Alium, page 34
The old wood and brick building had a big green door and two squat pumping chimneys. There was a tavern in the back space which looked as though it had once been a barn. Between them they had silver enough for two meals and a room. They ate ravenously, and Ogwold drank the liquor of Novare for the first time. It was foul he thought, and he nearly spat it out. But Byron drank powerfully three flagons of some foamy concoction, and while men around him seemed far the more inebriated after one or two, he remained his grim and stoic self, if more attentive. Yet with this new keen look in his lucid green eye, Byron was oddly more interested in his surroundings, and perhaps a little more loquacious than usual.
“So,” he said, tipping back a long draft. “You’ve nearly been eaten by mountain fiends at the word of a wizard and all you’ve got to show for it is this magic ball.”
Ogwold folded his hands. They felt warm and his fingertips twitched with an electric buzzing sensation. It was nothing like the energy of the sphere, of which there was a rumour in his pocket. “You must agree it’s more than that. It saved us from those cave monsters. And it’s intelligent. It led us here where we can finally rest.”
Byron raised the eyebrow over his empty socket. “So that is enough for you then.”
“Well, I had a push even before I met the wizard. Looking back, I was a slave. My father still is one.” Ogwold fixed his soft grey eyes on the grain of the sodden table.
“Slaves aren’t paid.”
“Ah, but it’s just enough to keep us doing what they want.”
Byron nodded. “When we first met, I could tell your mind was made.”
Ogwold looked up at the expressionless mercenary. “I really do feel like I’m meant to be here.”
“You seem…” Byron frowned, slugged a healthy amount of his drink. “More relaxed, not just having escaped the cavelings, but, well…” He stared at Ogwold as though he simply did not have the right word.
“Excuse me, but did you say ‘cavelings’?” A ruddy face with long, blond hair and brown eyes materialized beside their table. Attached to that anxious countenance leaning so closely in was the figure of a soldier, however lightly armoured. Gloved hands pressed down upon the surface of their table, the contents of the glasses upon it still shivering as he said, “Did they have only mouths for faces?”
Byron scowled, securing his drink.
“Yes that’s right, only mouths, and really hairy.” Ogwold laughed boomingly.
“The Eyeless!” The man passed his hand over his heart cryptically, sucking the wind from the ogre’s mirth. Several men and women throughout the room grew silent, turned their heads, one by one resumed their business. “And here you are. That is a most surprising thing if true.”
“We were captured and trapped inside the mountain. But we found a way out,” said Ogwold, now affecting a tone of solemnity.
“Well that is astounding!” The guard drew a stool as from nowhere and sat promptly down, staring intensely now up into Ogwold’s grey eyes. “But not without a fight I suspect. No one sneaks past the Eyeless. Perhaps your size helped. It takes a very strong warrior to take down the winged ones that come for us at night. We keep them away mostly by working together. Ah but, to be captured of all things, fully encased in their vile chambers—that is the worst fate a man may face. It takes more than strength to return from such doom.”
“My partner is a prodigious swordsman.” The guard only glanced briefly at Byron, for every soldier in the place had noticed him already, if not his gigantic sword. “He slew seven in three strokes of his blade, and the man is vigilant as a septry. I fear that he loves killing and fighting a little too much, but I guess that has helped us a good deal. As to our escape, we were quite lucky. We just kept running until we could smell the air again.”
The guard chuckled. “Remarkable.” He gazed into Ogwold’s eyes with admiration. “You know, I’ve never met an ogre before in my life. But you are clearly an ogre. You fit all the legends. Grey skin and eyes, huge bodied, black hair.”
“I am Ogwold.”
“Why excuse my rude eye, Ogwold.” The guard delivered a strange provincial gesture. “I am Solena.”
“Solena, I’ve met many Novare, but you, and all the people here, really do fit a legend I’ve heard. It is not often that Novare not only treat me as an equal, and never that I have met such folk as you and my partner here,” he smiled at the cold, stone figure of Byron hunched over his drink, “who are actually willing to converse.”
Solena frowned. “You are from the palm of Lucetal. Technically, so are we engaged with that Kingdom, but really we are all on our own out here. Fonslad is a single people. The King will never aid us in our struggle with the Eyeless, but he will always take our metals. There is no place really for war or hatred here, but for the Eyeless,” he spat onto the floor, “which we all loathe, together. And well there are many fell beasts in the range, the further you traverse it.”
“That is our aim,” Byron muttered.
Ogwold grinned. “To go further, he means.”
“Then you’ve a perilous journey ahead of you.” Solena leaned back upon his stool, crossing his leather-gauntleted arms. “Fonslad is as far as the traders go. The only delvers past this place are the most passionate and crazed. We rarely see any, but they do come through every once in a while to deposit their discoveries. They find many strange things further in the mountains, but little of current value in Occultash or Lucetal.”
“Are you a delver?”
Solena winked, though a shadow passed over his face. “Well, only sometimes now do I chance the mines. I come from a family of metalheads, but happen to be handy with a weapon. My strength is needed with the guard these days. We need all able warriors. But yes, my heart is for the deeps, like most Novare who live here. Like you, I’m sure! What is it you wish to dig up that lurks beyond even Fonslad?” He laced his fingers together and leaned again forward, elbows to the tabletop.
“Well, the truth is I’ve no idea.” Ogwold shrugged. The sphere pulsed and droned in the pocket of his cloak. “Call me an explorer.”
“Ah, one of those.” Solena grimaced.
Byron cut in darkly. “Do you know a path forward?”
“Well certainly.” Solena at last turned his gaze fully upon Byron and Ogwold thought he saw the man flinch. “Many of the hunters go into the wood and beyond. There is also a great chain of lakes where many fish, and we have even some clusters of cabins there, and outposts to watch for Eyeless coming out of the rock in the evening. The border of the forest on all sides is rife with their hive-holes.”
“What about beyond the lakes?”
“I have no idea what is beyond the lakes,” Solena said gravely. “They are immense and many. Even in the mire, the Eyeless are the least of your worries.”
“Right, of course,” said Ogwold. “Well, but is there anyone in Fonslad that might know something about the way through the mire? Maybe we can find a way around the lakes on our own.”
Solena’s smile returned with an edge of shock. “I begin to believe in your story from earlier. You are stout-hearted, Nogofod Ogwold.” He sipped his own drink smoothly, mulled over the notion for a little while. “There is an old woman, a witch, who lives in the Mistwood on the fringe of the marsh. She has helped us much in dealing with the Eyeless, and gives us even talismans that have some warding effect on the creatures. If anyone knows a path beyond the lakes, she will. Her name is Hesgruvia. You can find her by following the notches in the trees. Any soldier should be able to show you where to start.”
Ogwold smiled broadly. “Why thank you, Solena.” He brought his gigantic hand down to pat the young man on the shoulder, but the impact rocked Solena such that he was quite startled and toppled straight off of his stool. “Ah! Sorry about that.” The ogre extended a massive grey hand. Solena’s own looked like that of a baby disappearing into the palm which heaved him back onto his heels.
Byron smirked, holding out the unspilled glass which he’d rescued from the hand of the falling guard, and this more than anything seemed to calm Solena. The soldier smiled and laughed as he took the drink, raising it, nodding, imbibing. “How about I bring the explorers a round?” Without waiting for an answer, and quite missing the sheepish shaking of Ogwold’s big head, he spun and made for the bar. Leaning over the wood, he entered upon some terrifically enthusiastic conversation with two fellow guards there posted.
“You are not so fearful as you present,” said the mercenary, turning to Ogwold. He looked almost uncomfortably stiff for one who is so constantly piercing the eyes of others. “You slay monsters deep in their evil abode, yet honourably you mourn them; even after you are betrayed by the likes of Teperchael, with respect you approach the people of your own slavers; and without a doubt you have your heart set upon a mountain all men call unreachable.” As he spoke, Byron regained his old composure, and even lifted the seam of his mouth.
Ogwold smiled warmly. “Well, you make a great model for dealing with fear. I really wouldn’t be here right now if it weren’t for your example.”
Byron frowned and looked into his drink.
The ogre went on. “Though, there is one other who has helped me with fear, the one who sent me on this whole journey in the first place.”
“The wizard?”
Ogwold looked out of the dark window into the unseeable night. “Caelare.”
“Caelare,” repeated the mercenary, as if the word came to him out of some distant past.
“It was she who sent me to Zenidow.”
Byron chuckled, a strange, tuneless noise, but no less sincere for its awkward cadence. “Now that is reason enough.”
Chapter XIX
The Secret of Lucetal
King Chalem hunched over in his capacious silver throne. Azure robes like inland waters spilled over his broad belly and sandalled feet. An argent crown held fast the twisting pale blond tendrils of his devoutly unshorn hair. One husky palm smothered the metal pommel of a thin sceptre cut purely of luminous, blue gemstone. Elegant and intricate as was its form, the twin-edged instrument seemed hardly fragile when he rapped its fine tip loudly against the golden dais which raised his seat highest in the great hall.
Such anxious clacking echoed distant but sharp in the barrel ceiling, slipping under the lank tapestries, cutting through the roar of the surf as it bellowed dully at the stained-glass windows closely spaced along the walls. Through these tall parabolas slanted gleaming prisms of varicoloured sunshine, blazing in exquisite patterns, moving and changing over the flagstones and narrow carpet as the shadows of leaves and close boughs outside rustled and turned in the wind. Dazzling reds, greens, blues reflected and moved in the muddy hazel of the King’s wide-set eyes. But he was quite impassive to that scene, glaring so remorselessly through the living light as to penetrate the great wooden double-door at the opposite end of the room.
The wizard could not possibly waste another moment. Crimson was on every wagging tongue and in every eye enchanted since the Patientia was sighted over the sea. Bare and booted feet slapped in the ecstatic streets. Children called out with glee as on a sudden holiday. Market squares fell silent and emptied. The low mages of the Red Tower were miraculously cured of their lethargy. And now, in all its gaudy enormity, that absurd galleon had been at harbour since dawn. Chalem could envision the bobbing turtle prow, the swarms of peasant children beaming up at its dumb countenance, their ruddy fathers clapping hand to shoulder, leaning in to charm them with old stories.
He had long sent away the guard, desiring to express his full wrath in privacy. It would not do for talk to circulate in a palace and city which loved the wizard more than ever. Yet prodigious as was his capacity for festering rage, even that anger, greatest he had known in many years, had quite burned over, simmered into exhaustion as the glare of early morning softened into day. Only the lonely crack of his sceptre carried on through the monotonous succession of vacant hours, as though it might with one strike, perhaps the next, conjure up the bygone flame of his storied wrath.
Therefore, it was not with idyllic fury that Chalem received his long-detained High Wizard, finally striding as though he’d never left through the immense, groaning doors, but with the weary trepidation which better illustrated the inmost state of his heart.
“Hail, Son of Chalor, father of the Island, Lord of Lucetal, Colonizer of Efvla, King of the Capital, how is it with you!” Nubes shouted musically through the immense echoing room, stepping nimbly along, crimson cloak and fluffy beard fluttering gaily on the sea wind which rushed from the slowly closing doors. The King sat still and unresponsive as stone, sceptre firmly rooted, until he arrived before the stage, whereupon the generous pool of blue fabric there spread Nubes planted his black staff, old withered hands folded atop its gnarled apex, and cocked his head so quizzically as to mock his own deference. “And how goes that infernal war?”
The King muttered inarticulately at first, rubbing the humped bridge of his stately nose. “Fifteen years, Nubes.”
“Has it been that long already? And your mane is sunny as the day of its coronation!” The wizard chuckled as though, Chalem thought, such a compliment would certainly assuage the sting of his tardiness.
He snorted through expansive nostrils, now came a sharp rap from the sceptre as had not sounded since the doors were opened. “Do you know how many men and women have fallen in Efvla?”
“Countless thousands I am sure.” Nubes gazed into the kaleidoscope of the nearest window, a principally blue and green swell of glittering shards which swirled into the noble countenance of the first King of Lucetal, Chalor. “But that is your own fault for making war with a power you do not understand.”
“You insinuate I started this conflict?” Now Chalem grasped at the morning’s rage. The burn of an obsessively close shave trembled on his mottled jowls.
“As ever!” Nubes faced the King dryly. “Ah, you look so much like your father when you make that face. I imagine you’ve been sitting here all day looking just like that! Really, I must apologize for not coming at once. I was needed straight away at Occulimontis, you see.”
One corner of his broad mouth twitching, grinding his sceptre into the dais, Chalem drew a deep, rattling breath. The redness in his thick cheeks had retreated desperately from the notion of Chaldred, the King before him.
“Always speaking to me like I am a child,” he groaned. “But then, you are of course the eldest damned creature that goes about on two legs. Yes—I am angry, Nubes. Angry that you abandoned us in our hour of need. Angry that for all these bloodiest years of my reign you vanish into the country of our enemy. Angry that you return only to skip about the city like some fey hero spreading mutinous lies about the Xol.” The King sighed like a cornibet completing its haul, withdrawing his sceptre to sit across his voluminous lap. “I am sure your errand at Occulimontis was dire.”
Nubes cocked one snowy eyebrow. “That it was. I understand your ire, but you must know that I have and always will serve the Sons of Chalor. It seems rather that you cannot stand this invented notion that you need me. Are you not the powerful Chalem? Is Efvla not the theatre of your might? Whether or not your war is a good one, you are certainly ambitious, first in your long line to contest the elder rule of the purple folk.”
“Aye!” Chalem smote the dais furiously with his sceptre. The crack rang through the hall, such that Nubes called out with a loud harrumph. “I know who you are, Nubes. Merely I am dismayed by your wayward whims.”
“I’ve no such impulse in my history that has not behooved Lucetal.”
“So it is said by the fathers of my father. But never was there a King of Lucetal who allowed you such freedoms.” Chalem scowled, leaning back in his throne. “Yet you stir my heart High Wizard; that much is true. I need no magic to claim the black forest. Let the demons of Xoldra fall to horse and blade!”
Nubes smirked coldly. “I could not possibly have aided you as much as I am about to if I had stayed put these years. You are wiser than you know for unleashing me.” He stared hard and blue. “Though I offer no magical solution to your ails, you’d surely snap one up like the turtle of the bog.”
The King leaned forward, glowering. “There are many awful paths to victory I’d take before stooping so low.”
“And so you will,” said Nubes.
Chalem torqued one thin, golden eyebrow. “Tell me then,” he grumbled. “What knowledge has arrested you so long?”
Nubes quietly ascended the gilt steps to stand beside the throne. Turning round he stared out and up at the hanging rows of richly woven tapestries depicting the Lucetalian Kings of the Second Age, now beyond them at the vast mural painted with masterful detail upon the far wall, portraying those of the Third Age, that grave succession of visages more modern, ever unfinished above the double-door through which he had entered.
“Before I left the capital, I was tucked quite away in Occulimontis,” he said in time.
“Yes, you couldn’t be bothered.”
The wizard tugged his beard, nodding as to himself. “I had a dream, you see, about an impossible presence hidden away far beyond the remotest charted mountains of Efvla across the sea, where no Novare nor Xol has ever dared venture. Yet, it was as though this presence had always been there. Certainly it should have occurred to me sooner, for when I traced the folds of the Mardes I detected it straight away. No, something in the Fabric has changed to reveal it. Perhaps the low gods, Caelare herself, or even the High Gods have opened the hearts of the sensitive. Why they have chosen this moment in our history, I couldn’t say. Great things are afoot, Chalem, and I suspect your petty war will be wrapped up in it all soon enough. By now Fozlest too must have eyes in the mountains. I don’t doubt she’s had a dream of her own. Prescient as she may be; physically, I found it first: within the Great Mountain Zenidow.”
“Zenidow?” Chalem barked. “Impossible.”
Nubes raised his bushy eyebrows. “It was the most trying journey of my long life. But I built a home near to it in an elder wood out of time, and lived in the very shadow of the thing for many years. Only through careful study and the calling upon of all I know of the Fabric was I able to pass within the Great Mountain and learn its secret. As soon as my eyes were opened, it was my highest priority to return to you, Chalem. I can say that at least since I’ve come back down through the Mardes, not a soul of Xol persuasion has yet walked such reaches or learned the secret of Zenidow, though I did discover a civilization of Novare living far beyond the boundaries of our maps. They called themselves Arduans, and without their intelligence I mightn’t have found such a swift route thereon. Sadly I could not thank them properly. The city was quite destroyed when I passed through on my return, though not by the Xol I am sure.”
