The Unwanted Winter - Volume One of the Saga of the Twelves

by Richard Heredia

  Asmodemus went cold, no flame, no smoldering fire, and no magma-like skin-flows. “Of course, we are. It is my prevue as the Vicar of Storm to protect the Great Maelstrom from all enemies, homegrown or otherwise. As Councilors, it is yours as well. Besides, do we really need her riff-raff minions underfoot?”

  “She has millions, Sanctus Magnus. Her aerial forces alone outnumber our combined ground forces a thousand to one. I don’t even wish to consider who much bigger her army may be.” The Hlāford Dhŏŏm’s bassatone voice stopped in dramatic fashion.

  He is entirely devoid aplomb, thought Claudiu with a slight shake of his head.

  “They’ve never been counted, you know,” added the Swüreg King, his bushy eyebrows bobbing much like his outlandish ears that had begun to droop with age.

  The point, though, rang true. The Rigă-Kur could not deny the obvious. “She would make a formidable enemy,” he said, almost mumbling.

  “Oh, Vûhkta-shit!” exclaimed the Demon Lord, his flames returned full-force. “The Antitheus Battle-Daemons could slay thousands by themselves. She is no threat to us.” His tone was intense. If it were possible to show them, Claudiu was certain he would’ve seen the cords in his neck strain, veins upon his forehead throb. He was a true Furian though. Such features were far too humanoid for the likes of him.

  “She has millions,” reiterated Ghregûr, as if the Great Spirit was daft of a sudden.

  “Maybe as many as one thousand million,” added Claudiu for spice. He loved to see the pompous Da-Manga Furia squirm. “What if she allies with the Twelve…?” He was laughing raucously from within. On the outside, he was stone, though the notion was utter nonsense. Every demon abhorred the Twelves. They’d been diametrically opposed before time had been time. Each set of Twelve Guardians had been the arch enemy of every demon. Rakel Angantýr was no different. She might be the Grän Herra, ruler of the Skrímsli, but she’d been born a Furian, as pure of blood as the Sanctus Magnus himself.

  “Enough!” shouted Asmodemus. “Enough!” He took a few large breaths, then: “If she proves troublesome, I will deal with her myself.”

  Claudiu and Ghregûr shared a look. That was what they wanted to hear.

  Asmodemus noticed, scowling. “I don’t have any more time, my Lords. I must take my leave of you.” He didn’t wait for a response. His Holo-Crys went dead with the last word he’d spoken.

  A short silence ensued.

  Then, the Swüreg King turned to face the Rigă-Kur. His look was smug. “I hear your son, Fenris, struggles against this new Twelve.”

  Claudiu waited for nearly a minute before replying. He would not lose his cool to the likes of a creature with the wit on par with that of a brick. “There was a Fist of the Light sent to disrupt his plans. Since those idiots following Rûdulfolo had said such an act was impossible to conduct upon the Melded World, my son was caught unawares.” He paused to make sure he was fully collected. “But, make no mistake; he will have them in tow by the time of your arrival. I promise you that!”

  “And if he doesn’t…?”

  Now, it was the Vülfen’s turn to grin internally. They are all dolts, the whole lot of them! Claudiu didn’t answer right away, pretending to think hard on the issue.

  Ghregûr waited impatiently, chomping at the bit. “He should be added to my retinue, if he should fail to have the Twelve in his possession by the time of my arrival.”

  Idiots, one and all. It was so easy. It was like skinning a newborn, very little fuss, only a bit a squirm or two in the beginning. Then, the rest was like chopping wood. Go through the motions and get the job done quickly.

  He pretended affront. “Why should he be under your command? He’s a Councilor himself. He’s the Snowman’s Hand after all.”

  “He is also failing miserably with the task given onto him by our Great Lord. Maybe he was too green for a job as critical and time-pressed as being the Lord of the Vanguard. Maybe he was ill-suited for the job.” The Swüreg King looked very pleased with himself. “Vülfen do not make good leaders of Swüreg.” He said it as a matter of fact. It didn’t matter that Fenris commanded more than just fifteen hundred Swüreg warriors. He had Prēosts, Nixae, Jötuns, IsigWyrms, Dēowulf and many other high Creations at his beacon call. And, he had the Hross. There had never been a collection of such diversity from Storm under a unified command before. What Fenris had done over the centuries was nothing short of spectacular. And, he had done it by himself with very little help from the Vülfen Kur Ambalaj.

  The Hross…

  Claudiu felt himself smile openly. The first expression he’d allowed himself to reveal since he’d called this meeting some time ago. “I would like to place a wager upon it. Are you game, old friend?”

  The Hlāford Dhŏŏm laughed - a jiggle of anticipation. “Of course, of course.”

  “If Fenris fails to gather the Twelve by the time of your arrival, then he shall indeed report to your good offices. You may treat him as you will. I ask only that it is just and no harm befall him. But, if he does have them, then you will afford him every resource at your disposal and declare he is to be above reproach, excepting you authority, of course. I want him to be your chief military commander, in charge of all Swüreg on the Melded World. What say you to that?”

  Ghregûr squinted hard at his counterpart, loving the idea of the upstart Fenris groveling at his boots, but finding it equally revulsive to have the brat commanding his vast army.

  The Rigă-Kur gave the Swüreg King the necessary space and quiet.

  “Deal,” said Ghregûr at last. It was rasp.

  “Good,” began Claudiu, but stopped when he realized the other had blackened his Holo-Crys before he’d started speaking. The aged Vülfen was by himself in his throne room. “It is of no consequence,” he said to himself. “Either way, Vülfen power and influence would grow.”

  Secretly, he hoped Fenris would fail in his task. He hoped the Fist of the Light would keep the Twelve hidden just a while longer. To finally see the Hross put to the use they’d been created for would be interesting.

  Not even Fenris knew of this and they’d been his closest companions since birth.

  “Nothing will stop the Vülfen from ruling alongside the Great Maelstrom. Nothing!”

  Claudiu’s laugh rippled through the gigantic chamber until it turned to a howl, terrifying the many guards and servants, standing outside the throne room, waiting.

  It was a terrible keening that didn’t stop for nearly an hour.

  ~~~~~~~~<<<<<<{ ☼ }>>>>>>~~~~~~~~

  Part Four:

  Price of Equilibrium

  Antisthenes says that in a certain faraway land the cold is so intense that words freeze as soon as they are uttered, and after some time then thaw and become audible, so that words spoken in winter go unheard until the next summer.

  - Plutarch, Moralia

  Winter must be cold for those with no warm memories.

  - Movie: An Affair to Remember.

  ~~~~~~~~<<<<<<{ ☼ }>>>>>>~~~~~~~~

  ~ 57 ~

  Growth

  Day Two, Friday, 3:53 am…

  The tracks ended about a hundred feet from the rock face, an unexpected thing to find here where there should have been homes and yards. It took him more than a minute to realize the snow had been recently turned. It had been wiped down, possibly by large boughs of pine, because when he looked closely, he could see the individual paths of the needles in the snow itself. He knew, as he scrutinized the huge jumble of rocks and boulders, the band of humans he had tracked earlier were somewhere within or behind this great wall of rock, warm and cozy, protected and safe. It didn’t matter the falling snow was beginning to cover what was left of their tracks, he could tell. They were in there, a group of considerable size, resting, regaining their strength.

  He sat in the snow, not making a sound, and listened. His eyes were closed, his mind open, searching.

  It took only a few moments before he sensed it, atop the rock pile, sitting much like
he was doing, a creature of large proportions, all of its senses pointed toward him. He could almost feel the heat of its’ gaze through the cold of the night.

  Oralé mano, they are organized! he thought, letting his body slip into a trance, content to sit there the entire night, immobile, determined.

  He would find out. He had too! He had to make sure Andrew was safe.

  ~~~~~~~~<<<<<<{ ☼ }>>>>>>~~~~~~~~

  ~ 58 ~

  A Waking Dream

  Day Two, Friday, 4:14 am…

  The Legacy of Truth.

  The Talisman of the Kring-Hël.

  Joaquin awoke, in the cave, under a pile of throw blankets. Jason was at his side and the tiny, plump form of Louis upon the other. He was glad everyone else was still asleep, feeling the true weight of what they were up against hit him full force. There was little he could to fight such an onslaught and, in the end - he lost. He gave in and was very grateful the others didn’t have to witness him cry, weeping like a child, lost and without hope. It was a woeful sobbing, coming for somewhere deep inside, every exhalation hurting him to the core, every gulp of breath like poison in his lungs.

  He wept for a long, long time…

  *****

  With tears drying upon his face and his nose stuffed with mucus from sobs, only minutes before, had been wracking at his body. Without any cause he could readily discern, he was stunned into motionlessness, no more crying, no clenching at his gut, no movement at all. Within those seconds, the thought had come and the knowledge had followed - unabated, easy and without any impediment, without any pain. Merely, there was something he didn’t know in one moment and did in another. The sudden knowing of it had frozen him in place. He lay there upon the makeshift, bedding, quietly thinking, and blinking away his tears.

  He could see it clearly in his mind’s eye, plain as day as if he had known it all of his life. The Legacy of Truth, a talisman made real by only the Reborn Kring-Hël. It was the key, bringing life where there was no life, the fulcrum that would unleash a power never seen before upon the planes of existence.

  And I know where it is, thought Joaquin as he lay there. His mind automatically took him to the very foundations of the mighty Eagle Rock. That huge conglomerate boulder had forever towered over the 134 Freeway, between the cities of Pasadena and Glendale in southern California. The Eagle Rock - a huge mass of sandstone and sedimentary stones overlooking a small community of the same name - shaped like an eagle’s head and formed as an eagle in flight at the same time.

  All at once, he was standing there, as though he’d been magically transported from the cave. Now, he stood there, before it - though there was no snow. He looked up at the looming massive, remembering. At one time, back in the early years of the fledgling communities that had surrounded Los Angeles, bandits and outlaws had hid in caves that supposedly riddled the ridge, comprising the Eagle Rock and its immediately vicinity.

  Flash!

  Next, he was walking upon a road - the road leading from the left of the great Eagle Rock. He was walking upon a slight incline toward the hills beyond. He frowned, a little surprised to find himself traversing up Scholl Canyon Road. Why was he trudging toward the large garbage dumpsite that had serviced most of the northeast area of Los Angeles?

  The answer never came. Seconds later, he was in some crazy, fast-forwarding world. His speed increased. He was no longer walking. His pace was too fast. In fact, he couldn’t even run this fast. He was flying up the road, turning left, then left again as the road continued to race on by underneath his feet. He turned right twice and left again, soaring over a long curving turn, edging him right, before he continued along a long straightaway. He climbed higher and higher as he went, the trees growing ever taller, the landscape becoming all the more wild and untamed. The road zigzagged back and forth a bit through giant pines and sycamores, until he came to a sharp right turn. Here the road seemed to turn back upon itself, rising sharply as it did so, until it straightened out once again. The vista before him widened. But, he had little time to consider it, as he was forced slightly to the right. He found himself before a wide grove, surrounded by trees, at least a half-mile square. At the middle of it, he could see a large crucifix made of stone, standing at least twelve feet high upon a three-stepped dais.

  The Marker, whispered something in his brain. This is the place where lies the Legacy you seek.

  Flash!

  He was standing, half a heartbeat later, next to the giant-sized cross, peering at the scrollwork, the various etchings, covering both the front and back surfaces of the crucifix. He wondered at their meaning, something tugging at his consciousness, telling him to turn to the right. He did so, his eyes widening. He saw a wide casement of stone steps, wide enough, in fact, ten men could walk abreast and still not touch the sides. They were moss covered and ancient looking, though they remained intact, devoid of cracks, seemingly unmarred by time. They seemed to have been there for centuries. He stepped toward them and saw they lead downward, into the ground, a good forty feet, before they stopped at a broad landing, made of mismatched stones - once polished to high sheen - but now shone dully. They were topped with years of grime and the weathering effects of the sun and wind and rain. Across from the landing, stood a pair of gargantuan doors, bound in steel, huge spikes rising from the metal, obvious defense against attack. But they didn’t appear as old as the stones. They looked brand new, as if forged only days ago. The contrast between them and the stone flooring was amazing. Joaquin paused, comparing the two – one ancient, the other just erected...

  Great sorcery, came the unbidden thought.

  He made his way down the last of the stairs and came to stand before the immense doorway. Somehow, he knew they weren’t only locked. They were sealed.

  More sorcery, an incredible magnitude, makes them thus.

  Whatever was beyond the portal, it was shut away from everyone and everything, except to those whose entry was permissible. Yet, when he placed a hand upon one of the four-inch thick steel bindings holding the immense wooden beams in place, it offered no resistance beneath his touch. One of the humongous doors opened wide enough to allow him to slip past.

  He stepped into a passage, larger than the portal itself. It stretched on, into a profoundly disturbing darkness that his eyes couldn’t pierce at first.

  Heretofore, unseen torches began to ignite along either side of the tunnel-like way, two at a time, bursting to life, pushing back the inky blackness farther and farther away.

  He stood for a full minute, watching, as the torches continued to light in their scones, again and again, until he could barely make them out. The passage, slowly unfolding before him, went on for at least a mile.

  He began to walk and found, once again, he was immersed in some sort of fast-forwarding state. Everything whirled around him and he was winging his way down the tunnel within moments, turning ever slightly to the right, traveling deeper in the earth. Until suddenly, he “popped” into real-time, before another giant set of stairs leading downward, only these were three times the size of the one’s he had left behind some miles distant. He could make out a landing below, huge, for beyond the stairs emptied into a chamber of gigantic proportions. It took no more than a thought and he was at the bottom of the stairs, facing another set of double doors, humongous, King Kong himself could’ve walked through without issue.

  Again, he placed a hand upon the mass of wood and steel, spike and hinge, blocking his path. Again, they didn’t hinder him. One of them opened smoothly, just enough for him to squeeze through.

  And found himself within a great, limestone cavern, complete with all of its natural features and deposits that had been the catalyst behind its growth over eons. The entire structure expanded slightly downward toward what Joaquin assumed was its’ middle. From there, way in the distance, something glowed, pushing back the darkness with a soft green, languidly shimmering. It was easy to discern it was far, far away from where the boy stood.

  As in the pas
sage minutes ago, ensconced torches began to light themselves along the rough, uneven walls of the cavern. Beginning at either side of him, they came alight two at a time – one on the right, one on the left. At first they were close, but eventually, they came to life farther and farther away from his position until they too were so off in the distance, he could barely make them out. He waited as the light slowly increased within the cavern, one minute and another, and then one more as the torches continued to burst into flame, revealing more and more of his surroundings. Joaquin was amazed when the luminance was enough to reveal he was in a space easily as large as the clearing above him. It was nearly half a mile square and entirely filled with every sort of limestone deposit imaginable. This was a living cavern.

  Wherever there was a sink- or swallow-hole grew great vertical chimneys, standing where water had flowed straight down. Where water had flowed, more horizontally, grew large galleries of calcium bicarbonate. He could see thin stalactites clinging to the ceiling and fat lumpy stalagmites protruding up from the floor, even finger-like formations called helictites, pointing this way and that, just about everywhere. Where water had run along a crack in the ceiling, strange types of fringe curtain-like growths emerged. Above him was a great collection of deposits that looked like freshly cooked bacon, while along the walls of the cavern rippled flowstone after flowstone, in places where water had run down the vertical stands of the cavern. In many areas about the irregular floor where it seemed turbulent water had once coursed, lay strange accumulations called Gours. They appeared like a series of ill-shaped ringlets with sharp wavy edges, but were sometimes one within another, like giant, random puzzle hastily conceived. Ultimately though, his eyes came back to rest upon the center of the cavern where still a soft emerald-blue light emanated.