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Chapter 55
🕑 Added 2024-10-04 03:33:44 +0000 UTCMitchell found himself hunching his shoulders again and made an effort to stand up straight. He could already feel the knot forming in that spot just to the left of his neck where it connected to his shoulder. He’d lost count of how many times that had happened since they entered the Shadow Glen that morning. He noticed it affected the others as well. There was something oppressive about the land here. The weight of deep time pressed down on their heads. Even the yulops were sluggish and drooping.
“The forest is almost as old as I am,” Awen’s voice came into his mind. “It was one of the first parts of the land I nurtured. It is alive, in a way.”
Mitchell blinked at the sudden intrusion but then that feeling of warmth and connection came as it always did when Awen spoke directly to him.
“Is it sentient?” he asked her as he stepped over roots from a gnarled old tree that were jutting up from the loamy ground.
“Not as such, but it has moods.”
Awen paused and he felt a tingle in his mind, then she spoke again.
“Humans on Earth would call it a super organism. Hmm… I like that word.”
Mitchell could hear the smile in her voice.
“The vast network of roots has created a rudimentary sort of consciousness. It knows you are here. It can sense you.”
“Is it hostile?” Mitchell asked.
“Not in the typical sense. It will react to negative stimuli. This is why harvesting wood in the forest can be so dangerous and is so rarely done. A small number of trees being chopped down is no more to it than you shedding hair. But a large number of trees being harvested would prompt a response from the forest itself as it would feel itself under attack.”
This fascinated Mitchell. It made him wonder if the old growth forests on Earth had also developed a kind of consciousness. You could certainly feel the weight of time there, albeit not as intense as he felt now.
“Are we in danger?”
“Not from the forest, but there are plenty of creatures that would happily devour you if they have the chance. Do be careful.”
“I intend to. Are you well?”
“I am. Milandris lost several warlocks specialized in earth magic when, by sheer accident, a cliff face they were hiking near to join the primary expeditionary force, suddenly collapsed and crushed them.”
“Oh, no! How tragic!” Mitchell said and joined her in laughing.
“They were meant to relieve the ones that he has already worked to exhaustion and so his efforts have slowed considerably.”
“How do you stay hidden? Why hasn’t he found you already?”
“Because of how he is forced to search. His magic users probe into the earth for large crystal structures deep underground. Crystals resonate with a certain frequency. It is well known that I reside in an onyx geode so it narrows down their search. They can sound the resonate frequency of onyx in the ground and, if they locate a source, that is where they dig. But I know something they don’t know.”
Again, Mitchell could hear and feel the grin in her voice.
“What’s that?”
“I have long known how the mortal races hunt for my kind. The methods have not changed. While my arrangement with the monarchs has been extremely beneficial, I did not leave my security to the Knights alone. Millennia ago, I began to encourage the growth of other onyx geodes – deeper than they would form naturally to add additional difficulty to those that would hunt me. There are several scattered throughout my domain that, while beautiful, serve only as misdirection in the event that the protection of the monarchs and the knights failed.”
“How devious of you.”
“I thought so,” she said with a small chuckle. “But it is not foolproof. Eventually they will weed out the false positives and locate me. Currently, they are nearly a hundred leagues away from my true location, and between them and me there are four other geodes that are large enough to trick his spellcasters. And that is assuming he heads in this direction next. He has already located three and wasted considerable time in excavating them. With the revelation of the second false positive he became so enraged that he killed one of his casters himself.
“Without earth casters it could take several months to dig deep enough to find the geode. With casters that time can be reduced by a third or more, depending on the number he has and their skill levels. Thus, my ability to kill seven fresh ones has bought us additional time.”
Mitchell was very glad to hear that. The ticking clock that was their mission had been driving him slowly mad, Tell-Tale Heart style. So, while he knew they weren’t out of the woods—literally in this case –her revelation did take a considerable load off his mind.
“Well, Allora says once we get to this woman’s cottage and retrieve her items, we can set out to the capital and try to retake the throne and the city. I have no idea how we’re supposed to do that, but, as she likes to say, Vish will provide a way. I hope.”
“It will be my great joy to show you the land through the full bond. I know you will be amazed.”
“Of that,” he told her with a smile of his own, “I have no doubt.”
***
By the time the sun set, they had made it to the banks of the Orna. They had set a fast pace and compared to trekking over a mountain range, walking on mostly level ground was easy.
The river cut a wide path through the forest and Mitchell could see ample evidence of frequent floods. Allora said this was not the wet season, so the danger was minimal. Even so, they made camp well back from the banks.
Over the course of the walk, Mitchell had seen a great deal of smaller wildlife but, so far, none of the large creatures Allora had warned about. With his senses, which were now incredibly sharp, he thought they would have ample warning if something dangerous approached. He often picked up the rustling of smaller creatures in the underbrush, or caught the musky scent of some animal. He hadn’t noticed it as much in the mountains where there wasn’t such an abundance of life, but now that they were down in the land, keeping his attention focused on something became increasingly difficult.
Now, there were a thousand little distractions that his eyes, ears, and nose picked up on. He felt like that schizophrenic dog in the UP movie he’d watched as a kid.
“Squirrel!” he’d muttered more than once as something else caught his notice, much to the consternation of both Allora and Lethelin. He just grinned and didn’t bother explaining. It was okay if they didn’t get the joke.
It turned out to be Mitchell’s shadow cat that gave the the most cause for concern as they walked through the foreboding wood.
Vras, having mastered his discomfort of the forest, had begun to scamper up the trees and bound from limb from limb. It looked to Mitchell like the cat was having the time of his life. Vras marveled at the way his shockingly sharp claws found such easy purchase in the bark. He discovered that he could climb a tree nearly as fast as he could run on the ground. Then, after a few experimental leaps from one tree to another, he began to push himself, aiming for trees farther and farther away each time.
They had stopped for a quick lunch among a dense section of the gnarled and ancient trees and, while they ate, Vras busied himself with his own activities. The three of them watched as he leapt from one branch to another. Then he jumped back, but this time didn’t go for a branch, instead trying to orient his body to land with at least four paws flat on the trunk itself. He failed the first few times and fell to the ground, a little dazed. He got up and did it again, though.
“Is no one else disturbed by how powerful it’s becoming?” Lethelin asked as she watched him make the attempt again. Lethelin still wouldn’t use the gendered pronoun.
“Well, that’s kind of the point,” Mitchell had said. “He is on our side, remember? We want him to get stronger.”
What he did not say so as not to spook her more than she already was, was that it did indeed disturb him a little how strong and agile Vras had already become. Still only about a quarter of his full size according to Allora, his muscles rippled underneath his coal-black fur. Mitchell thought he detected the animal getting bigger by the day. And seeing something that strong, and that would become stronger, glide from branch to branch, and land almost silently, claws extended, Mitchell began to get a sense of the threat Vras posed. He believed Allora and Lethelin when they said shadow cats were natural-born predators, but he had been comparing Vras to tigers or pumas from Earth. Yet, a tiger could not do what Vras was doing. And Vras’s mother had been substantially larger than any feline from his planet.
Vras made the jump again, clearing the 20 or so feet with ease, and this time stuck the landing. His tail and tentacles swished happily as he craned his head around to eye the tree from which he had leapt from. His muscles bunched and he leapt again, landing solidly on the opposite trunk. It was almost hypnotic watching how he seemed to glide through the air with the power of his leap, elegantly rotating around to land on the opposite trunk.
“Few have had the opportunity to study shadow cats up close,” Allora said, a note of awe in her voice as she watched the display. “And, to think, this one is only a baby.”
The elf shuddered, her mind perhaps going to images of the damage he could do once he was fully grown.
Just then Vras leapt, only this time for a tree in another direction and once again, stuck the landing. Mitchell watched as it peered to the left at still a different tree about five meters away. It leapt once again landing a little awkwardly, but recovered and then, almost in the same instant, to the left again, landing on the same tree as he had when he completed the first jump. Mitchell saw it then and was about to tell the girls what he thought Vras was doing when the shadow cat did it again – much faster this time.
Vras leapt back to his starting tree and, only stopping long enough to coil for the next jump, went to the left, landed perfectly, bounded to the left again, and then back. He’d jumped from trunk to trunk in a rough square, clearing 15-20 feet per leap, in just a handful of seconds. He arrived back at the original tree, bounded lightly down, and flopped on his belly, panting slightly, and rolled to the side, tongue lolling in a clear grin of triumph. They all stared at him, stunned.
“I am disturbed now,” Allora said, her voice wary, a bite of food still halfway to her mouth where she had been holding it since Vras began his display.
“Thank you!” Lethelin said in triumph. “Balls and bloody taint! I thought you’d replaced your brain with rotten fish scales!”
“That was pretty awesome,” Mitchell said to Vras as he languished in his victory.
“That’s a strange way to say terrifying!” Lethelin grumbled.
Mitchell chuckled.
“I like the trees,” he said. “I can hunt from above. Quiet. Hidden. Protect tar s’thyr and mates.”
“Sounds like a good plan,” Mitchell told him and scratched his belly. The cat’s green eyes alighted with pleasure as Mitchell praised his success. And offered him some of their food, of course.
Vras was hunting regularly on his own now and didn’t need any of their food, but he still seemed to like to beg for it anyway. Mitchell credited his quick increase in size with the plentiful game they found here as opposed to the mountains. Meals would have been fewer and farther between in the peaks.
Now that they had arrived at the banks and evening had come, everyone enjoying the much needed rest from the hard pace they’d set themselves. Mitchell had gotten a chance to work on the cloud of daggers spell, something that he’d been neglecting since he got Vras. He had not managed to cast it and sustain it. It had two forms – a quick burst that was to last about six seconds, and another that could be sustained, albeit with a significant mana cost which also meant significant wear on his stones. Allora had pointedly reminded him that he was neglecting his study of offensive and defensive magic to talk with his pet, and so he had promised that he would begin again.
“Rock, paper, scissors?” Mitchell called out as he saw Allora yawn.
He had taught them the game days back as a quick way to decide watch schedules. Allora had taken it up with a surprising amount of fervor, viewing it as a true strategy game. He could see her brows knit together as she tried to discern the next throw of her opponents. Lethelin, on the other hand, played like he did, throwing down what ever occurred to her in the moment.
“I better not get middle shift again,” Lethelin said. “I had middle last night.”
The thief won the first throw getting paper to Mitchell’s and Allora’s rock. Then, Allora beat him with a throw of scissors to his paper, and Mitchell was stuck with the hated middle shift.
“I don’t know why you’re grinning so much,” Mitchell said as Allora sipped her tea with a smile. “There’s no strategy here. It’s random. You didn’t know what I was going to throw because even I didn’t know what I was going to throw.”
Allora looked at him with a delicately arched eyebrow across the rim of her little tin cup.
“I got the watch shift I wanted, did I not? I like being up before the sun so that I can speak my prayers to Vish and do my calisthenics.”
Mitchell shook his head and chuckled.
“If you say so.”
***
On first watch, Lethelin made another circuit around the camp as the others slept. They’d pushed hard today and she knew if she tried to sit by the fire she would likely pass out so moving was her best option. She stayed well back from the fire to keep her night vision as much as she could and tried not to look back towards where Mitchell and Allora slept, keeping her eyes outward. She also had her cowl up and she walked with slow, measured steps to maximize its effectiveness.
The cloak had cost Lethelin nearly a hundred gold crowns, the better part of a year’s worth of thieving and saving, but she had never once regretted its purchase. It had saved her life more than once in the two years since she’d purchased it and it set her apart from many of the other small time thieves in Varset. It opened up a lot of opportunities for her along with access to higher profile jobs because she could avoid being seen almost at will. The cloak combined with her talent meant she could remain undetected in almost any situation as long as she was careful. A wise investment indeed.
Cool wind gusted through the trees and she could hear the faint sound of the water about twenty or thirty meters from their camp. It felt so good to be home again. Trekking through the desert all those days, avoiding scorpions, clorvols, and packs of dakas had not been easy. It had taken all of her remaining coin to buy the potions that would mask her scent and give her the greatest chance of survival. But Lethelin knew that if she didn’t catch Ivaran on his overland trip it would be much harder once they got back to Awenor with their prisoners. It had been all or nothing, as far as she was concerned. One of them wouldn’t leave the desert alive. But nine hells, how she’d hated the heat. Being back in Awenor now was enough to almost make her cry. Even if she was not cutting through the Shadow Glen.
Lethelin wasn’t expecting to run across any patrols in this part of the country. There was nothing here to patrol for and the mercenary forces were nothing if not lazy opportunists. They wouldn’t be scouring the countryside in hopes of finding bandits, thieves, or smugglers, so that cut down the risk substantially until they got closer to a town. What she had to worry about were more of the beasts of the forest than other people. There were no spiders in this part of the wood, according to Allora, not the dangerous kind, anyway. The ones that could pluck a man up from a path and have him webbed before he could scream. And they hadn’t seen any signs of trolls, either. They tended to range farther inward. There were the giant toads to worry about but as long as she kept hold of her blade she should be able to stab her way free if one of them approached the camp. Plus they weren’t exactly quiet.
Lethelin’s silent circling of the camp brought her to the river-side of the fire and the thief noticed something she hadn’t before. Vras was missing. The furry little bag of chum normally kept close to Mitchell when it slept, having slowly gotten more comfortable with their day/night sleeping schedule. But as she scanned the shadows around Mitchell’s body the beast was nowhere to be seen.
“Where did you run off to, you little hell spawn?” Lethelin whispered into the darkness.
She began to scan the trees as if she had any hope of spotting a black shadow cat among the deep shadows of a Shadow Glen night. The speed and silence that it had moved today as it explored the canopy had been terrifying. Lethelin prided herself on her ability to move quietly but watching Vras slink over branches above their head showed her to be a rank amateur. And it was a baby! Allora said probably less than a year old.
“Cursed thing is probably up there right now, waiting to drop down and kill me and then tell Mitchell some forest creature did it!” Lethelin swore to herself and suddenly felt jumpy. Her arms broke out in goose flesh that had nothing to do with the cool air blowing off the river behind her.
Lethelin turned away from the camp then preparing to continue her patrols when she heard a sound to her right, from the direction of the river. Her head turned and she peered once again into the impenetrable darkness. In the distance she could see the water glinting from the glow of Ithstasy which was just beginning to traverse the sky but between there and here it was mostly shadow. The canopy was thick and little light broke through the tree cover. She went still, quieted her breathing, and tried to listen. Her eyes were near useless in these conditions but her ears were just fine.
Then she heard it again. It was almost like… Almost like the sound of a blade being drawn over a leather strop. Mira was in her hand in an instant and she readied her smaller dagger in her off hand.
“Could be nothing,” Lethelin told herself. “There shouldn’t be anything big enough in this part of the forest to threaten us. No need to wake the others for nothing.”
The last thing Lethelin needed was Allora teasing her for getting jumpy in the dark. And she would, too. In fairness, she teased the elf relentlessly but it was for her own good in Lethelin’s mind. The little princess was far too uptight. She—
There it was again.
Lethelin was just about to wake the others, she didn’t care about being teased now, when her eyes caught a glint not two meters in front of her. Two specs of yellow just above the ground reflecting a small bit of light from the dying fire. Eyes!
Before Lethelin could call out for help the eyes exploded from the shadows and resolved into a mouth big enough to swallow Lethelin’s head hole. Time seemed to slow down as fangs extended from the top of the beast’s mouth, each one as long as her finger and already dripping with venom. Lethelin drew in a breath to scream but knew it was already too late.
Just then, a patch of night darker than the shadows around it flashed in front of Lethelin and landed solidly on the attacking creature’s neck. Lethelin fell back on her ass, breath to scream trapped in her paralyzed throat, and could just make out the shape of a very large snake with a body easily as thick as her waist, twisting and coiling itself on the ground in front of her. On its back, with jaws locked onto the rear of its neck, was a beast as black as a gretch shark’s heart. It rolled with the giant snake, a fierce growl rumbling from its chest as the snake hissed and spun.
Lethelin caught sight of demonic green eyes flashing in the darkness, alight with an almost gleeful joy. Its head was twisted sideways as it tried to keep all six sets of claws locked into the hide of the snake while it thrashed. The animal brought its serpentine body around and tried to encircle its attacker but the beast seemed to anticipate the move. As a coil tried to descend upon its body, the black void broke free with it’s claws and jumped to the side, never loosening its jaws that clamped just behind the snake’s head. Once the coil slid away, it retook its position and claws sank effortlessly into scales once again. Only this time, the six legs began carving into the flesh of the snake. Long rents were torn into its thick hide and the blackness began to shake violently from side to side.
The snake began to slow, its movements becoming less insistent as its blood soaked the loamy earth and churned it into a foul mud. With a final violent shake, Lethelin heard the sounds of bones snap. The serpent’s body went stiff and then began to tremble all up and down its length before finally settling to the ground, still.
In the suddenly silence all Lethelin could hear was the low growl of the shadow cat as it sat perched atop its kill, accentuated by a harsh panting sound as it labored for breath, and her own strangled fight for air. As if for good measure, the shadow cat shook its head one more time but the snake was limp and lifeless.
Lethelin watched as, almost reluctantly, Vras opened his blood-soaked jaws and brought its eyes to hers. It stared into her and Lethelin thought it was looking into her soul. Eyes far too smart for a mere animal watched her. Studied her. Its long pink tongue came out and licked the blood off of its maw. His pearl white fangs were tinged a gory red. Lethelin saw it shudder in undeniable pleasure as it savored the taste of blood. Yet its eyes did not leave hers.
Lethelin knew then that Vras was deciding whether to kill her or not. She couldn’t say how she knew but there was something about the battle lust in the beast’s otherworldly gaze that said it was weighing the worth of her life. As if to confirm her suspicions, Vras’s eyes flicked behind her to where Mitchell lay sleeping, and then back to her. Lethelin dared not move. Her heart was beating so hard in her chest that she actually feared it would burst. Her breath was coming in pants as she stared her own end in the face.
Vras moved then, silent as death itself, and twice as merciless as it slowly approached her. It stopped about a meter away and its tentacles suddenly took up position just above its head, and they spread open to their full width. The beast’s brow furrowed in concentration and small lights began to shimmer within the opened palms of each tentacle. The air between Lethelin and the cat shimmered as Vras attempted to create the illusion he wanted. Lethelin saw a vague outline begin to form, about equal in height to her seated form and roughly humanoid shape, but without distinct features. Vras hissed in obvious frustration as the illusion winked out, then he tried again.
Over the next minute or so, Vras worked at his illusion until Lethelin finally saw what he was trying to show her. It was Mitchell, but he was not alone. Next to him in the vision was a smaller humanoid with less distinct features than Mitchell himself, except for one detail. Red hair. Mitchell’s arm was around her and he was looking down at her. Lethelin could just detect what she thought was a smile on his slightly indistinct face as he watched the illusion of herself that Vras had tried to create.
Vras had been studying her the whole time as he tried to form the image and when he saw comprehension on her features he dropped the effect instantly and his body drooped, as if it had cost him a significant amount of energy to maintain the effect.
Lethelin’s breathing had slowed somewhat but she was still drenched in sweat, and no doubt reeking of fear. But Vras only watched her now. Waiting.
“You saved my life,” she said, finding it hard to speak. Nine hells, she felt like she was going to pass out.
Vras flicked his tail languidly from side to side and he blinked slowly.
“Yes,” he seemed to be saying to Lethelin.
“Because of…” Lethelin took a deep breath trying to slow her heart and unclench her chest. “Because I’m important to Mitchell.”
Another slow tail flick. Yes.
His eyes flicked to where Lethelin still held Mira in her hand and he growled softly and showed his fangs.
Lethelin understood then. She swallowed to try and work some moisture back in her throat. She needed water. Sweet fucking sun, she needed a bottle of orcish ale.
She nodded then, not breaking eye contact with the shadow cat.
“I understand. Th—” Lethelin paused again and took a deep breath. “Thank you. Thank you for saving my life. I… I owe you a debt.”
One final tail flick. Then Vras turned and went back to his kill. Lethelin saw that he was favoring one side. He’d been injured in the struggle. His middle leg on his right side was putting almost no pressure on the ground. It wasn’t quite a limp because he still had five others, but she could see how it threw off the normally fluid way he usually walked.
“Balls and fucking taint,” Lethelin grumbled to herself as she got to her feet. As she watched, Vras grabbed the snake by the back of the head again and began to drag it off. It was slow going as the thing was heavy and he was down a leg, but the shadow cat didn’t let that stop him. With several growls and a lot of yanking, it pulled it off into the night where, Lethelin assumed, he would snack on it for a while.
“Balls and bloody fucking taint,” she swore again as they disappeared into the blackness.
Comments
DevonHexx
Fangs are what the people in Iletish call gold coins. Silver coins are dalled talons, and copper coins are called scales. But Awenor doesn’t use those nicknames, despite using a gold/silver/copper monetary system.
JL
DevonHexx
Yeah, it was fun to write. Some fun things for Vras coming in the future. Sharp eyed readers may have picked up on the foreshadowing. I’m glad I opted for the animal companion. It was undecided almost until I got to that section of the story where he was introduced. Can’t wait until combat encounters start happening.
Josh
Loved this chapter!
Josh
> and resolved into a mouth big enough to swallow Lethelin’s head hole. *whole
DevonHexx
Oh, he definitely was debating it.
Trevayne
Good chapter and a nice description of how Lethelin could overcome her aversion. Vras saving her life makes up for a lot, and it is a testimony to the depths of her fear that even when Vras is trying to communicate to her, she thinks he is debating whether or not to kill her.
