Prophets of the Ghost Ants

by Clark Thomas Carlton

  Sometime later, the Great Jag came to an abrupt end and yielded to the narrow clearing of the Petiole, the channel used by Palzhanite ants to reach the vegetation bordering the Dustlands. The Hulkrites attacked Palzhad from here once, Anand thought, and they may come this way again.

  Scents of sulfur and decay reached Anand’s nose as he next flew over the Tar Marsh. He looked down on the murky bogs that stretched from the Petiole to the Slope’s distant border in the east. Leaf-cutters were parading over the natural stone bridge that thrust above the Marsh and led to Culzhwhitta in the southeast. And surely they might march over this bridge, Anand thought.

  So many ways to destroy us.

  As he flew past the Slope’s border, Anand looked down on the grain-bearing weeds that filled the Seed Eaters’ country. Atop their stalks were harvester ants of the grinding caste. When the hungry locust sensed ripe grain, it coasted towards the grinders, who raised their gasters and wagged them. They sprayed an acrid repellent that sent the locust back into flight.

  Anand coughed on the spray and veered the insect towards the Slope’s capital. The return flight home was full of dives and dips as the locust fought the southbound wind. The wind always blows south in this season, he remembered.

  Anand was sick with fear as he flew to Venaris to inspire a new army. Will any recruits be at the stadium? Has anyone passed my message? Then another thought invaded his mind. Do these sedites even deserve their own country? he asked himself as his old hatred returned. Likely, I will have to wage this war with the Dneepers alone. He saw the stadium from its south side, its stands as dark as night in the shadows.

  It was all too quiet as he guided the locust into a spiraling pattern to make his approach. Blinded with sunshine, his eyes ached as they adjusted to the sudden shade and his ears were met with silence. His disappointment was crushing yet familiar—had no one come? As his eyes opened to the shade, he looked up in disbelief to see that the stands were filled. The Venarite laborers had filtered in by castes, taken their usual seats and waited in dutiful silence. It was not all of them, but there were thousands. The first sound they made was a collective gasp as a pink-skinned locust-rider landed in the arena.

  Anand caught his breath, and then coaxed the locust to crawl into position behind the amplifying-cones. The crowd watched in confusion as he squeezed his water bladder into his palms. They were gasping again, loudly whispering as he washed away the sugar powder to reveal his brown skin.

  “My name is Vof Quegdoth,” he shouted, “and I . . . am one . . . of you!”

  The laborers jumped to their feet, clapped their hands and filled the heavens with cheering. Anand felt as if he was floating on the waves of their applause and he could not help but chuckle. Through the blur of his watering eyes he saw the Venarites shaking the idols of Locust plucked from their altars. Some waved flags with hastily painted images of the Sky God. Anand was glad the cheering continued, for he needed the moments to gather himself.

  “Sons and daughters of Locust,” he began, and the crowd exploded again. “Not to wage this war against the Hulkrites means forfeiting your life. Winning this war means winning a place in the New Country . . . a place where every man and woman will have the rights and dignities of a noble.”

  As the crowd roared in response, Anand imagined the priests shuddering in their rectories. Laborers who had been reluctant to attend were rushing to the stadium now, eager to hear the message of the Dark-skinned Savior.

  A few days later, Anand, his tribesmen and the earliest Venarite recruits rode on ants and roaches to the weeds south of Palzhad to make the first of their camps. Anand sighted the white rock with spider-webbed veins and halted the procession to unearth the articles he had buried so long ago. In secret, he donned his Dranverish armor, so light and yet so difficult to penetrate. It was almost comfortable to wear under his clothing, silent when he moved, and completely imperceptible.

  As they had been instructed, the Dneepers were breeding roaches by nursing every hatchling and gorging them with food to force their growth. Anand added to their duties by asking them to capture and cage locusts for an air force. The Slopeish recruits were assigned to the building of leaf shelters and then to the collecting of the locusts’ foods. The next wave of recruits was put to clearing weeds and digging pits on the southern perimeter of the Petiole.

  At an informal assembly of what was becoming the New Laborers Army, the soldiers segregated, out of habit, into yellow-brown, brown, and dark brown formations. They encircled Anand when he entered a cage to fit a locust with reins and rigs. He had given other sets to the Britasyte craftswomen to reproduce by the hundreds, including the prod for the pilot’s mouth.

  Before he made his first flying demonstration, Anand donned a fat and mysterious turban, then strapped refilled shells of roach eggs to his thighs. Standing atop the locust’s cage, he addressed the Slopeites, Dneepers, and Britasytes in all their different tongues.

  “Every willing man and woman among you is as capable of this as I am,” he shouted. “You will have to practice, master it on your own, and then teach ten others.” The gate was opened, the locust leapt out, and Anand found the patch that coaxed the locust into a level spiral. As it went higher, he ripped open the turban and smashed the shells on his thighs to release streams of red powder. They drizzled onto the crowd to color their faces and hair.

  Anand coasted to the ground and shifted pinkies instead of thumbs to the roots of the antennae to land. He realized his mistake too late and the locust responded with a too sudden halt. It threw him over the locust’s head, where he dangled in the reins. “That’s how you should not land,” he said. As he swung, he expected a barrage of laughter but looked around to see faces stunned with admiration.

  Even my mistakes are working in my favor, he thought.

  A short time later, the Britasytes distributed new reins and riggings based on Anand’s model. Sitting astride a dead locust, Anand demonstrated how to rig a flyer, then gave instruction in the essential steering, landing, and docking techniques. The Slopeites did not ask direct questions, but observed in silence and questioned each other in whispers. The Britasytes were impatient to fly, and before Anand approved, they were rigging the locusts in their own fashion and taking the first erratic flights.

  Ignoring Anand’s command not to “fly too far south,” several students were dumped in the Dustlands and it took them days to walk back. The end result was a loss of a number of insects and their riggings. He commanded the disobedient to capture new locusts and was enraged that they may have been sighted or captured by Hulkrites. “Because you are Britasytes does not mean you are above our regulations,” he scolded.

  The most competent of the new pilots were Dneepers, who approached the new discipline with fearlessness and determination. Confined by vegetation all their lives, flying gave the Grass men an unbounded exhilaration. As Anand trained them, he realized they already had a hierarchy in place with established officers. These are my natural captains, he thought, and I will assign each of them to his own company. And after that, I’ll appoint men and women from the Slopeish servants caste who can interpret for the laborers and the Dneepish captains whose language is so close to the nobles’ own.

  While the pilots perfected their flying, Anand scheduled appearances at the stadiums of key mounds and sent messengers to announce the day and time of his arrival. He knew that to make the best impression he needed the right costume. A smile came to his lips when he realized the garment he needed had likely been sewn already. He flew to Cajoria but not before making a quick reconnaissance over Hulkren’s northernmost mound.

  From above, the deep blue of the Great Brackish Lake was startling. Its waters seemed to stretch forever in the east. To the south of its shores, Jatal-dozh was all too quiet. Anand could not smell the carnal odor of ghost ants nor sight any Hulkrish warriors or slaves. Had all at the northernmost outpost been recalled to the Hulkrites’ center for redeployment? Was Jatal-dozh truly abandoned or were t
he Hulkrites in the tunnels brewing some new offense?

  Were the Hulkrites coming at all?

  CHAPTER 50

  HIDDEN FEELINGS

  It was nearing sunset when Anand reached Cajoria and landed his locust outside the midden. He called to Yormu at the carrion piles and to Terraclon who ran from the chamber pots to wash his hands. The rest of the middenites halted in their tasks to gape at the stranger sitting on a locust. Anand grinned to be regarded with religious awe in the place where he had suffered as a half-caste. Terraclon approached and watched Anand pat his flyer’s head with the flat of his hand.

  “Why do you smack it, Anand?”

  “To keep it still. Come up, Ter. Come up, Father.”

  Out of habit, the two looked to Keel for permission. Recognizing Anand as the infamous Dranverite, Keel turned his back in shame and pretended to be busy. Anand smiled to see Keel no longer carried his whip.

  Yormu sobbed with pride as he climbed up the locust’s leg and hugged his son. He descended to let Terraclon climb up and Anand looked at his friend’s face to see his beard had grown thick and made him handsome.

  “Have you ever seen a mirror?” Anand asked.

  “Not a real one.”

  “You’d like what you see, Ter. Do you still have the bolt of blue cloth I gave you, the mottled one?”

  “Well, yes, Anand. In a manner.”

  “How long will it take you to make me a royal-looking garment of it?”

  Terraclon chuckled. “I must confess I have already done so.”

  Anand let loose with a long, loud laugh. The middenites turned and stared at him as laughter was so rare to their ears.

  “Go and get it, please.”

  “I can’t, Anand. If someone sees I’ve sewn something in imitation of the royals, I could be . . .”

  “Those days are over. The new way has begun and everyone dresses as it pleases them. Hurry, Ter. I haven’t much time. Locusts don’t fly once night falls.”

  When Terraclon returned with a folded garment, he looked sad.

  “Anand, I must tell you something,” he said, dropping his head.

  “No need to, Ter. I have always known. It is not stigmatized in Dranveria. It is even celebrated. You are like many of the priests on this Slope who practice it in secret, like the priests of many faiths. Our own revered Da-Ma, the Two Spirit is . . .”

  “It’s not that, Anand, I . . .”

  “I know, Ter. I have feelings for you as well. I have always felt close to you, like a brother of course, but . . .”

  “That is not it, Anand. Don’t flatter yourself!”

  Terraclon took a great breath and exhaled it noisily. “I am jealous of you, Anand, so jealous it prevents me from wishing you well.”

  “What are you jealous of, brother?”

  Terraclon looked down at the sand. When he looked back up, Anand was surprised by the fierce burning in his friend’s eyes as he choked out his words.

  “You have escaped! Seen other places, had adventures! And now you are flying on locusts and creating an army! That was you at Venaris who addressed the nobles and military, wasn’t it?”

  “Yes, Ter. What do the people say about me?”

  “The most incredible things! Some say you are the avatar of some Britasyte roach demon. Some believe you are the Son of Locust, the long awaited Dark-skinned Savior who will lead us to Bee-Jor.”

  Let them think that, Anand thought as Terraclon’s resentment seemed to deepen.

  “Have you been lying to me?”

  “What?” said Anand, snapped from his reverie.

  “I thought I knew you! Have you always been some god in disguise?”

  “Get back up here.”

  Terraclon climbed up and Anand put his free arm around his shoulder. “Ter, I can easily find someone to sew me a costume. The real reason I came here today is because I miss my father and I miss you. You know I am no god, but I have found a way out of this terrible place. And you are coming with me, into battle, I hope, and later into the new way. If you like, you will live with us one day—for you are my family. And I love my family.”

  Terraclon blinked in silence.

  “That’s not all, Ter. Though I cannot tell you how or why, you will wield great powers in the new country in a new role.”

  Terraclon looked stoned with emotions. “I . . . I love my family, too,” he said, and tucked the garment into Anand’s backsack.

  “The easy time is still a ways off, Ter. But some day we shall sit and do nothing but feast for days. And you will have a different garment for every day of the year.” Anand looked suddenly stern. “I hope you and Dad will fight with us. I’ll send my pilots here soon. If you want to join us, you’ll fly back to our camp with them. Jump down, now. I really must go.”

  As soon as his friend hit the ground, Anand prodded the locust and it leapt into a darkening sky.

  The cold wind that blew through Anand on the return flight stirred his apprehensions. Behind all his bluster, he had no complete strategies for defeating the Hulkrites. He had no idea how large his army would grow or how quickly they could train. I’m a young and foolish fraud, he thought. And with Daveena gone once more, he suffered the weight of keeping in these secret feelings.

  As the light disappeared, the locust suddenly dropped from the air and into the weeds. As it grew darker, the locust grudgingly took short and low leaps until it neared Palzhad. Just as Anand neared camp, he prodded it one more time and the locust smashed blindly into a tree and was stunned and fell. Anand grabbed at the tree’s bark, swinging himself inside a crevice. When his heart stopped thumping, he scaled his way down. If only the locusts would fly in the dark, I could defeat the Hulkrites from the air, he thought.

  When he arrived at the camp’s outskirts, he saw the supplies he had demanded from the priests had arrived and were arranged on the edges of the first pit. For now, he would implement the parts of his strategy he did know, but his mind kept going back to the flying of locusts at night. What did they fear most that would send them into a dark sky?

  And then Anand remembered his time spent in the lair of a spider.

  CHAPTER 51

  STRATEGY

  “I need the bravest among you,” Anand said in the midst of the Slopeites’ camp as they finished their evening meal. “Who will risk his life for the New Country to bring me a living lair spider?”

  A few men from the servants’ caste filtered through the crowd. Their elder, a one-armed man named Benjul, crawled on his knees and used his antennae to nuzzle the hem of Anand’s garment.

  “No need for that,” said Anand, trying not to look disgusted. “Stand proud, soldier.”

  “Savior, we have accompanied the nobles on lair spider hunts,” said Benjul. “I was used as the bait.”

  “You were used as bait?” Anand shuddered at the idea. “And please, do not call me ‘savior.’ I am your commander.”

  “Yes, Commander. Forgive me.”

  “Nothing to forgive. What do you know about lair spiders?”

  “I know where to find them, can identify their lairs. I was made to run over the spiders’ doors. I would risk it again for the New Country.”

  “And the New Country thanks you for it. But none of us will ever be used as bait again in the nobles’ pastimes,” said Anand. “You will do this, in as safe a way as possible, and only if you want to.”

  “Gladly, yes.”

  “Excellent. Please, bring us a lair spider of any size. You may break its legs, but I need it alive.”

  The following morning, Anand gathered the Britasyte men in the excavated fire pit and warned them of the dangers of the task they were undertaking. “You will be using the most destructive force on the Sand to make the most dangerous substance. It looks and tastes like aphid candy, but I command you not to eat it, not even to touch it,” he said.

  As usual, the wind blew south, away from the Slope and towards Hulkren. The Britasytes had arranged layers of straw, kindling, and wood
. Dispersed through the fuel were barrels that contained a fortune in silver pyrite crystals, some of it recently mined, some plucked from the royals’ garments, but most demanded from the priests’ own hoards. Anand led the Britasytes in a song while they rocked an enormous bow that twisted a twig in a divot.

  Smoke filled the pit and wafted up to dance in spirits that both faded and multiplied. When the flames emerged and climbed through the twigs, Anand’s heart leapt in excitement. He had made fire! “Now!” he shouted.

  The Britasytes scrambled up the ladders. Anand was last, and when he crawled out of the fumes and over the pit, he saw Slopeites and Grass Men on their knees in worship. He joined them to watch the spectacle of flames flashing and curling from deep in the pit. The barrels of pyrite plunged deep in the fire with a noisy crash. Their burning sent up a bittersweet stench that sickened those whose noses caught it on a rogue draught.

  The following day, Anand and the Britasytes descended into the pit wearing gloves and tight clothing while breathing through filtration masks to gather the pockets of white crystals. These were shoveled into barrels that contained a blend of honey and insect fat. After the barrels were tightly sealed, they were left in the pit, covered with sand, and guarded.

  “Neither insects nor humans are allowed near this place,” Anand commanded his men as the Britasytes arranged rocks stained with roach-scent around the refilled pit’s perimeter. “Until the day these barrels are hauled into Hulkren, they must remain buried. Guard them with your lives . . . or surely we will all lose ours.”

  Anand’s success at creating arsenic in the pit raised his spirits, but he was crushed anew with worries and indecision, sure that he needed more time than anything. One good piece of news was that Benjul’s men returned late in the afternoon with a small and crippled lair spider that they carried on a sedan chair as if it were a royal personage. The sight made Anand laugh, and when his belly ached, he realized how long it had been since he had laughed.