ACoL Book 2 - Chapter 6: Flee

The Shaydos were not far from The La’ark’s expedition. At their speed, they would reach the encampment in a day. However, something else was heading toward the expedition from the opposite direction. It was slowing down, yet it was approaching nonetheless.

The entity still remained hidden, traveling inexorably toward its target. It was getting close now, close enough that it was time for emergence. Like a whale swimming up to the surface to breath air, the entity began the process of manifesting. It’s only goal: devour.

***

Sperloc was getting old. But with age comes the gift of not giving a shit. Few things fazed the gnarled historian. Sure, he could string together a ballad of vehemence on occasion, but he was rarely shaken. Anger was good. Cynicism felt comfortable. Both fit him like a glove even though he felt mostly content with life. Life...it was absurd, as history time and time again proved. It was colorful, it was wonderful, but it was also filled with terrors and landrider shit.

And Sperloc’s own experiences left him hardened with a carapace of indifference. He’d seen it all: death, torture, new life, new ways of living, new ways of killing. He’d seen comrades eaten alive from within. He’d witnessed children murdered before his eyes. He nearly had his face melted off, a wound that left his snout permanently disfigured and twisted. Few things shook him with a primal fear, not even the possibility that Cordell was Herald-work. The danger was conceptual, not visceral. But it had been years since something truly scared him to his core.

That was to change tonight.

Everybody was asleep except for the soldiers who were on guard duty. Sperloc was dreaming about chasing his grandchildren around the house. They were squealing and their wings were flapping. A grin stretched his twisted snout. Occasionally, he turned in his cot and muttered. Menik got up to head outside and relieve himself. But he stopped to move Sperloc’s tail, which had draped across the ground. The tuhli grumbled incoherent nonsense and covered his snout with a wing. After Menik took care of his needs, he came back inside and went to sleep.

The night grew still. Only the occasional snippet of hushed bantering and landrider chuffing pierced the quiet. The tents were filled with the snoring of reptilian creatures and twitching wings, a reflex developed to ward off flies. But something disturbed the tranquility of the night.

It was quiet at first, barely noticeable beyond the crackling fires and snoring snouts. But it grew. It resembled a chorus of rattling insects, swelling until the air filled with its buzzing. The sound cut through Sperloc’s dream and his eyes shot open. He recognized that noise. It had engraved itself into his memory, haunted him in his nightmares. He hoped he would never ever hear it again and yet, here it was, unmistakable in its droning.

“No!!!” he bellowed, stumbling out of his cot. “It can’t...it can’t be...”

“Sperloc?” Somebody said. It was Madrian’s voice. The others were wide awake. Cordell was stirring, rubbing his eyes.

“What’s that noise?” he murmured.

Sperloc pushed Madrian out of his way and ran outside. Sparks rose into the air and flew around the encampment. The cacophony was all around them, growing louder by the moment. Landriders bellowed and grumbled, straining against their tethers. Soldiers tripped as they rushed out of their canopies to see what was going on. And there, Sperloc stood, his feet frozen to the ground.

Wake up you fool! he thought, Telo’s Wing! Wake up!

But it was real. It was no dream. This was actually happening. That sound...that awful sound. It was the same he heard as a child. He had to find The La’ark and let her know what was happening! He headed in the direction of her canopy when he saw Akhil riding around on his landrider.

Sperloc shouted at him, but Akhil didn’t respond. The damn fool, he couldn’t hear the tuhli over the noise! So Sperloc yelled even louder, running toward the shandan, waving his arms and wings, putting himself in the mount’s way. Akhil barked something but Sperloc cut him off. He didn’t care what he had to say.

“Run!” Sperloc bellowed, enunciating every word, “we need to run! It’s a zeffyr!”

“What?!”

“A zef-fyr! That noise is a zeffyr! Run!”

It was one of the only times Sperloc ever saw shock show on Akhil’s snout. He stared at the historian in disbelief for a moment before galloping off. Sperloc heard him bellowing orders, telling everybody to make immediately preparations, grab what they could, and flee. All shandan had been trained what to do if they found themselves under a zeffyr attack. There was only one thing they could do: scatter. Split into groups and head in all directions. The zeffyr had a target and that prey had to be isolated.

You could not fight such a terror, you could only minimize casualties. Every soldier in the camp knew this, though none of them ever expected to encounter one. They had become things of legends. Sperloc was the only one who had ever seen one...and the memory never left him. And so, when he heard the noise, he knew immediately what it was, and nobody questioned him. Madeen flew overhead, projecting directions. She could scout the terrain, guide them toward the best escape routes.

Sperloc ran back to their canopy and kept screaming, “A zeffyr is coming! Run!”

There was no time to coordinate. No time to plan. Sperloc simply grabbed what his arms and wings could hold and crammed them into the sacks hanging on his landrider’s flanks. Already, small groups of soldiers were fleeing the camp on their mounts. Distance was the key to survival, as nobody knew who the target was going to be. But whoever it was, nobody wanted to be around them.

“Kick the dirt!” he bellowed, “we need to go!”

The cabras grabbed their weapons, water, some rations, and then they left their cots behind. They mounted their landriders and galloped out into the night without waiting for word from either The La’ark or the fire brothers, Oris and Akhil. They knew who would ride with whom. It is standard for every army to plan for a zeffyr attack, ever since the War of Shards.

Landrider feet trampled wet grass as they wove between foliage and shrub. Sperloc’s old bones protested against the battering and leaping, but he ignored the telltale signs of age. Sparks flew ahead of the cabras, leading the way. They painted the trees with their piercing light, carving a path through the woods. Sperloc ducked, narrowly dodging a branch. Vines slapped against his wings. The forest itself seemed to be closing in on them, slowing their escape. And all the while, the buzzing only grew. It swelled until he felt it in his flesh. Not even the wind in his ears could drown it out.

But then the forest broke. Open fields welcomed the cabras into their meadows. Menik, who was leading the group, pulled forward. The others followed. Sperloc could see lights in the distance. Groups continued to pour from the encampment, scattering until they dotted the fields like clusters of stars. The distance between one group and the next became a vast dark void. The night bellowed with the cacophony of the zeffyr’s buzzing.

A feathered shape dived from above, pulling ahead of Menik. There, Madeen hovered, beating her wings. Then she flew away. As soon as she did this, Menik veered to the right. Sperloc did not know why, only that it had to do with something Madeen told him. Instructions perhaps?

They rode...and they rode...and they rode. They were alone now. Sperloc could no longer see lights from the rest of the expedition. It was just them, them and the never-ceasing buzzing of the zeffyr. It was the night carrier’s rattle, some called it. A knelling of doom. But it was perhaps a little bit quieter now. Did that mean they were safe?

Menik was heading toward a formation of rocks protruding outward from a hill. There, his spark hovered. A river could be seen flowing past the base of the hill. When they reached it, Menik brought the cabras to a stop. Everybody except for Vincent Cordell dismounted and led their panting beasts over to the water. There were no words. Each soldier moved swiftly and with purpose. While the landriders drank their fill, Menik climbed the rock, using his arms, wings, and feet to scale its face. Then he looked out over the fields.

“Do you see anything?” Madrian shouted.

“No!” Menik called, “but somebody’s coming.”

A spark appeared in the distance, a rider approached. They were accompanied by Madeen, who orbited the cabras once before landing at the base of the hill. When the figure got closer, Sperloc could see it was The La’ark. He didn’t know what she was doing here, but she looked furious. Menik spread his wings and leapt from the rock face. He was no air dancer, being too heavy for it, and so his landing was far from graceful. But he dusted off his hands and ran over to The La’ark.

“Do we know who it’s after?” he asked.

“I have a pretty good idea!” she growled.

“What do you want us to do?”

“Do?” Sperloc laughed, “there’s nothing we can do! Whoever...” his voice trailed off. He was about to say whoever it’s after is doomed. But The La’ark was glaring at Vincent Cordell. Of course...who else would be the target?

“What...what’s going on?” Vincent asked.

The La’ark paced back and forth, a thousand thoughts racing through her head. Shadows weighed down her eyes yet did little to dull their ferocity. Sperloc remembered when everybody thought she was a joke, a female being allowed to ascend the ranks of the shandan. She was no warrior. But her mind was brilliant. As a tactician, few rivaled her quick thinking. As she paced, the noise began to swell again. The zeffyr was getting closer, confirming that the target was, indeed, in their group.

“What the hell is going on?” Vincent repeated, “What the hell is that noise?”

“Madeen,” The La’ark whispered, “I do not make this request lightly.”

A sliver of orange light appeared across the night sky in the distance. Sperloc took a step back as reality bent and warped. Stars appeared to dance as distortions rippled their forms. The sliver spread until it became an arch. Sperloc felt his heart thrumming against his keel bone. The zeffyr was emerging.

“-I know you live with the memories of what my ancestors did...” The La’ark shouted, “but he needs to live.”

Distortions peppered the vista, making the air look like the surface of a moiling river. Orange light began to shine through that surface and a shape began to emerge. A rotating maw broke through like a sunrise, circular and filled with fire. It was as tall as a building and a white inferno broiled within. Sperloc felt his soul leave his body. He was a child again, standing on the outskirts of his hometown.

The sky over his village had been filled with a pit of spinning flames. A creature of crystal and abstract lore carved its way through the dirt, turning everything it touched into magma. It devoured everything that got in its path. It had no arms, it had no legs, no eyes to see or ears to hear. It just had an open maw on one end and a tapered body on the other.

And here it was again, after all these years, a manifestation of Sperloc’s nightmares. It loomed before them, angry and hot, its heat blasting their wings. The trees of the forest did not have time to burn. They simply exploded from the inferno alone, ripped from their roots. The zeffyr was coming straight for the cabras.

“Please...get him out of here!” The La’ark bellowed, “take him to the Shaydos!”

Madeen closed her eyes in acknowledgment.

“What the hell is going on?” Vincent shouted, “what the hell is that thing?!”

Madeen walked over to him and opened the eye on her gullet.

“What? What? I don’t understand!” Vincent hollered.

Madeen, beat her wings, stood on her hind legs and grabbed Vincent off its back with her front talons. Then she launched into the night sky before he could protest. As soon as they were out of sight, The La’ark barked an order.

“Scatter! Regroup!”

And then everybody bailed, fleeing before the zeffyr could reach them. Sperloc pushed his mount as hard as he could. He could feel its heat chasing him, beating at his back. Jets of violent fire shot into the night sky.

Jalhara, he thought, what have you done?