World Eater

80

ALZAR WAS STARVING.

A gnawing in the pit of his stomach had pulled him from his slumber, a pain that felt like a weight on his chest. Restless, he had stumbled into the forest, wanting to ease the tension in his mind.

He flinched at the sound of footsteps behind him. “Fancy?”

Her hands touched his shoulders. “Yes, Alzar?”

“I want you to tell me about World Eaters. I want to know who I am.”

Fancy’s eyes sparkled. “I see.” She ruffled the hem of her dress, taking a step in front of Alzar. “The owner of this body considered herself a researcher of the occult. I suppose you read her work, correct?”

An image of the website he had visited so long ago flashed in his mind. Alzar motioned to speak, but was interrupted.

“Her work was mostly correct. We are vast, shapeless creatures beyond human comprehension. We gain power by consuming.”

“I still feel hungry,” Alzar muttered, wrapping an arm around his stomach.

“That's how you should feel. Your existence will be one fueled by hunger. You will eat to live and live to eat.”

A tender smile sat on her lips, quelling the rapid beating of Alzar’s heart. Her air was unreadable, but intoxicating.

“Is it possible for a World Eater to eat another World Eater?” The words slipped off his tongue before he had time to process them.

Slim, cold fingers trailed down his cheek, caressing his neck and falling on the scar on his collarbone. “You'd become unstoppable.”

Alzar swallowed, throat sore. “If you are my mother, who is my father? Is he a World Eater?”

Fancy chuckled, resting her arms behind her back. “You have such a simplistic view of the universe. It's charming,” she murmured, tilting up her head to watch the clouds, “I am the only World Eater capable of reproduction. I am the Mother of all World Eaters, the most powerful of any of my progeny.” Light seemed to glimmer in her eyes, the reddish sky staining her skin rust. “I am not driven by hunger, but the desire to multiply. My only need is to bring you to maturation, Alzar.”

Alzar’s eyes followed Fancy as she drifted to a tree, plucking an egg from a small nest. Sweat soaked the back of Alzar’s neck as she presented it to him, his blood running cold.

“There was one thing my host never discovered: why we consume planets. I would have thought a fellow mother would understand.”

Alzar began to tremble, fingernails digging into his palms.

“You are an embryo inside its egg, Alzar. You are unable to take care of yourself, so I must incubate you,” she twisted the egg within her fingers, gazing at its surface, “An embryo is provided yoke within the egg to feed upon, correct? Why should a World Eater be any different?”

The shell cracked, spilling fluid and a shriveled chick at Alzar’s feet. Fancy grinned. “You already took your first nibble.”