Mark Newton - The Book of Transformations

Seven sleds carried them north by north-west, the dogs tearing up the ice, driving into the constant glare of the sunlight. About two hours into their day’s travel, the sled up ahead halted, and she brought her own to a stop.

One of her group, Minof, a bearded giant of a cultist and someone she was glad to have close by, peered through a telescope in one direction.

‘Gydja!’ he bellowed.

Papus climbed out of her sled and trudged around the yipping dogs to his side. ‘What can you see?’ she asked.

‘I think it’s them.’ He offered her the telescope, shaking the flakes of snow from his beard and fur hood.

Through the device she could see only whiteness at first, then the occasional streak of a change in the landscape’s texture, or a knuckle of rock jutting out of the snow like the hull of a sinking ship. She scanned across the landscape in the rough direction that Minof had been looking, then felt the force of his hand guiding the end of the telescope until she could see what he had seen.

They were very hazy, and very small, but there was indeed a huddle of figures in the deep distance — probably no more than ten people in all — with sleds of their own. At first Papus felt a jolt: this was the first sign of life they had seen out here for some time. Then, a pang of nerves hit her: if this was Dartun, she would soon have to inform him that he was wanted by the powers of Villjamur — a statement that would almost certainly initiate conflict.

‘Do you think it’s them?’ Minof grunted.

‘They’re too distant to tell,’ Papus replied, lowering the telescope.

There was hubbub within her own group, as several men and women clustered to see what the issue was and why they had stopped. Loudly, she explained Minof’s sighting, and gauged expressions for signs of a reaction. Most of them appeared to be simply relieved that their time out here might be at an end, and she very much sympathized.

After some debate, Papus ordered that they assemble any necessary relics and approach the group. It took them ten minutes of organizing themselves before they pushed on. A moment later, as she saw something approaching she gave the word to halt again.

A dog was trotting towards them. It was a gentle-looking thing, white with flashes of grey around its face. It padded quickly across the snow, paused to look at them, then sat about forty feet away.

Minof grunted and started forward to meet the dog.

‘Be careful,’ Papus warned.

Minof called to the animal, which sat up and shuffled towards him. Wind built up now, but otherwise there was only silence from her group. Flecks of snow — not from the sky, but gusted up from the land — drifted now and then across her vision.

Papus pulled her hood tighter and held up the telescope to watch the interaction. On closer inspection, the dog’s movements weren’t quite right: there was something almost mechanical about the way it moved, and it possessed none of the flowing grace found in her own animals. And on further examination the dog’s eyes… they were red, like two burning embers had been set within its skull, and its teeth glinted in the sun like daggers.

‘Minof!’ she shouted, as the man moved in to rub the canine affectionately, ‘I think you should step b-’

The dog exploded.

A huge plume of snow and blood banked into the air, and bass vibrations rocked the ground. Someone screamed, her own dogs howled, the cultists in her order began to panic. Moments later, the remnants of flesh and bone, and shattered plates of metal, fell across the surrounding snow with gentle thuds. Pink snow littered the detonation zone.

There was very little left of Minof or the dog.

‘Fuck,’ someone behind her breathed. Someone else was in hysterics.

Poor Minof… she thought, her mind a sudden tangle of fear and guilt. Most of the group just stared dumbly, but a few jogged forward cautiously evaluating what had occurred.

*

‘What was that?’ Verain demanded.

‘You can recognize an explosion, surely?’ Dartun replied flatly. They had watched the dog trot into the distance and, just now, seen the red eruption, felt it through the earth, observed the eerie calm of the aftermath. What the hell was that all about? She regarded some of the other dogs now and, out of curiosity, walked among them to see if they seemed suspicious. Each of them seemed eager to see her, one even licked her hand — nothing about these dogs suggested they were anything but animals.

A couple of the other cultists sidled up to her, and their expressions equalled her own. Any conversation was rushed and kept quiet. What was going on? Why had Dartun despatched a dog to explode?

As she turned, she could see Dartun gazing out into the distance, his fuligin cloak flapping in the wind like a banner of war. His profile was noble, his posture almost too perfect. Was there anything really left of the man she had been in love with?

They lingered in the breeze for some time. He was still standing motionless, watching the group in the distance. No one dared say anything to him.

Tuung stepped up alongside Verain and folded his arms, tucking his gloved hands under his armpits for warmth. Sunlight brightened his reddened face and he squinted at her. ‘Can’t you have a word with him?’

‘What about? He barely listened to me before we set out for this wasteland. Do you honestly think after all we’ve been through he’ll suddenly want to open his heart?’

Tuung grunted. ‘We don’t even know what we’re doing now, or where we’re headed.’

‘We’re going home to Villjamur,’ Verain replied.

‘What, just like that? We fuck off into these Realm Gates, get the shit kicked out of us, have most of our order slaughtered before our eyes in the most scarring manner imaginable, and we just fuck off back home again?’

His reminders of the horrors they experienced were not welcome. ‘Expeditions fail all the time. Explorers get lost and turn back. Ships catch the wrong winds, get dragged off course — these things happen, it’s life. We tried, we failed. We’re still alive.’

Tuung grunted again: ‘That may be true. But most explorers know where they’re going, know what they’re getting into — have a choice. Do we? Do we have any idea what Dartun is up to?’

Verain looked to where Dartun was still staring at the group in the distance.

‘They’re coming now,’ he announced.

Verain approached Dartun and hesitantly placed a hand on his arm. If he felt her gesture, he didn’t show any acknowledgement. ‘Who are they?’ she asked.

‘The Order of the Dawnir. Papus. Her cultists are coming to confront us.’

She didn’t ask how he knew. She didn’t want to know.

She’s come, at last… Verain felt a pang of relief. The last time she had seen this woman, Verain had revealed many of Dartun’s nefarious activities, including the intention to explore the Realm Gates. She had not betrayed her lover — she merely feared for everyone’s safety, her own included. He had become obsessed with becoming immortal once again, and he didn’t seem to be thinking right. Now she had come to take them back to Villjamur and Verain hoped their encounter would be peaceful.

‘She must have been trying to stop us seeing the otherworld,’ Dartun said, ‘or maybe she wants a resolution to our years of feuding. Perhaps she caught wind of my experiments on the dead, who knows. A little late for either, I suspect. It all seems so… petty.’

Tuung traipsed forward, rubbing the back of his head. ‘Uh, we’ve not got any relics that work, Dartun. They were made redundant on the other side of the gates. I’m not sure what you want us to do exactly, but we’re not in a great state to engage in combat.’