by Ben Galley
As he passed the makeshift tents and crackling fires, he breathed in the aromas of meat, herbs, and other such succulent things that made his stomach rumble. The tall people gathered around the fires bowed and smiled at him as he passed. Farden smiled back.
At one such fire, a herd of young boys were roasting chunks of dark meat over the flames with long wooden skewers. Not wishing to scare them, Farden approached them gradually, pasting a wide grin on his face. He needn’t have worried. As soon as they clapped eyes on him and his foreign garb, they leapt to their feet and crowded around him, babbling a hundred questions in their odd tongue. Overwhelmed Farden held up his hands. ‘I don’t understand, I’m sorry,’ he said.
One boy, probably the smallest, managed to squeeze some words out in a language Farden understood. ‘Magick man! Do tricks! We want see tricks!’ he yelled, and the others cheered and ran in circles. Each of them had tiny horns poking out from their foreheads, as if they were little deer. Farden tried to shoo them away but it was useless. ‘Okay!’ he shouted. ‘But in return,’ he began, and then mimed the rest, pointing at the meat and then to his open mouth. The boys took a moment to confer and then the smallest one came closer to bow. ‘Magick first,’ he said, grinning like a jester, ‘then food!’
Farden laughed and the herd of boys erupted into cheers. They scrambled back to their fire and their skewers and watched eagerly as the mage took a few paces back. A few curious others poked their heads out of adjacent tents and caravans. Farden took a breath and rubbed his vambraces together. A ball of orange flame appeared in one hand, then vanished. Another appeared in his opposite hand, then again it vanished. The boys went silent. Suddenly Farden clapped his hands together with a flash of light and both balls of fire spun around his wrists. Farden plucked them from the air and began to juggle with them as they crackled and whooshed through the cool evening air. A chorus of “oohs” and “aahs” came from the tents and the mesmerised boys.
Farden kept going until he was juggling six balls of fire, each the size of an apple, in a swirling cartwheel of flame. For his grand finale he clapped his hands together once more and each fireball popped with a flash of blue light and flame. The mage bowed and grinned; deep down he loved to show off.
The nomad boys cheered and danced and yelled and leapt and made strange ululating noises with their tongue. True to their word, the smallest boy marched forward holding a skewer so heavy with meat it looked as though it might snap at any moment. With a solemn face he handed it to Farden, who accepted the prize with his deepest and most formal bow. Their curiosity sated, the boys giggled and ran back to their fire. Farden smiled and left them to dance and holler.
The mage wandered down the line of tents, ripping big chunks of hot, dark meat off the skewer with his teeth. Whatever animal it had come from, it was delicious. He couldn’t have cared less if it was sandworm; it had been a long time since he had tasted meat that good;. Farden allowed himself a satisfied hum and wandered on, stroking the cold plates of the curled up dillos as he walked past each caravan.
Near to the end of the nomad caravan was a slightly larger tent held up by poles and ropes. Now that night had almost fallen upon the desert, torches on tall sticks had been lit and thrust into the sand around the tent. Flames danced over the rippled sand. A handful of moths flapped and worried around the crackling flames.
Like the moths, Farden was intrigued by this big bright tent, and he walked over to investigate, wiping the last of the grease from his chin. It was quiet at that end of the camp. The breeze whispered behind the tent flaps. Voices murmured. Sickly incense hovered on the air.
Leaving his skewer upright and wobbling in the sand outside, Farden ducked under the lip of the tent and looked around. In front of him were three men gathered around a small box. They sat cross-legged on woven carpets, drinking deep red liquid from wooden goblets. Glazed and glossy-eyed they smiled at him and raised each of their goblets in turn. Farden, knowing exactly what to do by now, bowed and grinned back at them, and they went back to their drinking. Behind the three men was a row of tall barrels upon which a cloth had been spread. Behind that was the door to the caravan, and the end of the tent. It looked to Farden like a makeshift tavern. The mage swiftly realised that the meat skewer had made him considerably thirsty. Why not, he thought.
Farden walked forward and stood by the bar and waited patiently. A large yellow cat sauntered around the edge of the bar and weaved through his legs and then, with the usual effortless grace of a feline, it hopped onto the bar and promptly curled into a ball. The cat watched the mage with its huge green eyes and flicked its ears at him. Farden had never seen a cat like it. It was some sort of desert cat, with an enormously long tail and cavernous, tufted ears, ears that looked as though they could have heard a mouse nibbling a berry from a mile away.
The cat seemed perfectly content to sit and watch this strange new visitor standing at the bar. Farden lifted a hand to stroke it and to his complete surprise the cat changed colour from yellow to green, and then to blue. Farden squinted at it, and it waved his hand in front of its orbicular eyes. It shifted to a sultry maroon and hissed.
‘Can I help you?’ said a small voice in his own language. The mage looked up to find a woman staring at him, a short woman with sharp horns protruding from her scalp. She had fair nut-brown hair and a thin furry face. She was quite attractive in a strange, wild way. Farden couldn’t help but notice her piercing blue eyes, which was quite a rarity in Paraia, and he found himself helplessly staring into them. They were the type of eyes that shimmered like the surface of a cold mountain lake, mirror-like and icy, and they stabbed at him like blue icicles. Eyes like Cheska’s. Farden’s heart twitched and he looked away. The woman coughed. The mage took a moment to collect his thoughts, and then dumbly realised he had been asked a question.
‘Er yes, well, maybe. I’m a little thirsty,’ he stuttered.
‘Then you’ve come to the right place,’ replied the small woman. She bent down and disappeared behind the makeshift bar and then swiftly reappeared with a small wooden tumbler. With a pop she uncorked a nearby flagon and filled the little cup with a dark red liquid, which Farden assumed was wine. The woman pushed it towards him and he instinctively delved into his pockets for something to pay her with. He rummaged for a moment, fingers roaming across a vulture’s feather, a dusty spyglass, and a cold, rough rock, no bigger than a nut. He considered it, and then decided no; something about the rock made him want to keep it. The blue-eyed nomad pointed a furry finger at the mage’s neck, where a thin sliver of dragonscale hung on a chain. ‘The necklace?’ she cooed, like an intrigued pigeon.
Farden shook his head. ‘It was a gift, from a friend. Not for sale,’ he said. She scrunched up her face and sighed. Instead the mage unravelled the scarf from about his neck, folded it into a neat square, and held it towards her. Despite the dust and a few stains, it was as good as new. The woman sniffed it and shrugged nonchalantly. ‘The trade is fair to me,’ she said. Farden hesitated.
‘I will try the wine first,’ he said, and the woman shrugged. The mage brought the wine close to his nose to give it a cursory sniff. Aromas of bitter herbs and cinnamon climbed up his nose, tingling his eyes. He took a sip and swirled it over and around his dry tongue, letting it swish about his gums and mingle with the taste of the dark meat. The wine was strange, sticky, oleaginous, with a deep kick, but he liked it, and it had instantly drowned his thirst.
‘You like?’ asked the woman and Farden had to admit he did. He handed the scarf over and she smiled. ‘Now I need a new scarf,’ he mumbled, but he didn’t hear him; she was too busy arranging the scarf around her neck.
The mage took another thoughtful sip of his wine and pointed to the cat. He remarked upon it. ‘Your cat changes colour,’ he said, and then as if to agree the cat yawned and turned a reddish-orange colour, like that of baked terracotta.
‘That it does,’ nodded the woman, still fumbling with the tassels of the blue and white scar
f. She seemed to be a person of few words. Farden took another sip and enjoyed the warm feeling in his throat. ‘Your accent is very good.’ The nomad woman tilted her head to one side like a little bird. Farden pointed to his throat, then hers. ‘Your accent?’
Nothing but another nod. He shrugged and poured himself some more wine. The warm feeling was creeping towards his head. He swilled the dark liquid around his cup. ‘This is good wine,’ he said.
‘I make it myself,’ she said, stroking the coarse fur of her rainbow cat.
The mage motioned to the men sat behind him. ‘The rest of the tribe must like it.’
She hummed in a way that said “of course they do.” She looked at him and blinked. Her eyes were the very epitome of blue. Farden couldn’t stop staring. He hoped he wasn’t making her feel uncomfortable. ‘You look like someone I know…’ he said, in a whisper, his voice unable to fully commit to a full sentence. The woman shrugged and played with her new scarf. Beside her the cat turned green, and Farden turned to stroke it. To his surprise his hand missed it completely, and he had to put a hand against the makeshift bar to keep from falling. He suddenly felt very dizzy. The woman looked at him with a suspicious squint.
‘Are you alright?’ she asked, wary. She might have taken a step back, Farden couldn’t tell; all of a sudden everything seemed to be quite far away.
‘I don’t know,’ he said and took another sip of wine to steady his gurgling stomach. The mage felt the world moving and spun around to see if he could catch it in the act. The three nomads gathered around the box had stopped drinking and were staring at him. Or were there six? There was definitely more than three. The cat had turned a darker shade of purple. He lifted the cup and peered into it. He had to close one eye to make it stay still. ‘What’s in this?’ he asked.
The blurry woman looked nervous, in a blurry sort of way. ‘I call it neverwine…’
‘Neverwine?’ Farden repeated. His throat burnt. His stomach curled up into a ball. His heart sank. He already knew exactly what she was about to say… Neverwine, made from a dark red moss…
‘…that always grows on the south side of certain trees, called nevermar, which, if properly prepared, can cure many ailments,’ finished the woman.
Farden stumbled backwards and tipped the rest of the wine on the sand. It looked like blood against the dusty yellow. He teetered on the side of one boot. ‘Nevermar,’ he muttered. Amidst curses and apologies the mage stumbled out of the tent and sank to his knees. Darkness had now fallen with him. Stars hid their faces. His throat closing up, Farden coughed and spluttered and somehow made it to his feet again. There was a throbbing in his head like a sledgehammer. Farden could taste the bittersweet wine on his tongue, feel the purple sugariness on his lips. The cliffs ahead of him were a dark blotch on an even darker sky and the campfires did nothing to illuminate the moonless night. Behind him the flames crackled. People laughed and sang. Strange rolling and ululating music came from somewhere and frolicked through the night. Farden felt sick to his stomach.
‘Oh gods, please, no,’ he prayed, fighting not to gag. ‘Help…’
The delirious mage stumbled as close to the cliffs as he could possibly manage and then collapsed to the warm sands. Before he knew it, the bile was filling his throat and there was nothing he could do to stop it. Dark, bitter liquid splashed the sands and stained the front of his tunic. The mage retched and heaved until there was no more, and then, because there was nothing else left to do, Farden slumped to the ground and let the dusty night swallow him.
…The pantheon must know, she told herself, and her purpose steeled her courage. Fear, like the silence in the spaces between spaces, hung in that place like a windless flag. Had she known what followed her, she would have waited, and hid in the shadows between the stars…
Chapter 5
“…Nine smiths together, nine suits of life, nine pieces beaten, nine years of strife.
Nine kingdoms covet, nine thrones of spite, nine armies marching, nine fires ignite.
Nine smiths all murdered, nine suits were stolen, nine pieces scattered,
and lost for evermore…”
Excerpt from the ‘Edda of Scalussen’ an old fable from before the Scattered Kingdoms
The icy sky was a broken mirror. Dark streaks of snow-heavy cloud stretched through the cold emptiness like the crooked fingers of a witch. The rain was falling sideways, and it stung his face as the mage walked silently through the misty streets. Dark figures moved around him like shadows. Some ran; others huddled in streets corners. He kept walking.
Time felt liquid in the dream. He could push his hands through it and move it around as he wished. Images flashed in front of his eyes as he walked, of people and faces; a blonde mage, tall, tired and confused; a hooded man in a dark cloak, easily seven feet tall; a thin pair of thin lips and pale, almost white eyes. They were pressing themselves against a door in a strange inn he had never seen as spears and blades broke and pierced the wood. Farden moved on.
The sounds of the city washed over him like thick oil, dripping and wallowing in puddles of loud and quiet. As he leant to and fro he heard slow screams and deep booming shouts. Foreign tongues yelled orders. An image of a black cat wrapped in a blanket. A maid shivering on an icy mountain, led by the fingers of a stocky man. Three figures ran through a bustling market, chased by blades and yelling.
The mage blinked and saw the port ahead. He moved towards it and was there before he realised. Everything was covered in ice. It clung to the rigging and choked the bells. The clanging of hammers reached his ears and he turned to see tall ships towering over him. Tall ships half-finished, full of chains and ropes. Farden took a step back and suddenly he fell hard on the icy walkway. He closed his eyes and winced in pain and reached out to hold his head only to find he was pinned upside down to a marble ceiling. The floor looked familiar, as did the bed and the other rich trappings around the foggy room. A door slammed and a shadow entered, and Farden watched as it moved slowly towards the bed. Whoever it was quivered and wavered like a mirage, and it took an age for them to walk across the room. The shadow eventually lay down and spread a hand across her bulbous stomach, eyes closed and hair draped across her face. Farden suddenly began to feel very uncomfortable. A cold pang of hurt struck his chest, somewhere between his stomach and his heart. He looked down at her stomach and glimpsed a shadow of a child curled inside her womb. A strong heart throbbed inside its tiny chest, and that cold pang of hurt inside Farden’s became a burning, and then a blistering fire of pain.
Then, with eyes as blue as any sapphire, Cheska looked up at Farden as he lay there on the ceiling, and smiled at him. Farden tried to speak but neither his tongue nor lips would answer him. The mage couldn’t take his eyes off her. She seemed so close. He reached out a calloused hand to touch her but she was so very far away. His child’s heartbeat throbbed in his ears, deafeningly loud, and as he strained and strained to reach out to them, the shadow that was Cheska put a finger to her lips. Slowly, very slowly, she raised her hand up towards the mage. Farden tried with all his strength to touch her finger and for the briefest of moments he could have sworn he brushed her fingertip. But something glimmered in her hand. Something small and something deadly. The mage’s eyes grew wide with horror as he realised what was happening. He thrashed and writhed but it was no use. He tried to shout but nothing came. Without the faintest shred of emotion in her sapphire eyes, she plunged the dagger into her belly and deep into her womb. Farden watched as the blade disappeared inside her, and then suddenly it was over. The dream collapsed in a flash of dark blood and fire.
It was still dark when Farden awoke. Dark and cold. Cracking open an eye he peeked at his blurry surroundings through sand-caked eyelashes. Bright torchlight stung him, and he closed his throbbing eye once more, feeling for the blue and white scarf around his neck. It was gone.
A fresh breeze tousled his grimy lank hair, ruffled his clothes. The torch crackled contentedly to itself. Farden took a
long slow draught of air through his nostrils. He could smell the crisp night, something roasting, maybe food, and bile. That much was certain. Farden stretched out a hand and felt his nails scrape on sandy rock. He groaned, and realised that eventually he would have to get up. Just a few more minutes, he said to himself, and then he would.
But a voice broke the crackling breezy calmness. ‘Sleep well?’
Farden took a moment to collect his fragmented thoughts. The remnants of a strange dream were scattered between hazy memories of the nomads and their camp, and that wine. That bastard wine. He groaned once more and rolled onto his back. A hand helped him and then patted his shoulder. ‘Easy. You’ve been unconscious for two days.’
Farden slowly and carefully opened his eyes to find the bearded face of his uncle staring down at him. Firelight played amongst the lines and crags of his concerned countenance. Tyrfing smiled wryly and tried to help Farden into a sitting position, but with yet another groan and a wave of his numb arms, he shook his head, mumbled a ‘no’ and remained lying on the floor, staring up into the dark star-studded sky. Farden took a deep breath and blinked a few times and scratched the back of his head against the sandstone rocks. Far overhead, in the upper reaches of the atmosphere, a dark winged shape circled the cliffs, and watched, and listened.
After a few moments the mage coughed hoarsely and rubbed his raspy tongue along his dry teeth. ‘The sky is so big here,’ he managed. ‘It always has been.’
Tyrfing took a moment to decide what to make of such a comment, wondering if his nephew was still feeling the effects of the wine. He shrugged in a manner that said neither yes nor no, and moved to stoke the little fire over which a spit of meat was hanging. He turned the hunk of meat over and looked up at the stars. ‘I suppose you’re right,’ he replied.
