darkSpyro

The Rending

The red sun had climbed to its apex over the Skelos Badlands, watching the daily comings and goings of the apelike humanoids and their watchers: large, saurian creatures with thick legs and armored skin that came in varying shades of light orange to a dark, rust-orange. From the upper window of the dragon-built adobe, the lava lizard Kurga looked out toward the large, horned skull of the Fiery Mother. A tear rolled down her scaled cheek as she watched a procession of lava lizards made their way into the skull's gaping maw with her husband, bound in gnorc-made shackles.

Kurga left the window and, as she made her way down the hall, found her thoughts turning to their child.

How do I tell him? He's a smart boy but will he understand...?

She came to a stop at the boy's bedroom and paused before going in. He lay asleep, his side gently rising and falling. He was small for his age, and the dark bruises and scabbed-over wounds bore testament to the consequences of his timidness.

Kurga rapped a claw on the wall. "Ripto?" The young lava lizard lifted his head and glanced around, then let it fall to the floor again. "Ripto?" She entered the room and knelt by her son and shook him gently. "Ripto, its time to get up."

The little lava lizard rolled over to face his mother, regarding her with sleep-encrusted eyes. "Whuzzit?"

"Its time to go--"

"Dunwanna go to pits, still sore." the half-asleep lava lizard muttered, pulling the covers over his head.

Kurga ripped away the covers. "Ripto, get up, we're going to the Fiery Mother!"

Ripto finally sat up, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. "Really?"

"Yes."

"All right! They're finally making me a watcher!" Ripto leapt to his feet and rushed past his mother down the hall, whooping in that rumbling, growly way all lava lizards do. Kurga followed, her heart growing heavier with each of her son's joyful cries.

Together they made their way through the Badlands. Younger lava lizards glanced up from their daily duties as Ripto passed, leering and barring their teeth at the runt. Yet he didn't notice them; Kurga could practically feel the child's excitement radiating like heat from the Mother's Womb.

But how quickly will it all be extinguished when he finds out why he's really in the Womb?

Kurga brushed aside the thought as they came to the path leading into the massive skull of that ancient lava lizard they called the Fiery Mother. Torches had been planted to either side of the path leading down into the Mother. Ripto had fallen back, bless his heart.

He was always afraid of the dark she thought, fondly remembering the time he'd gotten lost in the pits after dark.

The deeper they went into the Mother, the more audible the growls and grumbles of the other lava lizards grew. Soon they came to a pair of massive doors with what looked like a fallopian tube carved into the stone. Kurga pushed open the doors and entered, followed by Ripto. The talks among the audience ceased immediately.

The Womb was a massive circular chamber with multi-tiered seating encircling a half-mile wide pit of pure bubling magma. The color of the lava in combination with the torchlight cast an eerie red glow on the entire area. Her eyes immediately found her husband, Jargul. He stood facing her, and smiled when he saw Ripto peeking around his mother's ponderous bulk.

"Dad..." Ripto said, wide-eyed and confused, "what's going on?"

Jargul chuckled. "What the Overwives call Justice."

"Jargul Firebrain, have you any last words?" asked a deep, female voice. Its speaker sat with a group of four other lava lizards, all female and all disgustingly flabby and wrinkled with age.

"Yes, I do. The dragons are coming. They'll incinerate our people and enslave the apes. Its a shame you lot of hags are too narrow minded to see that."

"Dragons!" laughed one of the Overwives. "A creature of the ape-babe bed fables! We thought you a more intelligent creature, Firebrain."

"And even if there were dragons," said another Overwife, "the Fiery Mother would wake and devour them all then turn their realm into a floating ball of slag."

There were mumurs of agreement from all within the Womb.

"Your crimes, Jargul Firebrain, include: enslavement of your flock, eventual abandonement of your flock, and spilling the blood of your flock--"

"To open the portal! To find allies to help us fight the dragons!"

"Allies! The Fiery Mother is the only ally we need!" exclaimed an Overwife.

"We need the Numenaldre!" Jargul protested. "The apes have only limited texts on the old kings, and I needed more legible and comprehensive--"

"The apes are heathens formed from the dirt and rock and their Numenaldre are glorified lawn ornaments!" the Overwife bellowed. "Now then Jargul Firebrain for your crimes, you are sentenced to the Rending!"

A low chorus of "Rending! Rending!" broke out over the gathering of lava lizards. Kurga saw Ripto's eyes moving over the audience, full of anger and disbelief. She looked back at her husband and saw him as she did when they first met: proud, focused, intelligent beyond most of his peers. He calmly looked on at the Overwives, his face an unreadable mask.

"Mommy." Ripto tugged on Kurga's arm. "Mommy, make them stop."

"We can't sweetie," she said sadly. "I'm sorry."

Then the Overwives spoke as one: "Birth Gaolers, take him."

A pair of male lava lizards with plated skin stepped forward and led Jargul to the edge of the fiery pit. He cranned his neck around and locked eyes with Ripto.

"Be brave, child. You have no right to lay fault on the ignorant."

Ripto gulped. "Daddy don't go! Mommy stop them!" Ripto cried furiously. "Stop them Mommmy, stop them!"

"Into the fire!" cried the Overwives.

Jargul turned back to the lava, took a deep breath, exhaled, then gave an imperceptibly nod. The Birth Gaolers pushed together, thrusting Jargul Firebrain into the fiery Womb. Ripto watched, horrified, as his father was submerged in the molten magma. A large flame burst from the pit, carrying the dying cry of Jargul Firebrain, father of Ripto which echoed throughout the circular chamber.