We had arrived on Varkaras

As I was dragged up from the hold of the ship, trying to suppress my hidden satisfaction at having finally arrived, I managed a good look at the destination the cloaked monster had called us to. Before us was a very, very shabby port, made from lifted wooden buildings with thatch roofs. It was a thin, long strip of putrid civilization, the dark jungle behind him practically pressing against the walls of the building. Beyond the black green bark and midnight leaves of the towering trees was a single mountain made of looming black stone. There was more, I was sure, but the darkness of night made making out more details impossible.

All along the coast were arriving ships. Some were smaller than the Midnight Stalker, others of equal size, with a few of them being even larger. I could see some of the grews look at those prowling leviathans with hungry, envious eyes. Even Captain Ophelia, standing at the helm, looked at them with naked hunger. Part of me wondered if the whole reason she agreed to come here at all was to steal the vessel of her rivals while they were all gathered at a neutral port. I hope she failed miserably.

Vant pushed me forwards, and I meekly accepted his direction. The other slaves in the ship’s hold followed behind me in several columns, their heads downcast, their expressions miserable.

We’ll be free soon, my brothers, I thought, remembering the pale feather on the floorboards. Just hold on.

We were all lead through the shabby port town and to the edges of the jungle. Past the splintering planks, reeking alehouses, weeping brothels and sinking inns we were shoved. More and more crews joined us until an unwashed horde of slaves and their overseers overcrowded the lifted wooden “streets” of this filthy place. Had I not become so used to the unwashed depths of the Stalker I might have vomited. Instead, I gagged, immediately fearing that my cover had been broken by such a reaction. Thankfully, I was hardly the only one to grow ill at the immense gathering of such poorly maintained bodies. Prisoners and captors alike made a vile choir of retching, choking and vain attempts to keep their bile down.

But all that noise ceased when we met the hosts.

Three cloaked figures awaited us, practically identical in size and shape. All of them were of the same eyeless, translucent-skinned species that I had encountered a few nights prior aboard the Stalker. Their alien, too wide mouths were stretched to their limits smiling as we approached.

“Captains,” one of them sang.

Several well-dressed, well-armed and noticeable figures stepped forwards. Ophelia was one of the foremost of them, but not by much. The others were all individuals that were easy to discern, auras of malice and violence emanating from them. Their times at sea plying their predatory trade had made them all monstrous in their appearance. Some had taken on the physical traits of sea animals, with serpentine heads, crab claws, tentacles in place of legs, or even the ozone-stinking plates of krakens. Others bore weapons that could only have been of arcane construction. Swords that floated around them, pistols that constantly smoked as if aflame, whips that crackled with electricity, and more besides. They were a motley yet lethal group, one that was more likely to turn on themselves than anything else.

“We’ve brought your cargo,” one of them snarled, a chitin faced brute with poison tipped barbs jutting from his chin. “Where is our payment?”

“Soon, Kurkulak,” the one of the left soothed. “Payment shall be delivered upon completion of services rendered. They all must be brought into the Narthex.”

The captains grumbled, but nodded one and all. Whether they were genuine in their acceptance or were just playing along was a question I could not answer.

At the head of this chained horde, I was pushed through the jungle. It wasn’t as onerous a venture as I was beginning to fear. The eyeless ones raised their hands, and nature ripped itself apart to clear a path for us. Trees that had likely stood for centuries snapped at the center and fell backwards, poisonous plants withered and died, boulders were flung from their places, the skulls of ambush predators burst, leaving a neat trail of carnage and wreckage for us to traverse through.

Allfather fend, what are they?

Though beaten down for gods only know how long, the slaves behind me began to mumble in fear. Though their whispers were cracked down upon with whips and sharp words, I could tell that the overseers were no less uneasy with what they were walking into. Gold had brought them all here, likely no small amount. I imagined that the pirates had already been paid a significant sum to bring us here, for they would not have made this temporary peace if they had not already gained something out of it. But I wondered if they too were beginning to doubt the bargain they had made.

You’ll learn to regret it sooner than you think, I thought to myself, thinking on my dream.

But as we passed deeper and deeper into the jungle, I’d begun to wonder if my vision was a fit of madness. That I had only imagined the strange figure and the feather in an effort to comfort myself. As the trees above grew taller, the thickening foliage began to blot out the sun. Though the path was still widening to accommodate us all, the jungle was becoming denser. I could hear strange creatures moving about in the green. Chittering insectoids, growling felines, wooping primates, and eerier sounds that I hoped never to hear again. And as I was at the front of the line of captives, I had a clear view of the hooded trio. Looking at them for too long felt as if needles were being slowly slid into my eyes, so I averted my gaze as much as I could. But there was no hope to be found anywhere, in anything I saw.

Please, let my dream have been real.

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We reached the yawning cave of the mountain’s entrance. A colossal entrance way, with spiked rocks jutting out from the ceiling, giving the impression of a fanged maw. One “tooth” was thicker than all the beams of the Stalker put together, and there were nine of them in a row. Walking beneath them, I got the distinct and sharp fear that the whole wall would slam shut upon me, crushing into bits between the gnashing rocks. But fortunately–or unfortunately, given my present company–they stayed stagnate and we moved deeper into the mountain.

After what felt like hours of ducking our heads beneath lower hanging ceilings, nearly slipping on damp floors, cutting out feet on jagged rocks, and shuddering every time we heard a long, droning, mournful cry emitting from deeper within. I was sure I was going mad, because the cave seemed to shift to tighten around us, pressing pirate and prisoner alike into maddeningly narrow confines. Recalling the teeth-like protrusions at the entrance, I suddenly thought that were walking down the shifting gullet of some primordial monster, offerings one and all to a being that made no distinctions, seeing us all as food and nothing more.

“Here we are,” the three before us sang in unison.

I was briefly blinded as we stepped out of darkness into crimson light.

The cavern was colossal. On its own, it could have contained every ship currently anchored on the island’s coast. Its roof was exposed, granting us all a clear vision of the night sky above. All along the walls and floor ran veins of jagged, shining crimson crystals, all of them casting an eerie, bloody glow over the whole space. They gave an almost comfortable warmth to the place, a welcome relief from the previous chill of the tunnels. There were ruins of what might have once been a massive structure, the collapsed remnants being composed of a reflective, oily black stone. Many of them had been assembled into large, ramshackle altars, at nine of them. Eight in a ring, with the largest being in the centre of the circle. The whole place smelt strangely of incense and powder, tickling right at the fringes of my nose.

Two of our guides flew upwards, landing on one of the altars in the ring. I also noticed with a chill that every other ruined temple was occupied by another one of those things. Only the central one remained occupied.

Our grand group was separated, the various captains pairing together and leading their captives to the separate altars. Only Ophelia walked alone, following our guide to the central temple.

The rest of the captives had their chains set into the base of the cobbled-together structures. The guide showed Ophelia and I how to ascend the jagged, rocky path, until we reached the perfectly smooth floor above. The only things of note were a long slab of that same dark stone, and a twisted knife with strange markings carved onto it.

“Chain him there,” the thing spoke, pointing its finger at the slab.

I struggled, horror rendering him mute as I tried to rip myself away from the captain’s grip. But Ophelia Aethos was terrifyingly stronger thna she looked, and she dragged me over easily with one hand before slamming me on my back onto the rock. The impact knocked the wind out of me, long enough for my body to freeze again, caught in the stranger’s eldritch, paralytic grip.

“It is time,” it whispered, its whole body shaking with anticipation.

It raised up the knife, the blade glinting like blood in the crimson crystal light.

“For millenia,” it intoned, the eight voices of its siblings harmonizing with it, a horrible echo bouncing off the walls of the cavern, “we have served Her, have been the agents of She Who Watches. But we were cast down, betrayed, and she was thrust from the darkness that was rightfully hers. The warriors of Olympia, the divinities of Yggdrasil, the soldiers of the Sun War, they who cast us out, who sealed us beneath their fused earth and cast Her into the Beyond. But no more. With these offerings of blood, four descended from the world of bronze, four from the world of frost, and one touched by nova, we shall undo the sin of the past. The gate shall be opened and She will come home.”

With each word, the crystals in the cavern had darkened, to the point where I could only see the starlight above and the blade’s pale light. Its teeth were reflected in the dagger’s abyssal radiance, revealing a smile of utter rapture.

“Oh Mother!” their voices rang out with zealous ecstasy. “Firstborn of Night, She who reigned in the Empty Kingdom, it is time to come home! Let these souls sent unto You be worshipped forevermore, as the keys that have at long last undone the gate that have denied You become Yours. These children shall at last know their true mother’s embrace.”

The creature’s smile widened so much that its skull begin the split.

The eye within pulsed with violet light.

The dagger flashed downwards.

I closed my eyes.

Its tip never kissed my flesh.

I opened my eyes, to see that the dagger was simply gone.

“No more,” a soft, yet clearly heard voice intoned.

It was the stranger’s voice.

The darkness cleared a small amount, so that I was certain everyone in the cavern could see him. A lone, radiant figure, shining like a star. He was robed in feathered white, a cloak of sailcloth orbiting him. He held a silvery, shining sword, that seemed to ripple in the air. Though his features were masked by blackened crystal, I was certain that he was enraged.

“No more shall you pirates prey on vulnerable shores,” he continued, his words booming throughout the chamber. “No more shall you monsters take souls to suit your malicious purposes. While I live, no life that I know of will be denied its rightful autonomy. You have all lurked in shadows, enacting cruelties in the name of greed, of fanaticism, of vile self-interest. You have benefitted from the pain of others, believing so that as long as you have skulked away into the night you be safe. No more. The day has found you, and thus comes your just punishment. So says I, AURVANDUS, GOD OF FREEDOM!”

At the last word, eight shining comets appeared in the sky. They hurtled down from the starry heavens, striking onto the surface of each of the surrounding altars. As they shot through the air, they banished the final remnants of the dark, radiance exploding into the chamber once more. They collided with the surfaces of the eight surrounding structures, throwing both the emissaries and the captains from them. Emerging from their light were small bands of warriors and magi, each of them standing tall and proud and ready to kill.

Before the pirates could even begin to rally, Aurvandus, the god who had come for me, snapped his fingers. At once, every chain in the room shattered, their metal exploding outwards with no harm to their former inhabitants. I rose from my place immediately, trying to get a better look at the divinity hanging in the air.

“Take up arms!” he shouted, the voice musically wondrous and roaringly terrible all at once. “FIGHT!”