***** Author's Note *****
I am terribly sorry about the posting delay. I was having severe writer's block. Thank you for your understanding!
Don't want to wait for more? Now Available! Read up to Chapter 78 on my discord! Link in my bio!
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73
As Alaesia had suspected, the curtain of vegetation seemed to be hiding what she could only describe as a cave, but not a natural one as she was familiar with. A dark tunnel stretched out before her, and beyond, stone walls, though weathered and cracked, lined the area in a great round arc. It seemed the mound was almost entirely hollow, save for an arcade of pillars that formed structural rings around the whole thing and seemingly sectioned off various areas from the central chamber. Patterns carved into the faces of the walls bore intricate detail, possibly depicting imagery of figures and landscapes, but it didn't quite make sense to Alaesia.
Her fingers brushed over the mossy carvings delicately, taking in the sight with awe. Someone must have spent unfathomable time creating such beautiful artwork. It was something so captivating, Alaesia hardly would have believed it existed if it hadn't been tangible. The tunnel's opening to the chamber beyond revealed the sad sight of a portion of the mound's ceiling collapsed to rubble in the center of the room, but it was likely the only reason she could see, for how dark the deeper portions were. Small tendrils of sunlight, and more Mokob-hai pouring down, tried to reach the floor of the chamber, but dissipated and grew obscured in the mists that sank low within.
She almost wished, for a moment, that Zathra was there, able to share in the strange sight with her, before realizing, she could at least carefully make a mental note of the details to pass along later; that was if she could willingly find the courage to allow him to prod her mind. Perhaps that was the best thing to attempt, for everything around her was just so bizarre to the woman, having only lived as an outcast, such a structure seemed like it was straight out of a fantastic tale her parents might have told. She wasn't sure she'd be able to make heads nor tails of this place herself, let alone identify anything that might be magical in nature to return to the orc.
Alaesia moved cautiously deeper, noting a couple of rats that scampered away at her approach. Upon breaching the inner area, she found it hard to peer into the shadows to make out any discernible detail, but there seemed to be several stone blocks, lined up in a radial pattern between archways. Some were completely intact, while a couple looked worse for wear; one looked like a big stone block from the ceiling must have landed right on it, cracking it wide open. To Alaesia's surprise, the block seemed to be hollow inside and where it had been cracked, she was only just able to peer in.
It was only as she took a step closer to the stone box for a better look, that a rustling noise shifted and moved overhead. Alaesia ducked back into the shadows, eyeing the gaping hole in the ceiling of the chamber nervously, but it was a voice emerging from the shadows just by her shoulder that nearly made her scream, "What is this little thing, not trouble-ed by ssscent nor sssong?"
Alaesia gasped and scrambled back towards the center of the chamber in a panic, and scanned the room frantically for whoever it was that had uttered the query. Her voice rose in a shaky demand of her own, "Who's th-there?!"
"Neither orc, nor elf, is it little thing?" The voice was calm and quiet, slowly moving around her through the shadow.
"N-no..." Alaesia stammered. Her mouth suddenly turned dry as she tried to move to put some of the fallen stone blocks of the roof between herself and the disembodied voice. The darkness pressed in around her as if whatever stalked the shadows wanted to remain hidden. She flinched at a rustle that passed behind her, and whirled to face the gloom, but was unable to pinpoint anything amongst the leaves and creepers. "I'm h-human, of men..."
"Not man either," it retorted, maintaining its dry, level tones, "A flower, but wilt-ed, sssorrowed and seedless... How doesss it come to be here?"
Alaesia let out a muted cry of fright, as her eyes settled on a face, disguised beneath a mass of greenery... no... a part of the vegetation itself.
A thin, lithe figure slid forward, parting mists and plants at its approach from the shadows. The strange being loomed tall above her, his own head, a crown constructed of all manner of twigs and vines, nearly brushing sections of the ceiling. The entity seemed to be like some bizarre mixture of forest and man alike, but so far beyond such traits as well, like a creature of fairy tales.
"A-Are you an elf?" the question escaped her lips before Alaesia realized it. She had fallen back, leaning against the pile of stones at the center of the room, completely in awe at the figure who seemed as if the forest itself had created him. She held back the stuttering in her heart that told her to flee, while recalling Zathra's words for when she was faced with danger; Never Run. Whether or not this thing was a predator, she didn't dare risk provoking him. At the very least, to Alaesia's relief, he bore no resemblance to orcs or any other of their ilk; his very countenance seemed to whisper like leaves in the wind.
A soft rattle passed the thing's thin lips; a chuckle. It looked down at her through hooded, emerald eyes, "Sssuch a curiousss flower she. Not elf, ssseedless bloom, broodseed of Nurnen am I. Cultivated by elvish handsss long afore. Many namesss have I."
"N-Names? Wh-What would you have me c-call you?" Alaesia asked softly, eyes flickering nervously around to try to remember where the entrance to the mound was, but the thing started circling her. It was all she could do to keep turning to keep facing him.
Despite his body being seemingly constructed of plant life, the figure was cloaked in a long flowing robe of beautiful workmanship. An intricate pattern crisscrossed down the whole length of the garb, disappearing into the shadows where the fabric trailed long and silent behind him. Alaesia couldn't help but wonder if the broken statue she had found the bottom half of outside was an effigy to this supernatural creature before her who uttered sibilantly, "Create-ed and name-ed for a purpossse. Ammatar, callsss I."
The thing's, Ammatar's, eyes flashed with serpentine curiosity, making Alaesia wish she could call for Zathra. He might've had some answer of how to respond to this Ammatar creature; Alaesia didn't. Except, perhaps she could... Who knew how or if it might work, but all she could think of was to cry out silently in her mind, hoping against hope that the orc might be listening to the threads that he used to tap into her thoughts. Zathra, I need help. Please!
If the orc could even attempt to breach the wall of Mokob-hai to come to her aid, Alaesia feared it would be too much for him to overcome. Perhaps her only choice was to determine if this Ammatar was friend or foe, "Your name is A-Ammatar? Wh-what does that m-mean? What p-purpose were you m-made for?"
He reached a hand up, the limb seemingly constructed of veins of roots, towards the stone dome above them both, with a proud look upon his face. His spindly fingers whirled and twisted as he brushed them across the carpet of the Mokob-hai that clung to one of the columns, "Makersss craft-ed many thingsss, many orc-hated creationsss, with Carnan brooded many banesss."
"Orcs...bane...?" Alaesia breathed. Piecing together the strange pattern of speech and his curious gestures, seemed to be the only thing that helped her understand. "Is th-that what your name means? M-Mokob-hai...?"
"Petals fall, wilt-ed bloom, for sssuch befoul-ed ssspeech!" His tone grew curt and he stopped his pacing abruptly, as if hearing the words of the black tongue escaping her lips had cut him. Those large, deep green eyes snapped sharply in her direction, pupils narrowing to slits, "Venom bite and kindle flesh, makersss took of I. Orc-ish bane grew from sssire-ed ssseed. Only left with mouth to ssspeak and eat. Durthroka sssuch vile tongue callsss I. Kulgossstuka! Ssstain-ed in orc-ish cursesss! Consssumption is not mine alone! Orc-ish teeth rend bear-er and sssire-ed for wasssteful ssslaught-er!"
The sudden change in Ammatar's demeanor had Alaesia moving back nervously, but as slowly as she could manage. She could see a faint hint of light towards one of the walls that made up the mound. She prayed silently it was the entrance with the plants having fallen back into place to cover the gap, but couldn't be sure.
"I'm sorry... I-I didn't mean any offense..." The apologetic excuse tasted sour in her mouth, but what else could she hope to say to placate the towering entity? While far smaller than the likes of Ar-Tashk, Ammatar still stood taller than any orc or uruk she had ever seen, and was, more likely than not, just as dangerous. She balked, trying to make herself as small and uninteresting as possible. Why her question had angered the entity, she could only barely grasp through Ammatar's confusing dialect. "Orcs have h-hurt me t-too..."
Ammatar let out a low hiss, seemingly unswayed by the plight of the human woman, nor her attempts to empathize, "Tongue cannot be deceive-ed! Mar-ed and marked sssame as iron wrought are you!"
Ammatar whirled angrily around, grabbed something from a nearby pile of debris, swung back, and cast it at Alaesia's feet with a violent clatter. Alaesia had recoiled, sheltering her head with her hands, only to realize he hadn't struck her, but thrown a familiar iron bolt to the ground. She let out a tense breath, frantically searching her mind to figure out why this tree-ish being would have one of Ar-Tashk's ballista bolts. "I-I d-don't..."
A shifting sound ran along the floor to Alaesia's side, causing her words to cut off as she flinched away. She wildly searched the darkness, wondering if Ammatar wasn't the only one present and if someone might have been sneaking up behind. But there didn't seem to be anyone else amongst the gloom. Ammatar started circling her once more, snatching up a rat from a crevice in the stonework as he passed, and coddling it in one hand while petting it with the other.
"Break-ed are my creaturesss by orc evil! If undefy-ed, plague-ed be my landsss! Ruined to shadow like the bear-er foressst, overrun, doomed!" Without warning, Ammatar's bony claws sank into the rat's body and he held it up, impaled on the root-like claws at the ends of his fingers, towards Alaesia, while his hiss grew angrier and angrier, "Ssseek! Sssee!"
Ammatar hurled the slaughtered rat from his fingertips, right over Alaesia's head, towards the gap in the ceiling. She couldn't help but follow its trajectory, before realizing he was feeding the rodent to something. A silhouette lunged forward above, snatching the rat from the air as it was flung up and out of the mound. It was the unmistakable form of the half-grown warg pup.
It glared down into the mound, leering hungrily at Alaesia but not breaching the boundary as if restrained by the mere presence of Ammatar, whose tirade, it seemed, had just begun, "Consssume-ed death begetsss life! Orc-ish mockery begetsss death, unconsssum-ed. Dessserve such wassste-ed death, do my beastsss?!"
At his demand, Ammatar stopped once more as something shifted in the shadows alongside him. Alaesia shuttered as, somehow, another familiar mass of gray fur, was shoved forward from the shadows of the mound; the gray warg that had attacked Zathra. A great gaping puncture along its flank was dribbling blood down the beast's leg, and it whined, causing a wheeze of breath to escape the wound, at being shifted around like a ragdoll.
Alaesia's heart twinged with pity; the mighty beast, brought low by a devastating injury, evoked awful images of Ar-Tashk's own pained and broken state. She could see the warg trying everything it could to pull away from Ammatar, but only then did Alaesia notice it was held tight in some sort of massive, vine-like bindings.
The tree-ish entity's claws raked across the warg's back gently, as Ammatar glared at Alaesia, "Well? Answer wilt-ed bloom!"
Zathra, please, I don't know what to do! Alaesia's mind was screaming. She wanted to run, but once again, Ammatar's circling pace had tricked Alaesia into losing sight of the entrance once again. And even if she did, how would she know it wouldn't set off this tree-thing, like Zathra had warned her of? Ammatar's claws dug the warg by its neck as it snarled and tried to snap at him, but was helpless to resist; a feeling Alaesia was all too familiar with. The great beast yelped helplessly within Ammatar's grasp until Alaesia couldn't hold back, "N-No! Don't! It d-doesn't need to die! Please... There's an orc with healin-"
"Cease!" Ammatar snapped, slithering, yes slithering, closer until his face was mere inches from hers. Behind him, the gray warg was cast to the ground, loosed from its bindings, where it whined a low growl of pain, trying to regain its senses, but still alive. The tree-ish entity ignored the pitiable creature, focusing entirely on Alaesia, "Speak the rot in flower's roots that seedless makes you! Speak!"
Alaesia's whole vision was overwhelmed by the sight of Ammatar's flared green eyes. The sharp pupils dug deep into her mind, a horrible, familiar sensation, similar to Zathra's mind-altering magic, but now instead forcibly rooting into her head demanding an answer. Her body felt frozen, restrained, like being swallowed up and crushed by a pool of mud. What did this cruel entity want? Alaesia searched desperately within herself trying to comprehend what he was asking, only to have his intent flood clearly into her mind; he wanted to know why she, a supposed human, carried the taint of orcish blood within her. Alaesia tried to resist, but that rooting grasp of the forest being's mind broke through any defense she may have had, and ripped the answer unwilling from her memories; she had borne an uruk child.
"Breed and bear evil, wilt the bloom! Own the ruin have you wrought!" Ammatar's face contorted in disgust at the realization, cursing her in her head as much as out loud.
"N-No! I n-never wanted..." Alaesia tried to summon the courage to rebuke him, to push him away, but found something was coiled around her. Without realizing it, a thick cascade of plant matter, as thick as Ar-Tashk's arm had wrapped itself around her lower half and was creeping up her calves. She cried, out trying to rip the leaves and branches off, which only seemed to anger Ammatar further.
The contortions of his face only seemed to exaggerate as he hissed, "Walk with fellish Eldon do you! Ally to orc ssstain. Orc taint. Taken in corruption are you, like broken beassst! Not flower, but orc beassstling. Dessserve-ed of your seedless curssse!"
The leaves that curled around Ammatar's head, twisted and curled; the entire structure of his skull shifted with the roots that made up his human-like visage. It warped and broadened, growing larger before Alaesia's very eyes. His nose flattened and mouth widened into a horrible, ominous grin that stretched entirely across his face, until, in the place of the humanoid being, rose a serpentine head entirely constructed of the same forest elements his previous body was before. What Alaesia had supposed before was the fabric of his robe, now clearly formed the thick, scaled hide to which moss and creepers clung. She realized too late now why this thing that called itself Ammatar had been circling her, for she was surrounded by a mass that easily filled the inner chamber of the mound; the coils of a titanic snake.
***** Translations *****
Mokob-hai - Orcsbane (Plant)
Ammatar - The Devourer
Durthroka - Great One who eats (A title that orcs call Ammatar, meant insultingly/hypocritically)
Kulgostuka - The thing that feasts on all (A title that orcs call Ammatar, meant insultingly/hypocritically)
Eldon - Elf-bred (begotten by elves)
We've got a new character to add to the lineup! Meet Ammatar and his snake-y form! :D (This can be viewed either on my discord or by visiting my Ao3/Wattpad, Sadly no images allowed here on FFN)