The War of Stardeon (The Bowl of Souls)

by Cooley, Trevor H.

Tad stopped walking and turned to face him. “His face didn’t darken a shade.”

  “You couldn’t get close to the beast, but he wasn’t stressed at all. I would swear he knew exactly what the beast was going to do, before it did it,” Willum said.

  Tad stood in silence for a moment, stroking his chin thoughtfully, a deep frown on his face. “My intellectual side says we’re being ridiculous, but my warrior instincts disagree. I have been rewatching that battle in my head and I find myself taking your theory one step further. I think he was controlling it.”

  Chapter Eight

  Talon flitted through the leaves as happy as she had been in a long time. She was outside. Outside and running free, feeling new and different, thanks to Ewwie. Her sweet master had improved her body in so many ways. The changes had been painful, but it was a sweet pain, a pain she craved, and nearly every change was for the better.

  She inhaled deeply, thrilling in the interesting and luxurious scents of early spring. It was so different from the way she had used to taste the air. Her master had torn the scent receptors from a prized bloodhound and placed them deep within her nasal slits. There was food everywhere and her nose told her where to find it far better than her forked tongue had.

  The smell of fresh prey caused her stomach to rumble and Talon began to jump as she ran, hoping to better hone in on the scent of the birds that nested high in the trees. Ewwie had changed the structure of her legs, making the muscle more densely corded and powerful. The improved strength allowed her to leap with great bounds, reaching twice as high as before.

  Talon latched onto the trunk of a tree that she knew was occupied. Her claws dug into the bark and she climbed it with practiced dexterity knowing that the prey would not be caught unawares. With a startled squawk, a fat bird flew from its perch. Talon did not let it get far. She sprung from the tree and snatched the bird out of the air.

  She hit the ground with a roll and continued to run. Talon would have enjoyed killing the thing slowly, but she did not have the time to stop. Instead, she let the bird’s panicked strugglings amuse her for a few brief moments before tearing its head off with her teeth. She wolfed it down and savored the various textures and flavors of her meal.

  Talon’s new tongue didn’t work like it used to. She couldn’t taste the fear of her prey or the tiny particles of blood in the air. But it was thick and dexterous and sensitive to different kinds of sensations. There was a depth of flavor to the flesh of her kills that she had been missing before.

  “You are fooling yourself,” said the moonrat mother. “Your body was perfect before he touched you. Ewzad Vriil mutilated and enslaved you.”

  I am free, Talon thought.

  “You are only let out of your cage because he needs you to do his bidding. He’ll throw you back in as soon as you are done,” the voice snorted. “This is not freedom.”

  The moonrat mother liked to play this game, trying to see if she could get Talon to run off on her own. Talon had done so before, thinking that escaping her master would bring her happiness. But now she understood that true freedom was only given her when she obeyed her master’s commands. When she did as he asked, Ewwie let her stay near him as he worked and sometimes let her run free and hurt things and eat things. Refusal to obey only resulted in confinement and loneliness. If there was one thing Talon hated, it was loneliness.

  She lifted her arm and kissed the shriveled eye imbedded on the inside of her forearm. At first she had seen the moonrat mother as an intruder, but she had come to understand that the eye was a precious gift. Her beloved Ewwie had given her a constant companion. There would be no loneliness on this journey. This time she would make sure to do just as Ewwie asked.

  “By the gods! Must you think of him that way?” the voice complained.

  Talon gurgled in happiness at her irritation. The moonrat mother hated it when she called the master Ewwie and when the moonrat mother was angry the moonrat mother talked to her. Talon liked to talk.

  “Why you hatess Ewwie, female?” she asked, enjoying the feel of the human language on her lips and tongue. Of all the changes to her body, her favorite new feature was her lips. Talon spent much of the journey experimenting with them. She puckered and popped and blew as she ran, enjoying the variety of new sounds she could make. This annoyed the female voice to no end.

  “He’s foolish and insufferable and ignores my council,” replied the female with a mental glower. “And you shall call me mistress.”

  Talon knew there was more to it than the female admitted. She had been thinking on it as she ran. “You hate that Ewwie ruless you. You hate that Ewwie can hurtss you.”

  “Be silent, you foul creature,” the female hissed.

  “Will you hurtss me now, female?” Talon asked hopefully.

  “You don’t think I can hurt you, you insignificant thing?”

  “You can not hurtss me like Ewwie,” she teased, hoping to enrage her companion. The moonrat mother was good at causing pain. It wasn’t quite as delicious as the pain Ewwie could give out, but she found it stimulating nonetheless.

  “Oh can’t I?” Talon could feel the rage burning inside the mother. “You tempt me, but it is best I don’t punish you now. We are getting too close to your goal and in my present frame of mind, I might kill you.”

  “Death? From pain?” Talon shivered with anticipation. “Thiss you sshould try, female. I do not believess you.”

  The moonrat mother snorted. “Run faster. Your master is impatient. He keeps asking if we have found them yet.”

  Talon smiled. This was a thing her new lips did when she was happy and any way she could please Ewwie made her happy. She increased her speed as much as her body would allow. It wasn’t a lot because she had already been at her limit, but the bird she had eaten would give her body the extra energy it needed to go a little bit faster for a time. She had been running for several days, stopping only a few short hours each night to sleep. All of her meals had been eaten on the run.

  It grew dark, but that didn’t slow her stride. Not anymore. Ewwie had torn her new eyes from the skull of a mountain cat and now even starlight shone bright as noon day. In the past darkness had been a useful tool but it had also meant isolation. With her new eyes, the darkness was her friend.

  She headed into an open field and was just getting into the flow of the new speed when something caused her to stop as abruptly as if she had hit a boulder. At the edge of the field, standing right in front of her was a thick forest line. She felt a shiver deep within her. The bark of each tree had been carved with an x.

  “What is this, creature? Why have you stopped?”

  Talon reached out and traced the x with one claw. She had not felt this way in years. A memory came fresh to her mind. She could almost feel the heat on her scales and feel the sand between her toes as Deathclaw stopped and tasted the air before turning the pack around to find easier prey. The memory vanished as quickly as it appeared, but Talon understood. She was standing at the edge of another creature’s territory. Her lips pulled away from her razor teeth in another wicked smile. This was the territory of something powerful.

  She let out a hissing chuckle. What a battle this would be.

  “No, Talon!” The female voice had heard her thoughts. “The thing that lives here is none of your concern. Go around this territory. The place Ewzad wants you to find is very near.”

  “Ssilence, female.” Talon whispered and took a step forward, entering the beast’s territory.

  “He has a reward waiting for you when you return,” the female urged. “But you cannot have it if you fail him now.”

  Talon paused, frozen with indecision. Ewwie wanted her to obey, but something that powerful so close . . . she hissed, itching to destroy it.

  “Ewzad says for you to obey him now, or-or . . .” The voice grew harder now. “He shall lock you away again.”

  Talon’s heart sank. She whimpered but finally, reluctantly, pulled her foot back out of the territory. She slunk along
the edge of the treeline, grumbling. The urge to kill lingered. She glanced around, sniffed and listened, but there was nothing living nearby but the plants and insects. Why was it so quiet?

  A minute later her nose caught a scent that sent a shiver down her scales. There was power in the air. She stopped and scanned the forest edge. There it was.

  He was standing so still that despite her new eyes, it took a moment for her to pick him out among the trees. He was huge. Standing at twice Talon’s height, he looked like he was carved out of rock. She would have thought him a statue, if not for the slight rise and fall of his chest. His skin was the color of granite and his only clothing was a pair of bedraggled breeches. Around his neck hung a thick chain of black iron with a crystal shard pendant.

  “Be still,” the female said. “Wait until he moves on.”

  The giant stood at the very edge of his territory looking out, a pensive look on his chiseled face. Slowly he looked down at the territory line marked by the trees and then turned and looked back over his shoulder at the forest’s center. He let out a sigh. In this moment of unease he looked vulnerable. Now could be the perfect time to attack.

  A chirpy giggle escaped from her throat.

  “By the gods, be silent you stupid creature!”

  The giant turned his rocky head and looked right at her. “Who is it?”

  “Run around him!” the female encouraged. “You are faster than he is.”

  “Have you come for my treasure?” His voice was deep and throaty. “Well whoever you are, I don’t care. You can have it.”

  The giant turned away from her and took a deep breath, then stepped out of his territory. He walked away from the forest, heading east with a sure and steady purpose. Talon found this unacceptable. She crept after him, her fingers trembling with anticipation.

  “Stay back,” the moonrat mother warned.

  Talon snuck up behind the giant without making a sound, following close behind him for a few moments, listening to him mumble to himself. Her tail twitched as she thought of the battle that would ensue and of the misery and helplessness she would make him feel before he died.

  “He will kill you,” the voice promised.

  That made him all the more irresistible. Talon took two running steps and jumped to his back. She clawed and scratched at him, but could not pierce his stony skin.

  The giant swore and reached back for her. He was amazingly quick for a beast his size, but she was quicker and scrambled to the other side of his back, evading his fingers. She continued to claw and stab with her tail, looking for a weak point.

  “You little!” the giant snapped, contorting and twisting in an attempt to grab her.

  Talon knew how the battle would go, having fought many large creatures before. She continued to dodge, waiting for the moment when he would give up his reaching and try to roll on the ground and crush her. She would leap away just in time and then while he was on his back, she would have him.

  Her plans were disrupted when one of his hands seized her leg. He ripped Talon from his back and slammed her to the ground before pinning her with his other hand. His wrapped his thumb and forefinger tightly around her neck and lifted her with one arm. He held her out in front of him, a scowl on his face.

  “What are you?” He asked, looking her over with curiosity. “I haven’t seen a lizard woman like you before.”

  She hissed at him in defiance, clawing at his fingers.

  He rolled his eyes. “Look, I don’t care really. Just leave me be. You can’t hurt me and besides, I don’t want to fight right now.” He tossed her to the side and started to walk away.

  “Good,” the voice said. “Now get out of here before he changes his mind. Our goal is very close.”

  Talon pushed the voice away and sprang at him again. She wrapped an arm around his neck and strained, digging in her claws, trying to tear out his throat. To her satisfaction, she felt his skin give. Then he grabbed her and tore her free once again.

  The giant held her at arms length once more and this time his scowl was replaced by a glare. She saw the red gouges in his neck where she had scratched him. She could smell his blood. There was power in that blood. Talon licked her lips.

  “Just . . . leave me alone!” he said.

  Talon smiled at him, then puckered her lips and made kissing sounds. She chirped at him and cooed suggestively. She waited for the giant’s eyes to widen in confusion, then she bit into his finger as hard as she could. Three of her teeth shattered, but she broke through his skin. The taste of his blood was intoxicating.

  Power coursed through the giant’s veins and though the flavor was somewhat different, she knew that his body had been transformed by magic just as she and her brother had been. The difference was that where Ewwie’s transformations were rushed and slip-shod, the flavor of this giant’s transformation was orderly and perfect in its execution. That was something she couldn’t abide.

  The giant’s glare deepened and he pulled her closer. “Are you crazy, lizard woman?”

  She thrust out her tail, sending the barbed tip up his nose. To her satisfaction, the flesh inside was as soft and yielding as any creatures.

  “Idiot,” said the female voice.

  The giant roared and drew his arm back, yanking her tail barb out of his nose with a gush of blood. He took a step and threw her as hard as he could. Talon had never been hurled at such a velocity before. The ground streaked past her and she knew the landing was going to hurt. Talon savored the anticipation.

  She struck a tree, snapping several small branches before slamming into the trunk. Three of her ribs broke on impact. Then she fell and cracked another when she hit the ground. Talon lay there among the tree’s roots for a few moments unable to breathe, watching the tree branches spinning above her. It was a new feeling. She smiled.

  “Have you learned your lesson yet, you foolish thing?” the moonrat mother chided. “Stay where you are. Luckily he hasn’t come to finish you. For some reason, he doesn’t seem in the mood to fight tonight. He is still standing there watching you, though. Lie still until he walks away.”

  Talon took a deep breath. Her ribs cried out, but the pain was muted. They were already healing. Ewwie had made her body heal far too fast. She giggled and climbed to her feet.

  “Stop!”

  Talon walked towards the giant. She ached to kill it. She wouldn’t be satisfied until she had torn its rocky skin off and rolled around in its eviscerated remains.

  “You will obey,” the female said.

  Talon felt the moonrat mother moving around in the back of her mind and knew what was coming. She ran towards the giant, getting two full steps in before the pain hit. Every nerve ending along her legs burst into flame. Talon could feel her flesh searing, felt flames licking up her back. It was ecstasy.

  Talon kept running, screeching in agony and pleasure, enjoying the increased efforts of the female to ratchet up the pain. Her stomach cramped. She was hit by a wave of nausea. Her teeth exploded. Her lungs filled with glass. Her eyes boiled in their sockets. Yet they didn’t, not really. She was aware that blood leaked from her nostrils and ears, that much was true, but the rest of it wasn’t real. Ewwie liked to hurt the body physically, but the female could only cause pain in the mind.

  The giant crouched and watched her manic approach. His eyes were wary, but his body ready, arms extended in front of him ready to grab her. The scratch on his neck was gone and the bite marks on his hand were healed. The dried blood around his nose was the only sign she had hurt him at all. This both disappointed her and excited her all the same. This giant was a challenge.

  “Fine,” the female said. “I leave you to your death. Ewzad will be so disappointed.”

  Talon watched the giant’s stance and prepared to leap over his outstretched arms. A single tail thrust would put out one of his eyes. Then she would start the slow dance of death, staying just out of his reach while sending her attacks into his every oriface. He would slow down once he could no lo
nger see or hear.

  The female cut off the pain so abruptly that Talon stumbled. She leapt, but the giant snatched her out of the air. He gripped her around the torso with both hands, pinning her arms to her sides.

  “Did someone send you here to attack me?” he asked, his eyes intense.

  She cocked her head and chirped questioningly.

  “No? Then why are you here? What do you want?”

  “To killss you,” she said and licked her lips.

  “Is that all?” he asked in amusement. “So you talk. That’s good. Tell me what you really want.”

  “To tearss you,” she hissed, her eyes wild and menacing. “To open your skin and eatss your meat.”

  His amusement faded. “Is that so?”

  “Eatss you. Bleedss you. Hurtss you. Killss you!”