Shadows & Sorcery #173
Did you know S&S just surpassed SEVEN HUNDRED STORIES?
Spread the word!
Now, first things first, before anything else, in light of this, I’m going to take a week off. The reason: a few thousand years ago I said I was going to implement a regular off-time for myself to avoid burnout and, uh, just never did that. I don’t know why I didn’t. But lately, I’ve been feeling the burn creep up, and I want to slow down and actually announce this before I find myself being completely unable to write anything, and just suddenly say “see ya soon dunno when I’ll be back”. I’d say at 700, a quick break is okay. We’ll be back to our regularly scheduled nonsense the week after next. In the meantime, there’s a massive archive of stuff to read! Even if you’ve been here since day one, no way you remember it all. Except for that one guy who does, he’s powerful. Too powerful.
But onwards to the festivities, because this edition is actually a weird edition. I’ve done something slightly experimental. Two different worlds with two two-part stories each. Two standalone, totally separate tales in two parts. I had some titles laying around I wanted to develop, and all of a sudden, they did so. I hope you enjoy!
Apart from that, though, did you catch the last edition? That one had a dead god’s tomb, a tale of vengeance, and a holy assassin. It’s a good one, check it out!
And of course, please leave a like when you’re done—let the stories (and me) know you enjoyed them!
This week, we descend deep into the Thunder Valley so that we may ascend to the heights of the Storm Wastes, and we flee for the safety of the Church of the Shadow so we can seek the power of the Altar of the Shadow…
Thunder Valley
Betwixt a range of high, beetling hilltops was a deep, shadowed valley. At one end, there lay the vast sweep of a cold, undulant steppe and the craggy foothills of jutting rock pillars: the only approach for leagues around. Through the valley, there snaked a treacherous river of silvery waters, lying deathly still and opaque in some sections, hiding its immense depths, while in others crashing down the sharp cascades as white, rabid foam. Along this river's steep, rocky banks there dwelt a veritable city of tribes of warriors, soldiers, mercenaries, their thralls, vassals, companies, smiths, artisans, and more in a loose confederacy ruled by storied captains, fierce warmasters, haughty chieftains, and high kings. Each and every one had come from far and wide, either alone or under a master's banner, to journey through the steppes, through the valley, and into what lay beyond.
The roar of thunder galloped like a demon cavalry down from on high, booms and rumbles so heavy that dust often shuddered from the walls when it sounded. It was a warning to some, a challenge to others. It could be heard from even far out in the steppes, almost like a summons calling from an interminable distance. Thus had it long ago become known as Thunder Valley, a simple name spoken of with more reverence than the names of most gods. It was the thunder that called out to the first warriors, they who ranged the steppes on the backs of terror birds, beaks like battleaxes and talons like scimitars, their riders bowmen and lancers of unparalleled skill and wrath. The superstitions of the primitive barbarian were as yet fresh in their hearts, but curiosity got the better of them, and within the dark depths of the valley, along the perilous rapids, along the jutting banks and sheer cliffsides, they were finally overtaken by the primordial wonder of what lay at its furthest point.
In time, after that first founding, many warriors departed, spreading word to ally tribes and passing traders, who then themselves took word of it to distant lands, noting every time in every telling the hardness of the eyes of those who'd glimpsed it, and who had ventured into its heights. Warriors of all make flocked to it in the years afterwards, and then warbands came, their horns blaring, and after them, glory-seeking lords set steel upon the dark earth, and within one generation, a permanent settlement spread up the river which grew and grew to accommodate the quest. Squat towers with their scheming commanders, sprawls of rough housing, makeshift taverns roaring with song and boasting, smithies ringing day and night, training grounds stained with blood, grudges and alliances alike made and broken by the turn of the hours, the wafting of incense and sonorous tolling of bells, all of it within the shadow of the valley, the nature every day beat back only to return overnight sevenfold, the rains and charged air quickening the ferns and vines and trees of dark greens and blacks.
But even the deepest shadows of Thunder Valley were naught but revellers, basking in the nigh-divine might of the storm-wreathed wilderness that lay always just on the horizon.
Storm Wastes
The rain-drenched wilds were whipped by constant biting winds that clashed and fought for prominence in the livid air, and savage beasts roamed the stark crags, both flesh and stone seeming as if touched and changed by some ferocious power. Great sleek wolves snaked and barked between the jutting pillars that stuck out at odd angles, giving to even the hardest minds impressions less of ancient geological catastrophe, and more of mouldering ruins. Monstrous off-shoots of the steppe terror birds stalked and rushed in bloody hunts of the weird, slender apes that hissed and bore jutting fangs, while those same apes crept upon more primeval beasts bearing horns and plates that clashed in fearsome displays of might. Yet ever ready were talons, teeth, and spikes of stone in nimble, dextrous hands of muscle like taut cord. It was a land out of time, out of place, suffused with wildness and restless power that sought to be expressed.
These were trial enough for the haughty and zealous warriors who braved the labyrinthine foothills of the mountain, but of prime danger, and of prime importance, was the ever present roiling storm overhead that spat and cursed in eternal fury. Flashes and forks of lighting streaked and screamed across the sky in long, violent bursts, their harsh roar felt in the very bones of those who dared walk there, each release of cold white lightning a further challenge, each cacophony of thunder a further warning. Many turned back, not cowed, but humbled, waiting for the next chance to steel themselves and once again brave the storm-wracked heights. But not all were, and they were a rare and strange breed who pushed through the savage maze, past the leagues of prostrate bones speaking to the countless failed aspirants, blessed in death, who glimpsed the storm and there perished.
The air, as one approached, was charged, nervous—alive. It had a density unlike anything else in the world, great serpents of mist flew by and circled about spitting sparks, the tumult of the churning air and sky was reflected in the rain-slick, black-scorched earth blasted into a frozen sea of glass from countless aeons of lightning strikes as thick as ancient trees, crashing with the force and voice of a thousand avalanches.
It was here that warriors did battle with the storm.
Singing arcs of steel struck off bolts of energy in blazing, blinding flashes, sending showers of sparks raining and dancing upon the glass earth. Thunderbolts hurled themselves down from the slate-dark heavens upon the flat of blades and were cast aside. Pillars of light were cloven in twain, their forms scattering and and screaming in writhing bolts. Warriors grasped and wrestled with stray forks of lightning as agony surged through their bodies.
In the warrior city below, it has been, at various times, a rite of passage, a divine ascension, an intimate communion, a battle to end all battles, or something the gods, or the ancestors, gave mankind to strive for. Every warrior ascended the slopes for their own reasons. To date, none who have braved the storm wastes far, far above to do battle with that most primal of all powers, have ever returned.
Church of the Shadow
He must return to the shadow—must run—there were more of them, peering from around corners, darting into alleyways—hunting.
Great god of shadow, he prayed, help me, guide me, hide me, I'm sorry.
So what if our forefathers sinned? More and more were saying it every day as less and less renewed their vows, sat not under a holy veil, and spent their time at cards and carousing amidst the worldly wonders of their adopted city home. And more and more were dying because of it. Bitterness and spite would be the fuel that fed the fire of their doom, you can rail against it all you want, that was what the elders said from behind their own veils, which made the youth only laugh. But they had sinned, your forefathers. Won the war at a cost almost beyond imagining. You, the elders would say as they shuffled off, were the price.
The church wasn't far off from here. All the clansfolk lived close to it. They had to, by cult law, but it was also, though few would openly state it, just in case. Yet, despite everyone's general proximity, more were dying, and more were turning a blind eye to the bodies. It was putting a strain on the city, corpses turning up after horrific screams pierced the air at any given time of day or night. Whispers abounded about exile, looks were passed in the street, eyes turned in taverns and restaurants. A clade of his people had come here generations ago, scattered, weak, and pursued. They'd brought little with them but horror. The city had space, but, they were feeling more and more, not for long. I cannot add to that, he thought as he gasped through his aching lungs. Somewhere ahead of him, another one slid around a corner, showing just enough of itself to let him know he was being hunted.
He passed, then, by the house a clansfolk. One could always tell their domiciles from any other, for not even the most fervent faithful of the triple trinity displayed such intense and desperate devotion. A doorway bore a small black shroud over a dulled window, and in little pots on the doorstep there smoked long sticks of obscuring incense. In there was safety, or at least some a chance at evasion. But he couldn't risk them, though. It wouldn't be right. So he kept running.
It was daylight. Broad daylight. But this place was empty. Little reason for anyone else to come here, where the sullen clansfolk dwelt. There was something terrible and desolate about the sounds of city life just beyond, only reaching here as pale echoes of real life. A reminder that they were alone, and aside from aught else. There was no help, no aid of any kind to be found here. Just a place to sequester themselves and hide. But even if someone tried, what could they do anyway?
Only the god could help him now, that shadow called up by elder sires from who knew where when first the clansfolk were scattered. Whatever it was, wherever it came from, his people had bound themselves to it and hid in its shadow all these years, away from a vengeful dead whose wrath was greater in death than in life, who took great pleasure in their slaughter.
He must get to the church.
Altar of the Shadow
It was a tall, thin building, constructed entirely of a black stone which even on bright days—and sometimes especially then, thanks to how far back it sat—lent it a certain featureless aspect. It seemed as if smooth, the grooves in its masonry somehow only adding to the impression. There was a flutter in the heart as it entered his vision, and he flung himself through its single doorway, oiled so that it may be noiseless. Alas, it should have been a more familiar sight, he thought. Its interior was dim, even when sun streamed across the street outside. Slit latticed windows allowed only the most vague illumination to reach its topmost sections, a series of arches like ribs from which there depended numerous long sheets of half-transparent black veil that brushed and gathered along the black marble floor, enshrouding the ornate altar at the furthest end.
The altar itself, he knew, though he could not see it and it had been some years since he had, was covered in a canopy of twisting darkish pillars and several thick black shrouds. Within was salvation. But in order to attain this, he must first become lost amidst the shrouds. Such was the re-initiatory rite demanded of by the guardian god of the shadow. How we was actually meant to do that, he did not know, for no clergy kept the building that he might go to, the elders did that only during annual re-dedication rites, and he had scorned them in his insolence. The church wasn't a particularly large place, either, it was the darkness that gave it the impression of size and depth. And even if he had an idea of how to lose himself in the shrouds-that-were-as-shadow, he had been followed. The ghost was in the church with him.
Slowly he parted and moved through the hanging veils. There was a shape moving at a close distance to him. He couldn't quite make it out—and for that he was glad—but all the same, he could see just enough through the shifting layers, and something not entirely definable about its proportions, or perhaps its gait as it melted in and out of the strange darkness, let him know that the thing hunting him wasn't completely human.
His people had never handed down stories of the war. It had passed out of living memory, and those who had remained until the last made sure the history of it died with them, either in their beds, on some roadside...or at the hands of the dead. There had been little time for innocence in a culture that emphasized the weight of sin upon the collective shoulders of the entire race. He and his fellows had spent long hours in morbid contemplation, wondering just what had their own ancestors done that was so abominable, so harrowing, that the dead had hounded them across half the world?
It had invaded this one place which was supposed to be a sanctuary for his kind. Could they have come in here whenever they wanted? Why didn't they just wait for his people in their shrines? Was it blind within the church, seeking with its fingers? Or was it simply slowed, perhaps? Maybe was it listening for him, lulling him into a false sense of security, waiting for the right moment to throw out its arms from the black shrouds of shadow, and grab him.
He didn't know who they were, or who they had been. In the flight from their homeland, his ancestors had left things behind, some intentionally. He often veered between disgust, fear, pity, anger, and even sympathy for this now nameless, slain people. Was it vengeance for losing the war? Was it a score to settle? A grudge that demanded satisfaction, even if they who had kindled it were long dead? His people had lived, but they had lost everything, was that not payment enough for their transgressions? He wondered, sometimes, if it was rage at being forgotten. Well, nothing could be done about that now.
What if it vanished, he thought, behind some particularly thick hanging, just out sight, or what if it just stopped moving and he was unable to make it out in the darkness? And then he'd pass through a veil, and into its waiting arms? And what sort of face would it show? He believed they chose to appear as they did. It was either that, or their fury had twisted them into the shapes they now wore.
He stumbled forward with a tremble in his chest, so close to the surface it might burst forth any second. His breath was shaking. He couldn't keep the thing within his sights. He had determined to seek the altar and beg to be hidden. He knew he was going to hit upon it any second, and the prayer was on his lips. Only, he never reached it. He threw side another veil only to find a shrouded murk before him, exactly like the rest of the half-formless twilight he'd been staggering through, hunted. The trembling was replaced with a sudden rush of what he might have called elation. He was lost. Just as the god of the shadow ordained. Now all he need do was gain the altar.
And then, it found him.
All he saw was the outline of a hand, of black, slender, gnarled fingers, slowly unfurling as it got closer and closer to him. But it wasn't the twitching, spiderleg digits which made his breath catch in this throat and have him plunge into the mass of shrouds behind him, rather it was the merest hint, as seen between the parting of two veils, of a sliver of a face showing a single eye with the whites clear around a black pupil, and the slightest section of a mouth baring long teeth.
His grasping hands, tearing away veil after veil, found one of the twisting pillars of the altar's baldachin first. He grabbed onto it with a sob in this throat, trying to feel his way forward then on hands and knees in this darkest part of the church. He dared throw a glance behind him. It was there, bent low, and staring. He scrabbled forward with a gasp, through the thick black hangings, and onto the short dais upon which the altar itself sat, a circular slab supported by four pillars. He swore he could hear it making some kind of sound behind him, something in its throat and all too physical. He clasped his hands together and set them against his forehead as he knelt before the throne, unwilling to keep his eyes open simply because the spirit had been completely silent up until this moment.
He did not count his prayers, nor the minutes, nor what may have been the hours that passed. When he did open his eyes, he found his limbs were stiff and his back bent, and he had to push himself to his feet. He cast his eyes around as best he could in the veil-ridden dark, looking for tell-tale signs of shifting, of shapes in the murk, of throaty sounds. But no matter how hard he strained his senses, there was nothing. He had returned to the embrace of the shadow.
Omg these three were absolutely amazing!!
We love "regularly scheduled nonsense"! 😁