THE JEALOUSY OF JALICE

The flayer’s cry spurned them to abandon what remained to be packed. Similar cries followed, mixed with hoots and screeches that accosted the silent forest. Annilasia took the lead. Jalice noticed the tillishu carried only her satchel, having left most of her supplies behind. Elothel kept pace with Jalice, while Vowt and Mygo brought up the rear.

Jalice stumbled along, panic lacing her veins. They were so close to the House. It was as if an invisible claw tugged her towards an inevitability. It was bound to her, and she to it. Perhaps they would get there before the flayers. The frenzied shrieks that sounded around her threatened to choke out such hope.

Jalice almost tripped when the trees gave way to a vast meadow of barren land, and she froze. Decaying remnants of fallen trees lay strewn about—hollowed trunks devastated by some catastrophic event. Elothel careened ahead, and even after a brief moment of looking back and noticing Jalice’s halt, fae turned and continued sprinting on.

Vowt dashed past her. As Jalice took in the haunting scene, she was vaguely aware of Mygo at her side, yelling at her to run. But his words—and the shrieks that grew louder at the tree line around the meadow—muddled themselves in her fixated mind.

She knew this place. She wasn’t sure how, but it was familiar. Within seconds of glimpsing the flatland, just as this recognition dawned, a striking pain pierced her skull. Jalice let out a shrill yelp and shot her hands to her head. The pain sharpened. She thought she still heard Mygo, but he sounded far away. His urgent tugging to keep her moving registered as if in some nightmarish dream.

The shrieks sounded too close, and a ripple of fear distracted Jalice from the pain. Her eyes followed the far tree line circling the meadow as she ran. She almost missed it—the slightest movement—but the leafless trees hid little. Something large charged with great bounds in the forest before it slipped through the tree line and veered into the meadow. She caught the briefest glimpse of overgrown limbs trampling the earth, and an unmistakable hairless hide. An uneven, disjointed gait barreled the creature forward on its trajectory to intercept them.

Jalice’s breath caught. As she staggered under the tug of Mygo’s firm grip, she lost sight of the creature and instinctively refocused on sprinting after the others, with Mygo falling into step beside her. Flashes of the meadow covered in ash filtered in and out, as if she were passing from one dream into another. Or from one memory into another. With each apparent glimpse of the past, the pain in her head increased.

The shrieks multiplied until the air was nothing but an endless stampede of shrill cries closing in. Jalice discovered her footing remained steadier if she didn’t risk glances towards the writhing motion at the forest’s edge.

She startled when she ran up behind Annilasia and nearly knocked the woman over. The tillishu stood rigid with a stricken look. The others held a similar expression, transfixed by something despite the impending danger. Jalice followed their gazes. The ground sloped down abruptly before them and formed a crater within the meadow.

Her blood ran cold. A giant cubed structure at least two stories high lay submerged at the bottom of the crater. Seamless black panels formed it. One of its corners dipped sharply into the ground, while its opposite end shot skyward.

They had reached the Black House.

Jalice’s hand shot to her chest. Her lungs burned despite the cold. She couldn’t breathe, and she suddenly wondered what star had possessed her to think it had been wise to come here. The pain that had been plaguing her head in dull fits struck now with full force, and this time extended down throughout her body.

The briefest flash of a grotesque creature, crouching a few yards away on a set of forelimbs, accosted her vision. The two gangly arms, bending through the air like spidery appendages, were the only limbs sticking out from its thorax. At the front end, the creature’s torso morphed into a head and jaw, eerily reminding Jalice of a disfigured cretaceon. Large segments appeared partially decomposed, leaving unnatural cavities along its exoskeleton.

With a snarl, the creature lunged at her, but the impact never came. It vanished a few inches from her face.

Flinching, she whimpered. A rush of emotions careened across her mind as she recalled Elothel’s warning. The dokojin would manifest and attempt to divert her away from the House—and from remembering. Before the fear of it could settle in, she plunged ahead, scrambling down the slope. Elothel had told her a dokojin was to blame for her memory block. She didn’t care for the reasons at the moment.

She wanted those memories back.

***

Annilasia started after Jalice, but Elothel’s firm hand stopped her. She spun around to protest, but the mirajin moved past.

“I’ll go with her,” fae said. “Keep those things at bay.” It was impossible to miss the anxiety lacing faer words, even muffled by the garb.

Annilasia, somewhat irritated by the mirajin’s cowardly retreat, watched the pair speed off towards the Black House. She focused on the structure as her heart raced. It was just as she remembered it. Mysterious. Foreign.

Wrong.

Only now, there was a giant fracture running the full height of one wall and widening as it descended to create an easy, if crude, way inside. Annilasia scowled at the peculiar addition, unsure if even a lightning strike could have split the fine metal.

Mygo’s urgent shout broke her from the trance. She turned in time to see flayers converging no more than a dozen or so strides away. Her limbs worked in quick succession to retrieve the torch from within her cloak, tuck it under an armpit, and pull a large flask from her satchel. She doused the torch’s tip with the oil, then struck a match to it before unsheathing her sword with her spare hand. Sweaty palms gripped the two weapons.

Her preparation led straight into the first attack. The canine flayer pounced as its deformed skull emitted a guttural cry. Annilasia pivoted away from the massive claw that swiped at her face. The dodge put her in another flayer’s path. She dove onto her stomach as the creature lunged, and it shot overhead. Her breath caught as the flame of the torch fluttered from the rush of air.

A burning pain blistered throughout her calf, eliciting a sharp inhale as she glanced back to see a single claw lodged in her leg. The prostrated flayer pulled itself towards her, jaw stretched in feverish pants. She thrashed her leg to dislodge the claw, a mistake too instinctive to recall. The movement freed her, but only after the claw dug deeper and ripped the gash wide open. She scrambled away with a new limp and blood spurting from her leg.

The second flayer awaited, gangly arms soaring down. She waved the torch at it, gratified by the agitated screech this won her.

Yet neither of the flayers retreated. As she dodged, pivoted, and swiped with the torch, realization set in that these creatures’ behavior did indeed differ from those she’d first encountered days earlier. Rather than deter them, the flame only exacerbated their agitation, fueling their crazed efforts to slay her. The sword did even less to dissuade them.

Somewhere nearby Vowt cried out, his panic unmistakable. An intrusive thought bled into Annilasia through the chaos.

Dying stars, we’re going to die.