The frozen earth mocked me. Each swing of the mattock sent jarring pain up my arms, vibrating through my brittle frame. The air, thin and sharp as shattered glass, scraped my gills with every desperate gasp. Frost clung to the rocks, glittering like false promises of moisture. My borrowed human skin felt like parchment stretched over dry bone, cracking at the knuckles, the elbows, the corners of my mouth where I'd feigned pathetic pleas. The deep, cellular thirst was a constant scream, louder than the wind whining through the Bleak Peaks.
But beneath the agony, beneath the meticulously performed weakness, a different kind of fire burned. Low. Insistent.
I am sure.
The microscopic filaments, launched during that fleeting touch on Granite's knuckles, were doing their work. I could feel it. Not through nerves, not through emotion, but through a profound, biological awareness. A cellular echo. They were navigators in the warm, rich sea of Granite's blood, carrying the silent codes of occupation. They sought out the dark, fertile grounds within him – the deep layers of muscle in his thick thighs, the dense fat pads around his organs, the warm nooks near pulsing arteries. Places of sustenance. Places of growth. Places where the pink pearls would thrive.
He watched me sometimes. From the doorway of his hut, a dark, hulking silhouette against the grey sky, a mug of something steaming clutched in his hand. Smoke curled from the chimney – the smell of burning peat, earthy and sharp. He watched my pathetic, inefficient struggle with the frozen field. His expression never changed. That same stony vacancy. But I saw the faintest flicker of… something… when I stumbled. Not concern. Calculation. Was his investment breaking already? Would he demand a refund from the man with dead eyes? Unlikely. Merchandise like me came with no guarantees.
Good. Let him doubt. Let him see only the surface. The cracked vessel. He couldn't see the silent invasion spreading within him, cell by cell. He couldn't feel the first, tentative chemical signals being laid down, marking his tissues as mine. Ours.
"Dig, freak!" His voice, rough as the mountain scree, cut through the wind. He took a swig from his mug. The scent of cheap, bitter ale reached me, mingling unpleasantly with the pig stench. Liquid. Wasted on him.
"Yes, Master Granite," I rasped, letting my voice break convincingly. I swung the mattock again. It struck a buried rock, the impact shuddering up the handle, sending fresh waves of pain through my shoulders. I cried out, a small, sharp sound, and dropped to my knees, clutching my arm. Genuine pain this time, woven into the performance.
He grunted, a sound of deep irritation. He set his mug down on a flat stone beside his door and stomped across the frozen yard. His shadow fell over me, blocking the weak sun. "Useless sack of skin," he muttered. He didn't offer a hand. He grabbed my upper arm, his fingers digging into the muscle with brutal force, hauling me upright. Contact. Sustained contact. Skin-to-skin through the thin, ragged fabric of my tunic.
His heat was immediate, intense. A furnace against the pervasive cold and my own unnatural coolness. It wasn't warmth; it was life force. Raw biological energy. And deep within me, the response was instantaneous, primal. My plan, already established, pulsed. Chemical commands amplified. New filaments, microscopic and hungry, extruded from my skin where his fingers pressed, seeking entry points through the worn cloth and into the pores and micro-abrasions of his hand. The binding deepened. More genetic markers. More suppressors flooding his system, quietly muffling any nascent immune alarm bells. More navigation systems deploying, mapping his vascular highways, seeking optimal nursery sites.
He held me there for a solid five seconds, his grip like iron, his vacant eyes boring into mine with nothing but contempt. "You break, you're worth less than pig slop. Dig. Or I'll throw you back in the bucket and sell you for scrap."
He released me with a shove that sent me staggering back. I caught myself on the mattock handle, gasping, not needing to fake the breathlessness this time. The surge of biological activity within me, triggered by the sustained contact, was momentarily overwhelming. It felt like… satisfaction. Cold, deep, and utterly devoid of empathy.
"Y-yes, Master," I stammered, keeping my head bowed, hiding the predatory stillness that had momentarily replaced the trembling. My arm, where he'd gripped, tingled with residual biological activity. More details laid. Deeper pathways forged.
He retrieved his mug and stomped back inside, slamming the door. The warmth where his hand had been lingered for a moment, a stark, fading brand against the pervasive cold. I savored it. Not for comfort. For confirmation. Progress.
I picked up the mattock. The pain in my shoulder was real, a dull throb. The thirst was a desert in my throat. But the field seemed less daunting. Each painful swing was now a step towards the ultimate goal. Granite's strength, his vitality, his very warmth – it was fuel. Fuel for the future blossoming inside him.
The days blurred into a cycle of freezing dawns, back-breaking labour under Granite's vacant gaze, and the suffocating darkness of the pig-shed. The water ration was a cruel joke – a single, grimy ladleful of tepid water from the covered cistern beside Granite's hut each evening. He watched me gulp it down, his expression unchanging. It was barely enough to keep my gills functioning at a minimal level, to prevent my borrowed skin from desiccating entirely. The deep thirst was a constant companion, a gnawing emptiness that echoed the void in Granite's eyes.
But I adapted. I learned to conserve moisture. To move with minimal effort during labour, maximizing the illusion of weakness while minimizing actual exertion. I learned the rhythms of Silt End: the women hauling water from the distant, guarded spring; the men trudging to rocky, unyielding pastures higher up the slopes; the sharp calls of mothers to dirty children; the ever-present smell of woodsmoke, dung, and unwashed humanity.
And I learned about the others.
The Mute Woman. She lived two hovels down, belonging to a gaunt, sour-faced man who smelled of unwashed wool and rage. She moved like a ghost, head perpetually bowed, eyes fixed on the ground. Her hands were perpetually raw, scrubbing clothes in a freezing trough. I saw her once, early, hauling water. Her yoke was too heavy, the path icy. She slipped. The buckets crashed, precious water soaking instantly into the thirsty dirt. Her man erupted from the hut, not with concern, but with fury. The slap echoed across the yard. He didn't use words. Just fists. Short, brutal blows to her shoulders, her back. She curled into herself, absorbing it silently, her face a mask of terrifying emptiness. No sound escaped her. Not a whimper. It was worse than screaming. It was the silence of a spirit already broken.
Our eyes met for a fleeting second across the frozen yard. Hers weren't vacant like Granite's. They were deep, dark pools of swallowed pain, holding a universe of terror and resignation. There was no recognition, no solidarity. Just the shared understanding of being owned, broken things. Then she looked down, shuffling to refill the shattered buckets from the meager supply left in the cistern. A warning. A reflection of what passivity looked like. Not my path. My breaking would be his undoing.
Then there was Little Stone. Xiao Shi. The curious boy. He was a shadow, flitting at the edges of my world. I'd see him peering from behind a rough-hewn fence post as I shuffled to the field. I'd catch him staring, wide-eyed, from the doorway of his family's hut while I hauled the pathetic half-sack of potatoes I'd finally managed to dig up, my back screaming in protest. His mother, a thin woman with perpetually pinched lips and eyes hard as flint, would invariably appear, yanking him back inside with a hissed warning: "Away from the luojing! It brings bad luck!"
But curiosity is a stubborn weed. One afternoon, as I was scattering the foul kitchen slops to the grunting pigs – my most hated chore, the smell clinging to me – a small, dirt-streaked hand appeared on the low stone wall separating the sty from the yard. Xiao Shi's head followed, his eyes fixed on me.
"Why you cold?" he asked abruptly, his voice high and clear, cutting through the pig noises.
I froze, the slop bucket heavy in my hand. Play weak. Play simple. "Always cold," I mumbled, not looking at him directly. "Mountains cold."
"Ma says you're not people," he stated, matter-of-factly. "Says you're a snail thing. From the Wet."
Perceptive mother. I kept my gaze down, stirring the slops with a stick. "Wet far away. Dry here."
"You got a shell?" He leaned further over, his eyes bright with morbid fascination. "Under your clothes? Like a turtle?"
A dangerous question. "No shell," I lied, my voice flat. Just soft skin. Cold skin." I emphasized the last word, letting a genuine shiver run through me. It wasn't hard.
He chewed his lip, studying me. "Old Stone bought you. Like Da bought Mute Woman." He said it without judgment, just stating a fact of life in Silt End. "He's mean. Old Stone."
You have no idea, little one. "He gives water," I said, injecting a pathetic note of gratitude. "Sometimes."
Xiao Shi frowned. "Water's hard. Ma says it's life." He looked at the greasy water in my basin near the shed door. "That's bad water. Pig water. Makes you sick."
Out of the mouths of babes. "No choice," I whispered, letting the despair sound real. It wasn't despair for the water, but for the necessity of the charade.
He was quiet for a moment, then he ducked down. I heard a scuffling sound. A moment later, a small, slightly misshapen clay cup appeared on the wall. It held a tiny amount of water – maybe two mouthfuls. Clear. Precious.
"Spring water," Xiao Shi whispered, his eyes darting nervously towards his hut. "Don't tell."
My gills spasmed. Clean water. The scent was intoxicating, cutting through the pig stench like a blade. The biological craving was overwhelming. I stared at it, then at him. His expression was a mixture of fear and defiant kindness. A dangerous combination.
This was a complication. Kindness required acknowledgment. It created connection. Connection was risk. But the water… it was life. Real, untainted moisture. I needed it. My plan needed it. The larvae, once they formed, would be voracious, draining Granite and me. I needed reserves.
I moved slowly, deliberately weak, towards the wall. I didn't grab the cup. I looked at him, then at his hut, then back at the water. "Thank you, Little Stone," I breathed, the gratitude this time laced with genuine relief. "Kind."
I picked up the cup. My hands trembled, not entirely faked this time. I brought it to my lips. The water was cold, clean, tasting of deep rock and impossible purity. It hit my system like an electric current. My gills fluttered open, absorbing the moisture and oxygen with desperate efficiency. It was over in seconds. I handed the empty cup back, my eyes meeting his for a fleeting moment. "Secret," I whispered.
He nodded solemnly, snatched the cup, and vanished like a startled rabbit.
The water was a temporary balm, but it highlighted the peril. Xiao Shi's curiosity was a loose thread. His mother's superstition was a blade hanging over me. One whisper, one accusation of witchcraft or unnaturalness beyond just being a "freak," and Granite might be pressured to dispose of his problematic purchase before the incubation was complete. I needed Granite firmly bound, the process too advanced to stop, before any real suspicion took root.
The signs began subtly. Granite started sweating.
Not the sweat of labour – he did little enough heavy work himself. This was different. A fine sheen appearing on his forehead during the cold mornings as he watched me from his doorway. A dampness darkening the back of his rough wool tunic during the chill evenings as he sat by his hearth. He'd wipe at it absently with a calloused hand, a faint frown creasing his brow.
The warmth begins.
My biological senses sang. The plans were established. The initial larval clusters – microscopic, undifferentiated masses of potential – were forming in the chosen sites deep within him. Their metabolic activity was kicking in, generating heat. His body was responding, trying to cool itself, unaware that the source of the heat was internal, invasive. A fever with no infection. Yet.
He started drinking more. Not just his bitter ale, but water. I'd see him gulp down ladlefuls from the cistern, his Adam's apple bobbing. He'd belch afterwards, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. Thirst. His own body's fluids were being diverted, consumed by the burgeoning life within. The larvae needed hydration, nutrients. They were tapping his reserves.
He became… twitchier. Less patient. The usual stony vacancy was occasionally fractured by flashes of irritability. He snapped at a wandering goat. He kicked a bucket across the yard when it got in his way. Once, when I took a fraction too long bringing in the meager firewood I'd gathered, he grabbed my arm again – another burst of contact, another surge of biological reinforcement for the plans – and shook me hard. "Move your slug feet, freak!"
His grip was hot. Unnaturally hot. The heat radiating from him was more intense than before. The flush on his face wasn't just from the cold wind. The fever was rising.
I cowered, playing my part. "Sorry, Master Granite! Sorry!" Inside, the cold satisfaction deepened. Good. Burn. Burn for us.
He shoved me away, muttering under his breath. I caught words: "…always thirsty… damn chill… feels hot…" He rubbed his thick neck, his fingers tracing the pulse point there. Was he feeling it? The subtle, increased thrum as his heart worked harder to circulate blood thickened by the first microscopic secretions of the larvae? Probably not consciously. Just a vague sense of unease. A body whispering warnings he was too dull to understand.
That night, locked back in the shed, I sat in the greasy basin water, conserving my slime. The cold was brutal, but inside, I was focused inward. I could feel them now. Not distinctly, not yet. But as a presence. A low, collective hum in the biological network established through the plans. A hum of consumption. Granite's warmth, his fluids, his very essence, was being metabolized. Converted. Into life. My life's purpose.
I ran a hand over my lower abdomen. Still flat. But soon, very soon, the changes would manifest in me too. The visible signs of the host bond. The preparation of my own body to receive the eggs fertilized by the genetic material carried by the larvae within him. It was a complex, horrifying symbiosis. He was the garden. I was the gardener and the eventual vessel for the harvest.
Outside, the wind howled. Granite coughed in his hut – a deep, rattling sound. The pigs huddled together for warmth. And deep within the man who thought he owned me, thousands of tiny sparks of life began to glow, feeding on his warmth, his strength, his oblivious existence.
He sweats for us all, I thought, a cold, reptilian smile touching my lips in the darkness. Soon, the pearls will glow. Soon, the nursery will bloom. The dry mountain air tasted of dust and impending metamorphosis. The stone was cracking. From the inside.