SEALS

Chapter 14: The Secret City

Wander stood atop ancient brickwork overlooking the remains of what appeared to be a great center of convention and commerce. There were channels for water, pillars and a broken street. He looked down the street as he explored the area. For just a moment, he saw people milling about and market stalls before a great temple. Suspended thresholds became narrow second-level streets upon which people walked. Structures built of wood, mud and other lesser materials had long since rotted away. Only stone and firm concrete remained through Time.

The ghost-images of the long-dead vanished. Wander gripped his sword and tried to pinpoint the location of his enemy again. The memories that tugged at him were not his own. The ritual was nearly complete. Most of the hunter's blood was now black. Most of his soul had darkened.

Running through the empty ruins, Wander remembered the "secret city" belonging to him, Mono and their friends. It was a game they'd played as children – seeking out secluded alleyways and buildings that people didn't use anymore. There was one old house they'd set up a secret club in, complete with a small garden, overgrown with weeds. There had been rumors that the clan that had once held it was wiped out in an epidemic long before any of them were born. Most of the children of the city thought it was haunted, but Wander and Mono had found it clear of black spirits. It became a place for them and their friends to play.

This broken manor and all of the water runoff outlets, secret alleys and secret bridges were not a secret to the adults in their lives, but the children thought they were. Of course, they thought they had discovered the special places of their city hidden within the city. Like the discoverer of a hole-in-the-wall restaurant or tavern, "their city" was a special thing of their own, something they felt that only they knew about even as what they'd found was already widely-known.

As they grew from children into young adults, Wander and Mono had found out just what a non-secret the "secret city" had been the whole time, but those lonely places became no less special for it.

Wander clambered over a fallen pillar. The beings within him recognized the grand temple as one that had not been dedicated to them. The Colossus was awakened and raced down to destroy the invader. Wander panicked and scrambled up another broken pillar. This one was quicker than the one that had guarded the fire! It was also just as well-armored.

The young man jumped and gripped onto the ancient columns and supports. He ran across grass-covered stone roads as the angry hulk below him rammed into them, trying to knock him down. Briefly studying the creature's movements and apparent strength let Wander know that falling and becoming ground borne was a certain death-sentence, even in his already corpse-like and strangely strengthened body.

Hefting himself atop a great pillar, he paused and watched the Colossus pace like an angry cat below. In truth, the creature's body-style and movements reminded him slightly more of a dog – it was like one of the great, swift hunting hounds that men in gathered, horseback hunts set after wild boars. Boars were dangerous, so the dogs that felled them had to be equally dangerous. The Colossus was a bit like a boar, too. It pawed the earth with a hoof upon growing bored and agitated.

Wander sent some arrows its way. He knew they'd just bounce off the back-armor, but if he could get the creature to keep on chasing him, he could leap between safe vantage-points until he could find some weak-but-heavy structure that could crack its armor… or a cliff to send it off of. Unfortunately, he had not seen any sufficient ravines – just the ancient city.

He wondered how long this place had lain undisturbed as he jumped and climbed up another tall pillar. Wondering about this place gave him a mild distraction from his sore and scraped fingers. His hands were made of calluses now. His fingertips and the edges of his palms were almost like hooves. They could still crack and bleed when caught upon sharp edges of rain-worn stone. The blood was dark, but just a little red at the edges and when the sunlight hit it just right. This gave what was left of his humanity a little bit of hope.

Wander felt the pillar he was on going down and jumped in a way as to land atop the edge instead of falling into the grass. He'd found a beautiful secret city, one that he and Mono could possibly share and rebuild once this whole ordeal was over and she was alive again. They certainly could not go back to their own city. He knew that his attempted actions here constituted a clean break from life as he'd known it. As it was, he was destroying this beautiful, skeletal city and dashing the potential for its resurrection. Watching the armored face that was charging at him, he knew that it was an unfortunate necessity.

Eventually, the ruins lay even more ruined. Wander narrowly avoided instant death as he made a mad scramble for something to climb after the last pillar fell. He managed to heft himself up onto a wall just as his enraged prey figured out where he was and came straight for him. The hunter stood in relative safety and taunted the creature with arrows, having found just what he'd needed.

As the dumb stone beast cracked open its casing, Wander made a mad scramble to avoid the wrath of the hound. Perching safely upon a fallen pillar, he watched the Colossus stun itself, jumped onto its hairy back, made several clumsy butcher's-stabs and held on for a swift tour of the destruction he and the beast had wrought together.

He actually prayed to Dormin as he drove the sword home for the final time because he didn't think he'd be able to get an opportunity to strike again. With the final breaking of the seal, both of Wander's "secret cities" were once again lost to the indifferent void of Time.