I ducked through the archway of grinning, gap-toothed skulls, careful not to touch anything.
It was early morning, the sun barely peeking up over the horizon. The cave was cut into a mountain face, the entrance partially obscured by towering pines and scraggly firs. Tactically excellent. The Crave Ghouls would be able to see anyone headed their way long before they arrived, but no one would be able to spot them lying in wait. Well, they would have been able to see anyone coming. Past tense. Their reign of terror was over. Not a bad night’s work for a man who’d wrapped himself around a grenade and woken up inside the world’s most vivid brain trip.
Cal was gone, vanished back to wherever he went when he wasn’t with me, and Renholm fluttered along like a manic hummingbird. I half expected the shifty, murderous pixie to leave me high and dry the second he got clear of the cave, so I was pleasantly surprised when he waited for me.
I slung my makeshift satchel over one shoulder, then jogged a few hundred feet down the dirt path before I came to a natural ridge and a clearing in the trees. Machete boy and his crew of Ghouls had hacked off enough branches to create a massive window onto the valley below. I crouched and scanned the terrain.
“What are you looking for?” Renholm buzzed, touching down on one of my shoulders.
“Water,” I said.
Water was the single most important resource in a wilderness survival situation, and securing some early on could be the difference between life and death.
I could go weeks without food if need be, but I wouldn’t make it long without something to drink. There’d been a brook in the cave but the stacks of human remains, the greasy firepit, and the goo-leaking monsters made drinking from that another hard pass. Besides, maybe getting a bellyful of cool water would knock me out of this fever-induced delirium. If that was the key to unlocking and ending this hallucination, I would willingly stick my head under a raging waterfall, open my mouth, and drown in sanity.
“An apt decision,” Renholm agreed. “You smell atrocious. Not as bad as the Crave Ghouls, but it’s a race to the bottom. Doesn’t help that you’re carrying all those Hunger Affinity Scales. But, because I am a gentle-fae, I’d be happy to take them off your hands.” A greedy light burned in his mischievous eyes.
“Yeah, fat chance of that happening,” I said, shrugging him off my shoulder, “and the water isn’t for bathing, it’s for drinking.”
Renholm’s face broke into a shocked “O,” and he recoiled in obvious distaste. “Why in the heavens above would you want to drink water?” the pixie asked, sounding genuinely baffled. “Since I’ve taken you under my wing, I feel compelled to ask—have you actually tasted water? It’s both terribly pointless and terribly bland. The most boring of all liquids by far.”
“I’m not sure if you’re joking or not,” I replied. “What else would I drink?”
“Affinity, naturally. That’s what all true creatures of the Etheric Realm imbibe. Well, that and a good spiced wine. The wine is mostly for getting drunk, the Affinity is for sustenance. Those scales you carry will give you the ravenous hunger of a Mortka, but they will fill me up, not just in body but in spirit. If I consume enough Affinity stones, it will even allow me to advance and evolve.”
“That true for ghosts too?” I asked.
“I assume you’re asking about that vexing spirit friend of yours?”
I nodded.
“Yes. The scales will help him maintain his corporeal form. Many Mortka such as the Crave Ghouls require food for survival as well as Affinity, but ghosts, fae, angelics, and other creatures of the Ether only need sustenance of the soul to tide us over.”
“That’s good to know,” I said, pulling a Hunger Scale from the pouch at my side. “I don’t think I can survive off of these things, which means water. I’m thirsty and I bet you are, too. So I’m willing to make a deal with you. Help me find a clean source of water and I’ll give you one of these bad boys for the trouble.”
Renholm’s buggy, luminous eyes seemed to grow three sizes bigger. “For truth?”
“Scout’s honor,” I said solemnly, raising three fingers. I’d only made it through Cub Scouts, but he didn’t need to know that.
“I am unaware of these Sage Scouts, but if they are the gods of your people, I shall gladly abide by their pact if it means a chance at an Affinity Scale.” He took to the air in a whirl, flying up above the tree line. I cupped a hand over my eyes and tracked his movements.
After a handful of seconds, the pixie started blinking frantically, signaling me to follow. The mountaintop itself was dense with evergreens, but the pine forest ended at the foot of the mountain. The valley had been cleared and planted with crops. That meant there had to be a water source close by. With Renholm’s assistance, it didn’t take me long to find the visual break in the well-ordered fields below. I followed the meandering ribbon of green and blue across the valley until it disappeared into the trees to the north. I could make it that far, even if I was caked in monster goo and wearing a dead man’s trousers.
The pixie took off again, leaving a glittering trail of breadcrumbs hanging in the air for me to follow.
I broke into a run to keep up, sweat beading on my forehead and trickling down my chest, quickly wicked away by a gentle draft working its way through the trees. After a few minutes, I picked up the pace. Honestly, it felt damned good to stretch my muscles. Some part of me instinctively knew this place was impossible—a dream scenario cooked up by an addled brain and awesome drugs force-fed to me at a Naval hospital—another part of me didn’t care. I’d never felt this good before. This strong. Not even before deployment, when I was squeaking by under the eighteen-minute mark on my three-mile Physical Fitness Test, or PFT.
Thanks to that golden mist I’d absorbed back in the cave, I felt like I could run for a thousand miles. I only needed to go two or so, though, before I found myself kneeling by a hole in the rockface where the water flowed freely, gathering in small sandy pools before burbling over and down the mountainside.
“Your disgusting, bland water, just as promised,” Renholm said, gesturing grandly to the trickle.
“You’re weird as hell,” I said, “but so far, but I gotta admit, you’re pretty useful.” I fished free one of the lesser Hunger Affinity Scales and flicked it through the air to him with my thumb. He leapt from his rocky perch like a house cat and attacked the scale with gusto. In seconds it was gone, and his fat belly looked so distended I thought he might give birth. He touched down on the rock, swaying rather drunkenly.
“Oh… oh my. That was… perhaps too much.” He paused to let out a thunderous burp, then pirouetted and promptly toppled from the rocky ledge, landing facedown in a patch of grass. Well shit. I’d finally found a friendly face and I’d already managed to kill the little bastard. I dropped to a knee and poked him a few times with a finger. I let out a sigh of relief. Nope, not dead. Just in a food coma from the looks of it. Carefully, I picked him up by his glittering wings and set him back on the rock so I wouldn’t accidentally trample him, then went to work.
Drinking unfiltered water was always a danger, but I was prepared for that. Some of those survival training ops were finally starting to come in handy. I dug a pit next to the smallest pool, lined the bottom with crushed charcoal from my pack, then spread a fine layer of gravel over the top, leaving a shallow divot, lined with rock.
It took nearly twenty minutes, but eventually water from the brook seeped through into the hole. The gravel filtered out any of the bigger particles and the charcoal would absorb the majority of the harmful bacteria floating in the water. I drank until my guts were ready to bust then drank some more.
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I needed to let the rock pool fill and filter a second time, so I had a bit of time to kill. Might as well make myself useful. A few minutes in the underbrush and I’d found the game trails and bunny runs. I dug in my satchel and found the twine. I made a simple snare, tested the wind, and built a blind not more than twenty paces away from my trap.
I must have dozed off at some point because when I woke there was a rabbit ready and waiting and I had enough clean water to fill my glass bottle. Cal was still missing in action, though, and Renholm the pixie was passed out cold on the rock—a good thing in my estimation, since he definitely would’ve robbed me blind given half a chance.
The rabbit that had stumbled into my trap didn’t look anything like the cottontails I’d hunted back in Kentucky. Everything about it was bigger than I was used to. Bigger ears, longer legs, wicked fangs. The thing practically looked like a small wolf, and since when did rabbits have canines? Sharp ones, too, made for ripping and tearing. That wasn’t the weirdest thing. The strangest feature was the gnarled horns tucked behind the ears. I’d heard tell of the Jackalope, but I’d always assumed it was a taxidermy trick.
This critter’s rack was real enough.
Food was food, though, and I was hungry going on hangry.
I wasn’t going to let a couple of bony nubs scare me away from a good meal. I skinned it, gutted it, built a fire, and set the bunny to cook. While it roasted, I pulled out another Hunger Affinity Scale and examined it more closely. I stole a look at Renholm, snoring softly on the rock. His belly still looked distended, but it wasn’t quite so pronounced as before. When I’d consumed the Hunger Affinity Scale, the power had been overwhelming—if I hadn’t had my weapons to channel the energy into, I could’ve easily ended up facedown on the floor.
These things were real, tangible power and I needed to understand them better if I was going to survive. I had water, food, and daylight left, so there was no better time to experiment than the present. I placed the scale flat in my hand and pulled the Affinity energy down into my skin once more. Another surge of wild, angry, voracious energy filled me to the brim. My gut instinct was to shed the force into either my Colt or K-Bar, but I resisted that temptation. Instead, I focused on the rabbit, still cooking over the fire.
I couldn’t wait. Not for a second longer.
I ripped the rabbit from the spit and wolfed down the meat, the hot grease burning my lips and face. I didn’t care. It was so good. The best thing I’d ever tasted. I ate the skin and the meat, but still couldn’t stop myself. I headed over to the entrails I’d cut out and shoved those into my face too, savoring the metallic taste. That took the edge off, but there was still more to eat. To consume. I snapped the rabbit bones and drank the marrow like a man dying of thirst.
Finally, the roaring inferno of hunger in my center faded to hot coals. In its place was an anxious, jittery energy. All I wanted to do was run and leap and fight. I could feel the life force of the rabbit I’d consumed pumping through my veins and racing through my muscles. I wasn’t sure how long the feeling would last, but I knew if I didn’t move right now, I’d explode. I couldn’t sit on my ass for another second, not while the sun raced across the sky and darkness drew nearer and nearer.
I stood and stretched, then used a branch to get in a couple dozen pull-ups. Shit, but I felt amazing. Not just hydrated and well-fed but nourished and rested. Almost bouncy. I couldn’t leave Renholm snoozing on the rock—something would likely wolf him down in the same way I’d wolfed down that rabbit—so I scooped him up, dropped him into my satchel, and hopped back onto the trail, bunny style. I couldn’t help but think of what my mom had said a hundred times growing up: you are what you eat.
Turned out she was right, at least in this world.
The larger game trail cut down the side of the mountain before emerging onto a dirt lane about as wide as a single-lane Kentucky back road. But a genuine road was a good sign, because a road meant people. The dirt was damp, probably from overnight rainfall, and there were wheel ruts gouged into the fresh mud, confirming that some sort of heavy cart had passed through here within the last day or so. A little searching revealed hoofprints in the mud. I was no animal expert but I grew up in horse country, so I knew a mule print when I saw one.
Which way to go was just a coin toss, so I decided to follow the cart, forcing my legs to move faster, to carry me farther. Burning through the rabbit’s restless energy.
***
It was half an hour before sunset when I finally saw a plume of smoke rising up in the distance. Another ten minutes brought me to the edge of the forest. The road dipped down, transforming from dirt into cobblestone as it entered a city encircled by a stone wall, twenty feet tall. Cautiously, I scoped out the settlement from the safety of the tree line, ensuring I stayed away from the prying eyes of any potential threats. I was getting damned tired of surprises, and I wanted to know what I was getting myself into before blundering headlong into a potential enemy stronghold.
Thanks to my vantage and my newly enhanced eyesight, it was easy to see the winding streets and wood-shingled roofs peeking into the air. More stone chimneys jutted up, spewing out wandering clouds of blue-gray smoke. A wide river snaked along the eastern edge of the settlement, its banks lined by small trading vessels moored along wooden docks. The streets looked busy with the hustle and bustle of steady foot traffic—people out shopping or selling, horses plodding along as they pulled loaded wagons. I’d spent enough time running forward reconnaissance missions to guess the city probably housed ten thousand or so residents.
I wasn’t sure where in the hell I was, but this wasn’t Fallujah or anywhere else in the Al-Anbar province. There wasn’t a thawb or keffiyeh in sight. As any good Marine would, I spent the next thirty minutes maneuvering around the perimeter, trying to find a way past the wall, but the residents had done an admirable job of protecting their forest getaway.
I could’ve headed farther north, then come downriver—hoping to slip in undetected by way of the ports—but it was almost dark and that would take hours at least, with no guarantee of success. I also could’ve tried to scale the walls, but there were ramparts, walkways, and towers, which meant armed guards and lookouts. Misunderstandings with weapons was never any fun and I didn’t want to get pincushioned with arrows while I was scampering up the wall, so I finally headed back to the road and opted to try the direct approach.
Weary traveler seeks rest and all that.
A shout immediately went up from the sentries manning the main gate.
There was a guard wearing creased leathers positioned in the tower to my right. He had a curved bow with an arrow trained on me. His comrade on the ground fumbled with his halberd. All the medieval weapons and armor gave me pause. First the monsters, now this. This world was screwier than a three-dollar bill, but I put all that aside for the moment. I had survival to consider. These guys were armed, but I had a gun, a machete, and a knife. There were two of them and only one of me, and they had a fortified location.
Decision time.
One had elevation and cover, the other was on foot with a pole weapon and a dented breastplate and helmet. At a quick glance, the guard on the ground appeared to be in his mid-forties and not in particularly good shape, which meant the archer went first if this came to a fight. I could send a hail of rounds downrange before he could draw tight and loose his arrow. The distance was iffy, but I was confident I could make the shot.
As for the ground guard, his shoddy breastplate—rusted in places and pitted from age and wear—wouldn’t stop a .45 ACP, but it would do a damn fine job of keeping the bullet bouncing around the inside of his torso, turning him into Swiss cheese. These weren’t monsters, though, not like the red-skinned Crave Ghouls from the cave. They were probably decent enough folk, so I didn’t want things to get bloody. I also wasn’t going to lie down and die, though. Not for anybody.
“Halt, stranger!” the guard at the gate hollered, his voice teetering on the edge of panic. He pointed the spear end of his halberd in my general direction, but that did little to lessen his overall aura of pants-shitting terror. His anxiety was justifiable since I looked like a nut job with tattered pants held up by a length of rope, leather armor covering my torso, and a pitted machete in one hand. That I was covered in green gore and red rabbit’s blood probably didn’t help either.
“No farther, now.” I couldn’t place his accent. The intonation wasn’t Middle Eastern, but it wasn’t American either. Vaguely European maybe? “State your business.” As he spoke, it dawned on me that he wasn’t speaking English at all. The cadence of the words was off, the syllables longer and harsher than I was used to. But somehow, I had no problem understanding him. Not a lick.
Shit was getting crazier and crazier by the second.
“Hey, fellas,” I said, waving a hand. Like a sucker punch to the teeth, I realized I wasn’t speaking English either. “Boy do I have a wild-ass story to tell you fellas,” I said, the foreign words falling flawlessly from my lips. “Thing is, I don’t know where I am or how I got here, but I had a little mishap about a day’s walk thataway.” I hooked a thumb back down the road. “Ended up in a cave with some freaky looking red guys. Potbellies. Gangly arms. Nasty-ass black teeth. Anywho, the bastards ambushed me, might’ve stolen my clothes. I murdered ’em all, but—”
A wooden door inside the wall flew open and a portly guard with a wisp of hair and a thick handlebar mustache hustled out of a concealed guard shack.
“Hindrik, Rory!” he bellowed, wobbling forward on bowed legged, his hands raised. “Lower your gods-be-damned weapons, you fools!”
“But Commander, he—”
“Look at his hair, you ijits! Look at his bloody face! He’s got the mark clear as the sun at noonday. Praise be, but it’s a Vigil Bound. He’s come to save us all!”
“Uh, what was that now?” I asked.