Into the Raging Mountains Read online

  Azure! Azure! Laylada wanted to scream her friend's name. But distress swelled her throat closed. That, and her powerful feeling of self preservation.

  She had seen how happy the little blue face was as she scampered up to the glade to meet Laylada for a silly chore of berry gathering. The older girl had only thought to take her friend away from the misery for a few moments. Now, she's lost! Even surrounded by the appearance of peace and calm within the forest's embrace, Laylada could not, dared not call Azure's name.

  Searching the ground cover near and far, searching the foliage that had fallen and the piles of debris that lay scattered about, still she saw nothing. Her eyes blinked and watered as she tried see clearly into the lightless cover of the towering trees. The canopy was so thick, the visibility so poor, that even squinting, Laylada could only pray for a flash of blue hair. Every moment was precious. Every moment passed with her prayers unanswered.

  This was not good. Laylada couldn't just return to the village, as if she had had no part in her friend's disappearance. Although that is definitely the easiest path. Instead, her true heart that beat steady and strong in her ribcage demanded that she search onward for the missing child. Deeper into my own peril. Azure, oh Azure, where are you?

  She was certain that whatever had happened, she was probably Azure's only hope of escape. Perhaps the little girl was napping in the curl of a nearby trunk? Searching high and low, Laylada's heart grew heavy with fear and worry. She risked a whisper, “Azure, little one? Are you there? Little one—?”

  Too much of the waning sun's light would be wasted if Laylada returned to the village, explained the whole thing, and asked for help. There would be too much deciding talk, long discussions, and not enough immediate action. And action is what Azure needs.

  Walking around the trunk of the tallest of the four trees that filled the area, examining every bit of the floor and undergrowth for signs, Laylada did not see the arms that reached out from under a concealed pit and took her captive. She had only the brief sensation of tripping and reached out her arms to catch her fall, assuming that a low-raised root had snagged her footstep, before the fabric of sleep tonic was applied to her nose.

  It was a moment of surprise, and not the surprise she had expected.

  *

  His heart almost stopped of its own accord.

  When Cethel saw Laylada come round the bend of the berrybriers right after the abductors had taken off with the unconscious child, he wanted to shout. He wanted to warn her! He wanted her safe. Laylada! Laylada, no! This was not to be. Even though he had not seen them, Cethel knew now that the vicious, thorough predators were there. Though she was safe for a moment as his friend bent down and examined the scene of the recent taking, the young man could not move to warn her and risk his own capture.

  With dropping gut and rising sadness, he watched her searching, pushing farther into the underbrush, pushing farther into the wooded lands. As Laylada turned around the largest of the surrounding treetrunks, he saw the hands appear, right as they emerged from the seeming solidness of the packed earth. It was a well-constructed covering of earth and leaves. In a mere blink of an eyelash they had their hands all over her; Cethel saw it all. They took her down into the earthen pit, taking Cethel's heart with her fallen body.

  If he hadn't witnessed it, Cethel would not have believed the stealth and the speed of the taking. It was like a leaf falling at harvest time. So speedily done and so well accomplished was the task that the life of the forest kept on beating, oblivious to the brutality that walked in its shadows.

  Understanding dawned in Cethel's mind as he saw the two abductions. He had learned much at his father's knee and following around his uncles. Able to evaluate the prowess and skill of his enemy in the abstract games he had been taught, Cethel learned more from each observation. In his mind, he did the only thing he could to calm himself from a full blown, passionate but unprepared attack on the skilled men below.

  He made a silent list of the facts in front of him. These people were forest dwellers with knowledge and skills that far exceeded his. Even though Laylada was his heart's desire, and even though he would have died to protect her from harm, all Cethel could do was to watch.

  After several moments passed, he began to hear the call of alarms from the village and the cry of Azure's name. He wished with all his breath that he could call out Laylada's. Motionless, Cethel waited. The familiar calls came closer and closer, the alarm in the voices rising with the effort. Cajoling and bribing in their attempt to lure a reluctant child from concealment, Cethel bowed his head and closed his eyes.

  As if it is all that simple! Just a wayward child who would trundle home much to the chagrin of her parents and the chastisement of the whole village. At that moment, Cethel's contempt for Azure burned brightly enough to heat a house. Azure brought this on them all! All of this is her fault!

  Her disobedience should have been a forgettable event in the ebb and flow of village life, an easy problem to solve. Daily life should continue, as if there were nothing new under the sun that could harm them. Instead, everything is in ruins! Azure has destroyed my happiness with one careless choice!

  Cethel felt an abiding disgust. Of course, Azure would be missed. Even her name sounded sour in his mind. Her loss would be retold, but not Laylada's. After all, she was only an orphan—only a remnant of a disgraced family, no one important. Only little, precious Azure would be mourned by the villagers. Cethel ground his teeth. As if my heart is not stolen away!

  He looked through the thick leaves to the smoke stacks plainly visible from his forest perch. The clever trap was perfectly clear to his view. They were sitting in the village, stupidly content with themselves while stealthy enemies had infiltrated the surrounding lands and now controlled the forest itself. If Cethel could not get back to warn them, uncontested death would be upon them at the moment of the enemy's choosing. They probably would not even know they had been overrun until the villagers awoke from whatever was on the white cloth the skilled enemy applied to their nostrils. If they ever awoke. His thoughts grew increasingly desperate.

  Bushes stirred to the side. Still yelling her daughter's name, Tatanya ran through the briers, speeding along the visible tracks. Stepping high over the roots, so intense was her search for her missing daughter that she did not see the hands reach out to grab her foot. The sweeping arms missed her ankle by the distance of a butterfly's gossamer wing.

  Nightfall was fast approaching. His eyes opened as the light faded, as he tried to see what else occurred. Gradually, the sound of the other women faded. He could barely make them out with the lack of light, falling into the impenetrable darkness, but he watched as the skilled hands retreated into cover.

  In the near darkness of waning dusk, Azure's mother reached into her apron and withdrew some sort of light source. It filled the area with the strange crispness of blue beams, scattering through the woods. The light breached the darkened forest as far as Cethel could see, illuminating the hidden lands. He had never seen such a thing. And, in all his cycles of forest living and learning he had never known the beauty of the foliage when seen from that view point.

  Unaware of having escaped a trap, Azure's mother moved steadily onward taking the illumination with her, surrounding her in an odd glow, shining through the trunks, branches, and limbs. She walked with purpose and soon was out of sight, although he could still occasionally see a beam of light echo backwards from her direction.

  For his survival and for the village's sake, Cethel must be content to watch only, hoping for the fortune of concealment to be his just a little while longer. When complete dark had again returned to the forest, he heard but could not see them move. Rising up from the pit that he was aware of, they eased off in the direction of the first group though slightly to the side. Barely a sound was made in their passing, but Cethel strained to hear anything and caught the tiniest snap of dried leaves and the crushing of a twig.

  To his side, not a man's length aw
ay from his location, the forest floor opened and perhaps as many as four others emptied out of their hiding places, flowing forward to join the departing company. Cethel's death walked away from him.

  His choice was clear. Not yet a grown man, he was outmatched in so many ways. The village or the trail? As good as these people were, there would not be much of any trail left to follow. So many lives at stake now, so many … , but only one who mattered. And for her, for Laylada, he slowly followed the slippery people of the strange markings far into the inescapable black.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Causes and Fulfillments

  Summation from the journals of Rethendrel Corded

  It was almost a full cycle before the survivors at Corded Family Farm saw young Gretsel again. One warm and sunfilled day in the early growing season of the next turning of the sun, she returned. Walking beside her, was a little gray donkey. Though remarkably obedient and with a tall penchant for carrots, he was an unremarkable beast all in all.

  Oddly, Gretsel did not look a day older than when she had left the farm to go for help. Her hair was still the same length. She still wore the burned and smoke-imbued clothes that had barely covered her on her journey. Completely unchanged for almost a whole cycle's absence, her return was a miracle.

  Of course, great joy erupted immediately on sight of her, although some few mistook her as a ghost, so long absent. Offering no explanation for the lost days, she just joined in the family's patterns and soon was as indispensable as ever. When she was asked where she had been, the young woman would simply nod her head and say fiercely “There is no price too high to save what you love.”

  The sun rolled through the sky and the days of hunger and misfortune passed on into fireside stories and vague memories.

  *

  There was only one thing to do: a simple task left only to Ilion. There he stood invisible, as Alizarin faced the devastating beast of nightmare. The Corded farmyard reeked of pitch, stale hay, and unhappy infant. Reaching down, he scooped up the bundle of blankets and squalling baby. Stinking of used swaddling, shivering in the sudden cold, the little thing was inconsolable; Ilion didn't even try.

  His only concern for the child was that it be slightly warmer than it was currently, lying abandoned in the middle of the farmyard at the onset of nightfall. May your passing be swift and merciful, he thought sadly. Our death comes this nightfall, in any case. Reaching a hand down, he straightened the angry baby's blankets and knitted cap. Quickly starting a low fire in the kitchen stove, he couldn't help eying that thrice-damned pie piece that still resided on the kitchen table. Wrapping up the crying child in a pile of several dishtowels he found in the cupboards, Ilion touched the hair of the little head which did not calm the baby's cries but did much to steady his own fears.

  “Wish me luck!” he said jovially. Winking at the little one, still waving his tiny fists in outrage and discomfort, Ilion closed the kitchen-door. The noise of an angry, abandoned child receded into the general sounds of nightfall. He had bigger things to worry about, much bigger.

  With great care, he rounded the edge of the barn, noticing immediately that the heavy wooden doors were ajar. As Ilion advanced forward, the gathering at the butcher shed became starkly clear. His choices were few. He only just heard the last part of the monster's command for Alizarin to cut her own throat. Too late to stop her. Too late, always too late.

  Then another voice interrupted the foul scene, saving her when he could not.

  “You will not do this!” With a familiar casualness, Rethendrel emerged from the back barndoors, pushing the wooden gates open with ease. Theress seemed to give only slight notice to his arrival, but somehow his injunction to stop had given Alizarin a reprieve, although only for a moment.

  Ilion watched them conversing, watched the travesty of man talking to monster. He wondered at what sort of person she had been, when she was human. Surely the man loved her. Because of the staff's power, the hidden thing that inhabited her skin was revealed with all of its heartless cold and practical mayhem.

  When Ilion heard them speak so blithely about the agreement to sacrifice someone, he nearly retched. What under the blue heavens had happened at this wretched farm, that mythical monsters and ordinary men made callous bargains with the lives of others? Degradation that must have an end! If only Ilion knew how.

  He had only the staff and its ability to cloak, as well as its limited use as a weapon. The risk of breaking it seemed to outweigh the damage it could inflict in true hand to hand battle. Besides, he had seen firsthand how fast that damn bird-thing could move. Maybe one hit or two at most, that was all the opportunity he had to strike before death turned its beady eyes on him and feasted.

  At least there isn't much meat left on these bones, Ilion thought. I will not make a proper meal, scrawny as I am. Maybe the damned thing would choke on his bones and die.

  If all that Ilion had to worry about was himself then the easy road was clear: to walk out. Cloaked in silence, he could flee, perhaps even outrun the bird-monster, injured as it was. But the beast that reclined so easily by the doorway to the shed truly gave him pause.

  That foul thing that had pulled Rethendrel's cart homeward, that singular blackness that had spoken of conspiracies and sacrifices in an animal stall in a far away inn, was, if it were possible, even more fearsome than Theress. It was the true hunter. Ilion had never seen anything so terribly benign in appearance, yet so dreadfully powerful in its secret visage. He doubted any person had and lived to talk about such an encounter.

  It stirred something in his memories. Curls of blackness slipped off of its back, curling into the air, like smoke from an evening pipe. So many little bits of blackness floated around and about it that it partially concealed the actual beast.

  His ears heard the bird-monster say to her husband, “Things change, Rethendrel. They change.”

  Looking back at the married couple, Ilion saw her claws flick out, saw the imminent attack on Rethendrel's unguarded, unsuspecting shoulders and neck. Her razor claws extended into his back and sliced down. Shock and disbelief covered Rethendrel's face as the deadly pain overwhelmed him.

  Almost, Ilion thought to pity the man. Almost.

  Rethendrel's stunned and pleading eyes searched Theress' smiling face, looking for something within her countenance, something missing, something lost. Though it was clear the pain of the wound was great, the hurt in the dying man's eyes was torrential.

  Then, Ilion struck. Stabbing with his paring knife, hard into her back, the last man slashed downward, ripping wing tendons on an invisible monster. A scream, and a screeching caw followed.

  The donkey, the powerful, insidious beast, did not move from his sleeping form next to the open doorway, but one drowsy eye half-opened and watched the encounter.

  Still invisible, using any advantage he had, Ilion struck the head of the cawing bird beast twice with crushing blows.

  In the corner of his eyes, he saw Alizarin fall over; most of her body lay behind the chopping block.

  Keeping his attention focused on the threat of immediate death that turned in force upon him and his attack, Ilion ducked as a massive wing slashed the air over his shoulders, missing him. Almost decapitated. Even wounded this thing is so impossibly strong!

  Smashing down, dancing around, gliding in and out, bird and man circled. It was mostly about a pattern of defensive moves for him. Once in a while Ilion got in a heavy blow, but the beast seemed only to shake it off, pausing just a few moments in its attack. Even invisibility didn't protect him well. The Theress-beast had excellent hearing and perception. It had already been wounded by him in the farmhouse and now again in the back. It was perhaps the combination of those two injuries that gave Ilion any chance at all.

  Standing his ground when he could, giving way when he had to, the fight raged on. Winged claws swept swaths of air, turning wildly to catch Ilion unaware.

  Ilion gathered in. Instead of going into a trance of deep meditation and physica
l immobility, he entered into a state of heightened awareness. His body and mind flowed together within the constraints of possible actions, timing his movements, responding to the devastating attacks with passivity and minimal adjustments. The openings in her defenses were wide, gaping holes, and into those precious few opportunities, Ilion struck over and over.

  Gradually her strikes slowed, as she wearied of large gestures and bled from multiple wounds. Slamming his staff against her skull he heard the distinctive sound of pottery breaking open. She fell at his feet, tripping over Rethendrel's body. Dazed and wounded, she lay there, still as her cold, cold heart.

  Ilion moved away as quickly as possible, waiting for the other creature’s reaction. He did not want to be anywhere near the rising anger and annoyance that radiated from the larger beast, now standing on all four hooves or whatever in Drogos they were.

  Theress lay, breathing shallowly, with stunned eyes. Rethendrel lay next to her, still alive, watching her. Blood ran out of both of her nostrils and began to stain the dirt in a growing pool.

  “Theress. Theress—” the dying man whispered. He was silent for a while, and then,“What happened to us, Theress?” There was a plea in his voice, a need to understand.

  “You … you … fool.” The fallen beast took a labored breath. “Theress was taken … a cycle ago.” Her fading voice continued, “She's gone, idiot.”

  The grief that bloomed in his eyes changed his face. Rethendrel's countenance fell into lost pain and he withdrew within himself.

  The bird-thing screeched once, a forlorn call. Though he had not noticeably moved from his station near the door, the donkey's muzzle leaned down to touch its partially-opened beak. The tendrils of smoke and pitch that radiated from his true form, multiplied and slowly covered her broken body. Like the drifting of black snow, they fell, raining down all over her, encasing her.