Ars Hyrannor: Book of the Bloodcallers

CHAPTER 2: DMI'LAUS

Very far away.

The open sea.

Dmi’Laus breathed in the salted, wet air, as his small ship soared across the waves. His wake a flowing gown, sails flush with air, he couldn’t contain himself as he roared against the wind.

The blue flying beneath him was his home. Yes, he had the island, he had his own home, he had his people. But they were nothing compared to the sea. Energy coursed through his body, tossing him across and abroad his ship, rote memory and trained talent in a dance with the vessel, expertly piloting the tiny craft across miles and miles of ocean.

A dance was the best way he could describe it, really. His ship, the winds and seas, his body, all moving in concert, working with and against eachother, all to create an act that intoxicated him, backed by the deafening song of the winds and waves.

His boat wasn’t anything impressive. A two-person vessel, fleet and thin, made for messengers between islands. Ofcourse, Laus was skilled enough to work it by himself. Thee single sail, atleast, made that easy. Had he had a longer ship, with two -or Mother above forbid- three sails, he might have a little bit more trouble. No, this ship would work.

Far from sailing for fun, he had somewhere to be; the stretch of sea where people fished this season was dry of fish. This could mean two things: either a Soleshark had swam too north and had her fill, or a Leviathan had arrived. The shark, Laus could handle. Either scare her south, or send her to the seafloor. A Leviathan?

Dmi’Laus was the only person who could make it out alive.

Beneath him, the water began to bleed a deeper blue, and the water steadied. He was here. Hooking a halyard into the crook of his arm, he leaned down and picked up his harpoon.

Whalebone -a rib, he believed. A delicately carved pole allowing for tight leather strapping, sealskin. The head was long, made of the strong of the bone, with 3 hooks and a fine blade.

Counter-intuitively, he really hoped he had to use it.

Leaning over the side of the boat, he peered into the water. Nothing. And, not nothing in the sense of nothing unusual. Simply… nothing. Likely not a single soleshark. A pair of some different variety? Maybe they had been off completely, and something had come from the north? Would be an easy hunt; it was warmer up north, and whatever he fought would be exhausted from cold and keeping itself warm.

All this was to avoid thinking of the worst. The chance they had been right.

His knuckles turned white with grip.

He decided to check what starboard had for him.

Precious minutes passed, as the sun-pierced sea revealed nothing in the way of life. It was shallow enough he’d be able to see the bottom if he put his head under, but he wasn’t willing to do so not knowing what was down there.

This entire stretch of sea -around 4 seamiles long and just as wide- was dead. He could almost begin doubting that he could sort things out.

But, alone in barren sea? ‘I can’t’ is a thought you should never let yourself have.

Dmi’Laus would not be the most accomplished in his caste, had he ever let himself think that.

A ripple.

Small enough, you would not notice it on a bigger boat. Small enough, you would not notice it with dimmer senses. Small enough, you would not notice it without being on your highest alert.

A gentle ripple in the waves.

No time to think. Better he deal with the wrong target, than risk not dealing with the right target.

He mantled Power. Yes, his body was the strongest it could be, firm muscle coursing through, woven with expert memory and reflex, knapped into a fine machine to do his work. But there was a Power beyond power. Not in his muscles, but in his veins, in his heart, in his mind.

He swung his harpoon, but he also pushed. Force like a speeding ship sailed through his arm, into his weapon, and out into the world.

Waves parted.

The sea rent apart.

Blood mixed with the waves.

And dark, slick skin was all it revealed.

Leviathan hide.

“That…” he though, prepared for it to be his last thought, “was very stupid.”

Wiping blood off his breast, he scrambled back, and wrenched the sail. No use, no way he’d be able to get to speed quickly enough- let alone have that speed be fast enough to escape.

A massive fin eclipsed the sun above him, as his ship was pushed to a stop.

“Damn it all…” he growled, turning as another splash signalled the next emergence.

The Leviathan’s head was long, she could have eaten the whole boat in one bite. Black, shining, like volcanic glass, the two openings atop her burst with spouts of water- Shit. She turned, pointing a deep, abyssal eye at him. The side of her face was riddled with scars; white flesh scribbled on its maw, across its face, down to its reared torso. She wasn’t any Leviathan. She was one who’d been through Hell and back.

Laus would have to match up to Hell, then.

She peered into his eyes, and began passing the ship between her fin and her mouth. Taunting. Playing. Insulting.

Laus wanted to rage, to strike, to cleave its head straight off its snaking body, but he couldn’t push himself. For one, it would do nothing. Leviathan were tough, impossibly so, like he had pushed himself to be impossibly strong, perhaps. But the more pressing matter was how he couldn’t leap anywhere when he was focused on staying inside the now shaking boat.

The Leviathan finally made one decisive push, and the boat flipped.

Cold. Bitter cold. Angry cold.

Damn. It. All.

Damn it to Hell.

Damn this beast, Damn his home, and Damn this sea.

He was a Son of the Sea. How DARE he go down like this.

A Son of the Sea…

***

“Daughters of the Sea,” the Priestess began. Fires surrounded her, mounted on bamboo poles, as drums emanated from down the cliff. The children all sat around the sermon, atop the steep hill, coated in thick moss and mycellium, as the celebrations raged below. “It is not just a name we call ourselves, you know. The sea birthed us, and gives us life. And so,” she gestured to the crowd below. They raved and revelled around a single fire, a mass of bodies and instruments, the crowd of noises all creating a singular cacophony. “We give back to her,” The Priestess continued.

Dmu’Laus didn’t understand. She didn’t understand alot, she found. Why was this noise good for the sea? Why did the sea make them? Did the sea want them to do this?

And alot more, too. Why didn’t men get to do all the jobs women did? Why did they hate the people of the west-most island? Why couldn’t she eat ice coconut for breakfast?

Was she just stupid?

“Alright, girls”- something about that felt wrong to Laus. She didn’t know why. It didn’t feel like it fit with her. Like she wasn’t included. Wasn’t a girl. -“Who can tell me what a Sail hunter does?”

A girl near Laus shot up, her face a contortion of eagerness and self-pride. “I know!”

The Priestess smiled gently, “And?”

“They aren’t scared of anything! They go out all by themselves, they go to the sea, and they hunt all the scary animals!”

All alone on the sea? That doesn’t sound half bad, by Laus’ estimation.

“Very good!” She congratulated, the girl sitting with a radiant look, “they’re one of the smallest castes, because almost noone is that brave and strong! Only a, super brave, women are ever Sail hunters at a time…”

***

Dmi- yes. Dmi, like a man. Not the feminine Dmu. DMI’Laus had declared himself a Sail hunter the very next day, and that was almost 12 years ago, now. Declaring himself a man was different- personal. He knew, probably not as well as he could, what men went through. Was it so bad for him to be scared to say?

Whether they all knew or not, he was a Son of the Sea.

And it was funny he was having such domestic thoughts as he began to drown.

No. No no no. No gentle goodnights.

The Sea’s motherly embrace tempted him, but he knew it would be a Leviathan’s jaws next.

He kicked, powerful kicks, too powerful kicks. His hearth thumped in his ear, as he surfaced and roared out an inhale.

“Leviathan-!” he choked out, “You cannot have me!”

In that same breath, he flexed his arms, ready to fling his harpoon.

On cue, the beast speared out of the water, wrenching his maw open, as it moved to eat Laus in one piece.

He threw. Hard.

He never expected it to work. He braced himself to be a martyr, to join the stars. He was prepared to have his pyre burn that false name.

And he was proven wrong.

Blood sprayed, coating his pale skin, as the beast toppled to the side, bringing him inside.

Darkness.

It jostled, lurched. It wrenched aside, as if still alive and trying to bring him down with it. Pulling the harpoon free, he was greeted with light, showing him a path through the Leviathan’s brain, before it was cut off by the sea and her great darkness.

Well, now he was oriented.

Pushing the jaw open, he found the corpse buoyant. The underside of its lengthy mass was a milky white, stark against the blackness above, and his wrecked ship was easy to find on the plank hide.

“This… might be an even more stupid idea…” He said to himself, or perhaps the Leviathan.

A sail pierced its gut easily, noxious scents spilling out, and a rope tied easily around its broad tail. He shook it, and it proved strong. Well, strong enough. Enough to unfurl the sail, and feel as the body got to speed.

The hardest part of sailing a makeshift corpse boat wasn’t the shape of the carcass, or the stability of the sail, but rather the length of the corpse. Leviathan were big- Seas Below it was only now setting in on him what he’d done. The battle-rush was gone from him. He’d killed a Leviathan. Veritable Ocean Goddesses. Massive as some whales, long as the longer ones, and more mighty than any. Witty as a woman, if legends were to be believed. So mightsome, infact, that when they had heard of an entire, fruitful, stretch of sea drying up, it was considered overkill to suggest one was at fault.

This one had to be old.

No woman, or even a man if you wanted to be inclusive, should be able to best one.

Laus was good, he knew that. But he’d ensured he stayed out of legend.

Stayed alone. Where he wanted to be.

—

The islands graced the horizon like beads in a braid, the only place safe from the sea in the world. Priestesses told of the world, the sea, as a massive whale, and the islands as barnacles on its back. The chalky stone certainly looked the part, and it helped to distinguish the islands from the canvas of wine-dark sea and sky blue it stood against.

Not so soon after he could see the islands, did the islands see him. He knew it would happen, but he still dreaded docking. Explaining this. Knowing that he’d ascend to legend status as soon as they saw him with a broken spear and a pierced Leviathan.

Damn. It. All.

Was it so wrong he still wanted to be the best at what he did, but also didn’t want to be anyone that anyone would want to see? He’d tailored himself to solitude, never entertained the idea of finding a husband -a luxury such an important caste could afford- and fought his whole life to be by himself.

That seemed like years wasted, now, as he approached the dock with a Leviathan carcass beneath his feet.

Droplets splashed, a halo around him, as he beached the head of the Leviathan. He was reflected in all of them. It didn’t feel like his face. Rather, the face of a legendary woman, to be carved in stone. Not for him to live as.

Mostly women awaited him, it was the hour when only manual labour was still ongoing, all the craftswomen and scholars and priestesses busy with nothing in particular. They had killed a whale not long ago, and fresh ivory jewelled the crowd. All the adults, Laus included, were wearing newly made corsets. A few especially modest people had whalebone in their neck-covers, but really Laus never saw the need to do anything but cover it up.

Crowds always made him self-conscious, but it was usually about his body. His chest, for example. Sometimes, it felt like the world was one chest-measuring competition. Atleast men also strove for large chests too, but. Come on. He honestly wished it was ok to cover them outside of winter.

No, right now he felt conscious about what he’d done.

It felt stupid, to be ashamed of a feat of hymns. But he felt stupid often. What kind of stupid woman called herself a man?

“I took care of the predator problem.” He announced, curt as he stepped onto land, from his Heaven to the Hell that was other people.