Page 6 of Elixir of Strife
I flinched when I laid a hand on the knob of my apartment’s door, so cold in contrast to the key. I mean, I liked olives as much as the next guy, but an evil olive? Something that could alter my perception of reality if I happened to enjoy it as part of a nice Greek salad, or as toppings on a delicious pizza?
“Again,” Max had grumpily explained, “it’s not like magic mushrooms. I think. Point is, we should be focusing on what the client wants.”
I let myself into the apartment, immediately shot a longing look at my bed. I sure didn’t wake up that morning expecting to be assigned to go hunt down some fancy bottled water. An Aqueous Elixir, or so the partners at Succulence said. I kicked off my shoes, then stumbled over myself as I removed each of my ankle socks with only my feet.
Hah. Max hated when I did that, or so he claimed. He’d seen me do it a couple of times when I would sleep over at his place. And yes, fully sleep over, to sleep with him, in both senses of the word. We hadn’t yet decided to name this thing that we were doing together, except to acknowledge that it was fun. A hell of a lot of fun.
I placed my backpack on the kitchen table, sighing as I gave my arms a good stretch. Yes, my apartment was a shabby crap sack, but it was still home. I pressed two fingers against my lips, then pressed them against the framed picture of my mother on the nightstand.
“Hi Mom,” I whispered, smiling. “It’s good to be back home.”
“Oh. How touching.”
The voice came from behind me, something I’d anticipated, and yet it still sent a chill down my spine. I recovered from the initial jolt of surprise quite quickly — but then again, was I really surprised at all? I knew that the promise of danger would lure out my favorite scary sea dragon goddess.
“Hello, Tiamat,” I said, a smile already on my face as I turned to greet her. “Lovely to see you so sopping wet on my floors again.” I was right about taking my socks off, after all.
The goddess chuckled, skin glistening and damp, hair dripping with seawater. “I’d caution you to respect your elders, little lion, but it seems you have a habit of doing so already. I only wish my ungrateful children were as courteous.”
I shrugged. “It’s the Filipino in me. Kind of our thing.”
It really was, a whole system of showing respect to parents and grandparents, to anyone who was older. We peppered specific words into regular conversation to indicate that, a sort of honorific. We hadmano, the practice of taking an elder’s hand and pressing it against your forehead, a distant analog of kissing someone on the knuckles.
Seriously, the whole kit and caboodle. Showing affection to the framed picture of the mom that I missed? Well, that was probably more of a universal thing.
Tiamat crossed her arms and grinned. “Curious how you make mention of your heritage now, because it is, in fact, relevant to our little meeting today. Do you recall when I told you that others of my kind might be interested in expressing themselves through your craft? Further candidates for the delightful art of draconic Emanation.”
I fucking knew it. I kept my smile to myself, trying to play it cool.
“Brother,” Tiamat whispered, waving her hand across the room. “Come forth.”
The air, the ground, reality itself rippled, the world making way for the arrival of something great. Of someone powerful.
More than before, than my first meeting with Tiamat, the apartment smelled strongly of seawater, a blistering afternoon at the beach. I had no windows open, but a hot breeze blew through the room regardless, almost as warm as my morning in the alley. I swiped at my hair, wiped at beads of sweat that had already formed on my forehead.
This was different. Tiamat’s first visitation had been heralded by cold air. The sound of waves crashed at the very edge of my hearing, the wind whistling softly in my ears. And then he appeared, a statuesque man wielding a wicked blade, wearing a loincloth, and really, nothing else.
Sleek black hair fell down to his shoulders, muscles bulging from training and use. I recognized this form he was wearing, the striking figure of a Philippine warrior from the olden days. This was a man who defended his land with ferocity and the sharpness of both his blade and his spirit.
His loincloth shimmered like the momentary glimpse of a rainbow cast on sea spray. Except it wasn’t only the colors that shimmered, but the patterns as well. I recognized some of them, the signature weaves of indigenous tribes of the islands, their patterns as ancient as the hands that wove them.
“I know you,” I breathed. “Bakunawa. The sea serpent.”
The man’s stony features broke as he offered the slightest hint of a smile. “You recognize me, then. You remember the stories. Good.”
I’d always been fascinated by mythology, but especially by how similar legends reverberated through cultures scattered all across the world. Think about it. Bloodsuckers everywhere — Count Dracula, Elizabeth Báthory, the chupacabra — a vampire in every flavor. Hell, everybody had their own version of flatbread.
And whether it was Southeast Asia or old Scandinavia, everybody had their own sea dragons, too. That was what Tiamat and Bakunawa had in common. Bakunawa wasn’t quite a god, in a true sense of the word, but he was still a powerful entity in his own right, known in legends for his supposed command of storms, eclipses, the fury of the sea.
No huge surprise, then, that it was Tiamat who first approached me. She knew I had a deep liking for her kind. I was a fan boy. I’d conjure a sea dragon each time I used my fear hex to scare the crap out of some hapless victim, after all. The question was, why did she hold the grudging equivalent of affection for me?
“I suppose this should be quite obvious,” Tiamat said, “but Bakunawa here has expressed much interest in, shall we say, integrating with your essence. He wishes to Emanate on one or two pleasurable occasions. Manifest in this reality once more.”
The man nodded. “Not to be ridden by humans, but to ride the currents of your spirit. To feel the sting of air on my scales, feel the saltwater trickle from between my talons.”
“Oh, good,” I said. “More water. So like a garden hose.”
The room shook violently from a single stamp of Bakunawa’s foot. My heart pounded as I crouched closer to the floor, scanning the room for somewhere safe to hide. But there were no signs of an actual earthquake, no shouts of alarm from my neighbors, who were uniformly very, very vocal most hours of the day.
