I started to the west, along the face of the ancient fault that marked the edge of the lands above and the lands below. According to our legends, taught in the tales and stories of the rasskazchiki, it was made in the Age of Convulsions, when we had already fled from the Kotloveina, and abandoned the Koltso to the Geidrae. As their allies the lyudoyed advanced on the keep of the Forge above us to the south-west, and the Forge itself, both of which were without defenders at the time, all having been called to aid in the saving of lowland farms and peoples, the gods had lifted and broken the earth, making a wall of the very flesh of the zyemlya, saving the elderly, the ill and the young from their deaths, had the great oafs of the Volchvui reached the zamok on that fateful night. Many such miracles occurred in those days, when the Fordai did their utmost to save as many of the Karlykn as they could. Now little remained but for these many landmarks, scars really, and the legends of bravery, great acts of loyalty, and wonders beyond our ken in these distant days of faint hearts and lack of true faith. The stone exposed here by the scarp, nearly forty-five arshin high, falling into the ridge as one moved to the west, was of limestone. The most cave marked rock of them all. And the safest usually, except for the danger of the vod that had formed the cave returning to flood one out, with the rest of the flotsam left behind when it had found another course, so many years ago.
The clouds now reached the scarp, and I found myself surrounded by fog mixed with snow, as the temperature fell rapidly in the wind. I could barely see the cliff, and only knew of its presence by the many boulders and rocks of the scree at its base. And by being knocked into it by blasts of wind.
Added to the snow on the still warm rocks, and the melting that had come earlier in the day, my way had become very treacherous. Even a youngster like me could feel the Smyertvyeter' s touch in the storms caresses. Death himself come to harvest the fools who had ignored the warnings of Muamdal's on coming rage.
Fools such as my friends I arid rI.
Another gust of wind drove me across the scree and into the wall, literally. for I had fallen into the very opening I had sought. It was small, at least the mouth was, and the tunnel beyond was barely much larger. I felt my vision shift, from the light of the above, to the light of the below. Now I saw in shades of heat not color, and the phosphorescent glows of the changes in molds and such that occurred in the nether realms. While one can see by such above the surface, such vision is often blurred by other vagaries of nature, such as particles in the wind, and the light of the stars and moons, or more foolishly, the light of the sun, which is blinding in its heat.
It was only after a. few moments, that I spent getting back on my feet, and adjusting to the change in my sight, that I realized that the cave was not empty. Sitting beside a stack of wood and kindling was one of the Byezborodni, what the humans once called an Al£. Taller than I, and dark in complexion, more like obsidian or black marble than the granite colors of sun burnt Karlykn. His hair, though, was white. Not the soft faded blond I have seen since in the elves of the north, nor the colorless pall of the Peidzhei duch, but the silvery white of the snows on the peaks. Like the hair of an elder of my kind with many years upon her. He had on warm clothing, and a backpack, indicating he had been traveling, and was prepared for the weather of the mountains, unlike we residents, who had been caught so unawares.
But, the duch of all types avoided our lands normally. For reasons of personal distaste with those who have allied with the men of Ankhgor, across the smaller bay to the south and west. Once the byezborodni were welcome among us, and had visited often, I had been taught. But in the days when the Geidra took the Kotloveina, we made an alliance with the invaders of the peninsula across Aron's Bay, who had enslaved, and according to the duch, slain the Khiligani, whom they had counted as kinfolk.
As proud and spirited as we of the Karlykn are, we rarely carry grudges so long as the beardless ones do. Part of it is that they live twice to three times the years we do, so in their memory, things to us in the cold, distant dead past seem just like yesterday. It was the difference between we of the sparks, and the humans around us, even the Domovoi. In my short span of years, by our reckonings, kings had ruled and died among the nye-eiskra. And so the contrast betwixt karleek and duch, for" as- often men died in a fifth of our most ancient's years, so did we pass away to the Halls of Waiting in a similar portion of a byezborodui's life.
And now I, a stripling, was face to face with an elder beyond my ken of years. While I had been trained over the last few years on how to respect our allies, and many trading partners, depending upon race, nation, and even creed, none had anticipated me, or any karlyk really, meeting with an Alf. Being young has its advantages though. One can oft pass off a gaff in manners to your age. Besides, as my surprise now faded, the urgency of my mission here returned. Beside him lay a large stretch of rope. Combining it with our sanei would allow us to. get both the wounded to the cave safely, and quickly.
"I have injured friends, can I borrow your rope to use in getting them here?" I tried not to allow my nervousness to show in my voice, but it still wavered and cracked with tension. I winced at my obvious fear and worry, revealed so to a stranger. More that a stranger, but one not of the clans and hearths at all. A true outsider. But lives were at stake, and to me, then as now, nothing was so precious, that pride could go down before I could let others die. Too many in my life had gone to the Halls of Waiting already. I wanted no more to do so when I could prevent it.
The duch looked at me, with the long penetrating stare I was used to getting from Grimdarzog. What it was weighing, I had no knowledge of, for we were of different peoples, beliefs, even different types of souls. What any of the beardless could make of my actions, I had then yet to learn. This was my first lesson, on given in the flames of the moment, as our saying goes.
"I am a healer, versed in the ills and injuries of all creatures. In what way may I help your friends, and how are they hurt?" His voice was rough, not the musical lilt I had heard of in tall tales, or the few times they had appeared at the court. But being so high up, if one was not used to the air at such levels, the colder and thinner atmosphere left one hoarse and speaking in pain. This was something I had learned shortly after my own arrival in these hills and mountains.
I had the natural reticence of my kind in revealing things of our troubles to others. It was something all dwarves had instilled in us by the lack of any around our lands who truly understood the dour-seeming perspective of our insular people. Among our own kind we were jovial, friendly and warm, but it had been such openness in the past that had led to the loss of so many of our ancient lands and peoples. So we had become a lyud fearful of making friends, allies, or even just aiding fellow travelers in the thing called life. In the long run, the past taught us, they would only betray us in the end.
Yet lives were on the line, and in the tales of our kind, the true heroes could step across the lines and restraints of tradition and the Zhakon at times, making decisions that changed the way we of the Karlyk lived our lives, sometimes forever, others but for the duration of the crisis. But in those cases, after all was said and done, the majority of the people of the sparks agreed that what had been changed was needed, or at least only painful to us for the time it took us to adapt.
And with that came up other stories of my people as well, many about our ages long war with the Geidra-Korolyeva, and her hordes. Tales in which a tall, dark duch with healing powers had a part. An Alf who appeared and disappeared many times in the course of those centuries since the fall of the Kotloveina. Who healed dwarves, Domovoi, Alf and Human alike, a duch whom no other of that race knew of, who seemed more mysterious than any other of the byezborodnie, or beardless ones, if indeed he was of that race. Once I had overheard Darzog and his jena speaking in soft tones when they thought I was asleep of another appearance of the mysterious being.
He had spoken in that appearance of himself as a member of the 'elder race', an appellation often used by the byezborodnei when referring to themselves while among those of lesser span or years or history, the latter being but a fiction, as our history goes back as far as theirs, if not farther. That night they had spoken of the duch, and said the name he would often give for himself, one of the ancient and now feared dead language of the ones whom we of the Karlykn had called the Chraneitil.
Ever it appeared in the tales of yore as well, for the name was as ancient as the language it came from. And it was well-omened in that heritage as well. In all the tales of the Chraneitil it was the name given to the greatest healer of the day, more a title than a name. Zotikos, or so he called himself, the duch who was not a duch, but had the appearance of the members of that race from the lands of great continent to the south, the land called by its own people Domorushtuu. None doubted the skill of the duch, for his healing powers were nearly those of the great ones who had born the name in the mists of time, but many had differing ideas on who or what he truly was. As my guardian and his wife spoke that night, they themselves went over the old and newer ideas as to who this being truly was, to no avail of reaching enlightenment of his identity then. Very little of that conversation stood in my mind at that moment, only that all agreed he did only good, not evil.
I looked at last into the eyes of this stranger, and was struck by some scant instinct, one that seemed to me that I was looking at a set of orbs more like in feel to a reptile, than that of a dwarf, or a man. They had nearly cat-like vertical pupils, and curious, double-lidded eyes. Those gates of the soul held the pain of more years than any Karlykn I had yet to meet. And there was a small glint of recognition, as if he knew me, or guessed my identity.
I spoke the question of my mind, being yet young and impetuous, and not yet having gained the stoic attitude of my elders and the patience to wait for the right moment to ask, and blurted out my query. "You are the one called Zotikos, are you not'?" Suddenly I began to realize that the many ceremonies of my kind had purpose. They made one less likely to feel out of sorts.
The duch responded in a way I would never have anticipated. He reached down to the tent of wood he had laid for his fire, and spoke a single word while making a gesture. An was left blind for a few moments by the flash that accompanied the sibilant sound he had given voice to. It was as if the very sun, or the flames of Pojar, reached out to kindle the wood. Then my eyes readjusted to the normal sight of the world above, but with spots tat gave me dizziness and disorientation.
"I have been called that among my many other names, over the days of my life.” He spoke still in that soft and wheezy voice. “We will need warmth when we get all to safety, as well as it being needed to melt snow for water to make healing potions with. Now, no more delay, lest we find none to save, and leave ourselves in danger we cannot escape. I can feel the local storm god venting his fury without for being disturbed, and the rage of the spirits of wind and water as well. They will get worse in their fury over the day, as the Slattern, that false power, raises more of her magics and disturbs them more.”
It was only then that he noticed my dazzled countenance, and sighed. It was one I had heard often myself, the deep sigh of disappointment in someone. The sigh that my mother, Grimdarzong, and even the extremely patient Yakin often had given when I failed in someway.
“Forgive me, malchik, I forgot the reflex of your kind to see in the range of heat in the underworlds. I should have warned you of it, forgetting that those immune to many magics are often unversed in its ways and signs, thus not aware of the dangers they can face. Shake your head a little, not too vigorously, and it shall allow your blood to rinse your vision clear.”
Why, I still to this day do not know, but I trusted him and took his advise. Even though it was by his very actions that my sight had been impaired. That it worked told me two things, one, that he had dealings with my kind before, and second that he had not meant for my blindness to occur in the first place. Then he placed his hand on my shoulder and spoke again.
“Use the vision of the underworld when outside, the sun shall be shrouded enough by clouds and the shoulders of the zemlya that the flow from that ancient gate to the Realm your kind call Pozeitiv, should not harm your vision again. Heat is not as easy to block as light, and should allow us to see your friends more easily. Now must go, we have lost time enough.”
He strode out into the frenzy of the burya, holding onto me, while staring around. He leaned over to my ear and still had to shout to be heard out in the tempest of the Vyeter, something I could tell by the force and amount of his breath that reached me.
“Where were they at?”
I turned to his ear and shouted back, “At the mouth of the loschiena, just to the right of us.” At first I feared that the Vyeter, always whimsical, had torn my words away to another place, preventing this stranger from hearing me. It was then that I saw his eyes glowing, much as my own kinds did when using the vision of the underworld.
“Yes, I can see them. Let us get them, quickly.” The yell in my ear surprised me, for this duch had not turned towards me this time. I shuddered, fearful that I had lost my mind, or that he was some dreadful creature who could place his thoughts in my head, even to taking over my very body and soul. Or those of the very Karlykn I was trying to save. Only now did those fears, those of the deadly foes from the seas and waters of great depths and salinity intrude upon my thoughts, those of the Karakatietsa. Death and terror now seemed close around me, like the very shrouds and cloaks of Smyertvyeter, come to claim us all for the Halls of Penance.
Then we reached the rocky moraine that the accident had occurred on. I could just barely see the heat of the bodies of my friends and guardians, many arshin yet to go. The winds now howled around us like wolves on a hunt, coming at us from all sides. Several times, only the strong grip of Zotikos’ hand on mine kept me from being tossed into the gathering snow pack of the talus cone. Once even he, larger than me, and far more coordinated with that duch sense of balance, was staggered by vagrant blasts of air from unexpected quarters.
It took us nearly half a chas of sand to reach them from the cave, but no longer did I worry about getting back to its safety. I could see the thermal traces of its hot springs and outflow, even in the swirling snows. This was a useful trick to learn, I was discovering. Then, at last, we reached the injured and hale, and we experienced a calming of the winds, for just a moment. It broke, then settled down again forming a dome of calm around us. An unnatural calm, one I at first thought evil in feel, then realized it was not of nature, thus jangling my newly awakened weather sense. And I could hear then the soft whispering chants of Zotikos. and saw again his hands gesturing to claw like postures. In that moment, just for the shortest of time, it appeared that he had scales, not skin. Black, perfectly formed scales, not the uneven ones of the that covered the flesh of the Geidra-Vladuika. In that piece of time, I came to my first understanding of the true nature of the duch, or at least of this one, as I was later to learn.
And my fears were stirred more by words from Igdi.
“So, you hunt the Geidra-Korolyeva again, old wyrm?” He winced as he shifted his side his worst leg was on to better face us. “Will you grant us aid and demand again that we give our best Voyaka to your service to slay her? Or do we last dolgskrov you owe us from your last venture into the Kotloveina?” Igdi sounded bitter and torn, but he obviously had no questions as to whom the stranger with me was. As he spoke I realized that even Davrilz had gone onto his guard suddenly, as if he too had come to know of some danger from this Enostroneits.
“No, Igdaikitof Stryelok, for now I only come to pay debts, and to seek information of her actions. But let us put the past aside old wounds, and tend to these new ones. My gods have little power so close to the Koltso, and this calm will only last a few fingers of a chas, as the light still holds the sky above this valley.” Zotikos then swiftly began to work first on Igdi’s leg, swiftly yanking it to set the bones. Then tending the punctures where the slivers and ends of his byertsy had protruded. He worked with a speed and skill that later I would learn only a true battle cheiryug could ever acquire.
Despite being of a different race, his familiarity with Karlykn medical needs and bodies was evident.
After only moments he started to turn to the boy, at which point both the guards , Igdi the loudest, and most vehemently, objected. The duch looked angered, more by the prevention of his healing than the source. His face was slightly twisted, and for some reason, it was as if I could read his emotions. It seemed as if he was actually feeling the very pain of the malchik. Each time that Zotikos tried to move to aid the boy, one or the other of the guards would try to move his hands away from the boy. Their fear seemed foolish to me, for surely a healer took the same oath, regardless of races, or creed. Or so I foolishly believed then, not yet having me the Rodna Temnui, or the Yurodivy. Nor had I met the ones the duch themselves called “drow”. Perhaps the god of providence smiled upon me then, or was it the goddess of mercy? But I made a decision, my first command decision.
“Shabash! Igdi, Davrilz, the longer we delay the worse both malei and the burya will get. Let him work. Watch if you must, but interfere only if he does the boy harm not involved in medicine! And you, Zotikos, do your best, for we give to you a child to heal, more precious to my kind than all our gold and treasures, despite the legends without the mountains to the contrary.”
The duch started in surprise, for in my voice at that moment, I had put all the things I had heard in the voices of others who gave orders, from father down to the stable master. There is a tone, a level of voice, that comes from the Heart , It is not a shout, for I had seen Dagvar do it before he died with a whisper, and ‘Darzog do it with his eyes many times over. It can be thunderous, as when father would berate the garda-nachalniki who failed in missions, or used his voice to quell an argument when he sat in judgment. Long association with the Uchenei had led to my choosing the softer version, the stare and crispness of speech. Besides, father’s way hurt my throat.
Both garda snapped and stopped interfering, Igdi stared at me in confusion, but Davrilz swiftly turned away from me and began to watch as the stranger to him wrapped the arm and checked the malei, who in answer to soft questions gave his name as Markaim ot Konyuch, of Nalbal’s Ochag. Marko only cried out when his arm was set, then he passed out, in part from his pain, and part in relief as I would learn in his position at a later date.
At last the enostroneits broke his silence to us, and spoke tersely. “Neither of them should walk, even that short distance to the cave. But we must get them to shelter, and find materials to make splints from, to prevent their bones, their kost , from moving. I assume there are sleds and skis here, as you were entertaining yourselves that way when I arrived in this valley, a dol you call it, yes?”
I did not answer, but reached beyond the calm the duch had wrought of the winds, to grab the sanei, which were then only mounds covered in several fingers of snow. Davrilz’s skis were beside him, but he reached outside the calm as well, searching for Igdi’s, of which he found only one. Decisions were made, and the rope was used with Igdi’s ski to make a splint for him, and to attach to the sanei for us to pull them as litters for the wounded. Initially we malcheiks wanted to pull Markaim ourselves, but the adults quickly pointed out that we would be faster if each of us helped one of them pull. Davrilz and Stefo were to take Marko, while Zotikos and I conveyed Igdi.
And none too soon. No more than we had gotten the injured onto the sanei, and roped them safely to them, then the calming dome began to erode in the fury of the burya. It was as if the calm was a tent of cloth, tearing in the raging airs, holes and rips in its shielding effect appeared, then it shredded away, like fog before the morning breezes. Snow and wind gusts began to assail us, the gusts howled as if in triumph, as if the Vyeter, the spirits of the air, were celebrating their final victory over the preternatural calm we and existed for a while within.
Again, I shifted my vision as the duch had instructed me to, looking on the surface world as if it were the insides of the caves and mines we are so renowned for living in. Seeing the blurred beacon of the steam and hear from the cave, sometimes partially obscured, but others nearly clear as the sun in a cloudless sky. We moved like moths to a flame, and were tossed around as if we walked as they flew, battered around by the winds, and detouring rocks, boulders and deeper drifts that were beginning to form is spots. The storm soon numbed our arms and faces, despite clothing. My feet were tingling, a bad sign in winter, for it indicated the first touches of Khohlad’s icy fingers, the frost that steals. Now the tempest was a danger to us all, and I began to watch the shadowy forms ahead of us, wincing as the forward ones stumbled, despite the obvious fact that as I did, Davrilz too used the deep vision to see the goal. Even I tripped and staggered, as my feet and legs became like lead encased things, ungainly and heavy from snow and ice covering my pants. But Zotikos never faltered, despite his thin clothing, he never seemed to feel that bitter wind. Perhaps the Tsskazcheik, the tellers of tales of my kind, were right, that the duch were so of another world that the things in this one , excepting iron, could not touch them. I shivered at both cold and fear at that thought.
At last we came to the rocky escarpment that marked the cave’s eastern wall, where the small opening blazed with warmth in my eyes. Not painfully, but bright, and reassuring. like the fire the Taganui kept blazing all year long, in promise of shelter and refuge. Rapidly we hustled our charges inside, ruining the runners of the sanei by dragging them across the gravel and stone of the entrance, beyond the bends and the drop to the heated stream’s below basin and banks.
I winced and knew that ‘Vina would be upset by this damage, abut I also understood that this harm was required, to save lives. Perhaps I could convince her of this. The again, perhaps not, she being a dyeveitsa, that most contrary gender. Only time would tell, if we survived. Soon we reached a spot that the winds that struck the entrance and came within with us made only slightly chilled, beside the stream that smoked it heat to the air above it, filing the chamber it ran through with a warm fog, one that tasted of sulphur and charcoal. This was the spot we chose to settle in, while Zotikos went to fetch his bags and fire from the small side chamber I had fallen into near the entrance.
After he was out of range, by my best estimate, to which I had added a little more for a duch’s reported superior hearing, I asked the crucial question of my elders.
“You know him?”
Igdi merely stared at the wall, angry with me, and “Ugryumogon” was all the reply I got from the less upset Davrilz. As he was of the same bands as Dagvar had been, even accepted at my old bodyguard’s ochag as kith, he had less resentment with me, knowing both my history of loss and the agonies I had suffered over them. Also, Igdi was of the Heart’s Forge clan, and sat many nights before the ochag of Yakindegvik, as rodsvyenik. In some ways I think he resented my presence there, for like with me and Dagvar, he had a special bond with ‘Vina as well. Having seen her grow from a baby, her only guardian had strong, perhaps deservedly so, dislikes of outsiders taking any place in her life. I had gathered this much of the old warrior, even before then. Perhaps most of his irritation came from the fact that my clan held the rulership now, in his clan’s ancient homeland.
Finally the warmth of the cavern intruded enough to melt the glacier my brain had become. Davrilz had called the duch a name, one of equal legends to the one I had hailed him by. And spoke of him as an old wyrm, an appellation given only to a syelezen or drakyon. Urgyamogon, Black Flame, the dragon of great power, who some said was the mightiest of all save the avatars of their kind. In him dwelt the blood of Tragrilom the Black, worst of the great drakoni of yore. who once ruled the land across the far off Morye Taksverkat. He was the dread drakon who was the Geidra-Korolyeva’s greatest foe. Once, it is said, he was her slave, forced to do her bidding. And her unwilling mate, who broke free and slew a past avatar of hers. Even among my lyud, who had lost our homelands, treasures and sites of religious import, he was feared, yet respected.
And once he had been the main drain of our Voyaka, the warriors who stood above the rest in skill and courage. He had recruited several armies of our kindred for his war against his former mistress. wars he usually lost of late, as the Geidra-Korolyeva had recruited the Veleikan-Lyudoed, the Ogres, and renegades of the Kensori and Lejunui tribes of humans to her service, trained in ways of war beyond that which remained to we Karlykn.
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