The Hew-Man

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.  1  .

Zak

“Have you been practicing blood magic?” 

Lightning flashed, distant.  The storm had moved off into the mountains.  Zak shivered in the damp night.  Thunder answered before Zak did, both with indignation.

“Yes, Dad!” Zak shouted back. 

“Then stop standing there like a frightened imp and focus.”  Strenk’s voice was as deep as the thunder.  His green skin looked as black as the clouds overhead in the darkness.  “I need your help catching the wyrms.”

“I’m trying to focus!” Zak shouted, insolent.  Anger is a fickle emotion.  It rarely gets directed appropriately.  It’s a very useful emotion for blood magic, of course.  Strong emotions like anger and fear were great at fueling spells, but lousy for conversation.  Zak wasn’t mad at his father.  He was mad at himself.

The wyrms had escaped in the storm.  The hood of the wyrmpit had blown over from the wind and the stupid wyrms trampled out chasing each other.  Zak clutched his wolfhide cape close to ward of the wind.  A sudden blast of fire erupted next to Zak’s head.  Zak dove to the ground out of mortal instinct, but, as he did, his nose caught the odor of rancid sulfur and half-digested gruel.  Realizing it was just a belch of fire from one of his clumsy wyrms, he felt a pang of irritation at the overreaction.

“Steady, Zak.  They think this is a game.”

“Blast it!” Zak yelled without heeding the warning.  “I got it!”  The flash ruined his vision for the moment, but Zak got his feet under him and dove toward where the flame had been.  A wing flapped under his arm but he caught nothing.  The beast’s tail swatted him on his way forward and assisted his trajectory toward the ground.  Zak was rewarded with a mouthful of mud for his efforts and a fresh helping of rage.

“We don’t have time to play in the mud, son,” Strenk said, calmly.

The mud squelched as Zak freed his face from it.  “I’m not playing!” Zak shouted back.  Normally, Zak could coo the wyrms and calm them, somewhat.  Others would always make the mistake of trying to chase the wyrms.  Giving them chase only led to tripping, falling, cursing, and riling them up.  Wyrms love being chased.  Wyrms could be tricky, slithery, scaly, and, well, wyrmy. 

The beasts were useful, of course, and valuable.  They were dense with muscle.  Per pound they were the strongest thing in the village, though they only stood as high as Zak’s knee.  They had a lizard-like body, but with hard scales instead of leathery skin.  A wyrm’s face was ugly, something between a snake and an alligator with tiny goat horns.  The little demons also had wings.  That’s what made them so troublesome.  They were pathetic, little, leathery wings, but they allowed them to defy gravity and master alike.  Not by much.  They could run or jump faster and further.  Itty, bitty flights and itty, bitty infractions.  Of course, even itty, bitty infractions are escalated by something that breathes fire.  Well, ‘coughs’ fire.  A carelessly swung torch could do more damage.  But wyrms made more stench.  Hobb liked to say they ‘reek havoc.’

“Do not make the mistake of chasing them,” his father said.

“Obviously!”  Zak, flustered, tried to focus on his ability to corral them.  He could make them listen to him with his wyrmcall.  It wasn’t the baby voice one would use to calm a wolf.  This was a guttural growl, like a long belch.  The scroll-keeper had once told Zak that he imagined the ancient script of the mountain-cave Godkin must’ve sounded something like Zak’s growling wyrmcalls. 

As for the wyrms, the wyrmcall would stop them in their tyrannical play to look at him, curiously.  They’d be mesmerized by his call and cock their heads as if they were trying to understand.  Of course, it just looked that way.  Understanding was not something wyrms could do.  They were ridiculously stupid creatures.  They could easily escape their cages, but never bothered to go far.  The ‘cage’ they lived in was merely symbolic: a trench less than a pace deep that they could effortlessly ‘fly’ out of.  The hood that covered the wyrmpit was raised up to cover them, but only superficially.  It was more an umbrella than a roof.

Zak drew in a breath for his wyrmcall.  Just then another wyrm ran across his back and stomped on his head.  Zak’s breath ended in a mouthful of murky rainwater.  His arm shot in the wyrm’s direction catching its tail.  The creature whipped the tail the other way, lurching Zak toward the animal.  Zak couldn’t see it, but he imagined where the beast’s neck was and latched on.  He rolled over the muddy animal and it, in turn, fell over and plopped all its weight down on Zak’s stomach.  Winded and sputtering, Zak released his grip and wiped his eyes.  He coughed up mud while he tried to get his bearings.  Eyes cleared, Zak realized that he was pinned under the beast backward.  He was looking right at the creature’s backside when it released a cloud of noxious gas in Zak’s face.  The noxious gas was not a power unique to wyrms; that was a power shared by all creatures with a digestive track.

“Enough!”  Strenk scolded.

The wyrm calmly flopped off of Zak.  It was a struggle for Zak to get his lungs up to capacity again, with the muck and odors rolling around in his mouth.  He sat up and looked at all the wyrms sitting still, all staring in the same direction, a position and direction that Zak now mimicked.  There he saw Strenk, in a stance that exuded power.  One hand was outstretched, pushing as if it was holding back all the wyrms, which, magically, it was.  His other hand was balled in a fist.  On the top of that fist Zak could see the silhouette of some poor rodent’s head.  From the bottom of Strenk’s fist and through the cracks in his fingers dripped a dark liquid.  Steam curled up from the liquid in the cold air.  Blood magic.  Perfect, flawless form. 

Blood magic came easily to his father.  Magic powerful enough to hold these creatures in place took mastery.  With that mastery over magic and that powerful form, it was clear to see how Strenk had become the Chief of the Godkin.  Zak felt a pang of awe, but shame coated his mind like the mud now covering his weak, pale skin.

“That was good work, son.”  Strenk lied as the wyrms stomped back to their pen.  The anger in his voice softened to pity.  Strenk’s anger didn’t subside because of pity.  His father had command over his emotions.  Strenk wouldn’t lose focus on a spell because of concern for Zak.  He would ease his anger only after he was done with the magic or the rat was out of blood, but certainly not because his pity for Zak was stronger than his control over magic.  But pity was there, now.  Zak had already known he wasn’t necessary to help with the wyrms.  Strenk had never needed the help.  He had only offered Zak one more chance to do anything right and Zak had fallen into the same discomposure as the wyrms.  Now he felt shame instead of pride over even this small ability.

“Well done,” Strenk repeated.  “I couldn’t have handled them all.”  Strenk reached out to help Zak to his feet.  Strenk didn’t have to reach downward.  Zak kneeling on the ground was the same height as his father.  Strenk’s gnarled, green fist pulled Zak upright with enormous strength.  Though Zak stood chest and shoulders above Strenk, he felt he’d never live up to the incredible figure of strength before him.  Strenk was tall for the Godkin, but Zak’s freakish height was an exception.  All the other Godkin his age were growing stout and wide, while Zak kept – inexplicably – growing up.

“Remember, Zak, we must engage a conflict first with our minds,” Strenk lectured.  “Strength and magic are tools, like shovels or spoons.”

“I know, dad,” Zak replied, calmed by his own embarrassment.  “I shouldn’t have overreacted.  I should have stayed calm.”

“You let the wyrms fluster you.  You reacted the way they wanted you to.  Unfortunately, that is too often the Godkin weakness.  We are known for overreacting and lashing out in anger.  The Godkin curse is that our magic and our strength are powered by our emotions, and we habitually let them rule us.  We are not known for our cunning or our diplomacy.  We are known by our rage and brutality.  This is why outsiders name us ‘goblins.’”

Zak flinched at the slur.  “I’m sorry I lost my composure,” he replied.  Zak had never met an outsider, but he knew that they hated the Godkin; and he knew that they called them goblins.

“Are you going to eat that?”  Strenk asked, pointing to Zak’s cape.  Zak looked down to see he’d spilled his earthworm stew in his haste.  A leech was clinging to the mud-crusted wolf fur.  Zak tossed the leech in his mouth.  He wasn’t hungry, but anything connected to blood might help strengthen his connection to its elusive power.  It was probably just a hag’s tale, but best to be safe.  “The stew wasn’t very good, anyway,” Strenk added, “maybe some firetoad would spice it up.”

“Dad.  I have to tell you something.  I don’t know… I’m not sure if I can…” Zak started to say, but hesitated before he said, ‘I’m not sure if I can cast blood magic.’  Courage wasn’t a power Zak possessed, and it would take a lot of courage to admit that he could never live up to his father.  Nevertheless, he was interrupted.

Boom, Boom. . . Boom, Boom.

Zak felt the rumbling reverberations in his heart more than his ears.  These new boomings weren’t from the passing storm.  These were the crashes of the Krowdy-Krawn.  The massive hoop-drum in the Square was supposed to strike awe in those it reached.  For Zak and the other young Godkinder, the drum had always tolled for gatherings and festivals.  It had always been a happy sound.  But now the ominous crash brought fear.  It was said that the Krowdy-Krawn warned of terror, danger, or war; but Zak had always lived in a time of peace.  Only now did he understand the drum’s purpose.  It felt like dread.  It was a warning.  It was time.

“It’s time, Zak,” Strenk put the words in the air.  “Time to show off what you’ve learned.  Time to reveal your blood magic.”

The tolling of the drum continued with the beat of Zak’s heart.  He stared with dismay toward the Square, unable to speak.  The looming Krowdy-Krawn seemed to grow larger and larger over the circular arena at the center of Allspire until Zak realized that Strenk had his arm around Zak’s shoulder, guiding him ever closer to the ceremonial circle called ‘the Square.’

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Mat Labotka

Meet the author

Mat Labotka is an entertainer. Having studied drama and dance at Marquette University, and then sketch writing and improv at Chicago’s Second City, Mat is both classically trained and freshly comedic. After a long tenure in the Chicago improv scene, Mat is now living in New York City. Mat’s writing credits include ‘Riled Up!’ a series of comic books co-written and illustrated by Pete Hassett (who also drew the cover art for Zak), as well as plays and comedy.

Influenced by his work in improv comedy and his lifelong passion for entertaining, Mat’s writing is full of wonder and whimsey.

Mat also hosts a weekly comedy podcast, Grumble Goat, a short, fifteen minute, grumbling about life’s little annoyances.