Elf Saga: Bloodlines (Part 1: Curse of the Jaguar) Read online

  ELF SAGA: BLOODLINES

  Part One: Curse of the Jaguar

  by

  Joseph Robert Lewis

  ELF SAGA: BLOODLINES

  33 years after

  DOOMSDAY

  Copper Crow Books

  Copyright © 2015 Joseph Robert Lewis

  Published by Joseph Robert Lewis on Smashwords

  Cover art by Linggar Bramanty

  Edition: July 2015

  Smashwords Edition, License Notes

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  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication can be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means without permission in writing from Joseph Robert Lewis.

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  Part One: Curse of the Jaguar

  Episode 1

  So. Another town, another… whatever this mess is.

  I count twenty soldiers, their uniforms shredded, their swords and pistols mangled, their faces bruised and bloody. That’s typical. The novel part is that every last one of them is clinging desperately to the branches of a very tall tree high above my head. It’s a strange and brutal sight, so it’s a pretty safe guess as to who did this.

  There are a few local men trying to help the soldiers down out of the tree. It’s tricky work, since the tree is fifty feet tall and there aren’t any ladders, so they’re using ropes, out here at the dusty edge of town. The locals are lightly dressed against the morning heat, loose fringed pants, loose shirts with checkered bead patterns, and a handful of thick copper rings in their very long, very sharp ears.

  I nudge my big red pronghorn to saunter closer to the tree and I call out, “Good morning!”

  “Does this look like a good morning to you, stranger?” the fellow up in the tree grunts as he lowers his sixth soldier down to the ground.

  I shrug. Fair enough.

  “Did anyone see what happened?” But I already know what happened. The soldiers are all wearing the green and gold of the Azteran army, and we’re deep in the Chirika province of the Union. This is classic Lozen. This is what she loves the most, patrolling the border for excuses to kick some ass.

  “I saw it.” The man pauses to wipe the sweat from his face before climbing up to the next branch to get the next battered soldier. He shakes his head. “Never seen anything like it before though.”

  “Yeah, well, I have.” I make sure my hat is firmly on my head, shading my features. “It was a woman with jaguar spots on her face, right?”

  He squints down at me. “Yeah.”

  “And she took out all these men by herself. With her bare hands.”

  “Yeah.”

  “And then she threw them all up in that tree with a flick of her wrist before she rode off into the sunset.” I glance west where I can see fresh tracks leading off over the hills.

  “Yeah. Well, not the sunset part. The sun was barely up when she rode out.” The man tugs the next soldier free and starts tying a rope around the youth’s uniformed chest.

  “Twenty soldiers with alchemic pistols? Pretty nasty stuff.” I nod at the foreigners and the bright green acid oozing out of their crushed guns. “So... I guess it’s kind of good that she came along when she did.”

  “Hardly.” The man in the tree frowns at me. “These soldiers came to deliver medical supplies and help build the new windmills.” He waves toward the north and I see the half-finished towers of the three mills spread across the plains.

  Damn. I guess times change. And that means she’s not even fighting the bad guys now, if she even cares about that anymore. What the hell is wrong with her?

  “So you know that woman? Who was she?” the man asks.

  “Some people call her Lozen.” I sigh and nudge my pronghorn to follow the westward trail as I mutter to myself, “But I get to call her Mother.”

  “What was that?” One of the men on the ground jogs after me. "What did you say?"

  Oh shit. I muttered that, I swear!

  “Nothing,” I say, riding on a bit faster. “I said she’s a… bother.” Damn it, why don’t bother and mother rhyme?

  “You said she’s your mother!” He grabs my arm and sees the jaguar spots on my hand. “Hey, she’s got the same marks. She’s like the other one. It’s another one!”

  “Hey, hands off, jackass, I’m nothing like her!” I jerk my arm free. “I don’t go around attacking people. I make canoes, buddy!”

  But it’s too late. The man jumps back and yanks the knife from his belt. A moment later he has three more sweaty friends with knives beside him, a whole stupid little gang of frightened southern elves who think I’m working with Lozen to ruin their stupid little town.

  Thanks, Mother.

  “Hya!” I try to get the pronghorn running because once I’m gone they have no chance of catching me, but one of the knife-men is too close to the buck’s head, and the poor beast jerks back instead of dashing away.

  Damn it, Mother. This is all your fault… just like everything else.

  I see a flash of light in the corner of my eye, and I snatch the whirling knife out of the air and toss it aside into the dust. Jaguar reflexes to the rescue. “What the hell was that?! It is not nice to throw knives at people. Listen up, you screwheads, I’m not with her! Not even a little bit. I’m out here trying to hunt her down.”

  “Hunt down your own mother?” The man in front of me shakes his head. “I don’t believe a word of that.”

  I frown. “You don’t? Why not? What sort of magical relationship do you have with your mom? You’re not still nursing are you? Because that’s just gross.”

  “Why the hell would you want to hunt down your own mother?” he snarls.

  “It’s personal. Medical. Jaguar lady problems, you understand.” I grimace. “I mean, we all have our issues, don’t we?”

  A second knife comes flying at my shoulder, and I twist sharply to let it fly past me. “Whoa, whoa, whoa! Can we please just talk about this? Seriously, guys, use your words, not your knives.”

  The man in the tree drops to the ground and picks up a hatchet. Back home that’s a tomahawk, but I don’t think they use that word here. Not that the name matters, really, when one comes flying at your face. A handful of the Azteran soldiers lying on the ground are watching all this, but none of them are moving a finger to come after me. So that’s a bit of good luck. I guess.

  “Get her!” The whole gang lunges at me, grabbing my pronghorn’s antlers and my saddle and my clothes. I see blades everywhere and… I panic.

  I grab the nearest wrist with a knife and I slam the man’s fist back into his own face, sending him falling to the ground, stunned and bloody. I kick another in the chest and he flies back on his ass. A back-fist to a skull makes a muffled crack. I slam my palm into a nose, and rip the hatchet from its owner, only to bring the blunt side down on his head a second later.
/>   And then it’s over. Five men all covered in blood, half-conscious, sprawled in the dust. I only pause to look at them for a second, just to be sure they’re really down, and then I snap the reins and I’m gone, riding hard and fast over the western rise with the bloody hatchet still gripped tight in my sweaty hand.

  Finders, keepers.

  The trail is easy to follow. Mother is riding something called a horse, which I hear is some sort of hornless unicorn with no magic powers at all, which seems pretty dull for her. But whatever a horse is, it’s not faster than my pronghorn, so I’m catching up. I’m only a few hours behind now.

  This place is my first taste of a real desert, and I think I hate it. Hot, dry, and dusty. All sun and no shadow. No green, no water. Yeah, I hate it. I can’t wait to get home, back to Dad, back to the woods and lakes back east. Should only be another day or two, I think.

  Three days later, I’m still following the trail, and I’m still just a few hours behind. There have been two more Azteran garrisons smashed to pieces, two more companies of green-coat soldiers tossed into rivers and piled high on hill tops. And two more angry mobs chasing me out of town before I can explain that I am not my mother.

  Dad always said she had a temper. Guess he wasn’t kidding.

  I have to wonder if she knows I’m following her. Along with the jaguar strength, she’s got jaguar eyes and a nose to match. She can probably smell me coming. So now I have to wonder if she’s leading me somewhere on purpose, and why. I’m guessing it’s because she’s a bully with a twisted sense of humor.

  I see my first southern dragon gliding over the salt flats, shimmering like a mirage in the rising heat of the afternoon. It’s a huge thing, at least five times bigger than the forest drakes back home, and as I sit in the saddle watching, it roars a horrible screaming roar that makes me shiver and wish there was a tree to hide behind, but there is no tree. There’s nothing here at all but sandy dirt and rocks and scrub brush. Then the monster spews an arc of red fire across the sky and sails away into the distance, north into the deeper desert.

  And then the pain hits me, the sudden nauseating dizziness swirling behind my eyes. I fall out of the saddle and hit the ground on all fours, trying not to vomit. My skull is pounding and I squeeze my eyes shut, trying with all my strength to just breathe.

  Just breathe.

  Keep breathing.

  Bit by bit, the pain subsides. And when I open my eyes, the ground only wobbles a little bit. I sit and wait, still breathing, keeping my eyes down on the red dirt, watching a line of red ants march by. I don’t think, and I try not to feel. Just wait it out. A few minutes later I try standing up and taking a sip of water from my canteen. And a minute after that I’m back in the saddle again, riding west.

  Damn. The attacks are getting worse. I’ve never fallen out of the saddle in my life.

  Eight days after the tree full of Azteran soldiers, I’ve left the desert behind me and I’m riding slowly up a narrow, winding path into some crumbly red mountains. The pine trees here are massive, like nothing I’ve ever seen back home, but the woods are silent and still. No one lives here but the birds and squirrels. From time to time, a lone faerie flitters along parallel to me, far out of reach, leaving a trail of fresh moss and mushrooms and thick grass growing on the ground behind it, and then it darts away into the trees again.

  The trail goes on. One afternoon, as I’m picking my way along the top of a ridge, I see her. She’s half a league away or more, riding along the top of the next ridge over, so there’s a huge valley full of trees and streams between us and no way to get to her quickly. But it’s her. Mother.

  She stops and I can see her turn to look at me. I’ve got some of that jaguar blood in me too, and my eyes are better than most. I can’t quite see her face, but I can feel her looking at me. Judging me. She was always very judgy, especially about footwear. And then she turns and rides out of sight, down the far side of her ridge. By the time I cross the valley and get to the spot where she paused, she’s long gone.

  The next day I wake up cold and sore. I want to be home. I miss Dad and my brothers. I miss sleeping in late and carving my boats in the shade all afternoon, and going dancing every night. I miss fending off the cold breezes with my warm wool socks, watching long games of dehunshiga with all the half-naked boys hurling their little balls around with their little sticks, and most of all I miss Dad’s cooking. Slow-cooked brisket. Pelmeni dumplings. Borscht.

  Damn. I must be starving if I actually miss Dad’s borscht.

  I pick up a small sharp stone and sit still for a few minutes, and sure enough, a plump little scrub jay perches overhead. One throw and he’s dead, falling straight into my hand, and a minute later he’s a tiny meal in my frying pan. I guess it’s good that I inherited a few things from Mother. The eyes, the strength. Because I’m pretty clumsy with a bow.

  As soon as I’m done eating, I’m back in the saddle and riding west through the silent forest. At noon I stop at a stream for a drink. I kneel by the water, sipping from my spotted hand, and when I straighten up, there she is, standing right in front of me across the stream.

  Lozen Xocolatl Marev.

  I stand up slowly, like she’s some deer that might startle and run away, which is supremely stupid because there isn’t a monster alive that can scare her. I wave. “Hello, Mother.”

  She nods. “Genesee.” Her mouth twitches like she wants to smile, but can’t quite remember how.

  She doesn’t look her age, and I can’t tell if that’s the jaguar magic or just good blood. It’s been years since I last saw her, but she looks the same to me. No gray hair, no lines to speak of. She’s wearing a mish-mash of shirts and belts and jackets from half the peoples of the Union, some woven, some brightly patterned, some faded and dusty. And there’s that same old wide-brimmed hat on her head, shading her golden eyes.

  “That haircut is all wrong for the shape of your face,” she says. “And those boots do nothing for your calves, but whatever. So. What are you up to these days?”

  “Canoes, mostly. I make canoes. Just finished my apprenticeship, actually. I really love it,” I say, as if this was any old conversation with any old friend. I frown, angry at myself for letting her get even that tiny bit of information about me.

  “Sure, why not? Everyone loves a good canoe.” She looks bored and disappointed. “How’s your father? Is he still bitching and moaning about how I’m not mommy material?”

  “He’s fine,” I say. “He never talks about you.” That’s a lie. He misses her like crazy.

  She smirks. “I’m sure. And your brothers?”

  I clear my throat. I’m not going to slip up again. “Andrei got married last year. I don’t think you’d like her. She’s really nice, from out west.” I pause. “Necalli sailed east, saying he wanted to be an Alcani and ride unicorns.”

  She nods. “Good for him.”

  “If you say so.” I miss his laugh and his hugs. But I don’t miss hearing him coughing at night.

  She glances up at my pronghorn, a sleek red thing with vicious little antlers, staring serenely at the stream. “So what do you want, Gen? You came a hell of a long way just to chat about canoes, and I have to warn you, there’s only so much small talk I can make about canoes before I fall asleep here.”

  I stare at her. She’s exactly like I remembered. I thought I’d remembered wrong, that I was too young and too angry, but no, this really is what she’s like. Harsh and sharp, bored and distant, distracted and edgy. Strange and powerful to look at, but dangerous to everyone, even herself, probably. This is what Dad misses so much? “Look, I just figured you weren’t ever coming back, so I’d have to find you if I wanted any answers.”

  “What answers?” She shakes her head. “You’re too old to be crying over why mommy left, Gen. You know why. I’ve got things to do. Evil to smite. Innocents to save. Can’t do that sitting around a longhouse with a bunch of babies. I stayed long enough to wipe your butt and get you on your feet. Now I
’m back on the job.”

  “The job?” I wince and look away. I want to hit her, but I know better. I’m only half jaguar, and she’s the real thing. I can go toe-to-toe with a half dozen men at once, but not her. No one can take her. “Throwing soldiers into trees? That job?”

  “I made a deal once to get all the Azterans out of the Union, every last one of them, but it didn’t last. They came back, and they really like taking things that don’t belong to them,” she says. “Land. Gold. Lives. Someone has to stand up to them.”

  “Yeah, you’re a real hero,” I say dully, thinking of the three unfinished windmills.

  “Damn straight, I’m a hero,” she snaps at me. “Do you know how many wars I’ve stopped with my bare hands? How many dragons I’ve killed with my bare hands?” She holds up her hands, her furry hands covered in jaguar rosettes, and from her fingertips she extends her obsidian claws. I shiver. I remember those claws. They gave me nightmares when I was little. I’m glad I didn’t inherit those.

  “Yeah, I know. I remember how it was your favorite excuse for not helping with the dishes. You were just too damn heroic for all that.” I try to stare her down, like she isn’t bothering me, but I doubt I’m doing a good job of it. If she can face down a dragon, she’s probably not too worried about facing down her canoe-carving daughter.

  I look away. I’m not going to tell her why I’m really here. She doesn’t deserve to know anything about me or my brothers. “Listen, I just… Dad won’t talk about it. About the old days, when you two were running around slaying dragons and saving the world. Whenever I ask him anything, he just shakes his head and changes the subject.”

  “So you want to hear about how the most badass mom in the world smashed every sword in a whole Shihoku army? Or how I closed the doorway to the afterlife? Or when I punched my way out of a dragon’s mouth?” She grins wickedly. “You came all this way for story time?”