Shem was agitated. He looked at the calm waters bathing in the sun’s orange glow and turned to the forest—increasingly dark, increasingly menacing.”
“Shem,” Ifunka spoke firmly. “I must help him. Come with me or wait here. I will go into the forest and face whatever danger may lie therein. He said there are even greater dangers than clay men but our greatest enemy is the fear within us. Let go of your fear and come with me.”
“Yes,” Shem agreed. “We shall find him.”
The two headed for the forest edge, which seemed larger and more menacing at every moment. As they entered, they found themselves immersed in gloom—their eyes began to adjust once more as they walked deeper and deeper into its bosom. They searched the leaf-strewn ground and the boles of the lofty trees for any trace or spur of their friend but, not being experienced travellers, their efforts were in vain. They continued on for two hours until they only barely remembered the path they had taken and began to worry that they might soon lose their way completely. As the sun descended, the forest became darker and darker until their hands and feet appeared blurry, the sound of night insects and small predators became palpable and the temperature began to drop degree-by-degree.
“It’s hopeless,” said Shem. “We’ll have to make camp but we’ve left most of our supplies by the lakeside.”
“No, we must find Tvem tonight or he’ll surely perish. Let’s stop and meditate. We need to connect with the trees, feel their spirits and they will tell us which way to go.”
So Ifunka and Shem sat down, resting their backs on two leff-trees and fell into a deep meditative state. They were oblivious of their surroundings, even of the wiffdim-moths which battered their faces and the eighty-legged zorgu-centipedes which crawled over their crossed legs in search of small insect-prey. Vag-beetles with shiny purple exoskeletons and long, scimitar-like mandibles climbed up their robes, digging their spiky legs into the fabric thereof. The hum of bats—the screech of yishda (‘night-raptors’)—could be heard in the blackness of the forest canopy. Yet Ifunka’s and Shem’s minds were elsewhere, traversing the all-embracing, all-amplexive network of the mimra, that eternal web of existence which binds all things together, whether it be a man and an insect or the farthest stars in the remote nebulae of this far-flung universe. Nestled within this sacred web, the two monks were at one with all created things. Ifunka felt the tree which he was resting upon and it seemed as if it were speaking to him, telling him of greatness, the attitude of its mighty branches and the depths of its roots, which intertwined with all the roofs of every tree which surrounded it, such that every tree within Ffushkar was linked to one immense network of roots stretching across the entire continent of Tremnad. These trees felt one another, interacted with one another on a plain of existence few men can comprehend. The tree showed Ifunka that Tvem was not far—that he was, in fact, resting on the root of a kaptitv-tree, one kobotv away, hidden in an underground chamber. He would recognize this as a lump of earth—indeed, the same one they had passed earlier when attacked by the clay men on the way to the lake village of Ffush. Ifunka then removed himself from his trance, lifting himself as if from the bottom of a vasty ocean, until he burst forth upon its surface, his heart awash with salty foam. He opened his eyes and sighed; Shem opened his almost simultaneously.
“I saw him…”
“So did I,” Shem nodded.
“Let’s go!”
They stretched their legs and then bounded forth, as if propelled by some hidden accelerant, until they came upon the same mound of earth they had seen in their visions. They hid behind some boles, looking out cautiously at the mound, the entrance to which was no doubt guarded by half a dozen stealthy figures in gruesome masks, hidden in the darkness, so that the hole looked untenanted. Ifunka and Shem drew knives and waited for some moments, until it was clear that they had not yet been spotted. Ifunka raised his head and then nodded to give the signal, and the two boys rushed at the entrance. Two clay men emerged, clubs in hand. Ifunka dealt a solid blow to the abdomen of his attacker, piercing his flesh and sticking him right through while Shem slashed at the stomach of another enemy, spilling his entrails on the forest floor. Another four clay men rushed out of the cave. Bending low, Ifunka raised his arm, using the energy of one clay man against himself, causing him to fly into the bole of a zeff-tree, impaling his chest on one of its branches. The second lunged at him, leaving Ifunka to simply raise his sword and let the hapless foeman sink onto its blade. Shem swung low at the first enemy, severing its feet, while the second tripped over the first and Shem slashed the back of its neck, cutting its spinal cord.
“We’ve improved!” shouted Ifunka triumphantly. “Look how quickly we have dispatched six clay men. Come! Let’s enter their lair and save our friend.”
They entered the warren cautiously. Shem lit a torch. The fetid odour of the hole was overwhelming; it stank of decomposition, Tremna body odours, decaying branches and rotten vegetables. As they went deeper, so too did the stench increase, until they could hardly bear it. They covered their noses with their robes and proceeded steadily on. Eventually, they met a bend in the tunnel which led them to a dark and dreary chamber, within which they espied Tvem, wrapped in ropes and flanked by two hitvah guards, armed and vigilant. At the opposite end of the chamber there was a throne, glimmering white, upon which sat a woman, perfectly nude but covered in a coat of clay which painted her every limb and voluptuous curvature. Her hair was smooth and red, coloured by a layer of red earth which fixed it into perfect, long, rope-like locks which hung about her face and neck. Her eyes were deep brown, her facial features sleek and predator-like, with a sharp nose and chin, long ears, keen gaze and sloping forehead. After the common practice of Tremnan women, her body was completely depilated, save only for her wide eyebrows and thick locks. She saw with one foot resting on a tree stump, while the other rested on her knee, barely concealing her modesty which was, thankfully, obscured by a thick layer of clay. She screeched in the barbaric tongue of her people and Tvem was brought towards her at her command. She eyed him like a she-wolf, drooling over its intended prey. She stood up and descended from her throne. Seizing him by the neck with both hands, she placed her snake-like face against his and stuck out her long serpentine tongue. She licked his lips and then both cheeks and his forehead, all the while Tvem was frozen in a state of emotionless stupor. She then growled fiercely and bit his shoulder, her canines breaking his skin. Tvem’s face jerked in agony and he groaned. She slapped him in the face and then pushed him on his back, tore at his clothes and forced herself on him. Ifunka and Shem turned away in disgust as she growled loudly.
“What should we do?” whispered Shem. “This is a violation of morality.”
“I will enter the chamber when she closes her eyes and will dispatch her. You take out the first guard. I’ll kill the second. Then we’ll carry Tvem on our shoulders out of the warren. All right?”
“Right.”
As the clay women was carried away in the fullness of her ecstasy, Ifunka slipped into the room. Before the guards could notice, he had swung his sword fully, decapitating the woman with one blow. Her blood gushed out over Tvem’s body, covering him in its warm thickness. Shem sunk his blade into the first guard while Ifunka slashed the throat of the second. Tvem, astounded, was bathed in the life-blood of his erstwhile seductress, whose head had fallen next to his own, still frozen in a barbaric expression of primitive sensuality, her half-closed lustful eyes looking upward during her last moment of carnal satisfaction.
“Tvem!” Ifunka called. “Take my arm.”
Tvem reached out and Ifunka pulled him up.
“We only have a moment before others come,” Tvem advised. “We’d better flee while we still can or they will eat us all after severing limb from limb.”
They clambered up the entrance-way and into the fresh night air.
“Can you walk?” Ifunka asked.
“Yes, I can—run rather. Let’s run!”
The three men ran as fast as they could. Their faces and robes dripped with blood, which spattered on the leaf-strewn ground with every movement. The figures of clay men could faintly be discerned, leaving the cave and spreading out to search in all directions.
“Let’s hope they don’t find us,” Tvem advised. “Thou hast killed the queen of that warren, Washyag-Haz.”
“What did she want from you?” asked Shem.
“The clay men live in separate colonies governed by a single female. All the males are her children or, in some cases, brothers; so she mates exogamously, either with a male from another warren who is her second or more distantly related cousin or, when possible, she will abduct a foreign male, mate with him until she is certainly impregnated, sometimes over a period of two weeks, and then have him dismembered, cooked and will eat his flesh herself.”
“How do you know all this?” asked Ifunka.
“It’s not the first time I’ve been captured. Washyag-Haz captured me once before, about a year ago, and mated with me for a week and a half before I killed the guards and escaped. Perchance, she had a child of my seed, though I cannot be sure. She must have been keen for another. I have experience of escaping from such situations elsewhere as well. I was captured on five other occasions by two other queens, Heigal-Shim twice and Kahitv-Kshaff thrice. Each time, I managed to escape just days before they meant to slaughter me.”
“Couldn’t you have tried to escape before they had their way with you?”
“Well, I…. so… thou art young, Ifunka, young indeed.”
“Why… I do not understand,” said Shem.
“It is perverse,” Tvem explained. “But I am a lonely man. If I escaped early, what would be the fun in that? No, seriously, I have fancied that I loved Kahitv-Kshaff, and Heigal-Shim also. They were not tender, but their affections, however aggressive, somewhat enamoured me towards them. I cannot explain it, except to say that I have been very foolish in that regard.”
Ifunka glanced at Shem, whose eyes nearly popped out but, being male, they understood, at some level, what Tvem was saying. After an hour and a half, they had cleared the woods, evidently avoiding the pursuing clay men who, leaderless, had scattered throughout the forest.
“It will be a while before they can regroup. They will need to find a sister of their queen.”
“Where do the women go?” asked Ifunka.
“They either establish their own colonies or live with their mothers, hidden away, ensconced within the centre of their extensive underground habitations.”
When they had reached the safety of the lord’s home, and the gate was closed fast behind them, Tvem summoned the boys to that same grove of trees where they had learnt some deep truths not long before. He bade them both stand, at three paces distance from himself. He stood firm, his feet rooted in the ground, his shoulders loose, his arms by his sides and his face staring firmly at them both, but motionless, as if all the stillness of the world dwelt within his innermost being.
“Now,” he said. “Let us learn the first movement and, if ye are successful in learning it, I may teach you the second as well. Follow my example.”
Continuing to stand firm like a tree, Tvem pulled his right hand back and his left hand forward. Then, lifting his left hand as if pushing against an unseen foe he quickly thrust his right hand forward against the same foe and, with a swift movement, these same hands appeared to lift and toss the foe over his head and into the trees behind him. Ifunka and Shem could practically see this imagined enemy knocked dead or unconscious in one single movement. When he had finished, Tvem moved back to his original position of absolute stillness and tranquillity. Ifunka and Shem tried to emulate this movement but stumbled and, in Ifunka’s case, fell flat on his face. Tvem laughed and helped him up.
“It seems so easy yet I cannot do it,” Ifunka complained.
“With determination, combined with practice,” Tvem comforted him. “All things can be achieved. Even an apprentice bricklayer, when first given a brick, will struggle to lay it correctly. Try again. I shall show thee first.”
He again demonstrated the movement and Ifunka and Shem copied. They continued practicing the same move, again and again. Tvem moved their arms into position and helped them to root themselves the first several times. After forty minutes or so, they had succeeded in getting it exactly right.
“Good,” said Tvem. “Now, Shem, attack Ifunka and, Ifunka, throw Shem.”
Ifunka and Shem were shocked.
“We are monks, sir, we cannot attack one another,” Ifunka protested.
“Do as I order,” Tvem commanded. “If ye want to succeed in your quest.”
Ifunka tentatively grappled with Shem while the latter clumsily employed the first movement, until both of them tripped over each other and fell in a confused tumble. Tvem frowned.
“Is this how ye will defeat the demon-worshippers? Shall they cower before your aimless trepidation? Ye are no longer monks! Forget yourselves! Forget who ye were! Ye are warriors of the nine-fold path! Give up fear; abandon the limitations which have imprisoned you both. Fight, my students, fight!”
Charged with new-found enthusiasm instilled by Tvem’s invigorating words, Ifunka leapt to his feet, as did Shem, and they charged at one another ferociously, crying like primeval beasts in the most primitive age of Tremnkind. Shem fixed himself to the ground, positioned his legs, and performed the movement, reaching forward, grabbing Ifunka and hurling him over his back. Ifunka flew into a tree and was knocked unconscious. He awoke some minutes later, dazed and confused.
“What happened?”
“Shem, it seems, is naturally skilled at fighting. Get up—there is no time to lick wounds. Fight Shem and prove your mettle.”
Ifunka and Shem positioned themselves again and attacked. This time Ifunka stopped, performed the movement, and sent Shem tumbling over his shoulder.
“Kumi’s beard!” Tvem exclaimed. “Well done, Brother Ifunka. I think ye are both ready for the second movement, which is as follows: observe me closely.”
He again stood with feet firmly rooted in the ground, his poise still and severe. He breathed in deeply and then exhaled. Lifting his walking stick, which rested against a tree bole, he raised it in a defensive blocking position, with left arm raised above the right, and both arms extended in front of his face and breast, and then, in one swift motion, swung upwards with his right hand, knocking an imaginary foe in the face and, grasping the end with his left hand—such that he held the stick like a sword—he swung the weapon left and right, taking out another two imagined foes. Finally, grasping the stick like a spear, he then stabbed downwards at some prostrate enemy, cracking his skull.
“This move is more complicated,” he said when he had finished. “It shall take some practice.”
Tvem gave them each a walking stick, with which they practiced for several hours, until they had to break for the evening meal and kashammanaffob-prayers. After prayers, they resumed until Tvem was finally satisfied that they had each made a reasonable effort.
“Well done, brothers!” he said at last. “You are both now ready for the next stage of your quest. Sally forth and defeat the evil forces which oppose you.”
“But, with respect,” Ifunka pleaded. “It’s night here. We surely cannot go on the road now.”
“There is no time to lose,” Tvem remplied. “Night or day, the Great Spirit shall accompany you and the mimra shall surround you. I shall get your ffentbaffs and then you’d best be off. Ye shall not take the road quite yet but, rather, shall cross Lake Ffush, and then continue into the midmost heart of the forest. There ye shall find the enemies that ye seek. Ye are not now far off from them. Certainly more adventures await you but ye cannot fear what lies ahead. The mimra is ever present.”
When the ffentbaffs were saddled, the two boys packed up
their things on the beasts’ prodigious backs and mounted them. Tvem addressed them as they were about to leave.
“Brothers, ye have become like unto sons to me—I who have been here so long alone. My solitude has been broken only to return again afresh. Wherever ye now go, I shall be with you. Within the mimra, we are ever close, even as two blades of grass proceeding from the same soil. Our hearts are linked. I only urge you this: Fall not into temptation. Do not choose vengeance and retribution. Those belong to the Great Spirit alone! Choose the middle path, that of justice and, where it is warranted, mercy and forgiveness. That is the true and unchanging standard. Whatever dangers come your way, remain steadfast. Remember that the universe—the whole of existence—is within you and all power and all knowledge can flow through you if ye only become like unto a hollow reed, through which the mimra—that eternal energy—flows. Fare ye well, my friends, and, if the Great Spirit will, return unto me again.”
With sorrowful faces they turned away from this spiritual master and headed along the path leading to the shore of the lake. There their ffentbaffs climbed onto a long barge. Tvem untied the barge and they floated over the dark waters which glistened with the starlight from above. They dismounted from their beasts and took hold of two paddles, guiding and propelling the barge onwards to the opposite shore of the lake. As they did so, Ifunka thought he could discern the shape of some creature, of a large composition, moving under the barge and around it, stalking them like prey.
“Shem, what think you…” he said, but it was too late.
In one swift motion, they and the ffentbaffs were thrown into the cold waters of the lake and the barge was smashed in two. Two long, tawny eyes, malevolent and predatory, glimmered in the black night above them.
Ifunka was filled with adrenalin. He couldn’t think. His heart raced; cold, fresh water choked him. He struggled to stay afloat, arms flailing. Shem was gone. He couldn’t see him. Why? Where was he? Ifunka panicked. The eyes loomed over him, staring at him through the darkness. It moved slowly towards him—calculating, cold. Its face became visible—a long snout—with reptilian features. It was snake-like, predatory, yet cautious, as if it was unfamiliar with men, or at least careful in its dealings with them. Its face was now directly in front of Ifunka’s and he stopped moving, almost mesmerized by its penetrating gaze. It sniffed loudly, sucking in air. The creature had a large yet long head, conical ears, which stood erect, and a spiny crest in the middle of its forehead which continued down its neck. Its skin was scaly—a subtle blue which merged with the water as if intended as camouflage.
Green Monk of Tremn, Book I: An Epic Journey of Mystery and Adventure (Coins of Amon-Ra Saga 1) Page 22
