Chimera
( Earth saga.Chimera Duology - 7 )
Joseph Robert Lewis
Joseph Robert Lewis
Chimera
Book One
The Dragon and the Lotus
Chapter 1
The Lotus Cave
1
A light rain fell on the forest, the tiny droplets pattering softly on the leaves far overhead. The drips collected in the grooves of the leaves and the wrinkles in the bark, worming their way down until they grew too large and too heavy, and they fell again, plummeting to the soft earth to land with heavy plops in the muddy puddles. Asha paused beside a tree to look up at the bright slivers and patches of the sky between the branches where the sun was burning brightly beyond the clouds, its light obscured by the thunderheads rumbling overhead.
Wet forest sounds rose and fell all around her. The applause of the falling water, the shaking of the leaves and slender branches, the distant cracking and keening of trees tearing free from the muddy earth and toppling over into their unsuspecting brothers and sisters.
It had been raining for three days. Sometimes more, sometimes less. In the middle of the day with the sun high overhead, Asha felt the warmth creeping back into the soil and the air, and the hours of walking along the narrow dirt path were almost pleasant. Her long black hair clung to her neck and face and back, and cold trickles of water snaked down her skin under her clothes, but she didn’t mind. Not during the day.
The nights were worse. When the sky grew too dark or her feet grew too sore, she would climb a small tree, sit on a sturdy branch, and tie her waist to the trunk. If she was lucky, she would fall asleep quickly and awaken at dawn with only a slight pain in her back and neck. If she wasn’t so fortunate she would sit awake on the branch, listening to the rain and shivering. She sometimes wrapped herself in a heavy wool blanket kept dry by her well-oiled bag, hoping that it would keep her warm long enough to fall asleep before it too was completely soaked.
But there was more to hear than just the rain. Huge green vines constricted around the trees and swung through the empty air between them. Brilliant white and yellow flowers huddled in small groups, no doubt where the sun had fallen through the canopy before the rains came. Thick bushes squatted everywhere, and huge ferns reached out their soft fronds to touch her legs and arms as she passed. Her left ear heard none of these things, but her right ear caught the strains of thousands of roots and stalks drinking and growing. They sounded like ropes twisting and bansuri flutes playing long, low notes on the wind.
Within the flora rustled smaller and faster creatures. Ants streamed through the undergrowth, heedless of the water washing away their scent trails. Earthworms wriggled in the muddy puddles in the path. High overhead, a dozen different monkey voices hooted and screamed while the birds huddled in their nests, fluttering their feathers and flapping their wings to shake off the relentless rain. Bright green lizards and yellow frogs skittered over the rocks and up the trees, searching for grubs and flies. At first the rain had driven them all into their homes, but hunger had driven them out again and only a truly brutal torrent would keep them from their hunts now.
Asha trudged up the slippery track to a low rise and looked down on a creek winding across the forest floor, and a short distance farther down she saw the village beside the water.
“Finally.”
The village was smaller than she had expected, maybe three dozen houses all on stilts several feet above the ground. The stilts themselves were logs as thick as Asha’s arm was long, and at least one of the stilts supporting each house was not a log at all but a living tree still rooted to the earth and spreading its leafy branches above the roof. A fleet of battered canoes and rafts drifted on the swollen creek, each one tied to the supports of a different house. Farther back from the water and high above the muddy flood line stood a row of small huts on the grassy earth sheltered by several large stones looming up from the ground on three sides.
Upstream she found three fallen trees, one old and the other two so young that there was still mud clinging to their tangled roots. Asha crossed over the largest log and then followed the creek down to the village. There were no signs of life on the ground, not even footprints in the mud. But above her she saw flickering candlelight and thin traces of smoke rising from the stilt-houses.
She cleared her throat. “Hello!”
After a moment an old man emerged from the house on her left. “Hello to you.”
“I’m looking for someone named Kishan,” she said. “I was told he lives here.”
“He does, up there.” The old man pointed to the row of huts on the earthen ledge in the lee of the rocks above the creek. “Second one from the left.”
“Thanks.”
She climbed the slope and knocked on the doorframe of the second house. “Hello? Kishan?”
A woman pulled back the leaf curtain. “Kishan is my son. Who are you?”
“My name’s Asha. I’m an herbalist from up north. I was passing through a town a few days ago when I heard about a very unusual animal in this village. So I thought I would come see for myself.” She glanced over the woman’s shoulder at the hand-woven rugs, the crooked candles, and the rusted iron pot sitting on the red coals in the corner. “Is this the right village?”
“You came to see Jagdish!” A little boy leapt onto the woman’s back. He grinned as he kicked his feet in the air. “Come see!”
“Oh, that.” The mother nodded and pushed her hair behind her ear as the boy slid back down to the floor. “The squirrel. I suppose you can see it. Come inside.”
“Thanks.” Asha ducked inside the hut and knelt down on the rough rug. With the rain drumming on the roof, the sighing of the forest abruptly vanished and all she could hear was the pat-pat-pat of the heavy drops on the woven leaves above her head.
The boy Kishan sat in the corner with a ball of fur in his hands. “Here he is. Jagdish! I found him all alone in the forest and started feeding him myself. He’s the biggest, strongest, smartest squirrel in the world!”
Asha leaned forward to inspect the animal, and frowned. “This isn’t a squirrel, Kishan. It’s a baby mongoose. I’m surprised you’ve never seen them before. They’re pretty common.”
“Really? What’s a mongoose?” The boy wore a very serious face as he studied his pet.
Asha leaned back. “It’s what you’re holding. He’ll get bigger soon.”
“Bigger?” The mother shook her head. “Kishan, throw that thing out this minute.”
“Actually, a mongoose can be a very useful thing to have around.”
“I don’t care.” She coughed. “I want it out of my home.”
The boy pouted but did not argue. He stood and moved toward the door with Jagdish cradled in his arm.
“If you don’t mind, I’ll take him off your hands,” Asha said.
The boy smiled and thrust the animal at her. “You’ll take good care of him, won’t you?”
“Sure I will. After all, he’s used to being taken care of, isn’t he?” Asha peered into the mongoose’s eyes and poked at his teeth. “He’s very healthy. You did a good job raising him.”
Kishan plopped back into his seat in the corner, still smiling. “Do you know a lot about animals?”
“More than most,” Asha said. “I study them. Plants, too. I spend most of my time searching for things to make new medicines.”
“Have you ever seen an elephant?”
“Sure.”
“What about a tiger?”
“Lots.”
The boy chewed his lip. “What about a lotus demon?”
Before Asha could answer, the boy’s mother said, “Kishan!”
“Sorry.” The boy dropped his gaze to the floor.
Asha turned to the mother. “What did he mean? What’s a lotus demon?”
“It’s just a story.” She coughed again.
“You know, I think have something for your throat here. A little tea.” Asha dug into her bag and glanced toward the leaf curtain between them and the outside world where the rain was beginning to fall faster and harder. “And I think I have time for a story.”
The woman looked back at the door as a fresh peal of thunder rolled across the sky. “I suppose you do.”
2
“Two hundred years ago, they say the village was much larger.” The mother set the water to boil for the tea. “More than a hundred houses stood on the banks of the river, and the river itself flowed deep and clear, full of fish and prawns. The river was so bountiful that the men often carried baskets of their catches across the forest to sell to other villages. In those days, there were deep pools upstream and downstream, and they helped to control the swelling of the river during the rainy season and the houses by the water stood on much taller stilts. And every year as winter ended, a village elder would go to the spring at the head of the river to offer the mountain spirit a goat in thanks for its bounty.
“But then, one summer, the river shrank to a mere trickle and most of the fish and prawns disappeared. Animals stopped drinking from the river, and sometimes the people would get sick from drinking the water themselves. After several months of this, a few men went up into the forest to see what had happened to the river. Many days later, one of the men returned. His arm was broken and his leg was swollen with poison.
“He said the men had found the mountain bursting with life. Enormous trees towered overhead. Broad ferns bent so low that they carpeted the ground. And everywhere they looked they saw white lotus blossoms. They followed the stream up the mountain to a cave, lit their torches, and went inside. After that, the man couldn’t say exactly what happened. They lost their torches one by one, and in the darkness something attacked them. He heard their screams, and the crunching of their bones, and the slithering of a creature moving along the floor and walls. The demon bit his leg and hurled him to the ground, breaking his arm, but he managed to escape and stumble back down the mountain and through the forest to the village.
“A few hours later, that man died.” The mother turned to inspect the bubbles in the kettle.
Asha nodded. “But then something happened to his body, didn’t it?”
“Yes. It was raining too hard to cremate him then, so they buried his body at the top of a steep bank overlooking the river, but soon all the plants and trees nearby began to wither and die. The villagers dug up the body and found it bloated and rotting far faster than it should have, crumbling and falling apart, with little green shoots growing up through his leg where the demon bit him. So they built a pyre far back in the woods, sheltered from the rain, and burned the body there, and then they heaped earth and stones on the ashes. After that, the poison seemed to disappear from the earth and the plants and trees recovered, and for a brief season there were lotus blossoms in the woods, far from the water.
“But the river was still only a stream, and without the fish many of the villagers began to move away. Some went down the river, but most cut across the forest. They said they would never go near these waters again. The few who stayed in the village lived off the land, struggling to find fruit or hunt for frogs and birds. Those were lean years.
“Several years later, the story of the demon in the cave had spread as the people moved out and settled their families in other villages. All manners of travelers, soldiers, and priests began passing through the village to see the demon for themselves. Some of these people stayed in the village for a day or two, visited the survivor’s two grave sites, and then left. Others climbed the mountain in search of the cave. None of them returned.” She poured the steaming water over the crushed leaves and the aroma of the steeping tea filled the hut.
Asha stroked the mongoose in her lap. His thick fur was warm and soft, and he nestled against her, curling up tightly on her belly. “And this was all two hundred years ago?”
“Nearly two hundred, so they say. After a while, the travelers stopped coming. But then, about ten years after they burned the survivor’s body, a young woman came to the village. She was a nun from Kolkata. She wore a saffron robe, and despite her shaven head, she was very beautiful. At least, that’s how the story is told,” the mother said. “Women are always beautiful in stories.”
“Of course they are.” Asha smiled. “Most stories are told by men.”
The mother did not smile back. “The nun didn’t stay long in the village. She visited the two graves and then she went up the river.”
“Let me guess. She didn’t come back either?”
“No, she didn’t. But a few weeks later when the monsoons came, the river swelled and rose. The villagers began catching fish and prawns again, not as large as before but enough to sustain them. There was no more talk of leaving and the village has been here ever since just as you see it now.”
“I see.” Asha stared through the narrow gaps in the leaf curtain at the dark rain rushing down through the forest outside. “I’d like to stay here tonight, if that’s all right. I want to see the two graves before I leave in the morning. I think the rain will stop before sunrise.”
The mother sipped her tea. “How do you know?”
Asha watched the rain fall outside. “It sounds like it will stop soon.”
The next morning the sun rose over a silent forest and Asha stepped out of the hut to see the early morning light streaming through the leaves overhead to paint the earth in brilliant greens and rich browns. Water still dripped and pattered from the branches and fronds, but the all-consuming shushing of the falling rain was gone. Asha could hear the river gurgling around stones and roots, and she heard the frogs and lizards dashing through the undergrowth along its banks. Above her, the monkeys leapt and chattered, and the birds fluttered and flitted from branch to branch. The little mongoose called Jagdish wrapped itself around the back of Asha’s neck, huddled within the veil of her unbound hair, warming her skin. “It’s nice to be able to hear myself think again,” she said.
Kishan stepped out beside her, his bare feet slapping on the soft mud. “You want to see the graves, right? I’ll show you.”
They walked upstream, picking their way around the large stones at the water’s edge. The rocks were warm and smooth underfoot. Just as the village passed out of sight behind them, they came to a bend in the river and Kishan led the way up the bank to a grassy bluff overlooking the rippling waters.
“Here.” He pointed to a depression in the shadow of an old twisted tree. “This is where they buried him the first time.”
Asha knelt and dragged her fingertips across the soft soil, listening. The grass was sparse and yellow, the tree roots dry and frail. “Whatever happened here, it’s gone now. Everything’s gone now. Even the worms.”
Kishan shrugged and led her east away from the river. They descended a gentle slope and soon came to a clearing where several large flat rocks sat in a circle of tall grass.
“The pyre?” Asha paced across the rocks.
Kishan nodded. “They say it burned from dusk to dawn. And it stank.”
“Did it now?” she said softly. A monkey cried out in the distance and a second one answered. A warm breeze played through the leafy canopy and for a few moments all the trees in the forest sighed and whispered their secrets to one another. Jagdish shivered on her shoulder and clutched the folds of her sari in his claws.
Kishan leaned back against a green sapling that bowed under his weight. “So where will you go now? Back to the city?”
She wondered which city he meant. “Actually, I think I’ll wander up the river a bit farther and see what else there is to see.”
“You’re going to the cave, aren’t you?” He kicked a pebble with his toe.
“Well, I did come all this way to see a rare creature. I don’t mind going a little fa
rther to find one.”
“You won’t see the demon. I heard there was a rockslide years ago. The cave is blocked. And besides, it would anger the mountain spirit. It might dry up the river again.”
Asha nodded. She reached into the small pouch on her belt and brought out a small sliver of ginger root, which she poked into the corner of her mouth. “Well, if I see any spirits, I’ll be sure to be very polite to them.” She winked at him, and he frowned at her.
3
For two days she hiked upstream following the winding river higher and higher into the forest hills. And for two days she only saw and heard more of the same forest all around her. The same fish and frogs in the water, the same birds and monkeys in the canopy. As the earth dried out, more subtle fragrances began to drift on the breeze. She could taste the sweet nectar of the flowers and the savory oils in the nuts as she walked beside the river.
On the third day she reached the foot of the mountain. Looking up, she could trace the path of the river tumbling down over the rocks from pool to pool, half-hidden by the trees.
The trees.
“Maybe there are spirits here after all.”
The trees were like none she had ever seen before. She guessed that most were as thick as she was tall. As she stood there in the early morning light marveling at the towering trunks, she saw that there were no seedlings, no saplings, no small trees of any kind. Only giants stood on the mountain, pillars fit to hold up the heavens themselves.
Rough brown bark covered the trunks, wrinkled and pitted and folded so deep that she could slip her entire hand into the grooves of it all the way to her wrist. But looking up, it was not the brown of the trunks that colored the mountain wood but the dark green of the vines. The vines wound around and over every branch and limb and hung in countless slack arcs between them overhead. She saw no beginnings or endings to them at all, just the curving loops and lines and bands everywhere she looked.
Chimera esd-7 Page 1
