Crouched, they watched the grove until Venser’s knees burned and his stomach was wound into a knot of thirst so painful that he would have agreed to fight a legion of Phyrexians if it meant a drink at the end. He could hear Koth’s stomach gurgling. But Koth did not move. A hot breeze rocked the fruits on their branches tantalizingly. Finally Venser spoke. “Let us make a move or whatever is watching us will soon hear my stomach and know our position.”
“You are right,” Koth said. “You go ahead. Now is the time for you teleporting.”
Venser paused. “I will.” He watched the trees, thinking how to move into the grove.
But Koth thought better of it. “I will have no more of this sneaking around,” he said. And with that he began striding to the trees.
He stopped at the first tree and picked a head-sized fruit, which he carried back toward Venser. It happened when Koth was about halfway between Venser and the tree. A momentary whistling of wind and Koth dropped the fruit, drew his fist back, and lashed it out. Something fell from his fist and banged off the ground. There were two more whizzing sounds, Koth swung twice, and two more small forms fell clattering.
Koth seized the fruit and started walking back to the crevice. Venser blinked into being next to Koth and had to immediately duck one of the vulshok’s bright fists.
“Say something next time you are to appear, young artificer.”
Before Venser could reply another whizzing cut the air and he put out his hand, a blue miasma appearing around it from which only his fingers poked. The metal form flying toward them slowed and began to waver in its path, until it floated lazily past and bumbled away into the dimness.
“You should see what it’s seeing it its mind’s eye,” Venser said, nodding as the small dartlike creature moved past them. It was long and thin, with a beak pursed to a sharp needle as long as a man’s arm. Fluid dripped from that sharpened tip. A finlike appendage extended out its back. “We look like tall reeds to it, and it hungers for our flesh.”
Venser leaned close for a look, and at that moment was pierced by another dart flying from behind. The pain was instantaneous and searing. So much so that Venser found he could not concentrate enough to teleport away, and a moment later felt the world fade into blackness.
When he opened his eyes again, the land of Mirrodin was moving slowly past and the heat around his face was as if he were standing near a blast furnace. He closed his eyes and when he opened them again he was slumped against the metal side of a small cave. The metal burned his back, but he could not stand, could not make his limbs cooperate with his brain’s commands. The best he could manage was to slip over and fall on his side. He closed his eyes again.
When he opened his eyes for the third time he was floating again, bobbing as the land fell away behind. He found he could raise his hand and he did so. He scratched his matted hair and spoke.
“Where is my helmet?” he said.
“He lives,” Koth said. Koth turned to Venser, who he had strapped to his back.
“Well,” Venser croaked. “I feel just wonderful.”
He felt so bad that when Koth untied him from his pack, Venser cried out. Moving his limbs felt like the worst pain imaginable. As if they were being ripped free from their joints. Koth stood him on his feet.
“There is nothing wrong with you,” Koth added. “Stinger mechs like the one that found your neck offer paralysis serum, but movement does away with its effects.”
Venser nodded painfully.
“So move,” Koth commanded.
He took one excruciating step, and then another. It felt as though sand had found its crafty way into his joints. But soon the pain lessened and after an hour of walking in circles it felt only as though he were walking on fractured bones. Koth threw Venser his helmet and he greedily slipped it on. The familiar smell of his hair was in it and he relaxed a bit.
“Where are we?” Venser said.
Koth stepped dramatically back and extended one arm.
“Your body they will harvest,” Elspeth said to Vadi, her bowl of cold soup long forgotten. “They may even keep you alive for a time, letting you heal, occasionally taking strips of your flesh and sinew for fuel or musculature. You’ll begin to recognize your own body parts stretched and fused into the skeletons of your captors.
The vulshok watched Elspeth without expression.
In her mind Elspeth watched helplessly as three Phyrexians lifted a human in their meat-hook hands. The screaming … the screaming.
“But your mind will be left to its own sad devices. They don’t understand the mind or its needs. Your mind will fall away, or you will scream yourself to insanity. Be ready for this. This is the harvest you shall reap.”
Vadi looked at her suspiciously. “How do you know?”
“I know,” Elspeth said. “Because I survived them.”
The vulshok’s hand went out, but instead of touching Elspeth in consolation she took the hefty handle of a battle spear lying propped against the low table.
“I do not have their infection, if you think that,” Elspeth added, noticing how the Vulshok held her spear.
“You are not auriok. You are a troublemaker and liar like that upstart Koth. Speak now or I will lay you low.” The vulshok kicked her stool back and brought the head of her greatspear up so it hovered at Elspeth’s throat. “You are a spy for the Hammer tribe. Speak doomsayer!”
“I wish I had a confession for you,” Elspeth said. She looked down at the sharp tip of the spear. She scooted her chair forward toward the spear tip. “Knowing what I know about our mutual enemy, I wish you would end my days now.”
Vadi lowered the spear, the scowl still on her face. “You are no auriok. You’re no spy. You are none of these things. You are something much worse.” The vulshok spat a dry splotch at Elspeth’s feet. “You are a coward.”
“You do not know what I know.”
“You say you left your friends. You say they are better off without you. You say there is a great enemy. You say, say, say. All talk. All words. And words are wind.”
“They are better off not depending on me,” Elspeth said.
“So you will hide, is that it?”
Chapter 3
Behind the vulshok loomed the tremendous mountain they had seen on the horizon. Green gas swathed it in the bright light. It appeared to be made of corroded lead.
But Venser stepped forward and brought his hands together in a surprisingly loud clap. Koth could see the shockwaves from the clap bend and distort the air, as hot gases escaping a vent, and he felt the metal in his body stiffen momentarily. Then Venser disappeared and reappeared at an outcropping not far away. He teleported back a moment later.
“Did you see it?” Venser said. “A small metal form, smooth and shiny? Does that description match anything you know?”
“Yes,” Koth said in a low voice.
Venser cocked his head at the vulshok.
“But not exactly,” Koth said. “It is probably a myr. They are harmless little things,” Koth pronounced. “I mean, they are generally harmless,” he said, sounding less sure.
“The question remains why is this small creature following us?”
Koth turned to Venser. “How do you know it is following us?”
“I have heard it,” Venser said. “In the outer dark last night.”
“So have I,” Koth admitted.
“I wonder,” Venser said, staring out to where he’d heard the creature.
“Enough of this,” Koth said. “Come, let us walk.”
By nightfall of the next day the mountains had begun to fall. Koth, grumbling, walked toward where the suns seemed to go when they fell from the sky. The smell of rot was what reached them first. It was a type of rot smell Venser had not experienced before: the putrefaction of metal and meat as if from a derelict slaughterhouse.