He didn’t believe me. I shook my head back and forth with mocking eyes and raised brows as if explaining to him that he already had the answer. After some more hesitation, he did bite it, and the slimy thing lost its strength. It would die before I counted to eight.
“Haaaa! Do you believe this?” he shouted, looking at the tentacles and the head of the octopus, which had opened wide for its last dance under the sun.
Fishing was over for the day.
In the one thousand and more days that he remained with me, that was perhaps the only real smile and the only cry of enthusiasm that left his lips.
“You have to beat it forty times against the rock to soften the meat,” I told him. “Otherwise, you can’t eat it.”
“I would never eat that, Eusebius. I am no barbarian.”
We both laughed. This time, he believed me. He grabbed the octopus, raised it high above his head, and slammed it down on a rock over and over again. In between each hit, he would stop for a breath and give me an answer, a different one each time.
“I’ll tell you what I felt, Eusebius.”
The octopus crashed onto the slippery rock.
“I felt satisfaction. I had killed an othertriber with ease.
“Pride. Ten thousand warriors cheered for me.
“Joy. I wouldn’t die like the others.
“Fear. The black forest had frozen me dead.”
The tentacles slowly started to soften. Cut into square pieces, boiled, and served with olive oil and wild greens. And a cup of watered wine. That was my desire. If only that could be our greatest sin.
“Love. Zeria.
“Compassion. Akrani had helped me very much with the bow that first spring.
“Guilt. I had betrayed my Tribe.
“Is that correct, Eusebius? Have I learned your words? These feelings that you have?”
“These words are the powerful shields of God and Satan in their never-ending battle, Da-Ren. Choose them wisely.”
“Sorrow. Lebo rode better than any of us. I did not expect him to fall so young.”
That was a very ill-fated octopus indeed.
“I felt merciful. That word I learned much later.
“I felt unstoppable. Uncarved. Immortal. Wolf. Shit. Snake. Cursed. In love. Frightened. Fearless. Brave. Rabbit. All in one day.”
“Tell me.”
We were getting close to the truth.
“Do you understand?”
I think I did understand.
“There was a storm of confusion in your head.”
“You understood shit, Eusebius. Don’t ask me again what I felt. No matter what I tell you from now on, don’t ask me again. I felt everything in one day, and now that time has melted all of it away, I feel the same things differently.”
“You talk like a madman.”
“I will tell you what I sensed with the eyes, the hands, and the nose. The blood of the Dasal was red like ours; her eyes, blue. The meat that night was tender and juicy; it rained iron needles, and water seeped into the tent. I felt the rain, the knife, the smooth skin of my horse, Bera’s slap. That’s what I felt.”
I picked up the basket with the few small fish. Da-Ren was still clutching the badly beaten octopus, as if he didn’t know what to do with it anymore.
I had to explain to him. For his own salvation.
“For your own good, Da-Ren. God will not understand. We are not animals.” I moved away from him as soon as I said the words, afraid that he might hit me. “People have two paths to follow: that of God or that of the Devil. And throughout every moment, they are being judged by God and tempted by Satan. None of our Sorcerers of the Cross, as you call them, will ever sit to hear this story if you do not repent first. If they ask me how you served your penance, what can I tell them?”
An old fisherman with a child tied their boat in the hidden harbor. Da-Ren answered me before we began climbing the thirty-eight and a thousand steps for yet another time. He turned and looked at the sea. It expanded endless like the steppe, bottomless and untrodden, and diminished every hope of escape.
“I hate this island, Eusebius. I know the games gods play. I know I already died years ago and Enaka abandoned me here. I feel it, since you want to know what I feel now. My slow persecution after death. I feel it deeply. I know.”
“Don’t lose hope, Da-Ren. Believe in God, and he will redeem and cleanse your soul, leaving it white as snow and carded wool.”
It was from one of the psalms of Matins, the ones we sang to raise the soul to the heavens step by step. He softly snorted a short, ironic laugh.
“I hate this dry sun and the salt waves, the northwest skiron wind that shaves the black stones and bleaches them, the warm livas wind that has razed all the slopes. What do you feel, Eusebius? You tell me.”
I had come to this arid island from the mainland many years before along with other refugees in a wave-ravaged boat. I was not even eight years old. There was no tent for the orphans here as in Da-Ren’s Sirol. The refugees sent me to the monastery as an inexpensive offering to God so that He would help them on this parched land.
I hadn’t lived even for a moment as a common man. I didn’t know what I could feel.
“We have died, Eusebius. That is what I feel inside of me every night when you leave me in my cell, away from Sirol. They have brought our bones here. You are the skeleton of my life, and I am its demon. Both orphaned of flesh. You stand there in your cell across from me, motionless, speechless, expressionless, fleshless, white as old bones. You bring me closer to death with every slight move you make.”
Indeed, we may well have been dead. Perhaps the punishment of Hell was to believe that we were still alive, could still hope for salvation—and never achieve it. That would be the worst persecution. I had not lived joy, sin, love of the flesh, but neither had I experienced any great sadness since I was eight. Was this the life of a man or of a wingless Cherubim?
“In the Blackvein where I grew up next to the Forest, the land whispered, sang, and bellowed. You could hear the horses, the women, the wolves, the wild boars. The swallows and the robins chirped; the birches, the willows, and the oaks grew leaves, hard like papyrus, brown like leather. The wood awoke, bled, and died. The men, the wolves, the eagles hunted. We drank water, snow, we hid in the fog; I could hear the frogs and the lightning bolts. Here, there is nothing. Only this sun, its blinding light eating the papyrus and my skin, and questions—how did you say it—for madmen.”
He was going to break; I could smell it. I had to keep quiet now instead of persisting with my own preaching. I did the opposite.
“You killed an innocent man, Da-Ren.”
“I never managed to kill the guilty ones, Eusebius. Never!”
Unlike the two of us, who were still very much alive, the tentacles of the octopus were dead for sure after the beating. Before we began our ascent for the cells, Da-Ren threw the mashed sea creature to the barefoot boy who was helping the fisherman next to us. We were fasting anyway before the summer feast of the Blessed Virgin Mother.
“Never. For that alone, I regret and I repent.”
XXV.
The Final Battle
Eighteenth spring. Uncarved—Wolf.
O Goddess, sweet and beautiful,
come listen to your children.
The Sun has hidden from the Sky,
the black star shocks the darkland.
The red-eyed eagle flies blind,
his blood rains on the gold steppe.
The man bewails for his horse,
the woman mourns her offspring.
O Goddess, bright and powerful,
now stay with us this night.
The darkness cries the sorrow’s song,
the fear rips our loins.
Bring back Selene’s gift to us,
we beg you to reveal her.
And I will bring as sacrifice,
a young heart of my own blood.
The Song of Sah-Ouna at the Feast of Spring
The world was full of signs of the Demon’s darkness and the Goddess’s light, but only those longskull Witches could read them. We had visited most of the small camps of each Banner by that time. Even the Khun himself had summoned us to his tent, though it was only to shout his fury at us. But when it came to the tents of the Ouna-Mas and the Reghen, we had taken a peek only from far away. Some signs should remain hidden from the common folk.
But there were other signs that everyone knew about. The most horrible of all was the Springdarken, the hiding of Selene by the clouds on the night of her full glorious brightness. And if that occurred on the full moon of the Great Feast of Spring, then sorrow and fear fell like heavy sheets of gray rain across Sirol. The Springdarken had happened only once before as far as Rouba could recall.
“It was during the last spring of Khun-Mervak’s reign, our Leader before Khun-Taa. And Enaka sent him to his death soon after that.”
The Feast was cut short on the second night when the Sky unleashed waterfalls, crying for my great victory, Zeria’s mourning, her father Veker who had escaped death, Lebo’s blood, Akrani’s death, my terror in the Forest, and Malan’s shame. The prisoner he was responsible for had escaped, and Malan had become the laughingstock of the Uncarved in the camp, all in one morning. No one blamed me. I had won my fight, killed the man.
The day of the third and most important night of the Feast, that of the full moon, dawned. It would be the night when the Voice of the Goddess came through Sah-Ouna down to Sirol. The Unending Sky was angry and black as a raven’s eye. It didn’t shed a single tear of rain. It didn’t clear blue for even a breath. Men, women, and Witches stopped every few steps to see if the Sky would open up. But the whole day passed under a Springdarken cloak of clouds.
It was only after the setting of the sun that the Goddess finally triumphed, and her beloved daughter Selene came out upon her chariot in all her brilliance, fighting Darhul’s cloudbreaths. As she was riding glorious in the Sky, the clouds changed to white and then to black again and finally became a copper mist until they ran away frightened.
It would be a Great Feast again, and everyone walked lighthearted once more. Everyone except me. I would have preferred a Springdarken like the one long ago, the omen that had brought the death of the Khun.
Malan had been shamed. Soon, I would be First. If Khun-Taa died. If Enaka willed it. I was so close.
The First Witch had offered our sacrifices on the first day, and the fights in the battle ring of Wolfhowl had finished on the second. The third night was going to be brief. We all waited for one thing: to hear Enaka’s commandments.
Sah-Ouna filled her chest, and sixteen Ouna-Mas circled close around her, repeating her words so all could hear. Few things were more beautiful than the voices of the Ouna-Mas.
Listen, men, to the truth Enaka sends us.
Weak is the Sun of this spring!
The firstborn demons of the Forest, the Reekaal, have achieved great power.
Their souls have entered and now command the will of every tree. They have possessed the bodies of the Dasal and have covered the Forest with blood and terror, where Selene cannot see. Stay away from there. Stay away from the West. This spring is green and black and does not favor battle against the Reekaal.
The heads turned and twenty thousand warrior eyes fell upon the four of us Uncarved Wolves.
“They are looking at you, kid,” said Rouba.
“Me?”
“You killed a Dasal just last night.”
“Gunna and Balam killed one too.”
“Nobody remembers that. Not bloody enough.”
And the Dasal was possessed by a Reekaal she said.
“You are a hero now.” Half of the old man’s face was smiling.
The hairs on my arms had become iron needles, my balls heavy as battle hammers. “Da-Ren, the one who killed a Reekaal,” that would be the Story around the fires.
Chaka needed no ceremony. Sah-Ouna was still singing when he unwrapped the red cloth from Malan’s right arm and tied it on mine. And there it was. I had reached the fifth spring of training without bleeding to death, and I was the First in the Uncarved. Five winters after the Sieve, I had finally beaten Malan. If Khun-Taa died within the next thirteen moons, before the next Great Feast of Spring, I would become the Khun of the entire Tribe.
Khun-Da-Ren. Somehow it didn’t sound right.
I turned to Rouba and asked him, pointing to the mounds with the countless warriors all around me.
“How can one command so many men? Will they obey?”
“If you believe it, you can.”
“How do I believe it, Rouba?”
About two hundred feet away from us, Sah-Ouna sang to Selene, “O Goddess, sweet and beautiful, come listen to your children…” before she would announce another Truth of the Goddess.
“How do you believe?” he repeated my words and paused for a while. “Look at him there to the right.” He pointed to the ugliest and shortest man with a mauled nose disfiguring his face and two dull eyes in the center of it. “Do you believe that he is the One Leader? Is he better than you?”
“Him? No.”
“The one next to him? Is he better than you?”
This one looked like a strong warrior but only that. He was holding his meat with one hand, munching like a rabid dog and scratching his ass with the other. He was no Leader.
“No.”
“Look at all of those around you one by one. When you recognize one as your Leader, kneel before him and accept him. Swear to die at his command. If you do not find one better than you, go to the crystal waters of the river and look at your own face. Now, be silent. Sah-Ouna will speak.”
Sah-Ouna had finished her invocations to Selene, and she turned to face in our direction. I thought she was looking directly at me as she opened her mouth.
Now listen, all warriors of the Tribe.
Enaka commands this: These moons bring dark omens, but the seasons will change again. The Final Battle is coming for all the powers of the Unending Sky, the Earth, and the Darkness. Enaka will stand by our side; she will redeem the victors and accept them up there next to her. Fire and rain, our arrows, will annihilate the othertribers who have lost their souls to the demons.
The battle will be in the West, but not now. The next Khun is the one who will first pass through the Endless Forest.
So Enaka decrees.
“I am,” I answered to Rouba, my eyes wide open, a smile at my lips.
“The One,” he completed.
How wrong we both were.
Sah-Ouna’s words ended any dream of campaigning toward the West anytime soon. Definitely not that summer. Our ninestar Guide, Bera, who listened sitting down in the last rows of the mound, yelled the loudest, as if he wanted to start a rally: “The Witch defies the Leader.”
For some reason, Witches and ninestars had a dislike of each other.
“Shut up! She frees him. Khun-Taa is too old now to conquer the West,” answered Chaka behind me.
“I seek only One.” I heard the words in my head again.
Under the bright light of Selene the Great Feast of Spring ended, and we started to make our way back to our camp. As I was moving through the thousands of drunken roaring men, I saw Noki, my old comrade. I embraced him tightly.
“Ha, Da-Ren! My friend.”
“Noki, how—”
He had no time to waste with me in my night of glory.
“I am going to get myself a slave girl for tonight,” he said, his face glowing, drunk and happy, never slowing his stride. He didn’t even notice the ribbon of the First around my arm. “That’s what the Great Feasts are for,” he said as he disappeared.
Noki went where the Uncarved had yet to go, and I returned to the fire of our hut that was now warmer than ever. Only four young Wolves were left to share it. Four springs earlier, we were thirteen Starlings.
We sat in silence around the fire. We had gone through some hard days and even harder n
ights together, especially the past three. But still, we had no friends around this fire to give one another courage.
Balam had a stupid smile on his face because he didn’t know what awaited him. Gunna roared with the deep laughter of certainty because he was half-drunk and still so sure that he would be the next Khun. Or was it the other way around with those two?
I wore a silent grin because I had the red ribbon around my arm, and I knew I was the best.
We fell asleep with those smiles on our faces.
As if we were still children in the Sieve, the Reghen and the Ouna-Ma woke us in the middle of the night for a Story. Their Story. And ours.
The Legend of the Reghen
The Fifth Season of the World: Part Four
Tiny red stars dotted the body of the First Ouna-Ma the Blind. Her bowels grew rock hard and wouldn’t turn. Enaka wanted her close in the Unending Sky, to shine, to become the largest star next to Selene. Her time had come. After a while, the sorrow of her death consumed Khun-Nan, the first Leader. His last child had left. He had disunited all the families of the Tribe, and everyone had forgotten their wives. He had no male heirs, and even if he did, he had never learned of them.
“Who will be our next Khun?” the warriors asked over his dying body.
“Call the Reghen,” he said.
The three Reghen selfsame brothers, the ones who had killed the Ice Drakon of the North and the most famous warriors of the Tribe, heeded the call. The Third had died but was always with his brothers on their robes, marked with a red circle.
When they arrived, Khun-Nan said to them, “You will become Leaders of the Tribe now that I go to the morning star next to my daughter.”
The Reghen remained silent, their faces frowning until the Second spoke. “Honored Khun, the Ouna-Ma, your daughter, the Daughter of Enaka, gave us the last Truth before she ascended.”
The Second continued, repeating her words:
“Listen to me, Reghen. Do not become Khuns. You are elders, wise men, but your days are numbered. The One Leader must have the gift of youth, be brave and strong; make the earth tremble beneath his feet. His blood must be fresh and crimson, untarnished from fear, envy, and defeat, and only that blood must flow in his veins. He must be free of failure, without even the slightest scratch from battle on his body.
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