In the distance, they heard an uproar of snarls and screams.
Planting wide, bare feet on the forest floor, they moved forward like shadows. Torchlight flickered through the brush as they approached the origin of the noise.
Crouching low behind a group of kapok trees, taking care not to touch the gummy, spiked trunks, Kybek signaled for Asman to scout ahead while he covered his movement.
Asman peered through the branches at a scene of carnage. Elf soldiers in wooden armor were strung up by their ankles, hanging from the trees, thin, green bodies covered in splatters of milky white blood. Scenting and peering through the gathering dark he couldn’t see any blood on the ground in the clearing.
But, there, under the hung bodies, cobolds were sealing up leather skins of opaque fluid. He felt anger rise up in his gullet.
Cobolds.
He hated the little weaselly bastards. The sight of them made his vision turn red and gray. He wanted to kill every last one of them. It was because of little shits like these that his life was utter garbage.
However, his rising fury was cut short as he caught the scent of the cut hay he had noted earlier. It was rich and dense now and Asman realized its origin in shock. He couldn’t quite comprehend the scene before him though.
Was this some new ritual? Some twisted cobold game? By the darkest winter, he hated them so much. Their whining snarls, how they slinked through bugbear territory, no better than honorless thieves. And their foul musk! It burned his nose to be so close!
Once the skins were full of elf blood, the bodies were cut down, scavenged, then tossed to another group that began carving them up, although they seemed a little unsure what to do with the thin limbs and willowy bodies, the flesh so unlike their own.
One fat cobold was walking around the others, barking orders. He stopped at one body screaming at a butcher to come over and finish it off.
Just then a stone shifted under his foot and his weight took him forward a little too far. The palm of his hand came in contact with the jagged bark of the kapok tree he hid behind pricking his skin on the thorns. A sharp, burning pain exploded in his hand, causing him to growl out a curse. He could feel the tree’s sap set fire to his skin and blood from the thorn entering his arm.
His deep voice resonated through the trees and the cobolds began screeching at each other to pick up their weapons and attack. Their hysteria amused the well-trained bugbear despite his irritation at being discovered.
Clutching his hand, Asman looked over at Kybek. They smiled and tensed for the attack.
His blood sang at the promise of not only a good battle, but a rejuvenating competition against his scouting partner. With the enemy, deaths could come freedom for one of them. Whoever could claim the most kills would earn their place back in the bugbear nation.
Ignoring his pain, Asman drew out his long dirks.
He had failed his initiation but here was finally a chance to regain his honor and go home.
“Come at me, rat-meat!” he roared at his sniveling foe in their own pathetic excuse for a language, charging from his cover.
He reached the first cobold and dodged its unprepared attack. He spun around it then drove a dirk into its back and out through its chest.
Following through with the momentum, Asman turned his body around and snapped his arm up and out. The impaled rat-man slid off his blade and flew into the group gathering behind him, bowling them over. Asman leaped over the elf corpses and focused on the vermin’s leader and the ten cobolds he hid behind. At the lead cobold’s screaming command, his guards sprang out and swarmed towards Asman.
No match for a bugbear fighting for his very honor, the skirmish was over within moments and every cobold lay at Asman's feet. His chest heaved. Blood pounded in his head. Kill. Kill every last one of these fuckers.
He heard a squeaking moan at his feet and looked down to see their leader, blooded and staring at him with wide, please eyes, “Mercy, give mercy great one!”
He reached out with the hand that had brushed against the kapok tree and wrapped his swollen fingers around the leader's skull, squeezing. Asman could hear the thin bones pop under his grasp. He lifted his arm, raised its limp body, and roared. The thrill of snuffing out the little bastard’s life filled him with glee.
Cutting off his bellow, a sharp blow rang like a blacksmith's anvil through his head and Asman fell to his knees.
Blurring at the edges, his mind grasped at the sudden disparity in his vision. How was he seeing the fallen bodies in the dirt and the stars through the tree canopy at the same time?
His body hit the ground like a wet bag of blackweed leaves, and the question drifted from his mind. Through his darkening vision, he saw Kybek stepping over him, reaching down and slitting the throats of the surviving elves. White blood shot into the air and sprayed Kybek's shadowy fur.
Keeping him from blacking out, that heady smell of summer grass filled his nostrils. Kybek turned, saw that he was still alive and stalked over to where he lay. But before he could reach him, a huge bull cobold, as large as Kybek, leaped out of the darkness and onto his back. The sounds of them rending away at each other filled his ears like a storm as Asman fell unconscious.
He was out of place.
There was ground beneath him still, but it was cold and smooth, not the sandy forest floor he had fallen upon.
He opened his eyes and saw a pool of clear, blue water glowing softly before him.
On the other side of the pool, a white tree grew out of the same smooth stone on which his head lay.
Its bare branches hung over the water as if reaching down to scoop up something beneath the still surface.
He stood and felt a deep peace within himself.
Looking into the water beneath the tree, he saw hundreds of tiny lights, like glowing glass beads, swirling in the pool.
The tree shivered, but there was no wind.
He felt the tree’s sentience and knew it needed help and longed for those lights.
“Help us, Asman. You are the Root. We are Fulang. Come to us. We will give you true honor.”
True honor?
He didn’t understand.
Stepping into the water, he walked towards the lights.
He could feel them swirling around his feet like minnows.
Reaching down, he broke the water’s surface and scooped up a twinkling handful.
Thousands leaped to join in and swirled around his fingers.
They chased each other around his palm and over the back of his hand.
Smiling, he raised his arms towards the branches and all but one flew up to the tree.
The one that remained floated in the air before him and glowed a deep purple like the sky at sunset.
It floated closer to his face, shining brighter as it approached.
The intensity of its glow became uncomfortable to Asman.
Then, as if shot by a bow, the glassy purple light pierced his left eye.
Intense pain and blinding light filled his head.
Filled his memories.
But, as excruciating as it was, Asman felt exhilarated as he began to remember.
His life.
His body.
So much.
Too much.
Asman felt himself falling away from his dream.
Was it a dream?
It was unlike anything he knew or had seen.
He felt his dream body tumble in the dark, turning over and over.
It felt as if he were falling into another world.
Another mind.
The falling sensation stopped.
His body felt so small.
He opened his eyes to see find himself in a strange palace, kneeling on a polished stone floor.
His hands were pink and smooth.
His head lifted up.
He wasn’t controlling it!
Was he seeing through someone’s eyes?
Asman felt a strong human hand strike him across the face.
An old man sat across from him, eyeing him sternly, “If you truly attend to me, then listen to me here and now!”
Asman could sense this human’s feelings and thoughts as well!
He knew now that this human was female and she stood before her father, head hung low.
She had no idea how to make her father better, to change him back to the person she knew before.
To her left, her sisters stood against the wall.
Eyes cast down in fear and shame.
Too afraid to speak against their father’s anger.
She was so tired of trying to make things better.
Every word she spoke to her father was sent out, desperate to be heard, to make what was happening disappear.
But now, all she could do was stand in mute shame before the man she had once called father.
“You need to learn something now Fulang! Soon, you three will be the only ones left here and you need to understand something about this world before I’m gone.”
The old man motioned for her to approach and she stepped closer, she didn’t understand these words but her father seemed lucid.
How she ached to connect with the old man!
Her father went to the closet and pulled out an old wood and leather suitcase.
Placing it on the kitchen table, he motioned for her to approach.
He opened it, revealing ingots of some luminous, metallic substance.
It shone like gold and was full of red stars that swirled and danced.
She felt as if she’d been gazing within their depths for an eternity.
Or had it been mere moments?
So strange this sense of progression.
It was like nothing she’d ever felt before.
That one thing could happen after another.
Like things had a beginning and an end.
Her mind was changed.
Before looking at the luminous ingots, she remembered a time outside of time where everything existed at once.
But now, she sensed something new. She sensed the future.
Looking at her father, “What is this you are showing me ?”
Her father spoke words she’d never heard before.
She didn’t recognize the sounds with her ears, but her mind spoke, ‘proto non-quantum spacetime’.
Like a sheet twisting in the wind, her mind wrapped around this concept.
She knew what this substance was, it could be shaped and formed to make… things.
Things other than the self.
An infinite number of finite things.
Things that could be known.
Was this what her father had already shown her sisters.
With just one look at their eyes, she knew that they now shared this uncommon knowledge.
“Take one child! These are your birthright!” the old man’s voice shook the inside of her mind.
She could feel the words reverberate inside her forehead.
She reached out for one of the glistening red and gold bars.
She could feel her fingers tingle as they drew close.
In the last moments, before her skin touched, she felt his mind fall into the presence of the substance.
It was a binary force, always sensing the distance between two points.
It needed the help of a third entity to act as an observer.
To witness the dance between the others which would form a complete reality from start to finish.
Eons and ages.
A multitude of consciousnesses.
All formed from this substance.
It just needed to take her...
Her father plucked the ingot from her fingers, “You aren’t ready. It doesn’t matter, I can’t train you. I’m too broken.”
Everything snapped together in Asman’s mind as if two lodestones were being slammed together by their inherent force.
He shut his eyes tight to block out the pain of seeing.
Seeing everything! He saw all of time stretched out before him in one moment!
He pressed his hands into his eyes.
Pain filled his head and his chest clenched, searing his lungs.
He had to breathe.
He had to wake up!
Asman became aware of his body again. What had happened? So much pain! His chest heaved, his lunged opened once more. He breathed deep and was awarded a wave of nausea that washed over him so strongly he had to fight not to vomit. So dizzy. So dark! His face was hot, sweaty, numbed. He longed for the cool peacefulness of the stone, the pool, the lights.
His breathing hitched again. Where was he? Where was the tree? He hadn’t finished. It still needed him!
His hands searched around him trying to find sense, some familiarity. Pausing to feel his face, he discovered that it wasn't numb but covered in bandages.
He sniffed and could smell dry dirt, wet roots, and cold fire pits.
Sitting up, he felt around where he lay. His right hand still ached from where he touched the kapok tree and was swathed in bandages. It itched furiously underneath.
He was on the ground on top of a straw tick and covered in furs. Even with his ears obstructed by the bandages, he could hear distorted voices whispering in the distance. A rushing pressure grew in his head as the whispers reverberated in his skull.
Collapsing back onto the straw and burying his head in hands, his thoughts spun desperately on how to let the echo in his head escape. ‘Breaking open my skull would release it,’ his raving mind suggested. ‘Yes, just crack it open like an egg…’
Thankfully, he blacked out.
Much later, he woke from a blessedly dreamless sleep. The memory of the dream from before was fading, but he still felt an urgency in his heart to help someone. Who had needed him so badly? What was he meant to do?
He sensed someone sitting beside him in the darkness. Was it her? No, that girl had smelled of twilight and moonglow. The one beside him now, her smell was familiar and stronger than usual. Everything smelled so strong. He fought back nausea.
He turned in her direction, "Sergeant? Is that you?"
"Yes, Asman, it's me. Welcome back," she said.
"Where am I? Why can't I see?” he gasped as the sound of their voices made his head throb once more. Whispering now, “Why does my head hurt so much?"
She lowered her voice to match. "We are back at Camp Tereng-Kondoy. You were injured."
He remembered now. The patrol. Entering the forest. The dead elves.
"Kybek!” he yelled, bolting upright, causing his head to explode in pain. Gripping his skull again he hissed, "That bastard! Sergeant, he attacked me! I'll kill him!"
"Calm down boy." Aijahna put her hand on his and he flinched.
"Quit acting like a cub and open your hand." He did and she put something loose and moist in his palm. Raising it up to his face, he could smell the acrid sweetness of cured blackweed leaves. He popped them into his mouth and calm washed over his body as he chewed.
"Better?” she asked quietly. “Now, are you sure about Kybek?"
He slowly nodded as blackweed soothed his mind, buffered some of the pain.
She continued, "When we found you, there was a huge cobold standing over his body."
Asman wondered how long Kybek had been planning to betray him. They had been patrolling together for almost half a year.
"So, was it you who killed the last cobold?"
"Not me,” she said, “that honor fell on Aktol."
Asman was surprised, "The new guy?"
"Yes, as soon as he saw the huge rat, he shot it through the eye," she paused, which allowed us to get you back to camp quickly, and won him his honor."
"His honor?! What about my kills?” Asman demanded. “I downed all of those other bastards myself!”
"That has been under debate since you arrived back at camp," she said apprehensively.
"What's to debate? Kybek was going to steal all the kills for himself so he could get away from here!"
"Asman, no one s
aw what happened, and as far as anyone could tell, he might have been the one and not you." She paused, then explained " In the end, Aktol saved your life and killed the bull cobold. The bailuk commanders deemed him as having earned his honor and he will soon return to the Kardan tribes in the south."
Again, she paused, "But, my friend, that is the least of your concerns right now."
Asman's heart leaped into his throat, it was not like his sergeant to be so cautious in her speech. "What do you mean?"
Silence. And Asman perceived her pity.
His hand went to his face, "Sergeant, what happened to me?"
She took a deep breath, "Your left eye was knocked out of its socket. We couldn’t save it."
Asman's mind froze then, disconnected. As she explained what had happened, it felt like she was talking about someone else. Someone else whose eye had been cut out by the barbers. Someone else hit so hard, it was uncertain if they would ever wake again. Then she was saying something about resting. Something about his family.
He laid back down on the bed, his head felt like it was sloshing back and forth as if it were a half-empty barrel. It hurt so much. He wanted to die.
He couldn't understand her. She spoke of him resting and something about his family. He was so tired and the sea was roaring in his head.
6
Sit up. Don’t touch your face. I'm going to remove your bandages." The barber pulled out the bone pins keeping the dressing in place. He unwrapped them and a light shone through Asman's eyelid.
Satisfied that he'd removed as much ointment possible, he told Asman to open his eye.
Crusty pain shot through his face as long unused muscles opened both eyes. Asman winced.
He cracked his one good eye open and adjusted to the dim light in the cave, he could finally put a face to the voice he'd been hearing these past two months. An old, white-furred bugbear wearing a barber's jerkin and a stern but not unkind expression sat across from him, balling up the soiled bandages.
"Very good," said the barber as he held out his hand, offering something to Asman, "The wound has improved, but you'll need to wear this to keep dust and dirt out."
Asman looked down. A few seconds later, his eye focused on a long strip of leather, wide enough to cover his empty socket. After several attempts, he was able to tie it at the right angle. He rumbled, "When can I go back on patrol?"
The Necrosopher’s Apprentice Page 5