The Human Experience

Five-Quarter P, day 13, 3417.

Fort Neoma is said to be impregnable. I remember how impressive it seemed the first time I saw it. The artificial island is surrounded by sand banks that form a perimeter around it of several leagues’ length, submerged in only a few meters of water. From the air, it looks like a light blue ring around the island, where the water is shallow. This is what keeps everything but special flat-bottom barges from docking at Port Crimson. It’s why the only attempted siege on the island failed miserably. The deep-water Akkútian war galleys scraped against the sand banks, remaining beached.

The Star-King’s trebuchets dusted Akkút’s stranded galleys, boats rowed out to meet any fleeing swimmers. Blood stained the harbour for hours, giving the Battle of Crimson Waters and Port Crimson itself their iconic names.

Coming back here now, after six turns, I realize what’s been hiding in plain sight all along. Fort Neoma has been breached. Without blood, without war, the city has been taken. Trebuchets, fortifications, sand banks – none of that matters in the war against the Voices.

Pale mists skimmed Port Crimson’s waters in the breaking dawn. Hector listened to gulls cawing in the distance, watched them spiral downward like little missiles each time something stirred in the waves. From his vantage on level two he could see the merchants and sailors loading goods onto the docked barges below, but their noise didn’t penetrate the calm of the park in which he sat. Here the blackthorns rustled in the wind and the manicured peony bushes swayed in time to their music. Gravelled walkways wound in spirals through the lawn, leading to gardens and benches and limestone fountains.

Orcadis glided down one such walkway with his hands clasped behind his back and his robes billowing behind him in the wind. Hector thanked the Star-Gods the wind had picked up and he could no longer hear the man’s infuriating humming.

“He looks horrible this morning,” Hector muttered in Del’s ear.

She shifted beside him on the bench. “Horribly drunk, if you ask me. Did you see those red eyes? He’s likely been staring into a bottle all night.”

“I’ve known Orcadis since I was ten. Trust me, he doesn’t drink. Says it loosens his control over his mind.”

She shrugged. “Could be lystus leaf, judging by his issues with motor control.”

“Father doesn’t take drugs,” Kaed, standing a few paces away, said with a tone of finality. Del shrugged again and tipped her face up to the barely-visible rim of the Delmira moon, watching it drift between sheets of fog. Kaed stared at her until Orcadis called from some paces away.

“It’s time. Everybody up!”

With a silent sigh, Hector rose from the bench. Del followed, her movements as rigid as if it pained her to take orders from Orcadis. Not that she had any right to hate him more than Hector did. Part of him dared to hope his suffering at Orcadis’s hands had driven such deep resentment for the man into her heart.

But the more realistic part of him said she was just a cold, hateful person and that was why she’d been drawn to Lykus in the first place.

A low rhythm pulsed through the early morning. Orcadis beckoned them to where he stood beneath the grapevine canopy over the park’s entrance archway. They filed inside the arch, shoulder-to-shoulder as he’d instructed, their hands folded before them. Orcadis’s broad frame filled most the archway by itself.

The beat intensified. Pebbles quivered beneath Hector’s feet and he heard hooves beating the earth close by. The first of the convoy rounded the bend in the road, their horses trotting up to the park in time with that low drumbeat.

“Ready! Turn!” boomed the lead rider.

“Del, you need to–”

Delia turned her back to the convoy before Hector had even started explaining, followed swiftly by everyone else in the park.

“The Greathelm already informed me, Hector,” she whispered.

Orcadis stared straight ahead, but even from his profile Hector saw the slight puckering of his lips. “You must be mistaken, my dear. I’ve done no such thing.” He glanced briefly at her. “For someone who has never been here before, you know an awful lot about our customs.”

Del looked at her feet, letting her coppery waves drape her face the way she did when she didn’t want anyone to see her cheeks reddening. “Everyone knows the Star-King doesn’t let commoners see his face,” she hissed.

They were silent then, perfectly still and silent, so Hector couldn’t explain why he got that out-of-the-loop feeling like they were communicating. Maybe he still didn’t get people. Maybe he was paranoid. But he couldn’t shake the feeling that secrets were transpiring around him, whispering in everyone’s heads but his, just like the Voices.

He’d pull Del aside one day to set the record straight. One day when he could muster the strength to care about something besides being Lykus again and forgetting about Varali.

“Announcing His Excellency, Blessed by the Quintet, most renowned in the binary star system, Star-King–”

“Ech, ech! Blah-blah-blah! Don’t you thits get tired of blowing thmoke up my ath? By Delmira’th love, I knew Orry when you wath thill thuckling at your motherth’ tits. He knowth my damn titalth!”

From the corner of his eye, Hector shared a wary glance with Del. Everyone knew the attempted assassination had shaken the king’s faculties, but...really?

“Orry, brother, turn the fuck around! Didn’t I thay I’d have your head on a thpike if you inthithted with the formal horthcrap? Your whole party can turn, too. I alwayth love fresh reactionth. But be warned, my guardth have orderth to shoot anyone who thcreams, haha!” Orcadis shook his head with a half-amused smirk and obliged. Everyone turned to face the king’s convoy. Foot soldiers stood at attention, some with bass drums strapped across their chests, others with sets of tenor drums. Mounted escorts in double-breasted olive-and-black uniforms flanked the king’s stallion – if it could be called that. It was a hideous beast with some disease that left patches of pink skin showing through its mangy brown and white coat.

The king wasn’t wearing a crown. He probably thought he didn’t need one. The slab of pink meat and scar tissue where his face should have been made him conspicuous enough. Hector fought to keep his expression even. A lipless gash of a mouth twisted up like a permanent leer over his teeth on one side, extending all the way to his left nostril. There was no nose, just those two nostrils like he was some giant, shedding snake. A lidless eye goggled out of his right socket, and a mound of scarred meat enclosed the vacant left. What remained of his ears had melted into his face with the fire, and his bald head shone mercilessly under the suns, mottled with tight pink meat where the skin had peeled away.

He slid from his mount and approached, that lidless eye roving across the assembled line. The Star-King halted by Delia.

“Boo!” he bellowed, and thrust his gleaming, featureless face close to hers.

Del didn’t flinch. “Your Grace, it is an honour,” she said, tried to do the customary curtsey, then switched gears and bent into an awkward bow.

The lipless leer twisted farther. Hector couldn’t begin to guess what expression the Star-King had been going for. “Alright, I thupoth you get to live. Huh. I usually get to the ladeeth. Gueth Orry warned you real good, eh?”

“My friend, let me introduce you,” Orcadis offered, drawing the king away from Del. “This is Delia Alister of Van-Rath, and–”

“Fine, fine, wherth the Wolf?” The snake-face snapped to Hector. “Thith him?”

“Yes, this is Lykus Savage of Van-Ferrall, former Iron Wolf of the Helms.”

Hector bent into a low bow. It was better than having to stare into that gruesome mosaic of scars and wandering features. “Your Grace.”

A scarred hand clapped his shoulder. “Big fan of your work, Wolf,” the Star-King grunted. “I should fuckin’ have you whipped for leaving tho long, though. You know what you put Orry through? Ech, ech!”

“Never mind that,” Orcadis said, too quickly. “You remember my son, Kaed?”

“Eh? Oh, yeth. How are you, Kaed? You can underthand me now, can’t you?”

Kaed’s ears glowed pink. “Yes, Your Grace.”

“Good! Cuth it’s damn irritating having your father repeat everything I thay. You’re being good, are you? Not troubling your father with your nathty tongue? Good!” he barked before Kaed could answer. “Wouldn’t wanna have to burn it off like mine. Howth that deprethion thing? Good!” This time Kaed hadn’t bothered opening his mouth to answer.

“Lykus, I’d like to introduce Star-King Serasta,” Orcadis said. “It is by his command that you will be hunting down the Exodus.”

I’m sure you didn’t suggest it at all, Hector thought scornfully.

Orcadis plucked a grape from the overhanging cluster, rolled it between forefinger and thumb. “There’s nothing wrong with a good suggestion.” Hector stared daggers at him, but he didn’t seem to realize his mistake as he popped the grape into his mouth. “Your Grace, this is the team I’ve selected for the mission. Miss Alister will accompany Mr. Savage to Inaultis. Kaed will serve as their guide and two of my most trusted guards will be delegated for their protection.”

King Serasta grunted his approval. His goggling stare quivered on Del. “But what good ith she?”

For once, Orcadis looked caught off guard.

“I’m his mentalist, Your Grace,” Del filled in. “I’m the only person who can calm him when he gets...wound up.”

The king scratched the tight, shiny skin beneath his only eye. “Huh. Ath long ath you track down thothe motherfuckerth, I don’t give a damn. You know how important thith ith, don’t you, Wolf?” He leaned closer to Hector. “You know what the Voitheth whithper about. Apocalypth. Ith coming, I’d bet my right eye! You know that, don’t you?”

Hector tried to sound ignorant. He hoped it didn’t come out like an attempt to placate a child. “I was not aware, Your Grace. From my knowledge, the apocalypse is an unfounded rumour.”

“Ha!” King Serasta boomed, giving Hector a good view of the stump-tongue. “Unfounded? ‘The world thtarted with twin murdering twin and will end the thame way.’ Know that thaying? Ith in Neoma’th gothpel, you twit! Latht time the monarch’th twin brother killed him wath in the legend of Pyrrhuth and Tychon. When my brother and I were born, our mother cried, did you know? Thupid woman! Thould’ve killed the thecond-born like all the other queens who’d birthed twinth. Her merthy fulfilled the prophethy. It doomed uth all!”

“With all due respect,” Hector tried, “your brother’s assassination attempt was unsuccessful, Your Grace. The prophecy remains unfulfilled.”

“Fool! Did I not have Enver thententhed to death? Twin murdering twin! It wath the damned law and I had to do it! Not implementing it would’ve looked weak. Nobody believth in the old thcripture anymore. The people would’ve thought me crathy to keep that traitor alive out of thuperthition. Ech!” He spat at the ground. “Now hooth crathy? I killed Enver and bam! Alignment! Voitheth! What happened latht Alignment, Wolf? What?!”

Hector barely stifled a sigh. “A piece of the Amaris moon crashed into the planet, Your Grace.”

Serasta nodded, looking downright lost in his madness. He licked his lips – or where they should have been – with his stump-tongue. “Lucky you I’m thmart, Wolf. I commithioned the Helmth and a team of elite thientith to build uth an evacuation thpaythip to the Delmira moon. Biggetht project thinth great-great-great grandpappy Gedeon the Firtht built Fort Neoma! Ith thuthtained with all the nethethities of life. Greenhouth, water purification thytem, you name it. Right, Orry?”

“What the hell did he say?” Kaed muttered under his breath.

Orcadis ignored him. “Yes, a small base has already been built to receive the ship on Delmira. King Serasta has generously accorded every member of the Helms a place on board.”

“How could I not?” Serasta said, gripping the back of Orcadis’s neck affectionately. “If not for thith man here, I’d thtill remember the ugly mug of the fiend who mauled me. I’d remember thententhing him to death. I’d probably remember hith dithguthting pleath for merthy!”

“He didn’t plead, Your Grace,” Orcadis said gently.

The king waved his correction away. “Who needth to know? But thpeaking of, when will we be done, Orcadith? I’d like to work on the childhood memoreeth neckth.”

“It’s a work in progress, Your Grace. Erasing someone who was present every day of your life requires complete memory re-structuring. I can alter the most powerful memories of him, but I can’t erase his existence entirely.”

“You’ll get it, brother,” Serasta said. “And don’t forget about dart night at the palath, alright? We’ll thare a cathk of ale.”

“You know I don’t drink,” Orcadis reminded with utmost patience.

“We’ll thare a cathk of ale! And Wolf?” The eye rolled its way to Hector, goggling out of that malformed socket. “Tell me what the Ecthoduth ith up to and you have a playth on that evacuation thip. You and anyone you care to take with you.”

Hector bowed again. “I won’t fail you, Your Grace.” Looks like the rumours are right: Orcadis did take his brains out and put madness in.

Serasta’s mouth pulled higher over his teeth. “Enver wath Infected when he tried to kill me. When I find the Ecthoduth, I’m gonna dethtroy thoth motherfuckerth.”

“A just plan, My Liege,” Hector said, and felt anger again filling the void inside of him, giving his existence meaning. “Trust me, I hate those motherfuckers every bit as much.”