Haiku (41)

[Zadown]

For a change, he tried walking in the water instead. No shoes that would have gotten wet, now. Not that his clothes cared much about the ravages of time and the elements after he had worn them for a while. Immortal attires for an immortal, his magic seeping into them like an embalming fluid.

 

A bigger wave than usual drenched the hem of his grey robes, then receded back into the ocean that was humming its own symphony, his splashing sounds silly in comparison. The Dreamer twisted his whole body to give it a good look as he liked to do every now and then. It still looked enormous, changing, blue, wet and fascinating, among other things. He turned back to stare at the changing line where water met sand, the Rod of Cosmic Redemption he held on his shoulder making a low whispering sound as its far ends sliced rapidly through the humid air.

 

Relative silence after that for a while, the soft roaring of the waves and his splashing feet receding so far into the background he had trouble hearing them from the cacophony of his thoughts. It had been far too long since he had cleaned the immense libraries of his complex mind. All the latest vivid memories were lying around in messy piles, unorganized and mixed up with each other. He had lived far too long to allow that, knew how many details would be lost, how many wrong conclusions met if he'd let things be.

 

Splash, splash. A jolting wail of a seabird, rare enough to penetrate into his consciousness and he looked up without seeing the bird. Instead he watched the sky a while (splash, splash, splash went his feet in the shallow waters of the sandy beach, splash, splash), his eyes mirroring the pale blue, a color perhaps stolen from some pre-dawn summer sky. A few thin clouds, not much darker than the sky, slightly lighter than his new robes. He made a mental note to pay attention and see if the clouds were stationary, then forget it while moving the heavy, important memories of the last decade around in his mind.

 

Behind him, his latest footsteps faded after a wave or two. Further from the hungry waves a few of his older footsteps still remained, shallow on the harder sand. All of them pointed at the same direction.

 

His fingers curled slightly tighter around the heavy rod, turning even paler, highlighting the scars. A painful or exciting memory tightened his tendons and conjured a frown on his uneven face. His pace stayed even and steady, walking so automatic now that figuring out how to stop was harder than walking forward. Another frown right after the previous one faded, a promise he had made and not yet kept.

 

.. it hasn't been that long yet, not even by mortal standards. Jankiize knows I will eventually return. Perhaps, nevertheless, I should head there next ...

 

Another memory, from further depths of his mind, far past the recent experiences he was trying to rearrange into proper order. He stopped and swung the rod down, leaned on it like it was a walking stick.

 

It's the sea. Calm and clear ...

 

*

 

He stared at the blood-tainted water with incomprehension in his green eyes. The almost calm waters reflected his face: almost without scars, hair the color of dirty, sun-baked roads, mouth set to a bitter grimace. The green robes were distorted by the waves, his armor a glinting web of polished metal, its details lost in the imperfect mirror. The fisherman's corpse befouling the ocean was almost torn in half, floating face down with his feet anchoring him to the beach. He felt like he might be able to recall his name if he tried hard enough even if he knew that feeling to be false. Too much time had passed.

 

"That was just a mortal, Wodzan! We have t' find her before she does more senseless violence, not dwell on what we can't fix anymore."

 

Wodzan Xe Chanima shook his head and his expression lost its unfocused quality quickly. He dragged a hand through his short hair, the metal of a fingerless gauntlet shining in the morning sun and turned to glare at Phacyra. He was as he had always been and would always be, thin with sharp features, wearing slightly too big jacket of demonskin, agitation shining in the deep blue eyes.

 

"Find 'er, ye think? They 'ad nothing to do with what happened, an' this is her judgement on them. How do ye think she judges ye, now?"

 

Behind Wodzan opened a field of carnage, mortals lying around like dolls of some petulant giant that had gotten tired of its toys. The stink was still barely tolerable, the corpses fresh, but they knew in a few hours when the tropical sun would strike with full power the stench would be unbearable. The devastation had been indiscriminate and total: there were no living things more complex than a plant in sight. Dogs and cattle had shared the fate of their masters, and further away, behind a number of war boats, a huge inert shape showed even an unfortunate sea dragon had not been safe. Not only living things had been the target. Canoes were broken, houses turned into piles of palm leaves and splintered wood, a stone idol turned into rubble.

 

"But ... I did not do a thing, brother. I wasn't there."

 

Phacyra's words sounded feeble even to himself, a dark comprehension throwing a shadow over his face. Wodzan watched his friend's spirit plummet and said nothing for a moment, looked around to let the absolute destruction be recorded in his mind so it would be there should he ever need it, a thousand years later, two thousand. Phacyra stared at the points of his shoes, his black hair hanging over his eyes, and when he finally spoke it sounded like the mumbling of a drunk.

 

"She'll never forgive me, will she?"

 

Wodzan shrugged.

 

"Never. One of ye two'll die in th' end, and she was always th' most powerful of us three."

 

"A fine friend ye are, predicting my death so casually."

 

"I just want ye t' be serious about this, for once. Think!"

 

Wodzan grabbed Phacyra's shoulder, a rare gesture among the hermit planewalkers, and shook his comrade.

 

"Yer not more stupid than she is, brother! Remember her faults an' play on them, an' do it quick when she still hasn't found ye. The Fates only know how long ye have."

 

"Well, she seems t' have a capability for unrelentless rage ... but ..."

 

"An' what else?"

 

"Cold patience."

 

Wodzan nodded like a teacher to his favourite pupil and released his grip, his satisfied air gone as quickly as it had appeared.

 

"Capitalize on that, m'lord, an' think fast. I need t' do what I came here for."

 

"To visit yer tomb?"

 

He nodded again and turned towards the peak of the island.

[Zadown]

His face was even more impassive than normal, its scars inert, his eyes still. Having stumbled upon the step of that ancient memory he was now falling down the stairs of his mind, visions he had stored away centuries ago flashing past his mind's eye. The Dreamer's lips twitched, but the movement was so minimal it was impossible to tell if he had been thinking of smiling or sneering, or of saying something to the empty, tranquil sea air surrounding him.

 

Only his left hand stayed on the metal staff now firmly dug into the wet sand of the beach. His right curled into a claw, then held an invisible hilt.

 

*

 

"...!"

 

"... what?"

 

"Mirkel! Snap out of it! It has all backfired on us. The Burners got here before expected! Steelclad's boys are holding the front but it's all lost, the fated are dead!"

 

His vision shook. No, somebody was holding his shoulders and shaking him, a world of armored men, fire and loud noises materializing out of the fog of darkness he had been in. He knew he was hurt and for a fleeting moment wondered if he was in that numb state of shocked incomprehension he had sometimes seen in mortally wounded people before they realized they were dead. Then he shed that useless idea, knew Bachar would not waste time yelling to a corpse.

 

"Bachar?"

 

"You understand me, lieutenant?"

 

"Yes! ... yes. Get our men ready. I need a moment."

 

Bachar gave him a sceptic look but let his shoulders go and went away to yell at other people, doing what sergeants did best. Order out of chaos, a spine to the cowardly creature any mob, even a company of mercenaries, degenerated into when struck by panic. He stood up, noted the blood on his armor and how his limbs seemed to work despite that, saw a blackened and broken crater on stone wall nearby that explained how he had been wounded.

 

Siege magic. They had meant to parley even less than we did.

 

The earth quaked, an explosion more felt than heard. He could see the rising column of fiery smoke from the direction of Steelclad's company, mercifully far enough that the cries of the wounded could not carry. A powerful shiver ran through him and for a moment he thought it was a sign he'd break, that his willpower would abandon him now after a measly minor concussion. Then he could feel a surge of renewed strength and resolution flood through him, grinned inside the helmet despite the grim situation. Suddenly he knew what to do, if not the why.

 

"Briiiightblades! Get ready! We'll show these book-huggers what Aefian steel can do!"

 

At first it looked like the company had already broken down and his rallying cry did no good. Then Bachar roared a burst of instructions to his squad, creating an island of calm in the maelstorm. If another siege fireball had landed there and then, if one more of the veteran cavalrymen had ridden off at that moment, one blow struck against Bachar or him in fearful anger, the scales would have tipped against them. A moment of uncertainity showing in the eyes of the rookies and old armsmen alike, not longer than a few blinks of an eye. The moment passed and he realized they were his again, his and Bachar's. He mounted up, patted his superb horse on the flank.

 

"Brightblades! Cavalry in a free wedge with me! Bachar, bring the rest!"

 

Mirkel waved his sword, as bright a blade as he had ever seen reflecting sunlight like it had been on fire, and lead his company towards a pyrrhic victory.

 

*

 

The Dreamer narrowed his eyes, their surface changing from dull light grey to a more vivid, deeper blue. His face twitched a few times before settling on a sour look, like the old planewalker had eaten something disgusting.

 

The sword-god's call during my Ascension, yes. Pointless to wade in memories that deep. Like blind fetus reaching for the stars, swinging an angel of wrath in its pudgy claws, that mortal larva was ...

 

He tugged the heavy staff loose from the wet sand, rinsing the end in the sea to clean it before lifting it on his shoulder. A seabird cried again, this time further away, as invisible as it had been the last time. He was not sure if there had barely been any time between the two wailing cries, or if hours had passed. His memory was vast, labyrinthine thing, not easily navigated even by himself.

 

The Dreamer resumed walking (splash, splash, splash), dragging his mind back to the specific recent memories he was trying to reorganize. Without him noticing it, it did not take long for his eyes to return to the the limpid hue of the heavens. Every step he took lightened their Void blue until they looked like two holes in his scarred face, two tiny skies only missing the clouds and the invisible seabird.

 

Now, the Parallel gates and what the Patriarch told me ... there's what I should be thinking of!

 

Splash, splash, splash ...

[Zadown]

Vast visions of rotating, changing runes turned in front of his mind's eye, superimposed over the calm view of the beach. It was a web of guesses and approximations, associations and expectations, and that was merely the starting point. After that hazy beginning it devolved into a thousand misty and equally probable paths of how the gate might have reacted to the poisonous counterspell the Patriarch had injected into it. A great number of those possible results ended with the gate intact and stable, their work wasted. Other possibilities included everything from a quick catastrophic collapse (impossible since he had lingered there long enough to have seen it) to a rate of deteriorating that would lead to unstability hundreds of years from now.

 

If I only could use the stones or the cards to divine the current state of that gate. This leads nowhere, yet trying to see a construct not wholly in this multiversum with tools that are limited to the local Fate would be even more pointless.

 

The Dreamer grimaced, irritation tainting the tranquility his long walk had instilled in him. His eyes darkened, the seaside calm in them threatened by an approaching storm.

 

Now, what would my Master do ...

 

*

 

Mirkel rubbed his fingers and breathed out an icy cloud. He still had not quite used to the fact getting his blade struck away did not hurt, not used to how his new teacher looked like. He raised his green eyes, taking care not to waste even a glance towards his fallen sword. The Master was like a mountain or a craggy hill, a massive presence on both physical and mental plane of existence. His face was hidden inside his brown hood lightly encrusted with powdery snow, same coarse cloth covering his body as well. The only distinctive details were his stern eyes and the gleaming narrow sabre in his left hand, eyes and sword both ridiculously tiny compared to his hulking frame.

 

"That wasn't fair, Master."

 

"You'll never win a fair fight, boy."

 

"Why?"

 

"Because you'll never find one."

 

The mountain's snowy peak shifted in a way Mirkel had decided must mean a smile, or a vague hint of one at least.

 

"Retrieve the sword, boy."

 

"You'll just strike it away once again."

 

"Maybe. But your blade is your life, apprentice. Abandoning it does not mean you won't need it, it means you will not have it when you need it. It's a world of power, and that blade, as pitiful as you are with it, is your personal power."

 

The Master's voice was like two boulders grinding against each other, painful in its intensity, gaining momentum with every word. Mirkel took a half-step backwards, feeling like a little boy stuck in a faery tale of miracles, mirages and terror, and almost slipped on the icy surface.

 

"Now, retrieve your sword."

 

He walked to where the blade stood stuck in icy floor and tugged it free. When the mountain moved he was ready, this time, and managed to parry the first blow. Its force sent him flying backwards. Mirkel tried to ignore the blinding awe he felt when he saw his Master lumber forward, body clumsy but blade quick as lightning and concentrated inwards, in what he did and how he stayed upright on the slick floor. He managed one more parry, this time with more of the numbing force deflected harmlessly aside, a feeble counterattack and a stumbling dodge before Master's sabre struck his longsword with unstoppable power and the blade whirled away, sparkling and shining in the light of the distant Torch. Instead of staring at his sword, he took one last step backwards only to fall off the platform into a snowbank, a sabre piercing the spot where he had stood.

 

"Good. That'll do, for now."

 

Mirkel coughed and spluttered, dragged himself upright and looked around now that a sudden attack seemed unlikely. He was standing amidst snow- and ice-covered ruins, every unwavering shadow cast by the buildings was pitch black, the areas on which Torch's light landed raw, crude white, giving the place a monochrome look. When he breathed out he exhaled a small cloud of floating ice crystals, the tiny snowflakes drifting apart and vanishing into the shadows.

 

"Come."

 

A hand appeared from the indefinite shape, its outlines somehow ignoring the harsh light. Despite the blurred appearance of his appendage, the Master's grip was solid enough when he dragged Mirkel up. A part of the humanoid mountain vanished, leaving behind an eye-straining emptiness, then returned with Mirkel's longsword in its grasp. The Master's heavy hand landed on his armored shoulder, surprisingly gently.

 

"I will introduce you to Thea. She will teach you some magic, yes."

 

*

 

No fair fights, no giving up, no allegiances, no compromises.

 

The Dreamer grinned, his equilibrium restored. He felt it hard to get back into the calm, analytical frame of mind he had been in. Something was wrong in the memory, not a taint but an error, a tear in the fabric of it.

 

Was I Mirkel still back then? Or already Wodzan?

 

*

 

"What are we doing here, Master?"

 

His senses were assaulted by the savage cold, but he could feel it was no longer lethal, and with that realization its sting was blunted. Mirkel breathed out, creating a cloud of icy crystals that drifted apart as he watched.

 

"I told you to stop breathing, boy. It is ... unseemly for us. This place is a crucible, apprentice. A near-mortal clawing upwards towards the dim, distant Ascension goes in, into a black box of chaotic decaying magic, and an apprentice planewalker come out with his past fully erased. I hope."

 

His master shifted his immense bulk, drew a thin blade out of the frigid air.

 

"You can still die here, if you wish."

 

*

 

Back then it had felt like a threat, but the Dreamer understood the words now, three thousand years weighting heavily on his narrow shoulders. He kept on walking, a faint grimace drifting through the sea of scars he had for a face showing he heard the mocking laughter of a seagull.

 

And the naming ...

 

*

 

"Wodzan Xe Chanima?"

 

"Yes. The sword god said it doesn't mind."

 

"Harrumph."

 

The Master was wearing slightly more elaborate robes of black and white, but he still gave off the impression of a large hill just about to roll over you. They were in a large room inside Thea Aniar's demiplane that seemed white at first but then you begun to see the subtle pastel colors, different in every part of the space. It was mostly empty, containing merely a few chairs and a sofa around a table, some curtains flowing in a gentle fragrant breeze that circulated the whole plane. Mirkel sat in one of the chairs while the Master's bulk made the sofa look as if it had been a narrow throne.

 

"Usually, we do not object to the name chosen. But ... it is the name of a god. You may not see it for a while yet, but we and them do not mix well. We are not supposed to be worshipped, boy. I will not teach a godling."

 

He sounded angry, ending his short speech in a growl.

 

"Worse yet, you might end back home some day. Two beings of power with the same name in the same plane? Nothing but trouble, there, boy. Nothing but."

 

"There's nothing but trouble there for me. You've shown me the size of the multiversum! Why would I return?"

 

"You tell me."

 

He never did find out for sure if it was meant to be a test, or if it was a slip, a sign of how vexed the Master had gotten. Mirkel paled and his face twisted in a grotesque grimace of stubborn resistance. He had to bow his head, but he withstood the command itself, a fierce triumph shining for a moment in his green eyes.

 

"... no."

 

"Haha!"

 

The loud burst of laughter surprised him, the loud bang when the Master's hand slapped against the surface of the table jolting him again in close succession.

 

"Be like that, then ... Lord Wodzan Xe Chanima, Walker of the Paths. Be what you want to be."