Cloudfyre Falling - A dark fairy tale

by A. L. Brooks

  She did not reply. Simply waited for him to make his decision known.

  Gargaron dismounted and waded forward, his ankle still sore. Though he stood in the lagoon to his waist, and she perched high on the exposed rock, he still towered over her; a buffalo to a duckling.

  ‘You would need bend down,’ she advised. ‘I cannot reach you from here.’

  He crouched, the water rising up around his belly and chest and came face to face with her where she stood on the edge of this mighty stretch of rock. Up so close, she were, he realised, an exquisite looking creature. He had never seen the likes of her. Aye, on his travels and expeditions, he had witnessed forest sprites and river nymphs. Some had even called home the Summer Woods up behind Hovel when he were a boy. But this being were different. She sported, as far as he could tell, two sets of wings, like those of the Buccuyashuck dragonflies in the Spring that grew to the size of hoardogs. And a pair of skinny, bony arms and legs. Her fingers and toes, proportionate to her hands and feet, were long and ungainly looking. Like that of a Hovel Nightfrog. Her eyes were large and luscious. And alluring. She had small teeth, the same colour of her skin which were a soft creamy green. She had long hair that reminded him of healthy spring grass. She had small breasts tucked behind a green and brown shawl that were tied by a vine belt around her waist and which hung over small green thighs. She wore no shoes. Her toes had tiny green leaves where other beings would have nails or claws. She had an odour of flowers about her.

  ‘Do you have anyone left here?’ Gargaron asked.

  ‘No.’ Her voice brimmed with sadness.

  ‘Do you wish to stay here?’

  She did not know the answer to that.

  ‘If I agree to you delving into my mind, then might you accompany me on my quest to find this sorcerer?’

  She watched him closely, thinking deeply. ‘I will let you know soon enough.’

  He considered this answer. Eyeing her closely in turn. ‘Very well. Then I submit my mind to you.’

  6

  She swallowed deeply. And raised her arm and jabbed a small finger at his forehead. His body went stiff as stone, feeling as if some great worm had just thrust itself through his skull and into his brain.

  He saw a smooth pattern of images flow over his vision, like water in a stream swishing over smooth stones. Waking beside a river. Seeing death and destruction in his village. Finding his wife and daughter dead inside Summer Woods. Carrying their corpses to great precipice. Watching Wraithbirds carry them away.

  He saw himself burning his village folk, and fetching Drenvel’s Bane before leaving Hovel. He watched his trek to Autumn, accompanied by all that death and rot. He saw Dark Ones. Watched himself meeting the two-headed horse, Grimah. Observed his adventure on Skysite tower. And of drinking himself to sleep in the Autumn tavern, the Goat’s Head. He saw the dead again, scattered amongst the streets. And Corpse Flowers beyond count. He saw the metal man and its airship. And of taking to the skies…

  When the small green being finally withdrew her hand a trickle of purple blood coursed down the bridge of Gargaron’s nose, down his cheek. He noticed her fingertip smeared in blood, and a small barb, like that of a rose thorn, retracting. He saw her shudder, as if what she had learned were too much to absorb.

  He watched her face. She watched his.

  7

  She needed the Temple Tree. She desired communion with Mother Thoonsk about what best to do. But she knew not how to get up there without the use of her wing. And with her broken arm it would be impossible to climb. Thus she sat there on the spirit stone, surrounded by her home trees, wondering what to do. She looked across at the giant and considered him a while; his steed waited nearby patiently, nibbling at floating clumps of water-grass with both its mouths.

  ‘These Dark Ones I see in your memories?’ she eventually asked Gargaron. ‘What be they?’

  He shook his head. And considered his answer. ‘As yet I have had no genuine encounters with them other than brief moments where they have approached me, studied me, before retreating. I do not know who or what they are, nor from where they have come.’

  ‘Do you believe they have brought this death?’

  He sighed. ‘I can only speculate, of course. Perhaps they have. Or perhaps the breakdown of our land and its societies has brought them out into places they might not have ordinarily strayed. Or perhaps the mayhem and death has simply displaced them from wherever their home territories be.’

  Melai thought of the monster this Gargaron had recently slain. She had naught seen its kind in Thoonsk before this day. Perhaps it too had been displaced, or lack of food and prey had drawn it from its own country, or perhaps whatever creature or beings that normally kept it at bay had perished and were no longer prominent enough to contain it. ‘But I have heard your fears, oh giant, and I have seen that you suspect them in the downfall of the realm.’

  ‘Aye, that is true. But perhaps I merely blame them for so far I have naught else to blame. Such as you blamed me for the dying in these woodlands.’

  She said nothing.

  He went on. ‘Still, they could not possibly be to blame for every death. For I have seen animals, birdlings, die without warning as if they have been struck down by an invisible wave of spears. So, this Hawkmoth be whom I seek for this Hawkmoth claims he knows the answers.’

  She continued to watch him. ‘Do you believe this?’

  He shrugged. ‘I have precious little else to believe at present. Though I must say it has given me some focus.’

  ‘What if there be no sorcerer?’ Melai put to him. ‘What if it be some ploy to drag out the last of the living to their deaths?’

  He had to admit, this were something he had not yet considered. And it surprised him that he had not. Were he thus walking straight into a potential trap? Had he been left so bereft of feeling, so distraught, that his judgement had become so clouded? Had he been so desperate for an answer to this blight that he were willing to dash after the first solution that fell at his feet?

  Do not torture yourself, a voice in his head spoke. You have had much on your plate lately.

  He sighed. ‘If it be some ploy then so be it. I would sooner fall trying, than to fall sitting staring at the earyth.’

  She eyed him closely, thoughtfully. In turn he eyed her. ‘Makes me wonder,’ he said, his eyes narrowed. ‘If this Hawkmoth be indeed seeking the living, then why has he not yet detected you?’

  She shrugged. ‘Who says he has not?’

  8

  The second metal man were sprawled and tangled in a hazel tree. Half of it blackened, charred, hinting at signs of damage by fire. Parts of the hazel tree were scorched, with branches entirely burnt of their foliage, and those leaves not charred to ash had turned copper brown from intense heat. Bits of painted skin flaked away from the metal man. Bits of tubing or wire either floated upon water’s surface, or were caught tangled amidst reeds and lilies.

  ‘It appeared three or four days gone,’ Melai told Gargaron from where she sat upon Grimah’s broad shoulders. ‘I refused to believe what it had to say. I had never seen its like before. I were highly suspicious of its presence given that it appeared mere hours after my dear sisters perished. Before it were engulfed in fire, it reported the sorcerer’s wishes. Not long after, I witnessed you fall from the sky. It were then I assumed it were all a lie, that you had come with another metal man, a Rjoond invasion force as we here in Thoonsk have always feared.’

  Gargaron studied the mekanik. Its presence seemed to confirm Hawkmoth’s claims that he had somehow found survivors across the land where Gargaron himself had not. And by all signs, the sorcerer had dispatched his mekaniks far and wide to gather all those who had not perished.

  Melai wiped her eyes and gazed out through forest canopy to a patch of blue sky. ‘I were with my sisters when we felt the first shockwave. We were away in the woods, collecting Xhuerfruit. Have you heard of Xhuerfruit? It be a fruit fortified by bark as tough as hawk eggs, but if th
e fruit be ripe—and you know when it’s ripe for the bark turns blue and puts off such a sweet pungent odour—you crack them open while they are still attached to their branch and inside you’ll find the soft Xhuer pulp all wet and gooey, which you suckle and the small segments explode and pop on your tongue and there is the release of the most delicious nectar. It can make you dizzy and giggly as a drunkard.’ She wiped more tears. ‘Anyway, we heard it coming. A sound like howling storm wind. The trees here speak to one another, a language we begin to learn as babes, but don’t fully grasp until adulthood. We could hear them speaking of a great dark shadow pressing down. But we argued between ourselves as to exactly what they meant. They seemed to be speaking of a poison on the air. Since then, the trees have fallen silent. I hear them no longer.

  ‘When we returned to our home trees of Willowgarde, everyone… all my dear sisters… they…’ She wept. ‘They fell ill. I thought at first it were but exhaustion. For one by one, without warning, they fell to slumber. I could not awaken them. I screamed at them to wake up. When the second wave passed over, it, it st-stole their breath…’ She cried now. Heavily. She wanted to say more but could not. She cried into her hand, her injured arm cradled in her lap, her tears falling, becoming tiny sprites as they splashed against tree and bark.

  Gargaron placed his hand gently upon her back, his fingers almost eclipsing her entirely. To hear her cry reminded him of his dear Veleyal and tears escaped his own eyes. He found naught to say to her, naught that would help her. So he simply sat with her while she sobbed; he seated in water upon a mound of deadfall, she on sun drenched stone.

  Eventually she looked up at him, the green skin around her cheeks and eyes puffy and damp. ‘I will come with you,’ she said softly. ‘I will come to Haitharath the Old as we here in Thoonsk know this sorcerer. If only to avenge the death of my dear sisters.’

  9

  Melai hid her pain. And kept her wing and arm close at her side. Aye, she had agreed to travel with this Rjoond but it did not mean she yet trusted him. She reminded herself that, although he had so far proved himself a friendly fellow, his folk were the enemy of her kind. She would thus remain on guard.

  They returned to Willowgarde where Melai spread upon the spirit stone an enormous Aahnyey leaf. From the garden growing amidst the roots of the Temple Tree that clung to the spirit stone, she uprooted a vast array of small plants and placed them on the leaf. Zantha, Loniyahd, Teatha, and Fraew. Jaynu Root, Blossom Cup, Jazeem Fruit. Yellowcap Mushoom. Dynoldi Pea. Gipp. Hyth. Meathe. Fynesa. Cortha. Some of them were rooted to round mossy stones, some to clumps of wood, some into the stinking carcass of dead swamp fish. Others sunk their roots directly into the Aahnyey leaf itself when placed there. Nearly of them all drew moisture from the atmosphere and did not require regular watering. But all would sustain her and would continue to yield fruit and some she would milk for poisons for the arrows she fired.

  Before she were done she fetched one last item. A little clump of bark layered wood; small green leaves sprouted from it. It were a plant that housed some particularly nasty things. Her sisters would say, ‘On long journeys from Willowgarde, to ward against any lizards of the sky, we must always carry amongst us the monstrut.’

  Melai now folded up her Aahnyey leaf into a travel sling, and heard the Rjoond enquire about directions for a westways journey. She declared that she could point the way and also better steer him and steed around hidden drop-offs and plunge-holes if she were mounted again upon the horse.

  As this Rjoond, Gargaron, heeled his steed and pulled the great two-headed creature around, Melai took one last look at her home trees of Willowgarde. Within them she and her sisters had been born. They had been their home and mother, their playground and teacher. Now she were leaving them… For how long she could not know.

  A tear filled her eye. And from where she sat upon the horse’s huge shoulders she turned forward and did not look back.

  MOONSTONE

  1

  THERE were indeed deep plunge holes as Melai had warned. And she would berate Gargaron for not having wings, for not having the ability to fly. He told her she were quite welcome to fly on ahead if it would please her. But she stayed where she were, upon the shoulder of the steed.

  ‘How be your wing by the way?’ he asked.

  But she would not answer.

  The stretches of water became larger, deeper, in these, Thoonsk’s, westwun reaches. Trees grew sparse. Dead things floated. Fishes, turtles, water-lizards. And other beasts Gargaron had never laid his eye on. Oarfish. Critters he had only heard stories of. And things he did not at all recognise. Dark things with shining skin and arms ending in spiked claws, and mouths full of teeth, and gleaming, bulging black devil eyes. Gargaron felt a peculiar need to drive his steed around these strange clumps of dead creatures, fearing another attack by some alien critter such as that damned Soulsucka, but Melai would direct him irritably through them, steering Grimah away from treacherous plunge holes, and then scolding Gargaron for ignoring her.

  Every now and then Grimah would stray into water that threatened to swamp both himself and riders, the water gushing high around his shoulders, soaking Gargaron to his hips, Melai’s grassy hair swirled serpentine across its rippling surface. The steed nickered nervously. Gargaron opted once or twice to dismount, for fear that under his weight, the horse might sink into muddy floor. The act left Melai frustrated, arguing that if he were to do that she would then need keep look-out for steed and Rjoond. ‘That be not ideal,’ she warned. ‘I have not enough eyes to guide you both around deathly drop-offs.’

  When Gargaron suggested she take flight and call down directions from above, for surely with a bird’s eye view she would see the way more clearly, she argued otherwise.

  ‘I can see the bottom of the lagoon far more clearly here, thank you.’

  This rebuke intrigued him.

  ‘What do you suffer?’ he asked finally. ‘What injury did that beast leave you with?’

  ‘None,’ she said hotly.

  He pulled the steed to a halt. Both she and Gargaron lurched forward, such were the abrupt cessation of momentum. ‘I know you hide it,’ he said gruffly. ‘Let us have it out so that we might lance the problem before it festers.’

  ‘Press on!’ she insisted. ‘I am uninjured!’ Her tone suggested this were the end of the matter and end of discussion.

  He hesitated. Through her mind bond with him, he had happened to see her personal thoughts and fears. He knew she had damaged wing and arm both. Yet, he would see how long she could keep a lid on her pain.

  2

  Gargaron ate lunch. Dried mushrooms, cured ham. He offered Melai some but she turned her nose up at his taste in food. Following a somewhat derogatory comment by her regarding his culinary preference they sat there on a huge pile of deadfall and she ate nothing. And she spoke little. And she gazed at length into the woods, her thoughts far away. Gargaron would have preferred some conversation but reminded himself that she had only recently farewelled her kin. No easy task. Thus he respected her silence and her longing for solitude. And assumed her appetite would return in time.

  Grimah watched them both as if curious of their nature.

  After he had eaten, Gargaron shed his boot to inspect his ankle. Melai pretended not to look but she were intrigued to see the mighty tear put there by the Soulsucka were now effectively gone. Again she were surprised by this Rjoond’s ability to heal himself; she were slowly rethinking her belief that his kind were all oafish and dim witted.

  3

  They pressed on after midday, when the two suns seemed to be swinging by each other. The swamp appeared to steam. The air were muggy and rank. Sweat gushed off Gargaron in small rivers. Dead pond skaters floated. In the trees he watched bizarre creatures Melai called Buccas. Another species Gargaron had never laid eye upon. So fascinating were they he near drove Grimah into a plunge hole. ‘Watch where you send us!’ Melai screeched at him.

  Gargaron pulled Grimah to
an immediate halt. He saw where shallow sandy lagoon floor gave way to the dark maw of an abyss off to the steed’s right shoulder. He pulled Grimah back a few paces before returning his gaze into the trees. ‘What be those things?’ he asked. They were peculiar frog-skinned, spider-like creatures, and peculiar of shape. So peculiar of shape Gargaron were simply awestruck. It were as if a pair of folk, with all sets of limbs intact, were fused together back to back. And not only that, they were headless, two necks per individual that ended in naught but stumps.

  ‘Buccas,’ Melai told him. ‘Magical creatures. Kind, inquisitive, not so evil as their appearance might suggest. Forest folk claimed they could never die, that they be immortal.’ Her gaze shifted to water’s surface where one or two of these strange creatures floated. Dead. ‘Though now it seems they too cannot withstand this infernal curse that grips Thoonsk.’

  ‘This curse grips all,’ Gargaron reminded her. ‘Both Thoonsk and beyond.’ And they pressed on, steering clear of the plunge hole.

  4

  The hours drew on and the day grew hotter; a stifling humidity hung about the woodland. It drew rivers of sweat from both Gargaron and steed; Gargaron’s clothes were well soaked. He cupped handfuls of lagoon water to douse his head. ‘How do you bear this?’ he asked Melai, water and sweat dripping off his lips.

  ‘Bear what?’

  ‘This unbearable heat.’

  ‘I thought it obvious,’ she snapped at him.

  If it were obvious then he did not know how.

  ‘The suns,’ she pointed out. ‘Have you not noticed? They are such as lovers these days. They fall toward one another. The heat were never like this. It be unbearable. Thoonsk be normally a cool, temperate place.’

  ‘Very well. I shall take your word for it.’