Under Its Face

black silhouette of a stag on a gray and white checkered field: this is an emblem recognized by all peoples. It grants unrestricted journey through any of the cities and kingdoms of the five nations. Those who bear this emblem on shield or cloak are above the laws of royalty, and only answer to the Council of the Five Nations.

Even the wealthiest human king cannot walk into the Elven forest freely, and should a giant find a dwarf on their land, they would squash them without a second thought. But, those with the checkered stag sigil are welcomed at any door, not because of a decree, but for the services they provide.

These are the ones who hunt werewolves deep in the forest, oust vampires from positions of authority, and cleanse villages of zombification. They are recognized by their sigil and respected for the peaceful nights they leave in their wake. They are the Duskguard, and I recently applied to be one of them.

My name is Kennis Zabermen, and I can sense the flow of magic. I have been able to sense it since I was a child, but didn’t have the words for it until I was fortunate enough to be noticed by the court wizard of Danrich. The court wizard, Silverfrost, was kind enough to explain magic to me in a way that I could make sense of. She even wrote me a letter of recommendation to Brexia University where I studied magic for two years.

I had hoped to return to Danrich as an accomplished wizard, and bring pride to my kingdom… but magic is a complicated force. It’s all around us, running through us, and if you try to move against it, it will create a friction that burns you. I have the multicolored scars to prove it.

As a student, I had a real knack for levitating objects, which is considered high level magic. If you imagine magic like threads that flow through everything, and you can feel the threads in various objects, pull them like a marionette. Or, maybe it’s clearer to say wrap your threads around the object… It’s a feat that is much easier to demonstrate than explain. But, when I tried to levitate a grand piano in the music hall, the friction from the threads ripped a gash straight across my chest, and sent me to the infirmary for two weeks.

The incident caused my professors to lose faith in me, so I quietly returned to Danrich. It was not a great time in my life, but it certainly wasn’t the end. Maybe it’s because I’m a magic-user, but I’ve always felt destined for greater things.

My mother thought I was crazy to join the Duskguard. She was always saying things like: “You’ve never won a fight in your life, what makes you think you can take down a weremammoth?” For the record, I had no idea if weremammoths were real, I figured my mother made them up to scare me. She hated the idea of me becoming a monster hunter, but I was  fairly certain they would train me first, or at least kick me out if I wasn’t cut out for it.

But my mother had a change of heart recently. I came home to find that she had cooked me a huge feast of roasted pork, rich stew, and various meat pies. She said it was because she was proud of me for applying to the Duskguard. She also said that the butcher was selling pork at a discount.

Her change of heart was surprising, but it was nice. I believed my luck had turned around.

✥ ✥ ✥

We had stayed up late feasting and left the kitchen a mess. My mother often went out early in the mornings. I wanted to wash the dishes before she returned, but I was interrupted by a rapid knock at the door. I opened it. Outside was a cloaked figure standing awfully close to the entrance, like he was going to force his way in.

A low voice came from inside his hood, “Kennis Zaberman?”

Something seemed off about this person. I began to levitate a knife from the kitchen toward me just in case I needed it. “Yes?” I replied.

“Congratulations, you are now a Duskguard initiate!” stated the hooded man with a clear absence of enthusiasm. It was more like he was in a rush. “Lock up, I need you to come with me.”

In my surprise, I lost my concentration and the knife fell to the floor behind me with a clatter.

“Is there someone in there with you!?” The hooded man pushed past me into my house and saw the knife on the floor. He looked at it for a moment and smiled. “Well, I guess you do know a little magic.” He bent down, picked up the knife, and returned it to its place in the kitchen as if he knew exactly where it went. He quickly returned to me at the door, slapped my shoulder and said, “Let’s go, your initiation starts now.”

I hastily locked my front door and followed the hooded man.

“I hate to be a bother, but how do I know you’re really from the Duskguard?” I asked, trying to keep up with him.

The man slowed his pace, parted his cloak to reveal the famous gray stag emblem on his tunic, but he was so hasty about it that it felt like he showed me a weird stain on his cloak. He picked up his pace again, and I struggled to process my situation.

We arrived at a tavern a few blocks from my home. I had seen this tavern before, but had never gone in; I’m not normally one to drink. The man leaned into the door, slamming it open as if he wanted everyone to know he had entered. And everyone did. As soon as he entered, a group of people at a table stood up and cheered.

“Gentlemen – and lady – I present to you, the amazing Kennis.” The hooded man gestured his hands to me as I stood half in the doorway, stunned.

Standing near a table full of beer steins were a group of five people: there was a goblin man, a dwarf woman, and three humans. A hooded man turned to me, pulling back his hood and smiling as thought I should recognize him. I didn’t. He was an older man, maybe in his fifties. He had a black eyepatch over his left eye, and three very distinct scars reaching from his left cheek, over his eye, and over his cranium. It looked as if a dragon’s claw had grabbed his face and then tried to comb his hair with its claw.

The group beckoned me closer, chanting my name, “Ken Nis Ken Nis Ken Nis!”

The dwarf woman thrust a beerstein into my hands and shouted “Drink!”

I began to drink, but the beer was warm and unpleasant. It was strong with alcohol, the strongest beer I had ever tasted. The group pulled me to the table and sat around me like old friends.

“Hello.” I said sheepishly. “Are you all part of the Duskguard too?”

They erupted in laughter. The scarred man chuckled too. He looked at me and said, “Yes, we are all part of Duskguard.”

I looked around the group with a weak smile, trying to hide my disbelief.

“I’m Hansler. I run the team here in Danrich,” replied the scarred man.

“You’re the flipp’n boss,” interjected the goblin, who didn’t seem as jolly as the rest of the group. “You hears that, lamb? You’re sit’n with the head of the Duskguard, and you don’t even knowns it.”

Hansler gave the goblin an unamused look, but then smiled again. “I don’t think it’s worth bragging about. I’ve just seen more shit than anyone else, that’s all.”

“He sees all kinds of shit. I only see the worst kinds,” muttered the goblin.

“Eh, lighten up Grit’Nax. We’re drinking for the kid.” The dwarf woman nudged the goblin.

“My apologies,” said the goblin as he rolled his eyes. He then raised a glass toward me. “To the little lamb, and his adventures down the manure road. May it be a long one!”

Hansler raised his glass too, and looked at me. “It’s a toast, we have to drink.” He then threw back his beer stein then slammed it on the table.

I drained my beer as well, and was immediately handed another. It became clear that they intended for me to drink at their pace. Hansler introduced everyone to me. The goblin was Grit’Nax, the dwarf woman was Amber, and the three other men were Lemel, Veter, and Stan… I think. He had a coastal accent that I couldn’t quite make out.

After my third beer, Hansler ordered a bottle of some strong liquor. Amber said it would grow hair on my chest, but Grit’Nax said “wool”. I may not drink a lot, but even I know that beer before liquor makes you sicker. But, they poured me a drink anyway.

“Look, I know you’re going to ask, so just ask me now while we’re having a good time.” Hansler said, looking directly at me with a smirk. The table went silent.

“How… did you get that scar?” I asked with only moderate certainty that I asked the question he predicted.

Hansler smiled at the group, who all seemed to know what he was going to say. He leaned toward me, his fingers bent like claws as he said, “It was the largest diamond back dragon you had ever seen!”

Boos erupt from the table as Hansler laughed. “No, no. It was a harpy. It surprised me. They may have brittle bones, but when they catch you, their talons can slice you good.”

Veter grabbed his collar and pulled back his shirt to reveal a series of bitemarks at the base of his neck. “Kitsune.”

Amber laughed at Veter, “That’s more like a hickey than a scar!”

“I’m proud either way!” laughed Veter.

Amber stood up on the bench and raised her leg as if to step up onto the table. She hiked up her pant leg to reveal a large burn running from her thigh down to her ankle. “Hive Queen. They can spit acid. Guess who found that out the hard way?”

Maybe it was the alcohol, or the camaraderie, but I unfasten my shirt and showed my torso. An oily, rainbow streak of burnt skin swashed across my chest as if by a large paintbrush. “Trying to levitate a piano.”

The others quieted down. I got the sense that maybe my scars were not as impressive, so I sheepishly refastened my shirt.

“I’ve got more scars than all of you,” said Grit’Nax, coldly.

Maybe I made the others regret making me drink, because I couldn’t help but ask, “What kind of scars?”

Everyone visibly winced.

“The worst kinds, lamb. I specialize in killing the worst kinds of monster,” replied Grit’Nax, as he sipped his drink.

“What is the worst kind? Dragons?” I asked, with slurred speech.

Everyone looked at Hansler, but before he could react, Grit’Nax angrily blurted out, “Doppelgangers!”

The rest of the group fell silent. Grit’Nax looked at them with frustration. “Oh, you won’t tells the lamb!? You’d rather laugh about sexy fox ladies and birds with breasts?”

“Peace, Grit’Nax.” Hansler leaned toward the goblin, with a serious expression. “He doesn’t need to hear about this right now.”

“All the lambs should knows!” shouted Grit’Nax. “Then maybe, they won’t slaps at you because they think you killed their husband. Or maybe they’ll believes you when you tell them their real family has been dead for months. Or maybe…”

“That’s enough, Grit’Nax,” Hansler commanded.

Amber placed her hand on Grit’Nax’s shoulder. He shrugged it off. He then slid his drink to me. “Here! You’re gonna needs it!” He then stood up and walked behind me toward the tavern’s exit. But then, he leaned in toward my ear and whispered, “Some of them copy kids.”

Hansler shooed Grit’Nax away, who raised his hands and casually walked out the exit.

I stared at the cup that the goblin had passed me. Hansler poured more liquor into it. “He might be rude, but you can’t refuse his glass. Drink up.”

I tried to down the drink, even though Grit’Nax’s words seemed to hit me in the stomach. Or maybe that was the liquor.

Hansler nodded to the group who, all at once, stood up and dragged me toward the back of the tavern. Amber kicked open the back door where a wave of putrid air from the back alley attacked my nostrils. I felt Hansler’s hand grasp the back of my head by my scalp. Veter produced a large bucket and looked unconcerned.

My stomach spasmed. I gasped for breath as I felt it coming up. Hansler pushed my head toward the bucket, and a blast of vomit sprays out like dragonfire. It burned, and it hurt, and then I spasmed again.

“That’s it. Let it all out.” Said Hansler, in a comforting tone.

“It’s not your fault, kid.” Amber said in an uncontextually sad way.

Four, no, five times I spewed into Veter’s bucket. There went the feast that mother had cooked last night. I heaved until there was nothing left.

“Veter, you can go,” nodded Hansler. “Thanks for volunteering.”

Veter nodded back and left with the bucket. My eyes felt heavy, and everything went black.

✥ ✥ ✥

I opened my eyes and saw… legs. A man’s legs. I was lying on a bench looking under a table. My head was killing me.

“He’s awake,” said a familiar voice.

I turned my head and saw Amber leaning over me. I sat up, and saw Hansler sitting across from me, eating bread.

“Where am I?” I asked warily.

“You’re at headquarters,” replied Hansler, with a mouth full of food. “Here, eat some of this.” He broke a loaf of bread and placed it in front of me. “You’re going to need your strength.”

“WHO IS THIS GUY?” Asked a booming voice that almost shatters my ears.

I painfully turned around to see an enormous man with blue skin towering over me. A giant.

“Bash, this is Kennis.” Amber said, gesturing toward me.

The giant leaned forward. “HELLO, KENNIS. I AM BASH. I MAKE DOORS.”

“It’s… nice to meet you… Bash.” I struggled to find my words.

“Can we just give him a potion already?” Amber asked Hansler.

“Yeah, but he does need to eat something,” replied Hansler. “Maybe a few eggs.”

“I’LL GET HIM SOME EGGS,” offered Bash.

“Chicken eggs, Bash,” clarified Hansler.

“OH, THEN MAYBE YOU SHOULD DO IT,” said Bash, with a hint of embarrassment.

I looked around the room. Stone walls with narrow windows. It was still light outside, probably afternoon. There was a large tapestry hanging on the wall. The Duskguard emblem was woven prominently over an array of small monster motifs. There were racks of weapons and pieces of armor. As I gazed around the room, Amber shoved a vial of pink liquid in my face. “Drink,” she said.

“Hold on!” I shouted, with a throbbing pain in my head. “This is too much! How long have I been out? What did you guys do to me?”

“It’s… all part of your initiation,” assured Hansler.

“Excessive day-drinking is how you join the Duskguard!?”

“Drink the potion, kid,” chimed Amber. “You’ll feel better.”

After a moment, I took the potion and drank. The vial felt warm in my hand, but the liquid felt cold, and tasted a little like strawberries. Suddenly, I felt it. That familiar tingling of magic coursing through me, except accelerated. That was a healing potion. The throbbing in my head and the pain in my stomach melted away. I could think clearly again.

“Eat this bread. I’m going to fry some eggs for you,” said Hansler as he got up and walked toward a door.

“ARE YOU THE MAGIC GUY?” asked Bash, his voice still loud but tolerable.

“Yes, Mr. Bash. I can levitate objects.”

“Well, not pianos,” quipped Amber.

I demonstrated my magical powers by floating objects around the room. Bash was visibly impressed. Amber kept reminding me to eat my bread, so I did. Hansler returned with some fried eggs and a glass of milk. I don’t like milk, but he insisted that I drink it.

“Did you have to drink a lot when you first joined the Duskguard?” I asked Amber.

“No,” she said uneasily. “Everyone’s initiation is… unique.”

“Well, I’ll certainly never forget this.” I said, finishing the food. “I’m not saying it was bad, but it was very unexpected.”

Hansler looked at me with a more serious expression. “You’re not quite done yet.”

“I’m not?”

“No.” Replied Hansler. “But, you can go home now.”

I stood up, and Hansler stood up at the same time. He leaned forward intently and said, “Make sure you tell your mother that you passed. You’re in. You’re one of the Duskguard.”

“I am?” I said, partially surprised. “Do I get an emblem?”

“Not yet,” said Hansler. “Perhaps tomorrow, or the day after.”

“Alright,” I said, thinking maybe there was a shortage of emblems, and they needed to commission more.

Amber showed me out the door.

I walked home a little dazed, but the news dawned on me. I was now a member of the Duskguard. I made it. The drinking was weird, but everything seemed real. Hansler was right, I should tell my mother right away.

I burst through the door and surprised my mother. “I’m so proud of you!” she shouted. “My son is a member of the Duskguard! Our dreams have come true!” She offered to open a bottle of wine, but with my brief hangover still fresh in my mind, I declined.

That night, I imagined what kind of monsters we would track down first. I would have loved to see a Kitsune. I had only ever read about them, and they seem highly romanticized. But, Grit’Nax’s words started to creep into my head. He really must have seen some awful things; I couldn’t imagine what he had been through. Maybe that’s why they wanted to kick things off with a day at the tavern, maybe they wanted me to see their fun side before things got too serious. I never expected to see a giant in Danrich. I wonder if he only stayed at their headquarters…

I started to drift off to sleep, my body feeling heavy, but then I felt a distinct prick in my leg, like a bee sting. I sat up, but my head felt woozy. My mother was crouching next to my bed, her finger was pressed against my leg. Did she poke me with her nail?

My body felt heavier. “Mothe…” My words barely fell out of my mouth. Backwards I fell onto my pillow. It took all my strength to tilt my head toward my mother, who was now standing over me.

Her finger. It was long and bent. She had an extremely long nail that hadn’t been there earlier. I looked up at her face. The light of the moons shined through the window, and I could see her skin bubbling up like goosebumps. Her eyes… slits appeared near her tear ducts and grew down the sides of her nose. Her cheeks slid to the sides and her eyes grew larger as her cheeks pulled back toward her neck.

She tilted her chin up, and her skin began to part along the jaw line. Dozens of sharp teeth folded out along her neck as her throat opened to reveal an enormous maw. Then, her posture contorted as her now narrow stomach lurched forward from her waist, and her shoulders rolled back. Her head leaned forward, rows of teeth poised directly over my face.

My body wouldn’t move, but I could still feel the flow of magic. Damn that piano! I would burn all my flesh to pull a weapon from somewhere, but I couldn’t grasp anything. I reached out, as far as I could, feeling the edges of my room. That’s when I felt something big approaching beyond the wall. It was like a charging bull.

Suddenly, a giant blue fist punched through my bedroom wall, scattering debris and knocking the monster off balance. Then, like a blur, a cloaked figure darted in through the hole in the wall and tackled her. The monster’s joints twisted and bent as the cloaked figure wrapped their cloak around her head and pinned her to the ground.

Another figure slowly walked in through the hole in my wall, a much shorter figure. In the moonlight, I could see the clear silhouette of a goblin. He moved cautiously toward the flailing monster, holding a rope. With surprising agility, he jabbed and weaved the rope around the limbs of the monster, hogtieing it into submission. The cloaked figure unwrapped the creature’s face, and it gnashed wildly, trying to bite at the rope.

“I hate looking at these things,” said Grit’Nax, drawing a long dagger.

The cloaked man turned to me and pulled off his hood to reveal a black eyepatch. It was Hansler. “I want Kennis to see it.”

Hansler walked over to me and propped me up. I was limp in his arms, helpless. Hansler pointing my head toward the monster. He didn’t say anything for a moment, he just made me stare at it. The creature looked back at me with its crescent eyes. Even the way it breathed was inhuman, like it was choking on air, like an elderly laugh.

“Do you know what that is?” asked Hansler, like he was quizzing me.

I struggled to form words.

“I should have fed you more earlier,” sighed Hansler. “It has a paralyzing venom in its claws. If I had fed you more, you might be able to talk now.”

“Doppel…ganger…” I drooled my words out.

“That’s right,” said Hansler, with a hint of disdain. “That is not your mother. That is a creature who mimics and eats loved ones.”

“Where… is… mother?”

“It ate her,” Hansler said with gritted teeth. “It cooked her, and in a twisted attempt to hide the evidence quickly, it fed her to you too.”

“Nooo…” My words felt like they had been twisted out of me, like wringing a wet cloth. Tears welled up my eyes. I didn’t realize she was gone. I didn’t notice a difference.

Grit’Nax walked toward me holding the long dagger. He held it out in both hands, offering it to me like a treasure. “Shows this thing you’re no lamb. Shows this thing what you can do.”

I felt magic flowing around and through the dagger. It felt cold, and rigid, but I reached into it. I’ve levitated larger objects, but the venom made me weak, so I directed the flow with my eyes. I blinked to tighten my grip, each time the dagger jerked in the air as I gained more control. Grit’Nax stepped aside as the long dagger hung in the air, levitating toward the bound monster. It hissed and tried to use its teeth to grab the floorboards and pull itself away.

The dagger hung in the air over the monster. Down I thrust the blade into its torso. Up I plucked it, and down again. Down through the creature, into the floorboards, up into the air. Down into its neck, up over its face, down into its eye. Around, and around, and around. Deeper, until the handle was soaked in its blood.

“Now you’re initiated,” said Hansler “Now, you’ll want nothing more than to kill creatures like these for the rest of your life.”

The dagger stood motionless inside the skull of the monster, but I still held it with my magic. Hansler was right. Seeing that thing, knowing what it was—-the only thing worth doing became killing them.

✥ ✥ ✥

Hansler explained everything to me. This doppelganger was trying to infiltrate the Duskguard, and it believed I was a good candidate. Although Hansler and Grit’Nax knew there was a doppelganger in Danrich, they didn’t realize who until it was too late.

The Duskguard actually didn’t choose me for my magic; they didn’t choose me at all. The Duskguard rarely chooses new recruits, the monsters decide for them. That’s what the Duskguard is made of, people who survived attacks from terrible creatures.

I buried what remained of my mother. As gross as it sounds, it was a kindness that Veter kept the bucket. I also found out that weremammoths are real; if I find one, I’ll kill it for her and place its tusk on her grave.