by Brian Braden
The swirling current swept the tiny raft between grass-covered islands that, only days ago, were prairie hilltops. Okta strained against the rudder, crafted from split driftwood tied around a long, crooked pole. The current toyed with the raft, demanding all Okta’s skill to prevent them from slamming against the crumbling islands.
Alone, Okta focused on the immediate danger while the others grieved. Ghalen sobbed, face buried in hands, as Levidi tried to comfort him. Ezra and the Scythian woman huddled in the raft’s center, staring in shock across the watery expanse. Ba-lok, sullen and detached, slumped cross-legged at the front of the raft. The Uros stood alone, staring ahead.
A voyage of the desolate.
Okta grieved, too, but right now he needed to bring the raft under control, and he couldn’t do it alone.
“Uros,” he called.
Aizarg didn’t respond.
“Uros!” he called again, glancing nervously at the jagged ice chunks drifting by.
We will rip out our bottom on a hidden promontory or be crushed by ice.
Okta cleared his throat and spoke loudly, “If there are still Lo men on this raft who care about the land of the living, I would greatly appreciate some help. Or must I hand the Scythian wench a pole?”
Levidi left Ghalen’s side and took the rudder, as Okta made his way to the front. He gently touched Aizarg’s shoulder. The Uros snapped out of his trance and looked upon Okta with red-rimmed eyes. Aizarg’s desolate expression took Okta aback.
Today, the Uros lost his Isp and a daughter. Okta suddenly knew his place, his task.
“We are all in pain,” Okta spoke slowly, but firmly. “I built this raft, but you are its master. The sea comes first. Bring us home, Uros.” He emphasized the last word.
Aizarg focused on Okta and then looked around as if seeing everything anew.
“The sea comes first,” Aizarg whispered.
Okta nodded with relief.
“Do we have enough poles?”
“Three. That will be enough to push off when required, though the water is too deep for anything else. We have a sail, but no mast,” Okta replied.
Aizarg examined the raft.
Good, he’s thinking about getting home.
“Place the men on the raft’s corners,” Aizarg commanded. “Do you think the raft will remain sound if we remove two beams for a mast?”
Okta warily eyed the gauntlet of small islands ahead, white water forming around their bases. The raft would shatter if they struck any of them at full speed.
“She’s strong. Two beams from her gut will not weaken her significantly,” Okta lied. He had hastily constructed the raft from two levels of scavenged logs, some barely straight or thick enough for the task, all tied together with strips of shredded deerskin clothing. Removing two logs from the center would significantly weaken it, but without a sail death surely awaited.
“So be it. Fashion a mast. Use one of the poles as a cross piece. Rig...,” Aizarg paused for a moment, “...rig Setenay’s sail upon it. That will give us some control. I pray the current will not be so swift when we reach the Great Sea.”
Aizarg knelt down. “Loosen the bindings and I will slide them out.”
Okta turned to Ghalen. “Get up!” he shouted. “That is what Setenay would say now if she were here. Get up, grab a pole!”
Ghalen wiped his tears and stood. He grabbed a pole off the deck and took his place at the forward port corner.
“Ba-lok, take the starboard corner,” Okta commanded. Ba-lok glared at him for only a moment, and then took his place with the second pole.
“Ezra, time is against us boy, are you ready to begin your education as a Lo man?” Okta instructed the man-boy what needed to be done, impressed how quickly Ezra put his fear and mourning aside.
Okta loosened the straps binding the top-center logs just enough to allow some play. With some effort, Aizarg and Ezra jiggled and slid the middle log out. Water sloshed up and filled the long gap as Okta re-tightened the bindings.
Aizarg held the thick stick vertically and shook his head. “It’s too short by itself. We need another.”
“Levidi, hard left!” Ghalen shouted with pole poised to push off a looming hilltop. Levidi grunted against the rudder.
“Everyone brace!” Okta shouted and shoved Ezra to the deck. The raft shuddered as it gouged a slash in the hillside. Logs shifted uncomfortably under Okta’s feet. Ba-lok leapt over Ezra and joined Ghalen, whose pole bent to the breaking point. Together, they struggled to dislodge the raft from the grassy island. The craft slowly turned, broke loose and once again hurtled downstream.
Okta inspected the raft. The logs were slightly skewed, but intact. He surveyed the waters ahead of them. Tiny islands dotted the surface as far south as he could see. Ba-lok resumed his post just in time to push away another chunk of ice.
We won’t last much longer.
Okta turned to Aizarg. “The southerly wind blows hard. A full sail will do much to slow us down. We must risk another log.”
Aizarg shook his head. “The center of the raft will have too much play. One more strike like that and it will shatter.”
“Raise me a sail, Uros, and I guarantee we won’t hit another island.”
For a few quiet moments Aizarg gazed at the darkening southern sky.
“Do it.”
They quickly pulled another log. Okta tightened the straps the best he could. With each step the deck beams gave slightly under his weight, reminding Okta of their desperate gamble.
They tied the two logs together.
“Use the remaining pole as a crosspiece to mount the sail,” Okta said.
Aizarg lodged the new mast firmly in the gap, which helped tighten the deck logs, and secured it with the last of their leather strips.
Okta nervously watched the perilously close islands and ice floes.
It’s only a matter of time.
Aizarg tied off the last strip of spare deerskin. “We have no more. Nothing remains for rigging or to secure the crosspiece to the mast.”
Okta looked around, thinking of what they could use. His gaze fell on the Scythian woman and her long-sleeve cherkesska and deerskin trousers.
She shot him a distrustful stare and pulled her legs tighter against her chest.
“Ghalen,” Okta said with a wry smile. “Give me your pole. I have a job for you.”
***
Bloody scratches crisscrossed Ghalen’s face and arms. Sana and Ghalen glared out over the water, neither looking at one another.
Okta beamed as the taut, billowed sail greatly diminished their forward speed. Levidi had more time to turn the ungainly craft, and Ghalen and Ba-lok could easily push off from the islands.
Sana knelt on port side, grasping a strap that used to be part of her trousers. It now secured the sail’s bottom corner. She wrapped her free arm around her midriff, trying to shield her almost naked body from sight. Ezra knelt on the starboard side, holding the other strap and occasionally stealing glances at Sana. Together, they responded to Levidi’s simple commands of “Pull left!” or “Pull right!”
Tattered remains of Sana’s once proud cherkesska barely covered her breasts, the rest now sail rigging. Her long trousers reduced to a loin cloth, where she tucked the four small daggers Setenay let her keep. As Setenay predicted, not once did the Scythian woman raise her weapons against them; at least the bladed ones.
The woman is too furious to be afraid anymore, Okta thought. Ghalen tried to reason with her, but she had none of it and fought Ghalen like a lioness. Okta would be lying to himself if he didn’t admit he found it amusing. Even Levidi let out a snicker. Sana only relented when Aizarg threatened to throw her overboard and promised her enough clothing to satisfy minimum a-g’an modesty.
Okta grudgingly acknowledged the Scythian girl’s beauty. A wild mane of black hair framed deep brown eyes full of fire. Flawless olive skin and sculpted limbs, now liberated from dreadful a-g’an garb, were not unpleasing to behold. She r
eminded Okta somewhat of Ba-lok’s wife, Kus-ge, only taller.
Beautiful, yes, but too wild to make a proper Lo woman. Why Setenay let her live mystified Okta.
A burst of warm air gusted across the deck, bringing a familiar smell and drawing Okta’s attention. Smiles suddenly lit the men’s faces, as they looked at one another knowingly.
“We approach the sea!” he said, the song in his heart kindled anew.
The hills slowly vanished, replaced by tree tops poking above the water, reduced to bush-like clumps bent in the current. Flotsam and ice chunks collected in tattered branches still clad in autumn colors. Okta’s heart began to sink.
“This is what is left of the marshes,” Aizarg said.
“I cannot see the marsh grass,” Ba-lok said. “The water is too deep.”
“The current is abating. I can feel it in the rudder,” Levidi called from the back.
Okta looked south where the trees ceased in a line running east and west. The Black River swirled and blended with clearer, natural-looking water. Instead of the warm and sparkling Great Sea, an expanding expanse of flat, dark water mirrored the boiling clouds. He fell to his knees and plunged his hand into the water. One moment the current flowed warm against his skin, the next icy cold.
The raft slowed and began to flounder, even reverse in the face of the wind.
“The Black River and Great Sea do battle. We are unable to proceed; unable to go back from whence we came. We are between worlds,” Aizarg said.
“The Black River is winning!” Okta lowered his head into his hands and moaned. “This foulness leaching from the g’an violates our blessed mother. The god of the Narim devours the sea.”
Aizarg put his hand on Okta’s shoulder and squeezed it hard. “I, too, fear this new, strange sea...this Black Sea. But do not lose faith. This new god did not bring us this far to abandon us now. Our people are out there, waiting for us. Wherever they are, that is our home.”
Okta sobbed and grasped Aizarg’s hand, unable to speak thoughts as dark as the Black Sea.
What if we can’t find our home?
“I don’t recognize this place,” Ba-lok said. “We could be anywhere along the coast. Should we turn east or west once we clear the trees?”
Aizarg lifted Okta to his feet. “You know the ways of the sea better than any of us.”
Okta tried to clear his thoughts. He glanced at Ezra, who stared out over the unbroken sea. Okta suddenly remembered his terror when setting out across the g’an only days ago and knew this boy must be every bit as frightened.
I am Lo. He is not. He needs a raft under his feet and under his spirit. I must be his raft.
Okta absently patted his waist pouch even though he knew it contained no more mud weed. He took a cleansing breath and studied the tree tops where a marsh once flourished.
“See how the trees are thick on either side of us? We are in a stream bed. We’ve been tracking southwest since we set sail. My best guess is we’re somewhere east of Ba-lok’s arun-ki.” Okta looked to the young sco-lo-ti for confirmation.
Ba-lok nodded.
“Most of our nation lies west of my arun-ki,” Okta continued. “We should follow the treetops west along the old shoreline until we encounter an arun-ki, Ba-lok’s or another. If we turn east, we run a chance of missing all of them.” He nodded, as if reassuring himself. “Yes, I council west. The current has lessened and the wind is in our favor.”
“Our homes will be underwater,” Ghalen quietly voiced their unspoken fears.
Something about that statement angered Okta. “Our homes are our boats.”
Ghalen nodded. “True, Sco-lo-ti.”
“Aizarg, do you hear that?” Ezra said, lifting his ear toward the thick trees to their immediate west.
Okta craned to listen. “I hear it, too. Voices.”
“Not just voices,” Aizarg said. “Shouting.”
2. The Fall of Hur-ar, Part I
The most dangerous of mortals are those filled with ambition, but who lack compassion. Their hunger is never sated, their evil, always self-justified. Pride blinds them to the truth, even as their illusions crumble around them.
These men come closest to being gods.
The Chronicle of Fu Xi
***
The Captain of the Gate couldn’t hear himself think.
Bal-eeb leaned over Hur-ar’s mighty parapets and spit a thick wad of mucus into the mob pressed against the gates. The scene reminded him of cattle packed in the market stockades at auction; a mass of stinking, panicked animals sensing their imminent slaughter. He wanted to do more than spit on them, desiring nothing less than filling each and every one of them with arrows to quiet their screams. Their cries joined the mournful chorus rising from all the city’s quarters.
People are sheep. Herded and slaughtered, that’s all they’re good for. Underneath his smooth, confident exterior he hated all humanity...except for his men, of course.
He merely despised them.
“A waste of good arrows,” he murmured to himself.
“Sir?” his lieutenant asked.
“Reinforce the northern side of the gate. If these animals get out of hand, I want no less than twenty archers ready from both directions.”
“Yes sir.” The lieutenant nodded, and set about his task.
“Eight days,” Bal-eeb murmured once his underling hurried beyond earshot. One ill omen after another befell the City of Gold in the eight days since that fateful morning at the Black Gate. Each subsequent disaster foiled his plans and thwarted his ravenous ambition.
Moments after that sunrise, when the Narim failed to answer the call to trade, the beasts answered another call. As if summoned by an unheard command, the city’s feral dogs slinked from the shadows and released a chorus of howls so mournful people covered their ears. At that moment the oxen of the fields bolted their harnesses, and cattle crashed through their market pens and thundered down the Avenue of Merchants. In the noble houses, even in the King’s palace, pampered cats hissed and leapt for the nearest windows. The worst came when the sewers disgorged a filthy, brown river of rats.
The animals stampeded toward the city gate, with the largest beasts, cattle and oxen, in the lead. They trampled anything in their path, leaving crushed bodies in their wake.
Even warriors fled before the living tide. The stampede rushed out of the city before Bal-eeb’s watch officer could issue orders to seal the gates. The mass stampeded south across the Kupar Bridge and vanished. The few animals trapped within the city fell into a frenzy, attacking anyone who came near. Dozens of horses, including all those remaining in the army’s stables, fell under warriors’ arrows.
The farmers had no beasts of burden, the army no horses, and the city no meat. By sunset, the King summoned the priest and nobles. Prayers were offered and sacrifices made. Before the incense could rise below the enormous statue of the Black Dragon, the tremors began.
Over the next two days, a multitude of small earthquakes assaulted Hur-ar. While only powerful enough to break pottery and crack whitewashed plaster walls, they served to further unnerve an already frightened populace. The quakes also drove many foreign traders from the city, swearing under their breath the City of Gold was cursed. As a symbol of his goodwill and to ensure their quick return, the King sent armed escorts to accompanying the trader caravans to the edge of Hur territory. Bad turned to worse as the escorts quickly returned with reports of a rising Hur River.
A flat and sandy floodplain surrounded the wide, but shallow river. High, dry bluffs flanked both sides of the floodplain. In many places the bluffs were low enough for caravans to descend, ford the river, and ascend the other bank. Even at the height of summer, when the Hur River ran cold and swift from the distant Icelands, one could easily wade across. The great Kupar Bridge, the Narim’s gargantuan handiwork, stretched from bluff to bluff, high above the flat river.
Four days after the incident at the Black Gate, the Hur River ran deep and fast halfway up th
e bluffs. In several places it spilled over into the stumps and fields on the west and east banks. The Hur River grew as if trying to become worthy of the bridge that lorded over it. The bridge still stood high and strong against the current, but now was truly a necessity. As the river rose, the ill omens continued.
On the morning of the seventh day, the Royal Supreme Trader led another delegation up Cliff Road in hopes the Narim would resume trading. This time the King’s own bodyguard, led by Hecktar, accompanied the wagons. Bal-eeb and his troops were left behind, a devastating blow to his honor.
An astonishing thing occurred that morning. The Black Gate opened as shouts of joy went up from the delegation. The wagons rolled between the gates, and the outer gate closed. The brass bell rang out, and the gate opened again. Their elation died as the delegation discovered the wagons untouched and fully loaded. Three Narim stood next to the wagons, white hair gleaming in the morning sun just as the legends said.
And Hecktar, that fool, simply let them walk away! Just thinking about it made him simmer in renewed rage.
The three Narim strolled through the city to the gates. Worse yet, Bal-eeb’s former lieutenant simply watched the Narim as they walked out the gate and vanished to the west. He didn’t even wake Bal-eeb to report the event. Bal-eeb beheaded him on the spot. The Black Gates closed again, and the Narim remaining inside still refused to trade.
Bal-eeb would have stopped them and forced them to answer for what they had done. Narim or not, they interfered with his plans, his ambition. Just as Hur-ar endured setbacks, so had he.
The day before the Narim strolled out of the city, one of his soldiers, a trouble maker named Gilga, was killed escorting a slaver and whore to the city barracks. Bal-eeb intended the pleasure slave, a rare wench with silver hair, as a personal gift for the Commander; a bribe to stay in his good graces. His warrior slain and his bribe stolen right under the nose of the city garrison, Bal-eeb’s standing amongst the Captains of Hur plummeted again.
