Chapter Eighteen

 

It took Silus a moment to realise that what was happening was not a part of his vision. The floor below him really was swaying like the deck of a storm-tossed ship and the masonry that was beginning to break away from the ceiling really would crush him unless he moved now. In the end Bestion made the decision for him, dragging Silus to his feet before hurrying him out of the room.

In the cloisters the walls shook and the sound of breaking stone was almost deafening. When they stumbled out of the temple and into the courtyard they could see that the city was shaking itself apart.

People were fleeing from their homes as they fell around them, some having no choice but to scramble from windows to drop to the street two stories or more below. Not all of them managed to drag themselves to safety before they were buried beneath falling stone.

A strong wind blew down towards them from the upper levels of the city, bringing with it a foul stench.

A panicked tide of acolytes and priests flowed around Silus and Bestion. Most chose to head to the upper levels of Morat, fleeing towards the docks, but some went running down the terraces to the lower levels; throwing frightened glances behind them while trying to dodge the detritus that rained down around them.

"We must get to the docks." Bestion shouted. "The only safety will be out on the water."

Silus's first thought, however, was to the safety of Katya and Zack. They were still at the palace and, if the rubble from the collapsed buildings continued to tumble into the centre of the Morat, they'd soon be buried in the avalanche.

Silus made for the steps but an explosion threw him to the ground as the remains of an inn collided with the side of the temple, demolishing the cloisters. He got to his feet and was about to battle onwards when - through the thickening fog of brick dust and debris - he saw his wife struggling up from the lower levels, Zac clutched to her breast. Behind her followed the rest of the crew.

"Thank the Lord." Silus said, embracing Katya. "We have to get to the Llothriall. Bestion, follow us."

But when Silus turned to address the priest, there was no sign of him. He only hoped that he wasn't amongst the tangled corpses trapped in the temple ruins.

There was no time to check, however, as the tremors that had besieged the city intensified. The stairs leading to the upper levels cracked as they raced up them. Silus looked back once to see that Morat had become a vast landslide; its beauty lost in a vortex of tumbling stone.

As they crested the last terrace, Silus almost stumbled as he saw what lay ahead.

"Holy Lord! What is that?" Win said.

A dark wall of flesh rolled across Morat, consuming everything in its path. Already the docks had disappeared into its black gullet and as it ate it made a horrendous sound. The sun reflected from its wet hide and Silus wondered what manner of creature the Chadassa had called to their aid.

There was no escape. Behind them the city continued to fall apart and ahead of them it was being consumed at an alarming rate. Silus had just a moment to consider what had become of the Llothriall before the creature was upon them. He reached out and took Katya's hand, but his grip was wrenched away as he fell into darkness.

 

His pulse was loud in his ears as he awoke. Something damp covered his head like a hood and when Silus opened his eyes all he could see was a weak, milky glow filtered through a web of veins that beat in time with his heart. His throat burned. Something was holding his jaws apart. He bit down on an obstruction that felt like bone encased in gristle and a bitter taste filled his mouth. Silus tried to raise his hands to pry away the hood, but found that they had been encased in something that felt like warm, moist flesh.

He wasn't sure how much time passed before the tube in his throat was withdrawn and the hood was peeled away.

Silus found himself in a room that was made entirely of flesh. Great bony ridges supported the ceiling and the floor beneath him rose and fell as the walls pulsed. To either side of him sat several figures, their hands sunk to their wrists into the floor and their heads covered in fleshy hoods that grew from the walls. Fat, ridged pipes extended from the walls and into the hoods, suspended from which were veined sacs that hissed and wheezed as they contracted and inflated. Even though their faces were covered Silus recognised Win and the crew of the Llothriall. Katya and Zac weren't amongst them.

Silus tried to pull his hands free of the grip of the floor but the more he pulled, the tighter the grip became, until the bones of his wrists began to grind painfully together.

"Dunsany! Kelos! Wake up."

A portion of the far wall flexed and dilated open like a vast sphincter. A Chadassa stepped through the opening and into the room. The door folded closed behind it with a sound that made Silus's guts turn.

"What have you done with Katya and Zac?" he shouted, pulling against his restraints, a fresh surge of hatred for the Chadassa flowing through him.

"Belck has them now. They are no longer of your concern. I am to prepare you for the Queen."

"I'd rather kill myself than breed with your kind."

"If you resist us then the things we do to your woman and her grub will make this seem but a pleasant dream." With that the Chadassa put its hand against the wall and barked several words in a harsh, guttural language.

The hood encasing Win's head contracted and the Archduke cried out, thrashing against his bonds. The hood was so tight now that Silus could see Win's features clearly through the taut material. The expression he saw was one of uncomprehending terror. Blood trickled down Win's neck as the bones of his skull shifted and cracked.

His screams quickly fell silent. The hood relaxed its grip. Win slumped against Dunsany.

The Chadassa turned to Silus. "Now come, follow."

Silus's hands were released and he got numbly to his feet. The sphincter-door peeled open and the Chadassa was already halfway through when Silus tore the pipe free from Win's collapsed hood, his fingers almost slipping on the bony ridges. He ran at the Chadassa and encircled its throat with his left arm, before jabbing the pipe into its right eye, the black orb giving way easily to the jagged edge.

The creature screamed and scrabbled against Silus's hold, its claws tearing shallow trenches into his arm. Silus ignored the pain and rammed the broken pipe into the Chadassa's eye again and again until it dropped to the floor, its cries loud in the confines of the flesh chamber. Silus knelt on the creature's chest and, leaning down hard, he pushed the pipe as far into the Chadassa's eye socket as it would go. There was a loud crack and the pipe met with little resistance as it entered the soft meat of the Chadassa's brain.

Silus remained crouched over the creature for a moment, listening for the approach of more of its kind. But there was no sound of footsteps and, so, Silus got to work freeing the prisoners.

The hoods did not peel easily away from their heads and Silus was careful less he harm his companions in any way, but soon he had the first of them free. He gently extracted the breathing pipe from Dunsany's mouth, stepping back when he vomited copiously onto the ground.

"Am I dead? Is this the seven hells that the Faith used to threaten us with?"

"No, Dunsany, I can assure you that we are very much alive."

Dunsany noticed the corpse of the creature, and then Win's body.

"That... that's..."

"Yes, it is. Now help me get your hands free before they have a chance to do the same to the rest of us."

Using a section of broken pipe, they managed to dig Dunsany's hands from the floor. As he tore at the flesh of the room, Silus thought that he could hear squeals of protest coming from somewhere distant. When he peeled the hood from Jacquinto's head the chamber shuddered. Pores began to open up in the floor and through these oozed a sticky clear substance, while the door to the room began to shrink.

"Come on, we're leaving now!" Silus shouted, giving the crew no time to orientate themselves.

The hole of the door was almost too narrow to struggle through as the last of them left the room, and Kelos and Silus had to pull Father Maylan through the folds of flesh that had begun to close around his body. He tumbled through as the door sealed itself behind him and soon the chamber was lost behind a wall of unbroken flesh.

"I feel strangely reborn," the priest said, getting to his feet.

The corridor in which they now found themselves was made of a material that looked like raw steak. Above them, arches of bone supported the ceiling where thick red cables ran through the flesh, pulsing to a steady beat that echoed down the passageway. Silus put his hand to a wall and it twitched away from his touch.

"Wherever we are," he said, "this place is alive."

"We need to get out of here quick." Jacquinto said. "We have no weapons and there are bound to be more Chadassa on us at any moment."

"What if we made weapons?" Silus said.

He went to where a ridge of bone emerged from the wall and kicked it as hard as he could. For a moment it didn't look as if it was going to give, but then a hairline crack ran up its surface and Silus redoubled his efforts until the bone gave way. He then tore at it before turning to his companions, holding a vicious looking shard.

"It's not much, but it's better than nothing."

The crew of the Llothriall pulled and kicked at the walls until they had variously armed themselves with scimitars of bone and thick cords of flesh. Only Emuel refused to arm himself. "If it comes to a fight, and it is my time, then it is my time." He reasoned.

"And I'd argue that you were being a stubborn idiot if we actually had any time," Silus said, "but for now I think that we should start running."

Behind them the walls of the passage had begun to close up. As they ran Silus had a moment to wonder whether the collapse was as result of their damage to the walls, whether the organism through which they fled was trying to limit the harm they had inflicted upon it.

They turned a corner only to find that the passage came to an end. Behind them the corridor continued to contract.

Father Maylan closed his eyes and began to pray.

"Maylan, shut up! That's not helping." Silus said.

Silus pushed against the wall blocking their escape and it gave easily under his fingers. When he tapped it, it thrummed like the taut skin of a drum. Using his bone fragment, he cut into the barrier and it tore with a hiss of escaping air.

"Follow me," Silus said, before pushing his way through the gap.

He fell to the floor on the other side and, for one vertiginous moment, he thought that he would keep on falling. All that separated him from the surrounding sea was a thin, translucent membrane. The whole room was made of the same clear substance and Silus barely heard his companions tumbling into the chamber behind him as he stared in wonder.

The clear hemisphere in which they now stood protruded from an expanse of dark, scaled flesh. Through the side of the chamber and far to his right Silus could see a vast tail slowly fanning from side to side and he realised, with shock, that he was looking down the flank of an enormous creature.

Kelos ran his hand over the wall, a look of excited confusion on his face.

"Extraordinary. Thin as a bubble but utterly resilient"

"I think that we're in the thing that attacked Morat," Silus said.

"And I think that you may be right. Gods, I thought that the leviathan we encountered on the Llothriall was big, but this is something else entirely."

"There really is no hope then is there?" Dunsany said.

"What do you mean?" Silus said.

"We can't cut our way out of here because we'll drown and we can't stay where we are because the Chadassa will find and eviscerate us."

"I think that if they were going to eviscerate us they would have done so already." Kelos said.

"And what about Win?" Dunsany said.

As they stood in uneasy silence, Silus began to search about them for another exit, but it was a futile gesture.

"What is that?" Father Maylan said, from where he was crouched near the floor.

Silus dropped down beside him and saw a large shadow directly beneath them. As it unfolded a lance of green fire erupted from it and slammed into the flesh just beyond the chamber wall. A great cloud of blood immediately boiled into the water. In it, they could see the corpses of several Chadassa. Another lance of energy punched into the flesh further to the right and this time the floor of the chamber shook as a screech of pain rang through the walls.

"What is that thing?" Father Maylan asked.

"I don't know," said Silus.

And he was no closer to knowing as it suddenly lurched out of the darkness and pressed itself against the chamber walls.

 

Katya awoke to find herself lying on a strange, spongy bed with two Chadassa females standing over her. One of them held Zac to a pendulous breast and she was horrified to see him greedily tugging at the teat, his face flushed with the warmth of the milk he was drinking. When she snatched him away from the creature he began to cry. Katya tried to calm Zac by holding him to her own breast, but he refused to drink and instead beat against her chest with his tiny hands.

She tried to run then, but the room she found herself in had no door and when she started scrabbling around the moist, fleshy walls, desperately trying to find an exit, one of the Chadassa females grabbed her by the hair and dragged her back to the bed.

The thing pulled Zac out of Katya's arms and his cries were silenced as he began to feed once more.

Katya closed her eyes and refused to open them until one of the Chadassa hauled her from the bed and marched her from the room. Mercifully Zac was placed back in her arms then and he had looked up at her with a happy little smile.

As they entered a large chamber that looked out onto the sea, Belck turned to greet them. He reached out for her son and Zac was soon crying again as one of the Chadassa took him from her and placed him in the ancient creature's arms. Zac squirmed, his face wrinkled in a red grimace of distress. The Chadassa chuckled and cooed at the infant, increasing the volume of his cries.

Katya looked on helplessly as she was restrained by one of the Chadassa females. Her claws dug painfully into her wrists and she could feel her hot breath on the back of her neck.

"Ah yes," Belck said, "the bloodline may be even stronger in this one. It is a pity he is not of an age where he could be useful. Still, he is something of a prize. You may take him now."

The other Chadassa female took Zac from him.

"Leave him alone!" Katya screamed.

"And so to the mother," Belck said. "What to do with you I wonder?"

"You harm Zac and I will - "

"You'll what? What can you do Katya?"

It was true of course, she could do nothing but watch. Tears welled in her eyes and she quickly blinked them away, unwilling to show these foul creatures any sign of weakness.

"Yes, I thought so," Belck said. "Still, I believe that you can be of some use and Zac is still an infant. It would be wrong to separate mother and child at this delicate stage, don't you think?"

The Chadassa female came over to them, Zac curled against her breast, his eyes closed and his chest calmly rising and falling as he slept.

"If we give him back to you Katya," Belck said, "will you be more cooperative?"

She made a grab for her son and the Chadassa stepped away, Zac stirring briefly as he was jolted by the motion.

"No Katya," Belck said. "I asked you a question. Now, will you cooperate?"

A vicious, jealous hatred burned in her as she looked at her child sleeping in the arms of the creature, and she swore to herself that if she broke free she would kill the mongrel bitch that held him. But for now, her fury was of no use to her son, and so she held out her arms.

"Yes, I'll cooperate."

"Good. That was what I was hoping you'd say."

Zac was placed back in her arms and Katya was relived that he did not wake or struggle against her.

"What have you done with my husband?"

"Silus is being prepared for our Queen." Belck said. "His seed will be the herald for a new age. Aren't you proud to be even a small part of that?"

"Silus isn't one of you."

"So you have told us."

A sudden tremor shook the room and sent Belck stumbling away from her. Katya would have laughed at the look of confusion on his face if she weren't so preoccupied with keeping her own feet.

Across the room a door dilated open and a Chadassa male raced in.

"Ancient one, we are under attack. We have sealed the right flank chambers but we are already taking more hits."

"Podrol, what exactly is attacking us?" Belck said, as he steadied himself with his staff.

"I've never seen anything like it before, but Utral says that it is a Calma vessel."

Belck looked not only confused now, but Katya thought that she saw something like fear creeping into his face, though on features so alien it was hard to tell.

"Where is Silus?" Belck snapped.

"I'm afraid that he has escaped his bonds. However, he will still be somewhere on the ship. I have dispatched my best soldiers after him. For now, I suggest we get you to safety."

"No Podrol."

"I'm sorry ancient one, I don't follow."

"Get the woman and her child away from the ship first. I will stay and fight. If it really is the Calma they will not stand up long against the might of our warriors."

"Very well." Podrol approached Katya and she flinched away from his touch. "It is for your own safety."

There was nothing she could do to resist and she knew it. If Katya attempted to fight they would like as not take Zac away again and have her killed. The fact that she was being allowed to nurse her son was perhaps the only thing keeping her alive. She had to hope that Silus would win through and come and rescue her but, in the meantime, she could only numbly follow the creature that led her from the room and down a narrow corridor. Through the thin walls Katya could see what looked like a network of veins. Through each one flowed a dark fluid and, not for the first time, she wondered just where she was.

At the end of the corridor another door peeled open and she was led into a small spherical chamber. Podrol gestured to where a stump of knotted and bloody material grew from the floor.

"Sit." Podrol said, before leaving the room, the door dilating shut behind him.

Katya sat and rocked Zac back and forth, singing him a song that her mother had taught her, the lyrics telling of the glittering seas of Long Night and the creatures of light who danced there. She hoped that they would not have to wait long before Silus found them. The room was stiflingly warm and the light that illuminated it was sickly.

Suddenly there was a falling sensation in the pit of her stomach and she cried out, holding Zac tight. He woke with a squeal and began to struggle in her arms. Pale filaments grew from the walls, quickly wrapping the two of them in a tight, sticky web. Katya fought against them for a second, but as the room began to spin she found that she was glad of the restraints.

The walls of the room glowed before becoming translucent and now Katya could see where she had been imprisoned.

As she tumbled through the sea, away from the Chadassa craft, she wondered at just how they had managed to make their fortress inside an enormous fish.