The seven thunders, p.8
The Seven Thunders, page 8
“Screw finding a wielder,” he said trembling. The growl separated from the shadows and revealed a ferocious, wolflike beast. It had yellow eyes. It skulked forward on all fours and bared its fangs. Its claws scratched at the ground hungrily. Hermium stood paralyzed; he could not scream nor run. He was locked in the room with a monster! Maybe the Summer Commodore did want him dead!
The thought tumbled with Hermium as he was tackled from behind and the air knocked out of him. Relics crashed into other relics as he rolled with his attacker. Hermium didn’t know what he was fighting. His assailant had no hands; there was no head. But it was strong, real strong. It pinned Hermium down and then turned on the beast, flaring and beating white wings at the predator, pushing it back until the fanged creature fled out the window, roaring. The attacker hung there for long seconds making sure it was gone and then floated towards Hermium. Hermium reached for a dagger and pointed it at the dark phantom. It hovered over his body like a shadow with substance. There were no hands, no feet, no face. Hermium closed his eyes and thrust the dagger, but the blade would not penetrate. The attacker knocked it out of his hand and pinned him down, the torch dying slowly in the dirt.
Sensing the attacker’s grip relax, Hermium kicked the shadow off him. He hustled to his feet, panting heavily, afraid of it and that the monster that might return, and made a run for the door. But the shadow barred his way, this time hovering above the ground, moving where he moved. Its white wings were enormous, and its feathers fringed in blue. It was an Aeriatis hooded like Death, its garment nearly black like ocean after a storm, covered in shiny scales. What light remained from the torch danced on the strange, scaly fabric of the suit. Hermium reached to touch it.
“No, no, no, no. Where are you taking meeeeeeeeeeeeee?!” Hermium bellowed, as the shadow flew with him out the window.
Tell me what we are doing in this backwater again when there are other worlds to check? I’ve got a Tree to tend,” snorted the Qwee, swatting at the leafless branch that scraped his right minotaur horn and reminded him that it was broken.
The Rwaa, the great white tiger, approached the Qwee like he would a willful cub. “You saw the phoenix. You heard the Godhead,” he said, whipping his tail. “There’s no healing the One Tree unless we—”
“Yes. Seal the Everling,” the Qwee replied mockingly. “Maybe we’re the ones misinterpreting it. Have you thought about that?”
The Aegus, his long white beard hitting his waist cord, adjusted the hem of his shale-blue robe and crouched down to put his wrinkled hands on knotty roots, dismissing his brother the Qwee’s venting of hot air from his flared nostrils. “The pool gave me an indication that the Everling the Triunes spoke of is here somewhere.”
“You went into the Milk of the Universe even though it’s expressly forbidden except for members of the See? Are you mad? You know the holy scryers are the only ones ordained to enter and read the sacred substrate,” steamed the Qwee.
“Why should we be denied using it?” retorted the Aegus.
The Rwaa pressed between the two Vivirim with the weight of his big cat body. “That doesn’t make sense. I checked the library. They are all gone. Horatio was the last,” he stressed, growling low.
“Great,” snorted the Qwee, stomping the leaf bed beneath his hooves. “Next he’ll be saying that he wants us to go back in time to seal a dead man.”
“Don’t be bull-headed,” said the Aegus.
“Well, you were brazen enough to dip into the pool, and you made us all complicit,” countered the Qwee. “And why not just evanesce to the leader of this world and tell them what we know?”
“We are rumor, nothing more. We reveal ourselves to no one but the Everling,” stressed the Aegus, to the Qwee and to his other brothers.
“Oh, because the almighty Aegus has spoken. Triunes forbid we think our own thoughts,” mocked the Qwee. “By your plan, you have us groping through the trees like blind men.”
“Shush the hooves!” screeched the Xylarook. “I can’t hear above your clomping.”
“Something’s coming,” the Aegus said, having read the roots.
“Are you sure this is where she landed?” queried the Rwaa.
The Xylarook shook his head feathers and nodded curtly. Healerwood Forest was eerily quiet. Not a squirrel scampered across the needle-covered floor or climbed up tree bark; not even the birds chirped or nested in the thick foliage. The trees took on a look of menace as their immense limbs blocked out the moon.
Yards away, there was a rustle in the bushes.
The Xylarook scoured the area with his eagle eyes. “Woodwife? Is that you?”
The Qwee sniffed the air, scowling. “That’s no Woodwife. That’s something . . . dead.”
“The creature! It’s here!” roared the Rwaa.
“Rwaa, cut it off. Try to herd it to that clearing,” directed the Aegus.
The Rwaa bounded into the whitewoods, trees of tremendous girth and height, and stealthily followed the fetid scent. He caught a glimpse of the dead-undead prodigious abomination. It ran, crooked and awkward, between the trees like its bones were set the wrong way. It scraped the forest floor with its lumbering gait, leaving behind a trail of bunched needles and broken branches a blind man could have followed.
The Rwaa chose his angle and broke from the trees. He forced the fell creature left and refused it any path but the one towards the clearing. He pressed the chase but the dead-undead creature had sensed his trap and hoisted a fallen tree trunk over its head and heaved it at him. It grazed the Rwaa’s head and he tumbled with it as he fought for footing on the loose needles and slippery leaves. The creature lurched towards him as he struggled to move his left front paw from underneath the weight of the log; it wailed gutturally, moving its jaws, hungry to bite.
“Back!” yelled Mave. The creature snarled ghoulishly at the waify Woodwife’s sudden appearance and took off running.
“Go,” the Rwaa insisted of Mave. The tree warden did so, but not before doing him a kindness by removing the log with a wave of her hand. As she flitted away like a furious fairy just inches off the ground, the Rwaa roared, irritated, and continued his pursuit of the creature behind her. The dead-undead led them through the thickest parts of the forest to slow them down. It was smart and uncannily fast for something that should have been six feet under the ground rotting with the grubs.
The chase neared the forest’s edge where an old man and his horse and buggy were on a lonely road. The Rwaa picked up a second and third fetid scent. The horse bucked, sensing danger. The Rwaa ran harder as the creature before him broke through the trees. Two others joined it on the other side of the meadow, mad with hunger, wailing like berserkers as they crossed the purple-flowered field. They converged on the horse and the old man—the sound of their cries was daggers to the soul.
“NO!” bellowed Mave.
The Rwaa roared, perhaps louder than he ever had, and chased off the other two dead-undead back into the wood. Mave impeded the other from doing the same, planting her feet in ground and thrusting her hands into the earth and summoning roots to her assistance. The creature flailed and fought their binding, slicing Mave’s arm with its jagged nails, garbling inhuman, wailing utterings, as the Rwaa brought it down and held it with his weight. The creature fought back violently, snarling. It was incredibly strong. The Rwaa growled at the creature’s decrepit face. The white tiger’s eyes then turned from brown to blue. The dead-undead creature stiffened as if with a seizure, its mouth gaping. Then, like the spread of white leprosy over a body, its decaying head, twisted torso, and finally its legs, turned to stone.
The Xylarook landed in a rush, happy to see the Woodwife and attended to her wellbeing. The Qwee and the Aegus also arrived on the scene.
“You turned it to stone?” snorted the Qwee.
The Rwaa walked off the body. “Two others got away. I normally just paralyze things when my eyes turn blue; I don’t know what happened,” he said testing the strength of his left paw.
“What are you doing?!” screeched the Xylarook. Mave peeked out from under his wing.
“Sparing them,” replied the Aegus, setting the dead horse and old man’s corpse to burn. “They would have turned by nightfall.”
“Did you learn that from your book?!” snapped the Xylarook, shaking his beak and head feathers in disapproval.
“Ill-news,” sang Mave,
“Days wasted.
I followed such from the Weathering Wood.
Chased it.
Many more.
By blood, I’ve seen.
Earth upturned.
Bones retrieved.
A man.
Blood stone.
Dead walk dead make dead.
Dead this way they come.”
“You’re bleeding,” said the Rwaa. The Rwaa licked Mave’s arm, his eyes blue like a coral lagoon. The wound disappeared, and there was no scar on her fair skin.
“By the Triunes, you are an ameliogen,” said the Xylarook, flicking his head feathers.
“When it works,” the Rwaa said licking his fur, as if testing his tongue. “She’s right,” he said pacing around the broken body of undead. “This is not the same undead from the sacellum. Look at the hip structure; it’s not male.”
“The man and the blood stone—” the Qwee started.
“The Necrogist,” said the Aegus, interrupting his brother as he stroked his beard with a storm brewing in his eyes.
“How many has he made or…resurrected? Whatever the phrase is,” growled the Rwaa.
“Aegus, surely now you see that we must inform the leaders of this world,” reasserted the Qwee.
“No. Our anonymity is too important,” insisted the Aegus.
“Not even as a last resort?” questioned the Xylarook.
“Very well,” sighed the Aegus, “as a last resort.” The Aegus turned towards Mave and held her by her tiny shoulders. “You said they’re coming here. Where?”
Mave pointed through the trees at the red-flagged steeples that pierced the horizon.
“Why?” she posed,
“We know not.
But answers lie.
In Glimmeroc.”
“Qwee, Rwaa,” said the Aegus, “you two head on to the keep. And tread quietly.” He gave a pointed look at the Qwee’s hooves. “If you run into trouble, remember the rendezvous enchantment, and we will meet you wherever you are. Rook, you’re with me.”
“We will not forget,” purred the Rwaa.
“You’re going to find him, aren’t you? The Necrogist?” probed the Qwee.
“I am,” said the Aegus. The Aegus took the Xylarook by the wing and his evanesce failed.
“Well that’s comforting,” snarked the Qwee. He did it again and they disappeared as they should, in a blink of light.
“C’mon cat,” said the Qwee, heading to Glimmeroc. “I pray there’s an Everling in that keep, because soon we might not have the power to seal him.”
“Do you know how to seal, Qwee?” growled the Rwaa, not liking the use of cat.
“I’ve practiced the words,” responded the Qwee, unconvincingly. “How hard can depositing destiny be?”
“Real hard, according to the Xylarook,” purred the Rwaa.
“Of course, he says that, because he knows that the Aegus is the only one of us to have performed the ritual,” snorted the Qwee.
“Right. And you could?” probed the Rwaa.
The Qwee sighed heavily. “This whole conversation is moot and stupid. I’m not going to have to perform the ritual,” grumbled the Qwee. “And from now on there’s a moratorium on purring.”
Holy heifer,” said Tayori. “Is that a dead red snake?”
“It’s a message,” said Hermium, tossing the little serpent by its tail into the wastebasket.
Tayori scrunched his face. He hated snakes. “You need to make more friends.”
Hermium agreed. Two weeks had passed since the events of the relics room, and he felt more like a freak now than ever; the Red Adder’s message was just another case in point. Those who were even marginally supportive about him being the Kid with Two Letters, or saw it as something cool, were now looking at him side-eyed and calling him Suit Boy. And then, on top of that, there was the issue with his Woe Hammer case. How was he supposed to know that when he left it in the Summer Commodore’s office that nobody would be able pick it up but him?
“That’s why Hargus asked me to pick it up . . .” he muttered realizing the connection. If there was another disaster brewing on the horizon, he wanted to tell the Godhead to strike him down already, right there, in his room, wearing his summer working blues. He was sure Cadet Sergeant Iggsworth would be happy to sweep up the ashes.
“You know you could be friendlier. Smile occasionally,” said Tayori. “I’ll take that smirk as progress.” Tayori saw the Woe Hammer case sitting in the corner under the crisscrossed shadows cast by the noonday sun. Outside, cadets cackled, enjoying a break from the summer rains. “I heard the Summer Commodore was pissed about this case. Sat in his office over a week. Do you mind if I give it a go?”
Hermium shrugged agreeably and watched as Tayori wrapped his meaty, farm-bred hands around the handle. His build reminded him of Hargus. The case would not budge.
Hermium placed one finger on the handle and Tayori picked it up with ease.
“That’s insane!” said Tayori.
“Welcome to my life,” replied Hermium, plopping on his bunk with a sigh.
The wielder case fell with a thud, startling Hermium’s suit. “Sorry,” grimaced Tayori. “Whoa. Easy there. Does it always hover over you like a ghost?!”
“All the time,” complained Hermium. “It’s annoying, actually. Back! He’s a friend,” he said to his suit. Hermium shook his head. “It follows me everywhere. This morning I had to use the belt off my bathrobe to tie its freaking leg to my bed post just so I could use the bathroom.”
“That’s unfortunate,” said Tayori. He raised his hands to show that he meant no harm. “Is that a map? I love maps.”
Hermium stuffed the map under his pillow as the scent of honeysuckle wafted into his room. “A bunch of us Crows heard screeching in the woods. You?” said Duma Petalborn from the doorway.
Tayori looked at Hermium and nodded yes. Hermium nodded yes as well.
Duma walked to the room’s window and stared at the tree line. “They’re not telling us what they know . . .” she said with her back to them. Duma turned around. “Some of us Crows are headed to 101 early,” she said noticing the snake in the wastebasket. “You can join us if you want.”
Hermium and Tayori exchanged glances. “But we’re Hawks,” said Hermium.
The green-eyed precocious blonde crossed her arms. “Look, Halfwits, I’m just trying to be nice. Fine. Do what you want.”
“Wait!” shouted Tayori. “Herm, go on. I have to grab my Aeriatis.”
“Why’s it do that? Float that way?” said Duma, eyeing the suit.
Hermium blew his lips. “I don’t know.”
Tayori rushed back into the room with his Aeriatis case, excited to go. “What did I miss?” smiled Tayori.
Duma rolled her eyes. “Everyone wearing their coolsuits?” she asked.
“Chafie, check,” said Tayori.
“Check,” nodded Hermium.
Duma led the two boys out the northeast doors as instructed by the leaflet posted by Cadet Sergeant Iggsworth on the Zephyrus Barracks communications board. Hermium’s Aeriatis floated behind him like a silent watchman. They followed the footpath that ran perpendicular to the backside of Glimmeroc and into a grove of whispering pines.
Fire crickets jumped with glowing bellies. Blue-crested swallows trilled. Hermium spent the next ten minutes walking through the scenic trees hurriedly thumbing through his homework on the chapter of the Three S’s of the Aeriatis— which he should have finished last night and would have if not for Dr. Fidderick’s sleeping draught of Lymbic Syrup. Meanwhile, Duma and Tayori debated about his theories on Hermium’s suit from some article he had found in one of his issues of the New Briny Journal of Supernatural Phenomenon. She insisted it was rubbish, and he insisted that they were very diligent to make sure every story was factual.
“Herm, help me out here.” Hermium gave Tayori a dimpled, cheeky smile. “Not you too,” whined Tayori.
The trees thinned and Hermium saw Airjocks Gym, a rectangular, stand-alone building, constructed in the same style as the keep, bookended with two squatty towers that overlooked the skaabash field beside it, already groomed and ready for tournament play. The thought of seeing scrums and forward passes of a squibby made Hermium so happy he forgot the Red Adder’s message, if only temporarily.
A jubilant Tayori walked in ahead. “C’mon Herm! Let’s do this!”
Hermium looked at his suit, nervous about its cooperation. “Try not to embarrass me,” he pleaded.
Airjocks Gym was enormous. The roof was raftered with sweeping wooden arches and the interior walls were paneled with pillows of padding. The bulk of the space was dedicated to a bizarre set of apparatuses that had been arranged both in the air and on the floor. It was an obstacle course of wicked things that would have been hard for anyone seeing it for the first time to imagine passing. It had been situated squarely in front of that very population, so Plebes could observe upperclassmen improve upon their aerial skills and understand the work and devotion to craft it took to become an airjock.
As a lover of contraptions and tinkering, Hermium was hooked. One girl in particular grabbed his attention. She escaped a volley of exploding cannon balls, rang a bell, and then went right into a corkscrew maneuver and threaded three aerial rings. He followed her to the next obstacle where she flew inside a large aviary of winged Hissaspits, nasty reptilian beasts that were known to be vicious and highly territorial. He watched fascinated as she banked and evaded their venomous spit, until he saw a man emerge from between shooting vents of fire without a singe mark on his large, brown feathered wings with flashes of white on the underparts. He politely excused himself from a group of third-year Risers who were seeking pointers. The man had dark brown hair, salted around the ears, a strong curved nose, and an air of importance which was validated the moment he took to the air and landed in the lecture area behind his podium.
