The Queen's Pain

Chapter 3-2

“What are you humming?” Ken asked, hiding her irritation.

Two and a half weeks—the time it took to create a reasonable barrier around the entire town—and now Kenna needed to look for weak places to fortify. Of which there were many, thus the reason for bringing Jaden, who had a notebook and pen. The woman wasn’t exactly much for conversation, and she had almost nothing in common with Ken, but she wrote good notes, and everyone else was busy.

Sniffing compulsively, she rubbed at her nose with the back of her hand. Ken made a mental note to wash up, should they ever come in physical contact. “Umm, it’s Joshua Fit the Battle of Jericho. You’ve never heard it before?”

“Not sure,” she laughed. The melody sounded familiar, but she didn’t recognize the title. Another religious song, she thought. Jaden knew pretty much all of them. But Kenna’s interest in Christianity ended with learning stories from the Bible. She knew some passages by heart, but no songs. She hadn’t been to church since she was a young child. While the town did have a pastor, who led services every week, Ken never attended one, though she heard they were a pleasant experience.

Jaden smiled nervously. “You know: ‘And the walls came tumbling down.’ Sorry, with what we’re doing, the music is in my heart.”

Ken let Jaden have her poetic attachment. “Well, don’t sing it too loud, huh? You’ll give our woodland neighbors bad ideas. This wall needs to stay up if we’re gonna keep them out, right?—Oh, look, the wood is rotten here. Again. Where are we?”

Looking around, Jaden scribbled something down. “Mile one point two five.” She cleared her throat. “What if they’re meant to get in?”

“They’re not.”

She wrinkled her nose. “But if God put them here, then there’s a chance—”

“No,” Ken shut her down immediately. “They don’t belong here. They shouldn’t even exist. Someone used an unnatural force to make them. Not a god. A person. There may be someone looking down on us. I don’t know. But these things aren’t His or Her doing. In fact, they live and breathe to destroy what’s actually supposed to be here.”

“You don’t know that for sure, though.”

Gritting her teeth, “Yes, I do. I haven’t met the people who are doing this, but I’ve seen their work. And my dad has come face to face with them. Let me tell you, if you’re looking for a reason behind all this, it’s not God. It’s the other guy.”

“I was always taught that the devil couldn’t create, only destroy.”

“These things do destroy. Everything. And so does the evil behind them. The talisman gives the power to create.” Besides, the same people who taught Jaden her doctrines also forced her to marry a man four times her age before she hit puberty. But that wasn’t her fault. “Anyway, think of it this way: God put you here, with people who could protect you from these monsters. You’re behind our walls because you’re meant to be. Maybe we all are. We’re the forces of good. The only reason the wall isn’t perfect is because we had to build it so quickly.”

She nodded but said nothing further. Ken couldn’t be certain whether Jaden believed the speech or not. Since it was her job to care for the people of New Somerset, however, Ken couldn’t let the girl stew in her fear and uncertainty. “Look, I know you’re scared,” she continued quietly. “We all are. But it’s gonna be okay. If you wanna go back to the house, that’s fine. I can finish up on my own. It’s not a big deal.”

“I—uh,” was all the woman managed to reply.

Ken turned to face her and reached for the notebook. “Come on.”

But she shook her head and pointed at the space behind Kenna’s shoulder. Her mouth moved, but no words came out. Just a sound, something like a low cry. It didn’t take a genius to realize that her reaction had nothing to do with their little talk.

Spinning in place, Ken drew a large knife from her belt and faced the subject of Jaden’s terror.

It was just a hand—a claw—resting on the barbed wire of an unfortunately low part of the fence. But the appendage was easily the size of either woman, with talons matching the full length of Ken’s forearm. Her jaw dropped open. This wasn’t some hybrid deer or wolf. In her imagination, the creature could only be a dinosaur or dragon.

She heard it breathe out and felt a rumble in the ground below her feet. The hooked nails pulled on the weakened barrier. It bent outward. The whining and cracking of wood sent a pang of fear through Ken’s whole body. All their hard work, and this thing could easily destroy the one partition that separated their small town from a wilderness filled with monstrosities.

With her heart pounding, Ken pointed her measly knife at their foe. Addressing Jaden, “Go back home, as fast as you can,” she instructed in a somewhat calm voice. “Tell everyone. Adelaide first, and the scouts. And my dad. Tell them to bring everything they’ve got. Go now.”

There was no response, but she heard Jaden’s hiking boots dig into the dirt as she sprinted away.

Ken took a moment to assess the situation before deciding that the best route would be to lead it far from town. With a little contortion, she scaled a more stable section of the fence and jumped down on the other side. The thing, which looked something like a long salamander or snake with legs, moved low to the ground. It glistened in the sun between shadows of leaves and trees and was, unfortunately, about the length of two school buses. Its eyes, of which there were at least six in different sizes, didn’t notice her at first. It seemed only concerned with removing the obstruction so that it could continue its path downward.

When she looked up, Ken saw that the lizard had uprooted and damaged several trees, along with digging a gully as it stumbled down the mountain. It didn’t seem as though the creature worked well on steep inclines. There were cuts to its flesh from tree branches and rocks, and it seemed bloated in the middle. Silently, Ken wondered if the dragon was pregnant.

No matter. If this was the end result, its young would need to be exterminated just as much. She picked up a long stick and banged it against the fence. “Hey, you!” she called to it, stomping her feet. “Hey, you ugly walking sausage, come here! Come over here!”

The dragon turned faster than she thought possible, and in doing so, demolished part of the barrier. Ken dropped the stick and quickly darted up the mountain.

While the creature folded in on itself and made a U-turn, Ken relied on her significantly smaller size to work toward her advantage. She jumped over obstacles, squeezed between boulders, and weaved her way through heavy underbrush and tangled trees. Her slimy foe somehow managed to gain ground on her, however. It flung rocks down the cliff face as though they were hollow, and pushed its massive weight with a powerful, lumbering force.

She stopped in a thicket to ponder her next move. Her opponent’s mouth opened and a forked tongue slipped out, tasting the air and dirt for any trace of its potential prey. Maybe it would give up and pick another path away from New Somerset if she was just quiet enough. Maybe it would think her little fortress wasn’t worth the effort and move on to some safer location.

Instead, it caught Ken’s scent and barreled straight for her hiding place.

She only had time for one breath, and in it, she released the familiar words of the only talisman that came to mind. Not a weapon. Not anything that could even injure this beast. “A’nosh eta ma.” The crystal she’d inherited from her dead grandmother. The one true necklace that belonged on her person at all times. And the only one that actually made her feel safe.

Protection from violence by organic force. Living beings. It could stop anything from a dog trying to bite her to a human punch. With the stone activated, nothing using claws, teeth, or skin could get at her. In fact, there was a buffer zone that varied across her body, anywhere from about three inches to a hand’s length.

The purple and gray stone began glowing just in time. As the full weight of the creature pressed down upon her, it stopped agonizingly close. She watched with part horror and part fascination as it struggled not only to rip her to pieces but, unable to do so, swallow her whole. The edges of its mouth came down on either side of Ken as she lay on her back among downed trees and broken branches. But it couldn’t touch her. Not the fangs or the whip-like tongue. Not even the saliva, which she could only assume contained venom or some kind of toxin.

Its breath reeked of decay and death. As it dug in around her, trying desperately to bite through her magic shield, Ken weighed her options. The gun in a holster on her hip would work, but the sound could be deafening, and if this thing had any friends, it might alert them or draw them nearer to the town. Her other talismans would do the job, too, but could she really face a ball of fire engulfing her from every angle? Even though it wouldn’t actually burn her, Ken would rather surround herself with maggots than flames. Only one of those things produced a chilling sense of dread so deep that even the thought filled her up with terror.

The knife, then. A hand-forged, kukri-style blade given as a gift from the town’s self-taught blacksmith.

She wriggled back through the monster’s wide, unhinged jaw, gripped her weapon with all the strength she possessed, and shoved it as hard as possible into the roof of her attacker’s mouth. Thick, black blood oozed and then gushed from the wound as she withdrew further. It reared back, taking out a few trees along the way. Ken scrambled to her feet and jumped over a log. The oversized, snake-like tail pivoted in an attempt to knock her down, but when it hit her invisible barrier, the flesh simply stopped dead.

Though it proved more than a little intimidating, Ken reached out and slashed at the monster’s side. She dug the blade in as far as her bubble would allow and began walking, slowly, toward the head, which continued to try and swallow her.

It screeched and tore away, bringing her knife along with. But by now, the gash was so large that the weight of the animal worked against it. The terrain helped, as well. Writhing, the monster caught itself on the foliage and rocks and only opened the wound further. Boulders went flying. More trees fell. But Ken could hear the flesh tearing, as though there were no other sounds. She looked into the monster’s belly. She saw tendons and muscles snap around a giant internal organ that bulged outward like a water balloon inside layers of grotesque tissue and a surprisingly fragile series of rib bones.

Not a pregnancy, she thought, backing away carefully. Inside the bloodied pouch, pressed against an ever-thinning casing, was something with intricate horns. Not an overgrown baby salamander. A dead creature similar, if not identical, to the mutated elk those hunters killed. It was a stomach filled to the brim, not a uterus. Though the monster tried to consume her, its digestive system could never have accommodated even her miniature size in addition to the previous meal.

As blood—red now—and innards spilled outward, the smell overpowered her. She dashed a few yards away and vomited onto her favorite pair of sneakers. “f**k,” Ken muttered. It would take forever to get the smell of stomach acid and half-digested lunch out of the fabric, no matter how hard she scrubbed. Why couldn’t her talisman protect against her own puke?

When she looked back toward her dying conquest, she witnessed, just in time, the appearance of a small tear in the stomach cavity. One of the antlers pierced it. The monster groaned as the sack ripped open. The contents spilled out in a black and brown stew of decomposing mutant meat that smelled worse than anything she’d ever experienced. A putrid, bacteria-ridden carcass lay in a flood of mucus, oily residue, and something that looked like road tar. It was bigger than the other one, but there could be no denying that it was another mutant—an elk with canines like a saber tooth tiger and spines along its neck.

The giant lizard that ate it lasted only a few moments after its disemboweling. Long enough to try and fail to stand. It reached for the mess, as though it could simply stuff it all back in. But the pathetic creature couldn’t save itself. The head drooped, landing on the ground with a heavy thud, and the cold eyes lost what little light they once had. Ken gave it a few more seconds just to make sure she’d really killed it. God, what if there were more of these things out here?

“Dumb dragon,” she chastised it. “You were already full. Why’d you have to come bother us? Now look at you.” Her eyes followed the trail of blood, digestive fluids, and internal organs down the side of the mountain, where they pooled next to a large, flat rock. It was a disgusting display, and it would certainly attract other animals, along with the body itself. Something would have to be done about it.

But that job would be left to someone else. Or rather, a group of New Somerset inhabitants—heavily armed—who were willing and able to not only bury some of the evidence but light the rest on fire. Ken had done her job of protecting the town. She could leave the dirty work to others.

She gave the trees a good long look just to make certain that no other oversized reptiles were lurking. Finding none, not even a suspicious shadow, she slowly found her way down to the fence. Stiff muscles could have made the climb more difficult if the creature hadn’t flattened a whole section, which would of course need to be mended as soon as humanly possible. She made a mental note about it, but tried not to let the issue add to her anxiety. Ken would find comfort in the orders given to others.

She would pretend that killing something twenty times her size was commonplace.

And when asked? She would insist that there could never be more than one of those things lurking in the area without someone noticing. They might believe it.