Valley of the Shadow

by Michael Gardner

  * * *

  Colchis (Ancient Georgia on the coast of the Black Sea)

  251 AD (five hundred years after the events on Solomon’s Mountain)

  Windsong travelled to the forests along the shores of the Hospitable Sea in the land of Colchis. The warm climate reminded her of home and even though she could see mountains, an enduring reminder of Solomon, they remained far in the distance. A magnificent yew tree grew in the forest, its trunk as wide as The Watcher’s Tower. By its size, she guessed it was at least as old as she was. It wasn’t tall like a pine but it was perpetually shrouded in finger-like, sea-green leaves. She was fascinated by its trunk. At first she thought it looked as though many trees had been joined together and covered in flaky, umber bark. The longer she looked, the more she saw limbs and faces, as though people had fallen asleep next to it and the tree had grown around them. They looked peaceful.

  She climbed the tree, learning every hand hold and strong branch. She planted vines and when they were tall enough, wove them into living walls in the canopy. The walls took many years to grow but she wasn’t short of time. From the outside, her home looked like any tree caught in a tangle of vines. Inside, her nest was bright and colourful. She made fabrics, sewed curtains and sheets and embroidered them with memories of happy times shared with the people she had loved. Everywhere she turned, the walls and furnishings told stories. She slept with the peaceful people and hoped her loneliness wouldn’t last forever.

  She thought often about seeking out other Khryseoi, although she didn’t know if any remained. She had no idea what she would tell them about the black blade or Solomon’s pendant. She looked at it often, hanging on a plaited thong between two bear claws. It was unremarkable, yet in the dark of a moonless night, she could discern a faint light coming from within the stone. She didn’t like to touch it, even though she felt it was safer in her possession. The stone was cold to the touch, never warming as if it yearned for Solomon’s mountain. She placed it in a secret nook next to Acabar’s black blade.

  One season after another slipped by in a succession of blinks. She spent days watching the sun cross the sky, weeks studying bees as they went from flower to flower in their endless pursuit of nectar. Some days she perched on a flat rock by the sea, spear in hand, watching for life in the deep water. Fish swam by, sharks and sometimes rays, but the spear rarely left her hand.

  One year, her tree got sick. Its leaves started to yellow and fall more than usual. Her nest became visible to anyone who cared to look. There had been little rain. She ferried water in two skins carried across her shoulders on a stout branch and watered it until it recovered. When she saw the bright buds of new leaves appearing, she rested with her hands against the great trunk. “It may not show, but I am old too,” she said. “You have nurtured me, dear tree, and I owe you the same care.”

  She ventured out of the forest now and then. What she saw of the world frightened her. She worried someone would find her tree and take the pendant and the sword. Sometimes people passed through the forest, going wherever they were going. Sometimes they saw her but she made sure it was never for long. As much as she craved company, she felt safer alone.

  She woke one fine clear morning, rubbed her eyes and looked down from her bed to the forest floor. The warmth of the epiphaneia filled her with joy but not nearly as much as did the sight of Tak, nearly a full-grown man, grinning back up at her, his gums wide and bright pink. She scrambled down the trunk and into his arms.

  I dreamed of you, he signed, once he had the use of his hands again. I dreamed of this tree. So I came.

  “This tree is my home,” she said, noticing her voice was light and husky. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d spoken aloud.

  He looked up into the canopy, still with a grin on his face.

  “Do you find it amusing?”

  Oh, I approve! I had a tree of my own once. People take them for granted. They all have a story to tell.

  She took his hand and felt her own disappear in his palm. His skin was warm and dry. “There’s so much to talk about,” she said.

  Tak raised his free hand. We have time.

  “Have you dreamed of the others?”

  Tak shook his head.

  She prepared the finest meal she had cooked in a long time, a hearty stew made with fresh eel and vegetables. Tak’s eyes widened as she gathered vegetables from her garden, growing invisible to all amongst the shrubs and trees. She cooked their meal over a fire on a narrow white beach, separating the dense emerald forest from the bright teal sea.

  “How did you find me with only a dream?” she said, as they ate.

  I had a little help, signed Tak while he chewed. He swallowed and allowed a light whistling laugh to escape the back of his throat. One advantage of signing is I can talk with my mouth full. He scooped more stew onto his spoon and into his mouth. The people around these parts say there is a dryad living in their forest, a small woman with golden skin and dark hair. They said, if you try to follow her, she disappears into the trees.

  “That’s a nice story,” she said. “Better than being called a witch or a daemon.” She let out a heavy sigh, looked into his eyes and felt her shoulders relax. “It has been a long time. You’ve all slept a long time. Everyone but me! I wish I knew why. I’m very old, Tak.”

  The flow of time is different in the Valley of the Shadow. I saw it in my dreams once, the barren hills, the great river...

  She leaned over and touched his arm. “It has been five hundred years since Solomon’s mountain, give or take a decade.”

  Tak’s eye’s widened. It has been only fifteen for me. Despite being Khryseoi, my body was unaccustomed to the cold of the mountain. I saw my fingers turn black, felt an irresistible desire to sleep and when I woke, I was a baby again. My body developed at the same speed as a mortal. I know I shouldn’t find it strange, but I do.

  “It has been this way since Phylasso vanished.”

  Tak nodded slowly. Did you find Solomon?

  She told him what had happened, how they had been kept prisoner and how Raven had been forced to kill Solomon.

  Then it was all for nothing?

  She shook her head. “Solomon possessed a pendant, a fragment of stone. It’s unnatural... a piece of the spirit world.”

  The spirit world is natural too, but not as we understand it. What does this pendant do?

  “I haven’t had the courage to use it for any length of time,” she said, looking away. “When I did, I felt Acabar’s presence. He could sense me too. I haven’t handled it for a very long time.”

  A wise decision.

  “Solomon thought he could harness its power to perform The Unbinding. That’s as much as I know.”

  Tak swallowed hard. I’m glad he didn’t succeed.

  She washed the pot and their plates in the waves and they returned to the forest, walking slowly through the trees.

  “I managed to escape,” she continued. “Solomon had a bear. He’d ordered it to stop us from leaving. It didn’t know he was dead. It lost a paw to my sword before it let me go.”

  How did you get down the mountain alone?

  “Solomon had a sled. It was much quicker getting down. I recovered the black blade, Raven’s bow and...”

  And now you’re here. I can see there is a great deal to talk about.

  “The world has become worse in the time you’ve been gone. Every land is troubled by war. People are starving, poor and dying of plague. Weren’t we supposed to prevent this from happening? I’ve had a lot of time to think and I fear Eurynomos’s army is returning. Raven told me long ago that Acabar had held influence over a Persian King and had made him commit terrible deeds. I’ve no doubt all Eurynomos’s servants will do the same. We will be forced to involve ourselves in mortal affairs.” Tak’s hands twitched. “What good are our gifts if the world turns against us?”

  Tak’s shoulders hunched. They didn’t talk much for the rest of the day. She made him a bed in her house. Even tho
ugh she was weary when night fell, she couldn’t sleep. She reached out and touched his arm to make sure he was still there. “Please try not to get killed,” she whispered.

  Tak was a quiet comforting companion. He was skilled in bush craft and made her feel safe for the first time in centuries. She could leave the tree in his care, venture out into the world and mingle with people again. The Romans, she discovered, had now built a huge empire. People were flocking together to live in cities. Despite their admirable qualities of engineering, she found cities to be noisy, overcrowded places. She could smell the sour odour of people before she passed inside the walls. The Romans built baths but not everyone used them. She traded her wares for necessary supplies, listened for news but never lingered for long. It was a relief to return to the forest, her tree and Tak.

  As time went by, she began to notice that Tak had developed a fascination with the pendant. He rarely handled it but hung it on a twig where he could look at it for hours. He did so with a small smile, the same expression he wore while meditating, but with his eyes open. Sometimes his face became frozen in concentration and she could see the tendons of his neck stand out. After, he would sleep for days. Finally, he put the pendant away and sat down opposite her. His face was covered in sweat. She touched his hand. It was unusually cold.

  It’s too dangerous for me to use.

  She nodded. “I suspected it was evil. It must have twisted Solomon’s mind.”

  Tak bit his lower lip and chewed it gently. The pendant isn’t good or evil. It’s merely a tool that brings the waking mind closer to the spirit world. I dared to look and he saw me.

  “Acabar?”

  Yes. We studied each other for a time. I know him now. Phylasso told me about him once, although he had a different name then. He is The Betrayer, Prince of Deceit and the Right Hand of Eurynomos. If I use Solomon’s pendant, I’ll draw him to us. Tak was silent for a moment. He knows my true name.

  “Isn’t that what we want? To draw him from hiding?”

  As you suspected, Eurynomos’s servants are waking. Acabar isn’t alone.

  “How many are there?”

  Tak swallowed. Enough.

  She thought for a while. “Then it’s time to bring the Khryseoi together again, to make a stand. We can use the pendant to draw Acabar to a place of our choosing and it will be decided once and for all.” Tak bowed his head. She touched his chin and looked him in the eyes. His lower lids carried the beginnings of tears. “Why are you sad?”

  He’s been gone for so long. I fear it may be forever.

  “Phylasso?”

  Tak nodded. Only he has the power to bring the Khryseoi together again. He gazed into the distance and smiled. He can travel anywhere in a blink as a spirit and appear in flesh. He can awaken us, accelerate our growth so we reach maturity quickly and bring us back if we fall.

  She watched without blinking while his hands shaped the words. “A spirit? I saw him wounded many times. Once I even saw him die. He bleeds like the rest of us.”

  Tak’s eyes focused and he looked at her. He, like us, is a spirit housed in a fragile body. I can’t begin to understand the powers he possesses.

  “Can we learn this power too?”

  Tak’s whistling laugh sounded bitter-sweet. Most of our kind is asleep, drifting in the Valley of the Shadow. It would take me a millennium or more to do what Phylasso achieved in a few months. Have you noticed that the nature of our gifts are changing? We sleep longer between lifetimes and now age at the same speed as normal men. He touched his cheek with his fingertips. Perhaps, in the next lifetime, the blessing of eternal youth will also fade and I’ll grow old and die. Perhaps, if I die in this lifetime, I won’t wake at all!

  She forced herself to breathe slowly. “So, with every passing year, while we become weaker, our enemy gets stronger. I see his plan now. He strikes from the shadows, picking us apart one at a time, until there won’t be enough of us left to defend the world. Then, he will free his master.”

  Without Phylasso, we can’t stop Acabar. Eurynomos will return unchecked and begin his feast.

  For the first time since the mountain, Windsong felt her own eyes well from sorrow at the sight of Tak so distressed. She often felt sad but the more time went by, the harder it had become to give her emotions any expression. Crying had become too tiring. She shed a single tear. It splashed onto her cheek and was gone. “There is a way,” she said. “We have to change, adapt and stop living in fear. Raven is the key. He didn’t fall during the war. We can fight Acabar by using his own tactics against him. With the pendant, we can find his allies and snuff them out. We’ll travel, spread the word and gather the Khryseoi we find along the way.”

  Spoken like a true General!

  “What do you mean?”

  I’m grateful I was never one of the Fourteen! The idea frightens me to my core.

  “What other choice do we have?”

  We don’t.

  “Then we’re agreed? As soon as he returns?”

  As soon as he returns.

  Windsong shivered. “How long will that take?”

  I don’t know.

  She lay back, resting her head on a feather pillow embroidered with red flowers. “Tell me a story, Tak. Distract me for a while. You used to have so many stories before...”

  Before I cut my tongue out.

  “Yes. I know you won’t speak of it, but I can’t imagine what reason you’d have to do that to yourself.”

  Since I’ve looked into the pendant, I’m grateful I did. One secret is enough for me to bear.

  “I won’t ask. I like my tongue where it is. Can you tell me a story?”

  Tak nodded. What would you like to hear about?

  “Tell me about your life before you became a Khryseoi, when you still had a tongue.” She allowed herself a small smile.

  Are you teasing me?

  “Perhaps a little.”

  Tak stood up and planted his hands on his hips.

  “Where are you going?”

  To make us some tea. I get a dry mouth whenever I have to tell stories. He winked. The tea was another secret Tak refused to part with, a blend of leaves he’d gathered in the forest. It was hot, zesty and subtly sweet. A single mouthful was soothing and eased worry. She rested the cup on her lap and enjoyed its warmth on her hands.

  Tak laced his fingers together and stretched his arms. I was born in a land far to the East, he began, much farther from here than your homeland. It was always warm, even when the rains came. My people were small and slender in stature. I was an ordeal for my mother. She pushed me out before she died and for that I will always be grateful. The people of my village weren’t so gracious. They’d never seen such a big baby and blamed me for her death. They said I was a monster. My father wept as he put me in a basket packed with dried reeds. It takes a brave person to stand against their own kind and he found the pressure too great. He waded into the river, set the basket on the water and let the current carry it away. I remember the sun in my eyes, the constant rocking and the sensation of falling. Then, out of nowhere, a man fished me from the river. He wasn’t like my people at all. He had curly sand-coloured hair, a great beard and sun-bronzed skin. He lifted me from the basket and held me in his arms. “I will look after you,” he said.

  My boyhood was spent as a nomad. He nursed me and tended to my needs. We were always on the move. He taught me to speak. My first language was not the one spoken by my people, but Greek. I used to look up at his face as we walked. He always looked serious except when he returned my stare. I called him father. He used to smile whenever I said it but there seemed to be words lingering on his lips. One day he said them.

  “It pleases me to be called your father but I am not that man. It would please me better if you called me by my name, Phylasso.” He touched my cheek with the back of his fingers and tousled my hair. “You are a special boy who deserves a name worthy of your gifts.” He knelt down so we were eye to eye and reached behind his head to touc
h his sword. His fingertip welled with a drop of blood. He painted a stripe on my face, from my forehead to the tip of my nose. “Your name is Kaha’i,” he said. “Do you know what that means?”

  I shook my head, a little frightened by the sight of blood on his finger.

  “It means ‘The One Who Tells.’ ” Tak met Windsong’s gaze. Don’t say it! The irony isn’t lost on me. I’ve had many years to ponder why he gave me that name and I’ve never found the answer.

  “Phylasso had a talent for being mysterious,” she said, sipping her tea.

  When I was eight years old, we arrived in Greece. Phylasso took me to Athens, where I met my foster family. “We’ll meet again soon,” he said. “These good people will care for you. They will teach you about art, philosophy and many other wonders. Hippias, your foster father, is a champion boxer. I want you to give him good sport.” Tak stopped. His eyes widened and he stretched out a hand to her.

  “What is it?”

  She took his hand and watched his face carefully. As he closed his eyes, his smile lines vanished. He took long slow breaths through his nose. She opened her mouth to speak but he raised a finger to her lips. His hand ran up her face, his fingertips gently closing her eyes. She drew a sharp breath and held it, as if she were still trying not to hope. After a moment, hope burst free. “I see Xi! He’s returned!”

  ~ Chapter 16 ~

  Illyria (Ancient Balkan Peninsula)

  2485 BC

  “There is great power in a name. From this moment onward, you must abandon your true name and embrace a new one.” After Phylasso had spoken, there was a brief wave of conversation among the Thirty Thousand. The man at Amyntas’s side spoke. “I’m taking the name ‘Mael’. What shall I call you?”

  Amyntas glanced at his friend. They’d known each other since they could walk. It would take some time to get used to the change. “Xi,” he said.

  Mael raised an eyebrow. “Xi? For the letter or the number?”

  “For the letter,” said Xi. “I was fourteen when I first met Phylasso and Xi is the fourteenth letter of the alphabet. It makes sense, don’t you think? What’s happening now?” He gripped Mael’s arm as he watched Phylasso take his great sword and plunge it into the earth. Phylasso fell to his knees, bowed his head and began to chant in an unknown tongue. A murmur swept through the warriors, shamans and tacticians who had gathered in answer to Phylasso’s summons.