30 years later.
An explosion rocked the air, raining chunks of masonry and glass down from the building above. Ari and Sibyl dived behind the hulk of a ruined truck, rolling underneath to shelter from the hail of debris.
"It's getting closer.” Sibyl’s voice was tinged with the longing for battle, and Ari knew her friend wanted to be back there, fighting deep in Sector 35. The Corps was the only family they had now, a renegade team trying to restore order to a tiny corner of the desolate planet.
Once the dust had settled, Ari rolled out from under the vehicle. “The war won't end while we take a few hours off.” She sprang to her feet, her lithe body as fast as a wild cat.
"Time off?" Sibyl laughed as she brushed herself down. "I haven't heard that expression since before the Contagion."
“Come on. We need to keep moving.” Ari scanned the scene, acutely aware that they were off their patch, deep into Untamed territory, but she had to risk running this gauntlet. It was almost too late.
The message had arrived a few days before, passed through the networks that kept communication alive on this forsaken continent. Elyse was about to be Blessed, and Ari couldn't let that happen. Even though she hadn't seen her sister for fifteen years, she still remembered her blonde curls and the way her skin smelled after a bath, back in the days when they were still possible. The little girl’s innocent giggle stuck most in her mind, the last thing she heard before she was led away for her own Blessing.
She would not let that same violation happen to Elyse.
Ari and Sibyl darted between the ruined buildings of the Empty Quarter, eyes drawn to every shadow. The area was only designated empty so that it could be written out of any rescue plan, but Ferals lurked here among the Untamed and plague victims eked out a pitiful existence in its shattered world.
“You've never told me what happened back then,” Sibyl said.
Ari looked ahead, avoiding her gaze. “I’ll tell you when I come back out again.” If I come back out again. “It's a long story. Thanks for coming with me.”
Sibyl shook her head, dismissing the gratitude. "Just don't expect me to stop asking for some answers."
They walked on, alert for danger. The Empty Quarter had once been a business hub, with high-rise office buildings, boutique shops and restaurants. A center of commerce in the days when people had First World concerns – could they afford private education for their children? Which new car would be most fuel efficient and safe?
Those were the days when people didn't need to know practical skills like how to grow crops or fix farm equipment, or even how to fight and defend their families. The end of that life had come before Ari was born, but she had seen its reflection in her mother's eyes as she stumbled to draw water daily from the public well. Her mother's naivety in the face of disaster had resulted in her own birth, a child of rape in the days when defense of the country became more important than protecting the innocent within its borders.
Now the Turning was legend, with many tales told of how the days of plenty had been ended by the Contagion.
The mysterious illness had spread from the icy far north, at first considered a wave of extreme violence endemic only to isolated communities. But when ordinary families were slaughtered by soccer Moms and children hacked their school friends to death, the authorities began to study the nascent brutality. They found a virus, a strain unseen before, that turned the infected into savage, uninhibited killers.
They scrambled for containment, but the virus was airborne and soon reached the larger urban populations of the Northern Hemisphere. It spread quickly, taking millions in its bloody wake. International disputes erupted in the panic, blame heaped upon whichever nation was considered a sworn enemy. Humanity had only ever been a splinter away from chaos.
It wasn’t long before the combat went nuclear, wiping out major cities where most of the infrastructure and knowledge resided. The world was split apart, and now humanity dwelled in the ashes.
Ari and Sibyl walked quickly along the edge of the road, where the buckling and cracking were less pronounced, and they could use the crenelated buildings as cover.
Sibyl pointed to a graffitied wall at a symbol painted in pitch, its edges dripping like black blood. An orb cupped in a bowl on top of an inverted cross, representing the God of the Underworld who had stolen the hope of summer from the earth.
“Is that his Mark?”
Ari looked up and memories flooded back from the night of her Blessing when that symbol had been seared into her brain. The Fallen Ones had held her down as she writhed, while the sound of a thousand fiendish angels cursed and screamed for her corruption.
Ari nodded. “He calls this place the city of Dis, supposedly guarded by fallen angels, punished by God for their disobedience. The Mark encircles his domain.”
The Contagion had separated the remnant of humanity into those who turned away from the idea of deity, and those who believed it was God's judgment for the sins of the world. But Ari knew the truth. There was no God here, only one man's brutality, and the shadows were ever deepening.
She looked up at the sky. “We must hurry. The Blessing begins as the sun dips below the horizon.”
They started a slow jog towards the walls that loomed in the distance, where fires burned on the ramparts proclaiming the city's dominion over the scarred land. Their feet beat in time, their even breath creating a rhythm born from years together in the Corps.
The city of Dis had grown like a cancer inside the walls of an old power station that had once been luxurious flats in the days Before. In the chaos of the last generation, factions sprang up, and people aligned themselves with warlords who fought for dominance. The man who ruled Dis had a name back then, but now he was known only as The Minotaur. He lived at the centre of the labyrinth that the city had become, and he called the prettiest girls to its heart for the Blessing.
As they jogged on, Ari glanced up at the trees growing alongside this stretch of road, emerging roots thrusting through concrete. Nature thrived as humanity was all but destroyed. Trees like these were their refuge most nights, their home on many a mission for the Corps. Ari craved the security of those branches now, but she forced herself on.
A patch of thorny bushes loomed ahead. They were too far away to see clearly, but they seemed to be hung with scraps of material.
As they drew closer, Ari’s heart crumpled as she realized what they were. Corpses hung on the barbs, hooking into skin that had been cut and maimed, in various stages of decomposition. They hung along the main road to the city, traitors or blasphemers against the perverted laws of the Minotaur.
Ari reached for Sibyl’s hand as they stood before the ruined bodies, and tears gathered in her eyes. Those of the Goddess considered life to be more precious after the Contagion but within the boundaries of Dis, life was expendable. As they walked past the dead hand in hand, Ari felt a deep sense of guilt at leaving these people behind to their brutal fate.
“You were only a child when you escaped,” Sibyl said softly. “If you hadn’t left, you would have ended up bearing that monster's children, or dead out here with words of defiance carved into your flesh."
As Ari nodded slowly, she noticed a glimmer of color in the shadows. At the base of one of the bushes, a single rose bloomed, its petals stained red with the blood of the martyrs. Ari bent to stroke its leaves and breathe in the faint scent, a sign from the Goddess, hope of new life in this dark valley of the dead.
They walked on within the shadow of the protective trees and ducked into one of the ruined buildings before they came within sight of the guard towers of Dis. Ari took off her pack and pulled out a dress she had found only days before, slightly stained with blood but cut well enough to make the guards open the door for a closer look.
She stripped off her camouflage uniform and pulled on the dress.
“That's hideous.” Sibyl stuffed her rough hands deep into her pockets, fists clenched.
Ari untied her hair from its scarf, letting her dark curls hang loose. “The only guaranteed way into Dis is as breeding stock. I know how it works in there. I need the guards to take me to him immediately.”
She pulled her dog-tags from around her neck and held them out, the symbol of the Corps glinting in the afternoon light.
Sibyl shook her head. “I have enough of those from sisters lost.” She sighed, then took the dog-tags with reluctance. “Please don't go.”
Ari pulled Sibyl into an embrace. and they stood, hearts beating together. There was so much to say, but no time left, not now. After a few moments, they broke apart. Ari knew she must act now or she would give in to her fear, turn and run and leave this place behind forever.
“I’m coming back, and I’m bringing Elyse with me, so I need you outside to cover our retreat and help us get away. Inside there, you’d be a liability. You don’t know it like I do. I’m sorry, but I have to go alone.” Ari took Sibyl's hands once more, her eyes serious. "Promise me you'll move to a tree near the gate after dark, and stay there? If I'm not out by first light, I'm not coming out at all. Leave and get back to the Corps. Promise me."
“Alright, alright.” Sibyl brushed away tears. “Enough now. Get in and get out again. I’ll be waiting.”
Ari limped out of the building, feigning weakness as she neared the forbidding doors of Dis. They were fortified from the ruins of conquered enclaves, and now the ornate, triumphal arch had become a portal to the Minotaur's Hell, where the violent prospered, and the weak could only do his bidding.
Ari recalled the expression of fear on the murdered bodies and painted her own face with the same as she approached. Her heart pounded, her ears filled with the sound of her own blood as two guardsmen came out to meet her, eyes hard as they raked over her body. One held a ferocious dog on a short leash, its powerful jaws slavering, ready to charge and tear flesh on command.
Ari pleaded for sanctuary. She was just a woman trying to stay alive and this was her last chance for refuge. She knew it was how so many arrived here and did not emerge to the sun again.
One of the guards nodded, and Ari walked quickly through the gate before he changed his mind. The great doors slammed shut behind her, the sound of a prison cell closing. Panic rose within as her vision narrowed. She was trapped here away from the sight of the sky, out of reach of the Goddess, but it was too late to go back now.
“Take her up to him quickly,” one of the guards said to two others. “He'll be with the young one tonight, so he'll likely send her back down to us quick smart.” His leer transformed his face into the mugshot of a demon, the corruption of the city made flesh. “But don't worry, princess, we'll take good care of you. Won't we, boys?”
With raucous laughter echoing behind her, two guards pulled Ari deeper into the stronghold of Dis, her footsteps treading ground she had sworn never to walk on again. She glanced up at the walkways stretching into four great towers above. They were crowded with people walking slowly about their labor, too exhausted to even look down at her, too burned out to be curious. Entropy ruled here, decay and decline evident in the stink of the overcrowded population, kept wretched by the fear of what was outside the walls in the dark.
The Minotaur used narcotics to keep the population subdued, over-riding human will with a desperation to merely survive each day. The cheapest of the drugs, known as Vir-Gil, was cut with chemicals that burned skin and corrupted blood. Deformity seeped into the population birth by birth, so refugee women with fresh blood were always in demand.
Ari could see the imprint of what the city had once been, but the place had changed in her long absence. The colors were now a palate of grey and brown, not the burnt sienna of autumn leaves or the silver feathers of the mountain owl, but bleached and faded versions of the natural world of the Goddess. The world outside was difficult and dangerous indeed, but wasn't it better to die in the woods as the sun filtered down through the leaves, a last moment of pleasure before the end? There was nothing left of beauty here, except perhaps the children, before they were ruined even as they bloomed. Enough. Ari fixed her gaze on the back of the guard’s head, counting the minutes until she stood before the monster once again.
At the heart of the city, fragile huts packed with families formed a labyrinth, the jagged paths through the shanty town near impossible to navigate. It stank of sewage and decay. People fled at the guards' approach, shrinking against flimsy shelters, darting into shadows to avoid the batons that could come down at any point. The cowering figures were branded with his Mark, the burns of ownership black and ragged on their skin.
Ari followed the guards past pits like open tombs, where heretics against the Minotaur were thrown to fight and die, as flaming coals were flung upon them. Men shouted around the edges, betting what little they had on the brawling below, witnesses to a battle that could only end in death.
At the edge of the shanty town, the guards led Ari up rungs of steel inside one of the main towers, their lewd comments soon silenced by physical exertion. As she climbed, part of her wanted to smash her boot down into the face of the guard below, kick him off into the gaping space so that his body dashed on the ground beneath, giving the pitiful crowd some hope of defiance. She squashed those feelings down. Her ill-timed bravado would not help Elyse.
She forced her arms to pull faster, finally arriving on a wide platform that looked out over the city below, with a window to the ruined world outside and a single door.
One of the guards knocked, the sound echoing down the deep shaft below. Ari glanced out of the window to the horizon, the rim of the sun only inches away from dipping lower. Another few minutes and the ritual would begin. Her heart beat faster at the sound of approaching footsteps.
The door opened to reveal a young girl, eyes downcast, body hunched. Was this Elyse? Ari scanned her features. No, she would be in preparation, so this must be the one she would replace. As the Minotaur of ancient Greece, the monster of Dis took new life each month to serve his needs, before discarding the old to the pandemonium below.
“He's busy,” the girl whispered. “You cannot disturb him now.”
Ari stepped forward. “He’ll want to see me. Tell him a lost daughter has returned to beg for his mercy.”
The girl's eyes flickered upwards, meeting Ari's gaze with a glimmer of recognition. Perhaps they had heard tales of her escape. Perhaps she had unwittingly provided a hope of freedom beyond the gates.
The guard turned, his hand raised to strike her for impudence. Ari stood tall to face him, waiting for the blow.
“Enough.” A deep voice came from within, and Ari shivered in recognition. “She may enter.”
The guard paled and dropped his arm, pushing Ari to the door, keeping his eyes lowered.
Ari walked in, and there he was, the man she had feared all her life, who had roamed her nightmares since the day she had run from this place, wounded from his Blessing.
He stepped from the shadows, his broad chest bare and oiled emphasizing the tattooed Mark, the symbol of his domination. He was still magnificent, his height and strength giving him an advantage over any man who would challenge him in the pit.
But there were more scars on his body now and touches of grey in his thick hair. Ari realized that he was just a man, not the eternal monster of her childish dreams.
"Ariadne." His voice was a filthy caress. "I thought you dead many years ago." He stepped forward, his dark eyes compelling. “Kneel.”
Ari found herself obeying without resistance and she fell to her knees as he approached. His fingers lifted her chin, caressed her lips, then twisted into her hair, pulling it tight.
“Who is the traitor that tells of your sister's Blessing?” The Minotaur tugged her head back, pulling a knife from his belt, holding it against the flesh of her neck.
Ari's heart raced. Her pulse beat against the blade as she sent a desperate prayer to the Goddess.
He stroked the knife gently over Ari’s delicate skin, raising a bead of blood that trickled down into the top of her dress. His eyes watched as it ran over the swell of her breast, then he let go, pushing her roughly forwards. “No matter, I will find out after the ritual is complete. Tonight you will witness your sister's Blessing.”
He snapped his fingers. Three women emerged from the shadows, their bodies tattooed with serpents, their hair twisted into tight rings on top of their heads.
"Meet my Furies." He walked away, laughing over his shoulder. "Did you really think I would remain in my eyrie without protection? They were chosen from the death pits, the ones who remained standing after the Purge." He turned to the women. "Bring her."
As the Minotaur strode away up a staircase to the rooftop, Ari backed away from the Furies, crouching into a defensive posture. The women undulated closer, their bodies sinuous. They had the crazed dilated pupils of junkies, addicted to the drugs and violence that kept this city of ruined souls alive.
“I want to follow him,” Ari said, still backing away, fighting to keep her voice even. Her eyes darted to each Fury, judging their distance. “You don't need to drag me up there.”
“Now, where's the fun in that?” one of the Furies said, her lips drawn back in a vicious grin as the three of them edged forwards.
Ari tried to block their attack, but they were too many. A blow to the kidney opened her up for a punch to the stomach. She fell to her knees, winded and gasping for air. One Fury held her head up by the hair, and another readied her fist to strike.
“Not her face,” the other said, her voice tinged with fear. “He won't like that.”
The Fury satisfied herself with another gut punch, and Ari crumpled to the ground in agony. The women dragged her up the staircase, emerging onto a platform that perched atop the tower with views of the ruined land beyond.
A cool breeze blew across the deck, and the Furies raised their faces to the sky, drinking in the fresh air that was denied them in the depths of the stinking city. They held Ari tight, fingernails digging into her flesh, two of them with knives drawn. The sun burned the horizon, just a touch above sinking below it. As the last rays reached them, Ari saw her sister.
Elyse was tied to the altar on the edge of the platform, with nothing but air between her and the Goddess. Her limbs were lashed down, and she struggled weakly, her blonde hair spread out on the carved wooden shrine to his foul god. At the four corners of the altar stood dark angel figures, but now Ari could see that they were only metal sculptures, not real men. Those jagged wings had haunted her nightmares, but now she saw through the artifice, manufactured by hallucinogens the girls were forced to take, their minds corrupted while he took his malevolent pleasure.
The Minotaur stood on the edge of the tower, looking out towards the burning plains as the dying sun lit the earth with a ruby glow and a touch of flame. It seemed as if flakes of fire rained down upon a river of blood that weaved across the ruined landscape below, a breath-taking moment of beauty from the Goddess. He read aloud from a book of human skin, its patchwork of color catching the light, transforming its curses into a parody of sunburst.
As the Minotaur spoke the final words, he lifted the great helmet upon his head, with horns that Ari still saw in her fevered nightmares. The Furies gazed towards him, mesmerized, as his body was lit by the dying sun, his bronzed, muscled skin alive with fire.
In that moment, Ari knew what she must do.
She spun from the grasp of one Fury, pushing her away into another. As they stumbled back, Ari felt the bite of a blade on her arm as one of them slashed down, but she was out of their grip. Time slowed as she saw the Minotaur's eyes widen at the sound of struggle, and she glimpsed human frailty there. He was but a man, lord of this nest of malice, but still only a man.
Ari ran at him, her legs swift from the fitness of the Corps, the years she had spent training for just this moment. At the last second, she jumped, using the corner of the altar to give her leverage against his bulk. As his arms wrapped around her body, his roar of anger exploded, and together they toppled over the edge into the void.
As they fell, Ari looked out towards the dying sun, into the very face of the Goddess, his screams of rage her final prayer.
