Mother of Demons by Eric Flint

In her visits to the hospital, the Mother of Demons spoke rarely, and never to Nukurren. At first, Nukurren wondered (not caring, simply curious) if the Mother of Demons was angry at her for some unknown reason. All the other demons who came to the hospital spoke to Nukurren. Spoke to her often, in fact, and sometimes at tedious length; expressing their gratitude and their affection.

Eventually, Nukurren thought she understood. The Mother of Demons never showed her grief because it was so great that the showing of it would break her completely. And if she never spoke to Nukurren, it was not out of anger. It was because to speak to the gukuy warrior who had saved so many of her children (perhaps, in the end, all of them—for battles are fickle things) would be to acknowledge her own responsibility for sending them into their death. A responsibility which the Mother of Demons had taken, and had accepted; but could not yet, thought Nukurren, call by its own name.

The day came, after Shofiyaburrunushtayn finally died, when the healer demon Mariyaduloshruyush pronounced Dzhenushkunutushen safe from danger. Shortly thereafter, the Mother of Demons arrived at the hospital. The young male demon was conscious now, if still very weak, and he and his mother exchanged a few words before he fell asleep. For long, then, did the Mother of Demons remain, holding the huge, deadly hand of her child in her own tiny and much deadlier one.

The Mother of Demons sat on one side of Dzhenushkunutushen’s pallet. Nukurren, as she had done for many days, squatted on the other. As always, the Mother of Demons said nothing to Nukurren; did not even look at her.

Much later, the Mother of Demons arose and made to leave. But at the doorway, she stopped, motionless for a time, and then turned back. She came to stand before Nukurren and then, still silent, bowed to the warrior.

Nukurren recognized the bow. Nukurren was very observant, and had already learned many of the subtle methods by which the demons expressed their sentiments. But no subtlety was needed here. The bow which the Mother of Demons gave to Nukurren was not the bow which ummun gave to gukuy. This was the great bow, the special bow. The bow which had no name in Enagulishuc, but which the Kiktu called the gukku tak tu rottonutu, the “homage to the Old Ones”; and the Pilgrims, in Anshac, the purren owoc.

Truly, the Mother of Demons, thought Nukurren, after Inudiratoledo left the hospital.

She, alone, almost understands.

There was no place for Nukurren in this new world being born, for the chants were absurd. Grandiose, preposterous, ridiculous—lies. That the chantresses themselves, and those who listened to the chants, thought them the truth mattered not at all. Lies, believed, are still lies. And untruth was made even the worse, by the fact it was thought to be true.

For there was no Nukurren the Valiant. That creature did not exist, had never existed, could never exist. There had been no glory in her charge. Neither glory, nor grandeur, nor courage, nor valor, nor justice, nor hope for the future, nor even the thought of triumph.

There had been nothing in it. Nothing.

It had been that nothing which had made her charge truly irresistible. Nukurren knew, had long known, that she was a great warrior. But not the greatest warrior in the world could have carried through that charge. Her charge had been irresistible because it was not a warrior’s charge.

To be sure, she had used all her warrior’s skill—and immense skills they were. But the soul of that charge had been the shriek of a newborn spawn, realizing, from the first moment of consciousness, that the universe was a cannibal. Knowing, always, that there was nothing in the world; nothing but pain and solitude, which endured, and endured, simply because the universe was a torturer enjoying its sport. A cannibal, lingering over the feast.

Nukurren had gone to the battle, but she had not intended to participate. She had come, simply because—she did not know, exactly. A professional interest, partly, to see how well the demons had learned the lessons she had taught them. But, mostly, she had gone because Dzhenushkunutushen had given back her weapons and her armor, and she had never realized he possessed them. She had been moved, then. She had been moved, not by the still-new and uncertain friendship embodied in Dzhenushkunutushen’s return of her belongings. No, she had been moved by her astonishment that a monster could exist in the world who would salvage the possessions of a creature who, at the time, had done nothing to him but harm. She had come to the battle, in the end, wondering if such a capacity for friendship was possible.