\nThe Feeder King often hunched by the shadowed mouth of his cave, listening to the rush of the waterfall as he waited for pilgrims to visit him. He\u2019d see them coming from miles off. They would emerge from the shadow between the mountains before laboring up the twisted pathway, hugging shawls, cloaks and scarves to their necks and shoulders even as they sweated with the effort of the climb. It wasn\u2019t easy to bring new lies to the Feeder. But they brought their lies all the same.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cI gave up my farm to help my sister\u2019s boy.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\nLie.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cThe village watch makes sure nothing befalls us.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\nLie.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cI love my old woman more than all the gold in heaven.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\nLie.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cWe all worship you, Feeder King.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\nAlmost a lie.\n<\/p>\n
\nOne of the Feeder\u2019s acolytes once asked him plainly, \u201cWhy lies, Feeder King? There must be some more tasteful way to sate you, if you take my meaning.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cWould you rather that I taxed you on your food instead?\u201d the Feeder asked. \u201cYour gold? Your women? Your handiwork? I could live off those things too, like you scrawny men do.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\nThe acolyte recoiled ever so slightly. \u201cI\u2019m only curious. I don\u2019t presume to tell you what\u2019s best.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cOf course you presume. All people do, in their own ways,\u201d the Feeder replied, smirking at the acolyte\u2019s discomfort as he leaned his oily body closer. \u201cI\u2019ve tried feeding off other things before.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\nHe\u2019d consumed grain and meat when he was young, light, water and fire after that, then music for a time. He\u2019d even tried truth when he was feeling desperate. The thing was, truth didn\u2019t change anything. It simply was. But lies? Lies tipped the balance. They transformed people. Lies made things. Infused new life where there wasn\u2019t anything before.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cI think I\u2019ll stick to lies for now,\u201d the Feeder said and dismissed his acolyte with a wave of a deformed hand.\n<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\nHe was something like a spider when he first arrived in the mountains, a fat arachnid that gleamed from the sweat, mucus and discarded thread coating his body. It was hardly his first form, though. When he lived in the Outer Ocean he\u2019d been like a squid\u2014a slippery creature that could squeeze through small tunnels and hide in unlikely places but still choke an enemy\u2019s life away in moments. Ten years before that he\u2019d lived in a city as colorless as tar and slate, where he\u2019d taken the form of a bloated bird. He\u2019d watched his prey from a rotten tower top, swooping down like a feathered stormcloud when he was hungry. Now, as he watched from the waterfall, his skin was the lifeless color of a leechworm, but his shape made him almost like a human. A human whose hunger never failed.\n<\/p>\n
\nThe lies his people brought kept his appetite in check, but the Feeder still watched eagerly as new falsehoods entangled the tiny world of farmers, trappers, hunters and poachers below him. One village sent a mob to block another\u2019s wood road, shouting out oaths, retelling stories of old rivalries and accusing the others of offense. For the Feeder, watching them lie to each other was almost as satisfying as hearing them direct their fabrications to him. A feast from afar for the Feeder King.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cYou\u2019ve started something strange,\u201d his curious acolyte said one night. \u201cMy village\u2014and two others nearby\u2014have begun holding a sort of ceremonial meeting each turn of the moon.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cWhat sort of meeting? And don\u2019t blame me for what your villagers do. I keep to myself up here.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cNo blame, Feeder King. These gatherings are a lot like our meetings, though. They get together and tell lies to their leaders. That\u2019s all.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\nThe Feeder frowned. He hadn\u2019t thought lies could sustain humans. Not like they sustained him, anyway. Perhaps he\u2019d unknowingly taught them what he\u2019d taken decades to learn.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cWhere did they get this idea?\u201d he asked.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cNo one really knows.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cThey won\u2019t say, you mean.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cOh, they\u2019ll say. Fifty different men claim to have started it, but they can\u2019t all be telling the truth.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\nThat wiped away the Feeder\u2019s frown. He was almost hungry again just thinking about it, these gatherings of vapid, greasy tale-tellers below. They only came to him one at a time, slow enough for him to savor each offering. But even a patient Feeder liked to gorge on occasion.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cMy King?\u201d the acolyte asked with a twitch. \u201cYou\u2019re making a strange face.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cManners, manners. You\u2019re fortunate I\u2019m such a forgiving ruler.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cYou\u2019ve never seemed to care when I\u2019ve spoken my mind before.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\nIt was true. With all the bowing, groveling fools that trekked up the falls, the Feeder rarely had any real conversations anymore. It was refreshing to have a follower who\u2019d truly converse rather than offering his lies and immediately scampering down the pass.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cWhat should I do about these gatherings?\u201d the acolyte asked.\n<\/p>\n
\nThe Feeder smiled. \u201cDo nothing. Lies are cheap enough to waste here and there. So long as my offerings remain steady, I have no reason to care if a few village men collect similar payments.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cDoesn\u2019t it worry you?\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cNot at all. You make it sound as if a few pigworms gathering in the dirt could hurt my feelings.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\nThe acolyte shrugged. \u201cI didn\u2019t mean to imply anything. I just can\u2019t puzzle out why they\u2019re doing this.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cI might be able to enlighten you. They worship me, don\u2019t they?\u201d the Feeder asked. \u201cPerhaps they\u2019re measuring their lies before they bring them to me, trying them out. Or maybe they\u2019ve learned the value of reshaping the truth to sustain themselves. And I suppose they also feed, in their own way.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\nThe acolyte shivered involuntarily. Still looking unnerved, he bowed, told a few of his own lies and retreated down the mountain.\n<\/p>\n
\nThe Feeder watched him go. Despite his outward calm, he thought hard on what he\u2019d heard. Though he\u2019d smiled to his acolyte, he didn\u2019t smile to himself.\n<\/p>\n
\n
\nIt was almost a year before he visited one of the meetings for himself. He washed his body first, wiping away the sticky sweat that coated him even on sunless days in the dead of winter. He garbed himself in a cloak, a tabard, even a pair of breeches, though he couldn\u2019t find any shoes to wear. His feet looked frostbitten, scarred and gray, but the snow was deep enough that no one would likely notice. Leaving them bare, he climbed down beside the waterfall and slipped into Talonshade Village to find the meeting.\n<\/p>\n
\nIt was just as his acolyte friend had said. Perhaps thirty people gathered in a wealthy woodworker\u2019s home, each offering an outlandish lie in turn. It sent a shiver of pleasure up the Feeder\u2019s spine as he listened and fed from the cool of a snowdrift outside the window. So much to absorb. So much on which to feed.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cOld Hullom killed my best goat and fed it to his dogs.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cMy father once introduced me to the angel spirit of Toril the Blessed.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cI found someone\u2019s silver stash buried near my house. It\u2019s worth more than I\u2019d make if I sold my whole farm.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\nAlthough most statements were indeed lies, some were true. The fools inside just didn\u2019t know the difference. The true assertions made the Feeder laugh at his subjects\u2019 ignorance. The false ones flooded his ragged body with strength.\n<\/p>\n
\nThey went on for half an hour. Lie. Lie. Lie. Lie. Lie. Liars all, of some sort or another. Then a short man with hair the color of straw said, \u201cRals set fire to my outside woodpile last night. He burned down a year\u2019s worth of work and could have killed my children if I hadn\u2019t been handy to put it out.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\nAnother lie.\n<\/p>\n
\nThe man called Rals shot to his feet. He was a stocky man, with pale lips that protruded like mushroom caps. His face twisted with anger as he shouted, \u201cI\u2019d rather be a dog than listen to any more of this nonsense. Take your words back.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\nThe straw-haired man turned on him. \u201cNo. I\u2019ve said my piece, and everyone heard it. I can\u2019t take that back.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\nRals shot forward, fast as a hawk, and struck the other man in the jaw. The straw-haired man stumbled back and upended a chair. His fist smashed into a glass window as he fell. Before he could rise to his feet, one of his friends snarled and pushed Rals aside, while another tried to tug Rals\u2019s arms behind his back, both men\u2019s faces turning red with effort.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u201cThrow Rals out, if he can\u2019t behave himself,\u201d someone called.\n<\/p>\n
\nAnother man threw his own punch at the mushroom-lipped Rals, catching him in the temple. Recoiling from the punch, Rals broke free of his captor and knocked the other attacker back with a kick before bolting toward the door. A second later they were all after him, all shouting, all cursing him and his land.\n<\/p>\n
\nThe Feeder almost stepped away to hide himself from sight, but he felt paralyzed. Not by fear, though, or even fascination. It was something else altogether. He couldn\u2019t decipher the emotion, but he felt\u2014if anything\u2014a greater influx of strength now than he had as the villagers lied to one another, some strange well of power building up around him. It filled the woodworker\u2019s home like a blizzard. Like an avalanche.\n<\/p>\n
\nRals tried to run, but a dozen grasping hands, kicking feet and striking belts intercepted him by the doorway. He stumbled through the snow after that and left a red trail where he crawled. Voices shouted in fury behind him. No one noticed the Feeder, entranced by the front window. After jeering at Rals for a moment, the villagers returned to the warmth inside, still seething and raging enough that they left their original game of lies forgotten. Rals cursed back at them through a mouth full of spit and blood. Then he staggered away into the blue darkness of the night.\n<\/p>\n
\nThe Feeder stayed rooted in place for a long time. When at last he felt able to move, he walked briskly back to his cave, mind racing. Perhaps it was time to feed on something new. Lies were satisfying, but nothing like what the Feeder had enjoyed just now. If his villagers posed any measuring stick, they\u2019d enjoyed it too.\n<\/p>\n
\n
\nBefore living in the Outer Ocean or the mountains, before the forms and the feeding, he\u2019d been a wizard. He\u2019d honed his ability to shape and unshape everything around him, to weave patterns into the world, to master things that defied control\u2014storms, waves, wind, shadows and fire. He\u2019d been able to bind the world\u2019s resting forces together. Even to untie little strings keeping the world whole.\n<\/p>\n
\nNow his power was exhausted, his body fragile and clumsy. It took him weeks to reshape even himself. It felt as if he\u2019d forgotten how to control his other abilities, or perhaps just imagined he\u2019d had them in the first place. Still, he pined for his wizardry more than he\u2019d ever longed for anything. So he fed however he could in search of it.\n<\/p>\n
\nHe couldn\u2019t shake his memories of the day his power failed him. It had happened in a duel with a wizard called Helix, after earlier victories had made him brazen. He\u2019d gone into this contest sure he\u2019d win, unprepared even to be hurt, let alone destroyed. But Helix had\u00ac-<\/em> destroyed Entesi, as the Feeder had been called then. He wrenched Entesi\u2019s body apart. Helix then left him as little more than a pile of skin and bone sweating the last of his blood across the burnt top of a sand dune.\n<\/p>\n \nHelix scowled down at what was left of him, looking somehow unsettled at what he\u2019d done. \u201cThis was all a waste,\u201d he said, as if to himself.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYou\u2019ve killed me,\u201d was all Entesi could think to reply. \u201cYou\u2019ve killed me five times over.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYou\u2019ll probably live. They say only a final touch of magic can kill a wizard completely. And I didn\u2019t come all this way to kill you, anyway.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nEntesi reached for his heart. It still beat, somehow, beneath a layer of muscle and a cage of twisted bones. Entesi was too shocked to feel much, too hurt to make sense of his own pain. \u201cThen…why?\u201d he asked.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI wanted to learn what you\u2019d discovered, damn you! They all said you were the greatest wizard alive, Entesi. They said you\u2019d found new ways to draw power.\u201d Helix stiffened. He kicked a rock past Entesi\u2019s head. \u201cIt seems they were mistaken.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nWith that, he left Entesi there on the top of the dune, the sun searing his spilled blood into the ground. Entesi tried to watch him go. He called out to ask what Helix meant or what he truly wanted. He almost thought to beg for Helix\u2019s help. But he was too confused, too afraid of what was happening even to think of anything else.\n<\/p>\n \nHis arms wouldn\u2019t lift anymore. His fingers were locked stiff. He needed water, medicine, rest, food, shelter. But all he could think of was Helix\u2019s puzzled expression as he\u2019d left.\n<\/p>\n \nA moment later, sand vultures started to descend.\n<\/p>\n \n \nThe winter after the men beat mushroom-lipped Rals, blue fire consumed two nearby villages. The Feeder questioned his subjects when they came to offer lies. He fed on their rage as they described why they\u2019d helped destroy their neighbors, or as they lied about having nothing to do with it.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThis has to stop,\u201d his acolyte said, running a hand through his hair while he paced back and forth through the cave. \u201cHalf of my kin are at each others\u2019 throats, and the other half are frozen belly-down in the lake!\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nThe Feeder frowned at him. \u201cYou confuse me, friend. One moment you\u2019re so morbidly curious and the next you\u2019re blaming me for one village\u2019s feud with another. You must completely despise our conversations.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nA savage look crossed the acolyte\u2019s face. \u201cI don\u2019t know what you mean, Feeder.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cDeny it, then. You obviously feel some sense of power talking to a demonic glutton like me. Your skin must tingle as we mock the wretches with whom you live.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nThe acolyte flinched.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cGo on,\u201d the Feeder said with a wave of his hand. \u201cI can see right through you. Explain your problem.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThere\u2019s nothing more to explain! The entire valley will be dead by spring at this rate.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cBlood\u2019s a higher price than lies, I\u2019ll admit. But I\u2019m not the only one it nourishes. Surely even you can see the good at work here. I\u2019m growing stronger than I\u2019ve ever been, thanks to your people\u2019s anger, envy, whatever it is.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThere\u2019s nothing good about an entire village getting burned or butchered!\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nThe Feeder frowned again. \u201cYou still talk as if this is my doing, not theirs.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cIt\u2019s all your doing! It has always been you, you and your lies!\u201d The acolyte stepped closer, sweat coating his face almost as much as it coated the Feeder\u2019s exposed body. \u201cYou\u2019ve crossed a bridge we can\u2019t cross back, and I\u2019ve had enough with it.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nThe Feeder looked long and hard at his acolyte. Perhaps the man was simply afraid, maybe overworked. But he seemed courageously sure of himself. After a moment the Feeder said, \u201cI suppose I shouldn\u2019t be surprised that you\u2019re the first to turn on me. You know me better than anyone else, after all. If you\u2019d been wiser, you would have fed me to the wolves the day I came to your mountain range.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cIt\u2019s not too late for that, Feeder,\u201d the acolyte growled. \u201cYou\u2019ve ruined us, and we all know it.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nThe Feeder laughed. He must have sounded like a cawing crow, perhaps a yowling cat, but he laughed from his abdomen until his follower flushed with annoyance or shame. \u201cI\u2019ve ruined you?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cIf you don\u2019t step in and stop this killing, we won\u2019t come up here again! No more lie offerings. No more anything. You\u2019ll starve like a baby bird alone in its nest.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cSpiteful but amusing. What if I throw you over the waterfall right now? That would teach you some reverence for your King.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYou couldn\u2019t throw a bone across the cave without our help,\u201d the acolyte spat. He turned to leave. \u201cI\u2019ll give you five days to do something about the fighting below, or else I\u2019ll see to it that our little pilgrimages up the mountainside are over.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cMaybe I don\u2019t need your visits anymore.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nThese mountain people had made him strong again. The hungry enmity their own lie-mongering had started was now so potent the Feeder could drink it in from the top of the waterfall. No need to go down. No need to have them come to him. Bitter fury enlivened the air for miles.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYou say I\u2019ve ruined you,\u201d the Feeder went on. \u201cBut I think the opposite is true. You\u2019ve ruined me,<\/em> you and your piss-sweating villages of goatherds. I came here defenseless. Weak as a fledgling bird, to use your own words. You\u2019ve fed me. You\u2019ve<\/em> made me what I am.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI\u2019ve heard enough from you.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nThe acolyte walked away. As he crossed from the darkness of the cave into snowy sunlight, the Feeder lashed out with a wave of disrupting magic like he\u2019d once wielded every day. It made the man\u2019s legs go weak, his back buckle, his sight dim and his shoulders shake. The acolyte dropped into a snowbank, eyes rolling upward. He struggled for a full minute before he could turn to face the Feeder, open-mouthed.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cWh-what did you do to me?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cCursed you,\u201d the Feeder said simply.\n<\/p>\n \nThen he struck again, sending a black ripple through the air as fast as a bolt from a crossbow. The spell knocked the acolyte over and left him quivering as his body began to roll down the steep slope of the mountain.\n<\/p>\n \nThe Feeder inched forward to watch him tumble. The man\u2019s limbs were too weak to stop himself. His mind was too weakened to think of calling for help or begging for mercy. His descent was a long ordeal, but not even the glare of snow and sunlight could bother the Feeder now. Not now that he had a new source of power.\n<\/p>\n \n \nFor the next three moons, he had the mountain people bring him word of the wrongs others had done. He had to coax them out at first, soothe them into explaining who\u2019d done what against them. \u201cNot just the others down there, either,\u201d he explained after several fruitless visits. \u201cYou can tell me what I\u2019ve done wrong as well. I\u2019ll listen.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nNo one dared speak freely to him, of course. Half of them had seen his acolyte\u2019s body at the bottom of the falls, crushed and lacerated by rocks and trees along the twisted pathway. The same fate could take any of them, and they knew it. But the Feeder didn\u2019t need so much as a statement of their wrongs now. He could feel their resentment bubbling up like oil in a cooking pot. It steamed off their skin and burned in their tight-lipped mouths. The stronger their fear or their fury, the more he had on which to feed.\n<\/p>\n \nTheir visits became less and less frequent as winter deepened. Soon enough, no one ascended the Feeder\u2019s pass at all. The silence of his cave gave him a twinge of what he could only call loneliness. Maybe even that could strengthen him now.\n<\/p>\n \n \nSometimes he\u2019d go down, walking among the villages in the guise of a trapper or a trader. He\u2019d listen to their angry talk and watch them jealously guard their food and fuel, tasting the foul anger at work between them.\n<\/p>\n \nHe was walking through Talonshade Village like that when Helix appeared.\n<\/p>\n \nThe wizard still wore the form he\u2019d used decades ago, when he left the Feeder bleeding out on the sand\u2014an unremarkable man-shape with a pointed nose and thin hair. Their eyes met, and Helix walked closer. The Feeder dug his heels into the snow. He\u2019d never expected to see Helix again. But he was also ready this time.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cHow long have you been holed away up here, Entesi?\u201d Helix asked with a scowl. He walked slowly, casually even.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI wasn\u2019t hiding, if that\u2019s what you mean,\u201d the Feeder said. \u201cIn fact, I\u2019m surprised it took you so long to make your way here. I thought you\u2019d come to straighten me out as soon as you heard about my little kingdom.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cKingdom? Your \u2018kingdom\u2019 is a dung-heap filled with bloodthirsty sops.\u201d Helix stepped up to barely an arm\u2019s length, leering over his pointed nose. \u201cThey say you call yourself the Feeder now\u2014like a starved maggot. Perhaps you haven\u2019t made much of a king.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI\u2019ve taught my subjects all I know. So what brings you to my \u2018dung-heap\u2019 lands?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nSomething hardened in Helix\u2019s eyes. \u201cI\u2019m here for the same reason I found you last time.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cA duel?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cIt was never about the duel, Entesi.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nThe Feeder found himself grimacing. \u201cIs that why you spared me, then? Left me as food for the buzzards?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nQuick as lightning, Helix\u2019s hands shot upward. The snow around the Feeder erupted like a bursting pustule. He flew back ten paces, heat searing his skin, rivers of liquidy silver clawing at him. He landed in a snow drift and had to fight to keep his head in the open air. His adopted form trembled with pain.\n<\/p>\n \nA woman screamed up the road, and two men darted away as if they\u2019d seen a spirit. Helix spat after them. \u201cYour subjects run the moment you\u2019re in danger. So much for your kingdom.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nIgnoring the pain from Helix\u2019s spell, the Feeder stood. He tried not to follow his subjects with his eyes. They\u2019d come back, though. They had to come back. \u201cIt\u2019ll take more than last time to fell me, Helix.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI don\u2019t want to fell you!\u201d Helix shouted. \u201cI came here looking for a new power, something strong enough to bring back everything I\u2019ve lost! That was the only reason I sought you out years ago. Obviously, you didn\u2019t have any power to offer me then.\u201d He spat again, eyes darkening above his pointed nose. \u201cYou were my only hope. The strongest wizard in the known world, as people told me. Yet even now, with years to come up with something, your power looks as meaningless as mine is.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nHis hands shook with rage. He turned away.\n<\/p>\n \nThe Feeder stepped toward Helix. \u201cWhat have you lost, then?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cWhat does it matter? People. Memories. Nothing you can replace. You never had any power like they said you would.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nWithout turning back, Helix struck again, hitting the Feeder with another silvery spell. The Feeder was too surprised to consider countering it. He tumbled through the snow once more, only halting when his body slammed into a buried tree stump.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI cursed you then and I curse you now, Entesi. Hearing of your \u2018kingdom\u2019 here made me hope again\u2014for a moment\u2014that you\u2019d discovered something. It seems my hope was wasted.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nAnother spell pounded into the Feeder\u2019s side, but he resisted this time, redirecting the attack into the open air where it faded like a man\u2019s breath in the cold.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI did discover something, Helix.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nHelix\u2019s eyes widened ever so slightly. He turned in distraction, though, as a chorus of voices rang over the hard, frozen road behind him. The Feeder turned to see a throng of mountain people approaching. There must have been two hundred of them, some carrying torches, some axes, canes, hoes, hammers and fishing spears.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cIt\u2019s the Feeder King!\u201d a woman shouted. The woman who\u2019d run before. \u201cHe\u2019s still there!\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nA feeling of pure wrath welled up inside the Feeder, and it was life-giving air after drowning, soothing coolness after falling in a firepit. It thrilled through him like nothing he\u2019d ever felt.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThey want to kill you, don\u2019t they?\u201d Helix asked, finally smiling.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cNot me,\u201d the Feeder said, holding his ground as the crowd rushed closer. \u201cI\u2019m just a harmless trapper. You\u2019re the one magicking villagers in broad daylight.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nHelix had just enough time to look shocked. Then the stones began to hit him. Axes next. Knives and arrows. Crates, lit lanterns still cased in precious glass, bars of misshaped iron, chunks of ice. He went down before the throng reached him, but they didn\u2019t stop when he fell.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYou\u2019ve attacked us for the last time!\u201d the woman screeched as she kicked at him.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cYou made a mistake, showing your blood-sucked face down here!\u201d an old man called. He swung an adze at Helix\u2019s shoulder.\n<\/p>\n \nThe torrent of bodies pushed Helix into the snow, clubbing, cutting, smashing, kicking, even scratching at Helix, who thrashed to break free and roared in pain. He managed to fire a few spells into the fast-formed throng, but other villagers replaced the ones who fell. They didn\u2019t care. They\u2019d suffered too long to care. They pressed him down into the snow as they dragged and tore at him, shouted curses or spat at his face and hands.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cEntesi!\u201d Helix shouted.\n<\/p>\n \nThe Feeder, bruised and cut from Helix\u2019s spells, stood near the back of the gathering. He shook his fist for show and watched in fascination as his fellow wizard was torn apart. And all the while, he fed with his people.\n<\/p>\n \n \nIt was almost dusk before the villagers dispersed. They left Helix\u2019s remains for the bears, a series of red splashes across the middle of the road to where they dumped him down a gulch. Even then, the Feeder knew Helix wasn\u2019t dead. Only magic could really kill a wizard after all.\n<\/p>\n \nIn the shelter of darkness, the Feeder reshaped himself. For his own amusement he kept his shape human, thinning his hair, pointing his nose slightly, until he was the mirror image of his once-rival. He\u2019d just finished his new form when he reached the spot where Helix had been dumped.\n<\/p>\n \nHelix shook all over. His skull had been crushed, his ribcage too, and his skin was half-flayed behind him like a cape. He had nothing left to bleed, it seemed, but his body still thrummed with whimpering life. The Feeder plucked a wild snowflower and dropped it over Helix\u2019s ruined frame.\n<\/p>\n \nHe leaned close to the gasping thing that was his rival, whispering, \u201cYou were right to leave me alive, make me go searching. I think I found just the sort of power you\u2019ve been looking for.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cR-rage?\u201d Helix somehow managed to stammer. \u201cRevenge? Bloodlust? W-what did you find?\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cThose are beginnings, nothing more,\u201d the Feeder said dismissively. \u201cI could glut on these villagers\u2019 bitterness forever and still be just a Feeder King. But get them<\/em feeding off the same things? Now I\u2019m a thousand<\/em> Feeders.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nIt was funny, really. He might never have realized it without Helix\u2019s timely arrival or foolish attack. Now it was clear as winter sunlight. All this time he\u2019d thought the strongest wizardry was his own, when the greatest power was truly to replicate it, multiply it outward like a fistful of grass seed.\n<\/p>\n \nA hissing sound came out through a tear in Helix\u2019s knobby gray throat. \u201cY-you\u2019ll leave me, won\u2019t you? Like I left you all those years back.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cI could.\u201d The Feeder leaned yet closer, close enough to lick the broken skull if he wished. \u201cBut I won\u2019t.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nHe unleashed his magic as a wave of icy needles, blasting himself upward while the jet of cold, cutting spells severed Helix from his last hold on life. Then he shaped himself into a snow eagle and winged away from the mountain villages. He\u2019d done enough there.\n<\/p>\n \nIt didn\u2019t matter where he went next or whom he found there. Whoever they were, he\u2019d make feeders of them too.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The Feeder King often hunched by the shadowed mouth of his cave, listening to the rush of the waterfall as he waited for pilgrims to visit him. He\u2019d see them coming from miles off. They would emerge from the shadow between the mountains before laboring up the twisted pathway, hugging shawls, cloaks and scarves to …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":106885,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,19981],"tags":[19982],"class_list":["post-137741","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fiction","category-tcl-34-winter-2020","tag-the-colored-lens-34-winter-2020","entry entry-center"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137741","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/106885"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=137741"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137741\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":137742,"href":"http:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137741\/revisions\/137742"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=137741"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=137741"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=137741"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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