The Standing Dead (The Stone Dance Of The Chameleon)

by Ricardo Pinto

  ‘We’ll find caches at which we may refill it.’

  Carnelian pushed the waterskin back into Fern’s hands and resumed his march through the ferns. However unjustly, he could not help being angry with his friend.

  As they made a wide detour around the lagoon, its mirror trembled in the corner of their vision as a throbbing headache. Narrowing his eyes against its glare, Carnelian saw the creeping shimmer at its edge that spoke of the leviathans drinking there. Envy consumed him. Distracted, he caught his foot and crashed to the ground. Carnelian growled at the youths who rushed to help him up, rose by himself nursing another bruise, stumbled on, head bent, grumbling against the heat, the flies, the whole, accursed Earthsky.

  As their shadows narrowed away from them, Fern called to Osidian that he thought it better they should make a camp for the night. When Osidian agreed, everyone flopped down. Groaning with relief, Carnelian lay back against the rough fern leaves, feeling the thick stalks bend and snap under his weight. He lay with his eyes closed, listening to his breathing. As this grew more shallow he was able to hear the trilling, the snagging textures of insect flight, the gentle susurration of the breeze among the ferns and a delicate knock, knocking that made him open his eyes and see above him two curling crosier fernheads butting against each other. Then he saw the sky’s smooth fathomless blue depths and he smiled, contented.

  When the Plainsmen began to stir he lifted himself on to one elbow, grunting as his bruises crushed and stretched. He saw how wearily the youths stood and, finding Fern still bent, grinned at him. His friend straightened, grimacing at the pain, and, catching each other’s eyes, they both burst into laughter.

  ‘Shall I hunt with you?’ Carnelian asked him.

  Fern shook his head. ‘The Master wouldn’t want us to starve, now would he?’

  Carnelian ignited more laughter. ‘Then the Master shall take it upon himself to gather dung to make a fire.’

  ‘That would be kind of him,’ said Fern with a grin. He gathered up some youths and they slipped in among the fern stalks, their spear blades the last part of them to vanish.

  Carnelian felt Osidian’s gaze and, turning, saw in his eyes a green anger. Carnelian felt as if Osidian were accusing him of something but was reluctant to imagine what. When Osidian’s fingers strayed up to his rope scar it caused Carnelian to suffer an ache of guilt. He noticed Ravan watching them both with silent fascination. Carnelian turned his back, then chose Krow and a few others to go with him to gather dung.

  Carnelian, Krow and the others flattened a clearing among the ferns and with their hands combed the dried matter in towards the centre upon which they built a dung fire. The hunters returned with a single, scrawny saurian.

  ‘We’ll just have to make do,’ snapped Fern when one of the youths complained.

  In the deepening dusk, weariness was turning to bad temper. As the heat of the day faded into a brooding night some quarrelling broke out among the youths, which Fern resolved with surprising patience. Even before they were finished eating, some of the youths had succumbed to sleep.

  Each day was the same as the one before. Carnelian lost count of how many had passed since they had come up on to the Earthsky. The success of their evening hunts diminished with their strength. They drank whenever they found a brackish pool trapped between some roots or nestling in the crevice of a tree. Carnelian grew accustomed to his thirst sweetening even the filthiest water. His muscles hardened like drying fruit while weariness seemed to be softening his bones. The faces around him became cadaverous. With the others, he lost the will to speech so that the groans, the mumbling complaints, became the only human sounds he heard.

  Each morning Osidian, Ravan and Krow would lead the way and, grumbling, everyone would stumble after them. Carnelian knew well with what growing resentment they followed Osidian because he felt it himself.

  *

  ‘How long shall we have to follow the Master before we accept that he leads us to our deaths?’ said Loskai.

  Night after night Loskai’s complaints had become bolder, but this time there was a rebellious edge to his voice that made Carnelian sit up. All eyes were on Osidian, who sat as he always did, a marble idol, his sight tangled in the brilliance of the fire.

  Loskai leapt to his feet and indicated Osidian with his head. ‘Can’t you see he’s already a ravener?’ he said in Ochre. ‘When we can go no further, who will find us? Who will give us to the sky?’

  When Osidian lifted his head to look at Loskai, the Plainsman grew pale. ‘What’re you babbling about?’

  Loskai stared at him slack-mouthed.

  Osidian smiled coldly. ‘Do you want to lead, barbarian? Well then, I give them to you.’ His gaze returned to the fire.

  Loskai looked round for support.

  Ravan leapt to his feet. ‘I’ll follow none but the Master.’

  Krow joined him.

  Fern frowned. ‘Would you deny, Loskai, that the Backbone runs unbroken the length of the Earthsky?’

  The Plainsman looked blank. Fern sighed. ‘Going east we’ll come across it eventually.’

  ‘Eventually?’ said Loskai snatching at the word as if it might bring him victory.

  ‘If you’ve a better plan, let’s hear it,’ Ravan said.

  Loskai said nothing.

  ‘Well then, sit down, before you end up sharing Ranegale’s fate.’

  Loskai’s face hardened. Carnelian watched him glance sidelong at Osidian. For some moments the Plainsman stood trapped in the fascinated stares of the youths, before he seated himself clumsily, a murderous light in his eyes.

  Carnelian’s head bobbed with each step he took. His eyes could see nothing but the endless weave of fernroot across which he was struggling to pick his way. The sun beat down upon his back so that he was breathing the moisture of his own sweat. His whole skin itched. His scar had become so tender he had to keep pulling the uba off it. He was aware of the sour taste in his mouth, his gummed-up eyes, the weakness he had to overcome for each step.

  When shouting broke out around him, he looked up blearily, expecting to see a ravener or some other monster wading towards them through the ferns. He could see nothing. He narrowed his eyes to allow himself to concentrate on the shouting. It was fading and had the vibration of running. He looked for and found the disturbance in the ferns that betrayed the youths running headlong. It was then he noticed a ridge of rock rising from the fernland like a tumbled wall. North and south it ran as far as the horizons.

  ‘Praise the Mother,’ said Fern near him, in a ragged voice.

  Carnelian turned to see his friend fallen to his knees. Tears were glistening down his cheeks as he stared unblinking. Carnelian looked back at the ridge and understood what it was.

  Clambering up on to the Backbone, Carnelian took delight in the views it gave into the blue distance; in the cooling breeze, but most of all, in the tearful joy of the Plainsmen.

  Fern came scrambling over the rocks towards him. ‘We’ve talked amongst ourselves and even Loskai’s had to admit we’re not much more than a day’s walk from the Twostone.’

  Fern gazed over to where Osidian was standing with Ravan and Krow. ‘The Master’s sorcery is powerful.’

  Carnelian wondered if now Osidian would lose his hold over them. ‘Shall we get there today?’

  Fern shook his head. ‘Night would overtake us if we tried. It’ll be better if we make camp here and complete the last leg rested.’

  They built their fire up among the smooth black rocks of the Backbone. The Plainsmen were transformed. They moved their thin limbs with vigour. They smiled and laughed. Even their hunting was more successful than it had been for days. The moon rising full and bright seemed an omen of salvation. All the talk was of the delights, the comforts they expected to enjoy the following day once they arrived at the koppie of the Twostone. It was only when they saw Krow, grimly silent, that a shadow passed over their hearts.

  Fern sat himself beside the youth. ‘I’ll talk to your
Elders myself. No one’ll blame you for Cloud’s death.’

  Krow gave him a thin smile and Fern put his arm around his shoulders. Loskai was scowling.

  ‘What about our tributaries?’ asked Ravan.

  ‘I warrant that we’ll find they passed through more than forty days ago,’ said Fern and there were grins and nods of agreement.

  ‘The Tribe will have given us up for lost,’ said one youth.

  Frowns all round, uneasy muttering.

  ‘That’s why we’ll not linger more than one night with the Twostone,’ said Fern. ‘They’ll lend us aquar and, in no more than six days, we’ll be home.’

  Eyes brightened as the Plainsmen turned again to discussing the festivities the Twostone would be sure to throw to welcome them back from their adventures. Carnelian watched the youths’ eyes widening as they realized for the first time that they were now not only just one short day from safety, but in addition they would be returning as heroes.

  ‘And what about us?’ Carnelian asked Fern, quietly.

  His friend looked at him, frowning. He angled his head to one side. ‘I don’t know,’ he said at last.

  Carnelian thanked him for his honesty. He did not hear the words after that but only the happiness in their voices. Ravan’s face was not as bright as the other youths’. Beside him, Osidian looked morose. Carnelian saw how, apart from Ravan, the other Plainsmen were paying Osidian no more attention than they would have a rock. Carnelian could not recall anyone having thanked Osidian for getting them there. After the long nightmare in the wilderness, the Plainsmen had returned to a world they knew. In that world it was the Standing Dead who were powerless.

  RAVENER GRIN

  And the Skyfather made birds

  That they might be everywhere his eyes

  (Plainsman lore)

  THE PLAIN LAY UNDER AN IMMENSE BLUE WEIGHT OF SKY. A DISTANT herd appeared to be foothills. Stands of horsetail, groves of ginkgos, a few vast spreading acacias were all that alleviated the blank horizon. Trudging along the spine of black rock, it took Carnelian a while to notice the mound rising green from the plain.

  He fell back until he was walking beside Fern. ‘That is the first hill I’ve seen since we came up into the Earthsky.’

  ‘It certainly is a hill of sorts,’ said Fern.

  ‘Of what sort?’

  Amusement raised the corners of the Plainsman’s mouth. ‘A tumbling of stones among trees.’

  ‘It’s a koppie isn’t it, and the one we seek?’

  Fern beamed. ‘Yes, the koppie of the Twostone.’

  Clearly, they were not the only ones that had seen it. Murmurs of excitement were passing among the youths, putting new strength into their legs.

  Krow ran up grinning. ‘They’ll have been watching us for ages and no doubt will soon ride out to see who we are.’

  Some of the youths broke into song. One cracked a joke that made his companions fall about laughing. For a moment their gaiety lifted Carnelian’s foreboding, but then his stomach began churning as he imagined the reception the Twostone were likely to give him and Osidian.

  Fern led them down from the Backbone, making directly for the koppie. This island in a fern sea made Carnelian remember the stories Ebeny had told of the hills on which her people lived. If these koppies were not as grand as his childish imaginings had made them, neither were they the paltry things his Masterly cynicism had later reduced them to.

  Carnelian became aware of the deathly silence and saw how serious the faces round him had become.

  ‘What’s the matter?’ he asked Krow.

  ‘We should’ve seen riders by now.’

  ‘Perhaps they’re in no hurry. After all, we’re approaching on foot.’

  ‘If it were only that,’ said Fern, grimly and pointed. ‘Look.’

  Carnelian looked. ‘I can’t see anything.’

  ‘Exactly.’ Fern turned. ‘Smoke should be rising. Even this far out we should be able to see a stubble of lookouts on the koppie’s brow.’

  They walked on in an uneasy silence until they came close enough for Carnelian to discern that the hill was clothed with cedars. From their midst, two stone towers rose, uneven crags of boulders piled one upon the other, the whole mass bright in the sun. The hill lay within a swathe of land enclosed by a circuit of magnolias. With unblinking stares, his companions were searching for any sign of the Twostone Plainsmen.

  Krow cupped his hands together and blew a note that echoed among the trees, but the koppie remained stubbornly still. The cedars on the hill seemed the only living beings as, languidly, they slipped sunlight over their flat canopies.

  Krow took them in closer. The ground began sloping down to a ditch the other side of which rose steeply as an earthen rampart along which the magnolias formed towers. The youth led them alongside the ditch, until they were moving through the shadows the trees spilled out over the plain. At last they came to where a bridge of packed earth crossed the ditch to a narrow cutting in the rampart framed by two magnolias. They lingered for a while peering across at the cutting, which was barred by a spiked gate.

  ‘Shouldn’t this be guarded?’ Carnelian whispered to Fern.

  His friend dismissed the question with an angry flick of his hand. They watched as Krow crept across the earthbridge then leant forward, avoiding the horns studding the gate, to peer through the chinks in its wicker. Krow pushed against it and it opened and he was left standing black against the green beyond, beckoning them to follow.

  Carnelian crossed with the others. On either side a ditch held mirrors of dark water. Passing through the gate, he beheld a path shaded by cone trees running in the direction of the hill. They carefully closed the gate behind them before setting off along the avenue. Another wall of trees lay ahead. When they reached them, these turned out to form a double circuit between which there lay a ditch deeper than the first. An earthbridge led to a second gate and, once through this, Carnelian found they had entered another fern swathe, not as wide as the first, at the heart of which lay the hill with its cedars. His gaze was fixed on those giants as he approached. Their wide-spreading branches each held a flat roof of needled leaves; the whole mass shifting in the breeze made a creaking that seemed almost speech.

  At the margin of the hill lay a final ditch deeper and wider than the previous two. Immense cedars grew on either bank, their roots so densely reinforcing the ditch its walls seemed made of wood. The further rampart rose to a parapet of skulls from which horns curved the length of scythes. Krow led them over a bridge towards the rampart. Between two sentinel cedars a more substantial gate barred their way, before which stood the ghostly figure of a man.

  ‘They can’t have returned yet,’ whispered Ravan.

  Krow regarded him with a fixed, pale expression. ‘This late in the year?’

  Ravan shrugged and looked unhappy.

  ‘What manner of creature is that?’ Osidian demanded, pointing at the ghost.

  ‘A huskman, Master,’ answered Ravan. Though he turned towards Osidian, he made sure to keep one eye firmly on the ghostly man. The youth saw Osidian wanted more. ‘For his sins against the Twostone he’s been denied skyburial. They set him here as a sentinel to protect their koppie while they were away in the mountains.’

  ‘Why is this considered a punishment?’ asked Osidian.

  Fern glanced round. ‘His soul’s trapped in his sun-dried corpse like a flame in a lantern.’

  Carnelian looked at the mummy with unease. ‘For ever?’

  ‘Until those he sinned against consider he’s suffered enough.’

  ‘Or until he fails in his duty …’ said Ravan.

  Krow, who had been examining the huskman, gave the youth a look that silenced him. ‘Help me.’

  As Ravan’s face grew pale, Krow frowned. ‘Though we’re not Elders, he’ll recognize I’m Twostone.’

  Ravan looked unconvinced as together they advanced upon the mummy. When they drew close, Krow began mumbling some charm. Gingerly they rea
ched out and touched the mummy. Ravan shuddered visibly, as if he had felt the huskman move. Then, carefully, they lifted it and carried it to one side, leaning it upon its face against the tree. As they backed away, Fern pushed against the wicker of the gate. When it did not open, he shook it.

  He turned to Krow. ‘It is secured on the other side.’

  The youth was soon scaling the thickly woven gate. He struggled for a moment to climb over its spiky top before dropping down on the other side. Soon the gate was swinging open. Careful not to touch the huskman, the other Plainsmen filed past into the gloom beyond. Carnelian could not help peering at the mummy as he passed it. A man shrivelled like a fruit. Feeling it might turn to look at him, Carnelian hurried on.

  Through the gate, he found himself within the cedar grove. The towering trees not only cooled the air but sweetened it with their resinous perfume. The rafters of their branches and their spiny leaves made a ceiling delicately pierced by the sky’s blue. A yielding carpet of russet needles muffled his footfalls as he began to follow the others up the hill. Shade spread off between the column trunks. Clearings shone like courtyards, in many of which Carnelian could see ashen hearths ringed with stones. Here and there boulders crouched all scabbed with moss.

  Krow sprang away ignoring Fern’s call that he should wait for them and was soon lost. As they climbed after him, Carnelian caught glimpses of the twin crags crowning the hill. When they reached them, he saw their flanks rising blue-grey splashed with lichen roundels. He craned his head back to see the jagged summits.

  ‘Fan out and look for any sign they’ve been here,’ said Fern.

  Carnelian dropped his gaze to find the youths already slipping off among the trees.

  ‘Can we help?’ Carnelian asked.

  Fern frowned, shook his head. ‘You’d better stay here.’ He looked over at Ravan. ‘Stay with them.’ With that, he was loping off down the hill and had soon disappeared.

  ‘What do you think might have happened?’ Carnelian asked Ravan.