Wing & Nien

by Shytei Corellian

  Carly coughed, laughing through her tears. “Typical. Entirely unhelpful.”

  “Some things are difficult to unlearn,” Nien said. “It seems most of us see everything as this or that — either he was Merehr or he wasn’t. But Wing saw everything as both; all one thing. The children heard their parents refer to Wing as Merehr for so long. There were times I wondered myself. But he was also my brother, you know? He had always been there and I believed he always would be. I could never imagine it otherwise.” Nien hunted the dark landscape outside the window. “I see now that those feelings kept me from asking other, more important questions.”

  Carly huffed softly into his shirt. “You’re starting to sound like him.”

  Nien considered this a moment, shrugging, but wondering silently if Wing had awoken something inside of him that day in the Mesko clearing that Nien had been previously unaware of.

  “You’ve always been a teacher and a warrior,” Carly said. “Looks like now you’ll get to do both.”

  Nien had no idea how to reply to that — to any of it. For so long the hope, the expectations of their people had been focused on Wing. Would they now turn to him? He hoped not…

  “With any luck, you’ll have a little bit of time, though, to ask those ‘other more important questions’.”

  Perhaps, Nien thought.

  Wing had loved, and loved deeply. Nien had felt it in him just before he’d died: the love Wing had for the land, for Rieeve, for their world and all its people, for the children, and for him and Carly.

  Wing — Merehr — would become even bigger in death than he’d been in life, but what no one would know was how great he’d truly been, the truth of what he’d done in those moments before his death. Though Wing had always been more ethereally minded than Nien, what had happened upon Wing’s death was beyond even what Nien had suspected his brother might be capable of. Wing had changed the pattern of their world, opening a doorway in their planet, providing a means, a path, a possibility for there to be healing and growth, an expansion of consciousness that had never been seen before. And it would now be up to him, Nien, to continue where Wing had left off.

  “I’m sorry,” Carly said softly. “That is probably not something you want to hear.”

  Nien shook his head, and hugged her more tightly.

  “It’s all right. I wish I could see what it all means, what the future holds. But I can’t. I only feel…”

  “Pain,” Carly said ever so softly.

  Nien nodded, unable and, gratefully, not needing to reply. Words were useless anyway.

  Meaningless, pointless words, he thought.

  Side by side, gazing out the window where Wing had so often stood, they fell into silence, sharing as no one else could the grief of having lost a vital piece of themselves in Wing’s death. And in the room behind them Pree K, the children, SiQQiy and those that remained of her Guard, slept, and outside the glimmering snow and distant stars seemed to work against the sadness, breathing comfort in their own particular language, as if each star over Rieeve, each snow crystal upon its valley floor, shared Wing’s voice, and for a moment Nien saw the valley as Wing had shown it to him, even as he lay dying.

  I know what you’re trying to do, Nien thought, and I appreciate the effort. But right now, I want to miss you. Right now, I want to hear your voice. Right now, more than anything, I want you to walk through that door and come stand next to me.

  Right now, I just want you back.

  Chapter 95

  Soul Bond

  W ing’s had been the only grave dug in the cold, hard ground of Ime. Casualties other than the Ka’ull had been carefully wrapped and prepared to be returned to their own lands for burial.

  Now, in the midst of the Cawutt fields, a large crowd had gathered. Amongst them were the children, En’t, Jhock, and Pree K. Rhegal, Call, Master Monteray, and SiQQiy. Men of the Granj and SiQQiy’s personal guard were also there as well as Commanders from Preak, Legran, and Jayak.

  The air was thin and cold as Nien stood with Carly at the edge of the gently curved mound of freshly packed soil. Carly pulled Wing’s long leather coat tight around her body. Her sword belt hung about her waist, but the sword was not in its scabbard.

  Nien faced the solemn crowd. There had been so much death. So much burning of the dead, so much preparing of those who would be conveyed back to their valleys and families. It seemed never ending. That so many had turned out for Wing’s burial touched Nien; it also left him at a loss. Though Rieevan funerals generally saw large turnouts, they had never been grand affairs. So, he said a few words in the Fultershier, and then simply stopped speaking. He had no idea what to say that might help the crowd cope, not only with Wing’s death but with all the death; everyone present had lost someone they loved. It was too big, Nien could not encompass it, especially when his grief over Wing was still so fresh.

  Turning, Nien knelt at the mound’s muddied, snowy edges.

  In a voice quiet and bereft, Nien dug his fist into the black soil and let himself slip beyond the presence of the others and into that space inhabited by he and his brother alone.

  “You were always a little ahead of me — so I hope you’ll forgive me this once for complaining about your timing.” Nien gazed down at the mound of deep black dirt and fallen snow. “That day, in the clearing outside of Legran, you tried to tell me something but I didn’t want to take it in. I didn’t want to believe all that it implied.

  “So now. Now. How do I carry this trust? You taught me that we are not alone, but I cannot tell you how alone I feel. What you left to me, what you gave to me, is a gift more than the world, but it doesn’t help. I’ve never felt so lost.”

  As Nien stood again, black bits of earth clinging to his hand, he straightened and raised his face. Carly’s anguished face squeezed his heart as he cleared his voice and, with a little more strength, spoke again in Rieevan.

  “Wing Merehr. E fle’ me te no’va’nen. E te ne fle’ ka no-ba’nin. U te’ka de. Ne teka’ dey. Fu sche’na de la’nuta feal. Ke lata-na. Uoo fey-lapka dey. Melaan de mee’ta le. Me lanta me do ley. Speeall, schre’na pe low. Tuv’le pu na-te da. Fellan, lee’tan, Melaan...”

  Shoving his hand into his pocket, Nien withdrew a small figurine and placed it atop the black dirt. He’d finally finished it. He’d begun it long ago in Legran. He’d not been sure back then what it would be. Even once it was finished he wasn’t sure, exactly, what he’d made. It hadn’t been till after the clearing in Legran that he’d understood; though a single piece, the grain of wood was two distinct colors, a rich brown almost the color of wet black dirt, and the other the golden color of honey. His carving had brought out the contrast in both even as it revealed the way they curled and moved into and through each other. It might have been two figures — loosely appraised. As it had kicked around the house, it seemed everyone had seen something different in it, their own idea of what it might represent or mean. It didn’t really matter. For Nien, it had become a symbol of himself and his brother, two different wood grains in the same tree.

  “E te Melaan to’de. Y metta la to-dey.”

  Nien stood then, took Carly’s hand, and as the crowd slowly began to part, Call stepped up to the black mound and took in the delicate carving that lay upon it. It was of two figures, perfectly and meticulously detailed, a striking blend of light and dark wood wound together in a featureless embrace.

  Though Call had not seen it thus completed, he recognized the bit of wood that Nien had often carried with him in Legran. Looking down at it, Call felt an influx of words in Rieevan, Legrand, and Fultershier, a yearning to pen everything he could remember of what Nien had said, of everything that had happened since he’d first been approached by a tall, black-haired men outside of the Hiona in Legran.

  That same day, Call wrote down the Rieevan words that Nien had spoken over the grave, but it was some while before he understood the words he had written.

  From the Chronicles of Rieeve. Volume I. Revolution
802. Originally recorded in Rieevan by Call of Legran. Supreme Commander Nien Cawutt’s farewell to Son Wing-Cawutt Merehr.

  (Translation an approximation only)

  Revolution 800. Turn 10. Day Seven.

  “Wing Merehr. In words unspoken and a time forgotten, come and move over me like fields of silent angels. Like starlight, like white night, younger brother, you are the spirit of this place — before it was and after we will be.

  Beneath glowing moon and sun’s reflection, Rieevan Soul, I feel you here in a space between. This sacred trust will hold me together, forever, from here to where you are.”

  Afterword —

  Pause for Serenity

  “A t last!” Kate waved her arms and hurried across the short stretch of grass to the riverside. Monteray came behind her, and the couple met SiQQiy and Nien with open arms, smiles, and Kate’s tears.

  Between Kate and Nien a few quiet moments passed before Monteray broke the silence, and taking Nien by the arm asked, “So what about my old friend, Rhegal? How is he?”

  “He’s living in the Village — New Melant,” Nien answered. “The children pester him constantly. He purports agitation, but I think he enjoys it.”

  “And my nephew? Has he put in for honorary Rieevan citizenship?”

  Nien smiled. “He may have. At this time, he’s integral to the rebuilding of the Cant. But I can see him returning someday to Legran. Now that your own forces are coming together, you may want him back sooner.”

  “I already do. And the two of you? How is your time spent between valleys? Do the Quienans think they have been abandoned by their Empress?”

  SiQQiy nodded. “I have to give my full name anymore to get into my own palace.”

  “I’m sending her back soon,” Nien said. “It will do none of us any good if Quieness falls apart.”

  “And you, Nien,” Monteray asked, “what do you intend to do?”

  Nien sighed lightly. “Eventually, I would like to turn the Cant over to Pree K and the school to Rhegal…”

  “And retire in style to Quienan palace domes?”

  SiQQiy touched Nien’s face. “I don’t know how long he’d be able to cope with such luxurious surroundings, with having every need met.”

  “I might give it a try for a while.” Nien grinned, and then his voice took on a more serious tone. “But there is still much work to be done in Rieeve.”

  “And I don’t imagine it will be too long before the new alliance begins knocking on your door regarding Tou and Lou,” Monteray said.

  “It weighs on all our minds,” Nien admitted. He looked at Monteray. “As head of that alliance, might that be you at my door?”

  “Most likely,” Monteray said with a deprecating grin.

  Nien bowed his head.

  “And Carly?” Kate asked. “I understand from Call’s last visit that young Jayson-Wing is doing well?”

  “He is, and walking already. I think Carly may come along on our next visit and bring him to meet you.”

  Kate was radiant. “It would be wonderful to have a child in the house again.” And then, as if remembering something, Kate asked, “What of Wing’s big cat? The shy’teh?”

  “Lucin?” Nien said. “He’s still there.”

  The day after they’d buried Wing he’d gone back to the grave by himself and found Lucin there, lying atop the pile of wet dirt. The shy’teh had watched him but had not left upon Nien’s arrival. Nien had spotted him there another time or two, and then not again until the day he’d ventured into the Mesko Forest, compelled to go, by Wing he’d suspected. He’d moved through the forest on instinct, not knowing what he was about nor where he was going until coming upon something rather startling.

  Slowly, he’d drawn up. One of the Ancients of the Mesko Forest had been destroyed. It appeared as if a lightning strike had rent the giant in two until he’d moved closer. Looking down into the pit of the tree’s massive roots, he could see the tree had been taken in a convulsion, as if the roots had gripped the earth in a mighty contraction, splitting the tree in half when the contraction had released. It was then Nien had remembered the strange eruption he and the others had witnessed at the moment of Wing’s death when Castle Viyer had tumbled, the earth had rolled, and the Mesko Canopy had shaken with some unfathomable eruption.

  Nien had not been at the tree long when he’d looked up to find Lucin standing above him, staring at him with his bright, green eyes.

  You knew about this? Nien had asked the big cat.

  Lucin had looked back at him. What the cat might have been thinking utterly incomprehensible. And then the shy’teh had turned and, tail twitching behind him, had ventured away through the wreckage where the great tree had fallen.

  Nien had not followed.

  Blinking and nodding to Kate, Nien said, “I saw him at Wing’s grave a few days after, and once in the Mesko Forest since. He makes small forays down to the house — the children say they see him now and again.”

  “That’s good,” Kate said, smiling, and Nien thought that she felt much the same as he did: That having the shy’teh around felt, a bit, like having some small part of Wing around.

  “It is,” Nien admitted.

  “Come,” Monteray offered with a wave of his hand. “Let’s eat.”

  “Are you sure you don’t want me to come with you?” SiQQiy asked later that night. Everyone had retired to their rooms and the house was quiet except for soft creaks in the wood here and there, as the house itself seemed to settle.

  Nien nodded. “I’m sure. I won’t be long.” Nien gave her a quick kiss and went as quietly as he could down the stairs, slipping out the back door toward the river.

  Moving through the long grass, he glanced up at the night sky. The stars were coming out one by one creating a vast, fine blanket of glimmering reflections like stones caught in the sunlight of an endless heavenly stream. The breeze off the river rustled the sleeves of his shirt as he stopped at the river’s edge. Even in the silence of the night he could barely hear the sound of the water. Reaching inside his shirt, he withdrew a thin scroll of Mesko paper. He’d found it after the battle, tucked away in a corner of his brother’s transcription ledger. Carefully, he unrolled it. By now he knew every word of it but carried it with him anyway. Like a mother’s song whispered to a sleepy child, he let it play through his mind. He could even hear Wing’s voice in his head as he read...

  To the children: You have come a long way and have already endured more than most should in a lifetime.

  Your hearts are good, the path they lead you on will change the future of our world.

  Learn all that you can, in everything that you do and in everything that happens to you.

  Most importantly, know that you are not alone. Though I cannot tell you that you will never feel alone again, I can only tell you that you are not — nor ever will be.

  To Carly: Love is such a strange word. Overused and underrated, it is still what we are left with to try and describe the indescribable.

  You told me once that you would always be there, and you have been. You never lost faith. I have laid my heart in your hands...Thank you.

  And Nien.

  Emotion tightened Nien’s throat.

  Oft times I have wondered: In that great expanse of time and space, in those previous worlds, what did I do to be here in this place, at this time, with you as mortal brother?

  I want to grow old together. I want to know that in revolutions to come we will sit down together in front of a warm fire. And in that sacred place I will ramble and you will whittle, and we will talk of your star calculations and my harvest season, and our grandchildren will interrupt us, and our wives will scold us...But I will continue to ramble and you will continue to whittle until the fire has dwindled to coals and the moon is high over the Mesko forest.

  I love you, my brother, my comrade, evening shade of my soul.

  Holding the fragile paper in his hand, Nien stood quietly for a long time, still as the night air. In h
is mind, he could see Wing, on their last day in Legran together, standing with Lucin beside him, mirrored against river and mountain. Just as he carried the letter in his long coat, Nien had carried that picture of Wing.

  But Wing no longer stood there — the black dirt at the river’s edge was empty to sky.

  A cold breeze rose up.

  Shivering, Nien pulled his cloak close, and turned back toward the house. Moving up the gentle incline he glanced over his shoulder and felt…

  A grin tipped his mouth.

  “Don’t stay up too late, Weed Farmer,” he said quietly. “I’m going in.”

  Nien continued on up to the house, comforted that Wing had not yet made a permanent move to one of those higher worlds.

  Just for a little while longer, Nien thought.

  He and Monteray could handle preparations for the fortification of the valleys, as well as the liberation of Tou and Lou, but there were many questions Nien had that had nothing to do with the mean practicalities of war, questions he felt confident sharing with only one person.

  Listening to the sound of his feet brushing through the tall grass, a stream of pale light caught his attention. Glancing up, Nien saw that the white, transparent curtains hanging in the window on the second floor of the house were lit by the soft yellow glow of lamplight from within.

  Smiling to himself, Nien quickened his pace.

  SiQQiy was waiting for him.

  THE END

  Special thanks —

  In the beginning — to Joe Maki who first said to truly be it, you must say it.

  In the middle — my Mom who stayed up all night to type the first version of Merehr thirty years ago and for all the support since that only a mother can give. Chad, for effortless understanding (you know where I’d be without it). To SPA, soul mate, champion, ever-believer and brilliant navigator. Sometimes all you need is one simple thing. Riley, for letting me whine and offering last minute editing support. Krista, for reading the crap version, which encourages me more than I can say. Shawn and Lara for letting me live in their minivan. And Lara, who was the first to care about Wing Merehr almost as much as I do.