by Brian Braden
The wolf, joined by others and the lions, assembled in two rows on either side of the Black Gate. Lions parted to the right and wolves to the left. Panting, they lay down and waited.
***
Far below, two lions remained as sentries at the base of the Cliff Road to discourage any humans unwise enough to seek refuge from the rising water. The elephants led the procession as they made their way up the Cliff Road.
The Hur-po crowded the roof tops and watched their city die. The icy water filled the streets and began to creep up the walls and over stoops. The city’s thieves and underclass who dwelt in the sewers quickly drowned. Those who waded through the morass were pulled underwater by mysterious black claws, never to resurface. Poor and rich, slave and freeman, the people of Hur-ar were now truly equal.
The water reached the Cliff Road just as the two little beavers started up past the lions, which turned and followed.
***
The elephants reached the top of the cliff as the shooting stars began to wane in the heavens. The veil of clouds overhead thickened until the late afternoon sun vanished. The large bull elephant strode between the wolves and lions and pulled the bell with his trunk.
For the first time since the Black Fortress rose above the City of Gold, both the inner and outer gates opened at once.
The Ark waited.
5. The Longest Voyage
When the father of a Lo groom announced a betrothal, custom levied a unique dowry upon the father of the bride - one summer to construct a wedding barge.
The bride’s entire arun-ki helped fashion this barge, the largest vessel crafted by the Lo. Scouting parties traveled far and wide to gather the strongest marsh oaks, so thick it often took days to chop down with their stone and bronze axes. These prized logs were carefully tethered and floated to the shore camp.
Of all the Lo watercraft, they said the wedding barge had to weather the roughest seas. The logs were coated with pitch, stacked two deep, and bound with only the thickest ropes, finest leathers, and choicest flax. The barges were sturdy enough to hold the entire wedding party, which might number up to fifty, for three days of feasting and celebration.
The ceremony commenced on the morning of the first day, with the wedding barge tethered to the groom’s father’s hut. The details of the wedding ceremony are chronicled elsewhere in these annals. At sunset, following three days of feasting and celebration, the husband and wife cast away the tethers of their childhood and sailed off alone on the longest of voyages.
The Chronicle of Fu Xi
***
Someone shouted from beyond a thick clump of trees a few hundred yards away.
“Levidi, take us over there...and carefully. I don’t want to get snared in the trees.”
In a few minutes, the men had swung the raft north around the thickest of the trees, with Ba-lok and Ghalen at the front pushing branches from their path. The shouting became clearer until it transformed into the distinct sound of someone cursing.
They rounded a corner and beheld two enormous, well-constructed rafts tangled deep in the trees, the current pushing them farther into foliage’s embrace. Six burly, bearded men wrestled with the tree branches as a small, bald man shouted and cursed them.
Aizarg softly whistled through his teeth and shook his head. “The trees collect more than ice and flotsam. That is the last person I expected to ever see again,” he said.
Okta squinted. “Those are wedding barges, but I feel confident those men are not part of a wedding procession.”
One of the bearded men finally saw them and pointed. The small bald man turned around.
“Virag,” Okta whispered.
“Greetings, men of the Lo!” Virag called out in a smooth, gracious voice. “Could you help a friend in these troubling times?”
Aizarg spoke softly to his men, “Weapons ready, but don’t look hostile. I don’t think he recognizes us. Move us around to the north side of the trees so the current keeps us from getting caught.”
“What are you intentions?” Ba-lok asked.
Aizarg turned and winked. “Are you up for a game of raft-tipping?”
***
They hailed Virag from a distance and then secured their raft to a tree with a sail line. It stretched taunt but held. The current pulled them away from the clump of trees, while partially obscuring them from Virag’s rafts.
Aizarg handed Levidi his staff. “Wave it over the water. We must make sure no demons lurk below.”
Levidi did so, though there was no sign of the black creatures below the surface. “The only demon is on that wedding barge,” Levidi huffed.
“Not including Virag, I count six, three on each raft,” Ghalen said. “Their rafts are heavily loaded and lopsided. No wonder they lost control. They have no idea what they’re doing.”
“Those are Sammujad spearman. They outnumber you and wield sagar,” Sana spoke up. “They will crush you.”
Aizarg ignored her. “Call to them,” he said to Okta.
“We are coming over to help! Stay put and don’t move!” Okta shouted through the branches.
“Thank you, strangers!” Virag called back. “But leave your spears on your raft.”
“He still doesn’t recognize us. Let’s go. Be wary of the current, mindful of the branches,” Aizarg said and dropped his staff to the deck. In quick succession, he, Ghalen, and Levidi dove in and swam to Virag’s rafts.
Aizarg found the water cold but not numbing, the current strong but manageable.
Levidi came up first, next to Virag’s raft and held up his hand. “A hand up, friend?”
A warrior dressed in shaggy winter garb reached down, but quickly found himself head over heels in the water. The warrior came up gasping and thrashing, weighed down by his wet furs and skins. “Help me! I cannot swim! Do not let the demons take me!”
Levidi grabbed him by the nape and towed the helpless warrior to the trees. The Sammujad clung for life among the branches like a stranded kitten.
Levidi re-submerged.
“It’s an ambush!” Virag shouted. “Kill them!”
The remaining warriors on both rafts cocked their heavy spears, waiting for the Lo to resurface.
A hand shot out of the water and grabbed a warrior’s ankle. Soon, two wide-eyed, shivering warriors clung to the trees.
Virag scurried from side-to-side, jumped from raft-to-raft, pointing to bubbles and swirls. “They are here! Jab there!” he shouted, but could not coax the four remaining warriors any closer to the water.
Ghalen came up for air a dozen yards from the rafts. The nearest warrior hurled his sagar, but not before Ghalen submerged again. The spear splashed harmlessly into the water and then drifted away.
Virag and his men turned around to face Aizarg and Levidi standing on their raft, arms crossed
“Surrender your rafts. They are ours now. Do so, and you will live.” Aizarg commanded.
“Ha!” Virag stepped back and signaled his men forward. “Kill them.”
Aizarg leapt backwards to the most laden corner. The rapid weight shift forced the nearest of the four warriors to stumble forward. With expert timing, Levidi lunged and nudged him overboard. Ghalen quickly snatched the sputtering warrior and placed him in the tree with the rest.
Levidi and Aizarg again faced Virag and his remaining men, this time rocking the raft by jumping up and down. Off balance and with sagar extended, the Sammujad stumbled and bumped into each other.
One desperately lunged at Aizarg. The Uros easily sidestepped, grabbed the spear shaft, and pulled the warrior forward into the water.
“Slow down, Uros!” Ghalen laughed from the water. “You’re throwing them in too fast for me.”
Virag slapped the warrior nearest him. “They are only marsh men. Kill them!”
Pale and unsure, Virag’s remaining warriors looked at each other uneasily. In a matter of minutes, the remaining three joined their compatriots clinging to the tree.
Surrounded, Virag crouc
hed with knife extended toward Levidi and Aizarg.
“Perhaps we can come to an arrangement? I have much to trade.”
“Surrender all you have, and I will let you and your men live.”
“Then you condemn us to death.”
“You are a desperate man,” Aizarg said with speed and conviction. He stepped closer to Virag, but still remained wary of the slaver’s knife. “Desperate men will pay any price. If the world is going to end, then my price is small.”
Virag cocked his head and squinted. “Aizarg?
“Ha!” Virag relaxed and tucked the knife into his waist strap. He looked Aizarg up and down. “Why didn’t you identify yourself? I am not your enemy, yet you attack us. This is an outrage. Get my men out of the tree and let us go at once. These rafts are mine by fair trade with your fellow sco-lo-ti, deals made long before this flood. They are rightfully mine.”
“You rafts are now mine. Your goods are mine. Your lives are mine. Accept this or join your friends in the trees.”
“I don’t know how you survived the steppe, Aizarg, but I’m sure we can work something out.”
Aizarg waived his finger. “No bartering. My price is final.”
“My men and I will be dead in a day.”
“Then so be it. That is not my concern.”
Virag crossed his arms and slowly nodded, as if understanding the rules had changed. “A man of the Lo left my camp no more than five days ago. He reeked of mud and ranted about the end of the world. I was sure he was a fool bound for certain death. Now he returns smelling not of the sea, but of the steppe, ruthless and hard,” Virag chuckled. “He returns civilized.”
Virag’s words stung. He thought of all the Lo forced to wear Virag’s collar and of the torments Sarah suffered under this man. Part of him wanted Virag to make this easy, to fight and give him an excuse to put the little snake in the tree with the rest of his warriors.
“Your rafts.” Aizarg remained firm.
Virag held out his hands, palms up, in supplication. “Mercy, sco-lo-ti. Or should I say, Uros? Strange that the Lo would have convened a war council, and I did not hear of it.”
Ghalen pulled himself up onto the raft behind Aizarg. “Into the water with them! No good can come of this.”
Virag ignored him and continued, voice low and smooth, “We are not Lo, but we have done you no harm, committed no crime. Where is the Lo custom of mercy, Aizarg? Did that die on the steppe, too?”
Aizarg opened his mouth to give the command to cast Virag into the water, but stopped. He considered the black, swirling water and then the faces of the shivering warriors in the tree. Branches sagged under the weight of what looked to Aizarg like a pitiful family of soaked, shivering bears.
What would Setenay council?
“Cast them into the water, Uros,” Ghalen whispered. “He is a snake. Otherwise, treachery and death will be our reward. Isn’t it because of the likes of him that the god of the Narim sends this curse?”
From darkness, mercy.
“Ghalen, get those Sammujad out of trees and onto the rafts. Show them how to properly redistribute the loads.”
“Uros!” Ghalen clenched his teeth. “You cannot...”
“I can!” Aizarg snapped. “I am Uros.”
“Aizarg, please, think about what you are about to do,” Levidi said softly. “Ghalen is right, Virag is dangerous.”
Virag’s eyes darted from Aizarg to Ghalen to Levidi. The corner of his mouth lifted almost imperceptibly.
He senses us wavering. He thinks we’re weak.
“Ghalen, Levidi...what do you council?”
“Throw them into the water, and let Psatina deal with them,” Ghalen said.
Levidi nodded in agreement.
Words formed in Aizarg’s mind, though he was not sure if they were his. He let them flow off his tongue unopposed, “The Goddess Psatina is gone, washed away with our beloved Great Sea. This new Black Sea has no gods, at least none that speak to me. We will not let the sea and its demons do our dirty work. Let what is decided by man, be administered by man. Levidi, take Virag’s knife.”
Levidi snatched the knife.
“Ghalen, if death is what you council, then slit the throats of these warriors. Levidi, if you feel death is justified, slice the slaver’s throat now.”
A wave of fear washed over the slaver’s face. “Aizarg deals death like a Scythian warlord.” Virag spit on the deck before Aizarg’s feet.
Levidi looked at Ghalen with a pall of uncertainty and dropped the knife.
Ghalen stooped to pick it up. “I’ll do it!”
Levidi gripped his wrist. “Please, don’t. You’ll regret it. This isn’t like killing the Scythians. This is murder.”
Ghalen hesitated and then cast the knife down. He spoke in a low, disgusted tone, “We will regret this. I know this to be truth.” He shook his head. “We will pay a price for our mercy, a price of blood...and fire.”
Virag’s grin blossomed.
“Your heart knew better, and for that I am grateful.” Aizarg sighed with relief. “Virag, you and your men are no longer Sammujad. Accept Lo ways and my rule or perish. Swear an oath on it. The world you knew is washing away. What you see before you is only the beginning. Live or die, the choice is yours.”
Virag bent on one knee, bowed his head, and spread his arms. “I, Virag, give my fealty to Aizarg, Uros of the Lo.” Virag looked up at Aizarg with a smile that did not reach his eyes.
Aizarg bent down and whispered in Virag’s ear, “Do not confuse mercy for weakness. I do not trust you. If there is killing to be done, it will be done by my hand. Give me no reason.”
***
Three rafts skirted west along the tree tops of a lost coast, sails fully unfurled, dancing between opposing currents and winds. The two stout wedding barges led the way, with Okta’s tiny raft bringing up the rear. Aizarg equally divided the Sammujad warriors among the rafts, each having taken separate oaths. Ghalen held the tiller on the lead barge and calmly issued simple instructions to the two warriors flanking the sail. Levidi manned the center barge, also teaching the warriors the ways of the sea. Okta chose to stay on his own tiny raft with Ba-lok, shouting and cursing at the fumbling Sammujad.
Aizarg, Ezra, and Sana manned the lead barge, the two land dwellers clearly relieved to be aboard a more substantial vessel. Virag squatted in Sammujad fashion near Aizarg, who stared out over the water looking for signs of his people.
“Ood-i?” Virag asked.
Aizarg shook his head. For a moment a cloud pass over the slaver’s face.
“I see you traded Ood-i’s woman for another,” Virag nodded to Sana. “I approve.”
“She is a free woman and under my protection,” Aizarg clenched his staff tighter, knowing he was going to have to live with the consequences of letting Virag live.
“Of course.”
“The woman you sold to Ood-i lies buried beside him.”
Both men returned their stares to the water in silence until Aizarg spoke again.
“Tell me, Virag, why does a trader of the steppe have a wedding barge, let alone two, that are fully equipped with ropes, sails, and rigging, all in Lo fashion and all in good condition?”
Virag shrugged without looking up at Aizarg. “I am a trader. Everything is for sale. Everything has its price.”
That answer left Aizarg completely unsatisfied. “Who did you buy it from?”
“From the young sco-lo-ti’s father,” he jerked his thumb back towards the last raft.
Ba-lok’s father? The former sco-lo-ti of the Minnow Clan was dead by almost a year. I will have to question Ba-lok about this later.
The dark clouds to the south loomed larger. Aizarg could not see the sun but knew it was close to setting. They would have to tie up on some trees soon and wait for morning.
Where are you, Atamoda?
“Uros...,” Virag said. Aizarg turned to look at him.
“I liked you better with red hair.” The slaver�
��s cold laugh preceded them across the black water and into the rising darkness.
6. White Fire, Black Smoke
Each woman’s soul carries a tiny shard reflecting some quality of Nuwa’s spirit. I see my mother in the eyes of the pining maiden, in every hag chained to a past of regret, in every mother cradling her child. I search those glittering shards for clues to who Nuwa truly was. My heart tells me I will search until my immortal flesh is no more.
I, a god, have learned little about a woman’s heart, but I know this. While a man must respect the tempest of a woman’s scorn, he must fear the darkness of her regret the most. In a woman’s heart are secrets so deep even the Emperor of Heaven must tread carefully, lest He lose His way.
The Chronicle of Fu Xi
***
Perched on the edge of the glacial cliff, the Angel of Death waited. Above her, falling stars etched glittering trails across the burning blue sky. Before her feet, a narrow waterfall, only a stone’s throw across, cascaded into a perpetual, icy mist. Similar waterfalls, spaced dozens of miles apart, stretched thousands of miles along the edge of the glacier, feeding hundreds of rivers and streams pouring south across the tundra. Combined, they slowly drowned three continents.
To her right, a freshwater glacial ocean covered the top of the world. A tranquil blue mirror perfectly reflecting the falling stars, it stretched horizon to horizon, broken only by an occasional iceberg. Only when the water neared the waterfall, only inches from her feet, did it reveal its swift power. At glacier’s rim only a thin membrane of ice a few feet thick protected the world below from the ocean. She felt the titanic pressure straining to explode forth. Only a nudge, a breath, would inundate the world.
Tsunamis generated by the great falling star scoured the world’s coasts clean of mankind. Releasing the glacial ocean would now complete the divine genocide. The Spirit of Death knew she should feel something, but she didn’t even feel the wind.
She cloaked herself in an ancient memory, an guise far different than Nuwa. She wore it the way a widow wears her wedding dress, a ghost of ancient passion, of love lost and dreams unfulfilled. White silken slippers hovered inches above the snow. Her white robe, emblazoned with the image of the golden dragon, hung as slack as her red hair.
