Alisiyad Chapter 34 ~ City of Death

Russ woke feeling sore and unrested, as if he’d slept on concrete all night.  Not surprising, considering he’d slept on a stone floor, which is much like concrete.  He rolled over and rubbed his eyes.  Liseli lay next to him, grimacing in her sleep, her arms folded over her chest and her hands tucked under her chin.  She seemed tense and defensive even in sleep, as if she were curled up against something assailing her in her dreams.  Still, he didn’t want to disturb her, since their waking reality couldn’t be much better than a nightmare.

He sat up and looked around.  Lumpy forms of dogs lay scattered around the chamber, so still they almost looked dead.  Leeton stood over the bier, just as he had when Russ had last seen him before drifting off to sleep, and Russ frowned, wondering if the Alisiyan king ever slept.  He stood up, stiffly, and stretched.  Hearing him, Leeton turned.

Even in the dim, unnatural light, Russ saw the harrowed expression on the older man’s face, and knew something was wrong.  A second later he caught sight of Alisiya’s body on the bier behind her father, and his stomach did a little flip flop when he saw the garish black smile carved across her throat.  Blood stains covered her arms and a knife jutted from her chest like a sick and twisted cherry on a particularly unappetizing sundae.

“What . . . ?” was all Russ managed to get out, flabbergasted by the mutilation.

“I slept,” Leeton said, his voice shaking, “I slept . . . and now my daughter. . . . and my dogs.  There is someone inside,” he declared, trying to compose himself, “one of them must have survived; we will find them, and kill them.”

“Leeton,” Russ said carefully, overcoming his shock and becoming wary of the unstable look in the King’s eyes.  “I thought your dogs could sniff out everyone inside.  How could there be—”

“I don’t know, but look!  Look at this!”  Leeton gestured to the sleeping canines.  “I can’t find any wounds on them, but they will not rise and they are not breathing.  And my . . . Alisiya . . . she was supposed to wake.  She—”

“Wake?” Russ echoed incredulously.

“Yes, wake.  I was waiting for her to heal, to come back.  I did not intend to sleep at all, and I don’t remember even sitting down, but then I woke up this morning on the floor,” Leeton explained agitatedly. 

“Something or someone caused me to sleep, and that same someone did this.  We will find them and kill them,” he repeated.  “Find them and kill them.”

Now he’s lost it.  Really lost it, Russ thought.  No one could have survived that fall from the roof, and Alisiya had seemed pretty well dead.  But it confirmed his earlier suspicions that Leeton was gradually losing grip on reality in the face of his daughter’s death.

However, the dead dogs and the mutilated corpse was enough to convince Russ that Leeton was right about there being something else inside the temple with them.  He turned around to wake up Liseli, and was startled to see her standing quietly in the corner, observing them.

“We’ve got a problem,” he said grimly.  “Something survived in here and it killed the dogs.  I dunno why it didn’t just kill all of us, but . . . .”  He stopped, feeling a little creeped out by the way Liseli stared dispassionately at the scene on the bier.  “Um, I’m thinking it might be Ricalli.”  He glanced back at Leeton.  “Maybe since he’s not human the dogs couldn’t smell him or sense him.  I thought he’d left when your dogs first attacked, but . . . .”

Leeton and Liseli seemed suddenly oblivious to Russ’s theorizing; instead of paying attention to him they were intent on exchanging long, unblinking stares.  “And sooooo,” Russ said slowly, “we’re all fucked.  Yeah, pretty much no chance in hell.  I’m sure he’s about to kill us . . . and grind up our bones . . . to make popsicles — are you listening to me?”

“You,” said Leeton, ignoring him and pointing a shaking finger at Liseli.  “You have her blood on your hands.”

Liseli glanced down at her hands, and so did Russ.  There was dried blood on them, but Russ wasn’t sure what made Leeton think it belonged to Alisiya.  “Liseli?” he said carefully, sensing the situation was about to get very tense; “what’s that from?”

“It’s hers,” Liseli said indifferently.  “He’s right.  I did that.”  She nodded toward the bier.  “I had to.  She was coming to life again.”

Leeton made a strangled sound in his throat and leapt toward Liseli.

“Whoa!”  Russ dove between them and knocked Leeton aside.  “Wait a minute — stop!” he protested as Leeton caught his balance and tried it again.  “Just hold it—”

Leeton threw a punch and caught Russ squarely on the mouth.  He grabbed Liseli by the shoulders and shook her.  “How dare you!”

Russ recovered and quickly grabbed him from behind, wrapping his arm around the King’s neck and pulling him away.  Leeton let go of Liseli and tried to peel Russ off of him, but Russ pushed him to the ground roughly and yelled at Liseli to get far away.  Leeton scrambled to his feet, but Russ punched him in the gut when he tried to rush after Liseli.

“Don’t touch her,” he said darkly, throwing another punch for good measure as Leeton sank to his knees.

“Hold off,” Leeton panted, and put up a hand.

The King was not solidly built — he was tall and gave an illusion of imposing power with his demeanor, but Russ now realized that he actually had the size advantage.  But he was still wary; Leeton was older and a far superior Key.  Russ had no idea what exactly he could do, though so far he didn’t seem to be particularly skilled in hand-to-hand.  There was a good reason, apparently, that he had bred an army of vicious dogs to do his fighting.

“Damn it,” Russ muttered, wiping blood from his mouth.  The one punch Leeton had landed had split his lip.  “I don’t know what’s going on, but you’re not laying a fucking finger on Liseli.  Got that?”

“My daughter has been butchered,” Leeton said darkly.  “I was not enemies with Liseli, but I will not let my daughter’s death go unanswered.”

Liseli, meanwhile, had not run far away as Russ had instructed, but had instead gone over to the bier and pulled the knife out of Alisiya’s chest.  She held it at the ready now, and stepped toward the two men.  “Oh shut up,” she said with disgust.  “Your daughter was a psychotic murderer.  A monster.  I did what I had to do, to stop her from hurting anyone ever again.  She had to be stopped.  You know that just as well as I do.”

“She was my daughter.  My only daughter.  I risked my life to help you, and you killed my child while she was helpless.”  Leeton’s eyes were taking on that strange, unsettling shifting of color that he and Alisiya had shared, darkening as if at any moment he might shoot laser beams out at them.

“And now you’re helpless, too,” Liseli pointed out, ignoring his accusation and seeming unfazed by the inhuman eye action.  “Your dogs are dead, and even Russ can beat you up.  Maybe you should stop thinking about revenge and start thinking about self-preservation.”

“Liseli—” Russ pretended for the moment that he hadn’t noticed the “even” before his name, “—what did you do to the dogs?”  He said it calmly, but Liseli’s behavior was starting to worry him.

“Nothing,” she said, glancing around at the inert animals with a puzzled frown.  “I didn’t do anything to the dogs.”

They were all three silent for a moment.  Russ half expected Leeton to accuse her of lying and go off on a rant about his beloved pets, but instead the King just raised himself to his feet with a wary eye on Russ.  Russ returned the gaze with an equally untrusting glare.

“The dogs were dead first,” the King said.  “If they were alive they would have sensed Alisiya’s distress.  They would have ripped her to shreds.”  He cast a dark glance Liseli’s way.

“Don’t look at her like that,” Russ growled.

“Do not presume to tell me what to do,” said Leeton.  “You may have gotten a few punches in before but if you press me I will—”

“What?  Sic your doggies on me?  If you hadn’t noticed, they’re dead and that gives us all something to worry about.  You have a problem with Liseli, save it for later, I will gladly kick your ass then,” Russ said heatedly, taking a menacing step towards the King.

“You presume the ability.”  Leeton didn’t back down, raising himself to his full height and daring Russ to strike first.

“You’re fucking right I do,” Russ retorted.  “And you know what?  There’s a dead priest lying around here somewhere that proves I can hold my own, without any puppy dogs doing my dirty work, so yeah, you just try something and I’ll—”

Leeton interrupted Russ’s tirade with his fist, catching him unawares on the chin.  Russ cursed and parried with his own punch, aimed at Leeton’s head.  But this time he missed and staggered past the King, who caught him in the stomach and then kicked his feet out from under him.

“I haven’t lived this long by being outmatched by a boy,” he said disdainfully.

Russ scrambled to his feet and barreled into Leeton, taking the King down to the floor.  They fell on top of the stiffening dog corpses but hardly noticed, each intent on taking the other one out.  Russ had the advantage, with Leeton caught underneath him, and he wasted no time in battering the older man’s face with punches.

“Stop it!” Liseli interjected, standing above them.  “This is ridiculous!  I don’t need you fighting for my honor or whatever it is you think you’re doing, Russ.”

“He’s threatening to kill you!” Russ protested, leaning out of the way as Leeton tried to reach up and seize him in a stranglehold.

“And I have the knife!”  Liseli waved it at him.  “He gets near me, I’ll do the same to him as I did his precious princess.  In the meantime, something in this godawful place killed all the dogs without leaving a mark.  Should we be thinking about that instead?”

“I’ve been trying to,” insisted Russ.  “The vengeful father here is making it kind of hard.”

Liseli bent down and held the edge of the blade against Leeton’s throat.

“I’m a bad person,” she said quietly, as Russ stared at her.  “I used to be a nice, normal girl but then your daughter gave me no choice but to kill her, so I guess that makes me ruthless now?  Well, they do say it’s easier the second time.  I don’t have anything against you personally and I don’t want to have to kill you, but right now I’m getting sick enough of watching you and Russ fight like a bad WWE reenactment that I may just do it.”

“That’s my girl,” Russ said to Leeton, smiling grimly.

“I like her,” said a voice from behind them, and Liseli jumped in surprise, nicking the underside of Leeton’s chin.

Russ twisted around to see Ricalli watching them from the shadows.

He stepped forward, arms crossed over his chest.  “Yesterday we were discussing a mutually beneficial arrangement,” he said with a slight nod to Russ.  “I’d like to continue.  Once I have killed the man responsible for the death of my people.”

Russ hesitated.  Liseli stood, removing the knife from Leeton’s neck, and said, “No.”

“What?”  Ricalli raised an eyebrow at her.  “Were you not just threatening to do the same?”

“Threatening, yes, actually doing it, no.  Who are you?”

“He’s Ricalli,” said Russ.  “He’s dangerous.”

Liseli looked the god of shadows over appraisingly, then asked, “What were you ‘discussing’ with Russ?”

Leeton had gone very still, but Russ did not trust him enough to let him up.  The King turned his murderously angry gaze from Liseli to Ricalli, and Russ was sure he didn’t plan on just letting them do whatever they wanted with him.

Ricalli gave Liseli an answer; “He is a Key, I have a desire to travel.  We were discussing him becoming my escort through the Gates.”  He spread his hands in a non-threatening gesture.  “And why is this mutually beneficial?” he supplied the question, and answered it with an amused smile; “I have powers to ensure his safety in possibly hostile worlds, which is something I think you have both discovered is necessary.”

Liseli looked at Russ, questions written all over her face, but she didn’t say anything.  He just shrugged.

“Now, it seems we have a common enemy,” Ricalli nodded towards Leeton.  “I did not appreciate his mongrels massacring my offspring, nor have I appreciated being locked in the temple with them lurking and slobbering around.  Now, I could have taken care of him in his sleep as I did his dogs, but such a painless and peaceful death seemed somehow wrong . . . .”

“No,” Liseli repeated, and crossed her arms, offering no explanation.

Ricalli just raised one eyebrow again.  “I do think I liked you better when you were holding the knife to his throat.  I find your sudden nobility rather annoying.”

“Touch a hair on her head and I’m not taking you anywhere,” Russ said, ready to leap to Liseli’s defense.

“Relax, please.”  Ricalli shook his head.  “I wasn’t threatening her.”

“Because we both know how well you treat women,” Russ scoffed.

Ricalli dipped his head in acknowledgment of the point.  “It’s in both of our best interests at the moment to cooperate with each other, right now.  I am not stupid enough to think that hurting her is the best way to ensure your compliance.”

“Yeah, whatever, just stay away from her.”  Russ eased up on Leeton, standing up and pulling the King up with him.  Leeton, aware that his life was in the balance, was careful not to make any sudden moves. 

“Look,” Russ said, “I have nothing against Leeton, as long as he stops trying to hurt Liseli.  I’m not for just letting you kill him.”

“I am not in the habit of obeying humans,” Ricalli said, clearly annoyed.

“Hey, ‘cooperation’ was your choice of words,” Russ told him.  “You want me to Key you around, you can’t act like a psycho.  I don’t make deals with psychos.  I mean, well, I do, but part of the deal is to not act psychotic.  Got it?”

“You are a bizarre creature,” was all Ricalli said, with a quizzical look, and Russ took that as compliance.

Leeton, who had remained cautiously silent for a while, spoke up.  There was an odd shift in his voice that made Russ suspicious, but he said very calmly; “What exactly are you planning on doing now?”

Russ wasn’t sure who he was addressing, but he answered, “Well, if everyone here is agreeing to not try killing anyone else, at the moment, I think we should leave.  I mean—” he turned to Ricalli, “—we’re hunkered down here because your people outside are gonna want to kill us.  But you can stop them.  So . . . .”

“Yes, I will order them to stand down.”  Ricalli waved a hand dismissively, with a sideways glance at Leeton so brief that Russ might have missed it if he wasn’t watching so closely.

“Everyone here gets out alive,” Russ said pointedly.

“Yes,” Ricalli replied innocently.  “I understand.”

All four of them stood still for a few moments, looking warily from person to person, until Russ said, “Um, one of us has to do something.”

Suddenly there was a booming noise from out in the front hall, and everyone except for Leeton jumped.  He said with eerie composure, “I’ve opened the doors.”

They looked out into the hall and saw the bodies that Russ and Liseli had barricaded against the front doors scattered to each side of the hall, some pinned between the doors and the walls.  Ricalli clenched his jaw, but Russ didn’t know if it was from any sort of emotion over his peoples’ deaths, or just that the defeat hurt his pride.

Russ fully expected the rest of the city to come pouring into the temple, ready for revenge, but nothing happened.  “Well then,” said Ricalli.  “I will go meet the angry masses.”

Leeton tenderly gathered up Alisiya’s body in his arms, and without a word began to follow.  Russ took Liseli’s hand and they brought up the rear.

They crossed the threshold and stood in the courtyard, wincing in the bright morning sunlight.  There were no angry masses gathered for attack . . . strangely there didn’t seem to be a soul around at all.

“What the . . . ?” Russ wondered uncertainly.

Ricalli seemed caught off guard, and looked around.  Then he sniffed and grimaced.  “Death,” he said shortly.  “The city reeks of it.  Sickness and death.  Mortal bodies putrefying and rotting.”

Russ, having spent the night in the temple full of dead bodies, didn’t exactly notice much of a difference in the smell.  But then, he couldn’t say the air smelled fresh, either.

“Oh my God,” said Liseli quietly, taking a step back inside.  “I know what it is.”

“What?”

“It’s her.”  Russ followed her gaze to where it fell on Alisiya’s body cradled in her father’s arms.  “Her blood,” Liseli clarified.  “It’s killing them.”

Ricalli uttered a short laugh of realization.  “Of course,” he said, “The trough around the alter leads to the sewers.  One of the idiotic rituals the priests came up with was to sacrifice a newborn calf on the altar every new moon and let its blood run into the water system.  It’s meant to nourish the city, or something daft like that.”

“I drained Alisiya’s blood so she couldn’t come back to life,” Liseli finished the explanation.  She covered her mouth and said with hushed horror, “It’s my fault . . . I’ve poisoned the water.  Now it’s just like the Chaiorra . . . .”

“All the more reason to leave this place,” Ricalli said brusquely, not sounding very concerned about the fate of his people.  “And the sooner the better, they’ll be clamoring after me to save them as soon as they notice I am outside.”

Russ shot a disgusted glance toward him in reaction to his callousness, but Ricalli didn’t notice, his attention on the empty cityscape before them.  Leeton’s reticence on the matter was unsettling, because Russ couldn’t shake the feeling that he was only cooperating long enough to plot something nasty for Liseli or Ricalli.  Not that Russ really was concerned about what Leeton tried to do to Ricalli — but he doubted Leeton was content to let his grudge against Liseli slide.

They walked across the courtyard and down the long flight of steps leading down the hill, casting wary glances around them and each directing surreptitious looks at each other.  Russ even watched Liseli out of the corner of his eye.  He hadn’t had much of a chance to think about what she’d done to Alisiya’s body — and God knows he’d stand next to her whatever the reason — but that didn’t make it any less unsettling.  They really had to get out of the place and the quicker the better.  It was turning them both into something he didn’t like to think about.

They began to hear noises as they walked.  From inside the buildings and down the alleys came dying groans, strangely inhuman cries and mumblings.  It made them walk a little faster.  The city was dying, but not yet dead.  They saw crows circling up above, pecking at windows and cawing as they fought over remains.  Russ thought of the bird-girls — he’d tried to save them, and now were they among the dying?  He blinked, and swallowed hard.

A few blocks down they saw a woman — she staggered out into the street, dragging a bucket in one hand and holding a grimy rag to her mouth with the other.  She dragged the bucket over to the gutter and tipped it.  A disgusting mix of blood, bile, and excrement ran out into the street and sloughed toward the sewer drain.

Suddenly she noticed them, and her eyes widened when she saw Ricalli.  She gazed at him with rekindled hope.  Then she exclaimed something in Adayzjian and doubled over, coughing uncontrollably.  She lifted her face again, blood trickling from her mouth, and she reached out toward Ricalli in supplication, begging for his help.

Ricalli made a disgusted noise and hurried past, saying, “Come along, faster, every moment I spend in this stinking place is far too long!”

Russ and Liseli had both been frozen in horror watching the pitiful scene, but reluctantly followed Ricalli.  The woman cried and stood in the gutter, looking bereft as her god passed her by.  Russ knew that Ricalli couldn’t help her any more than he could, at this point, but apparently the lord of darkness had been absent the day they were passing out compassion in Adayzjian god-land.  But what else would he expect from a guy who shrugged at his followers’ ritual torture and murder of innocent people?  No . . . Ricalli wasn’t a good guy by any stretch of the imagination.  Russ squinted at him as he considered what would happen once they reached Alisiya.

He caught Leeton watching him as they walked, and stared back at the King as if to say, “Yeah, what?”  Leeton turned away, shifting Alisiya’s body in his arms.

They passed through the part of the city that had been so recently inhabited, and came to the old, bombed out section that Russ recognized as his first impression of Azmanval.  How ironic, he thought, that he and the others who had come to this world from that Gate would be responsible for turning the entire city into one big bad side of town.  Though with the sadistic Ricallyn ruling things, the good side of town had not been all that great to begin with . . . .

“It’s here,” he said, standing before the crumbling doorway.  He could sense the Gate lurking between the old stones, could feel the edgeworld opening up already, pulling him toward it, could hear the wordless call of the Gate. . . .  “Are you ready?”

“I am more than ready,” responded Ricalli.

“I wasn’t talking to you,” muttered Russ, and reached out for Liseli’s hand.

“I’m ready,” she said with a faint smile that didn’t reach her eyes.  She had been extremely quiet since seeing what was happening to the city, and was still holding the knife crusted with Alisiya’s blood.  Russ had wanted to say something reassuring about it not really being her fault, but he couldn’t quite get the words out.  She would just shake her head at him and insist that it was, anyway.  Well.  There would be time later for reflecting on things that had happened . . . now they just had to work on making sure there would be a later for them.

Russ stepped forward, aware of Ricalli uncomfortably close behind.  The Gate opened to welcome him, and he plunged over the edge.