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72. [Red Tide] Lady Mockery
🕑 Added 2024-10-21 21:20:53 +0000 UTCIn the furthest east, on the frozen coast of the north, at the edge of the oca’em’s sprawling Reef, in the smoke-shrouded city of Endpass, champions and their Quills watched the first sliver of sun break the horizon.
And, in the blinking of an eye, the gods plucked them up and dropped them elsewhere.
The first arriving Quills and their champions found themselves in a vast courtyard of stone, a castle with walls as high as the sky rising around them. Inside, they found an uncountable number of rooms, all the same, with beds and basins and privies. The hallways all bent backward, feeding unavoidably to the courtyard.
Benches fanned out in tiers around the courtyard, creating an amphitheater. The factions sequestered themselves there, keeping away from each other, uncertain what to do next. The boldest amongst them ventured to fill plates of food from the lavish banquet tables that lined one wall.
For many, that would be their last meal.
Gradually, the courtyard began to fill. The teleportation came for each Quill and their champions when the sun reached them. Some were better prepared than others.
The archmages of the Magelab were disappointed that the cart of ingredients, potions, and artifacts of power that they had painstakingly assembled for the last year was left behind. Only that which champions carried on their backs was delivered with them to Armistice.
The ambitious mage-prince Cizco of Infinzel was caught in the midst of trying to drag his oafish brother, the rotund King Hectore, from beneath the bedsheets where he cowered. Thus, King Hectore arrived at the Granting on his back, literally kicking and screaming.
King Mudt appeared with his sword laid in his lap, working a whetstone across the blade. Delight filled the Orvesian as the first sight he saw was Infinzel’s blubbering king and his frustrated brother. He sprang for Cizco’s back, his sword traveling a murderous arc.
“Brother!” King Hectore shrieked. “Beware!”
Cizco Firstson spun about and power flared from his fist, but whether he would have been quick enough to defend King Mudt’s blow will forever remain unknown. The gods intervened, shoving the two men apart with invisible force.
“Not yet,” said the ge’ema in a voice like bells ringing through the walls.
“When?” screamed King Mudt. “Enough of these rules! Let me do what you have brought me here to do!”
“Soon,” the ge’ema replied “First, the declaration and the placement.”
By then, every Quill and every champion had arrived in the courtyard amphitheater. The stone floor changed, filling in with greens and blues, until a map of the island of Armistice appeared in fine detail, as it would appear for that first Granting and then never again the same.
“King Mudt, you will begin,” said the ge’ema. “Choose your place. Declare your wish.”
--Record of the First Granting and Dawning of the Second Age
Lyus Crodd, Scribe of the Dead Kingdom of Orvesis
***
Red Tide, Enchantress of the 4th Renown, The Reef, her music heard from a great distance
Cuda Bite, Throne Gazer, Salt Wall, the champions of the Reef, and Turtle Jaw, their Quill, the realm’s second most hated species
Mockery, Knife Master of the 8th Renown and Quill of the Trolkin, her long wait at an end
***
9 Meltzend, 61 AW
Trolkin territory, North Continent
111 days until the next Granting
They brought the dogsleds to a halt when the giant's skeleton came into view.
Turtle Jaw hopped off ahead of Red Tide, shading his eyes from the low hanging winter sun.
“By the tides,” he said. “They made men that size?”
Red Tide ran a hand across her braids, knocking loose the ice gathered in the grooves. “Women, too, I'd bet.”
“Unless that's why the big fucker killed himself. Maybe he was lonely,” Cuda Bite added, yawning as he uncoiled from his own sled.
Salt Wall grunted. “It's a lonely land.”
Throne Gazer said nothing, but gathered with the others to observe the leviathan-sized skeleton. The bones were so white they hurt to look at. The giant had died on its back with one knee up and its left hand fallen upon its forehead in an attempt to shield its face. Wind howled through the gap between the tibia and fibula in a way that sounded almost musical. Snow drifts piled up and into the cracked side of its immense skull like spilled brains.
“A thing I never thought I'd see,” Turtle Jaw said, rubbing his gloved hands together. “Amazing.”
“You say that like you’ve accomplished something in the viewing, old man,” Red Tide replied.
He glanced at her and shrugged. “Wouldn't say I'm worse off having seen a giant's bones, I suppose.”
“Does it inspire a song for you, Red?” Cuda Bite asked.
She took a moment to stare at the skeleton and consider his question. “Don't look like nothing to me but death.”
“Lots of good songs about death,” Cuda Bite replied.
Salt Wall cuffed him on the back of the neck. “We'll write you a beautiful death song, nibbler. Don't worry.”
They were talking more. That was a good thing, Red Tide thought. Their minds were thawing out after the journey north. They had crossed flat, packed, endless snow where even land-walkers with their insatiable hunger for spread hadn’t bothered to put down holdings. The oca’em had fallen into a desultory rhythm over the last month. Short days of sunlight spent riding the dogsleds, breaks to water the animals, night around a fire eating whatever game the dogs hunted for them—typically elk or caribou—bitter meats that needed to be cooked to be tolerable, and then overnights huddled amongst the blood-smelling pack for warmth and shielding from the wind. The dogs slept in a braid formation that left open nests of fur for each of the oca'em to snuggle into. The animals were hypnotically disciplined, just as the beastlord Yodor Dominik had promised, and the oca'em soon found themselves completely abiding by the rhythm and timing of the canines.
Red Tide felt more and more like an animal in those days. Driven north with single-minded purpose like salmon in a migration. It became easy to forget who she was, what they were doing, and the fate that awaited them.
It was Throne Gazer who had named the feeling—a numbing of the mind—and requested that she play her harp more in the evenings. The strings were tight with cold and stung the tips of her fingers, but Red Tide abided. She sang them songs of warm waters and hidden beaches and spun legends of oca'em warriors sinking ships. Some nights, even the dogs cocked their heads to listen.
And now, upon seeing the skeleton, it seemed to Red Tide that a change had come over them. The scenery suggested their endless days upon snowy plains were at an end. Their own songs could resume.
The stoic dogs still pointed their snouts northward—there were more miles yet to cover to whichever destination Yodor had implanted into their minds. Their harnesses creaked as the dogs settled against the ropes, as if the act of standing still required effort on their part.
Throne Gazer had his trident out. He jammed it into the snow and reached his hand toward Cuda Bite.
“Your knife,” he said, voice scratchy.
Cuda Bite eyed him. “What? Why?”
“I am going to cut the dogs loose.”
Red Tide tilted her head in unspoken question. They freed the dogs of their towlines every night, but always kept their harnesses attached.
“What would you want to do a stupid thing like that for?” Cuda Bite asked. “Did your mother hide a wagon up here for us and I'm not seeing it?”
Throne Gazer jerked his chin toward the skeleton. Red Tide followed his gesture. A splotch of crimson had dropped from atop the giant's rib cage—like one last drop of blood—and now moved toward them.
“One of them comes,” Red Tide said.
“Yes, one of them comes,” Throne Gazer said. “And I will not see these animals butchered to feed savages. They carried us far and served us well.”
“They eat dogs up here?” Cuda Bite asked. “Didn’t think that was land-walker custom.”
“The trolkin are not like the other land-walkers,” Throne Gazer said. “They are predators.”
“They eat whatever animals they can kill,” Salt Wall added. As she'd come from the northern pods, Salt Wall had more experience with the trolkin than any of them. “They'll even eat each other if circumstances allow.”
“By the tides, what drives them to that?” Cuda Bite asked.
“The madness,” Salt Wall said. “Beware the melting, they say.”
“These land-walkers got too many fucking expressions,” Red Tide said. “What's that mean?”
“Their snowflake Ink,” Salt Wall said, indicating her throat. “Watch out if you see one fading away. Means the transformation is on. They stop being mere kin to the trolls. The gods don't grant protection from monsters like that.”
Monsters. They had come all this way north to treat with monsters. Red Tide supposed she understood the logic of it. Like the oca'em, the trolkin all lived under one faction, and so were free to kill each other, without the protection of the gods offered the land-walkers who divided themselves into dozens of territories. And, like the oca’em, the trolkin were seen as abominations by the rest of humanity. Naturally, it made sense their two groups should be allies against the land-walkers who hunted them.
However, the trolkin were more reviled than even the oca'em, and in conflict with territories from the north who could give two shits about life on the sea. The trolkin might provide protection, but they would also bring new enemies.
Of course, it was too late to voice this skepticism now. This was one of Deep Dweller's plans and Red Tide had to believe the old sea witch knew what she was doing. Plus, a champion from the Reef hadn't survived a Granting in a decade. Meanwhile, the trolkin had one amongst them who had made it through the last two Grantings, creating a true nuisance of herself. At the very least, Red Tide would like to know her secrets.
With Cuda Bite ignoring his request for a knife, Throne Gazer had instead knelt next to the dogs and begun trying to tug loose the frozen knots that secured their harnesses. The dogs didn't react at all to being unbuckled, their misting breaths steady and synchronized.
“My friend, will they even go if you let them loose?” Turtle Jaw asked quietly. “The beastlord worked some magic on them…”
“I don't know,” Throne Gazer admitted. “But I will at least give them a chance.” He glanced at Red Tide. “Perhaps if you were to use [Hypnotic Object] it might break Yodor's spell.”
Red Tide lifted one shoulder. “Sure. I could try.” She hadn't given much thought to the ultimate fate of the dogs, but it had clearly preoccupied Throne Gazer. She found herself warmed by this break from his usual aloofness. “But we might need them yet, so don't go untying all that shit unless you know how to put it back together.”
Throne Gazer hesitated with his fingers wormed into a knot, then sighed. He stood up. “Fine.”
“Besides, they didn't send a horde of cannibals to greet us,” Red Tide continued. “It's just the one.”
“If I'm not mistaken, that's the one,” Turtle Jaw said. “The knife master quill. Their survivor.”
The trolkin woman had drawn close enough that they could see more than just the garish red dress that stood out so brightly against the snow. She was large—a full foot taller than Salt Wall—and broad-shouldered. Her skin was a pale blue that blended into the snow and she had a mane of wild, frizzy silver hair. Red Tide knew little of the fashion of the land-walkers, but she understood that the trolkin's dress had been made for someone with a much smaller frame. The fabric barely reached to her mid-thigh and split open across her chest, exposing her Ink and—Red Tide winced—the scars where the trolkin's breasts should have been. She wore nothing else, completely unbothered by the cold, beyond even the oca'em tolerance to low temperatures.
Without greeting, the trolkin stopped at a distance of twenty yards and turned her back on them. As the Reef's champions exchanged looks, the trolkin cupped her hands around her mouth.
“Esteemed guests from the ocean!” Her words rang clear across the empty plain. “It is my pleasure to present to you the Quill of the trolkin, wielder of the eight blades, the keeper of winter, redeemer of her lost people, the splendid and valorous—Lady Mockery!”
“What the fuck?” whispered Cuda Bite.
The trolkin—Lady Mockery—spun about as if she were stepping out from behind a curtain and hadn’t just shouted her own introduction. She grinned at the oca’em, her canines long, teeth chipped and cracked, the expression a wild rictus. Mockery laced her heavy hands and shook them in the air, while the oca’em watched in uncomfortable silence.
A madwoman, Red Tide thought. They had come here to seek counsel and alliance with a madwoman.
Mockery started forward and, as she did, she touched a dark whorl of Ink on her chest. The symbol read [Fireblade]. For a moment, the trolkin’s fingers disappeared within her body, and then emerged clutching a knife that sizzled with fire. The Reef’s champions readied themselves for attack—particularly Throne Gazer—but needn’t have bothered. Mockery swept the knife through the air, creating the shape of a heart in flames that hung crackling in the air. She then walked through the fire, plunging the knife back into her chest where it harmlessly disappeared.
In that moment, Red Tide realized the trolkin stared only at her.
“Ah, Lady Mockery,” Turtle Jaw began, “thank you for receiving us—”
“Hush!” Mockery hissed without looking at him. “Tuck yourself into your shell, little turtle.”
None of the others intervened as the trolkin came to stand directly before Red Tide. She would have words for them later about that. For now, Red Tide made a point of not stepping backward, and of maintaining steady eye contact with the towering trolkin.
“Battle-sister, you arrive at last,” Mockery said.
“Didn’t know you had a sister, Red,” Cuda Bite muttered.
Red Tide swallowed her immediate objection at being named kin with this woman. Instead, she simply raised one eyebrow. “That’s right. Here I am.”
Mockery fell to her knees before her with a loud whump.
“You needn’t sully your mouth with requests. I would never make you ask,” Mockery said. “I pledge assistance to you and yours, battle-sister. You will have all the aid from me that you require. And together, our peoples shall be free.”
“Huh,” Red Tide replied. “Good.”
Comments
iridium248
Red Tide makes a friend!
