And the Third Reghen, the wisest of the three identical brothers, stepped forward and said, “I will also go, my Leader, because the Drakon is a sly demon, and he will set a trap for my brothers.”
“And what can you do?” the Khun asked.
“Nothing!” replied the Third Reghen.
“Nothing? What good will that do?”
“When I wait patiently in the icy cold for two nights, what do I fear?
Nothing.
And when I have nothing to eat for three days, what do I wish for?
Nothing.
When I empty a quiver of arrows, what distracts my mind?
Nothing.
When the othertriber begs me for his life, what torments my soul?
Nothing.”
And the Ouna-Ma answered, “Now they are enough to defeat not only the Crystaleyed, but all the Drakons.”
And so it happened.
The Second Reghen, the strongest of the three, left on his own and searched for two moons. It was he who found the Drakon and led the others to the demon’s whitest lair, white of the snow, white of the crushed bones.
He waited awake for nights, and when the Drakon fell asleep he signaled for the other two to approach. But the Drakon fooled them, for his nine eyes never slept all at once. One of them was half-open. The Drakon spread his wings and chased the Reghen with the rage of forty winters.
“Run to save yourselves,” shouted the Second to his brothers.
The Third Reghen was ready.
The Second had done his duty. Now it was up to the First, for he was the only one who could kill the Drakon.
The Third had only one thing to do. Nothing.
The Third did not run. He stood still in front of the Drakon. The beast flew over the frozen river to attack him. The distance between them closed. The raging fire from the monster’s nostrils surged around the Reghen’s shield and scorched his face.
The First Reghen, who had climbed and hid among the white hair of a willow tree, found his one chance. He aimed as the Third was burning in agony. His iron-tipped arrows flew and shattered the crystal eyes of the Drakon. His iron blades tore through the air and sank deep in the beast’s heart. The ice river boiled in the Drakon’s black and green blood.
The three Reghen brothers returned victorious, though the Third was disfigured for life. He wore his gray hood so as not to frighten those who looked upon him and never took it off again. His brothers, the other two identical Reghen, also wore their hoods to honor their own.
The Third, the Reghen of Nothing, had very little life left in him. A treacherous ice needle had found its way into his body when the Drakon got close to him. The ice needle grew and grew next to his heart until, by the next winter, it had pierced his lung and sent him to Enaka with the most triumphant of Stories.
The two brothers Reghen continued to wear their gray hoods, eternally loyal to the Third. They never took them off.
We defy everything.
We sacrifice the best.
With our sacrifice, the entire Tribe we protect.
We fear Nothing.
Or else, and far worse, we die for Nothing.
Thus declared the Ouna-Mas, the Voices of the Unending Sky.
All the children, except for one, hypnotically repeated the Reghen’s last words of the Story: “Nothing. Nothing.”
The strength returned to the Tribe in the days to come, and to the children. We did not hear any more coughing. The curse had been lifted, and the dying no longer breathed near the same fire with us. As the days of the Sieve were running away, the children took the Reghen’s words and made them a game.
“It will rain all day today.”
“What are you thinking, Bako?”
“Nothing.”
“When you fall and there is no meat at the Sheep’s tent. What do you think, Urak?”
“Nothing.”
“The maulers have come for the orphans again. What are you thinking, Malan?”
“Nothing.”
“What are you thinking about, Da-Ren?” Rouba asked me on the thirty-eighth day as we were walking toward the Wolves’ tent yet again just as twilight clutched the last clouds in the west.
“Noth…”
Nothing. I couldn’t see her smile.
“Noth…I…Elbia,” I answered.
Rouba stared at me silently for two breaths and then slapped me on the cheek, trying to wake me up from the nightmares.
“The snakes have gotten your spirit, kid. Elbia would have understood. It had to be that way. Elbia has risen in glory, up in the stars. We ended the plague with her blood and with her body. And her eyes cry with shame for you every time she sees you losing yourself. You disgrace her.”
“Her eyes did cry that morning, Rouba, but…”
It wasn’t shame.
“And what do you tell her, acting like this? That she died for nothing? Death strikes fast. No begging, warning, explaining. That is the Sieve.”
That was the Sieve. It wasn’t enough to have strong legs and never fall.
We had to endure three trials, to face the three deaths as they had told us from the first night.
Cold.
Hunger.
And the third, the unspeakable, the most terrible.
I hadn’t tamed the third yet, the tyrant of despair, of Nothing, to be able to stand again and endure after losing all light and all hope. When Nothing would matter anymore.
We did not bury the dead in our Tribe, but that night I buried Elbia into the dark past and moved forward.
To Nothing.
Apocrypha VIII.
Harvest the Innocent
As the One Mother heard the Legends, Chapter VIII
North of the Blackvein there are no months or years. Time is the slave of Enaka and her daughter Selene. The men count the days by looking up in the sky, when it is not cloudy, the women count the moons until they give birth to sons again, unless they are archers or witches. I am the only one who is both.
Some names are easy to guess, the flower moon, the snow moon, the strawberry moon, the antler moon, the hunter’s moon, the longfish moon—what they call the river’s blackfish with the fire-colored eggs. The harvest moon. They don’t work the land or harvest it; the harvest moon is when they raid the south and the Empire, early in autumn before the rains. Rain kills the horse, and the bow, cold is no time for war, neither is scorching heat. The mares are rested and well fed when the harvest moon starts. They harvest the innocent, as they harvested my village.
The worm moon is the one when I am most powerful, the moon of the First Witch, the one when I still light a candle for my brother, the first of spring. There is a great feast every spring, and they all kneel to me, waiting with teary eyes until I bring them the Voice of the Sky.
There are so many of them, north of the Blackvein, the ones who call themselves the Tribe, as if they are the only tribe of men, and everyone else is slaughter-meat. They are afraid only of the Forest and the Witch, and I rule as I knew I would, by stepping on their fear and their Goddess. I had a brother once, now I have thousands of brothers, and they all kneel to me.
It took some time, though Khun-Taa was my slave from that first night. I was never confused, never doubted myself. I was amazed at their numbers, and by their savagery. Jak-Ur couldn’t count or explain. I thought this was a tribe of thousands, but I never guessed more than two thousand. I had no understanding even when they crossed the river, following Khun-Taa and myself. Not until I crossed the river north after the raids to see Sirol for the first time. Only then when I saw the thousands of campfires, did I understand what I was up against, how strong I needed to be. This tribe can end all life, raze the living from the face of the earth; they are Satan’s monsters, not the scourge of God as the priests of the Cross call them.
Countless the hooves and the boots that will crush the skulls and the sepulchers, sow fire and salt, so that no life will ever sprout again. Those first moons made me wise; I saw the rape of my village repeated a tho
usand times farther south. I saw my face and that of my brother and mother in all the faces of the innocent. I’ve seen too much I can’t describe, the lard on the stakes, the boys begging, the crucified mothers. I’ve seen so much, that I cannot doubt my mission or cower now.
I wailed at night alone, as my Khun slept next to me, drunk and exhausted. I woke in the morning with rage to lead the sacrifices, to cut the heads off the priests, one more time.
I am a hater and an unbeliever, and yet they all kneel in front of me. It is essential for a leader to have some hatred for his own tribe. Else how can she lead them forward, sacrifice some to save the others, separate the wheat from the chaff? It is essential for a leader of any faith to be an unbeliever. Else how can she make up new sacred stories when the old ones become useless?
One thing I learned is that whether one is unbeliever or faithful, we all walk through hell.
It took me six bloody moons of tales, kisses, and soft words before I made Khun-Taa listen to me. He listens to the prophecies now, and I have stopped them. One woman alone.
I ordered them back north of Blackvein, I prophesied his death in the south, and Khun-Taa doesn’t cross the river anymore. He doesn’t dare go west, either, and there is nothing in the north. I had to draw blood, to lead the sacrifices with the blackhorn knife, else they would never fear me. The few slaughtered ones come in my sleep to haunt me, but I saved thousands farther south, thousands who never saw me, yet they curse my name.
This tribe feeds on war and horse and rots in peace and mud. I keep them in Sirol, isolated and tamed, to drown in their Legends of monsters and fear. One day, after they rot and become weaker I will drive them back to the steppe to die deep in the desert they came from. And they will follow me with song and milk-spirit, that bitter piss they drink. I would be done by now if only they had wine.
I can’t kill them with fire and blood, but I will one day end them all with wine and song and a prophecy they’ll fulfill with teary eyes. I don’t do this out of kindness; I am not the sword of the Archangel that descends to avenge God. I have become rage and revenge; I hate weakness, I crave the power, the young longskull girls who surround me and listen to me, the Packs of the Archers looking up at me at the Great Feast of Spring, the twelve-wintered boys and girls of the Sieve. I must judge them, sieve them and decide their fate. Make no mistake; I admire this tribe as much as I hate it. I might bring the end of this tribe, but I would never live anywhere else, never leave them.
There were many women around Khun-Taa when I first came, many more beautiful than I was. By the time I found him I had a shaved head and weary eyes. But a woman spreading her legs, and showing her full breasts, that is not power. It can save her life for a few nights, but it cannot bring her to rule a tribe of monsters. It takes a lot more to accomplish that. A few could. The blue-eyed one I cursed and exiled to the Forest because he was mesmerized by her. The one from the north, the brown-haired one, I ordered her death, and yet I still fear her child, that orphan. He came to life nine days after the Great Feast of Spring. That night I dreamt of a priest and a rag doll at the edge of my bed. They were laughing at me and out of their mouths came a river of spiders. I marked the newborn of that night, the ninestars, to remember them forever.
It has now been thirteen winters since Khun-Taa found me up on the hill, twelve since I became the First Witch.
Short after giving birth to him.
The one who will be Khun, my seed, the greatest Khun of all, the one whom I bred to lead them to their demise.
Even his name I chose to foretell that, but they are too stupid to recognize it. Stupid and vile. And I am their First Witch.
It is his time now, his Sieve.
XV.
Crazygrass
Thirteenth Winter. The Sieve. The Final Night.
No one fell on the thirty-ninth day.
“Tonight, everyone is a Wolf,” said the Reghen, early, with the first light of dawn, before we even undressed.
Whispers traveled from mouth to mouth that the Sieve would end that very afternoon or the following morning. And then what? I could no longer remember my life before the Sieve. But all trials come to an end someday. The worst trials of my life ended when they were finally under my skin and I had accepted them. As brutal as the trials were, by the time they ended I feared what followed more.
Some, like Bako, were bragging that they would join the Archers and leave for new trials and glories away from us shit orphans. They considered themselves the Wolves of the Sieve, even if they had fallen many more times than I. Before Elbia’s death, I had fallen only once. I fell a few more times after that twenty-first day. I was no longer the best, whatever the best could mean.
Unlike Bako, I had no idea where I wanted to go. It would be enough that I wouldn’t return to the Greentooth. The weakest began to pray to Enaka. But it was their prayers especially that she wouldn’t heed.
The Guides ordered us to light big fires in the middle of the field, and we brought hides to sit around. When the Sun was high, the Carriers passed milk to everyone. Not meat, and that worried me. But the maulers had disappeared, and everyone believed that we would leave at once. No trial awaited us.
“Today is a feast,” said Keko.
Rouba was pacing, caring for the horses. He never sat down to enjoy the fire.
“It’s not over,” he said when he found me for a moment alone. “Keep your eyes and ears open. It begins now.”
We lit seven fires in a circle. Five of us gathered around each one, with a larger fire in the middle for the Guides.
Beyond the field, to the west, I saw them. Skeletons taller than any warrior, holding hands, frozen white, wearing only the gray hair of a mad witch on their skulls. They weren’t marching, but they kept waving at us. I kept looking until I realized that they were nothing but snow-covered oak trees, their branches white on the side above, gray-dark below. Once more, the Forest disappointed me.
Nothing had come out of the Forest that winter. No animal, monster, or man. Only howling and leaves. When it wasn’t snowing and the sun was shining, the wind would bring us the only message of the Forest. Bronze leaves would lift up from the earth and dance all the way to reach our camp. Bronze was the only new shade the Forest brought in a Sieve that was colored scarcely. Black, gray, brown, white. Red.
I was looking for the Reekal of the Forest. For the Wolfmen I’d seen that eighth day. I never told Elbia about the Wolfmen. Why? Maybe because I had never wanted to worry her. Maybe the Wolfmen were another one of my dreams. As I was looking west to face my fears, everyone else was looking in the opposite direction. A cold wind embraced me as if Elbia’s ghost had glided past my body, coming to join the festivities of the Sieve. Sah-Ouna had just passed the gate and entered our camp.
“She has come again, Da-Ren. Careful now. It isn’t over,” I heard the ghost whisper to me before it hid among the oak skeletons.
Sah-Ouna was not alone. A younger Ouna-Ma was next to her, the one I would call Razoreyes. When she took off her red veil, I forgot about Elbia for a while. I learned then to create nicknames for the Ouna-Mas and the Reghen to tell them apart. She was the same as the rest. Black hair cropped short like wet grass, black pupils reflecting the endless darkness of the Sieve and the long quiver head. But her eyes were different, younger, and sharper. Razoreyes.
I didn’t fall in love with that Ouna-Ma, nor did I touch her. Not then. Winters later, when I got to know many Ouna-Mas, their tongues, their breasts, and their legs, then I fell in love with all and none of them. I didn’t have any feelings for Razoreyes. Only the feeling of something growing hard under my trousers for the first time.
“They come out from the womb that way. They were born wrapped within their mother’s womb sheath, still unopened.”
It was Bako talking close to my ear, which was enough for me to know that this was all nonsense.
“The pupils are like that from the herbs that they drink,” Rouba told me.
“When they ar
e still babies and their skulls are soft, the older Ouna-Mas tie their heads with bandages, and that’s how their skulls get their shape,” said Danaka.
I believed her. A girl can’t be blinded by a razor-eyed witch. We boys were already moths doomed by the merciless blaze of her eyes. It was us boys whom Enaka and Sah-Ouna desired. They prepared us, countless boys, to suck our blood and marrow in the Final Battle.
Denek, who was frequently in the Sheep’s tent, said the pupils could grow twice their size and cover almost the entire eyeball when they fucked and reached ecstasy. I didn’t know then what he meant, but as I grew older I saw it many times. And I learned that it didn’t matter. Whether they were born or became that way. The Ouna-Mas carried the Story of the entire Tribe, the past and our future. Their power came from us.
Razoreyes and the Reghen sat next to Sah-Ouna as she began reciting the sacred rites. A cauldron was already on the fire. I had heard the Guides cursing whenever cold, rain, sickness, or death came. I didn’t know what these swearing words meant, but they were at the tip of my tongue.
“What do you want with the cauldron, you vile bitch, you Darhul’s vomit? Do you want my beating heart, to throw it in there? Do you want to rip my eyes out so that they never see what they saw on the twenty-first day? What demon are you to sacrifice Elbia?”
I didn’t cry out the words, nor did I whisper them. Why should I? The Witch knew my every breath. She knew what was eating me inside. Enaka knew too. We were not hiding in the tent but outside, under her Sky, where no secret could be kept. At the edge of the western horizon, the Sun wielded his bloodied swords, fighting Darhul in the last battle of the day. Who was I to argue with the mothers and the daughters of the mighty Sun himself?
The Witch took out some herbs, a rasko root, and some dried walnut leaves and threw them one by one into the pot. She never touched the walnut leaves with bare hands but held them with a cloth. She then carefully took out from a pouch a small branch that looked like wheat in shape but was green in color.
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