They crossed into Arcadia. A land of a hundred forests, a hundred mountains, and a hundred gods, but few men.
He was treated as a little more than a pack animal. Cold porridge, water, a blanket of filthy wool were his comforts. To walk and to carry were his purpose. He understood this, but understood nothing else. "Who are they?" he asked Barro on a wet morning, clenching their pale fingers at a spare, hissing fire. Barro was a seasoned man, not young like Clovis; he was solitary but seemed wise to the boy. "They are Iylum's men. And now we are Iylum's slaves. You know of Iylum?" "He is god of conquest." "The gods have always warred with one another. Buy Iylum thinks he is better. Iylum thinks he is best."
"Where will they take us?"
Barro did not know, or did not want to answer, but said at last: "We will be dead before they get there."
Clovis was dead a tenday later, too cold and too tired he stopped on the mud track they marched, and knelt. Two of Iylum's men yelled at him, kicked him, spat on him, then finally took his load, his boots and clothes. They left Clovis there, sobbing, naked and dirty, defeated not by war or the gods but by himself, with his burden divided between Barro and the boy.
He did not feel pity for Clovis, but shame.
Some of Iylum's men would use Barro to exercise with wood swords and staves. They had used Clovis too, so now they used the boy. He did not know how to fight, and did not think he wanted to learn. It had done his father no mercy, or Dwlf or Amidash. Or Clovis. But he had no choice, because he had no choices.
He was slow and clumsy, but he was angry too. I am not an animal! his thoughts stormed, How will you fight a hundred gods! His adolescent rage was punished. Blows to his face and head that blinded him, deafened him, deprived him of all strength with shocking swiftness; he shook and staggered but he refused to submit, to kneel as Clovis had done. Finally his hands were struck, with such force he was swept clean of all other sensations than pain. He fell then, not whimpering like Clovis, but screaming.
They tended him and gave him strong drink that night, but drove him hard and did not feed him the next day. Like a dog, he knew. Like a dog that won't obey.
October 31, 2011
Arcadia II
This is how his education began:
Twelve of them skulked downslope through the thick dark, threading a maze of naked beech, boulders big as oxen, ferns painted by hoarfrost. Dwlf picked their path on deer-ways that wound and wandered, Amidash was the vigil at their back. Two other children and three women went with them, but it was the five men who seemed more afraid. They carried only hardtack and some dried venison, blankets, and spears.
In the day they would have reached the soft bice grass of the mead in an hour, but their progress was deliberate and chary. A twist of ankle would have been grave. Often they stopped to crouch and listen and watch for other feet and other eyes in the wood.
So the sky was lighting as they got level ground. The men whispered: "Do we go back?" "Twenty tents..." "Yes." "No. We must be quick." "They will mark us!" "The camp sleeps, and I see no watch." "It must be now."
They went along the forest edge in a sly hurry, until a stir of motion in the camp across the mead unnerved them, and they retreated up through the trees. Dwlf made their tracks to wend and allowed no rest. At low noon six men dressed in hard leather caught up. The fighting was short, too many were exhausted. Dwlf was stabbed through his left leg. Two other men of the cloh were slain, and then it was over. Amidash had vanished. The women and the other children fled, two gave chase.
He didn't know what to do, so he did nothing.
Their hands were tied and their shirts stripped. Down to the camp they were took, Dwlf and Barro and Clovis and him, but they met no others from the cloh. Then he saw the smoke, thick and black as the night had been, creeping down from the divide, as they had done.
The camp was breaking. The four of them lay or knelt in the wet grass, while four of the leathered men spoke over them in some coarse southron tongue. All carried forged swords belted in tooled scabbards, their boots were weathered and drab. Dwlf's throat was cut. The other three were made to bear provisions, and roped in a line.
They left, marching north.
Twelve of them skulked downslope through the thick dark, threading a maze of naked beech, boulders big as oxen, ferns painted by hoarfrost. Dwlf picked their path on deer-ways that wound and wandered, Amidash was the vigil at their back. Two other children and three women went with them, but it was the five men who seemed more afraid. They carried only hardtack and some dried venison, blankets, and spears.
In the day they would have reached the soft bice grass of the mead in an hour, but their progress was deliberate and chary. A twist of ankle would have been grave. Often they stopped to crouch and listen and watch for other feet and other eyes in the wood.
So the sky was lighting as they got level ground. The men whispered: "Do we go back?" "Twenty tents..." "Yes." "No. We must be quick." "They will mark us!" "The camp sleeps, and I see no watch." "It must be now."
They went along the forest edge in a sly hurry, until a stir of motion in the camp across the mead unnerved them, and they retreated up through the trees. Dwlf made their tracks to wend and allowed no rest. At low noon six men dressed in hard leather caught up. The fighting was short, too many were exhausted. Dwlf was stabbed through his left leg. Two other men of the cloh were slain, and then it was over. Amidash had vanished. The women and the other children fled, two gave chase.
He didn't know what to do, so he did nothing.
Their hands were tied and their shirts stripped. Down to the camp they were took, Dwlf and Barro and Clovis and him, but they met no others from the cloh. Then he saw the smoke, thick and black as the night had been, creeping down from the divide, as they had done.
The camp was breaking. The four of them lay or knelt in the wet grass, while four of the leathered men spoke over them in some coarse southron tongue. All carried forged swords belted in tooled scabbards, their boots were weathered and drab. Dwlf's throat was cut. The other three were made to bear provisions, and roped in a line.
They left, marching north.
October 13, 2011
Arcadia I
As a boy he was given nothing, and loved nothing, and aspired to nothing.
Dwlf was not their father, but had parented them both since leaving their birth-homes in the night. For one cold summer and one wet winter they hid under the skirt of a mountain, in a cloh between two of her legs, like pups confused by uncertain danger.
Other families came, but many left. There was always work to do, wood and fire and water and game to gather and tend and fetch and skin - and the ditch to dig, and dig, and dig; agone were days of idle boyish play, Dwlf taught them all the chores of men.
A cliroc stayed the winter, and made them to do obeisance to Gaerigania, the god of the mountain, but Dwlf did no rituals with them.
Amidash was the quicker and stronger of the two, and sometimes with Dwlf practiced spears. They had no forge for bronze, and trade was rare. A sickness of chills and sores took three of the families, and the cliroc, and bore a pock on Dwlf's left hand, but the boys were unblighted.
Rain and runoff rose in the ditch, and one night there were campfires in the mead below. Men argued in Dwlf's shanty. Dwlf took the boys and two other families, twelve of them all, and left before the Lady's blush.
The cloh had never bore a name. In his memory, it was the first of many places in a long journey.
Dwlf was not their father, but had parented them both since leaving their birth-homes in the night. For one cold summer and one wet winter they hid under the skirt of a mountain, in a cloh between two of her legs, like pups confused by uncertain danger.
Other families came, but many left. There was always work to do, wood and fire and water and game to gather and tend and fetch and skin - and the ditch to dig, and dig, and dig; agone were days of idle boyish play, Dwlf taught them all the chores of men.
A cliroc stayed the winter, and made them to do obeisance to Gaerigania, the god of the mountain, but Dwlf did no rituals with them.
Amidash was the quicker and stronger of the two, and sometimes with Dwlf practiced spears. They had no forge for bronze, and trade was rare. A sickness of chills and sores took three of the families, and the cliroc, and bore a pock on Dwlf's left hand, but the boys were unblighted.
Rain and runoff rose in the ditch, and one night there were campfires in the mead below. Men argued in Dwlf's shanty. Dwlf took the boys and two other families, twelve of them all, and left before the Lady's blush.
The cloh had never bore a name. In his memory, it was the first of many places in a long journey.
October 1, 2011
Threshold
He opened his eyes, to find security in the asterisms. Orientation relaxed the waking vision's grip, his throat unclenched with a sigh. As he breathed out, reflexively, the pit breathed from him. Trepid, he lowered his stare into the lightless expanse.
By place he counted back time, the anterior shrouded by a labyrinthine canyon, a trap he had thought eternal. Freed, he came out onto a littered and sulphurous moor, that descended onto salt tundra. There the wind had belched up a long squall of dust; northless, untethered, he flickered across the scrub until spat out on a basalt plain, trackless and corrugated in strange configurations. It graduated into a wide, shallow stair, that banked on chalk cliffs at the cusp of the world.
Here was a vast emptiness, in it no features to distinguish near from remote; an immense hollow - not like a chamber, he discerned no boundaries but the line where he stood, and the eclipse of the sky. As if he had found the sunken sun, an extinguished megasomatic entity, the corpse of a star.
Here he stood in lasting contemplation of that unknowable space. Motionless; time's surrogate prosody hung.
Longer, he brooded the solitary articles at his feet: Two stones, fist-size and worn.
Then, ponderous and resigned, he traded them, then walked out to the brink.
"Lord!" spake behind him.
By place he counted back time, the anterior shrouded by a labyrinthine canyon, a trap he had thought eternal. Freed, he came out onto a littered and sulphurous moor, that descended onto salt tundra. There the wind had belched up a long squall of dust; northless, untethered, he flickered across the scrub until spat out on a basalt plain, trackless and corrugated in strange configurations. It graduated into a wide, shallow stair, that banked on chalk cliffs at the cusp of the world.
Here was a vast emptiness, in it no features to distinguish near from remote; an immense hollow - not like a chamber, he discerned no boundaries but the line where he stood, and the eclipse of the sky. As if he had found the sunken sun, an extinguished megasomatic entity, the corpse of a star.
Here he stood in lasting contemplation of that unknowable space. Motionless; time's surrogate prosody hung.
Longer, he brooded the solitary articles at his feet: Two stones, fist-size and worn.
Then, ponderous and resigned, he traded them, then walked out to the brink.
"Lord!" spake behind him.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)