by B N Miles
He paused again and stared down at his boots.
“I didn’t see it happen,” Sirrin said and his voice was softer. “But I heard the crash. I came after him and nearly fell myself, but I stopped just in time. The buck had run off the edge of a short drop next to a waterfall and led Alfonse down with him. I’ll never forget standing at the edge of the drop, my hand gripping a branch, and staring down at the twisted body of my brother.”
“Oh, Urspirit,” Cam said and felt his throat tighten. “What did you do?”
“Climbed down,” Sirrin said. “Picked my brother’s body up. He was still alive, you see. Breathing, but real shallow, like. I carried him back to the village to this toothless old shaman’s hut and threw open her door.
“I begged for help. She got Alfonse down in a bed of straw on her floor and set me to boiling water. I think she did what she could and may have even used a little magic, but it wasn’t enough. My brother died that day on the floor of that woman’s hut and I thought I had died with him.”
“I’m sorry,” Cam said. “Losing a brother like that must have been horrible.”
“It nearly killed my father,” Sirrin said. “Broke my mother’s heart. I was the only thing they had left, and I was a worthless failure. At least, that’s what I was thinking while I sat in that woman’s hut next to my brother. And it was right then that I swore I’d do something more with my life.”
“Did you know you wanted to learn magic at first?” Cam asked.
“Not right away. It took me a while longer. I had to sit with what I saw, you know?” Sirrin picked up another rock and threw it. “I had to think about what I saw her doing. It wasn’t until a few weeks later that I went to her and begged her to teach me what she knew. She said no, of course, and I had to go back over and over, until she finally gave me that first lesson.”
“What was it?” Ca masked. “The first lesson, I mean.”
Sirrin smiled and his eyes were far away. “The first lesson was that the Ur can’t fix everything, no matter how hard you try.”
Cam let out his own stream of white cloud breath and leaned back on his hands. They sat in silence. Cam absorbed the story and tried to picture a young Sirrin mourning the death of his brother on the floor of a strange old woman’s hut. It was hard to imagine that Sirrin was ever anything other than what he was.
“What was her name?” Cam asked. “The woman, I mean.”
“Tiscina,” Sirrin said. “Nasty old bastard. But a powerful shaman. Taught me everything I know.”
“I’m sorry she couldn’t save your brother.”
“I am too,” Sirrin said. “But looking back, there was nothing she could have done. He was too far gone when I got him to her hut. And I think even if she had been there the moment he fell, the drop was too long and the damage too much.”
“Sorry all the same.”
Another silence, heavier that time. Cam kicked a rock and it skittered forward through the dirt and tumbled off the edge. The sun pulled out from behind some clouds and licked along Cam’s exposed skin.
He tried to picture the agony of losing a sibling like that, and found it came easily.
He’d felt it once before, when he watched his father die.
“Could you teach someone else?” Cam asked.
Sirrin gestured vaguely with his hands. “It’s not an easy thing to teach. As I’m sure you’re aware.”
“I know,” Cam said. “Believe me.”
“But I think I could.” Sirrin dropped his hands. “What are you thinking?”
“I’m thinking we have all this untapped potential,” Cam said. “If any Human can learn magic—”
“We can’t trust just anyone with this,” Sirrin said. “Imagine if we trained the wrong person.”
“So we’ll teach the right people.” Cam dug his fingers into the dirt. “We’ll be careful with who we choose.”
“I don’t know,” Sirrin said. “It’s too dangerous, what we can do. And some people can’t handle it. Believe me, I’ve seen what happens when you teach someone that’s not ready.” He was quiet as he stared down at the rocks. “If we unleashed magic and gave it to every Human, just imagine the consequences. People would be ripping each other to pieces, going mad with the Need, fucking like animals. It’d be chaos.”
“Maybe we need chaos,” Cam said. “Maybe we need a little danger.”
Sirrin met his gaze and his lips pulled into a frown. He opened his mouth to speak—
A bright light appeared, so bright Cam reeled backwards away from the cliff. He scrambled along the dirt and stone until the back of his head hit the cliff wall. He grunted in pain and felt dizzy as the light began to fade. For half a breath, he thought the entire valley had just gone up in flame.
Instead, a woman floated in front of them.
Cam’s mind twisted. It tried to make sense of what he was seeing, but there was no sense. Sirrin cowered next to Cam and covered his head with his arms. He let out a soft groan of fear or pleasure or pain, Cam couldn’t tell which.
The woman hung motionless before them. Her hair was long, wild, and pitch black. She was tall, or maybe short, Cam couldn’t tell, it was like her body morphed and changed as it lingered there, suspended over the sheer drop. Her hands were outstretched, her fingers finished with long pointed nails. Her face was tipped back toward the sky, her eyes wide and open and entirely black. She wore a gossamer dress, more like a second skin over her amply curved and sensuous body.
“What is that?” Cam said through gritted teeth. “Sirrin? Are you seeing this?”
“Fuck,” Sirrin whispered.
The woman tilted her head down toward them. Her hair floated in the air like snakes. Her dress rippled in the breeze.
“Hello, little shaman,” she said, and her voice seemed to echo through the cliffs around them and hammered directly into Cam’s head.
Cam leaned forward. He wanted to study the woman more, felt compelled to stare at her beauty, but the longer and the closer he looked, the more she seemed to shift and change and shimmer. His head began to pound. He wasn’t sure if the woman was making his head ache or if it hurt from when he smashed it against the wall behind him.
“Who are you?” Cam called out. He dropped his gaze down to her feet, her toes pointed downward, her skin light pink. He focused there and tried to tune out the rest of her.
“You know me, shaman,” she said in that inhuman voice. “You know my children well.”
Cam leaned forward more and felt himself climb onto his knees. He kept himself hunched downward as though the presence of the woman itself kept him bent in half. Sirrin curled tighter into a ball.
“I don’t know you,” Cam said. “I don’t even know what you are.”
“My name is Lycanica,” the woman said. “Look upon me, shaman.”
Cam felt a stab of horror run through him. He forced his eyes up along her toes, up her ankle, her long lean legs, the graceful curve of her hips, the taut muscles of her stomach, her full breasts, her slender neck, her pointed chin, her full red lips, her black eyes.
As soon as he met those eyes, he felt as though he couldn’t move.
“You’re… you’re a…”
“You’ve met my children,” Lycanica said. “You call them Weres, godlings. You have many names for them. But I call them my loves, my heartbeats, flesh of my flesh and skin of my bones. Do you understand me, shaman?”
“What do you want?” Cam said.
He thought she smiled, just the ghost of it. “What I want is immaterial,” she said. “What I need is more important.”
“I don’t know what you’re doing here,” Cam said. “I don’t understand why you’re doing any of this.”
“My children need room to breathe and live. Is that not reason enough?”
“You’re killing thousands,” Cam said. “We didn’t— We never—”
“You did,” Lycanica said, and it sounded as though her voice was composed of multiple screaming singers. “And yo
u will again. Your people have hunted mine for millennia. Your god broke from our kind and waged war against his siblings, and all for what? My children come and they go because of him, and now we’re left with ruin.”
“I don’t understand.”
“You will, little shaman.” She raised her hands, palms up toward the sky. “You cannot stand before my hordes. You will fall, as so many have fallen before you. But I find you interesting, and so I come with a warning.”
“What warning?”
“Leave this place,” she said. “Take your people and flee before my packs. Hide your women and children, leave behind your valuables, for nothing is as precious as your lives. Flee far and wide and cross the salt ocean. Never return to this place, or else I will not have pity on you again.”
“I can’t do that,” Cam said. “I can’t leave my people behind. I can’t leave this place.”
“You have been warned,” Lycanica said.
“Stop this madness,” Cam said. “It doesn’t need to be this way. It doesn’t need—”
“I will not stop,” she said and her voice burrowed into Cam’s skull. He tore his gaze from her eyes and hunched forward again with a gasp of pain. “I will burn your Mansions to dust and grind your bones into the earth. Your god will weep for what he’s done and I will not stop until I see it all finished. Heed my warning shaman and run.”
Another flash of light, bright enough to cause Cam’s ears to ring. He leaned forward prostrate and wrapped his head in his arms. The ringing in his ears continued like an after-image of the goddess’s voice until slowly it began to fade.
He lifted his head just a fraction of an inch. He saw nothing but the sky and the cliff.
Lycanica was gone.
He sat on all fours and gasped. He thought he might be sick but managed to keep it down. When he regained enough control of himself to move, he shifted back toward Sirrin.
“It’s okay,” he said. “She’s gone.”
Sirrin let out a shaky whimper and uncovered his face with one hand. “What was that thing?”
“Lycanica,” Cam said. His hands trembled as he crawled back to Sirrin and collapsed against the wall. “Come to warn us.”
“Why would she do that?”
“I don’t know.” Cam leaned his head back against the stone and took deep breaths. “But I don’t think that’s the last time we’ll see her.”
Sirrin let out a groan. “I felt like she was inside my head,” he said. “Like she was speaking directly to my mind.”
“I know.” Cam squeezed his eyes shut and could still see her like a ghost on the back of his eyelids. She was too beautiful, too perfect, and it terrified him. “We need more shaman, Sirrin.”
“What?” The word came out like a coughing gasp.
“Don’t you see? She’s afraid of us. We need more.”
He groaned and curled into a tight ball again.
Cam left him there as he leaned back against the rock wall. He kept his eyes squeezed shut and waited for the after image of the goddess to slowly drift away.
He knew what had to be done. Even if it terrified him to his core.
The only thing that could possibly stand up to something like that was magic. They were going to need as much magic as possible, which meant training more shaman.
Maybe it was too dangerous. Maybe Sirrin was right.
Cam didn’t give a damn.
There was no way they could fight something like Lycanica without magic and still win. There was no other choice.
He’d unleash enough magic on this world to burn it to ash.
14
Cam was damp with sweat from the climb. Sirrin didn’t speak on the way back and Cam didn’t try to push him.
As they reached the entry hall, Cam grabbed Sirrin’s arm. He held it tightly and forced the shaman to look him in the eye.
“Choose an apprentice,” he said. “Someone you trust.”
Sirrin stared back at him. “You saw her,” he said. “What’s the point?”
“We can still win.” He squeezed Sirrin’s arm. “Find an apprentice.”
Sirrin ducked his head and Cam released his arm. “I’ll think about it,” he said. “But I won’t make any promises.”
Cam watched Sirrin walk off toward a side tunnel leading to the residential areas of the Mansion.
He turned and headed toward his rooms. Blood and fire scorches still marked the stone floor and he wondered if they always would. The blood had turned brown and muddy in the open air.
The tunnels twisted. Air whistled down their lengths. Men sat in the tunnels and sharpened knives, spears, hatchets. Fires crackled in the rooms. Children ran in packs and laughed as they pushed each other over and played games. Cam walked up the steps to his rooms and found the door unlocked.
Miuri and Felin sat on the low couch in front of the fire. Cam could smell fish and vegetables cooking. Cam leaned against the doorway and looked at his girlfriends.
“Smells good,” he said, forcing a smile.
Miuri got up. “Are you okay?” she asked. “You look… pale.”
“Like you saw a monster,” Felin said.
“I’m fine,” Cam said. He looked around the room. “Where’s Key? And Galla?”
“Key’s out with Brice,” Miuri said. “Training some of the men right now. And Galla’s still in the bedroom.”
Cam followed Miuri’s gaze and watched the closed door to their bedroom. She’d been in there for the last day, ever since the confrontation with her father in the entry hall.
He let out a shaky breath and came into the room. He collapsed onto a wooden chair beneath the single window and felt the cold air creep down his neck. Miuri tilted her head at him in concern then walked to the kitchen area. She came back with a wooden cup full of water.
He sipped it and nodded gratefully. Miuri sat across from him and Felin perched on the arm of the couch.
“Something’s wrong,” Miuri said.
“I was out with Sirrin,” Cam said. “We were going to do some training together.”
“Is he okay?” Miuri asked.
“He’s fine, I think,” Cam said. “We got up to a high perch and were talking about how he learned magic. Did you know you don’t need shaman blood in order to become a shaman?”
Miuri shook her head. “I didn’t know that.”
“Any Human can learn it.” He smiled and a bitter laugh bubbled from his lips. “I wish my father had told me that sooner.”
“That could be a good thing,” Felin said. “You could train more people to fight like you do.”
“Good and bad,” Miuri said. “Imagine if Warden Dore could use magic.”
Cam grunted. “That’s what Sirrin said.”
“Still, if you found the right people…” Miuri trailed off, tracing a finger down her jaw. “That could turn the whole war.”
Cam gave her a tight smile. “But then something happened before we could talk more.”
“Is that why you seem so off?” Felin said.
Cam slowly looked toward the wolf girl and he felt a stab of indecision. She gazed back at him with her dark brown eyes that reminded him so much of Lycanica’s horrible black orbs.
“We saw someone out there,” Cam said. “We saw… something.”
“You’re freaking me out,” Felin said and looked at Miuri. “Why’s he looking at me like that?”
“I don’t know,” Miuri said. “Cam, what happened?”
“Lycanica came to me and Sirrin,” he said.
The girls went still. Felin’s fingers clutched the couch arm.
“What?” Felin said.
“Lycanica came to us,” Cam said. “She was… beautiful and horrible. She floated in the air in this… dress that was almost not a dress. It melted off her body like mist. And her eyes…” He felt his stomach clench and he thought he might retch. He took the water and sipped it.
Felin leaned forward, nearly falling off the arm. “Cam, this isn’t funny,” she said.
“Tell me this is some kind of joke?”
“I don’t think he’s joking,” Miuri said, her voice hushed. “Did you truly see the goddess, Cam?”
“We did,” he said. “She came to… warn us. She wants me to take as many people as I can and leave the Mansion. She said she’s going to kill everyone, she’s going to burn everything, but she thinks I’m interesting. I don’t know what that means.”
Felin stood and paced away. She looked like a caged animal and Cam watched her with wary eyes.
“My goddess wouldn’t do that,” she said. “She wouldn’t just… appear to you like that.” Felin whirled on Cam. “You’re just a Human.”
Her voice dripped with scorn. Cam sat back in his chair and wasn’t sure what to say.
“Felin, please,” Miuri said. “You don’t mean that.”
“My goddess has never shown herself to me,” Felin said. “But she appears for this man? For this Human?” Felin shook her head, her dark hair flying wild. “I don’t believe you, Cam. I don’t believe you.”
“I’m not lying,” Cam said. “She was horrible to look at. So horrible, but I couldn’t take my eyes off her. I don’t know how we can possibly fight something like that.”
“Lycanica is a bitch,” Felin said and snarled. Her lips curled up as she stepped toward Cam. For a moment he thought she might spring at him.
“Felin,” Miuri said and half stood. “Please.”
She took a step toward Cam. Her posture was full of rage. Her eyes bugged from her skull before she dropped to her knees in front of him. She leaned forward and wrapped her arms around herself.
A sob wrenched itself from her chest. Cam leaned forward and put a hand on her shoulder. Another sob. He felt it force its way up from her deepest reaches.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I never asked to see her. I never wanted any of it.”
“I know,” she said. “I know. I know. I’ve just… I’ve never seen her. And I’m one of her children.”
“I’m sorry,” he said again.
She let out a frustrated growl then looked up at him. Tears rolled down her cheeks. “What was she like?”
“Beautiful,” Cam said. “And terrible. She talked about you… about all of you… like you were a part of her. Like you’re her children.”