Aram considered these things while gazing obliquely up into the star-encrusted vault of the heavens from an overhang created by one of the great boulders, his head resting on his pack. The wind howled past just a yard beyond his feet but he was relatively comfortable. The armor kept his body temperature constant. Eventually his thoughts turned to Ka’en as they always did, and with the image of her beautiful face in his mind, he fell asleep.
In the morning, he ate a breakfast of fruit from the mountain and set himself to climb up through the jumbled mess above. He soon determined that climbing up, over, or through the broken rock that had been tumbled into the roadway was impossible, so he went to his right and got above it, working his way up and along the broken walls of the gap from whence it had come.
By mid-morning, he had worked his way past the summit of the crater’s rim to the south. An hour later, he walked out into the knee-deep snow on its gentler southern slope and gazed out over the forests of Seneca. The trees were devoid of leaves now and from his vantage point; the vast forest looked like endless clouds of gray smoke rolling over the snowy hills though here and there, there was the bright splash of something evergreen, cedar perhaps, or holly. As he stood in the crisp sun, gazing southward and resting a moment, something else caught his eye.
In several places, far to the south and southeast, thin tendrils of smoke, thickly clustered in spots, rose out of the trees and dissipated over the naked forest. So there were still people inhabiting these woods. Descendents of the Senecans, or someone else? For just a moment, he considered going southward through that trackless forest and finding out who it was that tended those fires. In the end, though, he turned back west and started across the exterior slope of the crater toward the jumbled foothills below the mountains beyond which lay the Inland Sea and the high plains of the horses. And home. And Ka’en.
As he climbed the slope, the crater wall trended around toward the northwest and he followed it willingly. The sheer wall of mountains ahead of him to the west and southwest appeared impregnable as they rose above the foothills on the western borders of Seneca, jutting as they did at a severe angle into the sky for thousands of meters. The high plateau lay to the northwest and he hoped to gain its height and from there make his way southward through those mountains from the advantage of a much higher starting point.
Eventually, as the angle of the crater’s exterior wall grew more severe, he worked his way up to the top and walked along the summit of the rim where the snow was not as deep. To the north, Kelven’s mountain was wreathed in high clouds. There was high, thin overcast above the plateau ahead of him as well but the southern sky, where the sun lived at this time of year, was clear.
When the sun dropped behind the massive wall of mountains to the southwest, he went down off the crater’s slope into the forested foothills, hoping to pass the night near running water if possible. Though it was bitterly cold, the armor protected him from the worst of it, its thin metal seeming to draw warmth from the sun, and he grew thirsty from the unending exertion of fighting his way through the deep snow. There was a stream tumbling down through the foothills but it was frozen over. He found a pool and broke through the ice with his dagger, drank his fill of the icy water and then refilled his canteen.
He slept that night in the limited shelter of a stand of small cedars and the next day continued up through the foothills to the northwest, gaining altitude all the time. The snow was patchier under the trees and made for easier walking. After two more days he made his way up the spine of a rocky ridge above a tree-filled ravine and looked out over the strange landscape of the high plateau that he’d crossed a little less than two months before.
It was even colder than it had been then and the same wind howled incessantly out of the mountains to the north. But that wind tended to blow holes in the snow cover, creating patches of open ground that would make for faster travel. Aram adjusted his packs and headed out across the plateau, skirting the pits that dotted the barren ground, now filled with snow, and around the tall spires of rock that jutted up everywhere. He stayed close to the flanks of the mountains which here made the sharp turn from a north-south tangent and trended nearly straight west along the southern border of the plateau.
That night, he hunkered out of the wind behind one of the rock spires; he slept very little. For the next three days he went west by the mountains, looking for a passage south. The cold began to wear on him then, even through the armor. The armor protected him, but after constant exposure to frigid air and wind, the core temperature of the strange metal of which it was composed began to drop, especially now that he tended to travel in the shadow of the mountains and out of sight of the sun.
He considered trying to cross the plateau and making his way into Vallenvale, but that was the long way around. Besides, though the horses had crossed the plateau in less than a week with him astride Thaniel, it would take him immeasurably longer afoot so he stayed near the mountains as he went west, hoping to discover a passage south. Finally, late on the afternoon of the fourth day he spied a pass between two mountains a couple of thousand feet above him that looked promising.
Aram spent one more night on the edge of the plateau, hunched as usual behind one of the crumbling spires of rock. The cold wind was biting at him now. Kelven had told him the truth – the armor would only protect him against so much for only so long. Before bedding down he looked around for wood to start a fire but there was none.
The next morning, he grabbed a mouthful of dried meat and ate it as he headed up the rocky, snowy slope toward the heights. The slope was not overly steep and by angling first one way and then the other, he’d gained the pass by just after midday. As the slope leveled out toward the summit of the pass, he trudged upward across a berm of crusted snow, found the top of it and gazed southward.
Mountains, and then more mountains – seemingly countless, endless spires of massive stone rolled away before him; broken teeth of jagged rock punched up into the sky for as far south as he could see, separated by deep, dark, and narrow defiles.
Aram was dismayed; he’d hoped to look through the gap in the rock and see, far away, the gray glint of the inland sea. Instead there was only an endless wilderness of immense granite peaks. He stood for a time, uncertain, daunted by the vast wilderness of vertical, icy rock that stretched away to the south. Then he looked west-northwest across the plateau toward distant Vallenvale. But that way held no hope for him either – he could not even see the distant forested pass that marked the entrance to that lower country.
He looked southward again and then understanding came. The view before him was straight down through the vast range of mountains that was on the eastern border of the sea, four or five hundred miles of impregnable ramparts of stone. The sea itself, and the high plains he hoped to reach, were apparently further west, on a tangent that ran southwest of where he stood. Believing this to be true, he was forced to make a decision. He could return to the plateau and try to gain another passage that led to the south further west, or enter here and angle to the right and try to make his way southwestward through the mountains toward the distant sea.
To that end, he studied the landscape that he must cross. Immediately to his front, the slope between the mountains fell steeply into a deep canyon that wound away to the south between the peaks until it ran up against another massive mound of stone, where it turned either west or east, Aram couldn’t tell. It appeared to him that it would be dangerous to descend into it and impossible to climb back out if it turned out that, in fact, below that distant pinnacle, it turned eastward toward Seneca, where he did not want to go, rather than westward, toward the sea.
He turned away and studied the mountain slopes. The mountain to his right, on the western side of the pass, rose above him for several thousand feet, an immense sheer tooth of rock, and its slopes were steep and spiked with sharp outcroppings, but to the southwest, in the direction he wished to go, between this peak and yet another monstrous pinnacle of rock, the
re was a narrow pass that led toward the west, about on level with that where he stood.
He studied the slope of the mountain angling away from him to the southwest above the dark canyon. It was mostly broken and abrupt, with knife-edged ridges and deep sloughs, but the most dangerous section was a wide slab of steep, smooth rock face that began below where the spire of the peak thrust upward and ran down the entire slope and over the edge of a precipice to fall into the depths. Very little snow clung to that slick rocky surface; it could find little purchase on the precipitous side of the mountain.
Aram studied the mountainside and gazed across at the pass to the southwest for several minutes and then, knowing that he might very well deeply regret the action, he shifted his pack, adjusted his weapons and addressed the perilous, steep slope.
The air was cold and thin and as he struggled across the nearly vertical slope of rock, fighting for every handhold and foothold, his lungs labored and burned. Every step threatened a plunge into the abyss, progress was slow, and as the sun fell behind the mountains and declined into the west, fear grew in him that night would catch him before he made the saddle on the south side of the mountain above.
The passage of the smoother area of rock was the worst, and by far the most time-consuming. Though it was not as devoid of handholds and footholds as it had appeared from the pass – there were many vertical fractures and tiny horizontal ledges – it nonetheless required intense effort and great care to make the traverse, especially bearing weapons and two knapsacks, and to avoid a deadly plummet down the cold, steep rock.
It grew darker. The sun was still in the sky somewhere to the west for its dying rays colored the tops of the peaks, but it would soon leave the earth. And it was already twilight down on the mountainside around Aram by the time he reached the far side of the area of slick rock and out onto the broken, corrugated slopes beyond. But this region, while rougher, and providing more purchase for his hands and feet, was just as steep and dangerous and he grew increasingly convinced that night would catch him there.
And that’s what happened. The sunlight left the peaks around him, night fell quickly, and the rocky defiles below the mountains dissolved into shapeless, utter blackness. When the day died, the saddle to the west was still a quarter of a mile away. Desperate and terrified of trying to sleep on the precipitous rock, Aram eased to the bottom of a rockslide as the light failed and wedged his boots into clefts of the broken rock, leaning back against the slope. He was tired and worn, dreadfully weary, but he knew that to sleep in such a place was to invite death to share his tenuous bed.
He ate and drank and then gazed up at the stars, and kept his mind occupied with thoughts of Ka’en, letting the bittersweet quality of those thoughts keep him awake. Hours, it seemed, passed, but they might have only been minutes. Weary, cold, and worn, he lost all sense of time’s passage. With excruciating relentlessness, the cold, thin darkness among the peaks gradually robbed him of his concentration and deteriorated into the terrifying promise of bitter, endless night. The terrible cold and utter silence of the high peaks lulled him toward sleep many times. He repeatedly fought it off by slapping himself hard on the side of his hooded head. In the end, though, he lost the battle with the cold and fatigue and his efforts to stay awake continued on only as a fantasy in fitful dreams.
A sound like the distant howling of many wolves awoke him. Rays of sunlight from the very eastern edge of the world had found the topmost of the high peaks and wind was rising rapidly from the depths in search of its warmth, moaning among the rocky defiles as if the sharp spurs and ridges wounded it as it came. Startled, momentarily forgetting where he was, he came erect. It was a terrible error. The weight of his pack pushed him over and he pitched down the mountainside.
As he slid and tumbled downward toward the dark canyon below, his pack began to come apart and he left a trail of debris on the slope above him as he fell. Then, as he tried desperately to grab at the jutting rock with his gauntleted hands to slow his plunge down the mountainside, his foot caught between two rocks and he fell outward. The sword of heaven slipped over his shoulder and slid from its sheath.
For just a moment, a moment that seemed to stretch out as if time itself held its breath, he watched in horror as the blade came free and arced away from him toward the dark canyon below. This object of power, the thing that had drawn him to the mountain, that represented the best hope for Ka’en and him and all people, was sailing away from him even as his life was about to end in a flesh-and-bone rending fall into the depths.
Ignoring the peril to himself, he pushed away from the mountainside, leapt out and grasped the hilt of the weapon with his right hand the moment before it passed beyond his reach. The black depth of the chasm yawned wide and dark less than twenty feet down the slope and the arc of his leap erased any margin of safety. In an instant, he realized that he would impact the mountainside just above the lip of the drop-off but that his momentum would carry him over the edge and into the abyss.
He grasped the hilt with his left hand as well and as he fell back against the steep rock of the slope, turned the blade toward the mountain and jammed it downward in a desperate hope that it would wedge in a crevice of the rock and save him. There was a sharp crack and a flash of fire as the metal pierced the earth. Aram was stunned to see the blade slip into the rock as easily as if it were mud. The sword sank into the solid granite of the mountainside up to its hilt and held, arresting Aram’s plunge toward death, though it continued to move slowly downward as his weight drew it through the rock that became molten under the influence of the unearthly blade.
Hanging onto the hilt of the weapon for his life, he pulled himself up over the lip of the precipice to safer ground. But then the mountain began to shake and groan and the rock around the blade began to melt and run, red-hot and as fluid as lava. Scrambling to his right where there was a small ledge, Aram pulled the sword from the trembling mountain. The sheath was still around his neck, hanging down the front of the armor. Quickly he sheathed the blade.
But the mountain did not fall quiet. It continued to tremble and shake as if it had been mortally wounded and a sound arose from deep in the earth like the groaning of a dying beast. Rock melted and flowed from the wound where the sword had punctured the earth. Though it had been solid granite, now it oozed like pus from a sore. Rock broke free from the slope around and above him and slid into the depths. Aram kneeled under the overhanging rock, praying that it would not come apart and carry him to his doom, and held onto the narrow ledge of rock while all around him bits of the mountain shook loose.
The wound in the mountainside widened and he could feel the heat of it as the expanding circle of melting rock neared his tenuous foothold on the slope. Though it forced him to look around desperately for possible avenues of escape, he nonetheless welcomed the delicious warmth of it as he felt the metal of the armor accept and retain the heat. But then, mere inches from his booted foot, the widening of the flowing wound slowed and stopped, and the molten rock began to cool, darken, and congeal.
Gradually, the shaking of the mountain calmed and then ceased. Afterward, for some time, the only sound that echoed among the peaks was that of the debris from the mountainside impacting the deeper parts of the canyon somewhere far below. There were a few aftershocks but eventually even these ceased and the high peaks settled back into awaiting the coming day.
Aram sat under the overhanging rock for some time, waiting on his racing heart and jangling nerves to grow quiet, and letting the warmth from the still cooling rock around the puncture infuse the armor with its warmth. As he waited, he studied the point where the sword had entered the mountain. The rock in and around that spot had softened and flowed like viscous mud; now it was hardening into strangely shaped ropes and coils of discolored stone.
He remembered what the Astra had told him; that if the sword pierced the skin of the earth and remained it would destroy the world. He knew that Ligurian and Tiberion were with him now, but they had
n’t appeared. He wondered what the Guardians thought of his failure in falling asleep on the treacherous slope and the near-disaster that had ensued; it occurred to him then that they might yet appear and demand the return of the blade because of the peril to the earth that his weakness had engendered. But moments passed and they remained silent and unseen. Probably, their only thoughts had been for the blade; had he died in a plunge to the depths, their primary duty would have been to retrieve the sword and return it to its home in the sun.
Aram made his way back up through the slide carefully, for many slabs of rock had come loose that had been solid minutes before. His bow and quiver of arrows were gone, no doubt carried over the edge and smashed to bits in the dark, rocky fastness below. One knapsack, that containing his deerskin boots and the bits of dried meat, was still about his shoulders, but the other, the one that held Sera’s dried fruits, the extra clothing, and the berries and fruit he’d gathered on the mountain was gone; he could find it nowhere among the rocks. His leather canteen was missing, as was one of his daggers. Of all these things, he mourned the loss of the bow most of all. It had been his best.
Having salvaged what he could, he continued on toward the saddle to the southwest between the high peaks. The sun broke upon him before he reached it. The slope was a bit gentler here where the mountain turned toward the low spot between the peaks and he walked more easily. It was only then that he discovered that he’d been wounded in the early morning incident.
None of his wounds were serious. Because of the protection of the armor, he’d not been pierced, but he was bruised and beaten and would no doubt stiffen up as he went on. If the passage through the mountains did not get easier, he would be slowed by stiffness and aching on subsequent days.
Kelven's Riddle Book Two Page 11
