These were his final words of wisdom. But I hardly heard them. All I could hear was Raven’s warning, that night before we reached Sirol.
“Run away, Da-Ren. Run away.”
LXXIV.
One Day of Bliss
Island of the Holy Monastery, Thirty-Sixth Spring,
According to the Monk Eusebius
“This is my sole advice, Eusebius. Run away from this island. Or it will become your tomb,” Da-Ren said to me.
“This is the only home I know, that of God.”
“Your god surely isn’t here. Neither yours nor mine. If you don’t leave, you won’t find him.”
It was the third year of manuscript revision, and the fourth after his arrival on the island. Da-Ren’s story had invaded my mind and pushed everything else back to a little insignificant corner. They were months—many harsh winter nights—when we made little progress, and yet I could feel the story, coiling and waiting in a corner of my cell, like a resting snake that was bound to wake again. And then other months, usually in springtime when the story was unstoppable, rising like dark growing ivy, expanding tendrils which I never imagined.
But Da-Ren’s advice about my own life was of little use to me.
Where could I go? Abandon God? Him? The story?
“You should go to Thalassopolis, see the palaces, the bazaar, the church,” he said. “Then head for Kar-Tioo, sleep and wake up inside the Forest. Go everywhere. Sail the sea, cross the desert. Embrace people, smell them, lick them, fuck them, and if it is your fate even kill someone. Get stabbed, not very deeply, enough to feel you’re dying and then you can rejoice in being alive. Fall in love, fall down, fall apart, despair in your greatest dream, fail in your own myth. Then you will find your gods when you are finally certain that they don’t exist.”
I was getting upset because this man who didn’t even know how to read and had no faith had experienced the entire world. I had seen it only through papyri. I didn’t consider his words blasphemy anymore. After three years, the doubt had poisoned even me. Did the Almighty actually rule over the whole existence? There were places like Sirol that God didn’t even care for. As for the barbarian, I knew now that the Truth of the Sacred Texts would not affect him; it had been obliterated by the truth of his life.
We had sworn that this would be the last time we rewrote his story. It was a convenient agreement since we had already spent all of Da-Ren’s and Baagh’s gold and had no more coin for supplies. The story had completed its course, coiled around itself and started to eat its own tail like the ancient ouroboros. Yes, we had left some falsehoods in the manuscript. Yes, a great scholar with better command of the written language would find weaknesses. And so it should remain at the end. Unlike God, man is imperfect and so are his stories.
“I can’t remember anything else to tell you, Eusebius. If there was something more to write about the Blacksmith’s anvil or if a Chief’s stirrups were enameled with silver after the campaign but not before, those things are of no significance.”
Most of all we tried to erase. To erase from the story the aphorisms and glorifications that jumbled together in his mind and on my papyri, the ones that invaded his real story and transformed it into a different myth each night. A more convenient myth which would allow us both to sleep. Sometimes we were successful, but most often we were not. We would fail unknowingly.
“We must preserve only the deeds on papyrus, Eusebius. The events. Not the feelings, we must kill those. Kill all the elaborate verbs too, they confuse and twist the truth. Keep just the deeds, the nouns. Iron, soil, and salt. Blade, breasts, eyes, the wind. Keep those. Fear, hope, excitement, shame, all these feelings of the mind have no substance. They change every night, with every breath even. They are false. Remove them all from the story. Erase the opinions, paint the images.”
“And the dreams? Aren’t they feelings? Erase them?”
Da-Ren scowled and pushed his chair closer to me, to make his words heard clearly.
“The dreams? No, no. The dreams we keep. They are the opposite of feelings. They are the essence left after the boil, the soul after the life, the trophy after the battle, what remains when darkness embraces us. Twenty winters pass, and I still remember some dreams clearly. The dreams are real.”
I had ordered and paid for a large chest made of cedar that took at least two strong men to carry. It was coated inside with wax and lined with soft cloth. We placed the codices in there to protect them from the damp. Each codex contained three or more chapters of Da-Ren’s story and had been painted with the smallest possible letters. It was a warm and gentle spring afternoon when we scribed what I thought then to be the last word of the manuscript. A few weeks later, God would grace us with an unlikely miracle at a time when even I was losing faith. A naval trireme brought Baagh and two more monks I’d never met before to the Castlemonastery.
“So, Evagus returns after three years, Da-Ren. The Lord is magnanimous!”
“And he brought two powerful Sorcerers…”
I wasn’t sure if this was sarcasm or desperation or something I still hadn’t uncovered. Da-Ren mocked all witches and sorcerers. He hated them. Why did he place faith on some monks that he’d never even seen before? I asked him exactly that.
“Because from all the sorceries I’ve ever heard, theirs is the only one that I would give my life to be true.”
The time had come for us to tell his story to the wise men so that they would listen and grant him a miracle. Eternal life. Defeating death.
On that spring afternoon, after we completed the scribing, Da-Ren ran outside and mounted the horse he’d bought from the peasants. He liked to ride on the hills before sunset. I hurried behind him following on a donkey. When we stopped to rest and drink from a spring, I spotted an osprey preying above our heads, descending toward the sea. I asked Da-Ren:
“And the Drakon?”
“A myth. A name. A legend.”
“Do you mean that he doesn’t exist? Your story ended, and the Drakon never appeared.”
“Didn’t he? Were you expecting me to wake up one day with scaled skin, breathe fire from the nostrils and belch poison from a cloven tongue?”
“I am glad you didn’t. Drakons are cursed creatures. In your tribe and mine.”
We stopped at a crossroads of two rocky paths, one leading to the north that he usually preferred and the other to the western cliffs of the island. Da-Ren stooped over the horse’s ear as if he were asking for advice. Having lived his whole life with them, he trusted horses more than anyone.
“The Drakon does not deserve your hatred,” he said.
“Monks and priests will curse you if you claim to be the demonic snake.”
“What do you think the Drakon is, Eusebius?”
“The opposite of God. He who dwells in the darkness and sucks the life out of everything.”
“Yes, the Drakon does have power, enough to annihilate the entire Tribe. That would make me one. You are right about that.”
Even on the barren slopes of Hieros Island spring had arrived; the wind blowing gently over a gossamer veil of color and scents. Da-Ren had brought a wineskin with him to celebrate the writing of the last word. His story had fallen on me like an ancient curse, but I still had one question. I was confident that I knew everything else.
“Were you born a Drakon, Da-Ren?”
His eyes followed the osprey as it dove toward the blue sea to prey.
“That’s what I was told as a child.” He ran his fingers through his hair and briefly scratched the ninestar mark that Sah-Ouna had read from the beginning. “But they lied, Eusebius. You become a Drakon. When you become enchanted, the metamorphosis begins, and you turn into a Drakon to protect it.”
“Protect what?”
“The treasure.”
“You never spoke to me of treasure and gold before.”
“Nor will I ever.”
We continued to the path that swerved west. It ended at a small church built with white-wash
ed walls above the cape. It was a temple used mostly by the peasants.
“Why do you paint your churches white, Eusebius?”
“To signify purity.”
Apart from the small door and the two windows left and right of it the church was a pure white on the outside, even its small dome and the cross at its top.
“Purity? White is the snow-covered corpses of the weak, the rain-washed bones, the slobber of the devouring sea, white is the dead skin,” said Da-Ren.
“We paint them white, so the sun doesn’t bake the faithful in the summer.”
“That makes more sense.”
“But makes for a boring story.”
In the daisy-covered forecourt, two monks were changing back to their day clothes. They were tasked to paint the hagiographies on the cedar panels and while working they had to wear special clean robes to keep any filth of earth or mind from entering their work. A young boy, thin and dark-skinned from the sun, was arranging the pails of honey, mastic gum, vinegar, and resin that they used to mix into the color on the cart. Da-Ren entered the church, not even making the sign of the cross. I waved at the surprised monks with lowered eyes and followed behind him.
“You, a worshipper of gods should go to Thalassopolis, Eusebius. Even if it means paying for it with your own life,” Da-Ren said again. Under the candlelight, he was looking at the solemn saintly faces with the long features that remained unfinished on the temples before the altar. The hagiographies had to be completed in time for the Pentecost.
“I will go. Someday.”
“Why do you worship this god, Eusebius? After all, you’ve heard. Look at him watching us from the dome. He has come all the way down here from the sky, but will he ever actually take a few more steps and hold your hand or mine? Actually help you? Those six-winged angels who praise him. Will they help the children? Enaka, who waits for me up in the Sky to sprinkle my soul like stardust on a clear night? Will she? Why should I worship her? The gods leave us to suffer until death, praying through our bloodied teeth for the afterlife.”
“Faith will bring forgiveness and slay the Drakon inside of you,” I said.
The twilight was fading, and the stardust began to glow as we exited the church.
“I have yet to find forgiveness, Eusebius. I still haven’t managed to forgive any of your gods or mine.”
“Don’t say such words, Da-Ren. The punishment of the unbeliever is eternal.”
“You are mistaken. I am a believer.”
“You just now said—”
“I said that I don’t obey, I don’t worship and I don’t forgive, not that I don’t believe. You don’t understand, Eusebius. I believe in the gods. Even more than you. Whether they live up in the sky or only in the skull.”
“Then? How dare you?”
“But I do not like their plans. The fate they have chosen for me. I believe them, but I no longer obey them.”
“And so you became a Drakon.”
“Without wings or fire.”
“What made you a Drakon, Da-Ren? What treasure were you protecting?”
The passion of romantic love was still an ideal I couldn’t fathom.
“There was only one treasure, Eusebius. Only one I found after all my journeys and the adventures.”
“What was that?”
“Only one worth living for.”
“One woman?”
“One day. One day of bliss.”
LXXV.
Quince Trees
Twenty-Fourth Winter. “Firstblade”
I have walked on this scorching desert without a droplet of hope for too long. I have endured the icy wind for too many angry nights without the warm softness of a kiss. And now that I made it to the wasteland’s end what awaits me? Eternal freedom? Another trial? One day of bliss?
It is neither the seasons nor the torments of the body that weigh heavily upon me. The memory of the comrades and the enemies, who have turned to ashes and bones, brings me to my knees. Every night I shut my eyes to forget, but so many faces pass in front of me. Warriors, slaves, demons and innocent. They don’t want to leave. They huddle and await next to my feet. Most of them giggle a sinister laughter, waiting impatiently for me to join them. A few try to warn me. One of them, a twelve-wintered girl, sings a song to lull me to sleep. She is the first one who ever loved me, the first I ever loved, and her memory lives eternal.
Men always ask themselves: ‘What would I do if I were the One?’ The Khun, the King of all there is. The One who rules over man, horse, land, and even has the magic to command the sun, the sky, and the clouds. It seems a useless question because nobody will ever be that One, yet its answer reveals so much about the true heart of a man. It uncovers vengeful ghosts, evil wraiths, and ravenous bloodsuckers hiding under the cold skin of those we think as common folk, heroes, or saviors. Yet men always ask themselves and so do I.
This is what I’d do. I’d stop the world. I would unleash rivers of icy slime upon all the war camps and the cities and freeze everyone on sight. To stand still like the faces of the waxed-wooden icons of the church temples. Passive observers. No words, no cries, and no blades. To rest, see, listen, ponder what they did, and find wisdom. And I would rest with them.
But the gods dictate the exact opposite. For me and everyone else, hero or villain. In that one moment, when one stands drained, defeated, and betrayed, that is when they choose to bring the greatest trial. As twilight blankets the battlefield and the spirit coils cold under aching ribs, they come and ask for everything, demand that we find new strength and rise once again. To make a final stand, a final choice.
And at that moment, after I thought that all has ended, I understand that this is the beginning.
It is on that night, as I face the pyre of the Ouna-Mas that my Story begins, the one I’d be remembered and loathed for. Everything chronicled and recorded up to that night is only for me to revisit for the last time and to pay tribute to the few comrades who fought by my side. This was the biggest lesson of the Sieve. Every trial was only the next step of a tortuous path that led to the Final Battle. The last ceremony in the middle of the arena. Wolfhowl.
I, the Firstblade, finally took command of Sirol after the funeral pyre. And it took me only a few days to become the most desperate, frightened, and fickle of all the rulers I knew. Without Reghen and Ouna-Mas to challenge or counsel me, without enemies to threaten me.
Sani was quietly exiled to the farming lands. There were no bloody quarrels. I didn’t even care to face him and explain. The Archers let him know. They also dismantled the Guardians and sent them to serve the different Banners. Most of those young boys found death over the next few days. It wasn’t planned murder; they just refused one too many times to follow the orders of their new Chiefs. One could call it suicide.
I ordered a council every night of the first three nights. Leke, Sani, Rhee-Lor, and Baagh. They had questions, and I had to find answers fast. Noki didn’t care to join us.
“You let Rhee-Lor’s men choose horses and slaves first. They have been wronged for too long.”
That’s all they cared about anyway.
I made up new Truths to fit my needs without consulting anyone. I took full advantage of the Ouna-Mas’ demise and declared a Truth, so I could keep Zeria next to me: “From now on, each Chief may choose one wise woman to advise him. I don’t care what she was before.”
Some of those Truths were seeded with wisdom, but I usually made them up as I opened my mouth: “Every woman with eyes of color will remain unharmed until Sah-Ouna returns.”
And always to protect someone. Zeria, my comrades, myself. But whatever I did, I could not hide. The stronger I became, the more vulnerable I was.
“A leader’s fame is his spear, but it can never be his shield. You’re doing the exact opposite,” Baagh told me once we were left alone. “You are trying to raise walls and hide behind them, but instead you’ve drawn all the eyes of the Tribe upon you. That’s the only rumor around the dung fires, the on
ly story they speak of. The Firstblade and his blue-eyed witch.”
“There will never be a sanctuary for me in this valley. That I know.”
I couldn’t find sleep at night. Every time the wind whistled through the ox hide tears and the withy fences I’d turn to look for the traitor’s arrow. Zeria stayed in hiding inside the damp accommodations, turning pale-white and hunched, caring for the four young ones. There was neither peace nor love on her face. A glimpse of gratitude, overshadowed by fear, that was growing every night.
I still hadn’t lain with her. One quiet night, after the Ouna-Mas were gone forever, my body warmed with the urge. I was staring at her thighs and her breasts shaping under the dress, and for a moment the hunger was there. But two of the children entered the tent crying. By the time she had quieted them down, I had fallen asleep, and the nightmares had overtaken me. I dreamed that we were all alone and I was undressing her, while many other hands tore down the hides around us. Like the talons of a predator, they shredded our tunics and clawed on our skin until my screams awoke the children.
“Da-Ren, I wish we could run away from here,” she said one morning when I took her to show her Sirol from the eastern hill.
We watched the first glimpse of sunlight illuminate the sown fields. A few winters back this would have been my wildest dream. I, ruling over Sirol, Zeria by my side. And yet its reality was just a smothering nightmare.
I didn’t say anything. I had failed many times to keep my promises. Better to act than talk.
“But I know you can’t leave your tribe, now that you are the Firstblade. At least let me escape into the forest.”
“I left my Tribe many times for you, but yes, if that’s what you want, I’ll lead you back there.”
“When?”
It is futile and silly to ask a mother for unconditional love. Such a spell works only on the hearts of young boys and girls. Her love was unconditional, but not for me.
“When I am sure that they won’t come hunting you down.”
Drakon Book IV: Butterfly Page 8
