Tears of the Dead (7 page)

A line of wrathful clouds, pregnant with lightning, raced from the south and obscured the blue sky and falling stars. Demonic voyeurs slowly rose from the depths, drawn by forbidden passion. The water’s surface crackled into a sheet of black ice.

Their robes merged and flapped like wings, but instead of lifting the lovers they sank, almost imperceptibly, to the snow. He reached up to strip away her robe just as her silken slipper touched the snow.

It melted through to her toes. Unlike the wind, it seeped against her flesh as dank and clammy as a grave.

Images of the stone garden in Nushen and the bodies of its dead flashed into her mind. Her eyes flew open.

“No!” She enveloped herself in a ball of fire as he flashed into a swirl of smoke. Flame and fume wrestled atop the glacier until all flesh and passion burned away.

The black ice shattered as demons fled to the deep once again.

Two spirits stood separated by the narrow stream, robes limp, feet not touching the ground. Offering Blade firmly clenched, she fully veiled herself in the image of Nuwa.

“You have chosen,” he said and faded into the mist.

A single mortal tear, a tiny remnant of his dark gift, fell from her eye and dropped upon the Offering Blade. It slid down along the razor edge until it transformed into blood as red as the orichalcum metal.

The tear rolled off the tip and dropped into the water.

“It is done,” she whispered.

A familiar voice rumbled on the wind from the approaching storm.

Keep your promise
,
and I will keep mine.

Nuwa transformed into the Golden Dragon and vanished.

The blood drop did not disperse and wash over the waterfall. Instead, it sank deeper into the ocean and grew, changing from crimson to black. The demons gathered into a twisting school of blackness and pursued it, drawn to its desolation and regret. They chased the bloody teardrop into the abyss until all sunlight vanished.

The tear grew into an enormous, sinister glob, larger than all the demons combined. Ruddy red eyes blinked to life, and armored plates clinked into existence down its long form until it became a monster of unimaginable power and size. The monster hurtled upward toward the surface, screeching demons trailing closely behind.

The beast suddenly turned and plunged into the ice wall encasing the sea. The ice wall exploded as the glacial ocean and countless demons cascaded thousands of feet to the tundra below.

In both directions the ice wall crumbled, and the ocean fell upon the land. The glacier itself, freed from the titanic weight, suddenly bobbed up hundreds of feet. A hidden ocean trapped below the ice, even larger than the vast surface ocean, blasted forth from its confinement near the bottom of the glacier.

Combined, they formed a wave of deathly cold water a mile high. As tsunamis wiped the world’s coasts clean, the glacial juggernaut began to scour three continents from within.

Between the two, the rains began.

“The icy sea pushed south, the cold wind blew north. The world inhaled deeply, preparing for the long plunge into the abyss.

On that first night the God of the Narim showed me my fate, our fate. In a cold forge of water and ice a new people would be created.”

-
Conversations with the Uros

The Chronicle of Fu Xi

***

Levidi and Ghalen lashed the rafts together to form a platform and secured them to the treetops, unwilling to risk navigating the powerful current in the darkness without the stars. The lines tugged hard against the trees as the current strained to drag them out to sea. The expertly tied Lo knots held firm.

Night cloaked the world in darkness blacker than any Aizarg could remember, mirroring what he felt in his soul. He sensed the clouds thickening above them, pregnant with death.

The decks felt like ice. They found a sturdy Lo brazier among Virag’s supplies and gathered plenty of dead limbs tangled in the tree tops.

Without regard to tribe, grudge or allegiance, they huddled in intimate closeness around the brazier. The wind whipped hard at the bronze pan, bending the flames and stripping embers away, casting them into the void.

Aizarg stood outside the circle, leaning on his staff and considering the motley assortment of lost souls gathered around the fire. He grasped for some idea what to do once the sun came up.

If it comes up...

Aizarg’s thoughts raced, pondering the fate of those gathered around the brazier and his people lost somewhere beyond the darkness. Hope for Atamoda and his people burned like the brazier against the overwhelming darkness.

How will I find her without a shore or the stars to guide me?

Aizarg’s gaze fell to Sana, hunched under a horsehide blanket and tense as the ropes securing the rafts to the trees. With the extra clothes they had scrounged from among Virag’s supplies, and the Sammujad skins heaped on her shoulders, she looked every bit the a-g’an savage. The Sammujad henchmen eyed her from time to time, but made no move toward her.

Pity filled Aizarg’s heart. He dearly wanted to hate the Scythian, but could not bring himself to do so.

She is truly alone. Her people are surely dead by now.

Virag sat closest to the fire, his perpetual grimace barely visible under a thick bearskin blanket. Ghalen sat opposite from Sana between Levidi and the six Sammujad, staring hard into the flames. Occasionally, Levidi tried to draw Ghalen into conversation, but Ghalen would have none of it.

Earlier, Levidi tried to do the same with Aizarg, but the Uros needed counsel not from a friend, but his Second.

Ba-lok, Second to the Uros, huddled alone in the cold shadows, his back to the party.

Darting outside in the firelight, Ezra followed Okta from raft to raft, helping him secure ropes and rigging. Okta doted over the rafts like they were children. It pleased Aizarg how Ezra threw himself into learning the ways of the sea, and Okta was obviously happy with his new apprentice.

Okta finds hope in purpose. Ezra is wise enough to recognize it.

Aizarg possessed a purpose, but he didn’t know how to accomplish it.

He thought of Noah and the night they spent talking. He thought of Noah’s Nameless God.

Open your heart. Speak in truth. Bow in humility. Do these things and He will listen, Noah had told him.

Aizarg took a deep breath and bowed his head. The voices of the Sammujad murmuring among themselves and Okta instructing Ezra barely penetrated the howling wind. Soon, Aizarg heard nothing and time seemed to stand still. The deck swayed gently under his feet. The staff seemed to warm in his hands.

Aizarg’s eyes flew open as a thought sprung into his head.

It starts here.

A pile of red embers glowed in the brazier, barely illuminating a circle of slumbering mounds, including Ezra and Okta.

Ba-lok still hunched in the shadows, staring into the distance.

I need my Second.
“Ba-lok, throw some more sticks on the fire.”

Ba-lok obeyed and the fire sprung back to life.

“Come here,” Aizarg said. No one stirred as Ba-lok slowly shambled to Aizarg, shoulders stooped.

“Tell me about these wedding barges.”

“I recognize them. We made them last summer, before Father went to heli-dar.”

“Why does Virag buy wedding barges?”

Ba-lok shrugged. “Why does Virag do anything? He commissioned my father for two wedding barges. His price was generous, enough bronze to keep our village supplied for two seasons. Virag even supplied the axes without charge. My father kept his own council regarding his dealings with Virag.”

“And Setenay had nothing to say? Wedding barges are not merely large rafts; they are sacred symbols of unity. I find it strange she would bless such a transaction.”

“Father said a wedding barge is only sacred if used as a wedding barge. Grandmother remained silent as it was clearly a matter for men to decide, though I think she didn’t approve.”

Aizarg shook his head. “I do not regret your father’s dealings. The feel of this sturdy deck below my feet is reassuring, you can be sure of that! It is only Virag’s purposes that trouble me.”

“Is that all, Uros? I grow weary,” Ba-lok turned away.

With a firm grasp on Ba-lok’s shoulder, Aizarg turned him around and pointed to the south. “What do you see?”

Ba-lok shrugged. “Darkness. Nothing.”

Aizarg pointed to the group. “And now?”

“Ghalen, Levidi, Okta, and the Hur boy. I also see Sammujad scum and that Scythian bitch.” Ba-lok spat out the last words with so much hate Aizarg recoiled.

Aizarg shuddered to think what Ba-lok suffered at the hands of the Scythians, knowing full well the horsemen’s reputation for savagery to captives. But he needed to pull Ba-lok out of his simmering hate.

“Look again.” Aizarg kept his voice calm and motioned back to the sleeping group.

Ba-lok yanked away from Aizarg’s grip. “I see someone else’s people. I see enemies! What do you see, Uros?”

“I see the köy-lo-hely,” Aizarg whispered. “And out there, in the darkness, is death. Do you understand?”

“No.”

He is broken. We are all broken; broken chain links of all shapes and sizes. What to do with them? Setenay and Sarah were our fire, our forge. Now our fire is dead.

“Where people drift in the darkness, we must be the light to gather them up. This is our charge. It must start here.

“I know you are in pain. All of us are in pain. Let it remind you to take your next breath, your next step.”

“You left me!”

“No. You were taken. To believe anything else will only feed your anger until your soul is as dark as this night.” Aizarg leaned in. “An Uros will fail without his Second. You were chosen for this task. Setenay knew it. I trusted her then, and I trust her now.”

An impulse suddenly overtook Aizarg. He snatched Ba-lok’s hand and thrust the staff into his palm. Ba-lok jerked away, but then his eyes grew wide at the realization that he felt no pain.

“You are Second. You were chosen. If I fall, you are Uros. Setenay knew, and so does the God of the Narim.”

Ba-lok hefted the staff, which seemed to glow dimly, though Aizarg could not be sure it wasn’t his eyes playing tricks on him.

“Help me forge this broken chain into a lifeline.”

After a moment of hesitation Ba-lok handed Aizarg the staff and turned away.

Can I reach him when his grandmother could not?

Ba-lok stepped over the slumbering bodies, threw a few more sticks onto the brazier, and then settled in amongst them to sleep.

Aizarg lingered a little longer, staring into the void and wondering if the Nameless God watched over Atamoda and his boys, or even cared.

***

Daybreak arrived gray and dim under ever thickening clouds. Aizarg stood alongside of Okta on the makeshift raft as the wedding barges followed behind.

“Uros, the current strengthens from the north and the tree tops vanish. The old shore will disappear soon and the Black Sea will stretch uninterrupted in all directions. The sails are taunt and fully tacked.” Okta nodded to the south. “It will not be long before we will be pulled to the deep sea. Perhaps our people have already abandoned the coast for deeper water as well. I’m sure by now all our arun-ki are submerged.”

“We will cling to the coast as long as we can. If the open sea is forced upon us, so be it, but I will not commit to deeper water until then.”

“What is that?” Virag said from where he sat at the front of the raft. He pointed to an object caught in a nearby tree.

“Get us closer,” Aizarg commanded Okta as he peered ahead. As they drew closer Aizarg’s blood ran cold.

Under Okta’s direction they maneuvered the rafts with full sail against a steadily strengthening current until they secured them to a tree top.

Aizarg hopped onto Ghalen’s raft, which was closer. Ghalen reached out with a pole and snagged the boat.

“The stern is missing,” Ghalen pointed to the ragged end of the two man fishing boat. “It’s shredded.”

Virag scoffed. “So what of it? I’m sure we will find many more caught in the trees.”

“It wasn’t shredded in the trees. It was torn off,” Ghalen pointed to stains the inside of the craft. “Blood.”

“Teeth marks,” Aizarg said.

“Demons!” the warrior named Spako shouted from the farthest wedding barge. The giant Sammujad shrank to the center of their rafts while the Lo men leapt to the edges, gazing over the sea.

Water demons crept under the surface, swirling and slithering from beyond the trees and out to sea. They parted around the rafts, giving them a wide berth. They rejoined to form a long, greasy slick, a river of black within the Black Sea, meandering to a point south.

“There are hundreds, Aizarg. Thousands!” Levidi shook his head in dismay.

“Where are they going?” Ezra asked.

Aizarg followed the line until he spied an object on the horizon. At first, he could not make out what it was in the dim light. Then the shapes formed a coherent whole.

“Release the lines and lower the sails!” Aizarg shouted. “Man the tillers; we abandon the coast.”

In the brightening gray dawn, they followed the stream of demons until they saw a flotilla and the black horde encircling it.

“The demons attack a gathering of anchored boats!” Okta shouted. “There must be over a hundred boats tied together.”

“I can hear the people screaming! There are so many demons,” Levidi shouted. “Can we stop them? Shall I wave the staff over the water, Uros?”

All eyes turned to Aizarg. After a pause, he spoke. “Do not wave it. Touch it to the water.”

Levidi placed the tip of the staff in the water. To all their amazement, a glob of brilliant, white, liquid fire dripped from the red metal orb. It fell onto the water and spread away from the three rafts. A sheet of white flame danced on the surface, chasing the demons toward the floating island.