Black Sea Gods: Chronicles of Fu Xi

by Braden, Brian

  “Atamoda, I will be back later this morning,” Atta called as he stepped back into the boat.

  “Thank you, Atta.” Her heart brimmed with gratitude. Some of the villagers, especially the men in their prime, chaffed at having to follow one so old. None of them could remain as calm and inspire so much courage as dear Atta. With Atta, they would be safe.

  Xva and Atta paddled out towards the center of the arun-ki near the köy-lo-hely. Even with both paddling, the boat cocked off in the powerful current.

  “Atamoda!” Someone called from across the water. She looked up and saw Ula standing outside her hut. Even from where she stood, Atamoda saw the shock on Ula’s face.

  She must have just awoken, too. Atamoda knew Ula was alone. Su-gár had spent the night with Alaya. Su-gár and Alaya were close in age and good friends. Su-gár often took refuge there when Ula and Ood-i fought.

  Atamoda shook her head and gave an exaggerated shrug.

  A sound like the faint hissing of grease just beginning to drip into the fire tickled Atamoda’s ears.

  “Mommy, can I play out here with the fishies a little longer?”

  “Yes, dear,” she said absently as she looked around for the source of the noise.

  “Can you get me a new stick, mommy?”

  “Not right now, dear.” The sound grew louder. “Kol-ok, do you hear that?”

  “What?”

  “It’s...” She strained to listen closer. “...It’s coming from the water.” Atamoda stepped to the edge of the dock next to Bat-or and looked down into the lagoon.

  At first, she thought they were discolorations, a trick of light and shadow. Have the fish returned? Atamoda bent over and squinted. The hissing suddenly grew louder, like the dark whispers of a thousand conspiracies.

  Just below the surface two flat, yellow eyes opened and peered back at her. Atamoda shrieked and jumped back. She grabbed Ba-tor’s hand and yanked him away from the edge.

  “Mommy sees the funny fish!” Bat-or giggled.

  Hundreds of slithering shapes suddenly came into focus. A thousand lifeless eyes darted back and forth, hungrily boring into her. A feeling of malignancy suddenly overpowered Atamoda and she screamed.

  “Mother!” Kol-ok rushed to her side. Atta and Xva brought the boat about.

  “Atamoda! Are you all right?” Atta called out.

  The collective hissing took on a broken quality; a stuttering, ragged cackle. One of the shapes swam to the edge of the dock and looked up at her. A hungry gash full of icy needles opened below the narrow, yellow eyes.

  Atamoda screamed hysterically, over and over. She squeezed Ba-tor’s hand until his screams joined hers.

  Kol-ok tried to pull her away and began to cry, too. “Mother, please! You’re scaring me...what’s wrong? Please tell me, please?” Confused, he looked into the water and then back to her.

  “Kol-ok, what’s the matter?” Atta shouted.

  “I don’t know! Help us, please!” Kol-ok sobbed.

  “Atamoda!” Ula shouted across the lagoon and stripped off her tunic. “I’m coming!”

  Somehow, Ula’s voice penetrated Atamoda’s terror. She looked up just in time to see Ula dive into the water. The instant Ula splashed into the water, the creatures turned and darted toward her like a pack of famished wolves. They moved with such speed they stretched and distorted into long oily streaks under the water. They were black spears aimed right for Ula.

  Ula didn’t come up for air.

  “No!” Atamoda screamed and pointed at Atta and Xva. “Atta, get Ula out of the water! Now! Hurry!”

  Instantly, they turned the boat and headed toward where Ula dove in.

  “I will get her!” Kol-ok moved to the edge.

  Atamoda snatched him back so hard he winced in pain. She put her face inches in front of his, eyes wide and shaking. “No!” You will take your brother and go inside the hut! Do not come out.”

  “But...”

  “Now!”

  Kol-ok pushed Bat-or up the ladder and into the hut without another word.

  Ula broke the surface, but far downstream from her hut. She reached up with a pale blue hand as her eyes rolled back into her head. She slipped back down and vanished.

  Atamoda ran to the end of the dock as Atta and Xva paddled hard to Ula. Demons seethed around their boat, but Atta and Xva were oblivious to the monsters inches away.

  They can’t see them!

  Before she could react, Atta dove in.

  Black forms instantly swarmed under the ripples of his splash like a knotted ball of marsh vipers. They rolled over him in a silent frenzy.

  “Xva! Get him out of the water!” she shouted. Xva didn’t acknowledge her and calmly paddled the boat back and forth, clearly expecting Atta to break the surface with Ula in his arms any second.

  Atamoda watched helplessly as the disaster slowly unfolded before her. Villagers gathered in front of their huts and on their docks. Atamoda saw a few prepare to jump in.

  “Do not enter the water!” she shouted to all who could hear. What could she tell them? How could she explain this? “The water is cursed! Stay out of the water!”

  A few of the dark shapes drifted away from around Xva’s boat. Atamoda instinctively knew the demons had made their kills. Atta and Ula were dead.

  She fell to the dock and released a long, desperate moan, powerless as death unfurled before her.

  Xva put the paddle in the boat and flipped over the side into the water. Atamoda squeezed the sides of her head and prayed for this nightmare to end.

  “Stay out of the water!” she screamed over and over.

  Xva’s empty boat drifted by on the current, turning around and around like a dead leaf on a winter pond. Atamoda placed her head against the dock and sobbed. Concerned villagers called her name from across the lagoon. A few shouted for Atta, Xva and Ula. Then their shouts became cries and screams.

  Suddenly, a pale hand shot out of the water and grabbed the dock. Atmoda lunged and grabbed Xva. She pulled with all her strength, but black ice formed and cracked around where his shoulders emerged from the water.

  Desperate, she plunged her upper body into the water and grabbed under his armpits. The cold seized her, almost making her inhale a mouthful of water. She opened her eyes and faced dozens of yellow eyes, but her courage held. Atamoda locked her arms around Xva’s back and pulled with everything she had. The demons shrank back for a moment, perhaps surprised at her audacity. In that moment she managed to pull Xva out of the water. They both flopped backwards onto the dock.

  She pushed Xva onto his back and knelt over him. His eyes were closed and his breaths where short and shallow. The young man shivered violently. Dozens of bloody slash marks and needle-like bites peppered his body.

  “Kol-ok!” She shouted up to the hut. “Bring blankets, now!”

  She looked back at the lagoon for any sign of Atta or Ula, but only saw Xva’s empty boat, a dot drifting on the far southern horizon.

  The hissing returned. Something bumped the dock. Atamoda placed her hands against the wood and felt a rough, ragged vibration. Another sound rose above the hissing, of wood being chipped away, of a thousand needle-like teeth gnawing away the pilings.

  20. In The Land of Giants

  The legend does not say when the Narim appeared in the Hur Valley; only that it was long ago. The tribe of immortals came from a perfect land far beyond the mountains.

  A tree with golden apples grew in that paradise. Women who ate from that tree gave birth to immortal sons and daughters with silken white hair. They were deceived by a trickster into betraying their god and, as punishment, were cast out. In his mercy, their god sent them a swallow.

  “Of all the blessings of this land, ye may take only one,” the swallow said.

  “We do not want to be like cattle. We do not want to reproduce in great numbers. We want to live with dignity. Let us not depart from truth! Let fairness be our path! Let us not know grief! Let us live in freedom! Give us wisdom,
” the Narim answered as one.

  Their god saw this was good. “Only with wisdom may ye find the path back to paradise through a fallen world.”

  The Chronicle of Fu Xi

  ***

  They followed the road north until mid-day, when it came to an intersection of another road running east and west. To the east, a wide, well-rutted road led to the river. The west and north roads were only overgrown footpaths. Here they rested on a stump and prepared to cross the bridge.

  Aizarg’s toes barely touched the ground. He felt like a child as he sat on a gray stump bigger around than his hut. When Setenay said the Narim laid waste to entire forests, he had humble willows and marsh oaks in mind. These kupar stumps must have once been enormous trees.

  Aizarg tried to peer around Sarah at the Kupar Bridge, looming behind her.

  “Hold your head still! I’ll be done in a moment.” Sarah grabbed his chin and made him face her. She paid scant attention to the surrounding wonders as she arranged a blanket over his head.

  “My people often cover their heads like this,” Sarah said as she worked. “It is something passed down from the Narim. We call it a kaffiya. It keeps the sun off our heads and necks when we work in the fields. Brown Lo blankets are different from the white Hur weave, but it will cover your hair and make you stand out a little less.”

  She secured it around his head with a twisted piece of cloth and then stepped back to examine her handiwork. Sarah rested her chin in her palm, narrowed her eyes and tapped her foot.

  “I think it will do,” she said after a few moments.

  Aizarg looked to his right from whence they came. On either side of the road, an endless expanse of giant gray stumps dotted the southern landscape. They reminded him of the Sammujad ghosts. Aizarg ran his hand over the stump’s flat surface. It didn’t show a single axe stroke. The Narim sliced off these trees as cleanly as Scythians slice off the tops of their victim’s skulls.

  The wood was solid under his hand. If they took their forest so long ago, why aren’t the stumps rotted out?

  Sarah held out her hand. “I need your pack, please.”

  Aizarg thought about asking why, but handed it over without a word. Sarah considered the pack and then looked nervously over her shoulder at the bridge.

  “Aren’t you going to cover your head?” Aizarg asked. Sarah didn’t respond and started to rummage through his pack. She pulled out some dried fish jerky and his water skin.

  “Eat and drink. It may be your last chance for quite some time.” He took them, but she wouldn’t meet his eyes and resumed digging through his pack.

  She’d been distracted since they descended into the Hur Valley. At first, Aizarg thought Sarah was still disturbed by Setenay’s terrified outburst. Now, he suspected Sarah preoccupied with trying to find a way into the city.

  They encountered this road not long after they entered the valley and followed it into the Dead Forest. Aizarg was curious about the mysterious trenches cut into the earthen road. Sarah tried to explain these ruts were formed by something called ‘wheels’, but Aizarg couldn’t grasp the concept. Occasionally, he hopped into the deepest ruts, which often came up to his mid-thigh. The packed soil felt like stone. Sarah said they were made by the Narim in ancient times. His imagination ran wild as he tried to picture what a wheel might look like.

  Aizarg slowly chewed his food and gazed down the eastern road. He tried to stay focused on the journey ahead, but he could only stare in awe at the twin towers of the Kupar Bridge.

  It looks so strong, yet graceful. Only gods could build such a wonder.

  “Why would they need something so big?” Aizarg whispered, not really talking to anyone but himself.

  Sarah looked up from the pack. “My people have asked themselves that for generations. The Narim never told my ancestors why they built it. For most of the year, the Hur River is so shallow a child could wade across. Some say they did it to honor their god.”

  Sarah continued to talk as she placed Aizarg’s pack on the stump next to him. “Once, in the time of my grandmother, King Yontel ordered the entire population of Hur-ar onto the bridge. The census was the official reason, but the real reason was a wager with one of his nobles, who was sure the bridge would collapse under the weight.”

  Aizarg turned to her, horrified. “Why would a leader take such a risk with the lives of his people?”

  “For gold and pride, of course.”

  “Obviously, it held,” Aizarg said.

  “Thousands of people packed the bridge from end to end. Grandmother said the bridge didn’t even creak.”

  Sarah straightened up and considered Aizarg’s pack. “It will do.”

  “What will do?”

  Sarah pointed to the bridge. “The road climbs a gentle bluff overlooking the river. Do you see it?”

  “Yes.”

  “That is the western access to the bridge and the first guard shack. There will be two warriors there. They collect the king’s toll...and a hefty bribe.”

  Aizarg tore his eyes away from the bridge and fully focused on Sarah. She stared at him so intensely it made Aizarg uncomfortable, as if she were taking his measure.

  “Are you going to cover your hair, daughter?”

  She ignored his question. “Do you trust me, Uros?”

  She has not called me Father since we entered the valley.

  Aizarg cocked his head. “What?”

  “Do you trust me?” Sarah reiterated.

  “Absolutely.”

  “Then do what I say without question.”

  Sarah pulled the leather drawstring, about a finger in thickness and a yard long, from Aizarg’s pack. She wrapped the leather strap twice around her neck and then tied it with just enough slack so it wouldn’t bind her skin. With a few quick, well-practiced movements, she tied a series of square knots with the two loose ends until they formed an ornate cord about four inches long. With the remaining slack she created a wide loop and then tied it off.

  She rummaged around Aizarg’s pack until she found his rope and flint knife.

  “Uros, I need to cut some of this rope. May I?”

  “Yes.” Aizarg burned with curiosity.

  He watched as she cut a piece four arms in length. She cut another smaller length and placed it on the stump next to the pack.

  Sarah pointed to the short length of rope. “Use that to secure your pack.”

  Next, Sarah took the flint knife and sliced her sheath dress just below her left hip.

  “Sarah?” Aizarg gasped.

  Sarah continued to hack at her skirt. “I hope Setenay will forgive me for ruining her dress.”

  After a few minutes of work she cut her skirt diagonally from her left hip to just above her right knee. She then cut a vertical slit revealing a long stretch of her right thigh.

  She tossed the excess deerskin to the ground.

  Aizarg considered the spare material, thinking it a shame to waste it. He stood, picked it up, and started to wrap the deerskin around his staff. “This will attract more attention than our hair.”

  “No, leave it unwrapped,” she said. “Your staff could be seen as a sign of wealth. It will attract the right kind of attention.”

  Aizarg warily put the strips in his pack. He had a bad feeling about this.

  Sarah took the long length of rope and tied one end around the loop on her new necklace.

  “Your hair will be taken as one touched by the gods. My hair could also be taken as a desirable oddity by men willing to pay gold.” Sarah placed the other end of the rope in Aizarg’s hand. “You are now a flesh trader from the steppe and I am your slave.”

  “Sarah, no!” Horrified, Aizarg pushed the rope away.

  “Listen! You said you trusted me, so trust me. My people say only a fool or a slave enters Hur-ar without gold or trade. We have no gold. We have no trade. If we cross the bridge without either, the guards will kill you and take me and they will be fully within their rights to do so! The Hur-po are cruel
, but they live and die by the law. A poor man and his daughter have no protection under Hur law, but a slaver and his pleasure wares do.”

  “Absolutely not! We will swim the river. We will climb the wall—I don’t care, but I will not see you defiled. You are my blood...”

  “No!” she screamed and pushed him back with such ferocity Aizarg stumbled and slumped down onto the stump. “I am not your blood! I am a daughter of Hur-ar and a pleasure slave to Virag the Terrible.” Wide-eyed with clenched jaw, a knife-edge intensity replaced her sweet tenderness.

  “Every day I was a slave I was tortured, humiliated and did things for which I can never forgive myself. But each day I wore Virag’s collar I thanked the spirits I was not a slave in Hur-ar.” Sarah pointed to the bridge. “There is no love and no hope beyond those towers for slaves or those without trade.”

  She poked angrily at his chest. “I know what we are about to face, you don’t! My body will be our trade. I will pave our way to the Black Fortress. Accept it, for there is no other choice.”

  Aizarg sat in stunned disbelief. Sarah, his daughter, vanished, replaced by Sarah the survivor. He assumed he knew the torments Sarah must have suffered, but until now he never saw the scars.

  He clasped her hands, kissed them and held them to his cheek. “I am sorry, dear Sarah. I am so sorry, so sorry...” Aizarg wanted to take away her pain and make everything good again. Seeing her like this broke his heart. Atamoda and his children flashed into his mind. He thought of Setenay’s madness and of lost Ba-lok. He held his face in his hands and tried to squeeze his eyes shut and hold back the tears, but they broke through anyway.

  She knelt over Aizarg, kissed his forehead and held him to her bosom. Sarah spoke with an air of resignation. “Until we make it to the Black Fortress, you will see me do things and say things which might make you despise me, even hate me. Please, do not judge me too harshly. When this is all over, I will understand if you want to disown me.”

  “I will never disown you!” he cried and lowered his head into her arms.

  Sarah’s voice darkened. She sounded like a stranger. “Be warned, Aizarg of the Lo, the man you are now will not be the same man who returns from Hur-ar. Cry now, but leave your tears in the Dead Forest.”