Chapter 154: Unrecognizable

Chapter 154: Unrecognizable

Niama. That was the only word that they clung to as they were trapped in the Lich’s dark garden. Niama will save us, each of them whispered to each other, like the frightened sisters they were.

No one was coming to save them, though. Only Lunaris tried to visit them the once in that desperate place, but before she could even whisper whatever message it was she’d dared come to deliver, a whirlwind of inky black barbwire sprung up out of the hateful thing that was the circle that bound them together, and she was forced to take flight lest she be caught alongside the rest of them.

It had been the only moment of hope that the three of them had experienced since they’d been stolen from the moon, and now it had turned only into a bitter stone in all their hearts.

After that, the only visits they ever received were from that terrible shade. Sometimes, it came in the body of one of its servants, but more often, it came as a dark thunderhead billowing with wicked powers.

Sometimes their captor tormented them words, but it always tormented them with pain as it cut away at who they were and pruned them into its desired shape. They had no idea of what that was, of course. All they could see were the bleak walls that surrounded the dead courtyard, and the leaden sky above them as the goddesses slowly forgot everything they’d ever known.

They had all had names once. Tarieneian Vale. Verdant Glade. Thornwood. Now they often had trouble remembering who was who, and when they spoke they were no longer sure if they were talking to themselves or each other.

It gained other things, though, while it lost so much. Sometimes, that would be a strange new power manifesting, but mostly it was hate. The monstrosity that had been three Goddesses slowly became consumed by hate more with every passing day as everything they’d loved about themselves faded away. It hated what the darkness had done to it, but it could not stop or protect itself. It could not even fight back.

One day one of her voices just stopped, and a few weeks later a second one followed. The corrupted nature spirit didn’t know if those two parts of itself had died or finally merged. Since it couldn’t remember which of the three it had been and which two were the ones that had vanished, it seemed to be the later. That realization wasn’t enough to keep it from feeling alone. Reêad latest novels at novelhall.com

That was when the Lich finally branded them with their new identity. By the time that dread creature showed up that fateful night wielding a darkly glowing wand with a smoldering tip, they had long since forgotten who they were or even what they were. The monstrosity that had once been more was bound to its tree like an anchor, but that did not stop it from pacing around the ring that was the boundary of its existence as it slowly mutated from something more plant than animal to something more animal than plant in a desperate and almost unconscious attempt to be free.

“There’s no escape for you,” the skeleton rasped when it finally stopped before it, just outside the line.

“No?” she asked, lashing out at the monster that had taken so much from her even as she knew that the thorny vines could’t cross the boundary any more than the rest of her. “Then come in here with me and I will settle for revenge.”

As the natural monstrosity spoke, she grew terrible claws from her six arms, but the Lich showed no reaction. Instead, with a few muttered words, she felt something gripping her heart even as it tried to beat in her chest.

“The only revenge you shall ever have is mine,” it intoned as she fell to her knees. “You will tear apart the Gods and Goddesses you once called friends—”

“Never!” she spat, but the Lich ignored her.

“You shall be their undoing,” it continued. “And when their souls are mine, I shall give you a gift.”

She tried to feast on nature's bounty here, but found the essence almost tainted. Could the darkness’s reach really extend so far? She wondered as she began to search for allies so she could explain what happened.

Shortly after noon she looked into a pond at her reflection and she immediately regretted it. What she saw was a horror. The left and right side of her face clearly belonged to two different people, and even if she had recognized whose body it had been originally, the fact that she had six arms made her look anything but natural. She was a monster, a nameless monster.

She concentrated, and after a few seconds she was able to become something close to what she thought that she might have one looked like. Even the indistinct features and curled vines that were only vaguely man shaped were better than the alternative, though.

It was almost twilight when she found a small encampment of the children of the forest. She concentrated, and with some effort, she forced her strange, new body to return to a form that they might find more pleasing.

“Greetings wanders, I come in—” As she spoke, the elves drew their weapons, obviously sensing something was wrong about her.

“Who are you?” one of the ageless young men demanded in the musical language of his race, pointing his black glass dagger at her. “You stink of evil. How did you find your war through our glamours.”

She wanted to tell him that the glamours, and the way they glowed in the deeping gloom were the reason she’d found them at all in the first place, but even as she opened her mouth to explain how she’d been captured and tortured by the evil gripping the land she felt the Lich smoothly slide into her mind.

“Such a good huntress,” it whispered in mock praise. “You’ve only just been released into the wild, and already you’ve found some of my most elusive quarry. Make sure not to let them get away.”

“I would never!” she hissed, trying to resist the command, but even as she did so, she felt her disguise coming undone and her other arms slipping free as their claws extended.

“By the goddess,” the closest forest child whispered, backing away as the ones farther from her started to scatter and run for their lives.

“You cannot escape me,” the Lich continued, ignoring the growing chaos. “Even if you could, you would soon starve to death because the light is forever lost to you. So, my Queen of Thorns, it is time to claim your destiny. Feast on the flesh of your allies by the time the sun rises, or I shall call you a failed experiment and feast on your soul instead.”

After that, the Lich was gone, but it didn’t matter. As he said that terrible name, Queen of Thorns, the profane symbols he’d carved into her very soul sprang to life and began to burn inside her like a forest fire. She now knew who she was again, for the first time in months, but she did not like it.

It became harder to think after that, and as her body began to shift with every move, and the bloody thorns erupted through her bark colored skin, she didn’t even try. She felt the hunger now, and she scented her prey, and that was enough.

A few minutes ago, she’d been a mutilated goddess looking for allies to save her, and now she was a thorned, eight-legged hunting cat bounding down the fading trail to rip those same allies to pieces. Part of her screamed in horror at this turn of events. She never even suspected that the Lich would let her escape, but now it was too late. She was gaining on her quarry rapidly, and any second, she’d be able to rip out his ageless little throat and drink the sweet taste of elder blood before she started looking for another corpse.