by Joe Kuster
Growling, he yelled, “Do you really want to fight someone who did what I just did? Just walk away, and I’ll let you live.”
An unintelligible chatter and snarl were the only answer he got. Still, it had been in response to his question, so they weren’t entirely bestial.
On the contrary, he could just about make out individual words hidden under the layer of “urks” and “ruhs.” It reminded him of trying to decipher Gus’s angry squirrel chittering. There was an intelligence and language there, even if he couldn’t understand it.
He tried leaning in again, but an arrow pinged off the tortoiseshell on his armored shoulder almost immediately. Having his answer, he tried another option.
Picking up a rock, he tossed it in. There were panicked screams and grunts.
Taking advantage of the distraction, he lunged into the darkness and stabbed the nearest archer in the back of the neck with his blade. He then pivoted and jabbed the other several times in the ribs as it ran.
Rachel came in behind him, having a challenge with the lack of light, but didn’t hesitate to run the goblins through with her sword to make sure they were down for good. He glanced around the darkened corridor, but no other attacks came.
The walls were rough rock and irregular, as though this part of the tunnel were just a gap between the numerous large rocks that had been part of a rockslide once upon a time. Their muddy footprints made the paths clear, but trash and debris filled the chamber. TJ sniffed and recoiled. The tunnel reeked of scat and decay.
“Hold up, I need to light a torch before we go further,” Rachel said.
Having anticipated this, TJ offered, “How about I try to give you better eyesight?”
She looked concerned, but it passed. “If you think it’ll work, but please work quickly. I doubt they’ll stay back for long.”
Leaning into his magic, he found he didn’t even have to touch her for his healing ability to slip inside her body. It happily skipped across their thick golden bond and began inspecting her eyes. TJ knew very little about biology, but his magic mapped things out as he went, giving him a better understanding of what things did. He’d never suspected there were so many parts to the body, but each one he touched seemed to give him an innate insight. Comparing the structures to his own, he began encouraging her retina to grow a similar reflective layer.
Rachel gasped and rubbed at her eyes.
Wincing, she squinted. “All I can see is white.”
TJ replied, “Give it a minute. I think you’ll adjust. It’s like going out into the sun after being in the dark.”
Rachel blinked and groped blindly, then she seemed to become steadier. “Oh, ooh! It’s working. It’s still bright, but it’s getting better. Wow, you can really see this well in the dark?”
“Yeah. Let me know if we need to pull that off you once we get outside. Your eyes aren’t made like mine in other ways. I could probably give you better vision overall, but I think that’d take a while to get used to. I’d hate to throw off your aim,” he said.
She nodded. “I noticed you fixed my left eye the other day. Thank you. Reading up close is much easier now.”
“Glad that worked. I guess we could play with other things if we ever get the time. I get the feeling there is a lot I could do, but it would take time to experiment. Serina could do some bizarre polymorph stuff. She turned my feet into flippers and my fingers to claws once. I wouldn’t feel comfortable going crazy with it, but I bet I could emulate a bit of that with practice,” he said.
Nodding to the darker part of the cavern, he asked, “Ready?”
“Yes. I’ll lead,” she whispered.
The tunnel was only five feet tall in spots, so they both had to stoop as they went. Small alcoves in the rock had formed naturally, and they checked each one carefully. It would have been easy to leave a few hidden attackers behind, but they didn’t find any as they moved deeper.
Seeing a constriction that was only a few feet high, they both cringed. There’d be no way of going through aside from crawling, and they could already hear a chorus of heavy breathing on the other side.
“Should I go first? Your sword won’t work confined like that, but my magic should be fine,” TJ whispered.
Rachel looked hesitant but eventually nodded as she switched to her dagger. It looked like she had lingering doubts but didn’t want to voice them.
TJ dropped to the ground and began crawling as best as he could in the bulky armor. As soon as he got his head into position, he had to roll to the side, barely avoiding two arrows. The third slammed into his shoulder at the seam by his neck.
Giving a roar of pain, he threw out a kinetic blast toward the archers, slamming each into the rock wall behind them. Two fell where they lay, heads deformed by the impact, and the other crawled around feebly, trying to reach for its weapon.
Fumbling, he jerked at the arrow and saw a thin splash of blood on the shaft of wood.
“Fucking little bastards,” he growled.
He threw the arrow away and continued crawling through the constriction into the large cavern on the other side. Exiting, he quickly rolled to the side as several thrown spears landed. Two clipped him in the second wave, but none of them managed to penetrate his boney armor.
He could only make out about thirty feet of the room with any accuracy, but the cavern was massive. The numerous piles of belongings and bedding indicated that this was likely the goblins’ main living space.
A furious cacophony of growls echoed about the space. Whipping out with his dagger, TJ stabbed the first one that lunged out of a darkened corner of the rocks. He spun toward the sound of an angry growl, but that opened him up for one to jump on his back.
Whirling madly, he slammed his back into the rock wall, trying to dislodge the unwelcome passenger. Unfortunately, that just brought him near the unseen ambush as four dropped from the ceiling directly onto him.
Sharp stone knives stabbed wildly into his exposed flesh as TJ flailed, trying to pull the monsters free. One sliced his ear; another stabbed him in the thigh. One was trying to cut the straps that secured his chest plate. Another had taken a different approach and was trying to stuff a sack over his head.
Skewering the goblins he could, he managed to fling the one on his head free, only to have another pounce on him and smash a rock into his skull, driving him to his knees. A little hand managed to get under his neck guard and began slicing deep with a flint dagger. One charged at him with a spear, but the tip snapped off as it collided with one of the bony plates.
He wildly swung his arm, trying to slash one that danced in front of him, but it dipped out of range. Blood gushed out from his cuts as the little monsters kept carving away at his skin or hit him with rocks. Despite the adrenaline, his vision had begun to dim as he struggled to not pass out.
With a roar, Rachel crashed into him, her dagger flashing left and right. “Get off him, you damned dirty fucks!”
The move knocked a few free, but he stumbled over his own feet, and he slammed headfirst into a deposit of quartz. Head rebounding, he slumped to the ground. Chaos ensued as Rachel screamed out a magic-infused battle cry that caused the room to crackle in golden light.
The attackers’ weight was plucked from his body one at a time, while the others continued carving him up like a turkey. Blood gushed in a torrent from his neck, and his fingers quit responding as one severed something in his forearm.
Jerking the last one from his shoulders, he smashed its head into the rock floor until it quit struggling.
Groaning, TJ brought himself back up to his knees, readying himself to jump into the fray. Only to find that it was all over.
In the center of the room, Rachel wheezed in ragged, uneven breaths in an epicenter of death and carnage. She was absolutely covered in gore, and around her lay limbs and chopped bodies of the last of the goblins. Blood and flesh dripped from her sword and dagger.
Panting, he used a thin trickle of magic to stabilize his neck wounds befo
re he fainted. He reached out to Rachel and did the same. Sensing his attempt to heal her, she jerked free the arrow lodged in her left breast. Somehow, it had punched through both her layers of leather and her chainmail.
It took a chunk of his reservoir, but he cleansed the toxins the goblin weapons had been imparted with. He checked on her magic core, and while she had more than he did, she’d dipped heavily into her magic. Whatever she’d done, she’d used her gifts to become a whirlwind of murder.
Rachel swallowed hard as she began to visibly shiver. After confirming that there weren’t any more monsters nearby, TJ gently wrapped his arms around her. Her jaw trembled, and she blinked away tears. With as much tenderness as he could, he placed his lips to her forehead and rubbed her back.
He ignored the tremors that had settled into his body as a constant chill as he tried to comfort her. Finally, when he could disregard his chattering teeth no longer, he said, “We need backup if we’re going to do things like this again.”
She nodded her head sharply but didn’t speak.
“Let’s find the map case. Serina said it’d be in the back,” TJ prodded as he pulled away. As much as he wanted to continue comforting her, they were on a tight timeline.
Kicking several bedrolls aside and stepping around a large pile of goblin scat, he found their treasure horde in a mud floored side room. It was mostly heaps of old musty clothing, damaged boxes full of old moldy produce, a smattering of trash, animal furs in various states of decay, and giant mounds of blood-stained armor and weapons that were too large for the goblins to wield.
Rummaging as fast as he could, he ignored the piles of coins and jewels. He could always come back for them when he wasn’t going to have his soul cracked in half by a deity throwing a tantrum. After a few moments to regain her control, Rachel followed along, searching the other side of the stolen treasures.
Not seeing it on the first pass, he began dumping the numerous looted backpacks. The first one was full of rotten apples. The second was a mix of clothing, survival gear, a bunch of knives, and what looked like a box of vials full of some unknown liquids.
Grabbing a large leather duffle, he upturned it into the pile. Amongst the various collection of knickknacks was a long leather tube. Desperately lunging at it, he tore the top open.
“Got it,” he yelled.
Rachel came at a sprint, eyes wide.
Heart hammering, he jerked the parchment free from its core and dug into the fabric that lined the container. Finding an edge that hid the secret compartment, he ripped at it until he was able to jerk it open. A folded piece of paper fell to the floor.
Dropping to his knees, his hands trembled as he read it. Arcane diagrams and finely printed incantations lined the document.
Across the top, it was clearly labeled, “Summoning the Destroyer of Veils.”
“The fuck?” TJ muttered, confused.
Rachel paled. “She wants us to… summon a veil destroyer? The world-enders of myth?”
“Oh, fuck me.” TJ dropped his head into his hands.
Misunderstanding, Rachel offered, “I can try to get one of the girls, but even if you need more magic, I’m not sure we should do this.”
Rubbing at his temples, he tried, “Do we even have a choice?”
Rachel sighed. “I can feel the cold seeping over our bond. I don’t think we have long, but… this could kill us and everything in the realm.”
“Fucking hell, Serina. Why would you send me after this?” he complained.
He looked inward, but his magic was just as confused as he was. It seemed to understand what the incantation was, and how to do it, but even it wasn’t keen on unleashing a behemoth demon.
He could see the condensation in the air as he gave a long slow breath. He was beyond cold. Whatever was going on, he didn’t have much time to decide.
Cursing softly, he said, “I guess this really just comes down to how much we trust Serina.”
“As terrible as it is to say, I just met her. She seemed nice, but… this could easily be a ploy to strike at the deities that watch over this realm,” Rachel said.
“She’s not like that. I mean, maybe she is, but this doesn’t sound like how she’d do it. As much as I hate to say it, she’s not the type to use a blunt weapon. If she wanted to strike at the gods here, they wouldn’t see it coming. Whatever she wanted them to do, she’d set it up so that they thought it was their idea.” TJ made his decision. “I’ve got faith in her.”
“I see…” Rachel said softly. “Very well, my intended. I’ve already thrown my very soul behind you and our benefactor. I suppose we need to summon the destroyer of veils.”
TJ blew out a long breath as he fought to keep his hands steady. Reading the incantation, he moved his lips while his fingers wove in intricate motions. As he reached the end, his mana levels plummeted. As soon as he was empty, he felt the pull over the bridge as the spell began trying to siphon from Rachel’s core. In seconds, she was left equally depleted.
It reached into him, grasping around desperately for just a bit more. Gritting his teeth, TJ allowed it to access the essence woven into his flesh as a being born in a higher plane.
A primal scream erupted from his lungs as he collapsed under the strain. Rents in his skin formed, and he began bleeding anew as bits of his flesh broke down like a corpse left to rot in the sun. Dropping to the floor, TJ struggled to stay conscious as the room started to darken.
Rachel lifted him to a sitting position as the room became so dark that even his enhanced sight could no longer make anything out. The blackness shifted and squirmed then began consolidating at the far corner of the room, atop a pile of discarded clothing.
The light slowly returned to the room as the shadows stretched, twisted, then coalesced into a blob. The blob grew from the size of a thumb, then a fist, then a boot. It squirmed and solidified as it took a familiar shape.
TJ cocked his head in confusion. “Well, that wasn’t what I expected.”
Chapter 16
“A cat?” Rachel asked.
Looking at the sleeping form, curled atop a grungy sweater, TJ couldn’t argue. It was an inky black housecat, barely more than a kitten. Its outline blurred as though its own shadow was breathing in separate time to the animal itself.
TJ pursed his lips. “I guess we summoned a cat, but it doesn’t seem aggressive.”
“It’s adorable,” Rachel said.
Cocking his head to the side, TJ had to agree. “I feel like I’m missing a joke.”
“I’m going to check to make sure we didn’t miss any goblins and keep an eye out for trouble. You don’t look in any shape to move just yet. Rest, my intended. I’ll watch over you,” Rachel said.
Exhausted, TJ nodded.
Seeing that the danger had passed and that the cat wasn’t moving, he tended to his wounds. His robes were a bloody mess and soaked through. His neck had only been partially healed. Three fingers on his left hand weren’t working right, so he assumed some of the tendons had been severed. The magical rents in his skin dribbled with a steady flow of blood. He might have fixed a few things earlier, but he was still a leaky sack of skin.
He pulled some prepared cloth strips from one of the pouches and wrapped each of the dozen lesions that his spell had caused. Rachel had picked up a special powder that seemed to cause his blood to clot almost instantly, which made the job infinitely less complicated. Whatever it was made from, it also numbed most of the pain.
He had to half unbuckle his chest armor to get the bleeding stopped, but aside from feeling he’d been used as a pincushion, he felt like he was stabilized for the moment. Laying his head back, he closed his eyes, unable to keep them open any longer.
A strange rhythmic sensation on his neck woke TJ sometime later. Yawning, he smacked his lips and opened his bleary eyes. It took him a moment to process the glowing golden eyes looking at him.
They were his eyes. As if he were looking in the mirror, the cat’s eyes were the same gold
, same vertical pupil; everything was a replica down to the most intricate detail. The cat disregarded his confused blinking and continued to knead its paws into his neck as if it were trying to offer up a massage centered on his trachea.
Wake.
Startled, TJ whirled his head left and right. He’d heard a small voice. It had been feminine, but it hadn’t been one he recognized.
Me.
“What? Huh?” TJ said.
Me.
“Uhhhhh…”
You.
Confused, he looked around again, but his eyes eventually settled on the cat.
Yes.
“You’re talking to me?” TJ asked.
Yes.
“Oh, shit… what did I just do?” TJ asked.
Free.
“I just freed the destroyer of veils. And it’s a cat. That’s talking to me,” TJ said.
Wizard liked puns.
TJ rubbed at his eyes. “Ok. So, you’re a talking cat. I summoned you. Whoever wrote that spell thought it’d be funny to call you the destroyer of veils.”
Yes.
Drapes, not veils.
Good for claws.
Fun to climb.
TJ snorted and fell into a giggling fit. Somehow after the desperate fight, this had managed to land as beyond ridiculous. “Got it. So, destroyer of veils, do you know why my patron wanted me to free you?”
Power.
Magic.
“Uh… you’re a magic cat?” he asked.
The black cat stretched, and its outline shimmered. Shadows that seemed wrapped around it stretched and flexed until black feathered wings formed.
Familiar.
Your form gave me wings.
Birds shall know me as Death.
Grinning, TJ finally got it. “So, Serina needed me to get a familiar. No idea what that does, but it helped her ward off Timarat.”
Realm Anchor.
My magic belongs.
Yours did not.
Now it does.
He reached up and gently petted the cat’s head, feeling a strong connection to the animal. It pushed into his hand and began purring.