Chương 12: B1 Chapter 11

Eyowon took my hand, and we moved together. The two slowest members of the village walked side by side, carrying out the most important task I'd ever been given. She guided me into her hut. The entrance was low, forcing me to duck beneath the woven reed flap. Inside, the air was warmer and heavier than it'd been outside, thick with the scents of dried herbs, smoke, and old earth. The hut was small, but every part of it had been arranged with careful purpose.

A shallow fire pit occupied the center of the packed-earth floor. Its embers glowed beneath a layer of gray ash, sending thin threads of smoke toward the opening in the roof. Bundles of herbs hung from the rafters, tied together with strips of bark. Some were pale and brittle, while others still held traces of green. Their leaves brushed softly against one another whenever the wind slipped through the walls. Clay jars and carved wooden bowls lined the edges of the hut.

Each had been marked with a different symbol: spirals, animal tracks, open eyes, and curling lines that reminded me of river currents. I recognized some of the plants stored inside them, but others were unfamiliar. Their scents mingled in the close air, creating a sharp, bitter mixture that stung my nose. A narrow sleeping mat rested against one wall, covered by a faded hide. Beside it stood a low table crowded with objects I'd never seen anywhere else in the village. Smooth stones sat in shallow dishes.

Feathers had been arranged in careful patterns. Small bones, shells, and polished teeth hung from cords along the wall, clicking softly whenever the hut shifted beneath the wind. Near the back, a wooden frame held several strips of bark covered in markings. I couldn't read them, but I knew they were the records Eyowon had gathered over a lifetime. Some were dark with age, their edges curled and cracked. Others looked newer, their symbols still sharp.

The hut felt less like a home than a place where the world had been taken apart and sorted into pieces.

"E'ru, please sit. I'll get you something to drink, and then we'll speak about what the future holds and what your path will be." I'd spoken so strongly and with such determination about what I wanted to do. I wanted to protect my father, my village, and my tribe. Yet in that moment, I felt like a child who had no idea what would come next. So I sat. It took me much longer than I cared to admit to find a position that didn't hurt my back.

The woven reeds pressed against my legs as I shifted my weight, searching for the narrow balance between one pain and another. Once I finally settled, I allowed the weight of the world to press down upon me. Eyowon returned carrying a cup of steaming herbal tea. Whatever blend she'd prepared was medicinal, and it smelled awful. I didn't complain. I drank it slowly and steadily while I waited for her to speak again. The bitter taste clung to my tongue and left a sharp heat in the back of my throat.

Eyowon moved around me with her serpent-headed cane, always seeming to know precisely where I was. She placed a shallow wooden plate upon the floor between us. The hardened heart of the caiman rested upon it.

"E'ru," she said, "was there anything different about the caiman that you noticed?"

"Different?" I repeated, considering the question. I looked down at the heart.

"No. Nothing beyond finding a caiman caught in one of my snares. It was a good fight, and it gave us more meat than I expected, but I didn't notice anything strange about the creature itself."

"That isn't what I'd hoped to hear," Eyowon said. She lowered herself carefully onto the reeds across from me, resting both hands upon the head of her cane.

"The gods have said our world is changing. The creatures of our land are changing with it. How they're changing, I don't yet know." I thought back over the night, searching my memory for anything I might've dismissed.

"I did notice something strange," I said.

"I caught it in another snare, but it wasn't the caiman. It was an iguana." Eyowon tilted her head toward me.

"The creature was three or four times larger than it should've been. Joa is preparing it now, but it was enormous. If it'd been any larger, it might've broken my snare." Eyowon straightened.

"That is good." I frowned.

"Good?"

"Good that you remembered," she clarified.

"We need to see it before Joa butchers it." She lifted her cane and struck its end against the floor several times.

"Call out for him. Have Joa bring the iguana to us while it's still whole. There may be something inside it, or upon it, that'll show us what has changed." Her blind eyes turned toward the hardened heart resting between us.

"And what you must do next." This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report. Normally, someone of her status wouldn't be the one calling out. But she knew it'd be more difficult and take more time if I had to get up, call out for Joa, and then sit back down than if she simply stood and walked to the flap herself. It took her only moments. Joa came running a minute later, holding the iguana itself.

I hadn't noticed it before, but it was much darker than any iguana I'd ever seen. I wondered if it was sick. Things like that happened sometimes. A creature would catch a disease, bloat, and change color as it rotted from the inside out. But this thing smelled of no rot. It looked fresh and clean. Its scales were almost like obsidian glass, nearly see-through at the edges. I hadn't paid much attention to it before. It had been dark, and I'd only needed to keep moving toward my next snare.

But this might've been the biggest prize of the entire night, even more valuable than the caiman and its heart. This iguana was unique compared to everything else. Joa lowered it carefully onto the packed earth, keeping both hands beneath its thick body. Even dead, it was too large to carry comfortably with one arm. Its tail dragged behind him, leaving a faint line through the dust, and its heavy limbs hung stiffly at its sides. For a moment, no one spoke. The iguana's body filled much of the space between us.

Its back was broad enough that I could've rested both hands upon it without touching either side. The scales overlapped in tight rows, each one dark and glossy, reflecting the firelight in broken patches. Along its spine, the ridges were taller and sharper than those of any iguana I'd seen before, rising like small black blades from the thick hide. Joa crouched beside it.

"I found no wounds beyond the one that killed it," he said.

"It was already dead when I reached it."

"Did you notice anything else?" Eyowon asked. Joa glanced at me before answering.

"It was heavy. Much heavier than it looked. I thought the body might be full of water, but it isn't soft or swollen. The flesh feels firm." Eyowon extended her hand.

"Bring it closer." Joa shifted the iguana toward her. Its claws scraped faintly against the floor, long and curved, each one dark as the scales covering its body. They were larger than they should've been, thick enough to dig into hard soil or tear through roots. The toes were broad and powerful, built for gripping rather than merely climbing. Eyowon reached down and placed her fingers against the creature's back. She moved slowly, tracing the scales from its shoulders toward its tail.

Her touch was careful, but her expression tightened as she worked. She paused at the raised ridges along its spine, then moved to the side of its neck.

"Is the skin cold?" she asked.

"Cold," Joa said.

"But not like a dead animal. It feels almost like glass." Eyowon pressed harder. The scales gave a faint clicking sound beneath her fingers. I leaned forward despite the pain in my back. The firelight shifted across the iguana's body, and for an instant, I thought I saw something moving beneath the dark surface. A thin line of pale light passed beneath the scales near its shoulder. I blinked, and it was gone.

"Did you see that?" I asked. Joa looked down at the iguana.

"See what?"

"I don't know." Eyowon turned her face toward me.

"Tell me."

"There was something beneath the scales. A flash of light, maybe. It moved from here" I pointed toward the creature's shoulder, "toward its neck." Joa placed his palm against the iguana's back.

"Perhaps the fire reflected off the scales."

"Perhaps," Eyowon said. But she didn't sound convinced. She guided Joa's hand lower, toward the creature's belly.

"Turn it over." He rolled the iguana onto its side. Its belly was lighter than its back, though not by much. The scales there were smaller and more tightly packed, forming overlapping plates that looked almost like dark river stones. There were no signs of disease. No swelling. No discoloration. No open wounds. The flesh beneath the scales was firm and unbroken. Eyowon ran her fingers along the creature's ribs, counting beneath her breath. When she reached the center of its body, she stopped.

"What is it?" I asked. She pressed her palm against the iguana's belly.

"Something is wrong." Joa frowned.

"Wrong how?"

"The bones." He leaned closer.

"What about them?"

"They're too thick." I looked at the iguana's body. I couldn't see through the scales, but I could imagine the bones beneath them. The creature had always seemed powerful, but this was different. It wasn't simply larger. Every part of it appeared to have grown together, as though its body had been shaped for a purpose no ordinary iguana needed. Eyowon moved her hand toward the creature's chest.

"The heart is larger too," she said.

"I can feel it."

"It's dead," Joa said.

"Yes."

"Then how can you feel it?" Eyowon's fingers remained against the iguana's body.

"I can feel where it was." The hut seemed to grow quieter around us. Even the herbs hanging from the rafters had stopped brushing against one another. Eyowon withdrew her hand.

"Don't cut into it yet," she said.

"Not until we know what we're looking at." Joa nodded, though his eyes remained fixed on the iguana. I studied the creature again. Its mouth was closed, but the jaw was broad and heavy. A row of small teeth showed between its lips, sharper and more numerous than they should've been. Its eyes were dark and glassy, with no trace of the dullness I expected from a dead animal. The longer I looked at it, the less it resembled an iguana. It had the shape of one, but not the feeling.

It seemed built for something larger than climbing trees, hiding among roots, and feeding on leaves. Its limbs were too strong. Its claws were too long. Its body was too dense, its scales too dark, its spine too sharply ridged. Eyowon turned toward me.

"E'ru, when you caught it, did it struggle?"

"Yes."

"How?" I remembered the snare tightening around its leg. I remembered the violent pull that had nearly torn the stake from the ground.

"It fought like it understood the trap," I said.

"It didn't thrash randomly. It pulled against the rope, then twisted away from it. When that didn't work, it tried to dig into the ground." Joa looked at the creature's claws.

"Did it make any sound?"

"No. Not at first."

"Not at first?" Eyowon asked.

"I thought it was only frightened. It made a sound like two river stones clicking together right before I slew it." Eyowon's hand tightened around her cane.

"An iguana shouldn't sound like that." I looked down at the creature.

"No," I said.

"It shouldn't." For several breaths, we remained silent. Then the pale light appeared again. This time, I saw it clearly. It moved beneath the scales in a slow line, beginning near the iguana's chest and traveling toward its throat. The glow was faint, no brighter than a coal beneath ash, but it was unmistakable. It pulsed once beneath the dark hide before disappearing. Joa stumbled backward. Eyowon didn't move.

"Where?" she asked. I pointed.

"Near the throat. It moved upward." She reached toward the creature again, but stopped before touching it.

"Don't let anyone cut there," she said.

"Not yet."

"What is it?" Joa asked. Eyowon's blind eyes remained fixed upon the iguana.

"I don't know." That answer frightened me more than anything else she could've said. She leaned closer, listening to something none of us could hear.

"The gods warned us that the creatures were changing," she said.

"They didn't say the changes would be visible only after death." The iguana's tail shifted. It was barely more than a twitch, but everyone in the hut saw it. Joa reached for his knife.

"Don't," Eyowon snapped. He froze. The creature didn't move again. Its body remained still upon the floor, its black scales reflecting the firelight. Yet the air inside the hut had changed. The smell of smoke and herbs seemed to fade beneath something colder, something metallic and sharp. I stared at the iguana's chest. A faint glow pulsed beneath its scales once more. Then it vanished. Eyowon lifted her cane and pointed toward the creature.

"Now," she said, "we'll find out what else has changed."