Authors: Brian Braden
Obeying his own edict, Aizarg remained within a spear throw of the arun-ki. The braziers flickered brightly through the sheets of rain. The arun-ki seemed to sit lower in the water than he remembered. The raft and boat deck lines seemed closer to the flat surface.
He heaved the net, watching the stones spin outward into a nearly flat circle. Aizarg kept the tag line just slack enough not to interfere with the spinning net.
Down the net sank until the line pulled tight.
Twenty feet and no bottom.
He wondered if it even had a bottom.
The rain continued its unending dance on the water. Many of his people hated the Days of Rain, because the unending roar on the flat water grated on their nerves, stoking tempers.
Hand over hand, he retrieved the empty net, dangled it over the side and gave it a little shake to clear any snags.
Sana’s words still haunted him. Those were the first words she’d spoken to him since they reunited with the clans. He knew she’d been spending a great deal of time with Atamoda, but her uninvited counsel surprised him.
Setenay’s voice.
He’d yet to tell anyone of Sana’s relationship to the Isp.
Atamoda still didn’t know. Aizarg wasn’t sure if he should tell her.
Once again, the stone went spinning. Once again, the net emerged empty.
Sarah’s voice.
The Mourning ceremony did nothing to salve the wound in his heart. Aizarg didn’t talk about the girl who would have been Atamoda’s daughter, and she didn’t ask. Aizarg wanted to talk about her, tell her about the girl who should not be forgotten. The proper time, the right moment, never materialized.
Pull.
His thoughts drifted to Ba-lok and Kus-ge. He knew plots festered with those two. To what purpose he didn’t know, but suspected Kus-ge wanted control of the food.
And then there remained the question of Virag.
Why did I spare him?
Aizarg asked himself that question every day since finding the slaver.
Throw.
Aizarg wondered if mercy had a place in this new world.
Pull.
The stone sank and the line pulled tight, the empty net collapsing somewhere below the boat. Aizarg didn’t pull it in this time. He stared at the raindrops dancing off the water, the memory of Atamoda’s scorn cutting new gashes in his spirit.
She hadn’t spoken to him since Alad’s banishment, sleeping on Levidi’s raft.
He saw more than scorn in her eyes.
Disgust.
A gust of rain shook him from the trance. Aizarg looked up to realize he’d drifted a considerable distance from the arun-ki. The downpour slackened to a drizzle, and the rain curtains parted. For a moment Aizarg had an uninterrupted view of the entire expanse, horizon to horizon. He slowly turned about, searching the horizon for any sight of land.
The arun-ki appeared as a piece of flotsam adrift on an eternity of water. The view overpowered him, much like the great wave had, though now he didn’t have the power of the Nameless God to save him.
Shaking, Aizarg slowly sank to the bottom of the boat, which had begun to fill with rainwater. Head in trembling hands, he began to sob.
“God of the Narim, take this burden from me. I am only a man. I cannot do this, not without her! Take everything, but don’t take her.”
To the south, a peel of thunder answered his prayer. The rain intensified and cloaked the arun-ki from his sight.
***
Sana departed and Atamoda returned her attention to Aizarg’s boat.
He had drifted considerably farther in the time she’d looked away. Her stomach twinged as she made her way to the arun-ki’s southeastern corner where she could better see his boat.
Thunder rumbled to the north, the light shower transformed into a blinding downpour and Aizarg vanished.
***
Aizarg sat in the boat, now filling with rainwater like a tub. He knew if he tried to paddle blindly, he could end up farther from the arun-ki. The same current that carried the arun-ki also carried him. Aizarg picked up the small clay pot floating at the bottom of the boat and began to bail. As fog formed from the downpour, it enveloped him like a white, featureless wall.
The rain slowed to a light mist, and the fog pressed in.
Aizarg ceased bailing and looked about, his breath floating away in heavy puffs.
Somewhere in the mist he heard a loud
huff
, like a sudden deep exhale.
I am not alone.
“Okta?” Aizarg thought for a moment and called out again in both hope and fear. “Alad?”
A strong musky, animal smell assaulted him. At first he couldn’t place it, but, as with many odors, it instantly transported him to another place and time. He remembered being a young man, crouching in the reeds, watching unseen as a Scythian raider wandered the edge of the marsh seeking easy prey.
A horse!
A billowing image transformed against the foggy curtain. The shape slowly gelled into the gray silhouette of a man on horseback.
How can this be?
“Who are you? What do you want?” Aizarg shouted.
Where the figure’s eyes should have been, two blue lights blazed into existence. Aizarg covered his eyes, the terror of the ice fog rekindled anew.
He found the courage to look up. The shadow rider had vanished, the air once again clean and as sterile as the sea.
The fog parted, revealing the arun-ki floating only a few yards away.
***
Atamoda watched as Aizarg tied his boat alongside Okta’s raft.
She snared him in a tight embrace. “You vanished in the rain! I thought I’d lost you. I’m sorry. Please forgive me.”
He ran his hands through her hair and considered her as if seeing Atamoda for the first time. “Forgive you for what?”
“For not supporting you. You are not alone, husband.” She wrapped her arms around his neck and buried her head into his chest.
Aizarg lifted her chin and kissed her.
He held her hands, rubbing them, gazing down at his feet.
“Wife, I want to talk about something. Something we haven’t discussed.”
“Anything.” She searched her husband’s eyes, thankful for this second chance the Nameless God had given her.
“Sarah...”
“Leviathan treated me like a brother. You bring me here, seduce me with scrolls and exotic herbs in hopes I will betray him. I should strike you down!”
I wanted to strike him down, to forget all Amiran said and never hear him speak ill of Leviathan again.
Amiran stepped toward me and crossed his arms, just as he had defied Quexil. “You are starting to sound like him. Does the delightful venom of this place infect your heart so completely?
“I listened to how you speak of Cin and your beloved Nushen. I took a chance you spoke truthfully, that you were different than the Sons of Poseidon. I am a servant to the truth. If my words offend you, great god, then I was wrong, and my life is of no further consequence.”
He paced around the long table, caressing the linen covered objects.
“Most of the clever contraptions you’ve seen thus far, like my spectacles, are toys Scholars fashion in our spare time; amusements and diversions. Let me show you the true fruits of our labors, why Leviathan and his brothers suffer our existence.”
One by one, he yanked away the linens.
I didn’t understand the objects’ workings, but their jagged forms betrayed malicious intent.
“These are models of actual war machines. They inflict death on a grand scale.” He pointed to one with a long lever attached to a four wheeled wagon. “This is called a “catapult”. It can hurl a five hundred pound stone over three hundred yards with uncanny accuracy. In the siege of Combrogi, I saw one blast through a five foot thick wall, allowing the Olmecs to swarm into the Erubian city and slay all within. Prince Gadeirus wasn’t too merciful following that battle; the enemy defied him too well.” His eyes narrowed on me. “We only took a few slaves, the rest he permitted the Olmecs to eat.”
I didn’t want to hear anymore. But Amiran kept talking, his words burrowing into my soul, leaving me nowhere to hide, no refuge from the truth.
“We rarely employ catapults, they are only required against the most sophisticated of foes, like Attica. Leviathan insisted I oversee the construction of only one for the Cin expedition.”
Thunder shook the Gray Tower as he pointed to a long, log-like contraption suspended from chains inside a cage on wheels. “Based on what you’ve freely told Leviathan, I think battering rams will be sufficient against Cin’s bronze swords and primitive stockades.”
Even now, I find it difficult to speak of how I felt that night. Coldness settled into my belly as I contemplated the depths of my blindness. Perhaps I felt more confusion than anger. Amiran left me with a stark choice: believe him or Leviathan.
“Go to the harbor if you don’t believe me. See for yourself the ten thousand Olmec warriors bivouacked along the shore. Better yet, inspect the quarry and glimpse what awaits your people.”
He touched another device, which looked like a shield on wheels with dozens of arrow protruding from it. “You will find forty of these down there, waiting to be loaded. This is a new weapon, never before employed in any previous campaign. It simultaneously hurls thirty spears over one hundred yards, propelled by tension stored in knotted ropes. Quexil wants to test it on captives, but Leviathan is saving it to use against your villages.”
I’d laid Cin wide open to a monster.
Finally, he came to a model of a ship with enormous masts and a hull like a pregnant belly.
“This ship is called a “carrack”, specifically designed for transporting heavy cargo during long ocean voyages. Thirty of these ships rest in the harbor, laden with supplies for a prolonged military campaign. Once they disgorge the necessities of war upon your shores, they will transport booty, including slaves, to the Kingdom. One such ship can haul over three hundred slaves in the most miserable conditions imaginable, Lord Fu Xi.”
“He is my brother!” I shouted.
“He isn’t your brother!” Amiran slammed his fist against the table. The model fell over and shattered.
Never had a mortal raised their voice to me.
“Leviathan wants to corrupt you, to numb your senses like the bitter weed. He needs to convince you to stand aside while his legions rape your homeland. He wants to use you and Cin’s pillaged wealth against his half-brothers, and seize the throne from Atlas.”
I drew the sword from its scabbard and held it in my hands. “He gave me the Red Sword.”
“Leviathan both loves and hates you. In you, he sees what he should have been, how far he and the Eleven Princes have fallen. In you, he sees his sister, the Gray Eyed Queen.” He pointed to the blade.
“That was his sister’s sword, as is the armor. We call them The Traitor’s Arms. If and when the time comes, in his mind it will make it easier for him to kill you.”
I sank into the chair. “Why are you telling me this?”
“Because once I serve my purpose, Leviathan will kill me, and upon his return, destroy the Imperial Academy.
“Do you know who I am, Lord Fu Xi?”
“You are Expedition Scholar.”
“I am Amiran, Master of the College of Metallurgy, Grand Scholar of the Imperial Academy.” He pulled up his toga sleeve displaying his trident brand. “But what I really am is a slave. The Academy no longer serves truth, but instead builds engines of war to enslave our own race. Where once Scholar’s served enlightenment, we now fashion machines to break, burn, and slash. Scholars do not wear the slave collar, we forge them.
“And that is what Leviathan is doing now; crushing a revolt in Wu’s north and capturing more slaves to serve as pack animals for the continental invasion.”
“I will see the harbor for myself.” I turned to go, fury against Amiran rising. “If what you say is true, I will confront Leviathan when he returns.”
“You are our last hope, God of Names,” he called after me. “Only you can stand against them. Gods were created to serve mankind, not rule them. What now transpires is perversion. If Leviathan succeeds, mankind will fall into eternal darkness.”
I fled the Library as Amiran’s voice pursued me down shadowed halls. “Can you hear the quarry, Lord Fu Xi? CAN YOU HEAR THEIR CHAINS?”
The
Chronicle of Fu Xi
“Forging the chain that would become a new tribe depended on changing one heart at a time. It began with tough choices, hard truths, and soft words.”
– Conversations with the Uros.
The Chronicle of Fu Xi
***
Aizarg pointed to the Supply Raft. “Thirty-three gouges upon the mast, thirty-three days since the mighty wave swept us away, and the power of the Nameless God spared us.”
As if answering for a crime, Virag and Spako stood in the center of the Köy-lo-hely under the stares of the Lo nation.
“I’ve called us together to address the whispers floating across the decks.” Aizarg let his words sink into the two main clans on either side of the Spine. “Some of you question my decisions not only to bring a’gan among us, but to allocate them rations.
“For weeks they’ve been exiled downstream, isolated. ‘We cannot have a’gan among us’, you’ve whispered around the braziers. ‘We cannot give our precious food to strangers’, you’ve mumbled in the ration line. Your Uros has heard you...and you are correct. From this day forth, there will be no more a’gan among us.”
The crowd looked at one another.
Aizarg nodded at Ba-lok. “The Sco-lo-ti of the Minnow will speak.”
Ba-lok glanced uncertainly at Kus-ge, who gave him a nod and a nudge. He stood and cleared his throat.
“I, Ba-lok, Sco-lo-ti of the Minnow, accept Virag and Spako into my clan.”
Virag bowed low before the Uros. “My thanks, Uros, and thanks to Ba-lok, my new sco-lo-ti. And my thanks ahead of time to the Master of Boats, who I’m sure, will assist in moving my boat closer to my new clan.”
Laughter rippled throughout the crowd as Okta scowled. Virag unceremoniously turned and shoved Spako toward the Minnow side of the Spine. The assembled clans chattered excitedly as Virag and Spako settled in among the Minnow.
“Stop!” Aizarg commanded. “Virag will go to the Minnow, but Spako will join the Crane.”
Virag approached the Uros, hands out in supplication. “He needs me, Uros. He is but a fool, despite his size and gruesome visage. Without me, he is lost.”
“As long as he keeps his feet on the rafts and out of the water, he will be difficult to lose.
“Xva!”
Xva rose. “As surrogate sco-lo-ti, I accept Spako into the Crane.”
Atamoda looked on as Kus-ge and Virag exchanged quick glances. She wondered what the slaver and patesi-le of the Minnow could possibly be conspiring about.
Atamoda looked back at her husband, wondering why he decided to split Virag and his henchmen up at the last minute. She saw the wisdom of such a move, but did he see something deeper, something she did not?
Eyes darting nervously, Spako remained in the center of the Köy-lo-hely, uncertain what to do now that his master had been taken from him. Atamoda didn’t know why, but a pang of pity struck her for the Sammujad warrior.
“Spako, the Crane Clan is your family now.”
Spako looked at his hands, wringing them incessantly. “Spako have family?
Su-gar emerged from the crowd. All eyes followed her as she stepped forward and took the giant’s hand.
“We are family now,” she said.
Atamoda saw an instant change. Spako’s gaze never left Su-gar. His breathing slowed, his shoulder’s relaxed, as he stepped over the Spine and followed Su-gar onto the Crane side of the Köy-lo-hely.
Amazing.
And then it dawned on Atamoda; the thick, frizzy beard, the meaty lips, the deep brow.
He reminds me of Ood-i.
She wondered if Su-gar even recognized Spako’s resemblance to her dead father.
Aizarg pointed to the Master of Boats. “Okta...your turn.”
The Master of Boats entered the Köy-lo-hely. “Ezra, get out here!” he bellowed.
Beaming, Ezra took his place alongside Okta.
“I, Sco-lo-ti of the Carp, bring Ezra into my clan.” A cheer went up. Aizarg held up his hand to quiet them.
Okta continued, “Ezra not only enters my clan, I take him as my adopted son.”
A hush fell over the Lo.
“Should my other sons...should they,” Okta hesitated, voice trembling. “My wife would...” Unable to finish, the sco-lo-ti held trembling fingers tightly against clenched eyes, fighting for control.
Ezra placed a hand on his new father’s shoulder.
In Okta’s spirit, the ashes finally fell.
Atamoda, too, began to cry. “Out of darkness, mercy.”
“Out of darkness, mercy,” the assembly repeated.
Ghalen came forward and embraced his friend, followed by Levidi and Aizarg. Soon, both clans surrounded Okta, sharing his joy and his grief.
***
The Lo resumed their places on either side of the Spine, Okta and Ezra among them. As the hum of conversation died down, Atamoda looked to the Crane’s surrogate sco-lo-ti, whose turn in the ceremony had arrived. Xva nodded, ready to fulfill his role.
Atamoda turned to Aizarg, who had returned to his stool. He stared at the staff, as if in a trance.
“Aizarg,” she said. “Xva is ready.”
He didn’t answer.
“Aizarg?” she repeated.
He finally dragged his gaze off the staff and onto her.
“Xva is ready,” she said.
“For what?” he asked, looking as if he didn’t know where he was.
“Sana...it’s time for the Crane to accept Sana. Are you well?”
“Hmmm. Sana.” He rubbed his beard and considered Xva. “Sit, my friend.”
Unsure, Xva sat back down next to Sahti.
“Aizarg, what are you doing?”
“Things have changed. Ba-lok, rise.”
Ba-lok stood, frowning and looking about. “Yes, my Uros.”
“Sana, come forward,” the Uros commanded.
Excited whispers danced through the crowd as the Scythian girl timidly emerged from behind Ghalen and stepped into the center.
“Sana, Setenay placed you with Ghalen until other arrangements could be made. I do not want any to walk away from this council without a clan they can call their own. We were going to place you with the Crane, but I have decided your needs, and the needs of the Lo nation, will be better served among the Minnow Clan.”
“Aizarg!” Atamoda leaned forward.
Aizarg held her gaze. “The Uros has spoken,” he said resolutely.
The thought of the Scythian girl in Kus-ge’s clutches, helpless to her abuses, frightened Atamoda.
Impassive, Aizarg returned his attention to the council.
“Ba-lok, does the Minnow Clan accept this a’gan as one of their own?”
Ba-lok looked down at Kus-ge. Kus-ge raised an eyebrow and pursed her lips, before nodding once.
Sana looked to Atamoda with pleading eyes, trying not to look frightened as others decided her fate.
Poor child, I cannot help you.
“Sana, you are now of the Minnow Clan. Go sit among your people.”
Except for the rain, the stunned Lo sat in complete silence as Sana took her place.
Atamoda caught Kus-ge staring at her, smiling. She fought her anger and sense of betrayal, wanting to get Aizarg alone to demand answers. Only her sense of duty, as strong and true as the Spine itself, kept her from fleeing the Köy-lo-hely.
“Atamoda, let us begin the adoptions,” Aizarg said.
“As you wish,
Uros
.” She could not look at him.
Atamoda entered the circle. “Let the orphans come forward.”
Eleven children, boys and girls from three to ten, meekly stepped from the both sides of the crowd, faces downcast with the terrible burdens thrust upon souls too tender to support them. The two little Minnow children, E’laa and Toma, held hands.
“Gather around me,” she beckoned them. “Minnow and Crane, our children.” Atamoda held her arms out over the children, presenting them to the Lo nation. “We must find new parents, loving and nurturing hearths so that we may honor their mothers and fathers who have gone before.”
One by one, couples came forward to claim the children. Some were childless, while others suffered the raw wounds of their own children lost to the sea. With each, guilt and relief stabbed both sides of Atamoda’s heart as she thought of her own family. Husbands and wives led the children back into the crowd until only the twins remained.
Alaya stepped forward, tearfully looking over to her husband. Levidi gazed upon his wife with tenderness and a hint of a nod.
“Levidi and I accept E’laa and Toma.”
Atamoda ushered the two children into Alaya’s arms, who knelt and embraced them. Levidi left his place next to the Uros and joined Alaya.
Atamoda knew these moments of joy where also moments of healing. Making such moments were the burden of the patesi-le.
“Are not these Minnow children?” Kus-ge’s voice rose above the rain.
A knot formed in Atamoda’s stomach. Slowly, she looked up and matched Kus-ge’s stare. “These children are Lo. What are you implying?”
“I imply nothing, other than these two belong with their clan.”
“Alaya and Levidi claimed these children and will be good parents. They’ve cared for them all these weeks. If someone from Minnow desired that role, they should have said so.”
Kus-ge stood with a relaxed expression narrowed on Atamoda.
“I’m sure the Staff Bearer and his woman would be good parents, but they are Crane. These children are Minnow.”
Atamoda looked to Ba-lok, who tugged on Kus-ge’s hem like a little boy, obviously uncomfortable with the confrontation and trying to get her attention. She swatted him away, eyes never leaving Atamoda.
“They are Lo. We are Lo. No one among the Minnow claimed these two. The children will go with Alaya and Levidi,” Atamoda straightened and crossed her arms.
“I claim them,” Kus-ge said.
Ba-lok bolted up and grabbed her arm. “Kus-ge!”
Kus-ge shrugged him off. “The disposition of children is the realm of the patesi-li, isn’t it
my sco-lo-ti?
” Her voice dripped with contempt.
Ba-lok sat back down again, leaving Kus-ge in full command.
“The children are mine by right.”
“No, they are not.” Atamoda looked at Alaya. “The Isp has spoken.”
“Isp? So you are the Isp?” Kus-ge’s eyes suddenly gleamed, as if she’d been expecting this moment. Her boldness, her eagerness, took Atamoda aback.
“Of course I am the Isp,” Atamoda shot back. “I am the oldest and most experienced patesi-li. That is the way of our people.”
“Setenay was the Isp. Is your name Setenay?”
“Setenay is dead.”
“Yes, and you are patesi-le of the Crane, wife of the Uros and the One Who Chose. The Isp cannot be the wife of the Uros, nor the One Who Chose. I am patesi-le of the Minnow, successor to Setenay. If there is an Isp, it is I.”
Atamoda felt like a fish, the hook firmly set in its mouth. She’d never considered anything, but that she would fulfill her mentor’s role. Obviously, Kus-ge had her sights set on taking Atamoda’s place beside the Uros for some time.
Atamoda did what any fish would do; she committed her will to fight regardless of the odds
“I am Isp. The children stay with Alaya.”
Kus-ge turned to the Minnow and held her arms wide. “Do I ask for anything not in accordance with our ways? Was not Setenay one of us? Are not E’laa and Toma
our
children?”
“Minnow with Minnow!” Ro-xandra shouted from the crowd, quickly joined by others.
“Kus-ge is rightfully the Isp!” bellowed another Minnow woman.
Alaya began to cry. “I’ve cared for them since the rains came. I love them. If they are your children, why did you not claim them?”
“Atamoda has cared for us all!” Su-gar stood and shook her fist at the line of Minnow.
Kus-ge spun around to face Su-gar. “I cared for our people, too. Did I not bring the Minnow in search of the other clans? We found the Crane, not the other way around. It was my magic that saved us from the demons.”
“Lie!” Su-gar shouted. “You collapsed and Atamoda fought on alone.”
Both clans were on their feet, shouting at one another across the Spine with only the brazier and the staff separating them. Kus-ge turned away from the Crane, shouting at her own people, stirring them with both her words and gestures. Now the numerical superiority of the Minnow became painfully apparent to Atamoda.
It also soon became apparent the shouting match primarily involved the clan women. Atamoda looked on dumbfounded as the men on both sides did nothing. Ba-lok sat at Kus-ge’s feet, as if studying the grains in the logs. Okta and Ghalen seemed as if they would bolt into the center at any second to reassert order, but kept their tongues in deference to Aizarg. The Uros merely sat on his stool, leaning forward with his chin resting on his fist. Occasionally, he glanced back and forth at both sides, as if studying the situation.
Behind the line of Minnow, slouching in the shadows, she caught the glint in Virag’s eye. The slaver grinned as if taking great pleasure in the confrontation.