Dagger - The Light at the End of the World

by Walt Popester

  When he got back down into the hold, Dagger wore armor too, though he doubted that simple boiled leather cuirass would be of any use for at least two reasons: the first one was his immortality, the second one, concerned the sharp arrows with which Gorgors had started to hit them and that had already killed two sailors.

  The sailors, for their part, were so frightened they had taken refuge under the deck and nothing, not even Olem’s curses, could convince them to get back out there to steer the ship. Some of them knelt down and began to rock back and forth. Many yelled at the captain that they did not want any damn reward, while the latter striked struck them with his glances. Soon, his head rolled down the stairs, sheared clean off by Olem’s sword.

  “Traitors!” the Dracon growled.

  The other ones raised their hands to a rough statuette of Ktisis they brought around the neck, begging for their god, and even Olem, to spare their lives. They had left the sails unmanaged and the rudder locked, so the ship was now traveling out of control. In the midst of all those rocks, it would soon become a problem.

  It seemed Gorgors had already won the battle simply manifesting their presence. Olem was anxious to go out on the deck to fight, but currents were stronger in that stretch of sea and now the ship was moving so violently it became difficult to keep one’s balance.

  The big ship that was pursuing them was approaching faster and faster, safely plowing the waves. Dagger, grabbed at a porthole, watching it get closer. It had hoisted the banner of Melekesh, only the last evidence that the whole world was now under the control of the Divine.

  “They want to sink us,” Moak whispered. “They have no scruples. They will send us into the abyss knowing that you will not die, anyway. This way they would get everything they want: our death, and your blood!”

  Dagger turned to him. “I hope you have a better plan than let them do it.”

  A predatory cry crossed the wind, making him creep. He saw the face of the Guardians grow dark, terrified. Apparently, the enemy ship could not board them in those weather conditions, but nothing could prevent Gorgors’ winged beasts to land undisturbed on the deck, now deserted.

  “On guard!” Olem roared, unsheathing his sword.

  The first cry of warning was followed by the trills of Gorgors, landed on the bridge deck. Only a wooden door, not even locked, divided men from shadows, armed to the teeth to kill each other.

  “Kugar,” Moak called in a whisper. “Go down to the deck below and do not come out for any reason, even at the cost of losing your life. You know what I mean!”

  Kugar bowed her head as a sign of obedience and dragged Dagger away.

  “I can walk!” he said but Kugar, pressed by the eyes of Moak, took him down just like a prisoner. They descended a half-moldy staircase and found themselves in complete darkness, at the mercy of waves and with a battle about to burst over their heads. Dagger felt the girl’s hand flapping tar on him.

  “Use this!” she said. “Maybe it will prevent them from smelling you!”

  Reluctantly, Dagger did as told. He soon found himself covered by a layer of tar. “It burns!”

  “Remember you are immortal, unlike me!”

  They sat at a corner, clinging to a wooden beam, trying to figure out what was going on above their heads. Soon they heard the infernal cries of the shadows, mixed to the voice of blades. The battle had begun but, before they could realize who was getting the better, they realized that it was already concluded. They heard the wails of the last dying Guardians, then nothing more. Dagger found that silence more sinister than any battle cry. Now they were alone, and knowing to be immortal was no longer a consolation.

  “It’s over!” Kugar whispered. “At least for me. For you, it’s only just begun.”

  “We must do something!”

  “Like what? Go out there and ask them to let us pass?”

  Dagger was about to reply, when the hull hit the rocks and they were thrown to the ground. The ship tilted and the rocks tore its side while it, driven by wind, still followed its way. In the darkness, he heard the thunderous roar of water burst into the decks and realized that the gash was straight in front of him. The ship struck another rock. He found himself immersed in the salty and turbulent water, trapped, unable to open his eyes until the ship did not start to turn, turn and turn, finally laying on its side. Now one of the gashes faced the sky.

  Dagger looked around and saw that Kugar was unconscious, maybe dead, her face underwater. He put his arm under her shoulders and pulled her back, while the ship was unleashed back again on its uncoordinated trail. He climbed to the gash, finding in his senseless fear of dying a courage and strength that he would never have suspected inside himself. He looked outside. The Cruachans were back in flight, but they were no longer ridden, a sign that even Gorgors had been trapped in the wreckage. The ship continued to sink, so that even that hole was soon underwater. Holding his breath, sure that waves would hide his runaway, Dagger managed to get out from that huge coffin dragging Kugar with him.

  Slipping below the water, he tried not to breathe but he found out that he needed to. Probably, if he drowned he would rise again. He began to think that a power like that would serve little purpose in such situations. He came up to the surface and looked around. The wreck of the ship had beached once and for all, half submerged, with a rock firmly planted in the right side holding her still, masts broken, torn sails. A dead animal, once alive, whose ligneous lament still rose high into the air.

  Kugar was not breathing. He swam to shore as fast as he could, thanking the rocks that split the waves and made them more lenient. Soon he reached a small cove located between two high cliffs. Glad to feel again the sand under his feet, he dragged Kugar by her clothing soaked with water to the edge of the forest that covered the entire island. In the shelter of trees, he lay her on the ground and slapped her several times.

  “Breathe!” he screamed, but Kugar stared at him pale and silent. Dagger knew what had to be done. He had seen it for the first time practiced by one of the smugglers of the cemetery, a man who came from beyond the sea. He placed his hands one over the other at the center of her chest and began to push several times, as if to coerce life back in the body. It did not work. He breathed into her mouth, continuing until he found himself exhausted. Then he screamed with anger and struck her with a single punch on the heart, putting all his strength in it. Kugar exhaled only a “What the fuck?” Imbued with new life, she turned on the side and vomited all the water she had drunk, breathing once again.

  Dagger looked at her in amazement. “Seriously, what were the chances it would work?”

  Kugar, exhausted, did not seem to hear. Dagger focused back on the situation, even if it did not take long to figure out it was desperate. They were on an island in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by a sea in storm and killer shadows who wanted him, only him. Looking up he saw there was no trace of Gorgors, but he could hear their distant trills.

  Approaching.

  “They’re… calling you…” Kugar whispered.

  “Do you think someone survived?”

  She dragged herself up to him. “Yes. Gorgors surely did,” she replied, sitting against a rock. “Ktisis bastard!”

  A few moments later a lightning revealed the warship that had hunted them down, making it emergence from the fog. The enemy ship had dropped the anchor at a safe distance from the rocks and seemed to be waiting. The Cruachans twirled above it, trilling nervous.

  “There’s a reason we were shipwrecked on this island. This is not just any place. They must know it.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “The Portal to Golconda is on this island.”

  A boat was lowered from the vessel, carrying twelve men wearing the military outfit of Melekesh, and the shadowy figure leading them. Black silk robes covered his entire body, even his face, shaded by a large hood. Only two armored boots stack out from those clothes. When he saw the living electricity that ran through them, giving the impressio
n that the shadow was walking on light, he realized they were made of the same metal of his knife. The Mayem.

  Kugar woke him from his thoughts, “He’s the one who’s looking for you,” she said. “And whom you are looking for— the Divine. He uses an armor of pure Mayem to move, an ancient and cursed artifact. It’s alive and answers the will of its wearer. How strange life is? Once Skyrgal used his body to move about our world, now he uses that to do the same. The pitcher goes so often to the well…”

  They were far enough not to expose themselves, close enough to see what was going on. the Divine raised a hand and soon a flying Gorgor reached the wreck. He got off the back of his Cruachan, keeping in perfect balance on a broken beam, while the winged beast, with total peace of mind, begin to lick the wounds on its dark wings of membrane. He drew his Hvis sword and clung to the edge of the gash to look inside. He saw something and turned to his dark comrades, shouting acute and ungraceful cries that, although they reminded the Cruachans’ bestial cries, were articulated into syllables and had to be a real language.

  “What’s he saying?” Dagger whispered.

  Kugar listened to the words in the wind. “He found someone alive. A bald man,” she deduced. “He’s making fun of his weight. I think it’s Moak.”

  Other Cruachans landed on the wreck, anywhere, while most stood in the sky. The Gorgor looked inside the ship once again, but jerked back. An arrow flashed just above his head, struck from the inside, and a distant scream was heard, “Come here, son of a leper Tankar!”

  “Olem!” Dagger said.

  “Shit! This time he will manage to get killed!”

  “What do we do?”

  “We wait!”

  The Gorgor seemed to giggle. He got back on his Cruachan and, with a flick of the reins, jumped back in the air. The winged beast circled over the ship’s carcass a few times, then it spread its wings to the wind and remained suspended in midair. It fell swoop into the crack, to pop out, a little later, with its claws planted in Olem’s bloody shoulders. The Cruachan dropped him in the midst of his companions, as a predator who throws the helpless prey to the hungry chicks in the nest. The Dracon immediately tried to get up, but he was disarmed with a kick on the hand and another one on his back. A shadow had already unsheathed his sword and looked on the verge of killing him, but the Divine admonished him and they all stopped. He yelled something in their hard language, consisting of guttural consonants and characterized by the almost total absence of vowels.

  “What’s he saying?” Dagger asked.

  “He’s ordering the Gorgors not to kill the prisoner, because he’s more useful alive than dead.”

  “And they’re listening to him?”

  “It seems so.”

  Under the orders of the Divine, the Gorgors lowered themselves into the belly of the ship. They gathered a total of five survivors, including Moak and Olem, then began to feast on the bodies of the dead: a couple of Cruachan amused themselves quartering the corpse of a Guardian, feeding on his viscera under the complacent eyes of their riders. They were soon imitated by the rest of the squadron. The wreck became a huge slaughterhouse for human flesh, with entrails and blood sliding on the side of the wooden ship toward the pink sea foam. Moak looked confused as did the other survivors. Olem alone still had the strength to yell at those beasts, before being silenced by a kick in the face.

  The Gorgors began to beat up the prisoners, screaming all the way.

  “They are looking for you,” Kugar said. “They knew you were on board. They are forcing Olem and the others to talk. You’re lucky that it’s them, I would not have thought twice before selling you out.”

  The Gorgors continued to pound the Guardians until they lost consciousness. One of them lost his life too and was thrown into the sea, to become immediately prey of a Cruachan who had not yet had his ration of meat. The Divine went back on board the ship anchored in the bay, while the survivors were loaded on a boat and taken ashore, escorted by ten Gorgors; an abundant escort for four stunned and shackled Guardians. The other ones got back in their saddle and flew to the island’s interior.

  Dagger noticed that one of the Gorgors remained on the ground was sniffing around.

  “The wind is changing,” Kugar noticed. “We must get away before they smell you.”

  They went into the forest, getting too far to see what was happening as well as to hear the horrible Gorgor’s cries.

  Kugar looked uncomfortably at the trees that surrounded them. “We need to steer clear of them.”

  “We have to follow them,” Dagger corrected. “If they are transporting prisoners by land, it means it’s from here they pop out. We must understand from where!”

  The girl grabbed him by the collar, and brought him face-to-face. “We must go home. It’s already hopeless as it is, why complicate our lives even more?”

  Dagger drew back her hand, looking straight in her eyes. “You will all end up in the stomachs of those beasts if you don’t understand where they come from! I spent my life hiding from those who wanted to kill me, I can give you a hand!”

  “Give me a hand to do what?”

  “To descend into the depths of the wolf’s den.”

  “It’s not what we were ordered!”

  “A Guardian does always what he is told?”

  “Well, yes,” Kugar replied.

  Dagger found himself wrong-footed. “Then I’m not surprised things precipitated so far. There won’t be other opportunities to follow them without being seen. Decide now, or never!”

  The girl bowed her head, thinking in silence. “The wind blows from the north.”

  “So what?”

  “It’s a headwind. It will blind them, at least until it changes direction. Then it will take your smell straight to their nostrils and we’ll find ourselves in a trap.” She reasoned about that one last time. “Damn you, Dag!” she growled. “Let’s go!”

  * * * * *

  7. Fear of the dark

  Life was not walking trails with innumerable forks in the road, Dagger thought. Life was wandering in a pathless forest where a dark shadow seemed to lurk at every corner, ready to pounce when you least expected it, to take away everything for which you had always fought. Even if it was mere survival.

  Insects as large as grapes marched up his legs, planting their feet into the skin with greater force when he tried to pull them away. Thorns scratched him, branches held him, every single drop of icy water seemed to have the only purpose to get under the collar of his armor, and slide there where he could no longer dry it. He was already lamenting the mud and the slippery cobblestones of Melekesh. All roads in a city led somewhere, even if straight toward death. In the maze of a forest it was different;you had to create a way and often it did not lead anywhere. In this situation, he could only do what he had always been no good at—relying on those beside him. So he followed Kugar blindly, wherever she might have brought him.

  After hours of marching in lockstep, she grabbed him by the arm. Climbing on the branches of a tree, they saw the Gorgors had tied the prisoners. Everything, in their behavior, suggested that they did not consider the idea of being followed. Olem had come back to his senses and was cursing them once again. Dagger wondered how long it would take before he managed to be killed. Moak was still unconscious, as well as the other two Guardians.

  One of the Gorgors unsheathed two Hvis saber and rubbed their blades, making everybody pull back when the flames rose in the air. When he walked over to the prisoners, two of them cried out in terror.

  “Shut your mouth, Guardian!” Olem cried. The shadow turned to him and pressed the back of the blade against his shoulder. The sound of the frying meat came up to them, but Olem didn’t yell as he gritted his teeth and endured the pain with discipline.

  “Are they are torturing them?”

  “Not precisely,” Kugar answered. “They’re having fun disinfecting their wounds with fire.”

  Dagger thought it was a bit rough as a mean of disinfecti
on, yet practical in its own way. He knew other methods, perhaps even more effective: he couldn’t count the times he had used his own urine as a disinfectant on himself or Seeth. He had never seen a wound getting infected that way. When he saw one of the Gorgors urinate in a corner, he realized why they didn’t: his green jet pierced the bark of the tree, penetrating deep and raising an acid vapor. One of the other Gorgors trilled something and the one who was urinating laughed. He got in front of the Guardian bound between Olem and Moak, the most run down, and splashed urine on his head. Dagger’s hand flew to his mouth when he saw the Guardian’s face melt under the acid spray.

  In the torpor that preceded death, the Guardian shouted, spitting out blood and bits of tongue. The Gorgors untied him and threw him face to the ground, still laughing. One of them drew his saber and scraped his back, baring his muscles. Then he urinated above his naked meat, digging a hole from side to side through tissues, bones, and organs. Then he stood up, pleased to see his creation, and decided to finish him: he put his hand into the hole he had created and ripped the heart from behind, throwing it to one of his companions while it was still beating.