Nightborn, page 27
Deep within him an ancient hunger was stirring, human ambition surfacing in the black pool of his soul like a drowning man gasping for breath. He had been a scientist back in his mortal life, and his experiments in forced evolution had produced many of the Terran simulacra species that this world now took for granted. But his current condition did not allow for the luxury of a laboratory—or a scholar’s library, or any kind of permanent home in which to store the specimens that scientific experimentation required. He’d had to surrender that whole side of himself when he left his home in Merentha, and since then his intellectual inquiries had been confined to a strictly internal landscape. It was one of the most frustrating facets of his undead existence.
But this place could become his laboratory now. He could mold new species to his will here and test their adaptation, using the volatile currents to accomplish in a few generations what might take centuries elsewhere. His soul hungered for that kind of intellectual stimulation as powerfully as his altered body now hungered for human blood. It was a powerful temptation.
But was it the product of his own hunger, or the Forest attempting a new kind of seduction? Would he feel the same way about the Forest if its whirlpool of dark energy were not struggling to draw him in? He was not accustomed to having to question his own thoughts like this. It was uniquely disturbing.
A scream split the night.
For a moment he thought it was a human cry. It had the emotional resonance of one, and Tarrant’s fae-sight could see the ripples of frustration and rage that appeared in its wake, clearly from a human source. But the sound itself was bestial in nature, clearly not formed by a human throat. How very curious.
Loosening his sword in its scabbard, he began to head in that direction. He moved quickly and quietly, a shadow among shadows, and the local wildlife must have been moving out of his way, for he saw no other creatures. Even some vines and branches seemed to draw back as he passed, clearing a path for him. Was that possible? He knew of no plants that were sentient enough to behave thus, but that did not mean that none existed. In a place like this, anything was possible.
Soon he could hear a low keening noise coming from directly in front of him. He stopped moving and extended his senses to their utmost capacity as he strained to analyze it. Canine, he decided at last. Only one animal was vocalizing clearly, but he could hear the huffing and panting of many others. A wolf pack, perhaps? In the world outside the Forest such things were of little concern to him; animals could sense his unnatural nature and generally kept their distance. But here, where so much of the environment was itself unnatural, they might be less inhibited. Or the creatures in question might be faeborn, not fleshborn, in which case they would play by a whole different set of rules. He would take no chances.
He drew his sword from its scabbard. Blue fae-flames danced along the edge of the blade, but it was a fire bereft of heat. Frost appeared on the plants nearest to him, and the edges of a few leaves grew stiff, shattering like glass as he brushed against them.
There was a faint patch of moonlight in the distance, and he moved toward it with the steadiness and silence of a true wolf. The trees thinned out just ahead, opening into some kind of clearing. The noise seemed to be coming from there. He did not approach the clearing directly, but took up position behind the last dense stand of trees, letting the folds of his surcote fall over his sword so that its light would not betray him.
There were indeed wolves in the clearing, real flesh-and-blood animals, but they were twisted and malproportioned creatures, unlike any species he had ever seen before. There were about two dozen of them, and they paced anxiously back and forth across the clearing, snarling at one another whenever their paths crossed. In the center of the clearing, a single wolf lay motionless upon the ground. It was larger than all the others, with fur that had probably been white at one time. Now its coat was dank with filth and only a few patches of white hairs showed through. The scent of its blood came to Tarrant on the wind, and to his surprise it stirred his hunger. Since he fed exclusively on human blood, that answered one question, at least . . . but it raised a thousand others.
Sword at the ready, he stepped out from his place of concealment.
As soon as the wolves saw him they began to snarl. Several rushed at him, but they drew up just short of attack, unable to overcome their instinctive fear of an undead predator. Others froze in place, their long, matted fur rising up in clumps like surreal porcupine quills, making fearsome growling sounds as they tried to warn him away. He observed them for a moment and then, when he felt certain that none of them were likely to summon the courage to approach him, he walked over to the wounded wolf. It did not seem to notice him until he came close enough for the chill of his sword to raise frost along its flank, at which point it bared its teeth and growled a warning. But the sound lacked conviction, and its fierce expression faded quickly, subsumed into sheer exhaustion. There was a deep gash in its side, Tarrant noted, and the ground beneath it was soaked with blood. That was not good for his purposes. Whatever manner of creature this was, he did not want it to die before he had a chance to study it.
He was not able to Heal it, of course. The power which sustained him was derived from death and darkness, and he could no more work a true Healing than he could bang together two blocks of ice to start a fire. But there were other things that he could do. Lowering his sword until it almost touched the wolf, he summoned forth the earth-fae that was bound to its blade. Frigid blue fire danced along the blade’s edge and a frosty mist began to rise from its surface, like human breath in winter. Then he lowered its icy tip into the wound. The wolf howled in pain and tried to pull away, but the muscles along that side had suddenly frozen in place and it was helpless to escape.
The mist turned crimson where steel touched blood, and Tarrant’s nostrils flared as he drank in the scent of it. Human blood, without doubt. He licked his lips as he moved his blade along the edges of the wound, making sure that the sorcerous steel made contact with every inch of the bleeding surface. The flesh that it touched blackened and curled back upon itself, as if mummified. He continued until the whole of the wound had been treated thus, then stepped back and studied his handiwork.
It would be a long time before all the flesh he had just destroyed would slough off and be replaced, but at least for now the wound was cauterized. No more blood would be lost. The white wolf lay panting on the ground, its eyes rolled halfway up into its head, but it seemed to be calm. Now that the worst of the pain was over it seemed to understand what Tarrant was doing. A flicker of something that was almost human intelligence seemed to spark deep within its eyes . . . and then was gone again, subsumed into bestial exhaustion.
With a glance about the clearing to make sure that the other wolves were still keeping their distance—they were—Tarrant braced himself to perform a Knowing. Doing any manner of Working in this place was risky, but he needed to know what this strange creature was, and there was no other quick way to find out. The currents surrounding his feet grew agitated as he summoned forth power from his blade once more, and doubtless the Forest’s fae would have been drawn into his Working if he allowed it. But he kept his mind focused and shut the local currents out, unwilling to risk any direct contact. The only power he would use was that which was stored in his sword.
Gradually his Knowing took shape, and he could sense it drawing forth information from the wounded creature at his feet. After a moment he shut his eyes and invited it into his mind, commanding it to present itself as a vision.
• • •
Pale, he is—so pale!—with milk-white skin, hair like spun moonlight, gleaming red eyes overlaid with some sort of Working. He stands proudly amidst the trees of the Forest, and its currents reflect his own essence back at him: power, ambition, vanity. So much vanity! This place is the greatest source of power on the continent—in the world—and he will become its Master.
He spreads his arms wide as if to welcome a lover, and whispers to the earth-fae: come to me, come to me, come to me . . . .
It comes. Core-bright power, life-hungry—ravenous!—pours into his soul with molten fury, filling his mind with the metaphysical echoes of a thousand human nightmares. Fear and madness churn in his brain, the final emotions of the men who had walked this path before him, who had tried to master the Forest and failed. But he will not fail. He envisions the mental patterns that will allow him to take control of the mad tide, muttering the ritual words that he prepared so long ago. He has dreamed of this day since his first Working. He is ready for it. He is strong. Soon, soon, this legendary realm that has destroyed so many will belong to him.
But he is not strong enough.
The power of the Forest engulfs him, chokes him, drowns him. It crashes into his soul with tsunami force and sweeps it clean of all human thought. Dark fae pours into his soul like wine into an empty vessel and begins to reshape his flesh, his mind, his soul. He howls in agony—a beast’s agony, not a man’s—and understands, in his final human moments, the full measure of his failure.
• • •
Tarrant stared down at the wolf as the vision faded, trying to reconcile the arrogant sorcerer he had just seen with the pitiful animal that now lay helpless before him. How many years had it been since the creature had last experienced a human thought? Did it have enough rational awareness to understand the magnitude of what it had lost and to mourn what it had become? The involuntary transformation it had suffered was both horrifying and fascinating to Tarrant, in that it reflected the very essence of the Forest. It was also a clear warning to him, not to lose his metaphysical footing in this deadly environment.
Kneeling down by the wolf’s side, Tarrant waited until it opened its eyes and looked at him. It seemed to him there was a flicker of humanity in the back of its gaze—but if so, it was a dim and distant thing, quickly subsumed by bestial pain.
The sorcerer in Tarrant’s vision had clearly made a study of the Forest. Somewhere in that man’s mind there might be useful information about this place. But for as long as he was trapped in this animal form he could not communicate it directly, and Tarrant did not have enough fae stored in his sword to sustain a Knowing as long as he would need to in order to draw it out of him.
Was it possible to change him back? It was an intriguing notion, but a dangerous one. Even now he could feel the Forest’s fae lapping hungrily at his flesh, waiting for a chance to consume him as it had consumed this one. It might have no real sentience of its own, but centuries of absorbing the essence of human nightmares had imprinted it with patterns of human aggression and human desperation. It might as well be sentient. If in his sorcery he forgot where he was and instinctively connected with the fae here . . . then he might well wind up like the albino, a beast in truth.
He gazed down at the wolf for several long minutes, assessing the creature’s value to him. Unlike the albino he was not a reckless man, but some things were worth taking chances for. Knowledge was chief among them.
At last he said, very quietly, “I can restore your human form. Perhaps your human soul as well. But there would be a price for such service.” He paused. “A high price.”
The wounded wolf stared at him. It was impossible to read what was in its eyes.
“If I give you back your human life, then that life will belong to me. For so long as you remain human, you will serve me. All that you possess, all that you know, all the power you command, will be mine for the asking. That is the price of my assistance. Do you understand?”
For a long time the wolf just stared at him. Did it still comprehend human language? If not, then there would be little hope of restoring it to its former state.
But finally, in a stiff and pained motion, it nodded.
“Then you must surrender yourself to me now without reserve. Forget everything that you were, up to this moment, and permit me to reshape you as I see fit. Anything less than that, and you will not survive the process of transformation.” He paused. “You were a sorcerer once. You understand why that is necessary.”
There was a long pause. He could not interpret the wolf’s expression, but he sensed that inside that bestial head quasi-human thoughts were struggling to take shape. Perhaps it was trying to remember the ways of sorcery, so that it might evaluate his instructions. Perhaps it was asking itself whether or not it was capable of the degree of submission he was asking for.
If not, then it would die.
“Do you agree to my terms?” Tarrant pressed.
The wolf’s eyes were fixed on him. Unreadable.
Finally—weakly—it nodded again.
Stepping back from it, Tarrant braced himself for what must come next. Shapeshifting was one of the most dangerous Workings in a sorcerer’s repertoire, and more than one student had died while attempting to master it. In order to adopt the form of another creature one must surrender oneself body and soul to the fae, allowing it complete dominion over one’s flesh. It was a terrifying process, and a dangerous one. Failure to submit completely might result in one being trapped between forms, and such a state was rarely viable. Few were the sorcerers who dared attempt such a Working, and fewer still the ones who succeeded.
As for Working such a transformation on another human being, as Tarrant was about to attempt—that would require the same kind of absolute submission, but not only to the fae. This human-turned-wolf must be willing to place his very soul in Tarrant’s control, without hesitation or resistance. Tarrant remembered the sorcerer he had seen in his vision: proud, vain, arrogant. Could someone like that manage the requisite humility? If his years in the Forest had broken his spirit—as Tarrant suspected—perhaps. If not, then Tarrant would have to conjure the information he sought from the man’s ashes. Difficult, but not impossible.
Closing his eyes for a moment, he summoned forth the coldfire that was in his sword, channeling it into a fearsome Repelling. Blue flames licked outward: a heatless, unnatural fire with death at its core. Several of the wolves yelped in alarm. One of them turned and fled into the Forest, and a second one followed. Then another. Soon they were all gone, save the albino wolf, which lacked the power to flee. Tarrant let the Conjuring fade.
The clearing was silent.
Now, he thought. Carefully.
He could feel the Forest’s power prodding at the edges of his consciousness as he began to shape his Transforming. This kind of Working called for an immense amount of power, and normally he would have used whatever was available to him, drawing upon the currents of earth-fae that coursed about his feet without even thinking about it. But even if he was willing to risk trying to control the currents here, the concentration required for that would doom his sorcerous efforts. The Transforming of living flesh left no room for distraction.
He would have to use what he had bound to his sword, and hope it was enough.
Summoning forth the death-cold power again, he directed a powerful Transforming at the wolf’s body. The animal spasmed in agony as Tarrant’s Working suddenly engulfed it, which was only to be expected: shapeshifting was a painful process. Tarrant persisted. Molding its body organ by organ—cell by cell—he forced it to adopt a new configuration, ever so slightly more human than the last. And then another. And another. Each intermediate stage had to be viable in its own right, Tarrant knew, a unique combination of organs and limbs that was capable of sustaining life on its own. Whether a sorcerer had enough knowledge to choose a viable biological pathway, and enough power to force human flesh to follow it, determined whether a shapeshifter lived or died.
But the albino’s body had been human once, and on some metaphysical level it seemed to remember its previous form. Once Tarrant realized that, he needed to do little to guide its transformation. Slowly, the limbs of the wolf straightened and lengthened. Its ribcage contracted. Its teeth shrank. Fur fell off in sickly clumps, baring a hide that was bloody at first, then pink and raw, then white and soft. Each change was intensely painful, Tarrant knew. Normally the pain passed quickly, but a prolonged procedure like this one offered no quarter. The albino’s body shook as it transformed, and once or twice a howl of agony escaped its lips, but for the most part it bore the pain in silence. Perhaps it remembered enough about sorcery to understand that pain was the price of success in such an undertaking.
And then, finally, it was done. The body that now lay before Tarrant was naked and filthy, but it was unquestionably human. The breathing was ragged, but the lungs were clearly functional. The heart was pounding hard enough that the veins under the man’s skin twitched visibly, but the rhythm was within normal human bounds. The wound was gone, Tarrant noted; apparently in the process of recovering its original form the body had healed itself.
He waited.
For several long minutes the albino lay utterly still, with no sign of consciousness. Hopefully his mind had not been so badly damaged that he would be incapable of communication. If it had, then all this effort had been for nothing.
Very slowly, the thin, translucent eyelids opened. Scarlet irises were surrounded by a corona of broken vessels, making the eyes look like orbs of fresh blood.
“What is your name?” Tarrant demanded.
The albino’s brow furrowed as he struggled to process the question. Tarrant gave him time. Regardless of whether the speech centers of the man’s brain had survived the change intact, he had not dealt with human language for a very long time. It might take him a while to remember how to speak.
