I walked down the dirt road, a naked slave girl bound and thrown over my shoulder.
This was Hyperborea, 300 million years in the past. It was the Carboniferous Period on where plants were (until recently) the dominant life on land. I breathed easy; the ratio of oxygen was much higher during this time. They grew all along the path, horsetail ferns and scrambling plants fighting for space. Cycads and ferns created underbrush so thick that a man with a copper machete could spend the whole day hacking and have crossed no further than a mile.
There was a rustling further along to the right of the path: Fern leaves shoved aside, and a giant millipede burst out. It was an Arthropleura; almost twice my size and covered in hard, chitin plates. It tasted the air with feelers as long my arm, then crossed the path and re-entered the undergrowth. In the air, I could hear the buzzing of giant insects. The sky was ruled by dragonflies as large as small dogs. As long as I didn’t run into a pack of them, I was safe.
The slave girl over my shoulder fidgeted. She was a slender, petite creature, about 5’5” tall. I had bound her thin ankles and wrists with knotted rope. Her young skin was clear and unmarked; a warm, tanned, Mediterranean tone to it. Her long, dark, hair hung straight and swished with every step. It shined in the morning sunlight.
"Please, I beg of you, Master!" The 18-year-old spoke the Hyperborean language ‘Low Common.' She spoke it well but with a strong, Anatolian accent. This placed her at about 12,000 BC during the Neolithic. This was when the people of that region developed agriculture and became ascendant. "Do not return me to my owner! I will be your loyal slave and serve you in every way!"
I laughed.
"My owner will slay me!" Feathered lizards squawked in the trees. They did not belong in the Carboniferous any more than I did. Like many things in Hyperborea, they had been transplanted here. "He will give me to his dark god and then feast upon my flesh!"
"’Yog,'" I said stroking her thigh. "His god's name is ‘Yog.' What your master does with you is his business. My business with you is almost done."
The ferns and cycads came to a sudden stop, and I stepped into a small, cleared, valley.
A gentle slope of knee-height plants ended at a narrow but deep river. Its water was dark with jet black mud at the bottom. Off to the East, the black river cut its way through ancient, granite hills. There were ruins there; thousands and even tens of thousands of years old. We were not the first wave of humans here. Nor would we be the last.
Off to the West, the river disappeared into thick jungle and wetlands. Beyond them was the dull grey of the Mist Wall. It was a permanent cloud bank over a hundred feet tall that encircled around the cosmic battleground of the gods. I could see a few lightning flashes over it; a quiet day in Hell.
Down in the valley before me, built alongside the river, was a small town. A two-story sandstone and mud wall ran around it; enough to keep out both men and larger, more dangerous creatures. Within the wall were beehive-shaped buildings made from stone. Many had thatched roofs made from hay (grass was another foreign import from across time). The smoke of cooking and forge fires rose above.
Right where the town met the water was a small set of docks. Long, Egyptian-style reed boats were moored along it. I watched bare-chested sailors unfurling a large, bright red sail. The wind quickly filled it in, and the boat strained to move. On its deck were clay pots filled with plant oil, dried fish tied in bales, and wicker cages holding naked slave girls.
I made my way down to the town gates. They were open; a pair of guards stood outside, looking bored. They carried shields of stretched hide, and their spears were tipped with dark, iron, blades. They wore bronze helmets shaped like fish heads.
Tattooed in black on their chests was the silhouette of a monstrous, fish-like, humanoid.
"The hunter returns,” One nodded, noticing me. “With prey most swiftly caught. Dagon be praised!”
"Good morning, gentlemen." I stroked the slave girl's smooth, clear, behind. "Not that swiftly, But still in good time all told."
Black stone statues twice the size of a man stood on either side of the gates. They were of a tall, humanoid being with long arms and wicked talons. Green river stones formed their eyes. Humans skulls had been placed around them on the ground.
They waved me through, and I entered Dura; a town that worshiped the monster fish god, Dagon.
Yes, Dagon. Cthulhu, Set. These were not fanciful horrors from the minds of writers of the 1920s and 30s. They were quite real, and Hyperborea was their battlefield.
Just four months ago, I had stumbled my way to it out of this alien jungle and to this town, dazed and delirious. A kindly ironmonger named Scar took me in. With foul broth and bed rest, I survived the ‘Transport Sickness.' I repaid Scar by working in his shop, first running the fires and pouring yellow-hot liquid metal. Then, casting collars and chains for slave girls. Finally, he let me try beating metal into blades. He taught me swordmaking, and in return, I showed him how to make steel.
I came upon a large shed of dark wood and stone. Hammering came from inside. Firewood was stacked outside in a pile. Kneeling by it was a tall, brunette slave girl with her hair done up in a swishing ponytail. She gathered wood into her arms and stood, straining. All she wore was a ragged, gray loincloth that hung down between her knees. Around her throat was a black iron collar. Her skin was sheened with sweat and marked with black, ash stains. She turned and saw me, her blue eyes becoming wide.
"Master Gerard!" She quickly got down on her knees and looked at the ground.
The hammering stopped.
From out of the shed stepped a large, well-muscled man. He wore a blacksmith's apron and thick, leather bracers. He was bald; his black beard and mustache tied with stone beads. He smiled when he saw me.
"Who comes to entrance bringing idle words and purse too light with coin?" He had the hard, clipped accent of a native-born Hyperborean.
"I've got no coin for your garbage, Scar."
"Painful words from a man who carries my best blade at his side. Have great Dagon and Cthulhu cursed me with ingratitude instead?"
We embraced. Beside us at the doorway was a small pedestal of mud bricks. Perched on it was an ugly, bone-carved statue of a Dagon. The morning’s blood offerings still dripped from it-I wondered if it had been human.
“You did not miss a sacrifice,” he said, seeing my gaze. “There are still two more days to the full moon.”
“Of course. Wouldn’t miss it!” I lied.
"What delight is this?" He studied the dark-haired girl over my shoulder and ran his hand down her leg. "Perhaps we should broach a casket of wine and waste this day with beautiful women kneeling before us, our cocks in their mouths?"
His kneeling slave blushed. Lovely Orla was an Ancient North Eurasian. Hers was a Paleolithic people from out of Siberia, from 24,000 BC. They had hunted mammoths. Then the gods hunted them.
"I would love to, but this one must be delivered to the bounty house. She is worth more than most."
"Who does she belong to?"
"Garaman the Trader."
"The Yog worshiper?" He shook his head. "A waste to give her back to him. Before the evening, she will be skinned and impaled, her flesh roasted and eaten off her bones."
The dark-haired slave screamed and began kicking and writhing.
"Now look what you have done!" Passersby stared. "Gag her, will you!"
Scar chuckled and pulled a dirty rag from a pocket. He put it between the girl’s teeth and tied it roughly behind her head. She continued whimpering into her gag.
"I have detained you long enough. Go, collect your money, Sell-Sword."
I gave him a thumbs up (which he did not understand) and left.
***
Muddy, dirt paths ran between the buildings of Dura. I passed a shadowy alley. Inside men crouched around a table and rolled dice made from human knuckle bones. One cheered and the others groaned.
Small children screeched and ran past me; a boy bouncing right off my leg and carrying on like I hadn't even been there. An old lady with her face as creased as a scrunched up ball of paper, smiled at them while she sat in her doorway on a low stool. She was busy descaling fish in a bucket. Their severed, armored, heads floated at the top.
I stopped at a wooden cart with creaking wheels passed me at an intersection. It was pulled by a reptile big as a small elephant; the ground shook with its steps. It stopped for a moment, and a long, purple tongue snaked out, tasting the air. A farmer beside it swore and gave it a whack. The cart lizard ignored him but finally started on its way again. I have no idea what species it was, or what time it had came from.
The bounty house was a two-story structure of white-painted sandstone. Its windows were barred like a prison cell's. Standing outside were two guards with round shields and swords by their sides. Their bare chests were marked with tattoos and scars. They gave me a dirty look as I approached.
"Gentlemen," I nodded. “Here to collect.”
They let me in.
Inside was a large, open, hall. There were no shrines or statues: bounty houses are neutral in the war of the gods. To my left as I entered was a large, long, wooden board. Papyrus scripts had been pinned to it. They were scrawled in Low and Middle Common, but some were in the other languages of the Hyperborean. Sitting at a small table beside the board was a white-haired scribe. He dipped the quill into a small, clay bowl of black ink and carefully continued writing on a parchment stretched out before him.
I went up to the board, found the one I wanted, and pulled the yellow, papyrus-like paper off.
The old man looked up at me, whatever unpleasantness he wished upon me a mystery behind those eyes. Then he turned back to his writing.
Across from the board, a room had been partitioned by iron bars not unlike in a jail cell. Behind the bars were sealed casks of wine, bags of grain, even furniture. Two men were assessing a pile of rough-cut gemstones, checking them against a papyrus list. Kneeling in a corner was a slave girl in a gray loincloth and chest wrap. She looked down at the ground, a heavy, iron chain around her throat went to a ring set in the wall.
"We have told you not to tear those, and yet our words fall on deafest ears!"
At a table in the cage was a middle-aged woman. Her hair was in a bun, her nose had the severeness every school child learns to fear. Beside her was a wooden chest.
"Here you go," I passed her the papyrus through the metal bars. "Garaman's runaway slave."
She studied the papyrus carefully, eyes darting back and forth. Then she read it a second time. I think she just liked making me wait. That was fair; I was hardly a team player.
"Take her," she said to the two men, pointing.
The two men unlocked the heavy cage door and stepped up to me. The dark-haired slave girl began thrashing again as I handed her over. Our eyes met, and she gave me a look of pure hatred. They quickly took her inside and laid her down on the stone floor, on her belly. The stern woman handed one the papyrus, and he began reading through it. He nodded to the other who quickly cut the rope around the slave's ankles and forced her legs apart. He gripped her buttocks and pushed them apart.
"15 gold," said the stern woman counting out thick, crudely cast coins. She put them on a pair of scales and made sure they balanced. "More than a girl like that is worth."
"Wait!" The man studying the girl’s buttocks held up one hand. "She is no longer a virgin."
The stern woman's eyes narrowed.
"Gerard of House Stone, could you not keep your cock from between her legs?"
"Have you looked at those legs? 15 gold."
"She is not a virgin anymore. Garaman the Yoggite requested his virgin be rescued."
"And she has been. It did not say in the contract that she be returned as a virgin."
"Don’t you know that she is useless to him, used? That now he cannot sacrifice her? Why do you think he was willing to pay so much for her return?"
The dark-haired girl turned her head back to look at me.
I winked at her.
"Well, that’s just too bad for him,” I shrugged. “He's going to have to find another virgin then. The contract has been fulfilled as written. 15 gold please."
The stern woman handed me the coins. I pocketed them and left.