by A. D. Adams
“We have twenty-one thousand ready to fight. You can show him, you know where we are. He can fly here and land by my hut. How many dragons will come with him?”
“Thousands. I don't know exactly how many at this point.”
“What about the humans?” the old one asked.
“He is visiting them now. I know the guard will come and at my last count, they had somewhere around sixty to perhaps a hundred thousand.”
“Can he control all these various forces?”
“Yes, I believe he can. His magic is beyond what I even thought possible.”
“I have a feeling that he will want the elves as part of the fighting force.”
“Those bastards. I wouldn't trust them as far as I could throw a dragon.”
“For some reason, I think he would want all those who will benefit to participate.”
“Well, that's his problem.”
“He needs to know that there is a dwarf village just outside our wall, and we are under constant attack,” the old one reminded the Sinut.
“Yes, I will make sure he is aware of your situation. I will have to discuss much with him, if he will listen.”
Chapter 15 - Unknown Becomes Known
(An answer to a question is often unwanted information.)
- The Time of the Draman -
Terra flew through the day and past sunset to finally arrive at his crevice home. As he was landing, he could see Fienna and Cardana waiting for him. He had been in mental contact with Fienna all during his flight. As Terra changed into a human once more, he hugged his family. Dragons, sea nymphs, his mother, sister, and the young one they had found watched them. Terra was tired and walked with Fienna and Cardana to the small cave in the rear of their home. Fienna had told everyone that Terra would talk to them at sun-rising.
Terra slept badly. The killing of all those humans bothered him. He had kept it out of his mind during his visit to the humans, but now it flooded back into his thoughts. He understood killing for food, but killing for revenge or even justice seemed wrong. He would never again lose control as he had after they had found the villagers dead. He knew many more would die before this was over. He had to come up with a way to shorten the fighting. He spent most of the sunset thinking about how to organize those who would come with him. He now had at least a basic plan, but needed to know what the land looked like on the other side of the mountains.
He needed to talk to Tone again, but this time it would be him starting the conversation. The sun was just rising and Fienna was stirring with Cardana. They would go to the private shore where they had first met the sea nymphs. It would be a place where he could talk to Tone, without interruption.
Terra had left before talking to anyone. He had ordered the guard dragons and nymphs to leave them in peace for one sun-rising. Terra carried Fienna and their daughter on his back. After landing, he reverted to his human form. They sat as a family looking over the great water.
“I need to talk to Tone,” he said to Fienna.
“Do you think she will respond?” Fienna asked.
“I won’t know until I try. Tone, I need to know what the land looks like on the other side of the Barrier Mountains,” Terra said into the air.
“What is that?” Fienna asked Terra as she felt the sand begin to shake.
Before them, the sand seemed to be shaking and forming into small hills and mountains as if they were flying high above it. Soon, Terra could recognize the Barrier Mountains and the coastal valleys. Then the land beyond the mountains began to take shape. On the far side of the Barrier Mountains, a long boxed in valley formed with a great wall closing one end off.
In Terra's mind's eye, the sand sculpture slowly changed to what he assumed was the actual view of the land itself. It was as if he was flying over the area. He could even see the creatures within the valley as his mind took him closer to ground level. They had a human form, but no hair. Their bodies were black as the deepest darkness with white feathers up their backs and covering their heads. Fienna could see through their mental connection what Terra was viewing.
The land was green and many fields of growing plants were evident. Although the plantings did not seem as healthy as those in the coastal valleys, he continued on flying over the great wall, where he saw dead land, between two mountains. A small muddy water flow moved down to a large flat area just outside the mountains. He saw no plants after flying over the great wall. At the end of the valley, out of sight of the great wall, he could see a walled village. The village was at the base of the last of the mountains forming the nymph's valley. It was completely hidden from those in the green valley and its protective wall. He estimated that sixty to seventy thousand squat creatures dressed in black rags lived in the filthy village.
The creatures were no more than a third as tall as he. They were human-like, although small and bulky. They were organized into groups that seemed to be commanded by one slightly larger creature. These larger ones were striking the others with long vines and lightning coming from the tip of short black sticks. These creatures had gray skin and large round dark eyes, but even from above he could see the hatred within those eyes. They seemed to live in caves made of dried mud and rocks. The whole area was disgusting to Terra.
Just beyond this group of creatures, Terra could see an uncountable number of gnarled dead trees. They stretch as far as he could see. This must have been a magnificent and beautiful land at one time. The trees flowed down the edge of the mountain range.
In his mind, he turned and flew down the edge of the Barrier Mountains at incredible speed. On his right side the great mountain range stretched beyond sight, on his left ran a great expanse of twisted dead trees with no living thing in sight. He flew up and saw twenty to thirty mountains with high snow-covered valleys. A few lower valleys meandered through the mountains with small streams of water flowing at their bases. Where the water emptied into the dead lands, it seemed to form into dead murky pools that rapidly evaporated into the dry, dead, hot air. Even in his mind, he could feel the death that this land offered to all that would come to it.
He came across one odd thing. There seemed to be a wall of ice that covered a valley entrance. The ice appeared to cover the entire valley as far back as he could see. He was surprised the ice was not melting considering the hot dry air.
As he flew down the edge of the great mountain range, the devastation of the land was total. He now knew why Tone was dying. Dark clouds started to form above him and the further he traveled, the darker the clouds became. He could see in the distance that the cloud cover grew ever darker and lightning flashed within the mass of darkness. Terra came to a large valley cut into the mountain range. He could see a village of the same squat, ugly creatures that were outside the wall of the box valley. There were over three hundred thousand creatures just in front of the great opening that appeared to lead into the mountains. He could see a lingering fog at the entrance of the valley. The creatures’ village was well away from the fog.
Terra could see that the creatures were again controlled by pain, handed out at the end of long vines. They had been here for a long time based on the number and complexity of the mud caves. They had also built a large wall of stone that had been taken from the side of the closest mountain. The wall was dragon length high. It had four large round walls in each corner about a quarter of a dragon length higher than the wall. On the top of these round things stood a number of the creatures watching the inside and outside of the surrounding walls. There was a gap in the wall closed by great wood panels. This faced the opening in the mountains. The clouds above the village flashed with lightning and swirled with a hideous darkness.
Terra turned in his mind flight to move up the valley toward the coast. He flew to a high vantage point and at first saw three large lakes intertwined with over sixty mountains, some of which had collapsed. Then the mind vision blurred, as it slowly came back into focus, the view changed considerably. The lakes had disappeared and now a valley wound
through the mountains. It was the same mountains without the collapsed areas.
He could see a valley with a small stream at its base. The valley rose and fell as it flowed through a complex path around and through the various mountains. He then realized that this was an image of what had been, before the Solans caused the great avalanches that saved the humans. He followed the image from where the village of the squat creatures had been at the entrance of the valley. Where the village stood was green and lush area fed by a stream of water that came from the base of the valley. He saw two massive mountains that formed the entrance to the valley. The small stream of water that flowed into the green area came down through the valley. A path followed alongside the stream that had been worn down by thousands of passing beasts for hundreds, or perhaps thousands, of seasons.
As his mind followed the image of the stream through the valley, he saw the stream had formed from water draining from the mountain tops, as the snow and ice melted. The stream ended in a group of pools, but the path continued on. The valley opened on the other side of the two great mountains into a wide green area. On both sides of this area, mountains rose to incredible heights. The path headed toward a smaller mountain that sat in the middle of two much larger mountains, causing the valley to split. As he followed the path, it flowed down one of the valleys. The other valley was much higher and would have required a climb rather than simply walking.
The path opened into a rockier area that followed around the base of another mountain and then twisted back and up into a narrow slit between two more mountains. The slit was just large enough for two humans to walk through, side-by-side. On the other side of the slit, the path went down into a large green valley. A small stream started to form just beyond the slit and it became larger, fed by small cascades of water from the sides of the mountains.
At the end of the valley, there was a triple peaked mountain on one side and a large single peaked mountain on the other side. Between these massive mountains, a steep sided valley existed. The stream at this point had grown into a dragon length wide fast moving torrent. This torrent of water emptied into the Lake of Solan.
As Terra rose high above the mountains, he looked back; the image again blurred, and the three lakes reappeared. He could see the landslide that closed the coastal valleys and the Lake of Solan from the dead lands beyond. The next rock-slide was at the narrow slit, no wider than two humans. These two rock-slides formed the first lake.
The next rock-slide was at the three mountains where the valleys split. The two larger mountains both had massive rock slides that filled in both of the split valleys. The final and largest lake stretched from the dual rock-slides to the two large mountains that sat in front of the village of the squat creatures. This lake was larger than the Lake of Solan. Terra noticed an odd thing where the dual rock slides had closed the split valleys. A path had been forged across the top of these slides and the central mountain.
He looked closer and saw that the path circled around three of the mountains and down to the devastated plain, on the opposite side toward the boxed green valley of nymphs. The path then went across the top of the two rock-slides to the other side of the lake. At that point, it appeared they tried to push the path toward the coast but failed. A significant amount of wood was piled at the edge of the second lake that had obviously been hauled up the path. Perhaps, the dwarfs were trying to build floating platforms to reach the coast. Terra could tell the entire path had not been used for many sets of seasons and it appeared to be abandoned and collapsing.
He turned and continued his mind flight down the edge of the mountains.
Chapter 16 - Dark Mountain
(Darkness can be a benefit or a curse.)
- The Time of the Draman -
As Terra flew down the edge of the mountains, he could see them curving into the center of the landmass. Terra could see lightning flashes across the flat land. The lightning seemed to be hitting, no, attacking, the dead trees, but was staying away from the mountains. The darkness became more profound above the flat land as he followed the curve of the mountain range. The clouds were lighter above the mountains, as if Tone was fighting this plague of darkness.
He came across another large walled village with perhaps another two hundred thousand of the squat creatures. This village was at the mouth of a long, deep crevice that followed along the edge of the mountains. At the base of the crevice was a dry bed where once fast moving water flowed. The village was built similar to the other villages, except it had two openings. One faced away from the crevice, while the other faced the crevice.
The crevice ended and as he moved up the curve of the mountains, they finally came to the end of the range. There was, in the distance, a great black mountain at least twice the height of any other Terra had seen until this point. He flew in his mind vision toward the great mountain, crossing the flat land. Lightning had destroyed the trees—only dead trunks remained. Even as he flew across this area the lightning constantly exploded between the black clouds and the few twisted dead full height trees left.
As Terra approached the dark mountain, he saw a set of low hills that surrounded it. It looked as if caves had been dug into the hills. He could see a few of the squat creatures huddling in the entrances of the caves. The hills formed a circle around the massive mountain.
The mountain sat in a lake of dull black liquid. The surface of the liquid rippled and seemed to be as thick as mud. Lightning struck all around the mountain, striking both the hills and the lake surface. The bolts avoided the mountain itself. It seemed to bend away from the sides and top of the black edifice.
Above the mountain, the clouds swirled into a vortex of deep black, which created a dark crown around its peak. The entire mountain and its surroundings were completely barren of life except for the squat creatures living in fear of the devastating lightning.
Terra, in his mind flight, flew around the monstrous mountain. He could see only one cave opening. It was slightly above the black lake and was even darker than the mountain itself. He could feel a hatred emanating from the entire area. It seemed to flow from the gaping opening in the mountain’s side like an ill wind.
Terra knew he would have to approach this mountain alone. No other creature could survive the lightning. His back ridge could absorb and deflect the terrible flashes of energy. The image of the mountain slowly changed back to a sand sculpture before him and his family.
The sand next to Fienna began to vibrate and mound up until it reach the same height as Fienna. It formed into an older, quite beautiful human female. She twisted as if looking around the area. She looked at Fienna, then Cardana, and smiled.
“She is a beautiful baby,” the woman said in a very odd scratchy voice. It sounded as if rocks were rubbing against each other, creating a voice of a sort.
“Thank you,” Fienna said.
“This is Tone. Tone this is Fienna, my mate, and my daughter,” Terra introduced them to Tone.
“I know of you from Terra and I know what is happening,” Fienna said.
“I am sorry I have to bring Terra into this, but I have no choice. He is the only one that can defeat the darkness. You see the dark one was my first-born and I failed him. I was able to control him, but he has become too strong for me. He must be gone, and soon,” Tone said with sadness showing in her face.
“You have shown us the other side of the mountains. I have questions,” Terra said.
“Ask them,” the sandy figure replied.
“What is the icy area in the mountains?”
“The ice is where the elves went. They suspended themselves in time with their magic. You have the power to clear the ice and release them. They betrayed their allies in the previous fighting. You must choose if you wish for them to join in this fight.”
“Why does the lightning attack the dead trees?”
“The trees are not dead. Their roots still live and fight the darkness in their own way. The dark one thinks the lightning kills the roots that
spread throughout the dead lands. He does not understand that they are all connected. The tree roots hold the water and many seeds of the long dead plants. They have grown weak and soon will begin to lose their fight with the darkness. They need you.”
“Can they help in this fight?”
“Yes, but you need to help heal them.”
“I understand. Why are the clouds brighter over the mountains?”
“I push clear water through the mountain winds up into the clouds. The water breaks up the dark clouds. It blocks the expansion of his power.”
“I see. Fienna needs to be able to talk to you as I do.”
“I will listen for her and will answer if I can,” the sand woman said.
“Good. We need a place to leave our daughter, a safe place where she is protected against any attempt to harm her. Do you have such a place?”
“There is a location under the water near the sea nymphs' village. It is the safest place I can provide for her. It is a cave within the mountain that the sea nymphs call ‘Lampo.’ I can show you the hidden entrance. You must go through a series of tunnels under the mountain to get to a chamber as beautiful as your home.”
“Does it have air?” Fienna asked.
“Yes. And it will hold her and any you choose to protect her safely. Rest, Terra. You will need all of your power. You are my hope and the hope of all. You need to know one final fact. The dark one may be many places at any time, but must always be in one place at all times,” the figure said as it fell into a simple pile of sand.
Terra did not understand why Tone gave him information in such vague statements. He wished she would simply tell him what she wanted him to know. Perhaps, it was because she never talked to anyone but him, and did not know how to explain things to intelligent beings. What ever the cause it annoyed Terra to have to figure out what she was telling him.
At sunset Terra and his family returned home and he began to plan for the upcoming fighting.
