The Ghoul set foot outside to find that it was morning. Despite that, it wasn’t much brighter. He looked up, for perhaps the first time since he’d inhabited a body of flesh, and found himself in a basin: a prison whose sheer walls stretched upwards for miles upon miles. Layers of clouds speckled its great stone faces like tufts of cotton. Above that, an eternal snowfall lay as a coat, turning crags to white smoke such that it became anyone’s guess where mountain ended and sky began.
The Ghoul looked down, then, at the valley around him. Here at the perimeter, the terrain was mostly rock. A few shrubs and trees stubbornly poked through, despite the challenges such an environment posed. They must have been alive until recently, when fel magics corrupted them. Now, they were black and gnarled things.
Deeper, towards the valley’s heart, there was more grass and less rubble, enough space for a few settlements to spring up around the river that cut through the gorge. The people here farmed and fished for their livelihood.
The Ghoul made a note of the plant life around him, as well as the distant farms. Greenery shouldn’t have existed in a place that rarely, if ever, saw sun. Perhaps something other than sunlight fed them?
And where had all these thoughts come from? Faint not-memories swirled through his mind, informing him of things like mountains, agriculture, and sunlight. Though he knew all of these things, he didn’t know how he learned them. Having knowledge but not knowing where that knowledge came from aggravated him.
Wait. As he observed the center of the valley, something caught his eye. He’d thought it a simple morning fog at first, but as it began to move, he realized it was something else. Far below and miles away, a cloud of dark mist had begun to rotate like some sort of localized typhoon. Spearing up through its center was one of the many titanic boulders that lay scattered around the valley. This boulder was familiar, however, for it marked the location of the hut where he was raised. The place where his mistress resided.
He growled. Behind him, Kalaki shifted, knocking a pebble loose that bounced down the slope.
What did it mean? He searched his knowledge, but none of it told him what the dark, swirling fog represented. Was it dangerous? He wanted to return to the woman, to protect her, but her command superseded even her own safety.
He knelt, sniffing the ground. Traces of fleeing humans lingered on the ground outside the cave. Many of the trails scattered, though one larger group went right, circling the perimeter of the valley rather than descending back into it.
His evolution seemed to make his senses grow somewhat sharper, most prominent among them his sense of smell. Perhaps it wasn’t even his nose that had grown more sensitive, but his mind, as it could now categorize multiple scents that might have been ignored before.
He investigated all the trails he found, but none held more unique scents than this one. This particular group was comprised mostly of elderly individuals. He chose not to follow it, however, as he also detected along the same trail a mass of ghouls who had already left in pursuit. Their putrid scent was so thick that it threatened to drown out the milder human traces.
The ones who ran that way probably hadn’t survived the night.
Instead, the Ghoul located a smaller trail left by two younger humans, one that only a single ghoul had followed. This trail led back into the valley, which the Ghoul expected held more prey than these barren slopes did. Also, the mist was in that direction. He wanted to know what it was. If something had happened to his mistress… he didn’t know. He didn’t enjoy that thought.
He began pursuing the trail immediately. Kalaki followed behind, stumbling along without a groan of complaint.
It didn’t take long for the Ghoul to find the other undead. It had quickly given up, collapsing to the ground. It was currently attempting to chew on a rock. He ignored it, deeming the creature too useless to even serve as fodder, and the duo continued onwards. The rock-chewer watched them go, but just before they went out of sight, it stood up to follow after them. The Ghoul didn’t care overmuch. Undead were inclined to follow the crowd, exercising only a very limited will of their own. Only he and Kalaki seemed any different.
The trail continued for quite some time. Despite travelling off the beaten path, the two humans appeared to have had a destination in mind, for they didn’t change direction.
The Ghoul looked up a few times to guess where they had gone. The only landmark in the distance was a village, further downstream than the one he’d already explored, with perhaps twenty huts all told. Even to his eyes, it was clearly an infested ruin. The humans he chased were either quite young or quite stupid to be running away from one group of undead and straight into the arms of another.
However, they were wiser than that, because the scent trail took a sudden turn before reaching the village. It seemed that they’d recognized their mistake and taken a wide detour around the hamlet, crossing the river where it was shallower and trekking into the uninhabited stretch of valley.
They seemed to start growing tired at this point. The trail began to meander, and the scent became stronger in places where they must have stopped shortly to rest.
After another few minutes, he came across a small clearing with the remains of a fire pit. An overturned log lay nearby, providing a place to sit.
And then he smelled it. Fear and blood. Lots of it. There had been a struggle. He knelt to the ground to investigate. There was another scent here, mixed in among the humans: one of a ghoul. Another undead had found them in this spot, killing them. His prey had been stolen by another.
He kicked one of the dead trees with a sudden, explosive speed, shattering it into fragments of bark and dust. Fury unabated, he stabbed at the ground with his skewer, eventually dropping it so he could start tearing into it with his claws, bringing up fistfuls of earth and stone, flinging rubble in all directions. He tilted his head back and roared, and the sound seemed to travel through the entire valley.
His forehead burned.
There were no humans left. He’d come too late. If he hadn’t passed out, he’d have had a chance to hunt the remnants of that group. Or, if he’d been raised earlier by the necromancer, how many would he have hunted? How much would he have grown?
What would he hunt now? He turned, eyeing his followers. Kalaki, that dull zombie, hadn’t reacted at all to his frenzy. Then, he saw the other ghoul, several paces behind. It stared back at him dumbly.
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He started towards it, his long strides closing the distance between them in moments. As if sensing his intent, the creature began to raise its arms in a defensive posture, but the Ghoul was too fast. He put his strength into his legs and pushed forward, the world blurring for a moment as he accelerated. He kicked the creature in the gut and it flew backwards, landing in a disorganized tangle of limbs. It wasn’t winded, as undead didn’t breathe, but the thing was certainly disoriented. Before it could get back up, he stepped on its chest, knelt, and ripped its head off. This was a bit more difficult than expected, but with some wrenching and twisting, the Ghoul managed it. A grisly pop sounded out, and the flailing arms of the corpse flopped to the ground.
The Ghoul walked over to a rock, cracking the skull against it and scooping out brain matter with its fingers, which he ate almost contemplatively. Even after the snack, he hadn’t achieved what he wanted. Disappointed, he dropped the bloody mass.
He felt a tiny flow of something undefinable enter him, but it wasn’t strength. It was so slight that it hadn’t even prompted the appearance of the glowing runes. Not enough. Cold flesh and viscous blood wasn’t enough.
No, these undead had very little to offer him. Kalaki might be worth more than the average undead, but not by much. Besides, the spear-bearer was connected to him, in a strange way. He had no desire to kill him.
That was when he smelled it. The wind shifted, and a scent tickled his nose. He turned, bringing his head up to smell the air. It was the trail from before! One of the humans survived and fled from here. A young male. His scent mingled with that of the strange ghoul’s, making him think that the other undead had been hot on his trail.
Perhaps he was still alive. Looking in the direction the two scents had gone, he saw that this time the trail led into the heart of the valley, straight for the swirling mist. He took off without a second thought, not bothering to slowly track the scents. Something told him that he’d find his quarry in the heart of that storm, and he didn’t want to miss his chance a second time.
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Kaipo wanted to leave. He wanted very very very much to leave. But no matter how he struggled, he couldn’t overpower the thing that held him by the neck, forcing him to march alongside it.
Did dying make them like this, or were all adults this strong?
It was one of the reanimated dead. It had come from nowhere, surprising him and Malia as they tried to catch some sleep in the little clearing. Malia had… she had—
He retched, but nothing came out. He’d emptied his stomach long ago, thankfully, or else the creature that forced him upright might have made him choke on his own vomit. Kaipo let himself slump, and his feet began to drag as his weight was supported by his neck. The rotting thing didn’t even break stride, continuing ever deeper into the dark fog. When the blood began pulsing behind his eyes and he began to see stars, he got his legs back under him and resumed trudging. He was too tired to struggle any more. Too tired to cry. He’d cried through the night and even some after he fled the cave with Malia, but not anymore. If he lived through this, he doubted he’d ever be able to cry again.
A sound startled Kaipo out of his depressed thoughts. It was a soft whispering, like the wind brushing over tall grass. Only there was no wind.
Then he heard it again, and he could have sworn it was a voice. No, wait—it was more than one voice. People’s words were carried to him through the fog, whispering to one-another.
Witch.
Kaipo’s eyes flew open. That was no distant whisper. Someone had spoken directly into his ear that time, but looking around told him that there was no one here save for his captor, and it wasn’t speaking.
Exile.
He scoured the surroundings, but it was too dark. A cold wind swept past, raising goosebumps on his arms.
Flay her.
Hate.
Why? Why?
You took—
We want vengeance.
—him from me.
Tear her apart.
My son, he—
It wasn’t whispering any longer, but a chorus of voices, all fighting one-another to be heard. Despite their soft individual volumes, when joined by the others it sounded like a large gathering of people all talking at once. He covered his ears, but these voices had a way of piercing Kaipo even when he didn’t want to hear.
This was a bad place. He heard people when there weren’t any people. Who, then, was talking? He had to get out of here.
It was time to enact his plan. He hadn’t attempted it yet, because if it failed, the monster would probably kill him, but he had an inkling that wherever he was going was going to be somehow worse than death.
Working up all the strength left in his body, Kaipo kicked off the ground, pushing away from his captor. It didn’t loosen its grip, but that was helpful, because it allowed him to use his back as a fulcrum. He powered through the abrupt pain in his neck that made him start to see spots, and when his lower body reached the apex of its swing, he pushed into it, swinging his legs forward.
He hit the knee of the monster and heard a sharp crack.
The thing released him as it fell to the ground, and though Kaipo stumbled, he quickly regained his balance and took off running.
A growl sounded out as the monster struggled to its feet, but it had no hope of catching him now. Kaipo was tired, weak, hungry and thirsty, but he was still one of the fastest runners in the village. Almost as fast as Lae.
After a minute of running, he noticed that instead of quieting, the voices had only grown louder.
He slowed to a halt and looked around. Was he going the right direction? He thought he’d been running back the way they came, but perhaps he’d gotten turned around? He took a hesitant step back, and then another, before turning and running the opposite direction. A minute later, he chose a different direction. And then another.
The voices didn’t stop.
He clutched his ears and began to stagger, overcome with dizziness. They weren’t whispering any more.
BURN.
SET US FREE.
FATHER MOUNTAIN… WHY HAS FATHER MOUNTAIN—
BLASPHEMER.
CHEW ON HER BONES.
Kaipo screamed in a futile attempt to drown out the voices.
A shape loomed out of the mist, and he almost hit it. It was a boulder, one of the mountain’s seeds. His parents told him that these huge rocks were, in fact, slowly growing, and they would one day expand into mountains themselves. When he was younger, Kaipo had worried that they would fill up the valley.
A hut had been built here, sheltered under an overhanging portion of the rock.
Through the pain in his head, he recalled this cottage. There was only one building like this. This was the home of the outcast.
He ran over, banging on the front door.
“Help! Help, please! There are things after me! Please open the door!”
He wasn’t sure if the inhabitant could hear him over the voices, but shortly, a beam was lifted and the door swung inward, revealing a room lit by candles.
He bolted inside, and the door was quickly shut behind him. The voices were dampened almost instantly, returning to faint whispers. The house was somehow able to block them out. As he collapsed to the ground, panting, he looked around him.
Candles were a luxury rarely afforded in the valley, but this person had lit dozens of them. The room smelled of incense, in what must have been an attempt to mask the unpleasant odor of burning tallow. The floor was marked with chalk in intricate patterns, and Kaipo had to check to make sure he wasn’t smudging any of the markings.
This was the strangest building he’d ever seen. But even this wasn’t the most surprising thing. He looked up at the figure who had let him inside. The outcast. He’d heard the older villagers talk of her from time to time. They’d speak of her alien appearance and mannerisms, how she’d appeared out of the mountains one day. They’d whisper of her magic, and of her Brand.
Kaipo frequented different circles, however. If he believed what he heard the other village children say, Kaipo might have thought her an almighty sorceress who could fly and smite gargoyles with a flick of the wrist. Kaipo didn’t buy into it. He was pretty sure that the greatest show of magic she ever performed was when she fixed Old Moke’s bad leg.
He’d never seen her before, being far too shy to ever seek her out, but he still recognized her at first glance. Her tanned skin and strange clothes distinguished her from the pale and plain Children of the Mountain. Her exoticness may have lent her a certain beauty, but Kaipo was certain she was beautiful even back in her home country.
He looked into her dark eyes, and it was as if he’d taken a dive into a deep pool.
She smiled, meeting his gaze. When she spoke, her accent sounded almost musical to his ears.
“Darling boy, are you lost?”
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