image [https://i.imgur.com/KL7Cq2o.jpeg]
“A warrior is not a warrior until a warrior is called.” That’s what she said to me, just before she left up the mountain called the Amon’tha. I will forever wonder about her words. Did they make her brave, or foolish? – Solomon Kirek, scout, 720 DE (Doom Era)
As long as Dorja draws breath, help is coming, she thought. It was the thing that kept her motivated, and kept her moving. Dorja was used to the cold of space travel, the chill corridors of starships, the icy feel of every metal surface, deprived of a sun’s natural warmth, but this was actual cold as forged by the determination of the elements. The wind was a blade of ice from the harshest north, slicing into her cheeks and digging into her eyes. The sleet lashed at her flesh like a taskmaster’s whip and her weeping hands—that is, her lower set of hands—had to hug tight to her midsection to keep warm. Her weeping hands had always had bad circulation.
Each wind-lashing was a warning from the Amon’tha. That was the name of the mountain. The mountain was telling her to turn around, climb back down, forget this errand, surely the girl Senjelica was already dead. Forget her, it said.
She wouldn’t.
Dorja is Dorja, she thought. And as long as she draws breath, help is always coming. It was her code, taught to her by no one, but created from a time when she needed someone. Long ago, Dorja had been alone and afraid, and no one came. Knowing that no one was coming had been the worst part. The sorrow, the hopelessness, the feeling of being caught in the gears of an unfair universe, it was too much to bear.
She vowed it would never be so again. As long as Dorja drew breath, help was coming for those who needed it.
As she ascended, all four of her hands working in concernt, Dorja’s fingers and toes searched for purchase. Her upper hands—her reaching hands, as they were called among her people—found a grip wherever they could, while her lower hands—her weeping hands—made occasional adjustments to the weapon and the gear on her back. She especially held tight to the glaive. If she lost the weapon, she was not likely to find its kind again. The blade was fashioned compristeel, and the shaft was made of a type of ardentwood found only on one planet. The blade was etched with runes of blessing, wards meant to protect her. She clung to it for dear life, just as she did the Amon’tha.
Her mind went numb on the first day of climbing.
The cold. It wanted in. But Dorja has a candle that keeps her warm, she vowed. Dorja has a candle. You cannot see this candle, Amon’tha, but Dorja has it. Oh, yes. It’s hidden inside, where Dorja’s mother told her to keep it safe. She aimed these thoughts at the mountain. Sometimes she even spoke them aloud.
“Dorja has the candle,” she huffed. Her breath came out in tufts of white cloud that frosted her lips. “It will keep her warm.”
The wind begged to differ. It found its way in through her clothing and armor, down her throat, freezing her tongue, freeze-burning her lungs.
The labor was intense. The rock wall was jagged and slick with ice, and with each motion acid poured in between her muscle fibers. Knuckles, usually a perfect blue, turned white from the prolonged strain. Calluses she had gained from training with the glaive now tore away. Scabs reopened. Her throat was throttled by chill air and her lungs felt like they would explode.
The cold wants in. But Dorja will not let it. Dorja does not permit the cold to win, nor the mountain.
Hand over hand she climbed higher.
Occasionally, she slipped. Recovered. Kept going.
Several times she paused to give herself a break, dangling only by her weeping hands and letting her reaching hands rest. Often during these breaks, she contemplated turning back. It was only natural for weakness to seep in. Test her. When the body is pushed to its limit, the mind will open negotiations, the Master once taught her. It will find excuses to surrender. You will not give in. It had been a commandment, really, and not so much a lesson.
The wind came on stronger and in sudden bursts, as if trying to pry her away from the wall. The Amon’tha wanted her dead. She slipped, scrambled for a handhold, barely found it in time. Panic raced through her veins. Under normal circumstances the mountain’s many nooks would be sufficient for gripping, but the ice made every foothold and handhold precarious, every movement a danger.
She looked down. Shouldn’t have done that. The world seemed impossibly small from up here, almost like a child’s toy set. It made her feel small and inadequate, her power was nothing compared to the Amon’tha’s will.
“Keep going, Dorja,” she huffed. And she did. Hand over hand, foot over foot, she climbed.
Dorja’s mouth was dry. There was water all around her, just in a frozen state. Water within reach, yet unobtainable—it was the petty sort of cruelty with which the universe excelled. She had a canteen in her gear bag, which she probably should have put next to her body to keep it from freezing. She was certain it would be a block of ice by now.
The wind intensified. It had a motive. It was in league with the Amon’tha. It wanted her gone.
“Dorja does not care if the wind hates her,” she whispered to no one. “Dorja will not be peeled away and discarded like the others. The Amon’tha will have to try harder! Do you hear, Amon’tha? Try harder to kill Dorja!”
Catching her breath, she gazed up at the sky. But the sky wasn’t there. Too many whorls of white snow were being pushed off the mountain’s peak, forming a white ceiling high above, concealing the distant white sun of this world.
She forgot that sun’s name.
And this planet’s name? Herenov 133c. Yes, that was it. And what a cruel world it was, one of the last outliers, filled with frightened farmers who believed they could outrun the Doom.
Dorja’s fingers trembled and her knees quivered. Not just from the cold, but from the sustained effort. She was certain her right foot was getting stiff. She had twisted it in a bad way on her first day of climbing, but couldn’t remember how. She couldn’t remember anything before a few days ago. Her entire life had been the Amon’tha, it seemed, and may it always be so.
She heard a dim roar. Looked up. She didn’t see anything. Clouds of snow swirled around her like dreams. There it is again. It was rumbling noise. Suddenly, a huge cloud of snow was raining down on her. Avalanche! Dorja hugged the wall tight and let the snow splash down all over her, cascading over her hairbun and shoulders, turning day into night for several seconds before it was over.
Suddenly, Dorja barked out a laugh. She and the Amon’tha were locked in combat now. Adversaries.
Eyes icing over, she came to enjoy it. Relishing the punishment—calluses, cuts, scrapes, and the penetrating cold—she fought to climb higher. She thought such mad thoughts: Dorja welcomes the cruel mind of the mountain. Let it always be so. Put her at odds with the universe, and watch her flourish until some strange god reaps her soul.
Stolen story; please report.
Such mad thoughts.
Wherever there is despair or hardship, let there also be Dorja.
She took a short rest, then got under way again.
Hand over hand, higher and higher, the wind howling all around her.
If only the steward and the castellan could see her now. They would probably both be having a good laugh.
* * *
TWO DAYS PRIOR…
It was cold when the castellan sent his steward to fetch the one the villagers called the blue beauty. Faces leaned out from windows to watch him hurry through the square, clutching his robes tightly as winds of infant winter lashed at him like tiny whips. Behind him, dawn had just crested the jagged mountains and the shadows peeled back from the farmlands like a dark bedsheet.
The steward was a good man. Hobbled, but wise and brave. Had once been a warrior himself, long ago, a Free Ranger in fact, along with the castellan. But no more. There were no warriors left here. Well, there might be one. If rumors were true.
Everyone watched from their windows because they knew where he was going, and they did not wish to be out while he did his work.
Word had got out.
They hoped he took the blue beauty away, for the priestesses of the temple had started their whispering: “The blue beauty is a curse, a blight upon the land she walks. It was she that brought this monster on us. It was her! Had to be. When she came, winter arrived early. Too early. The cattle died in that first shockfreeze. The castellan ought to have her hanged, and the rest of us will be fain shot of her!”
The steward found the blue beauty’s campsite at the edge of town, under a tent made of filthy wool and with a dreamcatcher hanging from the tent’s entrance. The whole area had the witch’s stink. All around the tent was a smattering of strange symbols scrawled in the mud, along with tiny animal bones arranged in patterns too wicked for the steward to endure. He shielded his eyes from them and approached the tent. The remnants of a doused campfire smoldered there, and he stepped carefully around it.
The steward began to speak, but a cold voice spoke before him. It came from within that foul tent. “Is that you, steward?”
He shrank away from the tent and covered his ears, for the priestesses said the blue beauty likely had strange spells. Her voice was known to be queer, almost like she was singing at times, but it could also be raspy and harsh, like dull chalk scraping a board. “It…it is me,” the steward said tentatively.
“I knew you would come. Is there anyone else out there with you?”
“I am alone.”
“That was wise,” the voice rasped. “Very wise. Dorja is most dangerous when surrounded. Did the castellan send you to kill Dorja, or does he have another use for her? Tell Dorja true, for you needn’t fear her, old man. But Dorja is Dorja, and if there are men with blades come for her, you must warn them.”
“Warn them of what?”
“That Dorja is Dorja.”
The steward had not the faintest clue what that meant, he only bowed low and said, “I can assure you, no one wishes you harm. The castellan asks me to…he summons you.”
“What does this word mean?”
“Which word? Summons?”
“That one.”
The steward groped for meaning. He had been told he must explain things to the blue beauty as though she were a child, for though she wore the body of a young woman—a malformed young woman—and carried a man’s weapon and wore a warrior’s armor, she comprehended some things as a child would. Her grasp of the galactic trade tongues, both OldGal and NewGal, was fragile. “It means you must come.”
“Must. Dorja knows this word. It is a commandment. Who tells Dorja she must?”
The steward swallowed and took half a step back from the tent, as if just now becoming aware of the evil indicated by the symbols scrawled in the soil. “The castellan. The castellan bids you come before his court. Just as he bade me come fetch you.”
“Dorja is bidden. Dorja is fetched. Dorja is summoned. Dorja is must’d.” The last word was spoken as a curse. “Dorja does not recognize the castellan’s summon, she goes where she pleases. Dorja is Dorja.”
“I understand,” he said in an attempt at appeasement. “But won’t you come? It has been whispered among the townsfolk that you…you are a fighter of some repute. The men in the beer hall, the ones missing their fingers, it is said that you are to blame for their mangled hands. It is also said that you were asking around for work. Work that pays well. You may be pleased to know that I have been granted the authority by the castellan to offer you recompense. Dah’ms. Coin.”
The voice spat out from the tent, “Dorja is looking for honest work. She will not kill the castellan’s enemies for him. Those men have done nothing to Dorja.”
“It is not the castellan’s enemies he wants dead,” said the steward, growing impatient at having to talk to a tent flap. “It is something else. There is a…” The steward trembled to even think of the word. “Vash’tik,” he whispered, and made the abjuration sign in the air. “It lies in the mountains, upon the Widower’s Summit, deep inside the Cave of Whispers.”
Silence from the tent.
He added, “And there is a child.”
“A child?” said the witch quickly. Her tone was soft, curious.
“Yes,” the steward said, sensing her intrigue. He watched as the wind batted the dreamcatcher around. “Yes, a girl. She’s been taken by the creature and its master, we believe. Please come. Listen to the castellan. Harken to what he has to say about Vash’tik, then make up your own mind.”
Something stirred inside the tent. Then a horror appeared. A slim blue hand pushed the flap to one side and the blue beauty came sliding out of the tent, slowly and smoothly, pouring herself onto the scene. With sickening grace, the creature stood to her considerable height. The steward paled before her ghastly image. Inhuman and strange, her smooth blue skin shone in the pale winter’s light. In omen, the clouds chose that moment to conceal the sun.
Gods below, save us from evil, he thought.
The blue beauty’s hair was black, and pulled tightly back into a bun. She wore the headdress made of a spacer’s armor and feathers, along with many talismans that hung pendulously from her neck and wrists, talismans made of bird bones and animal claws. Around her neck was a set of horns, the animal of origin unknown. Beneath all this ersatz jewelry was her body armor. It was piecemeal, black with splotches of brown, a cross-assembly of countless armor types—two sleeves of heavy compristeel, one thigh coated in reinforced leather, the other thigh naked, exposing muscles and thews of corded steel. Her torso was encased in some soldier’s chestplate, no doubt the previous honor lay dead on some planet or moon. And her blue flesh, so smooth and spotless, was painted in the white circles and the strange curling lines of some ghastly alien language, especially her face, which, except for the strange color, was as regal and proud as any lady of high station. The eyes were haughty, like a noblewoman used to being attended by a dozen servants. But this was no woman of nobility.
And her arms…
The steward tried not to look, but the more he tried, the more his eyes were drawn to those inhuman arms.
Those were what made her appear as the great horror. A grotesquery, to be sure. For she had two perfectly normal and muscular arms, covered in compristeel sleeves. But from her spine there protruded two more arms, one on each side, but these much bonier and with only three fingers each. Otherwise, the two spare arms were affixed to her almost naturally, so that she appeared to have two right arms and two left arms. In her two right arms, she held the fell weapon—a long staff tipped with a gigantic blade. A glaive, a weapon usually only meant for guards or infantry. The weapon was taller than she was by a head.
Something else surprised the steward. The blue beauty did not reek. Indeed, unlike the stinking campsite, she smelled of scented oils, flowers, jasmine. She appeared to keep herself hygienic, at least, despite living the life of a vagabond.
The steward looked at this beautiful horror and nearly wept. Such regal beauty. Such grotesque form. Oh, but the gods had been cruel to her. Where did she come from? Were there others that looked like her? The steward prayed there weren’t, he prayed the gods would not be so cruel as to inflict more like her on the universe, they had already wrought the Brood, and that was enough.
The blue beauty looked up at the azure sky, as if seeing something there no one else could.
“Take Dorja to the castellan,” she said at last, resolutely, in her singsong-raspy voice.
The steward bowed deeply, not in deference, but as an excuse to avert his gaze from her complex and tragic form. “Follow me. My lord will be most pleased you have agreed to listen. He was concerned that Coin would not sway you.”
“Dorja does not want Coin,” said the blue beauty, passing the huge weapon from her right hands to her left hands and sweeping past the steward. “She wants only the child.”
image [https://i.imgur.com/f6fHUfp.jpeg]