Evander and the Strangler's Quest

by Wells, L. G.

  Evander set off from the blackened spot in the forest without knowing where he was headed. His hand had begun throbbing more painfully, and when he peeled back the bandage to look at the injury, he found that the place where his skin had burned against the Tarrow Tree's bark had grown, and now the rotted skin reached all of his fingers and was creeping up his wrist. He could barely move the hand at all.

  He retreated to the area of the forest where the sprites often met him and stared up into the trees, looking for a dash of green, blue or yellow that would indicate their whereabouts. As he looked up, something jingled in his ear.

  Effer landed upon his shoulder.

  “You're supposed to be hiding, Prince Evander.”

  “I've got to finish The Strangler's tasks,” he replied. “He wants me to find the Two-Faced One's Door. Have you heard of it?”

  Effer zipped to his other shoulder, and Evander cracked his neck as he turned to follow her with his gaze. Beside her, Vee had fluttered down from the nearby tree, and the two were sharing a look.

  “What?” Evander asked.

  “It's not your time to enter the Two-Faced One's Door, Prince Evander,” Vee said.

  “What do you mean? I have to finish The Strangler's tasks soon or he'll break our deal –”

  “You can't go to his door,” Vee said. “One cannot simply search for it and find it. Most avoid it at all costs.”

  “Most people avoid The Strangler, too,” Evander argued, “but this is different. Where do I find the door?”

  A glimpse of powder blue came floating down from the tree like a leaf falling late in summertime, and Evander turned to see Scence hovering a foot or so from him. She stood pin-straight as she observed him.

  “The Two-Faced One's Door leads where you're not ready to go,” she said. “It takes you to The Unvisited World.”

  Evander blinked.

  “What's that?” he asked.

  The sprites shared a look.

  “I don't know what you call it in the human world,” Vee said.

  “It's the after-place,” Scence tried. “The world beyond. The soul's garden.”

  “I've never heard of those,” Evander said.

  Effer leaned over to whisper in his ear.

  “It's the place where Nature cannot go, Prince Evander,” she said. “It's where The Strangler leads you when your time on earth has ceased.”

  “It's Death's Door?” Evander asked, and the sprites nodded.

  He didn't feel afraid as he thought he ought to have, but rather embarrassed for not figuring it out sooner. After all, The Strangler had confirmed that Arthfael was, indeed, dead, and so it seemed natural that the only way to get him back was to venture to where his soul was kept and restore it to the world that he should have never been forced to leave.

  He looked back at the sprites.

  “So how do I get there?”

  “We've told you, Prince Evander,” Vee moaned. “You can't just go there. It's not something you can find, or stumble upon on a morning walk. The Door appears to those who are marching away from this world and into another.”

  Evander took a seat on a rounded rock and put his chin in his hand, trying to think of a solution. There had to be one even though the task seemed impossible, just as he had managed to steal the Deathless Flame and find the key beneath the River Odi. But this time his time limit was drawing to an end, and he still didn't know where to begin.

  Arthfael would have known. If the roles had been reversed, and Arthfael was the one searching for him, he would have gotten through The Strangler's tasks easily and without the aid of anyone or anything. But, Evander considered, his brother would have never made such a deal – especially not with something unnatural and unholy as The Strangler was said to be. And, Evander thought further, there would have been no need for Arthfael to retrieve him from the depths of the Unvisited World, for Evander wasn't needed in Selvyn's Kingdom like his brother was. He wouldn't be the one to stop Anguis and take back their father's throne, so there was no great reason for him to be alive.

  His chin pressed sharply into his hand and he winced, pulling it away and holding his wrist until the pain passed. It was odd to think that the injury from the Tarrow Tree would never heal, and would just continue to eat away at him until there was nothing left of him. In all the time since he had received the injury, he hadn't fully considered that it would take his life: he had been too busy thinking of how to save his brother's.

  “I'm going to die,” he said softly, realizing it at last. He stared down at his bandaged hand. “That's how I can find the door: I have to die. The Tarrow Tree's already poisoned me – it won't matter anyway –”

  “No, Prince Evander!” Effer and Vee exclaimed together, then the latter continued, “That's not how you win: you're supposed to bring your brother back to this world, not get trapped in The Undiscovered Realm yourself!”

  But Evander wasn't listening. He had already peeled off his bandage and was deciding how best to make the process of the Tarrow Tree's poison go faster.

  Standing up, he headed back in the direction of The Strangler's part of the forest and came to the Tarrow Tree that he had touched the first time he had entered the blackened spot of earth. Ignoring the cold and the sprites' protests, Evander pulled off his mother's white cloak, unlaced the top of his work shirt, and leaned forward towards the tree.

  “No, Prince Evander, don't!” Effer said, fluttering before him and placing her tiny hands upon his chest to hold him back. “This isn't the way to do it!”

  “You can't call death to you like this, Prince!” Vee agreed, who was grasping him by the collar. “This was never part of you deal with The Strangler!”

  “It's the only way,” Evander said impatiently, desperate to get it over with. “You don't understand –”

  “But you don't understand either, Prince Evander,” Scence said. “You're going to a place where we can't follow. We can't help you with your quest if you leave this world behind.”

  Evander paused and looked at them. Their light, powdery wings fluttered in various hues as they pleaded with him, and their large eyes stared up from their tiny heads. Effer's were filled with tears. And he wanted to take them with him, or perhaps he wanted to stay with them – he couldn't tell – but he had to find his brother, he knew, or Selvyn would be trapped in winter forever, and the kingdom would fall under Anguis' reign.

  “Thank you for all of your help,” he told them sincerely. “I could never have gotten here without you. But I have to do this, and this is the only way.”

  He turned from them and wrapped his arms all the way around the Tarrow Tree, pressing his chest to the bark and feeling the burning sensation immediately. He held on for as long as possible – waiting past the time when the pain was unbearable and the scent of burning flesh filled the air, until –

  His arms grew limp and he fell to the ground, collapsing into the thick snow. He stared at the whiteness for a long while, blinded by the pain coursing through every inch of him and praying to the gods that it would end as the sprites flitted over him, murmuring and lamenting that he ought not to have done it, until, one moment, it stopped.

  Evander blinked and sat up. He looked down at his hands and arms to see the blackened flesh, but not a hint of pain came to him. He stood and picked up his mother's cloak, swinging it back over his shoulders, and took the fallen lead box and tucked it beneath his arm. The he looked back at the tree, wondering if he had done something wrong, when –

  He saw it.

  There, standing before him in the forest, was a set of doors. They were as tall as the trees, with huge golden handles far above his head in the shape of lion's heads. In their mouths were the rings upon which Evander had to pull to open them. He reached forward towards them, ready to find his brother, but –

  The lions' eyes snapped open. They stared at him angrily.

  “Think carefully before you choose your door, Prince Evander,” the Left Lion boomed.

  “Wh
at's the difference?” Evander asked, looking between them.

  “One door leads to your brother's grave,” the Right Lion said. “The other leads to your own.”

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Evander stared up at the two doors for a long moment, glancing back and forth between them as he tried to discern any slight differences. But the doors were exactly alike in every way, and it was only their alignment that made them special at all.

  “Which one leads to my brother?” Evander asked.

  He knew that they weren't going to tell him, but he thought it best to try anyhow. The lions bared their golden teeth, clutching the handles ferociously, and then, in unison, they spoke in a rhythmic song.

  “When the earth sleeps, and lies barren and forsaken,

  I am the only one for whom it will awaken;

  I am the only rebirth after any kind of death

  Even though I have no lungs to give and take a breath.

  I am one of four rotating kings of the earth

  and though I'm not a woman, I'm able to give birth.

  I've been waiting several years for someone to set me free

  but if you can't answer this, you shall never see me.”

  They stopped, and a heavy silence filled the air. Evander waited for a moment, hoping that they might reopen their mouths and say more, but they continued to stare at him expectantly. He glanced anxiously between them.

  “Could – could you repeat that?”

  The lions' expressions remained grim, and Evander for a moment Evander feared that he had failed the final task already. He brushed his hair back from his eyes as he looked left and right, considering that – at the very least – he still had a fifty-fifty chance of randomly picking the correct door.

  Then, however, the lions opened their mouths and spoke the riddle again. Evander listened closely, trying to pick up on any clues.

  When the earth sleeps, he thought, sounded like nighttime. Though Selvyn was always barren nowadays, so he wasn't sure of the significance of that line. If that were so, then the only one who could awaken it would be the morning. Or the sun. He halted midway through the thought and shook his head. He would come back to that.

  The next lines could still be about night and day, if night could be considered a death of sorts. And days couldn't breathe, so that fit. He asked for the next lines again, feeling more excited.

  “I am one of four rotating kings of the earth

  and though I'm not a mother, I'm able to give birth.

  I've been waiting several years for someone to set me free

  but if you can't answer this, you shall never see me.”

  Evander bit his lip. He had no idea what a rotating king was, or what could give birth except for a mother. He shut his eyes and tried to focus on the last line instead, hoping that it might make everything clearer.

  What had been waiting several years for something? His first thought was that Selvyn had been waiting for the true king to reign ever since Anguis had taken the throne, but that answer didn't fit the rest of the riddle. The solution seemed to be in the phrase one of four rotating kings, but he had only ever heard of one king ruling at a time – unless it referred to the gods, but there were seven of them.

  He went through the poem again, his eyes still tightly shut. Nighttime. Day. Selvyn waiting for a king. What else could nighttime be? Darkness. Darkness waiting for light? But neither darkness nor light were rotating kings, for even poetically there were only two of them.

  Four something, he thought instead. Four directions: north, east, south and west. Four elements: fire, air, water, and earth. That one seemed more fitting. Did water give birth to earth? No, he realized, and it didn't breathe or bring anything back to life, either.

  Four humors. Four limbs. Four letters in four …

  Growing exhausted, Evander sat down on the ground. Even though he wasn't truly alive anymore and the cold didn't affect him, the snow was still deep and wet, and the spot wasn't the most comfortable. He wished he would be there when Arthfael rose to the throne and the winter melted away, but he was beginning to think that only one of them would be leaving the Unvisited World.

  And just as the thought caused his shoulders to slump, a separate one made them rise again. Winter. Winter was one of the four seasons, and it was a type of death. He hurriedly looked to the doors.

  “Can you read it one more time?” he asked.

  The lions obliged, and this time Evander had a clear sense of what they meant.

  “When the earth sleeps, and lies barren and forsaken,

  I am the only one for whom it will awaken;

  I am the only rebirth after any kind of death

  Even though I have no lungs to give and take a breath.

  I am one of four rotating kings of the earth

  and though I'm not a woman, I'm able to give birth.

  I've been waiting several years for someone to set me free

  but if you can't answer this, you shall never see me.”

  The first line referred to winter, so the next one referred to spring. Spring was the rebirth of the world after the harshness of winter, and didn't have lungs to breathe. It rotated with the three other seasons, which ruled the earth, Evander considered, in a way similar to kings reigning over a kingdom. Spring gave birth to a myriad of plants, animals and insects, and the kingdom had been waiting for its return since the end of Evander's father's reign.

  “Springtime,” he said. “That's the answer – springtime.”

  The lions glanced at one another, then, slowly, the door to the left opened.

  “You may find your brother now.”

  Evander plowed through the door and was met with a pair of stone steps leading downwards. Just as he was about to descend them, the door behind him slammed shut and he was left in pitch darkness. He fumbled for the box beneath his arm and opened it, revealing the Deathless Flame. It covered the stairs and walls in a purple light, and Evander cautiously made his way forward.

  As much as The Strangler seemed to think that he held more power than the other gods, Evander noted that the Deathless Flame was not affected by the Unvisited World. If anything, it seemed brighter than ever, and Navigatius, at least, had forgiven his transgressions and was leading him to Arthfael.

  He seemed to walk for days underground. The steps spiraled downwards but seemed to lead nowhere, and each turn turned into a view that looked exactly the same. Perhaps he didn't get the riddle correct, he thought once or twice, and this was his punishment for the wrongs he had committed on earth: to walk forever but reach nowhere. Maybe he ought to have turned around and banged against the Two-Faced One's doors again until he was let out, and see if the sprites had thought up a better way to complete the final task.

  And then he heard it – though he wasn't quite sure what it was at first.

  It sounded like gulls crying on the shore, or perhaps doves cooing from the highest roof on the palace. The sounds echoed off the walls and each other, and the closer that Evander got, the more cacophonous they became. He wanted to clap his hands over his ears, but one hand was holding the flame, and the other was trailing the wall to make sure that he didn't lose his balance.

  He reached the final step and was relieved to find flat ground. Huge slabs of stone led forward, and he followed them towards the strange screaming. He seemed to be walking in an underground hallway, only it didn't branch off into rooms or other paths. The lack of light was disturbing, and he wondered what he would have done without the gods' flame. Perhaps that was the true reason The Strangler had told him to retrieve it.

  “Arthfael?” Evander called, no longer able to stand the silence that hummed around him while the sounds of misery came from so close by. “Arthfael, can you hear me? I'm here for you!”

  A long, drawn-out moan plowed down the hallway towards him. Knowing that it was his brother's voice, Evander set off at a run. He entered a room that was flanked on either side by metal bars, and when he looked more closely, shining the
purple light over them, he saw that there were people behind them. They were chained to the walls, emaciated and dirty, while worms and critters crawled over their flesh. The dead. Evander pulled the light away, not able to look at them.

  “Arthfael? Arthfael, where are you?”

  “Heeerrreee …”

  The voice came from the end of the room. Evander ran down to it, pausing as he reached more iron bars. He shined the light into the cage and moved it from side to side, searching for the face he had longed to see again for so many months, until –

  He found it. But it was not the face he remembered. Arthfael's once youthful face was gone, replaced with a gaunt, hollow-cheeked skeleton. His hair was dark and matted, and his thin wrists were clasped within iron cuffs and bound to the walls with chains. He stared at the ground, and even as Evander made his presence known, he didn't lift his face to look at him.

  “Arthfael – it's me – it's Evander,” he said breathlessly. “I've come to get you. Come on: we're going home.”

  Clack, clack, clack, clack.

  The sound of something solid smacking against the stone floor came from behind him, and Evander had barely begun to turn around when he recognized what it was: hooves.

  The Strangler stood directly behind him, a smile pulling unnaturally on his goat face.

  “I shall be the judge of that, I believe,” he said.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  “You said if I completed the tasks, you'd let him go,” Evander said angrily, wrapping his hands around the bars behind him as he stared up at The Strangler.

  “I said that you would get him,” The Strangler said. “I never said I would hand deliver him back to earth.”

  Evander growled and turned to face the bars. It didn't matter: he had the key. He could unlock Arthfael and they would go back together with no problem at all –

  “Yes, the key will unlock him,” The Strangler said. “Go ahead. I shall not stop you.”

  Evander put the box holding the Deathless Flame down and reached into his pocket for the ornate key. Taking it out, he reached for the padlock chaining Arthfael in when –