Hubris - 43. The Gaulhill Sea

Barghast did not like the ocean like he'd thought he would. He didn't like the way it curled up from the earth, advancing towards the beach, bubbles of white foam appearing at the top of the water. Though he knew the waves were not alive - were not capable of thought in the same way he was - he also knew (sensed) there were living things that lived in them. The crustaceans for example (that was the word his beloved used to call them, a word he could not pronounce in Okanavian or his twin o’rre’s tongue) often came out of the water to scuttle along the beach for gulls and squirrels. There was one now heading East, leaving six long lines behind it. It was not as large as the others the lycan had seen, but it was large enough.

Crowe on the other hand had not been so cautious. Upon seeing the gray-green water, his eyes flashed with excitement. His lips curled into a smile and his heart gave a flutter of excitement that made the lycan’s ears twitch. “Behold!” he said breathlessly, and when he turned to look over his shoulder at the Okanavian it wasn't just a small smile he wore but a big one that showed all his teeth and made Barghast feel as weightless and flighty as the white birds that soared overhead. “Have you ever seen anything so beautiful?”

“What is it?” Barghast asked.

“The Gaulhill Sea.” Crowe faced the rolling waves. “I’ve read about it in books - but reading about it and seeing it with your own two eyes are two completely different things. Look back towards the horizon.” He pointed with his bad hand. “Do you see those things gliding along the water with the flag looking things at the top?”

“Aye,” Barghast said, not without interest. But he was only interested because the sorcerer was interested. “What are they??”

“Fishing boats.” Crowe shifted, swinging his leg stiffly over Mammoth’s broad back; the massive shire horse seemed as content to watch the waves crest and roll as the herald.

“What are you doing?” Barghast whined. The practitioner surprised him by lifting the hem of his robes to pull down his breeches. At first he could only gape wordlessly as Crowe stripped down to his delicate furless hide. Barghast recalled how sheepish his beloved had been when they'd first met, often gesturing for the lycan to step just out of sight. Now he grinned shamelessly at the lycan, wiggling his butt in a way that was both deliberate, and provocative.

During this whole show the Okanavian had searched all four corners of the horizon to make sure no prying eyes watched him; the only eyes he could see were that of the crustaceans on the northwestern edge of the beach; the creature making its own pilgrimage East had disappeared from view. Now Barghast returned his full attention to his twin o'rre.

And gaped at the empty spot where he’d been standing not a second before.

Barghast did not hear the whine that escaped him of its own volition. He did not feel his heart stop in his chest. He only saw the pale streak darting towards the gray-green water, kicking up clouds of sand, black hair streaming behind him. Eyes as bright and blue as the sky above him. Crowe was still so thin, but not as thin as he'd been during those restful days in the place the practitioner called Roguehaven. The thought sent a flutter of anxiety through him he didn't like, only to be extinguished when the sorcerer shouted, “I bet you can't catch me!”

“That's what you think, my beloved!” Barghast growled, shooting into a lunge. His heart felt fit to burst with excitement; they'd never played chase like this before. Not with each other and not for fun. “I will catch you and carry you back safe to shore and kiss you all over!”

Had Crowe not bought himself precious time by surprising the lycan, Barghast would have caught him well before he reached the water. However he was quick and graceful for a human, his tiny feet carrying him easily over the sand. By the time the Okanavian reached where the sand touched the saltwater, Crowe was already kicking and pulling himself through the rolling water as if the ocean had never been a stranger to him and he'd always known it.

Barghast dove into the water, instinctively sucking in a breath and holding it before his head was submerged beneath the surface. It didn't occur to him that he'd entered a world completely alien to anything he'd experienced thus far. Clusters of tiny organisms with scaly flesh and tails swerved to avoid him. Up ahead he could see his twin o'rre pull himself back towards the surface, his feet kicking to stay afloat. The lycan grinned to himself before grabbing a hold of Crowe's foot before popping up behind him.

Only when his head hit the air and he sucked in his first breath did Barghast realize where he was and what he'd done; and in doing so it was as if someone had kicked a bucket full of fear over. He sucked in another breath only to feel it catch in his throat.

“Twin o’rre!” he shouted. Only what came out of his mouth wasn't a shout, more like a choked yip. There was no ground beneath his paws to stabilize him. There were no handholds to grab a hold of. He was drowning in the drink, drowning in a fear he hadn’t experienced since encountering a group of murderous torchcoats eight months ago.

And then his twin o’rre was there, using a voice that was both commanding and soothing: “Barghast, it's alright. I’m right here…”

Rather than calm him, the sound of Crowe’s voice in the middle of this blue void only made the Okanavian panic more. He clung to the practitioner, thrashing with his paws while gulls soared and cried overhead, heedless of his thalassophobia. “Help me, twin o'rre!” he begged. “Help me, help me…”

Only when Crowe shouted “Barghast!” - not only did he sound commanding, but angry - did he stop thrashing. When he stopped the practitioner’s face was red and dotted with beads of water. “You have to stop.” He was no longer shouting but his voice had not lost its sharp edge. “Did you see those small things under the water? The fish?”

Barghast nodded. Of course he knew what they were. The sorcerer called them fish. He’d seen them in lakes and streams. “They’re harmless.”

Crowe nodded, his head bobbing above the water. The pull of the tide rocked them back and forth. “We're not at home. This is the ocean. There are much bigger fish and some of them have teeth. Teeth even bigger than your claws. So you have to stop and you have to be calm.”

His touch - his very proximity - was a tonic for Barghast’s jangling nerves. “You must think me a foolish, weak pup,” he whined before he could stop himself.

The practitioner shook his head, giving the lycan that sweet smile that appeared more and more often with each passing day; that made his heart feel as if it would soar straight out of his chest to take flight amongst the gulls. “I think nothing of the sort. I think you are a very smart, very brave pup.

..It's just that you're like me. You're learning about the world even as you walk its hide. We both are. We're learning together aren't we?”

Word by word breath by breath, Barghast began to forget where he was and how he'd come to be here. All that mattered was the beautiful morsel in front of him. “Together,” he agreed.

“There’s nothing to be afraid of,” his twin o'rre reassured him. His voice no longer had that clipped quality that always made Barghast want to lay his ears flat and tuck his tail between his legs. “We're not even a mile away from shore. Look behind you. Don't freak out…just look behind you. Aye, that's it.”

Slowly Barghast could feel his heart begin to steady. Crowe was right: They were not far away from the beach. But how?

He was here floating in the middle of the ocean with his beloved. When he looked back the memory of cutting through the water while a school of fish swarmed out of his way was a blur of fleeting images. A small wave crashed over him again and he felt as if he was looking up at the sky from a bucketful of water.

Crowe’s face loomed before his, startlingly clear beneath the ocean. He took Barghast’s paw and tugged upwards before kicking up with his feet. The lycan followed. In doing so he discovered swimming was a talent that came naturally to him, born of instinct and breathing. I still don't like the ocean, he thought. Not when there are fish that have teeth that are bigger than what I have.

The practitioner must have sensed his turmoil. He ran his bad hand over his shoulder. “Let's go back.”

Back on the beach, they laid in the sand side by side, their shoulders touching. Barghast kept snatching glances at his beloved. Even now, after spending the better part of a year together, it was still hard to believe the practitioner was here with him; even while surrounded by opulence he was the most beautiful thing on the beach if you were to ask the Okanavian.

He listened to the languid ticking of Crowe’s heart. Patches of red were beginning to appear on his milky flesh from exposure to the sun. He had a sleepy, pleasant look on his face. They could understand each other now after months of only being able to communicate through touch and hand gestures, but Barghast could still not read his mind. To try and discern what his beloved was thinking through body language alone was impossible. “What are you thinking?” he rumbled before he could stop himself, his tail twitching anxiously. He’d spent the last several minutes (or was it an hour?) trying not to ask, afraid he would annoy his beloved. This thought often led to horrid images of waking up from a doze one night to find his twin o'rre had abandoned him.

But now Crowe's gaze dropped from the crowd of gulls swooping overhead and when he looked at the Okanavian, Barghast could see no such thought had crossed his mind. “Right now I'm not really thinking,” he murmured in a voice that sounded sluggish, almost drunk. “I'm just feeling.”

“What are you feeling?”

Crowe lifted his foot, letting the salt wind blow golden flecks of sand from his skin; he nudged Barghast’s thigh teasingly, then began to brush him with his heel. The lycan closed his eyes, taking full advantage of his twin o’rre’s affections. “Content,” came the answer.

The Okanavian’s eyes shot open. He frowned intently, instinctively pricking an ear in Crowe’s direction even though their shoulders were touching. This was a new word. “What does it mean to be content?”

Crowe rolled on his stomach, looking him fully in the eye. Drifts of wind fanned his hair, now past his shoulders, around him like a shroud. The smell of honey and pine coming off him was stronger than that of the sea. “It’s being happy,” he said. “It’s when you find a place…or someone special…” He grinned sheepishly, closing his eyes…there were times when he still hid from Barghast as if fearing the lycan’s judgement. “...somewhere or someone you could spend the rest of your life with. I’ve always wanted to see the ocean. Up until it’s only something I’ve heard about or read about.” Returning to his back, Crowe watched the waves crest and crash with wonder. “Now that I’m here I simply don't have the words. I could…” He nodded thoughtfully. “I could stay here for the rest of my life.”

It was Barghast’s turn to sit up. He curled a digit beneath the practitioner’s chin, tilting his head so that they were looking at each other again. “And would that make you happy?”

“Maybe.” His beloved smiled again, but this time it was not one of his open, happy smiles. This one was cryptic and pained.

Barghast took his hand, letting it rest in the valley of his palm. It still amazed him just how much smaller the practioner’s hand was to his own. His entire hand sits in the valley of my palm. “We could. We could stay right here, just you and me. I can build you a hut…I can build you anything your heart desires.”

Crowe gave one of his fingers a squeeze. His smile illustrated half a dozen emotions: wonder, happiness, sadness, and a few others Barghast had no names for. “That sounds lovely.” He looked at the water longingly. The lycan tensed, wondering if he would go streaking off towards the water again. He didn't. “To look out a window or step out a door and see that every day. We wouldn't need to worry about food because we could live off the ocean.” He sighed. There was a heaviness to it no smile could hide. “Unfortunately I don't think that's the life Monad gave me. But it is something.”

Barghast pressed his ears back against his head. His tail tapped anxiously against the sand. He wanted to hold him and comfort him - he didn't need a beach, he already had everything he needed to be happy - but he sensed his beloved was not finished yet.

“It's something to fight for,” Crowe said after a long pause that seemed to go on forever. His lips spread into another crooned smile that trembled. A smile on stilts. “And you…being with you…that's something to fight for as well.”

Barghast’s heart thumped heavily in his chest. There was an odd fluttery sensation in his belly he had no name for. I don’t want to move from this spot. I don’t want to move from this moment. I, too, could stay here forever. There's no war here. No torchcoats. No pilgrimage. But he also sensed the truth in Crowe’s words. The cycle pulls at us the way the tide pulls at a rock. Our pilgrimage continues. When it's over…if it's ever over…then we will be free. A whine started to unfurl in his throat at the thought. For now we must enjoy the small moments. He reached out, curling a stray lock of hair around the practitioner’s ears. He loved the soft, gentle curve of those ears. Crowe closed his eyes but he did not wear the expression of one who is hiding; he appeared to be at peace, the creases of worry gone for the moment.

A scream split the air.

                                                                        …

Crowe was thinking how little he knew about the world - how he'd barely begun to scratch the surface - when the scream came to him on the wind. It was high-pitched, full of fear and despair, and female.

Like the crack of a pistol signaling the start of a race, Crowe and Barghast popped to their feet. The practitioner shoved his arms through the sleeves of his robes as they sprinted back towards Mammoth.

At a snap of the reins from Crowe, the massive shire horse burst into a full gallop. The screams steered them East in the direction the crustacean had gone. They rounded a wall of limestone followed by a thick jungle of trees that stretched back as far as the eye could see. And just a bit further they spotted several caravans that had halted in the middle of the beach. Several human figures stumbled around the hulking bodies of the wagons while two or three dozen more huddled together, forming a single mass. Even from this distance (a distance Barghast and he were quickly closing), Crowe recognized signs of shock when he saw them. He could feel the tension - the terror - in the air like an electric current that made his skin buzz and crawl. He sucked in a breath, preparing himself for what would surely be another nightmare.

Before Barghast and he jumped from the saddle, Crowe started to put together the details of what had happened. The dead carcass of the crustacean they had seen wandering along the water’s edge earlier now rested on its back, legs stiffened in the air. White pus oozed from several dozen bullet holes. Earlier when the practitioner had glimpsed it, it hadn’t looked as large but up close it was a small-scaled monolith. The stench rolling off its hide reminded the sorcerer of the dank cellar from his childhood. Debris studded the sand: strips of wood from where the creature had torn holes into the roof and side of the wagon with its massive mandibles. Tin cans stuck out of the sand like hidden treasure that was determined to be sought after. One such can rested against the side of his boot. Feeling like a man who suddenly realizes he’s caught in a surreal dream, Crowe pickled it up. The label read it was salted pork with TANNHAUS INDUSTRIES printed above it. Is there anything they don’t manufacture? the part of his mind not reeling in shock wondered.

Armed with pistols, rifles, and staves, several men started to their feet when they saw the newcomers approach. The women closed in around the small group of children, forming a human barrier. Mind spinning, Crowe counted several necklaces that matched his own. He yanked it from over his head, letting it dangle from the wrist of his crippled hand. “We mean you no harm. We were traveling along the beach, heading to Caemyth, when we heard the screams.”

“Lower your weapons!” a man with dark eyes roared. His rugged voice carried easily over the crash of the waves. “He’s one of us.” The man eyed Barghast suspiciously. “Is your Okanavian companion friendly?”

“Friendly,” Barghast rumbled; arching his tail high in the air, he wagged it to show this was so. He, too, had lowered his weapon. Several mouths dropped open at the lycan’s response. Apparently no one had expected him to reply let alone understand.

The large man with dark eyes dropped to his knees beside the woman who still knelt in the sand. She’d folded herself in half so it looked as if she were bowing. Her fiery red dreads fanned around her, obscuring her face. The man laid a hand on the small of her back; she flinched slightly but did not pull away. The contact between them suggested an intimacy or at least a familiarity between longtime spouses. Crowe wondered if Barghast and he would come to know each other so well; he pushed the thought away. The sorcerer regarded the dead crustacean a final time and felt a muscle in his face twitch. The creature reminded him all too well of the reavers Barghast and he had encountered in the Mirror Expanse four months ago.

“She’s gone!” The woman with red hair pointed her face at the sky. Her face crumpled. Crowe could feel her grief mounting. Soon it would overwhelm her and she would break into fresh hysterics. “She’s gone,” she crooned again. She hugged herself with thin arms. Silver bracelets - matching serpents with the head of lions eating their own tails - jangled at her wrists. She laid her head on the broad shoulder of the man as if it were too much effort to hold up. “Oh Felisin.”

“Try not to worry.” The man kissed the top of her head. The tremors around the man’s mouth spoke of a man who was on the brink of hysterics himself and trying to keep it together. “We'll find her. She just got scared and ran into the jungle. She can't have gone far…”

“What's happened?” Sensing an opening, Crowe chose that moment to step in. “One of your own is missing?”

The man looked at him with eyes reddened by tears of hopelessness and terror.

“Our daughter. She fled into the jungle when we were attacked…She’s only five.”

“Crowe!” Barghast beckoned the herald over with a wave of his paw. He lowered his voice, speaking in Okanavian. He pointed at a set of tracks in the sand that the sun had yet to erase. Together they followed the tracks away from the crowd of refugees who had no doubt been heading towards the same place as Crowe and Barghast before tragedy befell them. The lycan sniffed the air.

“Do you smell anything?” Crowe asked in a hoarse whisper. He switched to Okanavian.

The barbarian nodded intently. His ears twitched. “I can smell her. I can smell her fear. I can smell them. The girl didn't go into the jungle, she went into the caves. That's also where the creatures go to lay their eggs during breeding season. I can smell this, too.”

Crowe tried to repress a shiver and couldn't. He turned back to the man and woman. He saw another man, younger than the leader but a few years older than the herald himself. He sat against the bulk of the overturned caravan, hands placed over a suppurating wound. Kneeling before the older boy (he could have been Bennett’s age if Bennett was still alive), Crowe asked Barghast to bring him the pack from Mammoth's saddle. Barghast obeyed without hesitation. Crowe traded him with a small if slightly trembling smile, I òplklllàlalllarunning a finger across the lycan's knuckles as he took the pack.

The young man's face was pale. Beneath his sweaty, bloody hands Crowe could see bandages that had been completely gored through. Knowing that the man would need more than bandages to keep him alive before he removed them - or at the very least his leg - did not prepare him for the severity of the wound. The gash was bone deep and half a foot long, revealing the white of bone, the red of muscle, and the interconnecting strings of tendon.

Crowe reached for his dagger. He held the blade up to his wrist.

Barghast started forward with a high-pitched yip that made several pairs of eyes turn in their direction. “Twin o'rre, what are you doing?”

The practitioner gave him a hard look. You know exactly what I’m doing.

“What is your name?” he asked the older boy.

“Ashe,” the boy said.

“Ashe, you’re probably not going to like this, but if we don’t do something you’ll bleed to death. Bandages won’t help.”

The boy clenched his eyes shut. A sob shattered inside his throat. “I-I don’t want to die. Not like this. We were close…we were so close to safety…”

“You’re not going to die,” the herald reassured him in a voice that was hard and reassuring and allowed no room for doubt. “You will live and you will be able to keep your leg. But you’re going to have to do what I tell you, do you understand?”

The older boy nodded jerkily. Then he said, “Who are you?”

You’ll find out soon enough. Crowe drew the blade across his wrist until blood welled from the wound. He held it out to Ashe. “Drink it. You must if you want to live.”

“What are you doing?” a voice roared. It was the voice of the leader. He started towards Crowe and Ashe.

Barghast intercepted the man, his paws clenched into fist. The man stopped.

“Stop!” the herald said. He glared at the man. “I’m doing what I have to do to save his life. Do you want him to die? Do you want to find your daughter?”

The man shot him a suspicious glance. “Yes,” he said after a moment.

“Then I suggest you let me do what I need to.” He turned back to the boy, still bleeding. “Now drink.”

The boy did not hesitate the way Barghast had. His lips formed a seal over the wound. Where Barghast had been gentle, tongue lapping over the wound, the boy was greedy, hungry. The moment the blood touched his tongue he became feral, back arching, dirty fingernails digging into the meat of Crowe’s arm. Barghast stepped forward with a snarl, about to pry them apart. Crowe stopped him with a glare even as he resisted the urge to tear his arm loose from the boy.

When the bells started to peel in his head he said, “Enough! That’s enough!” He pressed a palm to the boy’s head and pressed hard. The boy’s teeth pried loose of him, jaw snapping shut with a bony clack. He sagged against the bulk of the caravan. Trails of blood dribbled from his reddened lips, mixing with specks of sand that clung to his flesh. Crowe watched as his eyes lit up and fogged over. The practitioner recognized the look of euphoria on his face and resented him for it. He’d seen the look on Barghast’s face, marveling at his healed wounds in the morning light; he’d experienced it several times when he’d chanced upon an aether tree and drank from their sap. It made his skin crawl to think that his blood could have the same effect on others. Perhaps my blood and the sap from the aether tree are one in the same. The thought sent an inexplicable shiver down his spine.

The shiver, however, was not one of displeasure. It broke his flesh out in hives and made the hairs on the back of his arms stand on end. Somewhere inside him a black grin opened. He balked at it, repulsed. Monad help me, what was that?

“Monad help me,” Ashe gasped. His voice only partially echoed the herald’s thoughts for his voice was one of slurred pleasure. He looked down at his knee. Already the bleeding seemed to have slowed. “It doesn’t hurt anymore!” he said wondrously. Then like ink spilling out of a canter, his eyes darkened, becoming suspicious. “Who are you? What are you?”

The sound of boots sifting through the sand coming to an abrupt halt at his back made the sorcerer turn his head. Ashe’s expression was fixed in the brooding face of the caravan leader. “What did you do?” he boomed. Though he stood only a few inches taller than Crowe, he was no less intimidating. He smelled strongly of sweat and piss. Barghast loomed close on the other side, baring his teeth in a growl, making it clear he would intercede if necessary.

Crowe felt strangely calm. He did not begrudge Ashe or this man their suspicion. Outside of their right to be suspicious of me, they’ve been through a traumatizing ordeal, he told himself. The man’s young daughter is missing, her mother is hysterical, and the other children are frightened out of their minds. Who knows what other terrors they’ve seen in their odyssey to reach safe harbor. “You will see that soon his leg will heal and he will be able to again. But first you must stay here and watch over him. He will need water and food if you have it. If not, you must take your men and whatever weapons you have into the woods and hunt for game.”

The leader threw his head back, barking with laughter. A laugh that was edged with hysteria. “Who are you to give me orders, son?” He poked a wide finger into the practitioner’s chest hard enough to send the sorcerer staggering back a step. Out of instinct, Crowe lifted a hand in the air to restrain Barghast. Somewhere inside him a voice said, This situation is spinning out of control. The thought was small. Inconsequential. There was only two things he was certain of: if something happened to the young Felisin he would not be able to live with himself; the second was that the only way they would be able to get her back was if Barghast and he went into the caves alone.

He inhaled. Perhaps it’s the sea breeze and the cry of gulls. Perhaps they do good for the soul. His hand twitched with the urge to slap himself. What a stupid thought? The sea breeze was not doing the refugees any good. “I am not trying to give you orders, sir. My point is that my companion has a keen nose and is a far better tracker than any of your men. Your daughter has not ventured into the jungle, she’s gone into the caves where these creatures breed.” He’d lowered his voice so that only the man could hear him.

The sight of the blood draining from the man’s face jerked the practitioner fully out of his euphoric stupor. He blinked. “I can assure you I will bring your daughter back.” He clasped the necklace at his throat. Somewhere he felt a spark of Monad’s light strike inside him; it only appeared for a moment before winking out, but a moment was all he needed. “In spite of what Theocracy claims, never forget that Monad is with us. Even in our exile his flame burns within us. We have the power to part the sky and turn mountains to dust. Couldn’t that mean it is possible to bring your daughter back alive?”

His words threaded through the clusters of refugees who all now watched him like hands undoing a knot. Their dull eyes glittered with something akin to hope. Even the glaciers of tension in the leader’s face eased. He gulped audibly. “What is your name, stranger?”

“Crowe. That’s Barghast. We travel to Caemyth just like you. And you?”

“Edward. And the broken red-haired beauty you see is my wife, Claudia.”

Acting on impulse or some strange form of intuition, the herald rested a hand on the man’s broad shoulder. “Try to hold onto yourselves until I return. Be ready if more of these creatures return. We saw more of them further back…not too far from here. I’ve never seen anything like them.”

“Nor have I,” Edward said with a shaky exhale. For a moment his face reddened and it seemed that it was his turn to burst into his tears. “We’ve been seeing them along the coast for the last three days and they seemed completely disinterested in us. So you can imagine when this one the size of a train car came and attacked us! I believe you when you say Monad is with us, because it’s a Void damned miracle we’re alive at all. We will do whatever we need to until you return. Just bring back my Felisin.”