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palindromepaladin · 7 years

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Dirk and Tilly VS the Dunestriders

By Rixon Grey

CHAPTER 1

For miles a pair of footsteps dug like blemishes into the vast wastes of the Elli’jj Badlands. One of the two prints was straight, of confident stride, and gave little way to change. The other pair, a few feet to the right of the first prints, swerved and twisted for lengths at a time and on occasion seemed to disappear and reappear altogether. No winds blew in the sun-baked dunes, which were pocked with large plateaus and deep sunken canyons, in a flat world made of sand and rock.

The two pairs of tracks would eventually be wiped clean by the flash sandstorms- twisters the size of mountains riddled with heat lightning- some day. Until that day came however, anyone needing to find the two men who walked the Elli’jj Badlands needed only watch closely to where they stepped.

One of the men had covered his head with wrappings of white linen, which were so bulbous and misshapen it looked as if he had used countless spools of cloth. Draped humbly on his breadth was a similar cloak of white linen. Below the cloak, a green tunic woven from the fibers of the Ruthvain Kingdom, and brown breeches covered most of his flesh from the vigilant sun. Behind him the cloak bulged with his burdens, a broad wooden kite shield and a leather pack with supplies. A bandoleer of water skins hung around his concealed torso. A bland scabbard swung around his waist.

The other man, shorter, drooling, wore a black hat. The hat absorbed much of the suns unforgiving heat, though he did not seem to notice or care. A ragged, patchy, tuxedo was buttoned tightly around his crooked and twisted body. He used a cane to limp forward, his shifting gait creating the twisted prints behind him.

These men were Dirk Bancroft, and Tilly the Magician, and they wandered in hope for a solution to Dirk's problem.

Dirk, bearing the bulbous wraps and bulky pack, would rarely glance over at his friend, with glowing eyes. Under the wraps he wore was a helmet which he could not remove, and which had seemingly no inside to it. It was as vacuous as the deepness which is the night sky, and his eyes were two ghostly stars. He said nothing, for to speak was to lose water, and he had a tight amount left within his skins. As he walked he polished the pommel of his sword with his bare thumb.

They had walked for days, stopping only to make camp during the sundown and sunrise. They hunted the reptilian fauna which littered Elli’jj when Dirk’s rations of dried fruit and cured vegetables ran out. This was not difficult as Dirk was quick, and Tilly used glamorous magic. Upon the coming of the second week, however, Dirk began to feel exhaustion creeping up from the soles of his shoes. Camp was made for longer, and his sleep came at weird, shallow, intervals. Finally, during the middle of the third day of the new weariness, Dirk decided to speak.

"Anything soon?" His voice was gravelly, and hollow in his helmet. His voice was reminiscent of distant gongs, clashing in rhythm to form speech.

"By the stiffies of giants, I hope so. This Endless Dune is becoming more of a hassle than an adventure. Chin up friend, if you can do so under that dome of yours, surely we'll hit the edge of the world soon." Tilly's words came to Dirk squeaking and harsh, as if he spoke only out of his nose. A smile rested permanently upon Tilly's face, and his endless supply of drool was starting to nauseate Dirk with its enticing promise of moisture. "Then we can jump off."

"Care not about death- simply do not want to die of thirst. Rather… killed by… something." Dirk huffed. He emptied another of his water skins, which left him with only two more out of eight. He knew they wouldn't last him throughout another week unless he dropped his equipment to lighten his burden. That, or a slow death mixed with dizzying thoughts and baked skin awaited him.

_At least I can't feel my lips crack, _he teased himself. Then sighed, weakly, wishing to feel his lips crack.

At the end of that day, when the sun was setting, they found a small craggy overhang to make camp. In the distance, the splitting wails of a flashing storm reached them, trembling the ground below them.

Dirk sat up, his back against the flat of the overhang, and eyed the storm, both marveling at its massiveness as well as making sure it didn't change course to meet them. His bed roll lay sprawled out in front of him, but he did not feel at ease enough to rest. Tilly snored loudly inches away from Dirk's feet. His noise rivaled the gasping calls of the storm. He looked at his companion's face and saw, even in the swimming pools of dreams, Tilly grinned with crazed mirth.

He nudged Tilly's shoulder with a bare heel. "Tilly, wake friend, I must discuss with you my troubles."

"No, that's fine. I'm sure you're just over thinking things." Tilly responded slowly, dully. He waived Dirk off and swiftly continued his snoring. Dirk kicked him with gentle force.

"Tilly!"

At this Tilly shot up, raised his hand out towards a pile of flaking pebbles, and yelped. At once the pebbles morphed into small beings with bird wings for heads, and various human parts for bodies. They were each no larger than a hen, and they all screamed, or moaned, or gasped, in relativity to whatever conglomeration of vocal chords they were allowed. Dirk groaned.

"One Savior, Tilly, look what you've created." Dirk grimaced, stood, and brandished his sword. He commenced culling the tiny horde of mutants, apologizing to himself as he did so.

He retched.

Once over, he returned to Tilly, who was still gasping, his face contorted with exhilaration.

"My apologies, bad dreams you understand." Tilly chuckled and adjusted his hat to his head. Dirk said nothing as he sat down and wiped the blade clean. Once finished he sighed in finality, and looked upon his friend.

"Worry not, it did not happen. The storm over there is not moving. It hasn't moved for hours, and from what I can tell it neither grows nor shrinks in size." Dirk pointed at it, and narrowed his eyes. He leaned in to Tilly's side, guiding his friend's gaze with his finger, "Tell me, can you reveal anything about it?" He lowered his hand and waited for a response.

Tilly's eyes illuminated softly with a green hue, and he rubbed his lower lip with his crippled hand. After a moment he grabbed up his cane, aimed it at the storm, and swirled it around a bit. He then placed the jeweled tip of the cane into his mouth.

Dirk stared.

"Mmm, no, I suspect nothing of magical influence with that sandstorm. I can tell you however that you missed one of my little monstrosities out there in the wasteland. Use your helmet, Dirk, tell me if you see anything odd." He pivoted swiftly and licked Dirk's helmet. Dirk pushed him to the ground and stood up. He wiped himself off with a leather glove.

Dirk stared at the ground, clinching his fist and relaxing it. Tilly said nothing, but stood as well, and dusted off his hat. After a while of no change Tilly fingered one Dirk's armpits with a wiggling hand. "Agh! Fine, fine, I'll see what I can do. Stop harassing me." He adjusted his cloak. Glaring at Tilly, then the flowing storm, he untied the wraps around his helmet. It shone weakly in the light of the distant storm, accentuating the emptiness of his inner helm.

Dirk removed his cloak, replaced the wraps within it, and set the white bundle on his bed roll. Slowly, he let his eyes slide upon the swirl of sand, which ravaged the land miles away.

He forced his consciousness to fall into the far reaching corners of his helmet, traversing it as one might traverse a deep pond. Searching for what to him seemed like minutes, though he knew not the true passage of time as he drifted, he came across what he was looking for. A violet spark near the base of his brain, or at least he felt so, which granted him the ability to view the world differently. He hoisted it along with him, back to waking consciousness.

As he returned to the world around him he was bombarded by wicked light. In this manner of perception he had shrouded his eyes in, the natural patterns of day and night did not apply. The world had spirits and energy fluctuations, and when his mind was cast through the lens of this specific helmet trait he was receptive to them fully. Hues of blues and indigos thrust themselves around him as the air moved, not as wind, but as the spirits of the wind. They were weak and emaciated here, living off scraps of movement.

The ground shimmered with silver seas of tectonic force, and when he looked down towards his own feet he saw the burgundy twists of blood in his veins. He breathed deeply, acknowledging the wind wraiths gaping eyes watching his exhale of air. He ignored their eating of his released breath, and turned his attention to the direction of the flash storm.

It was as if he glimpsed the shores of Hell. Raging terrors of lightning pierced through the discarding veil of gluttonous wind spirits, bleeding them with ravenous hunger for their fat blood. The silver of the sand by his feet was replaced in the storm with orange daggers raping the flesh of the obese wind wraiths. Many spirits of wind stood idly around the storm, he noticed, as if debating whether to starve or to join the calamity of what the storm would bring them.

His consciousness was pin-pricked to his side, as he snapped his gaze away in alarm. A creature floated hundreds of yards away from him, illuminated with a color that Dirk could only perceive in his mind, and to try to explain it would drive one to the precipice of madness. It had a needle-thin, yet impossibly long proboscis, which it used to jab at Dirk's helm. Fear took hold of Dirk, momentarily, until the realization came to him that the creature was after his mind. A mind which was protected by magic steel.

Though it posed little threat to his own mind, Dirk took it upon himself to try to shoo away the thing. As he waved his arms back and forth to move away the lengthy nose, he noticed fractures in his arms appear and his arms simply glided through it. He could not manipulate the world around him with corporeal exertion, and he knew not how to manipulate magic or energies, so he contended himself with allowing the mind eater to starve on his shelled brain.

He returned to the storm, and when he looked onward at the base of it he noticed tendrils grappling the fat wind wraiths in place. The storm was being held because the spirits of the wind had small, hair-like, projections penetrating their underbellies. Something below the surface of the world was forcing strong magical influence, and Dirk stepped back to shake the scene from his eyes.

Noise swirled around him as the wraiths of wind and rock started to understand that he was here with them. They clawed up to his helm, and stared deep into his illuminate eyes; they swirled around him and grabbed hold of his limbs with their weak extremities. He, in response, thrashed about and tried to beat the spirits off him. When his blows did nothing to discourage them, he screamed and tried to take his helmet off. Scratching and clawing, he fell to the ground kicking, desperately trying to rid himself of the horrors around him.

Dirk's self preservation was taking over his dehydrated logic: weariness overcoming his will to face all manner of evil with courage and strength. What was strength, however, in a land where it could not be used to subdue monsters? Dirk mumbled and groaned and he continued to thrash. The spirits of wind and rock began to enter his helmet.

He tried to force them out with the power of his mind. However strong a heart, Dirk's mental powers were far behind those of immortal spirits, and they overcame him. Until, in a flash of emerald light, they retreated. Dirk heaved in breaths, touching his face and arms, and then found the thoughts to sit up and observe what had happened. He saw the outline of a man, etched into the space in front of him with green strings. The man was tall, narrow, and carried a shaft of light in his left hand.

The man closed the distance between himself and Dirk, who was resting upon his elbows, and touched the shaft of light on Dirk's helmet. In an instant Dirk's mind dropped the violet spark down deep into the subconscious of his tired brain, and he returned to the world he knew as normal.

Tilly stood in front of him, tapping his helmet, creating loud clangorous rhythms.

"Hello? Dirk are you still in there, or has your mind finally fallen prey to disuse? Dirk?" Tilly's shrill voice and repeated smacks to his head woke Dirk from his stupor. He rose and groaned.

"Get away from me. That was horrible." Dirk placed his hands on his knees and shook. He spat, and when he did grits of sand left his mouth. He noticed a faint breeze at his ankles. "Let's move, dark or not I cannot stay in this place tonight." He began to re-wrap his head and pack up their supplies.

Tilly watched expressionless as Dirk geared up for another few days of restless travel. Accepting his companion's decision, the hunchbacked man followed close behind as Dirk strode forward into the dark desert. Tilly followed with no question until he realized Dirk was headed straight towards the howling storm.

"Uh, friend of mine, where are you leading us?" Tilly spoke calmly, though in his harsh and unpleasant way. "I know that vision of yours isn't always up to snuff, but we seem to be marching to the desolation of that flash storm."

"There is some evil power there, Till. One we must investigate. The storm is not being held there by nature, no, some sort of demon has it in its clutches." Dirk did not look back at the mage, and stepped up his pace. He had left the shield out, unhooked and dangling from a strap around his shoulders, ready for quick use. Tilly could sense energies bubbling within Dirk, fiery determination to counterattack the exhaustion he had been experiencing. He wondered whether Dirk would be able to continue for very long.

"Well, I suppose I've no choice but to follow alongside you. If we die out here and something eats me, you know I'll be quite pissed." Tilly's jovial, if not nasal, speech quickly became difficult to hear under the ravenous winds.

Roaring and wailing the mighty winds blew sand all around them. Granules the size of the jewels on rings and the dust motes that hang between beams of light all hurled away into the pitch desert, to lay there forever until another storm moved them.

The ground below their feet rumbled as they trekked onward still. A deep noise echoed below them, from leagues beneath the cracked rock and settled sand. They pushed forward, more and more winds beating them to and fro. Dirk's wraps whipped his body, and the bundles he wore around his torso threatened to come loose. They were still more than half a mile away from the overwhelming center of the storm, which flashed incessantly.

Step after step they made themselves advance. Dirk's instincts to investigate this strange occurrence prodded him to dig deeply into this hillock of chaos. His mind warned of the dangers of nature, while his heart ignored it. He threw away the fears of mortal folly, caste it far from him, too tired to see any fright too clearly anyway.

"The stone may be here…" He whispered to himself, though even he could not hear his own words. The vibrations from the ground rattled his legs, and the meat in his shoulders quivered. He raised his hand up to his face to block the sand whipping into his helmet. Though it did not sting his luminescent eyes, he knew too much sand in the vacuous space his helm created may cause unforeseen problems for him.

They were not far away from the edge of the storm, and the visions of those starved spirits of nature told Dirk to be afraid. If immortals are afraid of this horrendous power, what sort of luck was he trying to bargain from the universe?

A chorus of rage and might deafened the two men, and suddenly Dirk was taken aback by the impossibility of it. The very world around him was chaos and power. Unholy lightning cracked in front of him, tearing at the world and heating the very atmosphere. A strange and nomadic emotion fluttered in Dirk's chest. It was the feeling of jubilant insanity. Tilly had stopped advancing so Dirk grabbed his lapel and dragged him onward. They were so close.

Abruptly, a pit fall appeared before them and they had to stumble backwards to avoid dropping in. The fall was a canyon, organically dug into the ground, which went down for what could have been miles. There were shadows within the canyon that appeared and disappeared with each bolt of lightning. The shadows became shapes, small and in the hundreds, which moved. It was like a horde of insects dancing beneath the storm, which hovered in the center of the canyon, held aloft by nothing.

The two men huddled down on the edge of the canyon, trying to make sense of the wondrous yet terrifying sight of which they were bearing witness to. Dirk looked at Tilly, and then stared in disbelief. The smile which was normally plastered upon his companions face permanently was wilder than ever, Tilly's eyes flared with emerald fire. Drool leaked from his face, snot dribbled from his nose, and his little crippled hand reached up towards Dirk's forehead. Dirk was tempted to retreat from Tilly's touch, as his friend reflected two-fold the insanity which they were experiencing, but he had nothing left but to trust the mage.

As his hand touched Dirk's helm a squeaking voice surrounded his mind.

"Dirk! You were correct, this is no natural phenomenon- we are viewing some sort of ritual. I can feel the presence of many man-creatures down in the pits of this canyon, and I have a good idea that they are somehow causing this storm." Tilly motioned with a nod of his head towards the center of the chaos.

"We must wait the ritual out. Any interference could mean the destruction of our mortal and immortal beings." At that, he removed his hand from Dirk's forehead. Dirk nodded vehemently. The thought of somehow engaging this horribleness did not appeal to him, and he was relieved with Tilly's decision. The craze had vanished from Dirk, leaving behind a film within him of sickening regret.

Dirk thought back to why he had been so impulsive, and cursed himself. He wondered what had come over him to act recklessly, disregarding the safety of him and his companion. Perhaps it was not just his body that was wearing with their long travels.

They sat there, huddled together, deciding to wait out whatever was going on in front of them. The clashing of lightning and wind, the beating of the waves of sand in the air, and the screams from all of it, striking down on them, they took it as best as they could. The zealousness of the entire event threatened to crush them under its weight, and all they could do was to dig deeper within their reserves of will to stay steadfast. Dirk placed his arm over Tilly, and together they stared at the horrors. They waited for something to break.

CHAPTER 2

It was hours before the storm gave way to change. Instead of moving on, which was the nature of flash-storms to do, the mountain sized tumult dispersed. By the time Dirk lifted his head over the side of the canyon, he perceived only an empty pit going miles in two directions. He could only guess at how deep it was in measurements; however it was steep enough to convince him to back away from it, and in doing so release his covering arm from his companion. He, shivering, released weeks of strained and rancid emotions. This reminded Dirk of his thirst as well as how bright the sun was becoming.

Even with the shattering image they had gone through, nature gave little in way of relief from the growing heat and motionless sands around them. Dirk drank the last of their water, after Tilly had refused it, and checked the ragged state of his white wraps. The storm had torn his clothing to draping shreds. With further inspection he saw that he was also bleeding from most of his body and, while not much blood was being lost, he was susceptible to serious festering.

Tilly stood and walked towards the side of the canyon while Dirk took care of his wounds.

Dirk withdrew a small, rough-cut topaz from one of his pouches. Luckily the thick leather kept most of his supplies unharmed. His bed roll, he noticed, was saturated with small granules of glass, rendering it completely unusable. He chucked it down the pit. He pressed the topaz onto his chest, just below the soft of his neck, and whispered prayers. Heat oozed into his body from the gem, filling up his veins with comforting energy.

The heat was unpleasant, though the emotion it swirled up within his muscles made up for it. He let the topaz drain its forces into each of his lacerations, melting them shut. That done, he rested the gem on a rock to absorb the sun's shine. He was reminded of where he first found the little gemstone, stuck upon a silver instrument which a now-dead mage had been using to study starlight. The gem had always seemed to adore brightness, and it would illuminate even the most brutal of shadows.

Tilly hobbled in circles around the area where they had taken cover. He leaned down to the gritty floor, bending entirely at the waist, and dripped goblets of spittle. He then sprung upright, and marched to the edge of the cliff side. Dirk was vaguely aware of his companion’s interrogation of the situation, though he did not intervene. Tilly reached into his pocket and threw something small over the side. He watched it fall.

Dirk rubbed his neck, working out the stress and trying to feel the revitalized flesh back to comfort. He failed. The sun began cooking his exposed skin and shining helm, and Dirk knew it would not be long before the heat overcame his abrupt spurt of vitality. A whisper in the back of his mind told him to lie down, to let the sun burn his hide into leather. The voice told him to prepare himself for the hell he would go to when he died. That way anyone who found his corpse out there would mistake him for a pile of ashen rock. He stood and stretched his back.

"So what is your plan, Tilly?" Dirk asked, adjusting the straps on his metal harness, tightening them to fit his water-less shoulders.

"Well, first I'm going to get dragged into the middle of a heretical sandstorm, then after that I suppose we'll have to find a way to get into this massive sandy cunt in front of us." Tilly kicked a pile of sand into the canyon. "Those manlings down there are odd; I have a strong feeling that there is an inhuman influence upon them. Come, let's gather ourselves into this hellhole."

Dirk rubbed his wrists, embarrassed by Tilly's words and a few moments had to pass before he followed his companion.

They followed the edge of the giant split in the earth, traversing the flat terrain around it with ease. The intense light reflecting up from the sand burned their eyes, and was intensified by the darkness created from the cliff beside them. They often had to slow their pace, careful to keep in mind where the edge of the cliff was in relation to their path. Besides that however, there were no large overhangs or indentations that they had to clamber around. It was a blessing for the ease of travel, but a nightmare for the monotony they had both faced in the past few weeks. Now, with no protection from sand or sun, their spirits were being teased.

Dirk had taken a small lead in front of Tilly, more out of habit than sort of situational awareness that may have arose. It was fortunate for Tilly that Dirk had done so.

A thin but imperceptibly deep crack in the side of the cliff swallowed Dirk up to his shoulders. His breadth was only enough to keep him from disappearing completely into the depths below them. He had not gasped, but let out a small, "whoop" as he fell. He swore in fear when he realized what had just become of him. He resisted the urge to squirm, his trained mind restraining his quick muscles, instead choosing to feel slowly how tightly his body was wedged between the rocks. The wedge's hold on him was tenuous. He was reminded of how hot the ground was as it burned his bare arms.

"Uh, Tilly, could you… Shit." He breathed in shallow spurts. His mind was telling him to keep his torso as wide as possible, to limit his movements, while his lungs begged for an increase of air. He wasn't sure what exactly he wanted to ask of Tilly, simply a solution to the problem he was facing. Should Tilly lift him out with magic? He knew Tilly's small frame was not nearly sturdy enough to lift him out manually. He forced his mind to relax further, to quell the acrid buildup of acid in his knees and elbows, to sweat out the fear.

Tilly, who had moved in front of Dirk, looked down upon his companion. His body was slumped easily upon his cane, but when Dirk raised his sight to meet Tilly's eyes his nerves tensed. Tilly bore into Dirk with an unwavering glare. His mouth was wide, and shined with slobber. He smiled tightly.

"Tilly, could you remove me from this wait what are you doing?"

Before he could protest Tilly had rested a small, well dressed, foot upon Dirk's trapezoid muscle. He pressed downward with unprecedented force.

"Tilly no!"

"Never lay your hand upon me, Dirk Bancroft." He pressed harder and Dirk felt his shoulders slide down, his skin grinding against sand-packed stone. Dirk growled as he tried to quickly raise an arm or twist his shoulders to find a stop to his descent. He found none, and fell.

Seven feet below him, he hit a smooth floor within the side of the cliff. He pounced on all fours to the inner wall of the small cave he found himself in. His head felt light. No amount of air seemed enough for him as he heaved over and over.

Tilly appeared beside him with a crack of verdant lightning. He was laughing maniacally. "Oh, you were so terrified: so afraid of the big evil mage out to get you- ha!" He laughed harder as he saw Dirk clutching the inner wall of the carved space. "Piss and dribble, friend, surely you couldn't seriously believe I would do you in so unceremoniously?"

The place they had landed was a wide section of stone carved to replicate a sort of pathway leading down to the trenches of the canyon. Tiny lines, smooth and precise, riddled the walkway and inner walls, proving to be from primitive yet effective tools. Every few feet or so, along the walkway, a peculiar indention pocked the carved walls. A symbol of three punctures deep into the rock.

Dirk, slowly regaining his composure, rose to take in his surroundings in a clearer light. He raised a hand at Tilly. Then, he turned to examine the walls. Dirk removed his left glove and brushed the walls of the cavernous passageway. Rock dust covered the ground and was spread across the walls, not sand.

“Those man creatures, they understand tools.” Dirk said absently, replacing his glove and turning his gaze to the downward sloping stairs.

“Very apt, but explain why there are triclopean symbols etched into the wall every few feet…”

Dirk did not respond, choosing instead to start traversing into the canyon along the wall-carved stairs. He did not hear Tilly follow, though guessed his companion would find his own way.

The stairs were more a combination of walkways and ramps than true staircases, and oftentimes the passageway turned into a series of long tunnels dug deep into the canyon walls. At about what Dirk guessed to be halfway down, he began discovering abandoned trinkets and decayed furnishings. Woven baskets, woven furniture, woven scraps that could have either been clothing or some other sort of tools that were too rotted to make sense of, all pointed to signs that the people here had moved on long ago.

His stomach shook and tightened. He would need food soon, and thirst was becoming an increasingly frequent nag from the corners of his mind. This worried him, but only briefly. The light was fading in the canyon, both from Dirk being so far down and the time of day beginning to end. He needed to reach the bottom, or find an area that would allow him to start a fire without smoking himself out.

He returned descending, this time forgoing such careful stepping at treacherous footing, and instead leaping from place to place. Dirk was lighter than most warriors, but he was still heavy, and on a step forty feet from what he thought was the bottom of the canyon, his landing point snapped. He tumbled, smacking hard on three or four footholds and protrusions before smacking hard on the ground.

He felt his leg snap.

At first no sound escaped him, only air. His vision bulged and blurred, and his entire body swirled alive with numbing chemicals in response to guard against mental shock. It was hardly enough. The pain came, slow at first but built quick momentum. His leg felt destroyed from mid-shin to his upper thigh. His knee was split in multiple places and felt as if it was filled with mash.

He then voiced his suffering, a noise that was both groaning and whining, and incredibly repetitive.

Tilly was nowhere to be found. Dirk did not call for him. The feeling that came over him when he had decided to explore the storm reappeared, and he lay silently while staring at the mouth of the canyon. The sun had finally abandoned him, down at the bottom trenches, even though he saw clear enough that above him there was plenty of light. He stared up until he saw not the mouth of a canyon, but a vast empty canvas painted black and streaked with a single line of brilliant sky.

The pain in his leg pulsed, would ebb and flow through his hips and lower back, though he let his mind drifted away from his body.

A small trembling buzz gently rattled his head and shoulders. At first he thought his mind had finally decided to leak out from its metal prison, but soon came to understand that the physical world around his was trying to shake him awake.

Was he bleeding? He felt as if he was losing blood.

He searched in vain for his amulet of light and health, and found that he had left it at the top of the canyon. He almost laughed, but decided instead to begin fainting.

Hands grasped him, and while part of his spirit wanted to fight back, to surrender only when death took him, a stronger-willed emotion convinced him that it was time to be taken. He ignored the heavy vibrations and clenching hands, and let his mind join the black canvas around him.

CHAPTER 3

A soft white light awoke Dirk from his dreamless sleep. His body ached, but no part of him hurt more than the spider's web of agony in his leg. He took a line of air in. It did not help the pain, but it relieved his blurring thoughts. Above him was stone, which reflected a certain amount of the light that woke him. He soon realized he was in a cave or stone dwelling.

He looked around him to get his bearings, but was more confused for the act than not. The walls around him were honeycombed in a pattern that was near impossible to grasp, holes and spaces the size of a person all throughout the cave, going for as far as he could see. Other lights in the distance created shadows that skewed his depth perception further, and he had to shut his eyes more than once to let the images sink in.

Dirk held the ground below him. He felt wicker under his ungloved hands, and cold air on his bootless feet. He grasped at his chest and found only his green tunic; his armor was gone, nowhere in sight. The disposition of a confused victim was replaced within him quickly, with the mindset of an experienced warrior who had been kidnapped. His eyes darted to the floors nearest around him; he was on some elevated stone pedestal the size of his body. Well, much larger than his body actually.

He found no immediate weapon, no cudgel or staff, so instead he fell off the bed to search the ground more carefully for loose rocks. This was a mistake, as his leg was still shattered, and it dawned on him that he should heal it before continuing. Even if it took energy from him to heal his leg, it was better to fight a little wearily than to fight without a leg. He then remembered how he had left his amulet.

"Fuck." He whispered to himself.

His mind was swirling with the aftermath of the blackout. The entirety of him felt empty, without density, and the dryness of his throat pained him. He tried to organize his thoughts into small things he could make sense of.

Who had taken him into this place, why had they done so, and why strip him of his gear but not kill him? He was obviously not royalty, in fact he was more a vagabond than anything else, what worth would he be to anyone? His helmet may be worth researching if it was in fact some hermetic mage who had stolen him. That would also explain why he had been kept alive. He knew enough about magical properties to know that if he were to die with the helmet still magically adhered to his neck then the magic which possessed it may die with him. Any practiced mage would surely think that far ahead.

Perhaps the man things Tilly had described were cannibalistic in nature and he was left here, presumed dead, and being stored for consumption soon. Dirk was standing now, resting his torso on the block of stone when something broke his tumultuous thoughts.

A noise.

He found that the noise was difficult to locate, as the walls around him echoed, so he spun around. Dirk tracked the direction he thought the noise came from and the surrounding areas, but decided to hide after not finding anything. The noise happened again, a quick series of tapping and a secondary noise he could not easily recognize.

Dirk dropped low to the ground, searching harder for a crevice or space that was darker and further hidden by the shadow of the pale light. A thought crossed his mind that whatever dwellt in this place may be able to see in the dark, or at least have enhanced vision. He concluded that he had no better option, and pushed himself between two pillars nearby.

He waited in silence for minutes. He counted numbers in his head, but to no practical end; he knew little of mathematics and time keeping was never a strong suite of his. He just wanted time to pass quickly.

From above him, a tubular, segmented, figure crept down steadily into his field of vision. Two massive, empty eyes appeared, surrounded by tiny finger-like projections which twiddled incessantly. Dirk sucked in air, forcing himself not to scream, and instinctively dug backwards into the burrow in the wall. It was too shallow, and he had nowhere to escape to fast enough. The large shape was mere inches away.

He threw a closed fist at the center of the head in front of him. The idea that there may be an alien mouth, one filled with tools to rend his flesh from his bone, crossed his mind too late. He hit hard, yet flexible, material. The thing hissed, and the little fingers on its face convulsed in rejection to the act.

Dirk scampered underneath it and gave himself some distance while he could. He hobbled, as crippled as his absent friend, in desperation.

He turned back and saw what the thing was. A massive cricket-type of insect crawled along the walls and ceiling of the cavern. It had positioned itself sideways so that its left eye was pointed directly at him. Dirk could only guess at the emotions it held within its vacant stare. Two knobby arms on its side were poised upwards. From the tips of these arms grew barbs the shape of half-crescents. Each barb ended in three prongs.

It stared for moments, deciding how to deal with its aggressor, and Dirk all the while did the same. He heard no others coming to engage, and figured that he had little chance of escaping the monster without a better source of light. The tunnels around him still dizzied his head and confused his vision, however staring at the creature created a fixed point of reference. Maybe if he could convince it to follow him…

The cricket monster crawled to the floor, meticulously, while spinning its head around as to make sure that one eye was cocked towards Dirk at a time. Dirk crouched down, and raised his fist. He decided that the best way to fight the creature would be to tear its eyes and legs off somehow, he felt that his earlier jab, while not especially powerful by even his standards, did absolutely nothing besides mark him as an enemy to the thing. Its chitin hide would be too durable for any sort of bludgeoning, he would need a spear later on if there were more. Also, he would need to avoid being ingested.

Avoiding a fight would be his best course of action, however, and he slowly brought his foot backwards. His advance was short lived as the creature sprung upon him. Its two barbed arms were tensed back, and its head opened to reveal a maw of twitching teeth. Dirk swore and brought his foot up.

He threw his fists at it, using them together as a fleshy mace. His leg was difficult to balance on, as he could put little weight on it, and his aim was thrown off. The creature was hit hard in the side of its head, giving off an audible thump, and it was set away briefly. One of its claws snapped down and punctured deep into Dirk's right elbow. The wound bled immediately upon the barbs withdrawing.

The creature was stunned for only a moment, and then it was back upon him. It reared up, using its massive wings to give it inhuman control over its weight, and threw itself at Dirk.

He responded by reaching out and grabbing the two closest arms of the creature. It was a reflexive action, and he regretted it. The arms he grabbed were not the attacking limbs with barbs, but smaller, harmless appendages used only for movement. He held the thing back, its head unable to clamp down on him, but he could not hold it far enough to keep the barbs out of reach. They stabbed successively into his sides and ribs. He yelled out pitifully.

Rage overcame him, and with it energy passed through his arms to clench tighter upon the insect. He wrenched it close while bringing his head down with thoughtless aggression. Carapace met enchanted steel. The insect ceased its thrashing for a moment, as if in a daze. Dirk hoped that this lull was due to pain and took advantage of the momentary stun he had caused the thing. He brought his hands up and crushed its left eye, popping it like a chef popping an egg. The effect was instantaneous.

The cricket monster squirmed away from Dirk faster than he could understand what was occurring. It writhed and escaped from him in the maze of honeycombs and dim lights.

He stood, alone, shivering, for what seemed like no time at all. It was as if the world had frozen and he was the only perception in the entire universe. None existed but him in that moment and he wanted desperately to free himself from it. He was not Dirk, had no history, but was simply a consciousness that had wound up in a place with no comforts or condolences. Tears welled up in his eyes, he thought. He could never be sure on whether he was crying or just sobbing, as the helmet produced nothing.

There was no sound.

He shook, though was not yet especially cold. Blood poured down his hips and the sides of his legs, and he knew he would die here if he did not leave. He slumped down on a pillar beside him. Dirk looked down at his hands. Pale, pink, and well worn. His mind drifted to times when he did not travel around The Great Continent, to times when he saw the same people every day of his life.

The cricket horror was upon him again without warning. Dirk screamed, and this time it was he who thrashed. Every ounce of energy he had left was transferred inside him to the channels of rage he possessed in every muscle. He would destroy everything that was covered in mucus colored hide, would rend every spindly little digit from the sides of any shelled creature, and he would not appreciate the pain he felt as the creature bit the flesh of his shoulder away.

Running.

The familiar sound of feet pounding stone tapped politely upon Dirk's frantic mind. He did not know what that meant though. Feet running on stone: growing louder? His shoulder was hot, and even though the creature was still digging into his soft flesh, and his rage was not sated, he collapsed. Dirk's body failed him.

His heart pumped away life from his wounds.

Just then, a wooden staff beat the cricket off him. Multiple human legs ran across his sight, though he did not hear words exchanged. He looked up and saw men, from the lower half down. The men had the chitin shells of the very creature he had just fought from the midsection and up, and when he looked at their heads they were the heads of giant crickets.

Dirk vomited blood, quick spatters covering his chest, and blacked out.

He awoke some time later, this time in the dark. For a moment he wondered if he was dead, then felt the pains in his body and knew he was alive. Old and familiar fear bubbled up from his gut. His helmet had rarely taken possession of his sight in his past, and he knew not what had caused it to do so. Or how to fix it.

"Ohhh God." His voice escaped only as a wisp from his mouth.

He tried to lift his arms, to twist his head, anything to regain any semblance of sensory recognition, but did so in vain. The pain, dull and distant, became overwhelming at any chance he took to move. His leg was still broken, except now his shoulder and ribs were now warm and swollen with aching, stagnant blood. He felt something else on his skin, however, something stiff which crunched when he did manage to follow through with his reaching.

With his left arm he slowly touched his belly, just under his sternum, and felt coarse wraps. Someone had bandaged him. He remembered the humans, or half-humans, and decided they had something to do with his still being alive.

A dim light appeared from the corner of his vision. He did not turn to view it. The light grew until it overtook the whole ceiling above him, and Dirk saw the edges of the rock were of the same grain as those he observed in the walkways he took to climb down. The walls here also bore the triclopean sigils Tilly had questioned. The cricket monster he fought had triple barbs on its legs.

"Do you wake, Skka'Jel?" From behind the light, Dirk took in as he forced his neck to crane ever so slightly to his right, was a thin human figure. When his eyes focused he could see the makings of a mid-sized female form, that or a shapely man. An arm reached towards him.

Dirk swatted the hand and tried to sit up, getting further than he had expected to but still could not fully do so. The hand reeled back, and then, hesitantly, reached towards him again. "Please, you were grievously wounded from Tenekk. Our harvesters were lucky to have heard the call of the Ulu'Tenekk, for your sake of course."

Dirk allowed the hand to touch him this time, though did not ease from his propped position. The thin form checked his wrappings with grace. Dirk looked up and found that this human too had the head of the cricket monster. He continued to allow the person to check the medical bandages.

"Where am I? And who are your people who can…" Then Dirk stopped. He had started to speak out loud, but realization overcame him as the person reacted to his words the instant he expressed them. Just as he asked the question, an answer was put into his mind, or at least it was trying to. He could feel the words, more emotion and raw thought than formed phrases, but words none the less, trying to pierce the steel of his helm. "Your people are psychic."

"It is difficult to converse with you, which is why I was sent in place of Tau, our regular physician, for my speech is more developed. Your helmet is strong willed against our Ulu'Tennek." The female, for Dirk could now clearly see that his eyes adjusted to the light, pressed him to lie down fully. He did so. His torso felt empty and brittle, as if the very bones that held his guts up were drying out.

The smell of copper drifted through his nose, harsh and electric, and at first he thought Tilly may be near. Then after moments of silence he knew that his friend was still nowhere to be seen. Tilly would have made some entrance of grandeur, a smart comment or two, and busted him out of the honeycombed tomb he was in. The only light around him was the pale blue, the source of the smell he figured.

"What do I call you?" He asked the figure, who had taken a seat beside him. She did not look up, instead choosing to stare at the piece of twine which she had wrapped around her fingers. It was the same material as the bandages, and the weave underneath him.

"There is much to explain to Skka'Jel. You must rest until our conversations can be more fruitful. The information I can give you is coarse and difficult to pass on. Even now I can feel my own words having to press through many layers of…" There was more she had to say, Dirk could sense, but it was no use to try to force anything. His helmet blocked most magical intruders, he knew, and the manner of communications these people used must be linked to a form of magic. He would have to suppress the barrier his helmet produced, and the cricket woman was correct in expressing that he would need more energy to do so. He relaxed and let himself sleep.

Dirk stayed in that chamber for what he assumed to be a few days, though the lack of day and nights, along with Dirk's general misinterpretation of time, he figured it was anywhere from one day to five. He slept more often than he did not, though often awaking to the pains of hunger and thirst. He knew that he was close to death, and did not know if this women thing could save him.

Most of the waking times he spent observing the cricket woman when she was around him. He decided she was old, but not much older than him. She could be anywhere between twenty-five to thirty-five years in age. She had locks of grey hair sprouting out from under the chin of her cricket-like mandibles and along her back, but her skin was still supple and fairly taught around her legs and arms.

She never used the mandibles to speak or eat, even though he never saw her eat. Most of the times she was there she played with the twine in her hand or examined him. He caught her staring more than twice: her large eyes poised in his direction. She brought him bowls of water, though it tasted odd. When he drank, most of it landed in his mouth.

After a while Dirk felt good enough to sit up fully with relatively little pain. His leg still pounded harshly when he tried to move it, but his flesh had closed up for the most part. He concluded that he had regained some blood, but without food he wouldn't heal any further. As if reacting to his thoughts, the woman came back with small white bundles in a bowl.

He sat up in response to her approach. "Is that food? I feel as if I have not eaten in days." The cricket woman nodded, and began unwrapping the bundles. Inside were small insects, dead but unprocessed. Dirk hesitated for a moment then grabbed the least offending one. It resembled the cricket monster he fought, except it was the size of his fist. "The cricket in those caverns," He spoke between crunches, "why did it place me upon that slab of rock?" At this the woman stared at him. He sensed confusion, or perhaps she did not receive his question well enough. Dirk concentrated and tried to wriggle his mind, his deep consciousness, through less protected areas of the vacuous space in his helm. Once done he repeated himself.

"The Tenekk did not place you upon that altar," She said with a tone bordering on offense, "we did." She quickly motioned in a circle around her. Her people put him there, and she referred to it as an altar.

"Do I understand you well?" Dirk asked, while trying to stay focused on the placement of his mind as he spoke. "I was on an altar, something that is used for ceremonious reasons?"

The woman nodded. This confused Dirk more than it did to agitate him.

"Why? Why would you sacrifice me to that monster, and why would you now save me, and attack the cricket. I am so lost…" Dirk gripped the side of the bed as he contemplated the meaning behind the woman's words. They had placed him there to be eaten, he assumed, and yet when the cricket monster came they defended him from it. Perhaps there was sport in it; he was used as bait in some ritualistic game.

"No Skka'Jel, we did not put you there to be eaten alive by the Tenekk. We did not place you there to die, because we thought you already to be dead. You have no… head. Our words for you Skka'Jel, it means faceless." At this she motioned to her own head, as if further explanation was needed. "As well it should be noted, that the Tenekk would have brought you somewhere else first, and then you would have been given to something greater. The Tenekk is not an enemy of us, unless provoked first. That is why we have the Derekket."

"You have told me much, but my understanding of your people has not increased. Your words, even through my mind, are a mystery to me. I believe that even through minds there are phrases and emotions that I simply have not felt, and which your people have." Dirk moved closer to her. The woman did not retreat, but became visibly uncomfortable by his proximity. "How did it come that men and women have the heads of monsters?"

"…" The woman brought a hand to her lower jaw and began to tug at it. Dirk at first did not understand, until the woman began ripped the very flesh from her head. He was too shocked to react in time to save her as she peeled her face little by little. He watched until only pink, human flesh remained: a human face. "We do not."

She was on the younger side of Dirk's estimation, younger than him he was certain, though she did have a full head of grey hair. Her jaw and cheekbones were prominent, though not sharp and elegant, they were pushed forward. Above her thin mouth sat a small, stub nose. Above that her face held two large eyes; the irises were so blue they nearly matched the silver of her hair. Her complexion was soft, damp looking, and glimmered as if her skin was set with flakes of gypsum.

Dirk took another bite of an insect, this time choosing a dull beetle. He disliked the taste over the cricket.

"You are young." He spoke plainly, as he backed away. Staring was always a problem with him, he had known how uncomfortable his eyes made people. In contrast, the woman stared at him without breaking, not with intensity. "That or your people look young. How many seasons have you lived?"

"If I understand what you mean, then I have not aged. We do not know weather beyond the Shurkkit Dennuhl."

"The flashing sandstorms."

"Yes."

Dirk waved a hand in dismissal. He was about to ask another question when the woman interrupted his thoughts. She set the plate of food down and walked over to where he sat. She handed him the knife he normally keeps in his boot.

"You are a warrior, that much we have seen from your fight with the Tennek, and you must feel more comfortable with this in your possession. You may refer to me as Yilanna." She stood with her hand out for a moment or two before Dirk accepted it.

The woman was correct, he felt at ease with the knife. Had he had it when he fought the cricket he may have not been so injured. He was thankful, but not for long.

"How did it come to be for a man to have no face-"

"Where are my supplies?" He asked Yilanna. She did not seem to understand, but suspicion and alienation for these cricket-men were taking hold in Dirk's mind, he asked again with more aggression. If he could retrieve the pack he could heal his wounds much faster, escape, and find Tilly. He had dragged them into too much, and the evil he had originally felt had seemingly disappeared from his consciousness.

Dirk tried to rise, and Yilanna was quick to press down on his healthy shoulder, to keep him there. He swiped her had away coldly and stood. Quick and harsh was the pain his leg brought. Years of magical healing had spoiled him, had taken away his appreciation for the slow process of natural healing. He swore.

"You found me dead, yet I am alive and I would like the return of my things. My amulet, my pouches, my armor," Dirk looked down at his foot, "and my red string." He told her without malice in his voice, but the pleasantries they had shared were also absent. He was once again the stranger. Yilanna replaced the cricket mask on her head.

She beckoned him down the hallway which she would use to enter and leave. As they made their way Dirk limped horribly, often falling and bracing himself on the surrounding walls. Yilanna would frequently try to help when this happened, as well as ask Dirk to return to rest, but he would coldly dismiss her each time.

Throughout the many paths they took, each one filled with soft white light and of the same architecture Dirk had come to associate with the place, were miscellaneous bits of cloth and wood. The wood was the same coloration as the cloth Yilanna was dressed in, as his wrappings, as the twine she fiddled with when he was distant from her. It was the same material, all of it.

They came to a pile of wooden beams, each the width of his wrist and came to a height of his shoulder. Dirk took one as a walking stick, much to the obvious discomfort of Yilanna. Though she did not object, disdain was clear in her heart, felt even through the thick walls of his magical helm.

Dirk noted the distinct lack of other people as they walked, and understood that this was most likely Yilanna's doing. She protected her people from the outsider, he did not hate her for that.

"Yilanna! Where do you go with Skka'Jel? You know Ulu'Tennek has not issued indication as to his fate." Before the two stood a tall man adorned in the same weave and insect armor. His muscles were long, toned, and he carried a short halberd. Dirk saw he had four arms, though could not tell if they functioned, as the jumble of biology was still foreign to his understanding.

"The outsider wishes to retrieve his belongings. He lives as we do, and may find himself serving Ulu'Tennek. Specifically he wishes to hold the glowing metal."

"You know as well as I do that he cannot be trusted with his gear, he had weapons. Ulu'Tennek is to be protected from all, and this one has not proven anything to The Voice." Dirk's interpretations grew slowly, as he willed the shield of his helmet down in intervals, Ulu'Tennek and this voice was one and the same. Some singular will, driving a group of people. Perhaps the evil he felt?

"Do you alone speak for The Voice then? Shall I inform the rest of our clan that a single Derekket may now be the only servant in the ways of tribute?"

The man hesitated, grumbled, and then strode up to Dirk. "He may proceed if he removes his helmet."

Dirk was inches away from the insect mask the man wore. The warrior, the Derekket, was much taller than Dirk, though significantly less broad. The cricket-like apparel he wore looked much thicker than Yilanna's, and covered in chitinous plates that resembled heavy armor. Obviously the fighter was no weakling, and without real weapons Dirk figured he'd have to use his wits to escape the Derekket instead of force. His body was much too battered to put up any sort of fight as it was.

"My helmet is incapable of being removed. It is cursed by strong magic to be ever stuck to my skull." Dirk hoped that he had lowered the mental barrier well enough for this psychic person to understand him. He remembered how Yilanna had explained that she excelled in psychic conversation, and that she was chosen over others to watch over him specifically for that fact. This man may not have heard a single word.

The Derekket stared.

Yilanna then translated, speaking in many new phrases that Dirk found horribly foreign. She spoke for a length, however, and Dirk suspected that she said much more than he had originally intended. The man, angered, still belligerent and too close to Dirk motioned vehemently as he psychically scolded the healer.

Dirk had been in this position before, ignorant to the culture of which he had landed in, and though he did not feel threatened, he gripped tighter to the walking stick he had picked up. He glanced up at the sharpened point, the reason he chose this makeshift staff over the others. He was one against an unknown amount of dangerous people, with a broken leg and a scrap piece of wood as a weapon. The knife was handy but without reach, and these men must excel at lanky warfare. He would try to make friends before enemies.

"Surely there is a way to prove my sincerity," Dirk looked to Yilanna. "This Voice, the one you keep referring to, if I let it judge my merit will I be allowed to at least leave if it dislikes me?"

Yilanna shook her head slowly, a sign of defeat and uncertainty. She was no ambassador, and even though she seemed hurt by what was going to happen, she half turned away from him. Though they had connected on a friendly basis when he was healing, Dirk came to the conclusion that their time together was over, no loyalties or friendliness remained now that he was introduced to others. He was alone to prove himself to this entire clan of insect-worshippers.

The Derekket dismissed Yilanna then bade Dirk to follow him.

"You will do as The Voice tells you to do."

Together they marched through tens of different winding pathways, all twisting through the underground of the chasm walls, sometimes breaking out into the sunlight. It was then that Dirk found out what Yilanna was referring to when she spoke of the cricket beasts and men not regularly fighting one another.

The two came to an enormous, multilayered structure of wood, stone, and rope. It was a sort of housing, stables, for the cricket-beasts built on the side of the canyon. Dozens of chitin armored men were bustling between different levels, both tending to the structure as well as mounting the crickets and beasts of burden.

The Derekket, the one leading Dirk, brought him to a large insect. He motioned for Dirk to climb onto the queer saddle which wrapped around the beast. Dirk looked down at his busted leg, then up at the four-armed man. The warrior made a sign of frustration and grabbed Dirk, with his uppermost arms, and hefted him up enough for Dirk to clamber up on the saddle. He then took Dirk's staff and threw it down the side of the cliff.

Satisfied, the Derekket left and spoke with a small band of other members from his caste. Unlike the speech from Yilanna, these cricket men spoke with a mix of whines and clicks. Dirk stared openly.

The Derekket which had led Dirk here departed, and now he was left to the whims of yet a third party. Dirk's chest felt empty, and his heart was quick to start at the thought of having to learn to trust even more of these people. He instead decided that until they earned his trust, they were a sort of enemy to him. They had captured him, taken his supplies, and now he was ready to leave. He was not terribly excited to meet this Voice either.

CHAPTER 4

A Derekket sat in the saddle in front of Dirk on the same mount. It had the same amount of limbs as Dirk, though it wore an abundance of the cloth material around its midriff. None of the Derekkets acknowledged Dirk much to his relief.

Around him, the other members of the band of Derekkets mounted the monstrous crickets, and they sprang away alongside him. He knew they had to travel to find this voice, but he did not know for how long. Even more days could pass, and this did not excite him.

Riding the cricket was in between taking the bounds of a giant, and flying on an ocean wave. The wings were clearly too weak to carry multiple passengers for very long, but the legs on these creatures could crush rocks beneath them. The realization came to him that had he fought one of these mounts instead of the one he encountered in the caverns he would surely be dead.

The riders as well were different than the Derekket escort, these held a sense of pride and conquering about them. They each boasted a strong command over their mounts, each turn and maneuver was demanded by a strong arm and an unspoken will. Dirk assumed the creatures to be sensitive to psychic energy as well as the riders. Together, man and beast were as close to one as he had ever seen.

They bounded and zipped through the sun bleached canyon, sometimes going above so Dirk could hardly tell directions anymore as the sand was not but a sea of burning glass, and through the jagged crags time had pierced into the colossal fissure.

In their own empathic way, all the Derekket rode simultaneously up to the cliff side of the canyon. Here they drove their mounts quicker and lower to the ground. The sand around them flew as they dug deep trenches with the beasts' abdomens.

Dirk yelped in shock as the warriors of sand and beast made play of the land around them. It took Dirk little time to understand that the Derekkets were doing just that: playing. They brandished spears and carved deep the gravel canvas below them and they winged past one another. Though they did not laugh, the joy and bravery exuding from them shot through even Dirk's helmet. They were ecstatic to the point of craze, and Dirk thought to himself that surely these man creatures had summoned the flash storm out of ritualistic pleasure.

All the sand around him was furrowed with trenches and etched from the spears. Then the Derekkets flew high into the desert sky to view their work. Pleased, they returned to the matter at hand, delivering Dirk to their Voice. Dirk would have vomited if his mind was not so set on his dire situation. He was tired of being thrown around by these people and their mystical deserts. These dunestriders.

It was then that Dirk understood what Derekket translated to in the Ruthvain tongue. Here men rode beasts of terrible shape and size, they played with the very nature that surrounded them, these men were truly dunestriders.

They rode for many miles before coming to what seemed to Dirk as a large crater. He knew the stars would sometimes fall from the sky, and when they did they left miles long indentations in the earth. In not quite the center of the crater a large hole was sunk into the ground and there stemmed a large conglomeration of branches, which spewed up into the sky for a ways before intertwining, creating a sort of dome which was not unlike a gazebo in shape.

The dunestriders flew with increasing pace at the base of the gazebo of branches until Dirk was worried they might dig themselves down into the ground. They clicked horribly between one another, and gave off frantic whining noises. They drove downward close to the hole and Dirk's mind was tickled with a sense of urgency and danger from the warriors around him.

Around the hole and gazebo were giant moth-like creatures. They resembled moths in every way save for their eyes glowed like molten silver, and their hide was covered with small black spikes. There were nearly twenty of them chewing at the branches around the hole, and each was the size of an elephant.

Without warning or an attempt to explain to Dirk what was happening, the dunestriders moved to attack the moths. They braced their long spears against their segmented armor as a knight might brace a lance to joust and bombarded the moths with breakneck speeds.

The moths at first seemed to pay little attention to the riders, fixed on chewing the branches down to nubs, but after a handful had been slain they began rearing up to engage the men who commanded crickets. Their wings jutted out from their bodies and they quivered, hissing as if to warn the dunestriders to the death which they would face if they kept up with their attacks.

The dunestriders dove on fearlessly, with a zealous fury Dirk had seen only in heretical occultists. They swung the stone tipped spears and slashed at the wings of the moths, and then when one was grounded, another strider would come and finish it with either a stabbing spear or hungry mount.

Agitated and mad with blood-lust, the moths retaliated with the strength that only cornered animals understand. They beat the air around them with heavy vibrations, harsher yet lighter than the Tennek mounts, the air was cut by their wings, making the Tennek dip and rise unexpectedly.

A moth jumped with blinding speed at the Tennek which Dirk and his dunestrider rode, wrapping itself around the giant cricket and eating its flesh as it still lived. The dunestrider panicked, throwing the spear to the ground (as it was much too long to attack the moth at the range it was) and brandished a small glass dagger. The dunestrider unbridled himself from his saddle and slashed frantically at the humongous moth.

Dirk, all the while holding onto the saddle, screamed at the dunestrider that the moth was rearing up to bite him, but too late. The strider's entire left arm left his body, and the moth made quick work of the rest, gobbling him up with sickening hunger. Dirk sat still for a moment, coming to understand that he would have to act or die soon.

Once finished with the strider the moth once again sunk its many teeth into the chitin of the Tennek, which could not shriek from its lack of vocal chords but instead wriggled uncontrollably from the immense pain, and Dirk began untying the silken wraps around his legs. They were descending quickly, or should have been, but the moth's massive wings were slowing their pace. Dirk was released from the saddle, and he brandished his boot knife.

Dirk, bare of feet and with a broken leg, leapt onto the neck of the moth, knife in hand. The black spikes dug into his hips and chest plate, though did not quite break skin. He grappled the fleshy neck, which was covered with coarse white hair, and jammed his knife into its shoulder joint to keep steady.

The moth wriggled as the Tennek had, with blinding speed and imperceptible movements. Dirk would have been thrown off were it not for the fact that he was behind the moth, and all its movements were forward bound. His knife pressed further into its flesh, and the moth's eyes appeared to bulge outwards. Now they dove downward, plummeting to the sea of glass below them. Dirk was taken aback by the stillness of the air, the very silence of it all, and it confused his soul with how peace could be found in this most insane moment.

They hit the rough earth with a forceful crack of the beast's chitinous skin. As Dirk rolled over to view the aftermath, he found that the moth had died, and that he had miraculously survived. Any normal man would find relief at the thought that life still flowed through his red blood. Dirk was suspicious. Though he was not especially upset, he should have died twice over.

He looked up to gauge the distance of the fall and could not, as there was no reference point in the cloudless sky. The other warriors had destroyed the sickening moth monsters, but at a heavy cost to the lives of the band. Dirk lay with his back to the moth he had slain, and he hefted the knife from the plump stalk under its eye with a languid movement. If he lived to see Tilly again, or flowing streams, or green grass growing atop the clods of dirt around tree roots, he would never return to Elli'jj.

He rose, using more time than necessary, balancing as well as he could upon one good leg, and faced the gazebo made from spines. The same silken material which formed the cloth and wood as the people of the dunes used. The same… He fell onto the moth monster as realization came upon him: his eyes burned with bright focus.

The wings of the moth were made of a thin weave, powdered, white with flecks of woody brown. They grew from the moth itself, not from normal joints or shoulders that the wing of a bird might, but out from its chitin.

The Derekkets landed around Dirk, and helped him to his feet. He wanted to lower the psychic guard of his helmet to communicate with them, to interrogate them about the moths or warn them of his finding, but instinct told him that he should keep his walls up where he could. His body was more than vulnerable, and he faced a danger which would take all of his skill to challenge even at his best, there was no need for his mind to be vulnerable as well.

They led him to the gazebo, which roots quivered at his approach as the ears of a bat might at a sound. Dirk saw that they also brought with them the bodies of their fallen comrades. In total there were only three Derekkets and Dirk entering the pit within the quivering gazebo, along with the mounts which had not died.

They pressed him onward, not without a bit of malice. He guessed they were in low spirits due to the fight, and he did not argue against them.

Inside the pit opened up to a wide array of vibrating, woody roots. They created the path and walls into which the warriors delved. Flecks of blue gypsum and white quartz littered their surroundings, shimmering to create a swirling tunnel of lights. Dirk was vaguely aware of the ever present hunger and thirst in his gut.

He limped, well enough, down to a large chamber. In the middle stood a mass of roots tangled together like the petals of a flower which had not yet bud. They squirmed as the Derekkets drew near, bringing Dirk with them, and opened to reveal yet another pit. Dirk looked into it from where he stood feet away: black, lightless, bottomless.

Throw them in so that they may reach Etterrek.

Dirk withdrew quickly. The voice he heard was powerful, and at the same time calm. Demanding, yet sympathetic. Stately, but hinted at potential wrath if unsatisfied.

The dunestriders hefted ceremoniously the corpses of their brothers slain, and dumped them into the waving maw of roots and glimmering stone. Fear crept up from beneath Dirk's nape as the dunestriders then turned to face him, and started to make their ways to him. He tried to subdue the urge to draw the knife he had hidden from them successfully so far within his cloth. So close was he to drawing it that his arm had begun to move when The Voice stopped him.

Be at ease brave traveler. Your blood will only be spilt if you run from your judgment.

_ _At that, Dirk let the dunestriders lead him to the edge of the pit, using every ounce of trust he had left not to struggle. The air around him smelled of decaying silk and dusty suede. If cobwebs went somewhere when they died, it was down into the pit which opened up before him. He felt a small ebb and flow of a breeze around his neck and arms.

Yes. Your heart is clear to me. You crusade for justice, you burn inside for the wrongs of the world not just to be righted but to be avenged, and there is something else. Remove your helmet manling.

_ _"I cannot." Dirk spoke aloud, which to his amusement made the dunestrider holding him jump slightly. He had forgotten that the thing would most likely not be able to hear speech; he would have to try to lower the mental barrier of his cursed helm.

Dirk relaxed his shoulders and neck, and took pains to calm his thudding heart so that he may focus on his breaths. The little force of his consciousness probed the edges of the helmet surrounding it, moving like a wisp through his skull, and found no areas of weakness. He would have to force the helmet's magic down by will alone.

The training Dirk received as a young man by the monks of Ruthvain had taught him to withstand pain, disdain magics of any sort, and to kill those who practiced arts against the One Savior of Man. Never had the monks taught him to actually deal with magic in a sense other than protection from the corporeal damage it could cause, after all he had only been a dog of war, a foot soldier to be sent out to be slaughtered. Now, he wished that he had perhaps paid more attention to Tilly's ramblings about the use and application of magic.

_Warrior of the West, remove your helmet so that I may… What is that upon your head? _The voice sounded in Dirk's head as if it were yelling, in rage or fear he could not distinguish. My dunestriders: kill the man where he stands! Rend his flesh from his treacherous frame. Dirk felt weight on his head, and he tilted up to see.

A small, bird-like thing rested on his forehead. It squawked, a noise combined of a dove cooing and a newborn baby retching. Dirk yelped and swatted it off, just in time to throw himself to the ground in lieu of what was to come. The grotesque thing landed by the center roots, looked up at the dunestriders, belched, and viciously exploded into a cornucopia of guts and viscera.

While the explosion caused little damage to the dunestriders, the roots suffered heavy burns and began to smolder. A deafening whine chimed in the minds of the four warriors, and Dirk was the first to block the sound from his consciousness. He staggered as quickly as he could back up the walkway, retreating from the dunestriders with all the haste of a shatter-boned lunatic.

He scurried past one of the Tennek mounts, crawling on all threes, but he soon found it redundant to try to escape from the monstrous crickets as they were trapped in a sort of trance.

"You're running the wrong way you cripple." The voice of Tilly made Dirk's heart jump up to his throat, and then immediate relief washed over him as he turned to see his companion staring at one of the distracted Tenneks.

"Tilleman! One Savior I have been waiting for you to show up out of nowhere." Dirk hobbled over to the little mage and clasped his knobby shoulder. "Where in the deepest circles of Hell have you been?" Dirk shook Tilly's shoulder as his tone began to distort. Slick rage made its way up from Dirk's chest and glossed over his forehead. "Tilly you left me to die."

"What lack of confidence do you have in my confidence in your ability to keep yourself alive you piece of soiled cloth," Tilly leaned on his cane with swagger; his twisted frame presented no danger to the thick wood upon which it rested. "Besides," he eyed Dirk coyly, "I brought gifts, so be kind to me or I may not give them to you."

Tilly brought Dirk away, momentarily at peace from the monsters and their riders. Dirk knew, as well as Tilly presumably, that they would not have much time before the trance wore off.

"It is good to see you well, my friend. I had thought these monsters to have eaten you, or perhaps the sun and heat to have cooked what little is left of your sanity."

Tilly seemed not to hear him entirely, as he only nodded and gave an exceptionally wolfish grin in response. He was far too busy searching the deep pockets of his suit. Not as distantly as Dirk would have cared for, the sounds of the dunestriders rushing through the glimmering halls rose to meet the two. Tilly still dug in his coat, mumbling to himself things nonsensical to Dirk, while Dirk started to glance between his friend and the doorways which the warriors of insects and sand were sure to appear at any moment. He tapped the wall with his fingers.

"Ah!" Tilly shouted, making Dirk snap his attention to the mage, and threw something onto Dirk's chest. Dirk fumbled for a moment then held it in his hand. The amulet he had left to simmer in the unforgiving dunes well away from here. "I had to search quite a while for it; I assumed you may need its power since you have little yourself."

"Uh, thank you." Dirk put the chain around his neck and felt an immediate surge of electricity course through his blood. He doubled over, and used the wall to support himself. His spine lit up with warmth, a comfort which was disconcerting, he felt as if he was too safe. Too much medicine.

With a sickening series of snaps and sluggish, moist noises, his leg bones fused together once more. He groaned from the intensity of pain and pleasure, flowing through his muscles in waves the way air from a fan blade hits you: separate, but so quick it feels as if there is a single stream. His shoulder, ribs, the very blood in his veins all rejuvenated in a matter of moments. The rush of fresh oxygenated fuel overwhelmed his senses and sent his mind into a state of temporary euphoria, and then he was both aware and unaware of all things happening around him at once. He was an observer of reality.

The Derekkets rushed through the hallway, brandishing spears and small carved blades. Though their faces were hidden by the shell masks they wore, their body language showed unbridled rage. In a frenzied attack they rushed the two warriors. Tilly pulled a sword from his coat and thrust it into Dirk's hands,

"Fight them here! Outside they would surely have the advantage of space." He leapt behind Dirk and drew forth emerald energy from his hands and cane. Playing cards, laced with green lightening, sprayed forth from Tilly's hands, slicing the dunestrider's flesh but ricocheting off their chitin armor.

The front two dunestriders lunged at Dirk, one behind them not left enough space to join in the fray yet, and the fourth dunestrider was restraining the Tennek which had been trying desperately to tear the flesh from Dirk after the Voice's commands. One bore a spear with a crystalline tip, the other a sort of short scimitar. Dirk parried the spear, but failed at dodging the swing of the scimitar.

The blade cut deeply between Dirk's shoulder and neck, or it should have. After half an inch into his skin, honey colored light spread through Dirk's flesh like the roots of a plant. His skin crystallized in response, both sliding the rest of the blade away as well as immediately cauterizing the wound it caused. While he was still cut, he did not yet bleed. Dirk, did not have time to recognize this, as he thrust the butt of his sword's hilt into the scimitar wielder's throat.

The dunestrider gagged but held his weapon and stance well enough. The spear came at Dirk again and he ducked low to avoid the stab, while grabbing the tip and pulling it sharply towards him. The spear wielder was heavy, his armor and muscles thicker than the other three's, and Dirk drew him only inches closer. It was enough.

Dirk thrust his sword into the lower abdomen of the dunestrider, a less armored location, and blue blood spurted out. The mute warrior screamed in response, a hardly human sound, which reminded one of a large bird or distressed sheep. Dirk let his sword go as the Derekket holding the scimitar threw himself at Dirk, the edge of his blade heading straight for Dirk's chest. Dirk mirrored his attacker and grabbed the wrists of the Derekket. They wrestled like that for a moment before the dunestrider's foot sprung up to meet Dirk's groin. He twisted quickly and was hit in the thigh, mostly. Dirk let out a sharp growl.

The third dunestrider, this one wielding what looked to be a sickle set on a long haft, clawed with his instrument at Dirk's knee. He was blasted by a bolt of verdant fire, which penetrated him as if he and it were gaseous, and he dropped his weapon to begin patting himself. He screamed his clicking, whining, scream and ran in terror to no destination. His skin smoldered red then brown under his armor.

Dirk pulled upon the arms of his enemy, and brought his cursed helm down upon the chitin of the warrior. He hoped to have an effect similar to his fight with the Tennek, but besides a slight stun, no visible damage showed on his foe. He pushed the dunestrider away and scrambled to retrieve his sword from the now corpse of the other.

"Tilly, more fire, we must go back down to that corridor!" Dirk shouted to his companion, who hobbled hurriedly to Dirk's side and began another spell. Tilly giggled hysterically as he wove his emerald magics. The two dunestriders left flew towards each other at breakneck speeds. In a grotesque display of power and unruly glee, Tilly crunched the bug men into a single mass, of which no recognizable organic shape could be found.

All the while the Tennek charged upon Dirk. While this one was far larger than the one he had fought back in the catacombs, he knew now the tactics of crickets which held the size of lions. The speed of limbs which the Tennek monsters held proved far too difficult to deal with, so Dirk grabbed the spear from the ground and thrust it under the jaw of the monster.

He did not hit his mark exactly, not the throat which he had aimed for, but the cricket's equivalent of a clavicle, and found that the crystalline tip was able to shear through the chitin like dagger through thick paper. Orange liquid poured from the hole the spear had created, and dripped down the haft. The spear caught, and held back the Tennek before its two long barbs could reach Dirk. It thrashed relentlessly against him.

"The scimitar!" Dirk roared at Tilly, who flicked his cane. The blade flung into Dirk's hand in time for the spear to give under the weight of the Tennek. He slashed wildly at each limb that may find its way to him, hacking through three or four, but missing one of the barbs. It stuck into Dirk's torso, three prongs jabbing into the softness which his ribs tried desperately to protect. Dirk gasped in pain, both from the wound and from the energies of his overcharged amulet warring to heal the wound while barbs still penetrated his flesh.

Dirk flailed his arm, in a pathetic attempt to swing the carved blade, managing only to swing and miss. He let the pain sink in, accepting it, using the fervor of battle to burn away fear and kindle focus. With a huff, he hacked away the barbed extremity.

Growling, he continued his attack, this time using both arms to swing the scimitar. He hacked down upon the massive insect, over and over, refusing to acknowledge technique or experience and fighting only with the fury of a broken warrior made whole. By the end, the Tennek was as unrecognizable as the dunestriders which Tilly had crushed together.

Dirk panted, dripping yellow and blue blood, which mixed and coagulated like green boogers on his ragged clothing. He removed the shirt and pants after a moment. He looked to Tilly.

"Do you have my other equipment?"

Tilly began digging into his coat.

CHAPTER 5

Dirk eyed the amulet with idle curiosity while the two made their ways to the inner sanctum. The sun's energies had pulsed into the rough-cut jewel for countless days, both from their travels through the dunes, and the amount he had left it out in the open. Though Dirk had worn the jewel on a silver chain for years, he knew little of its power. The healing properties it gave him he thought merely enhancements of the prayers and cheap spells he had been taught as a boy, and the light it gave off to be a result of energy usage: the way a fire may produce both heat while also consuming fuel.

It was clear, however, that there were many side effects of magics and spells of which were unforeseen to his untrained mind. He touched the still-crystallized flesh which covered the wounds on his chest and ribs. Like sugar.

Geared up and ready to deal with whatever horror they faced, Dirk and Tilly strode easily through the winding tunnels. Dirk had briefly explained his time spent in the dunestrider civilization, and how a psychic will dictates the people who live under it. Tilly had been uncharacteristically quiet ever since, and Dirk could not determine the mood of his fellow, even though Tilly's grin was still plastered openly upon his face. They reached the inner corridor where Dirk had spoken with The Voice.

"After whatever happens, assuming we live, we must visit Ruthvain and eat bread." Dirk offered Tilly, as it had been weeks since either of them had eaten a typical meal. Though he rarely saw Tilly eat, Dirk knew his companion relied on the occasional sustenance as well as had moments of sheer gluttony. Dirk was again on the road to starvation, and pains pulled at his tight guts.

"Where do you think the woody sphincter leads?" Tilly prodded the hole in the sanctum with his cane. It wore the burn marks of the exploded mutant. The ebb and flow of a giant's breath traversed the hole, and as Tilly poked The Voice once again tried to reach into the warrior's minds.

Treacherous louts, who are you to dare speak so casually against my say? You have come here to be judged by the one true way, and judged you shall be. I deem you dissenters and practitioners of blasphemous powers. My Voice is that of everlasting domination, prosperity, and unknowable wisdom to all who hear it. Your blood will sustain my rise to the heavens. Your minds will grease the pathways of my own superior flourish.

"Someone loves himself a bit too much says I," Tilly spat into the abysmal pit. As he was leaning over, however, the ground below him rippled and cast Tilly down into the hole. He yelled in high-pitched shock and he plummeted, cane and all, deep into the underworld to meet the source of the Voice.

"Tilly!" Dirk ran up to catch him but was too late. He was able to catch a glimpse of green light, falling for a long while before disappearing into a vast nothing. Dirk stopped and stared for a moment, trying to decide his next course of action. Surely he could hack through this wood, even if his blade was dull. Then he remembered the desert glass blades, he had stolen away with the scimitar which had cut his own flesh, they severed the chitin of the crickets and riders like nothing.

Dirk drew the glass blade and as he cocked his arm back to swing, the floor below him fell apart, and he dove down into the pits which his companion had.

He fell for what seemed like just under ten seconds, though truth be told he did not count or even try to. He saw black and felt cold, and when he hit the ground it was as soft as a bed of silken webbing. As Dirk drew up the strength to stand, he fingered the amulet around his neck, and a bright light burst forth to clear away the darkness. It blinded him momentarily, such was the intensity, and when his sight adjusted he wished almost that he had remained in the dark.

Before him was what could only be described as a moth, similar to those he had fought with the dunestriders, but of unholy proportion and shape. Growths dotted the monstrous figure, wood and white sinew all flecked with gypsum dust, so much that Dirk had to focus his gaze to find what was the creature and what was not. Wings the size of clouds sprouted in threes along its back, though each wing was torn and pierced by each of the treelike growths. Its eyes, which were the shade of onyx, reminded him of a church bell in size, and they reflected little light.

Tilly lay motionless feet away from him, and he walked over to where his friend rested. Tilly's body was no more broken than usual. Dirk hefted him up, and saw that Tilly was dizzy, but not from the fall. The psychic presence of the massive thing, which surely was the Voice, had taken its toll on his little mage. Dirk was surprised; typically Tilly seemed immune to all dangers magical in nature. This menace must be something unlike either of the men had seen.

Dirk set Tilly down, "thank you friend," was all the powerful cripple could say in response. Having taken care of that, he turned back to the moth.

"So, it is you who speaks to the minds of those menfolk." Dirk strode up, shield and sword drawn, to the face of the monster. "Tell me, why is it that you haven’t tried to eat me yet?"

Let the thoughts flow through your pathetic mind.

_ _"What thoughts would those be?" Dirk adjusted his stance, and gripped the hilt of his sword tighter. The ground below him was slick with powder, and he gave extra caution to the footing around him. Groves made of wooden roots and craggy crystalline flakes surrounded him. The large cocoon around him was warmer than he would have liked. The creature sighed.

I admire your willpower, tiny warrior, but it is useless to struggle against the urges.

_ _Dirk relaxed. He looked left and right, shining the light from his amulet to make sure there was no ambush from cricket men or moth dragons. He saw and heard nothing. Then, brushing the tresses of his mind, he felt whispered words. The moth must have been trying to contact him, or his subconscious, because the phrases he felt were more emotional than logical. He heard repetition, but could not make out exactly what was being transmitted.

Who are you who stays his hand with the very word of Ulu'Tennek in his head? Are you a machine-man, for I have heard of those from the cosmic winds… Perhaps your creator is around to translate.

_ _"You…" Dirk dropped his guard now. Then he laughed. Hearty, bellowing laughter flowed from the helmeted fighter. He sheathed the sword and hung the shield on the pikes on the back of his armor. Dirk walked even closer to the moth god.

"You have been trying to hypnotize me this whole time, haven't you?" Dirk smiled within the vacant helm.

Why does my will have no influence upon your mind? I demand answers to my question! I am a God you pest. I have consumed the hearts of worlds and mortals alike, each because they have bowed to me and my mind. I am Ulu'Tennek. That name is feared in planes you could not comprehend in any sense!

_ _"Yeah." Dirk surveyed the nearest leg of the monster. It was made of the same chitin as the moths, similar enough to the crickets. "You are no god, Ulu, all the gods are dead. They are for us men anyway. So you say you came from another plane, you mean the sky? I saw the large hole in the dunes… " Dirk turned to his enemy.

"So what are you controlling the men in the canyon for?"

I do not answer questions from mortals, I am a-

_ _"A god, I know. Let me offer you an answer then you will tell me what I want to know." The moth rumbled and Dirk was reminded of its size. He withdrew his shield, but left his sword. "My helmet is cursed. It is a relic from ages long before the men I know could even forge metal. Your words to me are like distant shadows, I know they are there and I have a vague sense of what they mean, but they do not reach me. I cannot take the helmet off and it is both my bane, and it seems in this instance, my only saving grace." Dirk shined his light in the moth's eyes, "Your turn."

The men folk in the canyon bring me sustenance. I require tribute of near bottomless proportions to travel the cosmos, and that is all you need to know. Now, if you cannot remove your helmet to submit to me then the other will.

_ _"The other what?" Dirk asked before lightning rushed through his muscles and struck his heart. Green crossed his vision. "Ah fuck…"

Spinning Dirk saw a tiny figure, dressed in a patched suit the color of night and bearing a tall jeweled cane. Cards sprung from Tilly's sleeves and launched towards Dirk's face at blinding speeds. Dirk raised his shield just in time to deflect a few, while the others landed in the wood of his kite shield with a burning _thunk_.

Dirk rolled to the side, and went for his sword, then decided to focus on dodging Tilly's attacks. Tilly hovered feet up into the air, glowing the color of carved emerald and cackling with malicious power. Lightning struck Dirk in the chest again, and Dirk fell to his knees to cough. "Fucking magic."

Birds flew at Dirk from a myriad of directions, each dead eyed and full of explosive blood. He cowered behind the shield and sprinted away, running from the pops and bangs which ended with avian viscera. The roots simmered in response to the birds, and the moth-god shuddered. Dirk looked back and saw the smoke rising from the silk and wood. Tilly continued to laugh.

"Energies run through me like a river: no stop and no end! Surely this is godhood." Even with the small, nasally voice, Tilly's words echoed deep into Dirk's soul. He would have to act fast or the mage he had found a companion in would kill him, easily. He caste a silent prayer to protect him from magic, to a god he hoped was less a fraud than this insect deity.

Grabbing at his belt for the scimitar, Dirk ran towards the limbs of the moth. Tilly threw a bolt of lightning and this time Dirk was able to throw himself behind a wall of thick, silken rope. The verdant electricity crashed and fried the material instantly. The fortress-sized moth quivered and buckled with pain.

Dirk lunged with the strength of desperation. The scimitar hacked into the gushing flesh of one chitinous leg. Indigo fluids rushed to meet Dirk's face, and again he swung the blade. He hurdled to a different leg, both to avoid Tilly's magic and because the one he had attacked was hanging on only by a bit of exoskeleton.

Stop, you know not what you are doing. You are a barbarous fool, you who can hear not the words of gods.

_ _"You have no idea," Dirk cleaved through another leg, and when he was done looked over to where Tilly was floating and saw that his friend had collapsed. He lay in a pile of some substance that Dirk could not make out. The bright light that his amulet had been beaming forth was dying slowly, and he knew that whatever overcharge of power that it had saved had been spent on his many wounds. Complex as it may be, the amulet was still only a trinket.

Deciding that now was his time to act, Dirk ran to the head of the moth. It had fallen, and it mirrored the image of Tilly, crippled and sad. A beacon of fathomless power, brought down by the courage of one idiot. Dirk raised the glass blade and intended a swift strike to the neck of the thing.

Halt! You moron, simpleton, you know not the consequences of my death. So struck with violence is your heart, you assume that the death of your enemies is your only answer. Have you considered the fate of the men who live in the canyon once I have perished? These roots which grow from my very body give them the wood to build their homes, the silk to clothe their soft bodies; I am the oasis from which they drink.

_ _Dirk stayed his hand, arm cocked and ready, and heard what the thing had to say: confusion and turmoil beginning to soak into his mind.

Kill me, and they are left to die alone in this forsaken place. I have seen worlds with riches and know how to create them. I could give to these people a paradise, no more of the scraps and refuse I have so far offered them. Stay your blade and find your mercy. I have seen your heart, brave and true, you care about all life. I have a destiny within the cosmos beyond this world, the stars call to my own soul, to kill me would be to kill a wonder. My selfishness will depart and all that remains will be the god these manlings deserve. Please.

_ _"You so beg of me mercy? These people are your mind-slaves. You are wrong, I saw dwellings in the canyon long deserted- these folk were desert men before you fell from the strange and cold stars." Dirk fingered the pommel of the sword. "You think they will die here without you."

I know they shall. They have become dependent and have lost their old ways. You will deliver to them freedom, but at the cost of their lives. Who are you to make judgments so vast for people who are not your own?

_ _"No!" Dirk slashed through the chords of the moth-god's neck. It squirmed as warm ichor flowed freely from its severed veins. "You are wrong, false god! I am a human, a man, and I know what it is to be a slave to powers such as yourself." Again Dirk brought down his sword, and the tight ropes of flesh and sinew flew away like the fraying edges of tightly woven yarn.

"You think these people would choose subservience in the face of danger and death, but I know the heart of those people, it is the same one that beats inside my chest. This helmet may block the minds of those around me, but my heart is free to feel. These are my fellows, and they will find their own way. God or not."

I can tell you the location of the stone which you seek.

_ _He hesitated only for an instant. Then he growled into the bulbous eyes which hung in front of him like balls of obsidian, "Fuck you, I'll find it myself."

Dirk removed the rest of the head from the grotesque body. It landed on the ground with the sound of one hundred bags of flour falling onto grass. Dirk heaved in air, taking in breath after breath until what he was taking in was nowhere near enough. He ran to Tilly, still a pile of soiled cloth and slobber, and hoisted the man onto his shoulders.

The ground was wet with still-flowing blood and bile, and the light on Dirk's amulet was dimming at a rapid pace. He could not remember if there was a path out of this pit, if they could somehow walk, and knew that they would need Tilly's magic to escape. There was no way he could navigate the miles of paths without light, and even the blue shimmers of the hole well above them had died: he assumed from the death of the creature.

Dirk shook Tilly.

"Wake friend, wake, we must depart. I have not the strength to carry us both out of this abyss. Tilleman. Tilleman!" Tilly did not move, though he still breathed. The light was nearly out. Flickering like a dying candle, the necklace was removed from Dirk's neck, and placed upon Tilly's forehead.

"Please. Let the strange magic work, heal my friend and lead us to safety." Dirk dug deeper into his chest and brought forth rage and hatred, and he willed it to be strength and cunning. He could only feel the magic, feel the correct way to be, even if he did not know with his mind this had to be enough. The amulet flickered, flickered, then was as pitch as the world around them.

Dirk heaved in air, could feel tears on his neck and ooze at his feet.

"Tilly, my friend, wake so that we may leave this nightmare. We have done our part and I want to be safe." He hung his head and tried to focus his breathing. He knew that the beat of his heart and rate of his breathe were connected, and he tried to slow his chest by holding it. Dirk looked around him, hoping that somehow his eyes had adjusted to an unseen light, but no. The world around him matched the hope he held in his heart.

"So no more dragging me into sandstorms then?" The words sputtered out of a small and whining nose. Dirk drew Tilly near and held him tight.

"Tilly! You damned magic wielding prick, finally, I thought we would most certainly die in here." He let Tilly go, and could now see thanks to the dim green light which glowed easily from the jewel on Tilly's cane.

"Why? I was passed out from a psychic overdose, you are so dramatic you bucket wielding monkey." Tilly stood and Dirk did the same. They brushed themselves off and Tilly swirled his cane into the air, and then brought it down, touching both tips to himself and to Dirk.

They appeared, instantaneously, upon the surface in the blinding sun of the Elli'jj Badlands. Around them, a massive crater, and long, slender roots nestled between sand and rock which had fallen after the death of their source.

"So you killed that freakish thing?" Tilly, squinting, smiling, asked his companion. Dirk nodded. "Right, so those manlings must have one hell of a hangover, I know I do, and I have my consciousness taken over at least twice each moth." Tilly looked at Dirk.

"Did you just say twice a moth?" Dirk stared ahead, not looking at his friend.

"I suppose you think they will survive without their god."

"I have faith in the strength of humans to live without masters."

Tilly leaned on his cane, exhausted, and lifted the brim of his hat. "The borders of Elli'jj should end if we head straight North, though I cannot say with certainty we won't die before reaching them. However, I suspect you would like to check on your pals before we depart, make sure they are alright and what not."

Dirk stared and stared.

No winds blew in the Elli'jj Badlands, except when taken up by a flash-sandstorm. As such, the tracks of any who travel the wasteland of dust and glass are held there forever until such a storm grazes over their exact location. Dirk saw no tracks in the sand. None but two.

He turned and began the long walk North, hoping that before they reached civilization, they came across water. Tilly would drool and he did not want the sickening gleam of moisture to catch his eye before he was able to have a clean drink. Tilly said nothing, and followed closely to his friend, hobbling the whole way.

END.

#original #my writing #fantasy #Dirk and Tilly #palindrome paladin #original content #Rixon Grey #novella

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