The boat moved through the swamp like one of the Treestriders barely visible in the distance, with the grach working in tandem and bringing their long poles down like the legs of a scurrying insect. Acting on advice from the Lion, Rusty had put speed enchantments on the four who were propelling the flat-bottomed watercraft. It was fun to watch them go for the first hour, but his attention soon wandered.
“You should get some sleep while you can,” Alice told him, from the leaf-covered canopy of the barge’s cabin. It didn’t have a door, but the wooden box of its frame offered some shelter from the green sun, and the others had been resting inside. Rusty shook his head, but smiled at Alice.
He couldn’t blame them for sleeping. A good chunk of their nights had been spent recovering from the ordeals of their new runes. His gaze wandered over to Beth, and then he looked away, guilty. His sister had been hurt because he was here. Because she wanted to help him.
“I never wanted children involved in this,” the Lion rumbled, from where he was sprawled out on the deck, housecat style.
“Then you shouldn’t have tried to eat my brain,” Rusty thought at him.
“I had another option, but it literally left this world a second before I could use it. You and the others were my only choice.” The Lion looked away. “But I am not proud of it. I admit, I did it only for my own selfish survival.”
“Tried to do it,” Rusty amended. “I stopped you.”
“No, I did it. I believe, from what memories you left me, that we would have ended up like this in a similar situation, only I would be able to take direct control when necessary. Now I have no control, but remain as your advisor. And… I find some relief, in this.”
“You’re not sore?”
“Sore?”
“Angry.”
“Ah. I see. No, I am not. Every time I move from one bonding to another, I know that I am dooming another to a lifetime of struggle at best, and an inevitable, ugly death at the worst. It was different once, but the stakes are too high, now.”
Someone poked his back, and Rusty almost jumped out of the boat. He turned to see Ken leaning against the wall of the makeshift cabin. “You’re talking with him, aren’t you?” Ken asked.
Rusty nodded. He side-eyed the grach, and Ken shrugged. “I don’t think they understand us, not like the satyrs could. So why don’t we talk about what’s really going on?”
“He’s not wrong,” the Lion said. “The satyrs might use charms. The grach will not. You may speak without fear of being overheard by our allies.”
The satyrs were spread out along the riverbanks, moving fast, scouting ahead, and keeping what escort they could. They were busy, and Ken and the Lion had a point. If ever they had a time to talk freely without fear of eavesdroppers, it would be now.
Rusty went into the cabin, and as the others looked to him, eyes shining in the shadows, something within him crumbled. “So I don’t really know what I’m doing,” he said, and then oh, the tears were coming, and he tried to stop because boys don’t cry, but Alice and Beth and even Ken were hugging him as he sobbed, biting his own arm to keep it as muffled as he could.
“I’m going to get everyone killed,” he confessed, as he said the thing he feared the most. And then he was quiet for a while, as they held him and whispered, and eventually the fear passed and left only tired behind.
“We’re all pretty much playing it by ear, daddy-o,” Ken said, after a few minutes of calm. “This isn’t like any of the books, and it’s dangerous as hel— as heck,” he said, glancing at the two girls. “I’d be more worried if you insisted you DID know what you were doing.”
“That would mean that the Lion ate your brain,” Beth said. “And he’d better not!”
“I don’t eat brains!” The Lion grumbled. “It’s a symbiotic relationship!”
“He says it’s symbiotic,” Rusty said.
“I don’t know what that word means. But you tell that oversized fleabag I’ve got my eye on him.”
“He can hear you,” Rusty said.
“Good.” Beth folded her arms and set her jaw.
“‘Bout that,” Alice said, letting go of him and leaning in, “Where did he even come from? Way they been talking ‘bout him… the satyrs, I mean, they say he always been here. Since the world was made, and all.”
Rusty translated as the Lion spoke.
“It is possible that I was made before this world existed in its current state,” the Lion said. “Time is different between… worlds, you call them. It is a good enough term, that. I only know that the ruins the grach revealed to us are from the First War.”
“The war between the angels and the fallen?” Alice’s eyes were wide and white and bright in the shadowed light of the cabin.
“Ah, you speak of your religion. The man Rusty’s brother brought before me knew of this, and I discussed this with him after we came to an accord, so many months ago. Child, if your god exists I have not met them. They may exist. There are many worlds, and some are definitely made things, but others look like they simply… happened. I have by no means seen all of them.”
“Good,” Alice said. “God IS real, you just ain’t seen him yet.”
Rusty looked to Ken, and Ken shrugged. He rolled his eyes a little, as if to say this isn’t something we should be worried about right now, but if it makes her feel better okay.
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Rusty was glad to have his memory enchantments back. It made it easier to understand what people were thinking by their movements and reactions. It was a little side perk he’d discovered with the spell, and he had a feeling it would come in handy for the battle ahead.
Beth wasn’t even looking at Ken, but she seemed to pick up on the general mood. God could wait, but the kids couldn’t. “You said somebody made you. Who?”
“I know this, and I do not know this,” the Lion said. “Both are true. This is confusing, I know. Let me explain.”
“Yeah, you lost me there,” Ken said. “Please do.”
“I was not built to have infinite memory. The nature of my existence means I must carry what I need from host to host, and their brains are limited by their physical nature. It is possible that the Makers secured the details of their existence from me, to protect themselves. Or it is possible that over the aeons, I have discarded it as unnecessary to my mission. Whatever they were, they are either fallen to an unrecognizable state or gone beyond recovery. All that remains are the runes that they have seeded across the worlds.”
“What did they tell you to do?” Beth asked.
“They told us to ensure that everyone played fairly. We enforced the rules of the game.”
“There was a game?” Rusty asked, then repeated the Lion’s last reply for everyone’s benefit.
“There IS a game,” the Lion said, and for the first time a tinge of anger rolled into his voice. “And the Unicorn’s people are CHEATING.”
“What uh, what kind of game are we talking about, here?” Ken asked. “I’m guessing it’s not pinochle.”
“WE are the game,” the Lion said. “We are the last of the unbound great beasts. We are the last remaining unconquered challenge for the Zodiac Hunters. The game is to hunt us, one copy of each of us. Then may the bearer ascend to the realm of the makers, and claim their prize.”
“You’re supposed to die?” Beth blurted out.
“And die well. But we were given the means to continue on past death. To retain memories, and reform in another body.” The Lion sighed. “And if they had played by the rules, we would not be here today, far from my home.”
“This isn’t your home?” Alice asked.
“This damp swamp? Most certainly not,” the Lion snorted. “Mine was a realm of tall grasses, and warm sun. Of plentiful prey, and trees that had their roots in the air, and their tops below ground. A place of cool caves, when the suns gathered in their triat and baked the earth below to rare moments of discomfort. A place where I could lay my enemy’s bones in rows, and be known and feared and… respected..” Rusty recited the last bit hesitantly. The Lion’s rumbling had gotten deeper throughout this recital, and the last couple of sentences sounded downright sinister.
“How are they cheating?” Rusty asked out loud.
“The runes are being misused,” the Lion grumbled. “The power of the runes was meant to allow the wielders to stand a chance against US, not to be turned upon innocents, to oppress and enslave them. The Unicorn did that. He built an empire to help him destroy us. And worse than that!
“The realms of the great beasts were meant to be sacrosanct, so that many wielders could visit freely, and try their skill. Instead, they were conquered, and guarded by the forces of the Unicorn. Oh, others tried before then, but we stopped them. We could not stop the Unicorn’s slaves.” The Lion’s faces, all of them, drooped. “I alone escaped the chain of binding. My brethren exist in their own conquered realms now, slaughtered over and over, facing armies instead of heroes, rebirthing over and over, only to die again as the Unicorn raises his archmages up through the ranks of the Zodiac. They gain power undeserved, as rune wielders who slew us many times walk unworthy inheritors through an EASY KILL.”
Rusty saw Beth and Ken and Alice looking at him, horrified, as he spoke.
“I alone escaped their… slaughterhouse plans,” the Lion said. “And along the way I split myself into many, fragmenting my powers among several hosts. To the fragment that is myself, was given the care of the “speed” rune. So long as the Unicorn does not hold it, then even if all other shards have fallen, my body will not reform in my realm. I will not become a… mine, for them.”
“How long has this been going on?” Beth whispered.
“Centuries,” the Lion said. “Almost a millenia. Given the time differences between the Makers’ realm circles and your own, it would be since before your people had anything like civilization.”
“You poor thing,” Beth said, and hugged Rusty. Rusty awkwardly hugged back, blinked his eyes. NO they weren’t hot again. He’d just cried himself out, darn it.
He kept telling himself that.
“So how do the satyrs and grach and duskwraiths figure in all this?” Ken asked.
“I knew I would need allies,” The Lion said. “I found those who strove against the Kingdom of the Unicorn, and made common cause. I cannot tell you of the wars, battles, and skirmishes fought. Even listing them would take more nights than we have left in our journey. I cannot tell you how many have been lost, how many have paid the price. Entire worlds gone, entire species destroyed.” The Lion’s voice fell, and Rusty whispered the last few sentences, the sadness of the elder thing’s voice bleeding into his own.
“Okay. I’m guessing the grach live here,” Ken said. “Why don’t they use the runes to fight back?”
“I spoke of the First War,” The Lion said, shaking off a little melancholy at the change of subject. “Once the grach were stormfolk, like yourself. Like the Makers. And like your species, the one you call ‘human,’ soon enough, several of the grach wizards decided to turn their new powers to subjugating and conquering their own people rather than playing the game. But the grach are not as skilled with deceit. Enough saw what they were doing, and decided they did not wish to live in oppression early enough to band together and stop the conquering wizards. Though it took time and much, much sacrifice, they did. And then they took the legendary rune that this world guards, and placed it into the chest of their greatest hero. And he worked the greatest spell ever to strike this realm, sacrificing his life to do so.”
The kids were leaning forward, staring at Rusty. It was a little unnerving, and he kept glancing to the Lion.
“Well?” Rusty asked, out loud. “What was that spell?”
“His rune was the rune of ‘Change.’ He changed the Grach, forever. No grach would ever be able to bond with a rune ever again, nor use a talisman, or even imbibe a runic elixir. The spell shook the firmament of the world, and his body turned to dust in an instant, for though he had absorbed much chakra from slaying so many wizards, the amount required to work such a spell is too great for any living being. Well… perhaps not the Unicorn. Perhaps.”
“What IS the Unicorn?” Alice asked. “He wasn’t a great beast like you, was he?”
“No. He is worse than that.”
Rusty waited. Ken poked him, after a long minute. “Well?”
“He’s not saying,” Rusty said. “What gives?”
“I am uncertain if I should speak of it,” the Lion said. “Given some of your distress on earlier subjects.”
Rusty relayed that. Ken threw his hands up. “You want us to trust you, right? You want us to help? Then square with us, here! Dish, daddy-o!”
“I… do not understand… no. That is a lie.” The Lion sighed. “I understand the sentiment. Very well. Young Alice, do you recall when I told you that in my travels, I had never encountered a god, not one that you spoke of?”
“Yes, that’s what you said,” Alice said, warily.
“Well neither had the Kingdom of the Unicorn. And they did not like this. So they resolved to fix this situation.”
“They’re trying to use the runes to find God?” Alice asked, sharing an excited look with Beth.
“No. They are trying to make one.”
“The Unicorn is God?” Beth burst out, a little loudly. Rusty quieted her, as the Lion’s next words hung heavily in his ears.
“The Unicorn is not a god. Yet.”