by Colt, K. J.
The lump of stone slammed into my shoulder with enough force to send me flying out of the doorway, crashing to the stone floor and rolling over several times. I groaned, clutching my shoulder. Nothing was broken, but my scales were swollen, and the flesh underneath had been bruised.
That door had been closed for a reason. It held a monster.
I pushed the heavy door closed with my foot and fumbled for the beam; it was bigger than I could reasonably lift, but fear gave me strength. I managed to slide it back in the locking bars.
My muscles hurt, and I gave them a moment to rest as I slumped against the wall. I considered the fluffy, docile creatures nearby. Were they pets and this larger black one a monster? It seemed likely.
“Beast!” I hissed at it.
The front doors of the building creaked open. I stood, moving away from the animals and back towards the food storage area.
Ten of the creatures I presumed to be humans stood at the door’s entrance, surrounding a tall one at the centre. It was that one who held my attention.
She was similar to the humans but taller by almost a foot, her yellow hair long and spilling down her shoulders. She was dressed differently too, in graceful flowing green robes that hovered just above the dirt of the floor. Her form was completely alien to me, but she had an unearthly beauty to her.
Her long pointed ears betrayed her elven heritage. She stared at me with eyes that were a sapphire blue.
“I am Melicandra the Binder. You are Ssarsdale, are you not?” she spoke, her draconic accented but clear.
I shuffled nervously. I did not know what to think of this imposing elf. “I am not. Ssarsdale is the name of my destination, a city below the ground. My name is Ren.”
Her eyes narrowed dangerously. “I can only assume you speak of the Shallow City. Why did you enter the village? You risk exposing your kind to retribution. The common folk fear and distrust you.”
I had no idea what she was talking about. Did Ssarsdale have contact with this village? “I was only seeking shelter for the night before travelling on.”
My response surprised the elf. “You are not from the Shallow City, here to bring us tribute?”
“No. I am originally from Atikala, a city of my people further below the ground, but it has been destroyed. I seek my people.”
“Atikala? You must mean the Deep City. It was destroyed by the falling star? It fell that far down?”
I hesitated, shrugging helplessly. “I don’t know anything about a falling star, but if the Deep City is what you call Atikala, then it is truly gone. The ceiling of the underworld fell in and crushed it.”
A voice, deep and alien, spoke. It was nearby, on the other side of the door. “The kobold is lying.”
“Who’s that?” I asked, craning my neck to see.
Melicandra studied me, her expression flat and emotionless. “I will show you. Do not be alarmed. Come, Quennax.”
A creature slithered into view, a snakelike beast with four arms that ended in wicked claws, a tail that ended in a stinger, and a thick horn growing from the centre of its bestial head. It had two long bat wings tucked in close to its body and a glowing arcane mark I recognised instantly.
It was an eidolon, a creature spun from energy stolen from the far realms, stitched together by the power of the summoner and eternally bound to serve them. Its form was fluid, changeable with a ritual to reshape its body to take whatever form its master wished. They were intelligent and could speak, but an eidolon was only a shade of a living creature. Even death could not stop them as they could be re-summoned from the darkness between worlds within a day.
I had seen one of its kind before. The kobold who had summoned it was considered aberrant and had been killed. Its powerful monster, however, had killed half a dozen warriors before its master was slain, the creature disappearing with the death of its master.
Quennax regarded me with unnatural eyes. “Gold scales?”
“Yes,” said Melicandra, “I was thinking the same thing.” She turned to me. “Did Contremulus send you?”
I searched my memory. Contremulus. The name was draconic in origin. “Who is that?”
“If you do not know who Contremulus is, then the answer is no.”
“May I eat it?” asked Quennax. He looked me over with hungry eyes.
“No. The kobold may be of use to us yet.”
“As you wish, mistress.”
“Thank you,” I said to her.
“Do not thank me yet, goldenscale. Your kind are uncommon in this area, but trouble always follow in your wake. We must be cautious.”
“I understand. Forgive me, but you are an elf, yes?”
“Yes.”
“And your companions are humans?”
“Yes. Excluding Quennax, of course.”
“Of course.” I cupped my hands in front of me. “I don’t know what to tell you, but I am not like the others of my kind. Ever since the city’s destruction, I have been forced to see…things. Creatures both good and wicked. I can only tell you truly that your people and mine are very different, but I bear you no ill will. I wish only to travel to Ssarsdale and let my kin know what has happened to their cousins.”
Melicandra ever so slowly folded her delicate arms in front of her. “I am afraid that I cannot permit this to happen. Your kind cause endless troubles for us and our relationship is tenuous at best. The gnomes of Stonehaven, our allies beneath the ground, speak poorly of you.”
“Stonehaven is gone.”
She looked at me, her expression unchanged.
“I saw it myself,” I said. “Stonehaven fell upon Atikala. The hole descends through both cities.”
“That is unlikely,” said Quennax. “Miles of stone exist between the two settlements.”
“I saw it with my own eyes,” I insisted. “I would not be here if it wasn’t gone.”
“And why is that?”
The truth bubbled up to my lips. Because Khavi and I would have thrown ourselves at them, killing as many gnomes as we could. But I caught myself in time.
“With Atikala gone we dared to approach the gnomes.”
“Odd that you would choose to do this. What did you hope to gain?”
I could not think of an answer swiftly enough.
“It is lying again,” said Quennax. “May I eat it now?”
Melicandra said something in what I presumed to be her own language, a flowing speech that seemed similar to the fey tongue but some of the unpleasant squeaking was replaced with a beautiful cadence. Was every language except the gnomish one so beautiful?
Her eidolon retorted, but after a brief exchange fell silent. Melicandra turned to me once again.
“I apologise for Quennax’s rudeness.”
“It is no matter,” I said. “I understand completely.”
Melicandra paused. “Your motives for discussing the destruction of Stonehaven are irrelevant. I have one question regarding your story, however.”
“Yes?”
She locked her gaze onto mine. I sensed that of all her questions, this was the most important of them all.
“Who are we?”
I knew that to mention Khavi’s presence would probably doom him. “I was travelling with two other kobolds. Jedra and Faala. They did not survive the journey to the surface.”
“It is lying again,” said Quennax.
Melicandra ignored her eidolon. “Do you have any proof of this?”
“Yes. Not far from where I emerged from the surface, there is a tunnel to the underworld. I can show you if you have a map. You will find two graves not far in, freshly dug. Those are the bodies of my companions.”
Melicandra nodded to Quennax. “That should be simple enough to check. Make certain it is done.” Her fingertips lit as she evoked a spell, briefly bathing the area in enough light to make me squint.
Quennax hissed in disgust, then slithered away and stretched out his wings. The snake creature leapt into the air and was gone.
�
��I apologise for his manner,” said Melicandra.
I looked at the ground. “I apologise that I know enough about eidolons to know that they follow their master’s orders without question and would not act against their wishes unless explicitly instructed to do so.”
“My, my,” she said, the faintest hint of a smile crossing her lips. “You are smart for a kobold.”
“Thank you. You are smart for an elf.”
Her smile widened. She said something in the human tongue to the guards, and they all seemed to relax. Most of them turned and left, leaving two.
“So where are you really from?”
“Atikala,” I said. “Truly. The city is gone.”
Her posture deflated. “I had hoped that the damage was not that deep, but this is alarming news if true. If it fell that deep, then we have worries beyond the comprehension of most. For what it’s worth, I am saddened by this news. I have no love for kobolds, but such a large scale loss of sentient life cannot be anything other than tragic.”
I didn’t really know what to say to that. If Atikala had received word that all our enemies had died at once the celebrations would likely never end. “Thank you.” I inclined my head. “What’s this about a falling star?”
“A moon ago a piece of the sky fell near here. Hotter than any fire, heavier than any iron, red as blood. It poisoned the land with a red mist, drowning all that it touched. It broke through the ground and left a gaping wound in Drathari’s flesh. Many have come to examine it from lands both close and far away, including gnomes and dwarves from Undergate with scrolls of earth shaping.”
“I don’t recall seeing a piece of the sky in the debris, but I did not stop to examine the rubble at length. There was a lot of it.”
She nodded. “Understandable. The fragment would be tiny and not dissimilar to any other stone, save for the glow of its heat and its weight. I expect that it will never be recovered.” I wasn’t sure, but I swore I saw a flicker of some kind of emotion flash on her face. “Others will disagree.”
“Others such as Contremulus?”
Melicandra nodded.
“Who is he?”
She paused, looking at me with a complex, saddened look on her face.
“I hope you never have to find out.”
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
SHE WOULD TELL ME NO more of Contremulus. Melicandra made sure my bindings were not too tight, loosening them a little, and answered a few more of my question. She seemed amused by me eating the dried mold. She explained it was hay, and that it came from the mold which she called grass, and that it was for the animals. I apologised profusely, but she said my deeds were excusable; there was no harm done, save that hay was considered below sentient creatures.
She told me I was in a thing called a barn. The Worldbones were trees. Ferokhan was the child’s name. The fluffy animal was called a sheep, its hair called fleece, spun into a material called wool. The unhaired one was called a goat, kept for its meat and milk. The larger, stone-footed beast was a horse. It was for riding, a fact that I took in with great scepticism. It smelled foul and had an even worse temper. The sheep and goats, on the other hand, were much more docile and seemed as though they would be comfortable to ride and smelt delicious.
I kept my thoughts on the potential taste of the beasts to myself.
She left, leaving the two guards to keep watch over me. I couldn’t speak to them, and they showed no interest in speaking with me so we stood in silence.
I was preparing to sleep on the cool stone when a guard opened the door and offered me a thick woven cloth and a small piece of padding. I took them, bowing thankfully, but had no idea what to do with them at all. I carried them to the rear of the barn, to the animals, looking for a place to store them until I could figure out the riddle.
As I walked past the pen one of the male goats, Melicandra had called them bucks, reached out and bit the cloth. Ever so casually it began chewing, tugging it into its mouth.
I understood then. The humans wanted me to feed their animals to earn my stay. I eagerly fed the whole of the cloth to the animal. Then I fed it the piece of padding which it happily ate too.
I had no idea how to feed the rest of the animals. I started to tear the sleeve of the padding of my armour, but one of the guards said something, motioning for me to stop. They were laughing; I was doing something tragically wrong.
Then one of the guards’ laugh was cut off, and he slumped forward onto the stone.
Khavi yanked his spear out of the dead man’s back, thrusting it up into the second guard’s throat and up into his brain. His arms jerked and spasmed, then he fell off the weapon and collapsed in a limp heap.
“Come on!” hissed Khavi. “We’re getting out of here!”
I stared at the dead men, horrified. They were beginning to trust me. They had even shown me kindness of a sort, although I didn’t understand what they tried to do. They had relaxed their watch, loosened my bonds, brought me things. For their kindness Khavi had killed them.
“Why did you do that?”
“Keep your damn voice down!” Khavi hissed, stepping over the corpse of the first guard. “Come, the way is clear, but it won’t be long before the other bodies are spotted.”
“Other bodies?” I felt the blood drain away from my scales. “Khavi, what did you do?”
“What do you mean?” he asked. “I’m getting you out of here. We have to be quick; I was spotted on the way. It was that damn short one.”
“Short one? Khavi, that…that was a child!” I stepped forward, grabbing the front of his armour and shaking him. “What did you do to him?”
He stared at me as though I was mad. “What do you think? He was calling for help.”
I felt sick. The hay I had eaten was trampling my insides. “You killed a child?”
“They killed ours,” Khavi said. “They killed mine. Or have you forgotten already?”
Ferokhan had not been our enemy. Just a curious child who hadn’t run away when I’d appeared. These humans had nothing to do with Pewdt. I wanted to choke the life out of Khavi, but something large and bulky was pressed into my claw. A bundle of things.
“I got your stuff,” said Khavi, “and your shield.”
I unwrapped the package. It was all here. I slipped my right arm into my shield, tightening the strap, then tied my rapier’s sheath to my belt. My haversack was returned to my back. I noticed the Feyeater on his belt. “And how many people did you kill to get them?” I asked, rhetorically.
His reluctance to answer caused another surge of anger within me.
“The guard was armed!” Khavi protested. “What was I to do? Just ask him politely?”
I ground my teeth together to prevent myself saying something that would turn him against me. “The deed’s done,” I said. “Nothing can be done about it now.”
“How was I to know they weren’t to be killed?”
“Is that your default position whenever presented with a problem? Just murder your way through it?”
“No mercy for monsters,” said Khavi. “Yeznen said that.”
I crouched beside the first of the guards, rolling him onto his back with a groan. His eyes were open, an expression of shock and pain on his face. I gently closed his eyes.
“These ones weren’t monsters.”
“Fine,” said Khavi, “but they’re dead. What are we going to do now? How are we going to get out of here?”
I looked to the end of the barn where the horse, goats, and sheep were.
By the time we were ready to go, the barn had been surrounded by the humans. They shouted demands in their tongue, Melicandra not amongst them. Nor was her eidolon.
I risked a peek out of the double doors that led to the barn. Over two dozen guards stood at the ready, half with crossbows and half with sword and spear.
I closed the door before they could see me. I relayed the information to Khavi. “They have so many males,” I said, mulling the idea over in my head. “They are all
male. Why would they send precious males in the front?”
Khavi’s didn’t know either. “That’s really strange. I wonder how they reproduce?”
“Maybe they don’t let their females fight.”
Khavi frowned in confusion. “Why not?”
I shrugged helplessly, returning my attention to the door. I risked another quick peek, judging the distance between the door and the humans. We had one shot at this. We succeeded, or we died.
I’d learnt all I could. We backed up, then I yanked on the hair at the back of my goat’s neck. It bleated and bucked, then started running forward, straight towards the door. Khavi’s grip around my midsection tightened. I held on to the goat with one claw and began to cast.
The buck smashed into the doors with its horns, throwing them wide open. My spell went off. I had timed the magic perfectly. A roaring wall of flame leapt from my clawtips, stopping just short of the guards. They raised their arms to shield their faces, crying out, and I turned the goat’s head towards the south.
“Come on!” shouted Khavi. “Can’t this thing go any faster? Just hit it! Make it feel pain!”
I didn’t hit the goat. Instead, it seemed to instinctively do what I wanted it to, galloping down the brightly lit streets, carrying us easily. The guards behind us began to recover; a crossbow bolt whizzed past my head, and several others clinked off the dirt or thumped into the walls of nearby houses.
I turned the goat between two houses. It balked at the tight passage, and I had to tug on its hair; it hesitated then bolted in.
Thick strands of fibre, like those in Six-Legs’s lair, were strung between the buildings here, with shirts and other garments stretched over them. The resemblance between them and the corpses we had seen was uncanny; I hesitated for a moment before I overcame my fear and urged the goat forward.
We ploughed through, snapping several of the lines. I was snagged on one, the force nearly tearing me from the goat’s back, but my grip held firm. Khavi held on to my waist, keeping steady.
We came out the other side covered in clothing. The goat stopped and began to consume some of it. I kicked at the goat’s sides, trying to get it to move.