Ultimus Thesaurus: The last Treasure (Era of Change Book 1) (25 page)

“I promise. I will heal my father and clear my past. Not with my life, but with my talent.”

The conviction to do something sometimes was enough to succeed, but the conviction to create something was usually not enough to actually do it. And so we began another trip to stand against the impossible. The balloon drove slowly through the air, but the engine that should actually keep us at a constant height repeatedly malfunctioned and while the air rapidly left the balloon, we lost more and more time. Isaac tried desperately to fix the engine, but no matter what he did, he was controlled by panic.

And so I looked at the engine with all the composure that I could muster and tried to not too often look down on the steep mountain, which would certainly be our death. With some smaller chops and shaking on the apparatus I brought the fire back and therefore also the air that we needed. Unfortunately it had taken too long and we were therefore forced to land in the gorge earlier than planned.

“We should immediately land and go back to the peak of the mountain. It is not safe to proceed like this,” said Isaac, but I was not convinced that we could spare the time.

“The balloon has already failed and we do not have the time to land and the many more days to bring it back to the mountain. This is our only chance, so we must use it now.”

Even if he was right that the danger was greater, so we could now only hope that none of the stories about this gorge were real. We had little food and looking at the balloon it became more and more apparent that it could hardly help us escape from the gorge. Our planned flight had soon become a confused crash into the unknown.

It took many hours until we reached the city and saw the prison in which our journey began. 

Seen from the air, the environment was almost picturesque, would it not be for the destroyed city around it, whose ruins now were a heavy burden on our shoulders. But behind all these images of the past was now the uncertain future that sooner than intended became the centre of attention when the engine decided to malfunction again and stopped working altogether.

Rapidly we sank down and passed some of the buildings of the city only by a few metres at the edge of the cliffs. As Isaac was able to control the balloon only with great difficulty, I succumbed to fear, even if only for a moment, while we came ever closer to the cliffs. The balloon turned around wildly in the wind and where our orientation was at first gradually lost, our faith had finally been shattered.

The outer shell of the balloon scratched with a shrill noise on the stone wall and as long as the metal tried to conserve our fall, so there it finally was. It did not take long until the balloon itself was severely damaged by a gaping hole and we quickly lost all of the air. Our descend, now almost a free fall, pulled us more and more up from the bottom of the tray and only the fast and courageous grasp after one of the ropes rescued us from certain death.

I could not really understand what happened around me and even though I was still aware of our fall I could only actually remember the last seconds before we collided with the bottom of the dark depths below us. My vision had become blurry and I could hardly see what happened around us, but the engine had started back up only moments before our fall and its strong flame now ignited the thin skin of the balloon and pulled a dense wave of smoke over the crash site in which it was not only difficult to navigate, but even harder to breathe.

“Isaac? Can you hear me?,” I shouted with all of my left over energy and noticed late that he was right in front of me lying unconscious on the floor.

With all the strength that I could muster I drew him out of the basket and looked around. 

Nothing was clearly recognizable and only a few patches of the wall had been uncovered by the fire of the balloon. I decided to find a place where we could wait until the fire was gone, but before I realized I stumbled and crashed with my head on a stone, firmly smashing my face against the floor.

The wound on my head was bleeding heavily and I imagined seeing someone who walked inside the flames carrying Isaac on his shoulders. Like in a vision I saw a tent, a chair and the man from the fire and when I stretched out my hand to him he grabbed it and everything was real. In just one second he had rescued us from the crash site, but I could not understand what was happening.

“You must rest. Drink a little of the water and lay down. The dreams bring betterment,” he said and without being able to answer I drank the water that he gave me and fell asleep.

My body was numb from the fall and the wound on my head caused a loud noise to vibrate through me that covered my whole being like a veil. As the man had indicated, the dreams that I saw were not normal. Everything in them appeared strange, almost as if they were not my own dreams at all. I heard voices of many people and their shouts were full of fear and sorrow. No one was there to help them and even I was not able to do so.

Only when my despair drove me out of my mind, I woke up from this nightmare and saw the man in front of me, who had saved us. He was no ordinary person, because his appearance was so different from mine, so much even that I could not fail to stare at him, what he, understandably, disliked a lot.

“It seems to me, you both are no erudite Webuti. Of course I have seen only a few of your kind and even fewer have survived this meeting. What brings you to Jik'Zur? Is it death you seek?” he asked and took a sip from the cup that he held in his hand.

His clothing was very thin and it seemed as if it was only slightly covering his skin. 

His hairstyle was exceptional, since his long hair almost formed a sculpture on his head of the likes I never had seen before. In his eyes the room reflected as they were as clear and blue as the ocean. And his voice had a gentle sound that almost seemed as if the words he spoke wafted over to me on a calming wave.

“We are looking for a good friend. His corpse has been brought here. Perhaps you can help us? As you noticed, we are strangers in this place,” I answered and tried to sound as diplomatically as possible, because the insinuations of this stranger were not of the friendliest of kinds.

He looked at me and analysed me exactly, while his eyes again and again wandered over to Isaac. His hand now eased the grasp around his cup and he took some herbs that he immediately crushed in a mortar.

“A friend you say. Why should someone send his friend here? The truth is an expensive good, stranger. We are the people of the shadows, the Skaduwee and we do not like to be lied to; especially not from a Webuti like you.”

The herbs that now had become a fine pulp, he administered to Isaac, who immediately woke up from his sleep. With heavy breath Isaac reached for his neck and it was as if he wanted to show us that he was no longer able to breathe.

“What kinds of demon are hidden under your skin?” the stranger asked and delivered Isaac with a powerful blow from his suffering.

Still he found it difficult to breathe, but with time his condition normalized and he began to understand where we were.

“The balloon? Where are we? This is the gorge?” he asked full of pain and lay down again on his back.

The stranger handed him a glass of water and rose from his chair. He opened the entrance to the tent and revealed to us a view over a big village in the middle of this dark gorge.

“This is Krag, the home of my people and the last refuge from the shadows. You have come a long way to search for the friend that you have lost. But the truth can never hide at this place. I will see what you carry in your heart and I will judge, if my people should welcome you. My name is Melisizwe and I am the eye of the shadow.”

To the two of us it was clear that this man would not be pleased if he knew what our true intentions were and so we decided with just a glance that we were not going to tell him. Even if he really could see what we wanted to do, so we could still not risk to be stopped. Jasper was our friend and we had lost him. For me that could be considered the truth.

He showed us the village, led us slowly around, while I supported Isaac to stay conscious. Mel, as I now called the stranger was no talkative man; he was an observer and judge. The glances of the many people in this village were full of fear and prejudice, as they saw us, but as soon as they looked at Mel it negated all negativity and peace returned. His power and his reputation, reminded me of the prince and his unfathomable gifts, but this time it seemed as if this man did not abuse his powers.

The people in the village respected him and even if they lived under very poor conditions, so they knew it not as such. They found all the things they needed in this gorge and the rest of this world would just confuse them. But was this a reason to keep them out and to deprive them of what the world could really be? It was not clear to me why someone would voluntarily live in such a place.

“This is the Drorumte, our field of dreams. Here we see the world more clearly than a Webuti,” he said and asked us to sit down on the few blankets, which were lying on the floor in front of us.

Everything in this village was only sparsely illuminated by torches and not a single ray of sunlight touched the ground under our feet. In the deep black of the remote dark, which we observed from this square, we could see nothing and so we accepted the judgment of Mel and did not contradict him. 

They called us aliens, Webuti, and they seemed to hate what we were. Nevertheless they took us in and trusted us, as long as our words were the truth.

“This field is formed by the force of the Gesoe, the spirits of the ancestors. Here I communicate with the dead, who cover our people like a black rain. Their blood nourishes the soil in the shade and through their corruption the Skediere, the monster of the shadows are born. Their claws are sharper than the mind of any human being. Their legs may take the speed of light and their eyes displace the darkness like the sun the deep night.

We live here since the war shattered the world. Only a few Webuti have found us so far and even fewer have left us. The truth is everything in this place, because the lies are like the shadow itself. We know no mercy, no court and no forgiveness. My verdict is our judgment, my word is our word and my desire is the will of the shadows. Everything you see out there is produced by my power and by my power alone it will exist. The darkness does not allow even the sun itself to touch this place and like a king I protect my people.

Your friend is one of the Uiti, the outcast. They fall down through the shadows and in the shadow they rise again and their body becomes a prison for their minds. It is a torment, a shame, and an end that no one deserves. Why have you brought your friend here? I will see it and you will also see it,” he said and held both hands in front of his body.

He squeezed them together with all his strength and began to hum louder and louder, while the flames of the torches intensified and the shadow lifted, as his hands slowly separated. Now we could see the thousands of corpses, wandering as if they were still alive. None of them had a consciousness, because they knew no direction, no meaning and no existence. Out there in the dark we would find the man who I had once admired more than any other person.

It was an ineffable feeling that I felt when I realized what I had done to him. He was caught in an endless suffering, even more agonizing than his own death. 

I felt a debt that never again could be taken from me and it was this moment that made me understand that there was more to be corrected between Lucia and me than a simple apology could ever compensate for.

Mel made us understand very quickly that this was a different world. There were no fixed laws, except the one. Never leave the village. One that we were not able to abide by and so we asked him to make an exception and allow us to search for Jasper.

As was to be expected, Mel rejected our request and gave us nothing more than the hope that he would find another way to search for Jasper. For him it was easy to move through the shadows and his eye saw everything that was hidden within them. He had created this darkness in order to protect his people, but he could not tell us from what.

“We should just go. A place like this offers us no security. Have you seen the eyes of the people? They don’t want us here,” said Isaac, but his injuries were still too severe to safely return home.

Jasper was also our only hope and therefore we had no other choice than to trust Mel, who in turn didn’t trust us at all. As he doubted our intentions, he observed each of our actions and we were given a tent near his own in which we slept on the ground.

These were miserable conditions in this part of the world, but I feared that the whole world might soon become such a place. With the idea of convincing Mel, I therefore once again entered his tent at night and faced his judgment. It was hard to make out whether it was day or night, but we soon accommodated ourselves to the habits of the people who lived here.

Mel sat in his chair and looked on a map of the world, as I have never before seen it. It showed a single large continent on which some parts of our world could be clearly recognized, but others seemed to be lost.

“An old time. And in your eyes I can see the darkness that ended it. Your blood is poisoned and the demon that you carry within you will eventually destroy you. 

Nothing is hidden from my eyes and yet the people try to hide everything from me,” he said with a sigh and slowly I realized that he really knew more than I was able to fathom.

“Where is our friend? If you already know all this, then you could just tell me. We need him in order to protect this world.”

He rubbed his hands together and looked at the fire in the coal pan in the middle of the tent. His gaze was marred by sorrow and too much knowledge.

“Of course I can tell you where your friend is. But I see no future for you. Your end has already begun. Why do you want to sacrifice yourself for things you do not even believe in? You think that you can stop this man; this man, who proclaimed himself as the prince of the ancient dragon lands. I know him and his intentions and I know that nobody ever stood against him and survived.”