Paragenesis: Stories of the Dawn of Wraeththu (32 page)

The light within the tent grew
dim, then bright, then dim again and Terzian could not tell if it
was the guttering of the oil lamps or his own vision. He was unused
to this feeling of helplessness, and yet there was a familiarity
about it, as if it was something he had known, or would know. The
air shimmered and wavered, and Terzian closed his eyes, taking
refuge in the darkness of his own mind.

His surrender was acknowledged
with a triumphant, wordless blast of thought from Ponclast. Terzian
felt himself pushed to the ground, onto the damp, mildewed carpet
laid over the bare earth. He felt gloved hands pulling his clothing
away roughly, then running up his thighs, firmly prising them
apart. They did not have to try very hard.

A leather-encased finger
entered him, investigating and probing. Terzian wondered briefly if
he should ask, or demand, that Ponclast remove his gloves. It
seemed somehow wrong to have the skin of a dead animal between him
and his seducer, a barrier where there should be none, but Ponclast
showed no inclination to shed his borrowed skin, and seemed adept
enough at finding the right places within Terzian’s body despite
his handicap. Perhaps he never took the gloves off and was by now
so used to their presence that they felt like his own skin.

The fingers withdrew, leaving
Terzian filled with nothing but frustration. Not for long. With a
sudden, savage thrust Ponclast drove into him long and deep. No
leather this time, for which Terzian was grateful, just the smooth,
silken hardness of Ponclast’s ouana-lim. Skin against skin, flesh
against flesh, har inside har.

There were sounds inside
Terzian’s head; roaring or drumming, he couldn’t tell which, nor
did he particularly care at this instant. Ponclast thrust angrily
into him again and again, making no particular effort to pleasure
the other har, but, strangely, doing so nonetheless. Terzian
realized that this was going to be a very brief experience. He
found himself almost wishing for the slow ecstasy of a more
measured encounter, but that was obviously not Ponclast’s plan, and
he knew there was no point in attempting to persuade the har
otherwise.

The noise grew louder; a
wailing, keening sound adding its discordant harmony to the base
notes of Ponclast’s ragged breathing and Terzian’s own thundering
heartbeat. As the sound reached its eerie climax, Terzian tensed
and shuddered, and was suddenly filled with a hot rush of liquid.
The essence of Ponclast’s body mixed with his own secretions, and
seemed to spark a chain reaction inside him, spreading through his
body and out to his extremities.

The howling did not stop. If
anything, it became louder. Terzian lay on the floor, panting and
trembling a little, and realized that it was not in his head at
all, but all around them.

Without ceremony, Ponclast
withdrew himself from Terzian and rose to his feet
gracefully.

“Timber wolves,” he said, and
suddenly the noise lost its supernatural quality, and Terzian could
hear it for what it really was.

“They come out from the forests
at night, searching for prey,” Ponclast informed him.

His ouana-lim was still hard
and erect, thrusting out at an aggressive angle from his body like
a weapon, and glistening wet in the low light. A few drops of the
combined essences of their bodies dripped from it onto the dirty
rug on the floor. Terzian would not have been surprised to see the
liquid eat a hole in the stained fabric, like acid, but nothing of
the sort happened. There was only the addition of another stain to
the ancient carpet, joining the many already there.

Ponclast ran one hand along the
length of his engorged organ, either in an attempt to remove the
sticky, residue, or simply because he enjoyed it. At some point,
his gloves must have come off, because his hands were now bare.
Obviously his own flesh demanded something finer than mere animal
hide. Terzian looked closely. He had been expecting some
disfigurement, or scarring perhaps, which would account for
Ponclast’s reluctance to remove the gloves, but the hands were
perfectly normal.

The howling stopped abruptly,
leaving a jarring silence broken only by the lesser wailing of the
wind finding its way between the gaps in the wall of Ponclast’s
tent.

“The pack will go hungry
tonight unless they travel further afield,” Ponclast said. He
grinned fiercely, wolfishly. “We are not the prey, Terzian, we are
the predators!”

When Terzian left Ponclast’s
tent, he did not return directly to the unwelcoming embrace of his
own shelter. Instead, he made his way down towards the river which
ran through the shallow valley in which the group of hara were
camped.

The stink of Ponclast’s tent
was in his hair, in his clothes, in his nostrils. It seemed to have
ground itself into his skin, through his pores, into the very
fabric of his being. Even the clean outside air would not rid him
of it.

The night was intensely cold
and utterly still. The layer of snow underfoot had frozen crisp and
iron-hard, and it crunched noisily with every step that Terzian
took. Above him, the cold silver disc of the moon was haloed by a
wide circle of light. Looking up at it, Terzian felt the first
freezing flakes of snow touch his face. Their icy sharp bites
lasted for only a moment before they immolated themselves upon his
burning skin.

He reached the edge of the
river, which lay like a dark scar on the paleness of the landscape.
The moon was reflected on the smooth surface of the water, leaving
a long trail of light which might easily have been a path which
could be taken to reach the other side. Terzian stopped at the
river’s edge – the banks were not steep here – and began removing
his clothing.

Strangely, he did not feel
cold. There was not the slightest movement to the air; no wind to
rob his body of its living warmth. He felt alive and invigorated in
a way that he had not in the stultifying confines of Ponclast’s
tent.

He removed his boots last and
tentatively set his naked feet to the ground. The frozen snow
burned, but only for a moment; then an enveloping numbness took the
discomfort away. He walked the short distance to the water’s edge
and continued without hesitation into its freezing embrace.

In the dark, with the moonlight
reflecting on its surface, it was impossible to tell what lay under
the water. There might have been rocks, weeds, potholes, open jaws,
unseen hands waiting to grasp at his ankles and pull him under –
anything. Terzian’s mind was focused on other things, however, as
he waded further out into the deeper part of the river. The
physical shock of the cold water was almost unbearable; it took the
breath from him, forcing to concentrate on inhaling and exhaling in
short, staccato gasps.

Above him, the moon looked down
dispassionately. If he tilted his head backwards, Terzian could see
clearly all the contours and marks upon its surface, the legacy of
a thousand impacts, yet despite these imperfections, it was
still a thing of beauty, a sister planet for the Earth, a companion
in the emptiness of space. Knowing it was there somehow mitigated
the loneliness of existence. Terzian took one last, deep breath,
held on to it, and plunged swiftly under the freezing water.

Instantly he erupted upwards
again, shedding a spray of water droplets glittering like
multi-faceted jewels in the cold light. He gasped for air, as if he
had been under the water for hours, not mere split seconds. Water
streamed from his naked body, down his chest and arms, into his
eyes and ears and mouth. His long, fair hair was drenched and
sodden. Pulled down by the weight of the water, the ends of it
trailed in the river, bait for any passing fish or malign water
spirit who might wish to seize it.

His sudden explosive exit from
the water had shattered the stillness of the night. The moon’s calm
reflection was utterly destroyed, broken into a thousand pieces of
light, flickering like fireflies. Terzian wiped his face with his
hands, clearing his eyes so that he could see again. Water had
potency that air did not, the power both to chill the body and to
cleanse it. To his relief, he could no longer smell Ponclast or his
tent.

He waded back to the shore,
shivering violently now. When he reached his discarded pile of
clothes, he hesitated for a moment. Part of him wanted to abandon
them there, but he knew he could not afford to lose them, the boots
in particular. Instead, he scooped up the pile and doused them in
the river. When he retrieved them, they were heavy and wet, but he
gathered them up nevertheless.

As he stood up and turned to
make his way back to the encampment, he was overcome by the sudden
conviction that he was being watched. He stood very still. For a
moment he thought he saw something shining in the dark. Something
yellow and gleaming, like the eyes of a beast. He stared hard into
the blackness, but if eyes had been upon him, they had not cared to
stay and observe further.

Clutching his bundle of wet
clothing, he set off across the frozen ground back to the
encampment, ice crystals already forming on his cold, naked
skin.

Three nights later, when the
moon was hidden and veiled behind the surrounding hills, a ragged
regiment of hara made their stealthy approach to the human-occupied
town. Although it was late, and many of the old and young were
asleep in their beds, the town was still alert and defended by a
not inconsiderable force of the able-bodied.

The human race had fallen on
hard times. No longer could they rely on their technology, their
society and their sheer numbers to ensure their absolute dominion
over all else. Nowadays, it was every town, village and settlement
for itself. Wild creatures roamed the hills and forests around the
town, preying upon the weak and unsuspecting. Some took the shape
of human beings, but were not. The townspeople knew that no help
would be forthcoming from others of their own kind should an attack
come, and so they kept guard, their back to the walls, their guns
trained outwards.

Ponclast was unconcerned.

“We knew they’d be armed. I
predicted it, did I not? Hold your nerve, Terzian, I am
prepared.”

Ponclast had a strange
expression on his face; distant, and somewhat vacant, his eyes
glassy and heavy-lidded. He appeared almost drugged, and, in fact,
Terzian had seen him slipping some small, greenish kernels into his
mouth at regular intervals. He decided he didn’t want to know what
these were.

“I am prepared too.”

Ponclast smiled vaguely.
“Prepare for the worst, hope for the best.” He said gnomically.

This did not fill Terzian with
confidence, but he held his peace. There was no point in unnerving
the rest of the tribe. He looked round at the ranks of hara. Ranks
was too formal a word for them, he thought. Disorganised rabble
would be more accurate. These hara were used to fighting, but they
were a wild and chaotic bunch. Some training and discipline would
not have gone amiss, the better to forge them into a true combat
force, but it was too late for that now. They would simply have to
make the best of things.

He turned his attention to
their target. The town had been turned into a sort of crude
fortress by the expedient of blocking off all but one road into it
and barricading obvious weak points with whatever had come to hand
– old vehicles, furniture and broken masonry. It wasn’t completely
secured by any means, but neither could anyone expect simply to
stroll in without the permission of the inhabitants. Permission
which was obviously not going to be forthcoming on this
occasion.

Terzian had keen eyesight, and
he could see the occasional glint of something metallic, the odd
shadowy movement, which told him that the humans were there, their
guns at the ready. If they, in turn, were aware of the exotic
barbarians at their gate, then they showed no sign.

There was a palpable aura of
impatience emanating from the assembled hara. Many of them were
hungry, they were all cold, and the town lay like a fattened and
docile animal before them. Just beyond those flimsy barricades was
food and warmth and shelter from the encroaching weather. The hara
shuffled and stamped. A few muffled curses reached Terzian’s ears,
and then an unearthly howl, like one of the hidden timber wolves
saluting the rising moon. But this sound was not made by any wolf –
it came from the throat of a har; primal and protean, full of
savage energy.

Terzian felt the hairs rise on
the back of his neck, even as he turned to glare and silence the
restless throng with a short hand-gesture.

“Our time is upon us!” Ponclast
announced to all.

He lifted both his hands, which
Terzian noticed were ungloved, and a strange light danced between
them, iridescent and rainbow-hued. It followed the movements of
Ponclast’s hands, wavering tremulously in the air. He seemed to be
caressing and stroking it like a lover, without actually touching
it.

“Go forth and claim your
birthright. Inherit the Earth, Wraeththu children. A new day dawns
for us all, and when the sun rises tomorrow, it will be upon a
landscape of the mind such as has never been seen before.”

Mad, though Terzian. Quite,
quite mad.

If the rest of the tribe shared
his assessment of Ponclast’s mental state, they did not show it.
From the shadows, from behind the cover of trees and decaying
buildings, they surged forward eagerly, an unstoppable wave of
bodies, eerily silent now in order to maintain the element of
surprise for as long as possible.

At some point, an alarm must
have been raised by the human lookouts. There was a series of
shouts from behind the barricades, then the impression of movement
and urgent activity.

Terzian watched Ponclast
closely. The other har’s eyes were closed. He appeared to be in a
state of intense concentration, and the flickering light seemed to
be all around him now, licking over his body like cold flames,
rippling and changing colour. Static electricity crackled the
air.