The Keeper of Tales

by Jonathon Mast

  He chuckled. “It was just us then. Do you remember? Just the brenevai on the earth. The dwarves hadn’t found the way to the surface yet, and humans had not yet been thought of. It was just us. People of magic and earth. Flesh and dirt and light, woven together. Us. And then the first different one was born.”

  A few deer moved close to see the visitor, their ears twitching.

  “They’ve all forgotten, of course. They think it was on purpose. As if anything we did was ever on purpose.” He walked. “You’d laugh. They think I’m so wise. They think I’m so far above them. They don’t know that I’m just old. I know the stories better than they do because I lived so many of them.” He stopped. “I miss you. All of you. So much. But I suppose soon enough. Well.”

  He paused and shook his head. “I’m sorry. I came to say goodbye. Let me go back to our story.”

  He took a deep breath. “And so, a child was born to brenevai parents whose skin wasn’t like ours. It seemed so, so pale. And the child’s ears were tapered so much more than ours. She seemed to be born of air rather than earth. Like us, and yet not. And then another baby was born like it. And then another. Nearly all that generation, our children, but not like us.

  “Do you remember? Do you remember what we did?” Tor gave a hollow laugh. “We panicked. We thought it was a plague. We theorized we were going extinct. We feared for the future. We proclaimed it a bold new era. Oh, we did so much. Every mother called upon every healer.

  “Eda was one of them. She held her swelling stomach and ran to Ethar, a woman who had delivered so many children in her many, many years. And Ethar felt her stomach. She fed Eda so many potions. ‘Yes, Eda, your child will be healthy.’

  “‘But will my baby be my child?’ she asked.

  “‘This will be your child. What color the baby’s skin? Does it matter? Love the child you are given, whatever the child looks like.’”

  Tor shook his head and chuckled again. “Ethar had such wisdom. I wish more had listened. But at least Eda did.

  “Eda planned to love her child. She and her husband prepared a bed for the baby. They gathered enough supplies that they would both be able to stay with the child for the three months that tradition said they must simply care for a baby and do nothing else.

  “But Eda’s older sister, one who already had four other brenevai children, was with child as well. And this older sister, named Laeahn, gave birth.

  “Eda visited, waddling with her swollen belly, to see her new niece. There was no baby in Laeahn’s home, though.

  “‘Where is the baby?’ Eda asked.

  “‘There is no baby,’ Laeahn answered.

  “And Eda lowered her head and began the ancient mourning song, a song that was old when the brenevai were still young. But Laeahn stopped her. ‘I have no child. No new baby. The thing that came from me has been left out there. Do not mourn it.’ And her words held such hate, Eda fled.

  “Eda closed herself off from the world. None could see her, not even her husband.

  “And three months later, she gave birth. Her firstborn, a son.

  “A son with pale, pale skin. With tapered ears. A son who felt more of the air than of the earth.

  “And she gave him the brenevai name for air: ‘Elvan.’

  Tor sighed. “And so, my firstborn grew, hated by so many, but loved by his parents. And the others began being called the same thing: ‘Elvan.’ In this way, the elves came to be, born from us, but not of us. They even changed the name. They call themselves ‘elven’ people now.” Tor shook his head, a wry smile on his face. “And the brenevai soon were no longer born. We lived, but no more of us came to be.

  “Many brenevai hated the elven. Of course they did. When one’s species is dying, it is so easy to be bitter. But I learned then, it is so much better to look at the world with wonder, and bottle that wonder in a story. Those who could not bear the thought of withering fled over the eastern ocean. And we few remained behind, didn’t we?

  “In the end, we accepted the elven. We loved them. We raised them. And now they think we did it all with purpose. That we chose them. That we named them elves as some sort of honor. That we had wisdom that we never had. Because that is what the stories say.”

  The gray sky thinned. A weak sun shone through.

  “But soon there were even fewer and fewer of us. The brenevai began dying out. There’s only two of us left. The Steward of the Stream and me. We’ve done our best to protect our children. All of them. Children of word, children of earth, children of birth, children of blood. All of them. But.”

  Tor sat. “Every story ends, doesn’t it? The brenevai are all but gone. And now.”

  He turned to the east. He closed his eyes. He listened.

  “Our children of word. Their nursery is burning. I can feel it.”

  They came. They slithered and flew and galloped and strode and processed and crawled over the land, as fast as whispers and as loud as sunlight. And like that, Tor was surrounded by stories. He saw them all: Northane and Dairune and Daeu and The Sands of Dried Tears and The Scimitar of Peace and so many others. They stretched to the horizon. They sat before him, children ready to listen to their loving father.

  He looked them over. His children. The ones he had gathered. The ones he had nurtured. The ones he had kept. He told them a story.

  “Once, there was a Keeper of Tales who loved what he did. He loved stories in ink and stone, word and whisper. But the time came for that Keeper to leave. It came time for a new Keeper.”

  The stories nudged at him, begging for affection.

  He held up his hands. “The old Keeper said goodbye. It was time for a new age.”

  They pawed at the ground. They roared to the heavens.

  “My time is over. Go. Another will watch over you now.”

  And they bowed to him. They came and bid him farewell. Some embraced him. Some nuzzled his hand. Some simply nodded. On and on they came. Every tale that had been told since the Deluge, and some even older. They all gave obeisance.

  And then Tor was alone.

  “You see? Every story ends. Even those stories I have known for so long. Even my story ends.”

  He looked around again. “So, I came to say goodbye. I won’t be able to return. I need to do what must be done. I will miss you, my beloved.”

  His eyes drank in the ruins. He breathed in the greenery. He tasted the breeze. One last savoring look.

  “Goodbye.”

  Chapter Sixty-Nine

  The Library burned.

  I fell to my knees. The stories. Oh, the stories.

  The ones I hated. The ones I loved. It didn’t matter. They all burned. Hundreds. Thousands of years of tales.

  Without the stories that said darkness would be defeated, did we stand any chance against the Kaerun? But without the stories binding me, was I free from becoming the Fallen Lord?

  The air pushed against me. The heat of the flames wrapped me in its feverish embrace.

  Someone tugged at my sleeve. Yolian tried to drag me away. I glanced aside from the burning books. Daragen and Abani helped Lazul escape the flames. They had found a path near the cliff face that was clear of both goblins and fire. Yolian urged me to follow, though I could not hear him over the gasping breaths of dying stories.

  So many heroes that would be forgotten now. So many.

  I shook Yolian loose and shouted that I would follow, but I wanted to make sure that we left as few behind as possible. He accepted the answer and ran to join our companions.

  Sweat stung my eyes. It was so hot here, but I needed to look once again toward those shelves that had held so much knowledge, so many stories. It had been such a thing of beauty, no matter what I thought of the tales. Even at my lowest point, before the tales had called me back and shown me their goodness, even when I was ready to turn my back on them, even then I would not have wanted this. This was too much.

  And now we had no anchor. All that had made Chariis what it was had fallen. The storie
s were gone now.

  I scanned the field of battle, but the many soldiers were all struggling to escape one way or another; none needed my aid here.

  I turned and made my way to the clear path along the cliff wall. Others had discovered it as well. I found myself with soldiers of every nation and race moving in single file to avoid the heat as best we could. There was no fighting here, merely fleeing. We came at last to the edge of a building and the base of a narrow stair. We climbed with great haste. We soon found ourselves on the cliff overlooking the city.

  It had been the Fabled City, illumined by deeds of greatness memorialized in tale. Now only flames lit its walls, red and orange flames against the black of night. The entirety of Chariis was crumbling in on itself, not from decay, but from despair. The city exhaled and bowed to its new masters.

  We made our way without words. None were needed. We hauled ourselves over the top of the cliff and walked away. None of the troops dared look back. I saw moisture that was not sweat upon many faces. They understood what had happened. What the world had lost. And that it meant their homelands, too, would fall.

  At the top of the stairs we were greeted by silent stands of trees. All made their way toward the safety of the shadows. I expected many of the men would regroup into their own nations’ armies and leave for their homes to make what defenses they could. Any alliance we had here was truly shattered. Why stand together when there was nothing in common to defend?

  Trudging back along the cliff a short distance, separating myself from the others, I turned to look back on the city I had so loved. It was like seeing the dead body of a dear friend. You could still determine that it had once been your loved one, but there was no longer any life there. Only a shell.

  The tales were gone. They were all gone. Destroyed in one fire. All the weapons that protected us. All the tales I’d hated. All the tales I’d grown to know and love. All of them.

  And it was my fault.

  If only I had led with more vigor. If only I had driven the companions harder. If only we had captured Garethen to interrogate him. If only, if only, if only. The heartbeat of a bitter old man. A bitter, useless old man. I fell to my knees.

  I had to rise, to go home to the North. Perhaps by standing with the Spiremen we might be able to resist the tide. Perhaps we could remove our people far enough north, to the Spires, which could be defended for centuries without fear. Perhaps farther. No one knew what lay beyond.

  I should have done all that. I should have moved to action. I should be gone, like all the soldiers that had left. I was alone now.

  But weeks of toil. Weeks of worry. Weeks of mourning. All of it landed at once. All the loss, all the pain, and all the aches of age compounded onto my bones. I couldn’t even lift my head. All that came into my mind was loss. I became aware of a great void, and it sucked the breath from me. The emptiness pushed all else aside, pulling tears from my eyes.

  The brightness of the flames below made me night-blind. I didn’t see the flickering blue light enter the small clearing. The roar of the inferno had deafened me. I did not hear the sound of hooves on soft ground. The heat of the fire lingered on my skin. I did not feel the sudden coolness.

  It was as if they saw and respected my mourning. The Kaerun slowly circled around me. Six creatures about ten paces away on every side. They turned the horses to face me, and they waited for me to rise. They were in no hurry. Their objectives had been reached, and almost assuredly they had feasted below, so they were not hungry for more tales from me.

  I did not bother to rise from my knees. “Leave an old man. I’m nothing to you.” My voice. What happened to my voice? I sounded so much older than I remembered. Before I could tell stories with clear tones. Now my syllables creaked with age and weariness.

  Their whispers had not changed. “Ah, but you are wrong, Naeharum Adal, Keeper of Tales. You have much for us.”

  “Have you no pity?”

  “The world of men did not pity us when we were dying. They wanted us to die.”

  I closed my eyes against the guilt.

  “We pity you now, Adal. We have not forgotten you, have we?”

  I exhaled, long and slow. “You’ve taken my dreams. Without Chariis, the whole world is without an anchor. We’ll all drift apart. Without these things to hold us together, whole nations will crumble. We have no weapons to defend ourselves. No hope to support us.”

  The Blue Rider turned the words over in its mouth, savoring the knowledge it confessed. “We know.”

  Finally, I raised my eyes to one of them. “You don’t care about power, do you? I thought that was what this was about. You wanted to unite the lands under your rule. But you’re not like Garethen or any of the other villains in any of the stories. All you want is revenge on us for forgetting you.”

  The dark face did not change in any form of response, and so I knew I had spoken true.

  “When Garethen reawakened you and gave you the power to devour your own, you came with great hatred. All you want to do is grind us into the dust, so we forget everything and in turn be forgotten. You want to annihilate all the stories. All the tales. And then, all of us.”

  Once again there was no response.

  So, they were like me. I had wanted to destroy the stories.

  I had wanted to do it to free everyone, not to annihilate them. But I had to call myself what I was. I was the villain. And even if I now regretted such thoughts, now mourned the tales, did that erase my past intentions? Did it make me any less a villain? I had allowed the Library to fall, after all.

  And so, let the villain die. In countless tales, evil turned on itself. Let it turn on me, then.

  “What are you waiting for, then? You’ve found me. The Keeper of Tales. The one who now likely knows the most tales of anyone in all the lands. I would be a succulent meal. I’m defenseless.” I spread my hands wide. Northwind lay at my side, but I knew it would do little good against them.

  They didn’t move.

  I didn’t have the energy to stand. I couldn’t defend myself. Why didn’t they attack? Why did they watch me?

  I wanted them to take their revenge. End it. I had no hope.

  But still, they didn’t draw their swords. They didn’t seize stories from me. They waited.

  Then a half-smile crept onto my face. “You’re still bound by the eldest stories, aren’t you? You still have to follow the rules.” The half-smile became a whole smile. “You can’t attack me while I’m on my knees. You must wait for me to rise. It has nothing to do with honor or pity on your part. The hero of the tale is never slain while on his knees. Always with a sword in hand, defiant to the end.” Even after my rejection, the stories protected me. Even after all I had done, how could they bother to protect me now? “And I’m not standing defiant now, am I? So, you can’t kill me now. Not like this. If you could, you would have by now.”

  I stood, carefully sheathing Northwind as I did. As long as I was not ‘defiant to the end,’ I would be safe. Here was a chance to learn something, to perhaps discover some secret. Perhaps, perhaps I wouldn’t be useless. Perhaps I could redeem myself.

  “Why are you so cold?”

  I don’t know why I asked that first. Perhaps because the thought had struck me as I saw the thick frost by the horses’ feet. Perhaps I myself was being guided by a greater story. Perhaps I was being prodded by something older than I was.

  One of the Kaerun answered. This voice was still a whisper, but it was thinner, and it sounded more strained than the others had been. “Men have living tales inside them, which keep them warm. We devour tales. We have dead tales inside us.”

  I blinked. I had no response.

  Glancing around, I saw no easy escape. There were six of them, each mounted, surrounding me on six points. True, there was a forest not twenty paces beyond them, but I was old and worn out. There was no way to outrun or outmaneuver them. My only weapon against them was the tales. Could I use one to—?

  I quickly rid myself of th
at thought. I was not standing defiant against them. To do so would mean my quick death. I asked another question. “What will you do now?”

  “There are many tales here yet for us to devour. Each one eaten weakens the lands more. And then we will chase down the stories that have escaped. The ones that didn’t die. The ones that have gone wild. And then.” The rider relished the words. “And then we will take you and use you to bind the only creature that holds the key to our destruction.”

  Wait. There. There was the thing I had been searching for. “You’ve been defeated before, haven’t you?”

  The Kaerun twitched ever so slightly at those words.

  “You were destroyed once before. You, or something very much like you. But how? How could anyone defeat you? It would take wiping the world clean of stories.” I paused. A world clean of stories. We had so few tales from before the Deluge. The world was wiped clean then, wasn’t it? “It took the Deluge to defeat you, didn’t it?” My eyes brightened. “The Deluge had nothing to do with Garethen and Ydarion battling each other. It was to stop you. To wipe your presence from the lands.”

  One of the horses stamped, uncomfortable.

  My hopes rose. I could make it up to everyone. I could save the lands after all. I wasn’t just a useless old man. I could save them! “And that’s what it will take to defeat you again, isn’t it? We need to create another Deluge to wipe you off the face of the—”

  I had spoken too much. They attacked.

  The one on my right lunged, reaching out with a hand like a talon, straining to touch me. I dodged him, barely, but the one from behind charged next, right on top of the first. I was able to roll out of the way and start running, but I didn’t get four paces. A third Kaerun blocked my path, its horse in front of me, its hand reaching out.

  I slashed upwards with Northwind. The hand was disrupted, but my blade passed through with barely a quiver. The hand reached on, unabated.

  The hand touched my chest, and I felt a pulling at my heart. I felt as if the breath had been knocked from me, and my limbs were paralyzed. Blossoms of frost formed on my breastplate and condensed on my beard. Even my blade was touched with it.