by S A Maus
Omer grunted. “Unless that prey is Nepharic, or an Alappiq, or a Banshee, or-,” Tahr threw up a hand, cutting Omer short.
“You are no fun, Tested Omer. I hope you enjoy yourself more on the journey, or it will be a long walk.”
“Walk?” Omer said. Now it was his turn to raise a brow. “I had planned to take a horse. Timmelan is at the northern edge of Hyrotha. It will take days by horseback. I cannot imagine how long it would take on foot.”
The huge Hunter shrugged, as if he could not be bothered by such worries. “The road along Arbelekost has washed out. The rains last month. You probably haven’t heard, being busy with your Testing. Horses would not fare well out there. We must go through the Irgiklod instead,” Tahr said. “There are no easy paths there, unless you want to go around the mountains. Horses are not made for the high roads.”
Tahr stopped and narrowed his eyes. “And you will have to drag me if you want to travel the Underworld. Wouldn’t that be a sight? You pulling me along, your little arms straining.” He laughed.
Omer sighed but played along. “I’ve no clue what you’re referring to,” he said. “I don’t know of any place in the Irgiklod called Underworld.”
“Fine, fine, the Khanista’elar’meanatta,” Tahr cried into the night with raised hands. “And a pox on the head of every Lether that thought it was a good name. Why on Aarde they built a city under the mountain and not over it is too much for this hard head to think about, and I think beyond those Lether as well. Did you know that there is no other Lethermen city below the ground? Or so Zekhain claims. The old world was strange. But I like Underworld better, a dark name for a dark place. I prefer the sun and the moon for walking.”
Omer groaned. The thought of walking all the way to Timmelan was not exciting. “Fine, no horses,” he said. “But no singing from you, then. I know what you get up to on these long journeys. I overheard Sarai complaining of it once when you two returned from a mission.”
Tahr’s head jerked back as if he had been stung. “Sarai? After the Grim incident? She loved my singing!”
“I think not,” Omer said.
Tahr huffed but said no more. Together they passed through the entrance courtyard, up the stairs and beyond the great overhang that welcomed Hunters to Shalim. It was an odd feeling, passing through an overhang Omer had passed many hundreds of times. Now he was leaving, no longer a novice. For a moment he paused there, looking up at the high arch. “I feel like I am going away forever,” he said, and a brief sadness rose in his chest.
Tahr placed a hand on his shoulder, his mighty grip soft and comforting. “Not forever,” he said. Then he tilted his head. “But the old Omer… he is gone. So maybe you are leaving forever. Leave behind the Man, enter the world En’shen. That should be a proud moment. Smile, Omer! You have become what few Men dream of. You are Omer of the En’shen.”
“I am a Hunter,” Omer said.
“Ai, you are a Hunter.”
Omer bowed his head and pressed on.
***
Their path went first down the mountain on the eastern side. There lie the Steep Stairs, cut harshly into the mountain and weaving back and forth in a steep decline. After an hour they reached the bottom, stepping off into a fine mist that clouded the Pass of Shen, which cut between the mountains and opened into the lands of Oreeon in the east and Hyshan in the west. Hyshan would have been the easier way, being a more civilized and tempered land where Men held great swaths of the earth and the forest, with long carved roads to walk and pleasant paths in between. Yet, under Tahr’s guidance, the east had become their way. They turned left and walked for some time around a looping road of stone, until at last they rounded a corner and the mist ended. They were atop a high place overlooking the Ever-plains of Oreeon, a sea of endless gray-green grass that stood as high as Omer’s shoulder, billowing in a southern wind that caused it to look like the ocean was rolling beneath them. The Pass fell from the height in a steep hill, following as it could through the pathless land on the Old Ivim Road, though to call it a true road in that late day would have been folly, for it was overgrown and broken in many places, ending far away in Emnir Ilon, a forgotten city of Men. The smell of freshly passed rain was on the air.
The road was not their path, for it cut nearly perfect through the center of Oreeon, and the Irgiklod waited far to the north. Instead, the two companions turned off the path and on to the rough mountainside. For some hours they walked down the sloping hills which fell off the Hyrgeled Mountains, passing from rocky heights to short, bristling grass, and then finally into the great sea of high gray-green. The going was slow from there as the rolling growth clung about their feet and pushed back with every gust of wind. Oreeon had forgotten Men long ago. It no longer cared for their need or their haste, and it threw against the pair every blade of grass and every crumbling dirt patch with as much vigor as a mother protecting her nest. There were no paths through Oreeon save the old Road, and to walk beyond the Road was to enter a struggle of Man against the untamed Wild. Even with his Tested body, Omer found fatigue threatening to gnaw through his feet and climb into his bones, finding a place between the bouts of pain his Cost would shudder through his limbs.
For six days they walked beneath the shadow of the mountains, staying as they could to the higher ridge of the long slopes. The slopes were hard to follow, for the mountains became steeper the further north they went, until only cliff faces were on their left with a sparse gap of conquerable land where the grass was high but still shorter than the rest of the Ever-plains. Here they could move with more comfort, though Omer would never call it comfortable, for the steep hills were prone to giving way suddenly and the wind blew without ceasing on their heads. Oreeon stretched on like water, a shoreless lake where the waves swept without end; but slowly the northern mountains, which had at first been little more than peeking hats above the horizon, became peering faces that watched their approach with grim, brown faces.
During their walk, Omer took what chances he could to become used to his Tested form. At first, it was very difficult. He could see farther and clearer in the daylight, and his ears now heard sounds that he could not even place, so far away they must have been. At one time he would hear an eagle’s cry when no eagles could be seen above, at others they baying of rams without sight of any on the mountains, and on the fourth day he heard deep rumbles of thunder despite the skies above them being cloudless. It was maddening and confusing, but Tahr promised that, in time, he would come to consider it as normal as he had once considered his old body normal.
On the seventh day, as they came near to the hills that bordered the Irgiklod Mountains, Omer stopped them. They had eaten only once since they left Shalim and he was beginning to feel weakness creep in.
“I packed too much, I think,” he said when they had seated and were eating their meager meal. “We’ll not have eaten half this food by the time we reach Appledor.”
“Novice mistake,” Tahr winked. “I should have warned you, I suppose, but you would not have believed me. You eat the same for forty years and you are a bit skeptical when told you won’t need to anymore. But what is this about Appledor? Are we stopping there? I know it is near to the mountains but I assumed we would go west immediately. Unless you have been craving a pie without telling me. I have no objections to pie.”
Omer chuckled but shook his head. “Appledor is where Gaul lived in the short time he was patrolling,” Omer answered. “It’s… it’s why he was called to the contract he perished on, because he was near at hand. I had not planned to go there when I thought we were going through Hyshan, but now I figure we should start there to see if anyone has heard rumor of his return. It is a long way to Timmelan, after all. Perhaps we will learn much before we arrive.”
Tahr pursed his lips and nodded. “Reasonable.” Then he smiled and slapped Omer on the back. “You have a strategist's mind. Not me. I am a straight-line sort. Point me and let me go, I’ll be there quicker than not. But this is your contrac
t, not mine. Where you go, I follow.”
“I do not know if it is the wisest way, but it is the closest,” Omer said. “Gaul always spoke highly of the people, as well, and Appledor is well acclaimed for its bakers. It may be our last chance to see pleasant people before we reach Timmelan, unless we stumble across a friendly farmer in the wild.”
“Those Timmelans are a surly bunch,” Tahr grimaced. “Only been there once, but they were nasty as the drunkest sailor. What is it they call us? Runners?”
“Walkers,” Omer answered. “They call everyone not a citizen the same, not just Hunters; but that is hardly their worst quality. It is hard to believe Gaul came from Timmelan. Though, I suppose he is not really from The Hill, as they call it. Their farm was in the fields south, so perhaps he avoided their worst qualities. I would often jest that Timmelan would have thrown him out sooner or later if he had not come to Shalim.”
“That he would,” Tahr said. “Appledor it is then. I am excited! I have not been there in some time. I miss the smell of the bakeries.”
“I heard they have become something of a tourist spot of late,” Omer said. “Apple pies, made from real Appledor apples, they say, and people come from as far as Thrimm to buy them. I have not had one for…,” he frowned. “Has it really been ten years? It seems like only yesterday, but I was not yet thirty when I had my last bite. I wonder if it still tastes the same.”
“We won’t find out standing here!” Tahr cried, and then he leaped up and bounded off towards the northern mountains.
***
On the morning of the eighth day they reached the northern hills and began their ascent up the Irgiklod. Their aim was the Crack, a precarious path that crossed over a low point in the mountains where two great peaks intersected and created a crevice that could be walked. Most Men avoided that way as the path was hard and prone to rockfall and mudslides, opting instead to take the eastern or western ways where true passes through the mountains could be had; but the Hunters favored the Crack (or Lemin’s Way, as they preferred) for its speed, and because it was near the Underworld, an ancient Lethermen stronghold which was long abandoned and had fallen to ruin. That place was a constant draw for evil things that sought the mystic runes the ancient Lether had perfected ere the Magi came.
They crossed the hills without trouble. The high grass of Oreeon failed and gave way to rocky earth full of sharp stones. With dusk falling they reached the slope of the mountain and made their way up. High above them, nearly invisible in the crush of earth that was the Irgiklod, a single seam waited, a gap that looked to be razor-thin from a distance, as if a giant had taken a knife to the rock. The Crack. Between the rocks a wind was blowing, full of stale air that smelled like dust and promised a miserable trek through that place.
The pathless hill gave way to the thin crevice of the Crack and they went down into it just as night was coming full. On either side, the mountain rose up in a sheer wall, without cut or break, and only the occasional pock where a stone had fallen to scar the earth. By daylight the Crack was very dark, being swathed in long shadows save for the noon hour when the sun peeked down. By night it was a pit of nothing, a blank murk where no sane Man would dare to tread. The moon and stars could not reach here. To Omer’s tested eyes, however, it seemed to be only a deep dusk, the gray shade of evening that, while not easy to walk in, was not hindering to their way.
“I needed a torch the last time I was here,” Omer said.
“Hm?” Tahr said. He had been lost in thought and staring at the ground. He looked up with a raised brow. “Torch? Oh, yes, well you were normal then. Eagle eyes now,” he squinted and tapped his temple.
Omer stopped. He ran his hands over the rock on either side, the sensation of rough stone strange and vibrant, much stronger than it had ever been. It felt as if he had never touched stone before and was just now realizing it. Every groove was deeper, every scratch harder. “I feel like a different Omer walked this road last time. Like I am someone else now.”
“You are,” Tahr said plainly. “Old Omer died in the Trials. He was boring though. I am hoping new Omer will be more fun, but he has not shown it yet.”
“It is not a Hunter’s job to be fun,” Omer answered.
“Not their job to be boring either,” Tahr shrugged. “It is true though. You are now what Men only dream of in their little homes. Even the earth will recognize it.”
“What does that mean?” Omer said.
Tahr stopped and turned around. He raised a hand, then slowly he pointed up towards the blank night sky. “Do you hear that? That distant tapping?” he asked.
Omer tilted his head, listening to the dark. For a moment he heard nothing but noise, the rush of wind and the caw of the crow, blended amidst insects and groaning rock, but then, at first low, but rising as he focused on it, he heard a sound like a finger tapping on stone. “I do,” Omer answered.
“That is water falling off a melted peak far above us, hitting either stone or a still pool,” Tahr answered. His voice had dropped to a somber tone and his face went flat. Omer found it oddly disconcerting to see the great Hunter without a smile at least edging his lips. Tahr tilted his head up. “No farmer has ever heard that tap. No Man has ever seen it.” He looked back down to grab Omer’s gaze. “I know you heard the thunder a couple days ago. That was a storm somewhere in Hyshan over the mountains. A storm we never felt even a drop of. The world recognizes, and the world will teach you secrets, if you listen. Old Omer could not have heard it.”
“I would not like to take the Trials again, but I think you are right,” Omer said. “This change is special.”
“It is,” Tahr said with a smile. “It saves us much money on torches.”
They fell back into step, the muffled scrapes echoing across the thin path and escaping up into a dark, cloudless sky.
Sometime near the fourth hour of morning they arrived at the first rise in the path, a steep ascent where the Crack sharpened and became barely wide enough for a single foot to land cleanly. Here was where the danger of the Crack scared off most travelers. The center of the path stretched for half a mile with a treacherous gap that at times was not wide enough to step on, requiring the traveler to sidle up on either side of the pass and step along with wide legs. Horses and mules were entirely out of the question, and even veteran adventurers would not often return for a second go at the shortcut through the Irgiklod. Omer and Tahr had little difficulty traversing the slippery way, but even they were slowed down to a crawl and seemed to barely inch along as the stars wheeled overhead.
It was nearing dawn when Tahr pointed up the eastern wall. “We are near the Underworld,” he said. Omer looked up. Twenty meters overhead a stone grate could be seen. It was a vent, one of many that pocked the outer face of the Irgiklod and helped with airflow long ago when the Lether lived beneath the place their feet now tread. Just below the grate was a curving rune, shaped like a half-moon with a sharp point at its center: the mark of its carver, though what their name was not even the Hunters remembered. If Omer followed the point of the moon north he could see many more vents lining the way, each arrayed in a straight line that even the Hunters would have struggled to match in craft. Omer had never seen them so clearly and he marveled at the ancient work. A tap from Tahr pulled him back to the pass at hand.
“Come on,” Tahr said. “I don’t want to be sleeping on this.” He raised his foot and tapped the narrow gap below them.
Six hours later they were ascending the last rise in the Crack, cresting into a land brilliant with sunlight. Far overhead and to the east a waterfall crashed down, passing from deep pools into a rushing river that flowed beside wide plains of grass and thin forests, hurrying north into the land of Hyrotha. It was the Right of the Twin Rivers, and it would eventually meet far away with the Left (which fell off the Irgiklod far to the west) and become the Frim, the greatest and only major river north of the Irgiklod. The sun gleamed off the waters, casting the land in a halo of morning that seemed to wash over
the grass and the hills like the waters it came from.
Near at hand and just off the mountain slope stood the town of Appledor, nestled up against the Right and surrounded by orchards of apple trees. Even from the great distance, Omer could see Men wandering about, hands full with bushels of harvest or tools for the trade, and beyond them a haze of smoke rising from the bakeries that Appledor was famous for.
“Thatch roofs and sweet smells,” Tahr declared. “Dutiful Hunters might cut west now, but curse me if I’m going to turn down those pies. These are my kind of people, Omer. Regular folk who care about sunrise and full stomachs, laughing by the fire. Not those Nunians, always wondering about some fashion, or those Thrimm poets.”
“They are a nicer bunch, at least,” Omer said.
“Nicer and warmer! The world has been harsh to Hunters of late. They seem to forget our long protection.”
“Maybe they have,” Omer answered. “We have become so good at our duties that those we protect forget why we do them in the first place. But such is the Hunter calling.”
“Such it is, but I will enjoy the smiles of those that appreciate it,” Tahr said.
“And those smiles are completely magnanimous?” Omer stabbed a finger into Tahr’s shoulder. “Certainly has nothing to do with the wild Byrgryph you killed out here a few years back.”
Tahr shook his head, the metal clasps in his braided locks catching the sun in dazzling array. “You remember,” he laughed. “I had hoped you would forget and think I was merely well-liked. Well, all the same, I feel at home here. They like Hunters, and that means something these days.”
