Read Online The Legend of El Shashi by Marc Secchia - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Marc Secchia
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those demons I had envisaged and they had claimed payment due for the magic she had wreaked upon an innocent world.
A thick, greasy tendril of smoke began to leach from the brazier. It did not dissipate as I would have expected, nor did the raging storm shred it. Instead it swayed, coiled beneath the blast, and oozed toward me.
I wanted to cry out, ‘What more? What more can I stand?’ But now the sweet stench of burning flesh suffused my nostrils. It triggered the memory of how, in my ninth anna, I had chanced upon a charred body in the bragazzar woods near Yarabi village; how I fled to my farm, never stopping for breath; how upset I had been when I burst into the farmhouse only to discover my parents were away trading. Janos found me quivering beneath my bed that eventide. He told the Layik of the village, the head woman. The scandal broke that same night. My find unearthed a cell of Ulitrists–those Ulim-worshippers who, it is said, dissect corpses in search of arcane knowledge and burn the remnants for Ulim’s pleasure.
Were Janos’ organs sizzling on the coals? Was Jyla an Ulitrist? Her independence decried such an association. She would see allegiance as an impediment, I supposed, making her motivation no less opaque to me than before. But I did note a sick stirring of grephe at the thought –and agonised again over Janos’ fate.
Wurms, I understand now, are augmented forms of the crawling or squirming classes of insects, of which the Fiefdoms are bedevilled in abundance. The Sorcerer applies his or her powers by means of a sorcerous construct–the Web of Sulangi being one amongst several–to enlarge a creature’s size and power far beyond what nature intended. Eldrik Warlocks are particularly fond of these monstrous pets. Even the brutal Faloxx hunt elsewhere, though it took the annihilation of not one but two invading armies to drive that message home. No one bothers the Eldrik. No person, to my best knowledge, had ever crossed their borders.
The smoke slithered into my hands.
Lasciviously, it curled in bracelets about my wrists. It clung to my skin with a touch at once feather-light and inexorable. The brutish wind gave it no pause. Stinging rain could not sweep it away. The smoke behaved as an animate liquid–never sticky, never hurried, spreading up my arms as smoothly as oil.
The smoke felt as I imagined Jyla must feel. O hateful touch! No sorcery of hers would overmaster me unopposed. I hurled my fullest strength against the manacles, fighting claw and fang against the way the storm pummelled my body and blinded my eyes, and against the weird smoke, but it mattered nought.
Water streamed into my eyes. I wiped them clear on against my upper arm only to see Jyla’s face close enough to spit at, her expression marked with a kind of maternal delight that perversely mimicked what I had once seen on a woman who that makh delivered her babe at the roadside safe and sound, and, cradling it in her arms, gazed adoring into her newborn daughter’s eyes. So Jyla perceived her creation.
I, glimpsing movement behind her, beheld: A bird … a blue condor? Here?
The tornado made a fluttering rag of my body. The great bird should have been smashed against the tower. Instead, it drifted through the uproar, wings outspread as though buoyed upon an afternoon zephyr. Effortless. Not a pinion was ruffled. Not a feather seemed out of place.
Its eyes fixed upon mine. Suddenly , I could not look away. Surely I dreamed? Peace streamed from the bird’s gentle gaze into my fevered mind. I imagined it speaking: ‘Come. Here is an oasis of tranquillity, if only you will take your rest.’
A sending of Mata’s? But … I was no believer!
The smoke slid up into my nostrils. Slipped down my throat. I tasted grit, ash, and the tang of blood. I could not breathe. My lungs burned, but the thing would not relent. Deeper and deeper it spread. I heaved, tried to cough, and strove with every fibre of my being to vomit it up.
A thick, greasy tendril of smoke began to leach from the brazier. It did not dissipate as I would have expected, nor did the raging storm shred it. Instead it swayed, coiled beneath the blast, and oozed toward me.
I wanted to cry out, ‘What more? What more can I stand?’ But now the sweet stench of burning flesh suffused my nostrils. It triggered the memory of how, in my ninth anna, I had chanced upon a charred body in the bragazzar woods near Yarabi village; how I fled to my farm, never stopping for breath; how upset I had been when I burst into the farmhouse only to discover my parents were away trading. Janos found me quivering beneath my bed that eventide. He told the Layik of the village, the head woman. The scandal broke that same night. My find unearthed a cell of Ulitrists–those Ulim-worshippers who, it is said, dissect corpses in search of arcane knowledge and burn the remnants for Ulim’s pleasure.
Were Janos’ organs sizzling on the coals? Was Jyla an Ulitrist? Her independence decried such an association. She would see allegiance as an impediment, I supposed, making her motivation no less opaque to me than before. But I did note a sick stirring of grephe at the thought –and agonised again over Janos’ fate.
Wurms, I understand now, are augmented forms of the crawling or squirming classes of insects, of which the Fiefdoms are bedevilled in abundance. The Sorcerer applies his or her powers by means of a sorcerous construct–the Web of Sulangi being one amongst several–to enlarge a creature’s size and power far beyond what nature intended. Eldrik Warlocks are particularly fond of these monstrous pets. Even the brutal Faloxx hunt elsewhere, though it took the annihilation of not one but two invading armies to drive that message home. No one bothers the Eldrik. No person, to my best knowledge, had ever crossed their borders.
The smoke slithered into my hands.
Lasciviously, it curled in bracelets about my wrists. It clung to my skin with a touch at once feather-light and inexorable. The brutish wind gave it no pause. Stinging rain could not sweep it away. The smoke behaved as an animate liquid–never sticky, never hurried, spreading up my arms as smoothly as oil.
The smoke felt as I imagined Jyla must feel. O hateful touch! No sorcery of hers would overmaster me unopposed. I hurled my fullest strength against the manacles, fighting claw and fang against the way the storm pummelled my body and blinded my eyes, and against the weird smoke, but it mattered nought.
Water streamed into my eyes. I wiped them clear on against my upper arm only to see Jyla’s face close enough to spit at, her expression marked with a kind of maternal delight that perversely mimicked what I had once seen on a woman who that makh delivered her babe at the roadside safe and sound, and, cradling it in her arms, gazed adoring into her newborn daughter’s eyes. So Jyla perceived her creation.
I, glimpsing movement behind her, beheld: A bird … a blue condor? Here?
The tornado made a fluttering rag of my body. The great bird should have been smashed against the tower. Instead, it drifted through the uproar, wings outspread as though buoyed upon an afternoon zephyr. Effortless. Not a pinion was ruffled. Not a feather seemed out of place.
Its eyes fixed upon mine. Suddenly , I could not look away. Surely I dreamed? Peace streamed from the bird’s gentle gaze into my fevered mind. I imagined it speaking: ‘Come. Here is an oasis of tranquillity, if only you will take your rest.’
A sending of Mata’s? But … I was no believer!
The smoke slid up into my nostrils. Slipped down my throat. I tasted grit, ash, and the tang of blood. I could not breathe. My lungs burned, but the thing would not relent. Deeper and deeper it spread. I heaved, tried to cough, and strove with every fibre of my being to vomit it up.
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