The underground cave I was running though was impossibly huge. Already I had passed multiple hills and gorges, yet the grand structures of the chamber in the distance seemed not to have moved at all.
Pinpoints of light more numerous than I could count lit the great hollow, emitted by an astonishing plethora of living creatures. It was more like a jungle than a cave, in atmosphere as well as appearance. Perhaps it was all the biomass that gave the place a muggy, stifling air, or maybe it was geothermal energy – the ground was pleasantly warm underfoot. Either way, the humidity and heat were both far higher than I was used to. In a way it was fitting for me, having lost my dress in the battle.
After cresting a small ridge I looked back for signs of pursuit and saw nothing moving among the landscape of sticky, moss-like plants I was passing through. The strange horned centipede-people I’d encountered after waking up seemed to have lost track of me. With a little luck they’d given up and gone back to their awful hive to repair the damage I’d done. With a little more luck that was the only such hive in the area.
Recalling the grotesque rooms I’d passed through, filled with decaying remains, and the pale, clammy flesh reaching to grab me, I scanned the land behind me once more to be sure. The only movement came from tiny flying creatures. Most were no bigger than gnats, flickering about in small clouds, seeming to gather up tiny specs of some sort of dust that floated on the air.
Here and there larger animals were visible, their shapes more defined to my eye thanks to their size, each perhaps an inch long. They had bodies shaped like tiny snakes, but fins stuck out halfway down either side of their torso. When extended these fins stretched out flaps of thin papery skin like bat-wings, giving the creatures the shape of a classic kite and letting them float aloft with surprising ease.
The kite-snakes seemed to be predators – whenever a cloud of ‘gnats’ swarmed too close the snakes would retract their fins and expel puffs of air from bumps like vents on their back and belly to propel themselves at their prey.
The gnats weren’t easy targets however, they were quick to take shelter among the moss; any snake that chased them down there would stick fast in the gooey droplets and be engulfed as the plants curled up around them. Even the moss was carnivorous down here it seemed.
Creatures large enough to eat me were absent however, so I slowed the pace of my flight. Running blindly was no good; I needed to search for ways up to the surface. I had a feeling it wouldn’t be easy to find my way back to there.
Ahead a huge cluster of waterfalls descended from the ceiling, more water than I could comprehend. The riddle of flows had eroded through to pour down an impossibly tall drop, each breaking up long before it reached the floor. What fell on the base of the cavern were sheets of rain that misted a dense partially-submerged forest below.
Beyond the flooded region directly rained upon by the waterfalls, the waters drained into a huge wetland area I’d seen from the hilltops, vast fields of underwater growth giving off a warm orange glow. I’d seen large shapes moving atop the waters, grazing animals unlike any I’d seen before.
My interest was piqued by the animals, but the waterfalls themselves were the more magnificent, a sight that many humans would have risked their lives to find – and I had stumbled upon it!
I couldn’t help but stop and marvel at the spectacular view, the sheer majesty of the sight enough to bring a tear to my eye as I tried to take in the sheer scale of power of the rushing water and admired the patterns of the flows.
For a moment I’d wondered if I could escape via one of the channels the waters had cut, but even if I could get up there, the openings were overflowing, leaving little empty space for air.
Around the many openings through which the waterfalls gushed there hung down strands of branching vines like tree roots, evoking beards around colossal mouths. The plants were covered in strange nodules that flashed red with irregular patterns.
Bat-like animals flittered around them, just visible with my enhanced vision, plucking what were apparently fruits. Some of the vines were imposters however – one bat flew up to bite into a fruit only for the fruit to open and bite into the bat instead, the vine coiling like a snake around its meal!
The predatory vines only reached a small distance down from the roof of the cavern, no hazard to anyone on the floor, but it was another point against trying to climb up there.
Even if I got past them and found a passage with enough airspace to breathe, the idea of climbing against the flow was folly. I could say that with confidence as I recalled the cave where I’d awoken and my experiences there. I definitely needed to find something else.
That didn’t mean I couldn’t admire the falls from the safety of the cavern floor of course, but stopping for too long would be dangerous too, so after a few minutes I made myself get moving again.
Approaching the forest below the falls I emerged from the rocky hills into a marshy area of dense moss that encircled the wetland. Surfaces were slick and slimy where the rain kept them permanently wet, forcing me to take care as I passed through.
Stepping into the precipitation spawned far overhead was like stepping into a lukewarm shower, not at all unpleasant for a girl caked with drying blood and viscous filth. The water had a mineral taste not unlike the ‘luxury’ spring water sold on Earth. I thought about stopping for an impromptu shower, but decided to wait until I was in the wetlands proper.
Entering the new landscape felt like stepping into a different world, the flooded forest stretching out for what had to be miles ahead. Rain constantly fell all around, throwing up spray from the surface of the waters and bouncing off leaves and roots, as if the rain were falling from every direction.
Mangrove-like webs of grey leathery roots anchored thick trunks in the white sand beneath the water. The trunks ended in heads where there grew blooms of broad black leaves, shaped like clusters of ferns, the bladed leaf segments opalescing gorgeously where the rain soaked them, casting rainbow light all about, refracting off the scales of small fish that swam between the roots underneath.
Stepping into the pool, I found the waters close to body temperature. The silt at the bottom was soft and silky to walk in, puffing up in clouds with each step, sending the fish scattering.
I took a few minutes then to stop and wash myself, ducking my head under the surface then rubbing my hands over my face and through my hair, cleaning off the accumulated grime of my flight from the centipede-people. Some of it was oily and sticky, refusing to shift, but I got the remains of the smashed eggs off me at least. I was glad to divest myself of that guilty and gruesome reminder of my mistake.
It felt oddly improper to bathe naked ‘outdoors’, so to speak, to run my hands over my sensitive skin and curves here in the cavern, where anyone could see me. I reminded myself that I was in hostile territory. If anyone spotted me there would be worse consequences than embarrassment.
Despite the discomfort of lacking anything to wear I felt refreshed and reinvigorated after my combined bath and shower.
Setting off again I headed deeper into the mangrove swamp, wading through the thigh-high waters in the hope they would disguise any trace of my passage.
Even if they were alien in colouration the ‘trees’ were a welcome presence too, living things that definitely weren’t out to eat me… almost definitely… probably.
They showed no sign of moving under their own power at least, even when I carefully scrutinized the roots or leaves.
Said leaves were quite odd though. It was strange that the plants down in the underground had leaves to begin with – not that it wasn’t equally strange to find plants here in the first place – but as I looked closer I noticed that the glow they gave off appeared to be magical.
The light they were emitting appeared to be some sort of reaction with the water, which was itself laden with a surprising amount of mana. The trees were absorbing magical essence from the waterfalls and the reaction produced the shimmering colors that lit them so delightfully.
Perhaps mana explained the density of life beneath the surface? Above, the sun fostered a great abundance of plants and animals, but mana was far denser in the air here underground.
The proliferation of life was astonishing, so magic seemed like a natural explanation.
Even as I was musing on the matter I noticed tiny dragonfly-like insectoid creatures zooming about over the water, bodies sleek and streamlined like teardrops. When they dived they could fold legs and wings flat against silvery bodies to shoot into the water like bullets and stab their pointed heads into a fish, hunting the larger animals with impressive ferocity.
I recalled the delicious grilled fish I’d eaten in the Eyrie. It felt like years ago, but it had only been… a day? Two days? I couldn’t even tell any more.
Realizing that my mouth was watering at the memory, I wondered if I should learn from the dragonflies’ example and try the fish down here for myself. It would mean killing them of course, but even if I’d never hunted my own meat before someone certainly had. If I wasn’t willing to kill a fish for food then I probably shouldn’t be eating fish in the first place.
That thought gave me pause, but the insistent gurgle of my stomach decided the matter for me. They were only fish, as I told myself, and I didn’t have time to forage for other food.
I gathered a small electrical charge in my hand, modifying the incantation to reduce the energy, then released it as I touched my finger to the water’s surface. A jolt ran up my legs and a scent of ozone filling the air as the water steamed.
Most of the shoal darted away with flicks of their tails. Half a dozen fish caught in the shock convulsed unnaturally, their mouths gaping a few times before they grew still. Eyes that had been alive moments before stared blankly at nothing as the bodies sank slowly into the clouds of silt disturbed when the others fled.
I’d expected them to float, but instead I had to root around in the mud for the animals, the silky top layer giving way to denser sediment below that stuck unpleasantly to my hands. I wasted more time washing it off.
The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.
After recovering my catch I flash-froze each in turn with ice magic. I’d heard that in some countries on Earth freezing was used to kill of parasites, even in fish eaten raw, and it would keep them fresh until I could cook them. It also seemed the least cruel way to ensure none of them were still alive.
Cooking would require fire magic, but even if they got burnt the insides should be edible. It would be a far sight from the meals at the Eyrie, but I had only myself to blame for that.
Aellope had tried so hard to warn me after all. I could hardly bring myself to kill a fish, yet I’d jumped into a war….
I recalled the giant harpy, so elegant and beautiful in everything she did.
An image of her warm smile came to me, as the two of us shared a drink together. Her teasing had been merciless as ever that night, but she’d opened up to me too. She showed me a side of herself that no-one else got to see – something only for me, the Ael that the Stormqueen couldn’t be with her courtiers or advisors, or even her sister.
Far from the unshakeable all-powerful empress, she showed me a girl with an earnest and loving heart, who would lose sleep worrying about her family.
It cut deep to think of how we’d parted, on such bad terms.
The letter I left her was a clumsy attempt to smooth things over; mostly my arrogant, stubborn attempt to argue why I was in the right.
The dispute still rankled. Being so thoroughly proven wrong made me more frustrated if anything – even if Ael forgave me, would she ever see me as her equal again?
It occurred to me to wonder if she was thinking of me at all.
We’d known each other for a short time after all, and I had… let her down in many ways. I’d lied to her, hid who I was… what I was… an imposter among the amazing Harpy women….
Even if she could accept it all, accept what I used to be, believe in who I wanted to become, the lies alone were a betrayal.
I looked down at the water around me, seeing my reflection in the soft lighting. A beautiful young woman looked up at me through irises flecked with a rainbow of colors, her petite nose running, tears on her cheeks.
Even if the Harpies couldn’t accept her… accept me… that didn’t mean I could just stay in some cave feeling sorry for myself.
I rinsed my features off, forcing myself to smile. Even if I lost everything else, I had myself. The hope of who I could be.
But while I might talk myself out of self-loathing and misery, I still had to get out of the underground too, before the centipede-creatures caught up with me. I seemed to have lost them, but on reflection there was little chance they’d just give up, not after I destroyed their eggs and injured their people. I certainly wouldn’t have given up that easily in their place.
Rescue was an unlikely prospect too. With where I’d washed up the Harpies must surely have assumed I was dead, killed in the fall or drowned in the water. My friends were likely mourning me at that very moment.
Even if they knew I lived, they were at war. Princess Arawn had gone to fight, taking with her the Valkyries, and as much as I wanted to believe in her abilities, I’d learned all too painfully the power of numbers – and of surprise.
Even if I could never return to them, I prayed that at least Arawn could make it back safely. And Aggy’s sister, Ryta, whom she’d been so worried about. There were more battles to come, too. More people who would be in danger.
Perhaps next time it would be Aggy herself, or Chione. Or the kindly old Karlya, or reclusive young Shukra….
My anxieties returned in full as my imagination ran wild.
I knew what I had to do.
Even if the Harpies couldn’t forgive me, even if Aellope rejected me; I had to get back to the surface to help them.
I laughed. Had I learned nothing at all from my near-death?
But even if it meant risking my life again, I wouldn’t abandon them, the friends I’d made. The first real friends I’d ever known.
It was time to get moving, to find a way out of this cave.
I snapped a thin branch off the mangrove-fern under whose roots I’d hunted. It wasn’t wood, but something similar, hard but flexible enough that I could string the catch together on a loop to make them easy to carry, hanging it over my shoulder to keep my hands free.
A meal secured, I set off again, in search of a safe place to eat and signs of a way up to the mountains.
~~~
With no timepiece or solar bodies to mark the passing hours I couldn’t tell how long I’d been in the cavern, but as I passed out of the mangroves I guessed I’d spent at least an hour in their rainy forest.
The water hindered my movement but I powered through all the same in the hopes that it might obscure my trail to any pursuit. Not knowing even what senses the strange monsters had it was hard to be sure of course.
The runoff from the waterfalls so high above pooled past the ‘trees’, forming a series of huge shallow lakes that stretched for miles, overgrown with glowing life and bubbling with strange-scented gases that seemed to seep up through the ground beneath.
The pools were filled with thick tangles of green stemmed plants, their leaves fat and thick, porous like pumice, emitting a soft orange glow that lit everything from below as they reacted to mana in the water.
Stranger than the flora were the fauna – if they could even be called so. The grazing beasts I’d observed from a distance seemed as much plant as animal on closer inspection. There were a variety I could see, most moving in packs of alike individuals, while a few others acted independently.
The animals were all united by one feature; their bodies were not skin and muscle, but plant-matter.
The largest of the creatures could have been mistaken for abstract art had they paused their languid grazing for a moment; each of the herbivores was formed by the creased and wrinkled brown flesh of huge mushrooms growing into the shape of a six-legged mound the size of a rhino.
Their limbs were mushroom stems, the digits at the end a tangle of roots, and where the stems grew together at the ‘shoulders’ there emerged the flared caps of multiple mushroom heads, wavy sheets like rippling fans, undersides ribbed, tops rounded like speckled ochre and moss shoulder pads.
Atop the backs of each lumbering grazer the flattened mushroom caps grew in layers, earth accumulating to allow small plants to take hold, other mushrooms included; passengers that festooned their hosts with a vibrant display of lights and even flowers – although I couldn’t imagine what insect might pollinate them. In places the hijackers were parted by trumpet-like stalks that pushed up through the growth from the mound below, emitting puffs of glittering spores when the animals moved, like smokestacks from internal engines.
The creature’s mouths were toothless maws, opening at the end of protruding ‘heads’ that were otherwise featureless, but I soon noticed the clusters of glossy round nodules that grew scattered about the animals. Each bulbous growth shone like polished copper, appearing in groups like clusters of eyes, pointing in all directions. They were quite unlike any eyes I’d seen before, if that was indeed what they were, but the beasts could sense my approach easily enough with them.
Had I been back on Earth I wouldn’t have believed that creatures like these could exist at all, but magic made many things possible. I was living proof of that.
The herd trudged away as I drew near, but smaller grazers seemed more curious, a number of squat bulb-like creatures waddling over. They looked quite cute at first, rather like turtles, but while their tubby shapes and comical movements might have seemed harmless, the details of the creatures were unsettling.
They looked me over with heads that grew from their shoulders like morel mushrooms, the creases and pits glittering with countless glowing red eyelets. Each of the bulb-turtles was the size and rough shape of a giant tortoise, limbs formed of creamy beige trunks, their ‘shells’ wrinkled and craterous membranes like their heads, the dark interior spaces wriggling with life.
At first I’d thought they might be after my fish, but the fungal animals had no mouths and showed little interest in my catch, instead keeping their distance from me, as if curious but wary.
I was grateful that they didn’t try anything, but as the mute and mouthless beings gathered I had the impression that they were trying to herd me away from their patch.
That was fair of course, they were just defending their turf, and I had no intention of lingering there.
Pressing on, keeping my speed up, I gradually passed out of the wetland into regions where the standing water seeped slowly into a thick layer of mossy fungus, clusters of countless tiny trumpet mushrooms forming something almost akin to grass, broken up by the odd patches of other species.
The carpeting growth felt cool and clammy underfoot and the air, thick and soupy with spores, had a stagnant, stale scent to it, recalling mold and decay.
All about mushrooms grew, taller than ever, more like trees than fungi, their broad caps bringing to mind the dragon’s blood trees of Earth, forming a canopy that enclosed the narrowing trails between them. Few of the species present under their shade phosphoresced, gloom settling over the landscape, deeper the further I went.
The soft terrain forced me to slow my pace, but it would likely do the same for any pursuit, so I forged ahead all the same rather than doubling back.
Without landmarks or clear paths to follow, the best I could do was keep going straight. I’d seen from outside that the terrain should rise up again into hills if I went far enough, so I just needed to reach them and I’d be out of the ‘woods’ and have a good view of what was ahead.
Or so I’d thought.
When my sense of time was telling me I’d been in the strange region for multiple hours I started to worry. I should have hit higher ground by that point.
I thought about burning or chopping down some of the mushrooms, but that would mean giving my position away to anything chasing me. I resolved to go a little further, to look for any signs of the ground starting to rise or any landmarks I could follow.
It was not long after that I spotted signs of someone else passing across the direction I’d been heading – footprints where the fungal undergrowth had been trampled flat by a biped of similar size to myself!
My heart leapt at the thought, could there be another human down here? Or any species with language and a face for that matter.
But as I followed the tracks I noticed a strangeness to them. The fungus didn’t hold impressions as well as earth, but their maker appeared to be barefoot as I was, with a similar stride to my own.
Could there really be two small humans down here, alone and wandering, missing even necessities such as shoes?
The realization made me laugh despite the disappointment; I was following my own trail.
There was no-one in the ‘woods’ but me, lost and wandering back on myself after walking in circles. With no landmarks I must have veered steadily off-course over time.
If the centipede-people had any sense they’d be far better able to navigate the areas than I was, and I’d already slowed down far too much. I had to get out quickly. But how could I find my way out if I couldn’t even keep in a straight line?
I tried climbing one of the mushroom trees, but as tall as they grew their trunks were soft, bending under my weight when I got higher. But a better plan came to me. If I’d run into my own tracks then I could follow them in reverse and I’d be sure to find my way out again.
It was as I was retracing my route that I saw a fallen creature of some sort, flesh rather than plant matter for once, lying in the shadow of one of the ‘trees’. A tangle of legs made its form unclear, but much of the corpse appeared to be missing, a bloody stump where an upper body might have gone.
I’d missed it the first time thanks to the trunk obscuring it from sight, but heading in the opposite direction it stood out. Helping me spot it was the movement of something alive nearby.
One of the bulbous turtle-like creatures from the wetland was sniffing around the corpse – if indeed they could sniff – hanging its head low as if mourning a fallen friend.
It was heartening in a way, sad though it was, to see emotion from such alien entities. Perhaps the swamplands here weren’t as hostile as I’d feared.
The creature wasn’t alone. Another of the creatures bumbled towards me, legs sinking into the soft carpet under it, giving its gait an endearing clumsiness; as bizarre as the animal looked, it moved almost like a puppy.
“Hey there, little guy,” I murmured, squatting down to hold out a hand. “It’s okay, I won’t bite. And I don’t think you can, so come on over.”
The morel-growth swayed in the air, glowing red dots within its folds appraising me warily. It took a hesitant step forward, and I nodded encouragingly. To my delight it nodded back, a sluggish bobbing of the head – it wanted to communicate!
Even if it couldn’t actually speak back, perhaps talking would reassure it. “It must be spooky being in this dark forest underground, huh? I sure hope whatever happened to your poor friend over there won’t happen to us.”
The creature kept approaching, its body undulating nervously. It moved its head up to inspect my outstretched hand.
I bushed it gently with my fingertips and the thing recoiled, head retracting towards its body, but when I didn’t chase it the creature slowly stretched back up again, curiosity overcoming caution.
“That’s it, I won’t hurt you. You’re the first friendly thing I’ve seen down here after all. You’re pretty gross, but honestly you’re fascinating too. I’ve never seen a mushroom that could walk about before you know.”
A pat on its head saw the creature recoil again, but only at first. Soon it was letting me stroke the slick, wet surface, the animal’s body contracting and expanding as if it was getting ready for a big yawn.
“I don’t even know if a mushroom has muscles or bones, I’ve got no idea how your body works at all! People on the surface would be amazed if they could see you. But I doubt you or your buddy there would like going up there, huh?”
I looked over to the other morel-turtle. It had raised its head as if finished with its solemn examination. I thought the bulbous animal would depart in sorrow, but like my new friend it seemed to be pulsating, its body giving off wet churning sounds as it waddled closer to its fallen friend, clumsy short legs clambering to lift it over the corpse.
With a wet ripping the meshwork of creases and valleys in its underside pulled open in countless places, holes opening, slick pops and spurts of liquid emerging to drool down onto the carcass below.
What followed were black and writhing, a nest of grotesque parasites descending to bore into the pallid meat, worms that oozed fluids, squirming in and out of host and meal in a horrifying orgy of feeding!
I gasped, looking back at the monster I was petting; my hand was stroking a writhing nest of worms emerging from its head!
All over its body was splitting open, grotesque shapes welling out of the folds and seams as it lumbered forwards.
I screamed, stumbling back, falling and scrambling amid the squishy bed of fungus to rise and get away!
The monster came on, rearing up to reveal a hollow underside that was a nightmare chasm, moving pieces of parasitic life burrowing out of the walls, falling to the ground below.
Finding my feet I backed away, scanning the fungal ‘grass’ for any signs of the worms moving towards me.
Coming to this dark, menacing forest had been a mistake. I was totally lost and the creatures here weren’t cute, they were evil!
The thing kept coming.
I immolated it with a billowing cloud of flames, oily slime evaporating with pops and hisses, the nest of parasites bursting open as the things burnt up on. A second shot destroyed the insides and ate through the legs that were struggling to support its burning form. A third incinerated the remains and reduced the ground around it to smoldering ash.
The other monster barely reacted, occupied as it was in a feeding frenzy. I raised a hand, thinking to burn it too, but it seemed to flinch as if recognizing the danger, frantically trying to slurp back in its repugnant innards.
Swallowing the urge to retch I left it, setting off once more, following my tracks.
The encounter had been all the worse for my foolish misconceptions about the morel-monsters. They weren’t being friendly; they were looking for flesh to consume! I had been no more than prey to them, yet I’d convinced myself they were cute, like puppies….
Imagining their minds as if they were just little humans was absurd, but I had done it all the same.
The monsters down here weren’t people at all. They had bodies I could barely even perceive as living creatures and their experiences and environment were utterly unlike anything I had imagined. It was only natural that such alien lives would give rise to intelligences equally incomprehensible.
As my feet slipped and squashed the mushroom floor I wondered if even that seeming panic the monster showed was no more than an illusion. A trick of my human perception trying and failing to decode a puzzle in a language it didn’t speak.
For all I knew the head bobs I’d read as curious and friendly were a warning, a hostile display demanding I back off from their meal…. To the monster I’d slain I could have seemed like the aggressor, an intruder it couldn’t understand or communicate with.
Well if the surviving one wanted the place it could have it. I sped up, my toes ripping up plant-matter with each step as I followed my tracks in reverse; back towards what I hoped was the wetlands.