Deadhouse Landing

She had spent her time on the south coast facing the cold grey waters of the Strait of Storms. These entities known as the Stormriders were an interesting phenomenon. One she’d never had the inclination or opportunity to investigate before. Clearly, they represented a lingering ancient intrusion into the region. But just from where, she couldn’t say. It would take generations of observation to know for certain, of course, but it appeared to her that their presence was slowly fading upon the world, grafting of an alien order as it was.

The flash of sheet lightning from behind threw her shadow far out before her, and Sister of Cold Nights straightened, lifting her head. Was that …

She turned to regard a dense mass of clouds slowly building over the island north of her, and nodded. At last. Perhaps my time here has not been wasted after all.

She started for the city.

*   *   *

Cartheron set a hand on his brother’s arm, holding him back from a side street. ‘I’m not so sure.’

Urko shook off his hand. ‘We just head up this way to the square. The one with the broken statue.’

Cartheron squinted into the dense banners of hanging mist. ‘Like that last turn?’

Urko huffed, crossing his thick arms. ‘Hunh! One mistake! I’m telling you – this town is not this big!’

‘I agree.’

It was strange; the moment they’d left the waterfront behind and walked up between the warehouses it was as if they’d entered another city. The narrow meandering streets were familiar, but not quite right. Same with the shop-fronts.

His brother spun then, crouching. ‘Did you hear that?’

Cartheron squinted into the miasma. ‘What?’

‘Sounded like … claws scratching over stone.’

‘A lost dog?’

‘Damned big one,’ Urko muttered.

Indeed, a looming dark shadow was now moving behind the shifting curtains of mist. One impossibly large. A trick of this strange light, Cartheron told himself. No beast could be that large. Probably just as high as his knees – not damned near the size of a bull. Just a distorted shadow.

A low growling rumble reached them then, as of rocks being ground together. The very cobbles beneath their feet vibrated with it. The brothers shared a glance: run or freeze?

Cartheron slowly reached down and drew his boot knife. The tiny weapon looked comical compared to the monster that was edging in upon them. That was, if the shadows, and their fears, were not playing tricks upon them.

A long, broad muzzle parted the vapours. It was fully as tall as their own heads. Lips drew back snarling from wet gums, and slit eyes glared an eerie near-black before them. A heady waft of desert scent, like spice, nearly made Cartheron dizzy.

Before he could act, his brother leapt upon the beast, wrapping an arm about its neck, bellowing, ‘Run!’

But Cartheron did not run: he stared, frozen, while his brother tightened the crook of his elbow upon the beast’s throat and its eyes widened in something almost like surprise – if such a creature could be capable of such an emotion.

It reared, snarling, and threw itself against the wall next to them. Both it and his brother gave animal grunts as bricks crunched and wood splintered. It staggered off, attempting to shake this impudent fool from its back, but Cartheron knew that nothing short of decapitation would ease his brother’s arms once he’d clamped them round anything.

They disappeared into the mist, the hound rearing and snarling, Urko half hopping, half dragging his feet. Cartheron moved to follow, but stopped – there was no way he would ever find them. He swore then he would honour his brother’s damned fool move by beating this confounding miasma. He would escape it. Standing there, his back pressed against chill damp stone, he decided that perhaps the way to beat it was to remain still; it may be that some logic or pattern would emerge amid the confusing chiaroscuro.

Just as at sea when caught amid thick fog. You didn’t look, you listened. And so he closed his eyes, listening to the night.

*   *   *

Nedurian soon found that he no longer had to warn the citizens of Malaz against entering the streets. It appeared they were quite familiar with these uncanny happenings: doors were slammed and barred and heavy shutters banged shut over windows. In no time he was alone in a tiny mist-laden square, and only then did it occur to him that he had no idea exactly where he was.

A low rumbling reached him then, as of a beast the size of a bull exhaling, and he thought, Well, perhaps not so alone …

He raised his Rashan Warren to its sizzling heights about him and waited, motionless, in a pool of absolute dark. Whatever this was, it ought to pass him by.

Instead, however, twin pinpoints of a sullen bluish glow emerged from the dark, closing, growing in brilliance, and he realized with a renewed prickling of his skin that he was being stalked through the paths of his own Warren of Night.