, his eye stalks and antennae poking out from inside it. The crown sat lopsided and looked ridiculous. He was carrying a rusty iron mace in his hand which he was probably using as a scepter.
The other slug was smaller and had various lumps hanging off its front side. Maybe it was sick. Mark counted seven, and when it got closer, he recognized them as loose, saggy breasts. What gave them away were the darker green nipples at the ends. She also wore a crown, but it was much simpler and made of dried vines. Mark assumed she must be the slug princess.
Pain erupted from his leg as the butt of a spear was jammed into the back of his knee. The hiss next to him meant that Ahnix received the same, rough treatment.
Mark shot out a hand to her wrist as her claws came out. He caught her eye with his and silently begged her not to start popping around murdering everyone. There were at least twenty to thirty, armed slug creatures around them, and they both knew it would be suicide. It was extremely hard for the fierce cat-girl, but they both went down to kneel before the Slug King of the Jungle.
"Rise, my son," he gargled in a deep voice, "and let me look at you."
Both Mark and Ahnix got back to their feet again, and the king continued, "My patrol says you had heard my summons to the scant few remaining Collectors to come and wed my daughter and Princess. Speak up, do you truly seek the hand of my beautiful Jaseen?"
Mark knew that letting his jaw hang open would get them killed, so he did the only thing he could. He played along.
"I have heard your summons and of the fabled beauty of your daughter. It is true. I, Mark the Collector have come to ask you for the honor of Princess Jaseen's hand in marriage, your grace." He looked into the blinking eyes of the slug princess standing before him and smiled. He added, "That is- if she'll have me."
He could tell Ahnix was agitated by the way her tail was jumping around behind her like it was caught in its own personal tornado, but he had to believe she was smart enough to know he was just playing along for now.
The fat king slug blinked his eyes, one after the other and spoke again. "Now wait just a moment, son. How do we know you are truly a Collector? Handsomer creatures than you have come along pretending to be what they were not." He poked the scepter in Mark's direction as he spoke.
Not wanting to involve Ahnix in any way he decided to prove it as quickly as he knew possible. He held his ring up so all could see. Once he had everyone’s attention, he kicked off a small heal on the princesses.
Slowly falling, orange sparks appeared all around her body, and the slimy slit that was her mouth hung open, drool leaking out. To Mark's dismay, all seven of her wrinkled nipples also began to ooze a yellow discharge, as well. She reached out a slender green arm to the fat king slug beside her to steady herself.
"Oh. Oh, father... this one's a keeper," she gargled.
The slug king quickly slid forward and put his hand on Mark's shoulder. The smell coming off of the fat slime bag was like piss and sour milk.
"My word! I never thought this day would come. You will fertilize many eggs in her belly and fill my kingdom with a clutch of new Collectors! Come, let me show you and your Enthralled the kingdom to which you'll be devoting yourself."
The king slinked his body sideways and pushed Mark forward with his muscular hand on his shoulder.
"Tomorrow we feast. And afterward- The ceremony! These are exciting times. Such exciting times indeed."
Mark and Ahnix were lead by the king, the princess and a few armed guards around the small wooden city. He first showed them the underground caves that served as his kingdom's living quarters. The tour didn't go in too far, thankfully, as it was pretty much all similar slimy tunnels, but Mark got the sense that he could be lost for days in their dark depths. They passed by a few slug families who dipped their eye-stalks as the royal procession passed, and he saw other slug women with the same randomly placed, seven breasts hanging off of their front sides. No one wore any clothes in the slug kingdom. Mark supposed they would just get laden with mucus anyway. Slime trails were everywhere. The smell was also something he could only t
ake for a few more minutes. He cast a glance at Ahnix, trailing behind with her eyes narrowed, and wondered how long she was going to put up with this before snapping.
Next, the king brought them back out into the fresh air of the jungle to a large wooden platform that looked down on the river- and it was quite a sight. The rushing water from the east plunged headlong into the swirling, glitching tear and they had built their city right up to its edge.
"You see," the king said, sweeping his flabby arm across the riverbank. "There are nets to catch the fish and other objects that flow toward us, and we snatch them out before disappearing forever into the Blessing that protects my kingdom."
The Blessing? They've been using the tear as a natural fortification. Mark's eyes passed over the wooden cranes and intricate net systems littered randomly by the water's edge. There were also several boats of various sizes tied up by ropes, including a large riverboat.
It didn't seem like the slug people built it, and more likely it had just washed downriver to them.
"I see you've snagged a few boats as they came your way too," Mark commented.
"Yes. Many treasures come our way. We just toss the garbage we don't want into The Blessing and- Oh! Let me show you a special prize we caught just the other day!"
The fat slug king led his entourage to a large shack made from wood planks near the riverbank. There was one slimy guard outside the door, and he snapped to attention as they approached.