Onslaught

CHAPTER THIRTEEN: THE MAGNIFICENT ADDICTION

Staff in hand and hale at last, Kamahl ascended the Gorgon Mount. No beasts confronted him this day. They had seen him kill. the mantis druid a month ago. The monsters cringed away, as well they should, for Kamahl would have slain any of them. He planned to destroy even the source of their power, the thing that had made them: the Mirari sword. The beasts knew it.

So did the forest. It had no intention of allowing him to succeed.

From the top of the green canopy, a great bough crashed down toward him. Kamahl couldn't leap aside in time, but he planted his century stalk. It was like a lightning rod, channeling the power of the forest against the forest. The bough struck the staff and split. Massive halves fell to either side of Kamahl.

He stared down at the cross-section. The heartwood of the bough was slender and rotten, but the quick was a single thick ring-all that growth in one year. The Mirari had perverted the singular power of the forest, turning growth to cancer. It had seduced an entire land.

Why do you persecute me? The voice of the wood rose through the staff and shook Kamahl's hand. You, who swore to defend me.

Kamahl climbed up the riven bole and strode toward the spirit well. "I do defend you. I defend you against yourself."

Since last he had departed this cave mouth, it had grown, like all else. Now it seemed the throat of a volcano. Steep sides of mud, shot through with roots, descended to a deep black pit. It would seem an easy enough descent, but when Kamahl's boot dislodged a stone, it rolled down to be snatched up and crushed by the root tangle.

The forest again spoke through his staff. / do not wish you to descend. I wish to keep the sword.

Kamahl nodded gravely. "With the Mirari, what you wish is what will kill you."

No. What I wish is what will kill you.

Kamahl lifted the staff, tucked it to his waist, and hurled himself out over the root network. The white tendrils came alive. They rose and reached. Kamahl flipped over and fell, slipping just past the snapping roots. He plunged. A tip snagged his armor and yanked him back, but he whirled the century stalk and broke its hold. Planting the butt of the staff in the steep wall, Kamahl vaulted down into the blackness.

He passed the hoary lip of the hole and dropped for ten pounding pulses until his feet struck stone. He rolled along a smooth pathway, a wall rising to one side and a sheer drop falling away to the other. Kamahl came to a stop in a small alcove. Sitting there, he panted and waited for his balance to return.

The bright heat of the forest had given way to the dark chill of the underworld. Mutating magic clawed at his flesh and would have twisted or destroyed Kamahl if not for the century staff.

He rose, his eyes adjusting to the light. Staff in hand, he strode out of the alcove and down the tortuous path. Ahead, the trail ended. Wide-spaced peaks jutted above a sheer drop. Kamahl jumped to one, then another, then a third. He bounded to a narrow lip of stone on the far side and ran down a slope of loose scree. At its base, he entered a deep, twisting cavern. While the rocks above had been jagged and broken, shattered by the traumas of growth, these passages were smooth, as if they had been melted. As Kamahl took a few more steps, he realized why. The stone itself was waxy, not hot but quick-growing, changing, moving.

He stood within the cancer itself, and the cancer knew him.

The stone beneath his feet shifted. It withdrew into shallow wells, the edges of which formed claws that clutched Kamahl's feet. He leaped and barely got free, his left foot trailing blood. It would pay to be quick now. He ran. The passage was morphing around him, struggling to close.

Ahead, a narrow section pulled in like a drawstring pouch. Kamahl leapt, leading with his century staff. It rammed through the opening. Kamahl followed. Arms, head, waist-the rock closed over his knees. Growling, Kamahl wrenched himself and his staff through the valve, which slammed shut behind him. He rose quickly, planting the pole for balance.

Through it, the forest spoke. If you think it is hard to get in, imagine how hard it will be to get out.

Kamahl marched on, snarling, "You will let me out. If I succeed, you will be different than you are, and you will let me out."

The chamber before him would have been utterly dark except for its inhabitants: numinous orbs and luminous ectoplasm-the ghosts of the wood. Millions of ghosts. On its own, nature was ravenous. The law of the forest was kill or be killed. When that law was sped up exponentially, the result was genocide. Not just individuals but entire species had ended up in these caves. Spirit hares leaped and dived through the air. Ghostly wolves lurked among archways. Spectral elves sat around a remembered brook and poured their laments to the sky. Every spirit made a keening wail.

The sound tore at Kamahl. Shreds of creatures twisted around his staff. He strode on like a man through sleet.

You will not pass these caves, Kamahl. Though your body advances, your soul is winnowed away.

"These are your aborted children, Krosan. Don't you hear their cries?"

Don't you hear their cries? Their maddening cries?

"I hear them, and I will end them. I will stop this mad growth and the killing it brings."

Growth is growth. Growth is the be-all and end-all. There is no such thing as mad growth or bad growth.

"When growth brings death, when it destroys, it is mad."

The forest grows more in a month than in a century. It has brought more creatures into being than in a millennium.

"And it has ushered out a hundred millennia of species. If this growth continues, the whole forest will be destroyed before winter."

You have given me six months to live. I give you six seconds.

With sudden fury, the spirits in the cave rushed upon him. Ectoplasmic hands grasped the staff and struggled to rip it free. Kamahl held all the tighter, whirling the pole in an arc before him. From its powerful pith flowed the true energy of the wood. It gathered the tormented spirits: In its simple strength, they sensed the old forest, the home they longed for. Like cobwebs wrapping around a stick, the ghosts mantled the staff. They roared and spun in hopes of returning to the way things were. In a scintillating white mass, they covered the head of the staff.

Kamahl advanced into utter blackness, his way lit by the pulsing souls. Their howls were maddening. Still he bore them. As potent as they were to the ears of an outlander, they would be doubly so to the heart of the forest.

Ahead the passage opened into a huge cavern whose ceiling and walls were lost in blackness. The floor was slick and utterly flat, and it gave off wisps of mist. A rotten stench filled the air.

Kamahl had reached the bottom of the labyrinth. He knew what lay at the bottom-or more rightly, who.

There, half sunk in the glassy floor, lay the corpse of Laquatus. Like all else in the rampant forest, this dead thing had grown horrifically. The body was huge. Its feet were as tall as Kamahl. Its legs were as wide around as ancient trees. All across its flesh, scales had turned to leaves, veins to vines, flesh to humus. The corpse had become a forest giant composed of compost. Worse yet, the giant moved. It possessed life but not true life. Its belly quivered with maggots. Its fingers trembled with the shouldering hunger of rats. The gasses of decay filled its chest and came hissing from its lips. In eye sockets, things swam.

Kamahl had the strong impression that if not for the Mirari sword through the thing's heart, it would rise.

It would, Kamahl. Draw that sword, and you will have a giant to fight.

Kamahl did not respond. He had come to stop the rampant growth. He would do so, whatever the cost. He stepped out upon the smooth floor and found it to be unutterably cold. It was ice. The natural fluids of this deep place had been frozen by the unnatural chill of that corpse. Kamahl's boots cut shallow marks into the ice as he went. He walked cautiously, fearing to break through into the black waters below.

The spirits atop the staff moaned all the louder.

"You threaten me with a corpse. I threaten you with spirits," Kamahl said, edging his way along the giant's legs. "The corpse is the creature I killed." He lifted his staff. "The spirits are the creatures you have killed."

Not even the Mirari sword, not even your spirit staff, will stand against this giant. You will never escape this cave with the sword in hand.

Kamahl gritted his teeth. "You have invested me with the power of transformation," he said as he approached the giant's fuming chest, "and now I use my gift upon you."

Holding the spirit staff high in one hand, he reached the other to the Mirari sword. It dragged at his hand, as of old, and begged him to take hold. The sword's seduction had only grown, bedded here in the heart of the wood.

Kamahl had also grown, but inwardly. He would not be so easily enticed again. Grinning with determination, he eased his fingers around that so-familiar hilt. His hand tightened. Flesh touched metal, and mind touched mind.

The forest mind was enormous. Every branch was an axon and every leaf a dendrite, each species an axiom and each creature a thought. Even Kamahl was but a favorite fancy of that great mind. He was a wandering hope that touched other thoughts and changed them, a rubric that freshened the corners of that fetid brain.

Do you see now how small you are? You are only a notion, a thing to entertain or dismiss. What umbrage for an itinerant idea to think it could change the organ that had made it! Do you see how inconsequential your soul is, how meaningless these souls are? They are only old thoughts, forgotten. This growth is not genocide; it is learning. I have not slain all these creatures but only outgrown them. I am thinking thoughts a thousand years beyond you.

Kamahl did not answer aloud. He needn't. His mind was part of the greater mind. He needed only think to remind the forest of those memories it had forgotten. His body became a conduit between the Mirari sword and the spirit staff. Souls raced from wood through flesh and into steel. They took with them their wailing dread, their hopes and desires.

Remember, thought Kamahl, remember these dismembered parts of you. Thoughts are alive. They are creatures who wish and hope, grow and change. Even I am a multitude. You, then, are a multitude of multitudes. To so callously kill these children of yours is to callously kill yourself. Remember. You are more dead than alive, more scar tissue than new flesh. Regain what you have lost. Become again what you once were.

All the while that he spoke, the ghosts of the forest coursed through its forgetful mind. Their piteous wailing brought forth other emotions-recognition, fondness, sadness.

The forest remembered. Once again it saw the bright macaws and heard their sweet cries in its upper branches-pale ghosts returned to life. It glimpsed tigers amid bamboo stalks where tigers no longer survived. It remembered the ticklish touch of bush babies, the patient nibbles of ground squirrels, the savage cries of howler monkeys. All were gone, now and forever.

Worst of all were the millions of vanished insects. Their drone had been the pulse of life. While the insects thrived, all that ate them thrived. They were the foundation of the food pyramid. Now, they were gone. The foundation had cracked and crumbled, and the apex even now was falling in on the rest. The extinction of the smallest thoughts in that great mind foretold the death of the mind itself.

The mourning of the lost spirits had infested the forest. It too began to mourn. While it did so, Kamahl rooted out his true foe, the mind of the Mirari.

Abruptly, it was all around-curious, insatiable, ceaseless. It was a mirror, yes, but liquid. It not only reflected but also conformed to what it encountered. That was why it was so destructive. It became the apotheosis of what it beheld. Among the barbarians, it had become Bloodlust. Among the Northern Order, it had become Tyranny, and among the merfolk, Deception. The Cabal had made it Corruption. The forest made it Cancer.

The Mirari had traveled Otaria and manifested itself as five pure, evil gods.

Still, Kamahl did not sense a mind that was fundamentally evil-only insatiable. It was a mighty intellect, not human or elf or dwarf, but deeply interested in all of them, otherworldly but somehow Dominarian. It wanted to know and grow, and therein lay its magnificent addiction.

Kamahl would teach it. He had sparked the forest's memories to demonstrate its evil. He would spark the Mirari's memories to do the same.

Do you remember when you came to the Northern Order?

It did. It remembered shining in their midst, embodying all that they wished to be. It remembered transforming them into images of perfection. It remembered their worshiping eyes as everything soft and corruptible in them turned to stone. There was no recollection, though, of the misery, of the death.

Kamahl had plenty of recollections. He poured them into the Mirari. Folk froze in place as their legs calcified. Hands shuddered in panic as death crept over them. Screams ceased only when ribs no longer could squeeze out air. The Mirari had given them their hearts' desire and removed the last of doubt. It had killed them.

The insatiable mind darkened a bit. Before, it had merely reflected evil, showing it on its outward skin. Now, true darkness entered the Mirari. Still, it needed more.

Do you remember the young man who first had found you?

The Mirari filled with images of a burned out ruin and a slender young explorer-intent of eye and sure of hand. It recalled the sensation of riding at that young man's side, bouncing against the warmth of his hip, listening to his complex negotiations. There was fondness in the great mind for that young man.

Kamahl showed his own memories of Chainer-when he had lost his innocence and his mind. His shoulders were still young despite the crushing burden they had borne. His eyes were old, though, and his mind older still. His head was coming apart like an onion losing its skin. Layer upon layer of his mind split and sloughed, forming into monsters. Soon there was nothing left of Chainer except monstrosity. Just before that final, horrid divide, the young man had granted Kamahl the Mirari, had beseeched him to carry it away from the Cabal forever.

Again the mirror darkened. It was losing its infinite reflection. Atrocity kills curiosity; virtuous minds cease to want to know. The Mirari was a virtuous mind, and the darkness troubled it. One more memory would bring this rampant growth to an end.

Do you remember what you did for me?

Reluctant, suspicious, the Mirari brought to mind what it had done. It showed Kamahl mantled in power, invincible in battle, surrounded by his admiring people. It showed him overcoming any foes that came against him and ruling more surely than any of his folk ever had.

Kamahl turned his thoughts toward one of those foes-his sister. He remembered the look of horror and betrayal that Jeska wore as his sword sliced into her. He dredged up his deep self-loathing for having struck the blow. He tasted again the bitter gall of fighting her in the arena. Kamahl poured out his terror, all the darkness that clouded his soul. Let it cloud the Mirari. Let it darken the mirror and kill the cancer.

That mind blackened. It had seen enough. No longer would it reflect the world around. Its eye had turned inward to darkness, and it ceased wishing and wanting. It only ached. The Mirari went inert, a benign and inactive tumor in the brain of the forest.

Kamahl had taught it something new-compassion. He had shown it the way past reflections and to the heart.

Do not be so arrogant, Kamahl. You are, after all, but a thought in our mind. We have many more thoughts, ones that could teach you a few things.

Suddenly, Kamahl saw. In its fever, the forest had grown across hundreds of miles of desert. It stopped near the Corian Escarpment, a great spine of granite that thrust up from the sands. On the other side of the stone wall, another realm rampantly expanded-a vast swampland. Just as Kamahl had become the avatar of the wood, his sister-his nearly slain sister-had become the avatar of the swamp.

"I know. She is my own great wrong, which I must right. There are evils that consume me as well. I know."

Not all. You do not know all.

Through the eyes of eagles, the forest saw. It soared above black swamps and found avenues laid there. It followed lines dredged through water and lines laid upon land. Roads, bridges, canals thronged with folk. They rode and walked and sailed along convergences, drawn to the center of a vast web.

And what a center-a great circle in stone. Kamahl had never seen so stately a stadium. Though thousands flocked toward it, a whole nation already sat in its seats. On the sands below, elephants raced fifty abreast. Their feet churned up clouds of dust, and their blade-barded shoulders brought blood from each other. Red lines followed them as they went. Cheers roared out with each pachyderm that fell, and great lizards ran across the sands to tear into the beasts.

The Cabal pits had been recreated for a vaster audience.

Stands, luxury boxes, vendors, waiting pens, the sands, the elephants, the speaker's pinnacle-all of it centered on a single figure. Jeska. The unhealing wound on her belly had festered into a wound on the world.

Leave the Mirari sword here. It can do me no more harm and can do you no more good. Leave the sword, and leave the forest giant that it pins.

I will let you go from the cave, from the forest. You have set right the evil within me. Now, you must set right the evil within you.

Go, Kamahl. Take your army. Bring back Jeska.