Ringwall`s Doom

by Awert, Wolf

  XVIII

  The night was agreeably dreamless, their sleep deep and restful. Something was evidently watching over them that night. Even Ramsker, who had stayed up on the surface, slept peacefully. This peace lasted even when the small group left the next morning to fight their way back through the forest. Nill dreaded the long march through the forest to the Waterways, but it appeared as though the plants gave way to them this time. They parted and where they could not, because it was so dense, there was a rustling sound and Dakh found a quick way around the blockade. The days and nights passed quickly and uneventfully, until finally, on the morning of the eighth day, they saw the sky again, and with it smelled the unusually fresh breeze.

  “We’re almost there,” the druid said as they left the canopy of the trees and crossed one last thicket of bushes to look upon a sloping, damp landscape. A small settlement lay before them. It was the strangest place Nill had ever seen.

  “The Ropers,” Dakh said. “They live by and off the sea.”

  Countless posts were stuck in the wet ground, and between them huts and houses swayed slightly in the wind. Some of the posts were in the water, others on land, but Nill got the impression that the border between land and sea had been disputed here for countless harvests without either side gaining an advantage.

  The Ropers drew threads from plant fibers and brought them together to make threads and, as their name suggested, twisted the threads to make ropes. The ropes were tied so tightly into all kinds of shaped that they were semi-rigid. Ropes and knots, therefore, made up the housing. The buildings swayed slightly, but did not seem unstable.

  “They live with their animals,” Dakh went on, but the two boys did not understand what he meant. Only when they drew closer did they see small crabs scuttling over the ropes, and greenish-black colonies of mussels growing on the posts and ropes.

  “And they’re solid?” Brolok wondered as he imagined a black, stormy sky and waves taller than ten men thrashing against the coast.

  “I’ve never heard of one of their ropes breaking. There have been a few incidents with the posts being pulled out, though.”

  “But the ropes have got to get old and rotten, right?” Nill asked.

  “Yes, but they can see it happening long before it’s critical, and so they just make a new house. Part of the fiber they use comes from the water. Long, band-shaped algae that wash up on shore; they’re the water’s daughters and last in the element that bore them for a very long time. Of course, there are silk threads used as well. They are wrapped tightly around the ropes – you see the gray sheen on it when the light hits it, right? That’s the seasilk. The cloth of the early kings. A forgotten art.” The druid shrugged. “So many things forgotten… so much lost.”

  Alert eyes followed the three wanderers. They belonged to the boys and the elders hanging in the ropes and sitting on the knots. The ropes were drier than the ground.

  Dakh walked directly towards the largest of the huts. Had it been built out of stone, Nill would not have hesitated to call it a true house. But…

  The druid climbed up a short rope ladder, gave himself a small shake and entered the densely-woven rope hut. Brolok tried to imitate him, but got stuck and hung helplessly in the swaying ladder until Dakh pulled him up.

  “Better for spiders than people,” Brolok grumbled, wishing he had made a more dignified entrance. Nill had an easier time of using the ladder, as he had seen where Brolok had failed.

  “It’s good to see you. Come in, come in.”

  As was so often the case, one of the old men asked them inside; the younger ones were all outdoors, where this old man had spent his best years as well. When Nill’s eyes got used to the darkness, he saw with a slight shock that the man was missing an arm and a leg. The leg was supported by a piece of carved wood ending in a sort of plate to stop it from slipping through the mesh of the ropework that made up the floor. He had replaced his missing forearm with a hook, presumably to hold tight to loops and knots.

  “Foss got me,” the man said, and Nill went dark red when he realized how long he had been staring. Now all I need is for Brolok to start waffling about some wounded warrior who kept fighting despite having all his limbs hacked off and winning for the king. I’d never show my face here again.

  The old man smiled as if he could read Nill’s mind.

  “What’s a Foss?” Nill asked, grateful for the opportunity to say at least something.

  Dakh laughed. “That’s a story for tonight. First, we should greet old friends.”

  He embraced the old man. “You’ve got better, Fosshunter. Last time I was here you were crawling more than walking.”

  “Aye. Been a long time since you were here. Had a lot of time to practice. We had to pump a whole lot of water out of you back then.”

  “Don’t remind me. I’m telling you, it wasn’t just the mud pulling me under.”

  “Sure,” the old man grinned. “That’s what they all say when they can’t handle the morass.”

  “He’s a druid!” Brolok was outraged. Druids did not simply sink in the mud.

  Dakh gave a sheepish smile. “Well, the spot where I got stuck was a bit resistant to the magic of the elements.”

  “Borderlands?” asked Nill swiftly.

  “Sort of. Not quite, but pretty far out there,” the old druid admitted. “I got a little lost. I don’t want that to happen again, which is why I came here.” He turned back to the man he called Fosshunter. “We need a guide.”

  “Tell me all about it later, right now is time for supper. Mussel soup I think, and maybe some crab meat, algae paste and some waterdragon scales.”

  “Scales?” Nill repeated.

  “It’s a big green plant that keeps its thick leaves above the water’s surface. You can put a child on one of those leaves and it won’t get wet. Juicy, tasteless and tough to chew.” Dakh flashed a challenging grin at his friend.

  “Juicy, with an exquisite flavor and only tough for someone who’s spent his life wasting his teeth on nuts and roots.”

  The banter went back and forth for quite a while, reaching the sort of ribaldry only seen among people who were indeed oldest friends, who had shared more than just a sparse meal and a hard bed. Nill had never seen Dakh so happy. It was as though he had shaken off the weight of countless winters.

  Supper was, as in most other places, a social affair; strangers were welcome and old friends all the more so.

  Brolok, who missed the familiar smell of ore, had difficulty with his meal. Always the constant tug and push of the water. No excitement, but no calm either. Everything swayed and flowed and waved back and forth. It was so different to glinting ore, its veins anchored in the solid stone where everything stood still, calm, dependable and unchanging. He chewed unhappily on his mussels and tried to think of something to say that would not betray his queasiness.

  “Seasilk,” he said. “What is it?”

  “Our wives spin it,” one of the men explained. “We get it from the mussels, from the gray stuff they stick themselves to surfaces with. We scrape ‘em off, wash ‘em and spin it into threads we can weave into clothing. They used to be very valuable, because they mirror the light of the morning mists glowing in the early sunlight. These days, people prefer bright colors.”

  “They still wear your clothes at court in the Waterways. It’s the traditional color of princesses until they marry,” Dakh added.

  “Yes, some places in Pentamuria still value our skills. The water feeds us and gives us all the wonderful things we can trade against things we can’t get from the sea, even if that’s not much.”

  Nill had to laugh. Something about the situation – sitting out here in the middle of nowhere, miles away from the nearest settlement, yet the people here thought of their home as the center of existence – just tickled him.

  “I think Brolok prefers Metal,” he said to pass off his laugh.

  Fosshunter joined in. “Your friend should be proud of his element, because Water came d
irectly from Metal. The old world sweated it out. New Water is constantly being formed, but we don’t notice it anymore. These days we find the Metal’s Water all over the place – in the clouds, the mist, the rivers and in the ground, and mostly in animals and plants. But it came from the Metal. Water is so strong because it’s the wellspring of life.

  “But Water is wary of the Earth, because Earth absorbs it and makes it disappear. Water is strongest where the opposite is true: where it covers the Earth completely. Like here. This is where Foss made its home, the head of the sea serpent family, guardian of the element.” He lowered his voice dramatically. “They say, Foss is a magical being, big as a dragon – others say it is a dragon, but in the water. But water dragons don’t exist. When Foss dies, the next oldest serpent takes its place as the new Foss. Foss has no gender. If you want to know what it used to be, you’d have to take a look at its younger siblings.”

  “And what do you call the stuff you pick up in the water?” Dakh smirked.

  The old man squinted. “Foss, too. All sea serpents are Foss to us, the big and the small. In its honor. But there is only one Foss.”

  “Does the name mean anything?” Brolok asked brightly. He wondered whether Fosshunter was a real name or a title.

  “Of course it does. Means ‘falling water.’ If you ever get a chance to see one of the truly great serpents rise up from the sea, the water crashing down from it, you’ll know the awesome power of the beasts.”

  The evening passed quickly, full of tales of Foss and its children and the brave warriors of water who went out to sea to challenge them. Not all stories might be true, and not every Roper was born a hero, but who really cared about the truth in such legends? As long as the story was good, Nill did not mind.

  The next morning they departed again, but this time they had a guide.

  “We’re looking for a sorcerer and his wife. They’re supposed to live somewhere in the Waterways.”

  “The realm of Water is vast. Tales and rumors reach us all the time, but we never bother to remember them. Firewards from here is the great forest you came from, metalwards is the Borderlands no one dares to enter. Behind us lies the Water. We must go toward Earth and cross the great marsh until we reach solid ground, then take a route somewhere between Metal and Water. That way we can avoid the Borderlands. If the sorcerer is hiding in the Waterways, he’ll be in the swamp.”

  “That is why I asked for your help. Crossing the swamp isn’t easy.”

  “There is only one path from our village back to solid ground. It’s simple to find.”

  “If you know where to find it,” Dakh laughed.

  “I’ll take you only as far as solid ground. Then I have to return. My only advice is this: avoid the mist. When the white father appears, take the opportunity to rest until he leaves. Don’t try and wander through the mist.”

  “I don’t know if we have that kind of time.”

  “You’ll have all the time in the world to consider the foolishness of your actions when you’re stuck in the moor. Come now.”

  Nill felt deeply uneasy in this part of the Waterways. Almost as bad as Ramsker, whose hooves were adapted to rock and hard earth, but here he sank into the mud with every step. His usual foul temper was even more pronounced now that his eyes had a doleful look to them.

  Nill’s head was in constant motion. He listened and checked the wind and tried to understand the strange, wet smells. The forest was hiding behind a wall of fog now and seemed to have become no more than a memory. To their right extended, far in the distance, the Borderlands which Nill felt more because of its strange magic than its shape.

  They traveled all day and half the night until they finally reached a low hill of soggy earth that was barely hard enough to stand on properly and bore a cluster of bushes.

  “We will rest here tonight. I’m sure you’d love to help, venerable druid,” their guide said.

  Dakh nodded and began to tell the twigs of the bushes to cling to each other. Nill hurried over to the next hill and imitated Dakh. Only Brolok stood around listlessly; talking to plants was as pointless to him as talking to his supper. It was in rare moments like these that his being a half-arcanist made him feel like a useless idiot.

  Dakh managed to weave a comfortable hammock for two people at once. Nill had no such confidence and decided to split his bed into two more solid pieces. His back would be aching in the morning, but at least he would stay elevated.

  “Brolok, would you mind finding somewhere safe to keep our things? One of the stronger bushes that doesn’t bend when you hang something on it or something.”

  Brolok nodded, glad to do something. Yet his ill mood did not lighten. Dakh, too, had lost some of the happiness he had shown back in the village. Only their guide seemed unfazed.

  The morning sun woke the travelers. Or rather, what little of the sun made it through the mist woken them, a weak dawnlight that seemed to come from everywhere and was not even distinct enough to make out a direction.

  “I return to my people,” their guide announced. “The mists will lift soon, so Foss wills it. If you take the road metalwards” – he pointed in a direction that looked utterly indiscernible from any other direction – “you’ll have true solid earth under your feet again soon. They even have fields there. Farewell!”

  Before anyone could return the farewell, let alone thank him, he had already vanished in the light gray vapor.

  “We should leave at once,” Dakh said. “I’ve a feeling we won’t be alone for long.”

  “Are we being followed?” Brolok asked.

  “I don’t know and I’d rather not find out. I feel something fireward from here, but this cursed mist is swallowing not just the light but any auras as well. We ought to go.”

  They ate their breakfast as they walked. Their drink consisted of what little fog had landed on the moist bread and the drops that ran down their brows and noses.

  “Water everywhere, but it’s too filthy to drink,” Nill grumbled. He, like the others, was saving the clean water.

  Dakh was now leading. Again and again he stopped to listen.

  “Someone is behind us. I don’t know who it is. And there’s something ahead of us. It’s probably best if we don’t take the direct route of Metal but take a detour instead. I don’t want to meet anyone.”

  The mists grew thicker and thicker around them. Nill’s vision was limited to a few footsteps. It happens. Sight comes and goes, he tried to soothe himself. Like in the night.

  It was nothing like the night at all. The night is still and silent, but the mists are always swirling. It floats past without offering help. The movement is everywhere, wherever you look, and yet you see nothing. But the worst, by far, was the sound. The mist swallows the sounds only to spit them out somewhere else. A sudden crack is eaten up and goes away too quickly, and distant noises appear without warning. Even your own voice is flat, toneless and lifeless.

  Nill heard the grunting of basking moorhogs on all sides, and a dull, sad note reverberated through the air. Dakh stopped abruptly.

  “Shell horns! Whoever is behind us has stopped caring whether they’re hidden or not.”

  Brolok thought he heard fragments of speech, but the sounds were gone as soon as they’d come.

  “Why would anyone be after us?” he asked. “We were in the forest for at least a fortnight. No one knew we were there. No one bothered us at the Ropers. Why would someone suspect us here in the Waterways?”

  Nill gave a wry smile. “Brolok, have you forgotten the scene we made in Fugman’s Refuge?”

  “Nill, use your head. If they were coming from Fugman’s Refuge, they would have had to come from Metal World, ride firewards past the Oas, wait until we left the forest – without knowing we were there at all – and then circle around to end up behind us.” Brolok drew tactical plans and movements in the air with his hands for Nill to see the foolishness of his assumption. “Dakh. Dakh, say something.”

  “I don’t know what t
o say,” the old druid said. “All I know is that there are people behind us. More than a few. I don’t know their intent. Don’t even know if they know we exist. It might all be an odd coincidence. But I don’t believe in coincidences. They’re coming from Wood. Let us move further inland, to dry soil. Let us see if they change their course or stay on it. I do not want to meet anyone out here in the swamp.”

  With solid ground under their feet the walking was far less arduous, even though they had to stop time and again to make sure they were not going in circles.

  “The horns have stopped. But now, just behind us, firewards, there’s someone else. Can you hear it?”

  Brolok and Nill strained their ears in the silence. “Nothing,” Brolok said – but suddenly, there was something. A regular splashing sound was heard, and then went away. “Wait – riders. Riders behind us. As long as the hooves sink into the mud, they don’t make a sound, but when there’s more water than earth they’re loud and clear.”

  “If there’s some important place ahead of us,” Nill remarked, “then it might be fully possible for these groups to all have the same goal. After all, we’re moving metalwards, and waterwards only leads to the Borderlands, where no one wants to go.”

  “You might be right, Nill, but I’m afraid the goal they have in common is us, and I don’t want to wait around and be proven right,” Brolok said.

  “Silence!” the druid hissed.

  The horns remained quiet, the riders kept their distance; and yet, the threat seemed to loom ever closer. Dakh looked worried.

  “A small troop is coming from Earth and another from Metal. The second is slower. No riders, but they’re casting powerful magical shadows. Something bad is happening. We will try and lose them in the swamp.”

  *

  The sun was still considering whether it wanted to rise or not when a tall figure slowly got up from its crouching position to which, with each nightly breath, it had been driven by the search for safety and security. With quite some effort, the man blindly felt his way towards the door of his hut that was hidden by the grassy turf. He pushed the crooked door open and the cold dampness of the early morning air hit him like a mace to the face. It was always cold here where the Waterways approached Metal World. Sometimes, the veil of mist would not lift for days at a time. Then the only thing to aid a wanderer was the few gurgles of running water. It only got bright when the mists went back into the sky to form clouds, and even then the yellowish gray of twilight overpowered all other colors.