Elders of Eventyr

by Ellias Quinn

  The tomb-keeper got to his feet and called one of the green-kilted Eletsol to him. The Eletsol’s eyes opened wider as the tomb-keeper spoke, and then he was gone, flying through one of the tunnels. The tomb-keeper took Matil by the elbow of her free arm. He lightly pulled her away from her friends.

  “Whoa,” Dask said, moving toward Matil. “Where’s the kid taking her?”

  Uro indicated a tunnel opening at the far end of the cavern. “We will gather the drummers and proceed to Dyndal’s chamber.”

  Simmad’s eyes bulged out like he was about to explode.

  “You mean he’s right in there?” Khelya whispered.

  With a nod, Uro said, “Our greatest treasure. Dyndal’s remains.”

  A disturbed expression slowly congealed on the Obrigi’s face.

  With the tomb-keeper and Matil ahead of them, the Eletsol leaders and the sign-bearers walked quickly to the tunnel. The sound of running water receded. This tunnel was not as tall as the other one, but it seemed much broader. Plant life continued to grow in here despite the lack of natural light, and Matil saw more carvings underneath the vines, these ones static and sober. First a giant Eletsol man was portrayed holding out a hand over which some object floated – Matil recognized the object’s slit eyes and squat form at once. It was the toad pendant. The rest of the carvings featured alva prominently, all different kinds of alva bent in mourning over large figures lying on their backs.

  After a rightward curve in the tunnel, it ended at a mass of thick roots and vines interspersed with pale pink blossoms. The tomb-keeper let go of Matil and stepped forward, raising his hands.

  Uro brought Dask, Khelya, and Simmad up to Matil. “The three chiefs of the clan covered the tomb with a lock – a great knot which none besides them and the tomb-keeper know how to undo.”

  The boy moved his right hand one way and his left another. For a long moment he went on making hypnotizing motions, but nothing seemed to happen. Then a root on the wall of plants slithered off to the side. A thin vine uncoiled. In the dim green atmosphere, the plants appeared to steadily untangle themselves. Bigger roots and stems started to curl away from the center, showing an empty chamber on the other side. The plant life slithered aside, its strands laying back against the tunnel walls obediently, as if trained. The tomb-keeper let his arms fall, breathing hard with the exertion of magic. The way was clear.

  He took Matil into the next chamber. From the tunnel the ground sloped down, an immense, bare space. Flowers, berries, and leaves were thick on the walls. The near side of the chamber was wide compared to the narrow far end. On a ledge at the distant end stood a raised bier made of blooming plants woven tight together, raising up a supine occupant covered in leaves. Sunlight spilled down from a large crack in the roof, and particles floated in the rays over what appeared to be a man of Obrigi height lying on the bier. Each Eletsol, especially the young tomb-keeper, looked on the bier with solemnity. Dask crossed his arms. Simmad craned his neck forward to look while Khelya trembled. Matil took her by the hand.

  They all walked down the slope without a word, the padding of their feet the only sound in the huge place. When they were halfway down, grinding noises echoed out from behind them. Matil and her companions looked back. Eletsol carried or wheeled in drums big and small, the wheels bouncing over the bumpy floor. The drummers passed the chief’s group quickly and made it to the ledge at the end of the room. The ledge had two ramps, one on either side, for them to roll the drums up. They placed the drums in a semicircle behind the bier.

  Everything was set up by the time the group stood before the waist-height ledge. Someone coughed in the chamber, echoing loudly. Matil gripped Khelya’s hand harder in surprise. Behind them, the room had filled with Eletsol of all clans, and the front of the crowd was only a few steps from her back. She had watched the drummers too closely to notice the muted alva assembling on the slope.

  It seemed that the entire crowd stared at the man on the bier. At no point had Matil been able to see what he really looked like, obscured by leaves as he was. She could see, from his bare torso and one arm lying over his stomach, that his complexion was light tan, almost golden, and his body’s outline was visible enough to tell that he was bigger than Khelya. Could this really be Dyndal? He didn’t seem like an ancient corpse. Matil glanced up at Khelya, whose expression had lifted in hope.

  The tomb-keeper spoke with Uro and some other Eletsol, and Uro turned to Matil. “They will take you to give him the sign.”

  She didn’t have time to ask what he meant before two men in green kilts and yellow paint lifted Matil into the air, one on either side. Her stomach swooped and she gasped as the floor receded beneath her. The two Eletsol flew up to the ledge and brought her lower to hover over a space near Dyndal’s left hand. The body’s appearance struck her with its stillness and height and shining golden skin.

  Matil realized why they had brought her up here. She leaned forward to lay the wooden pendant on the bier at Dyndal’s side. The men flew her back down to the others, a gentle rush of wind stirring her hair.

  “You okay?” Dask said.

  Matil gave a breathless and smiling nod.

  The tomb-keeper’s blue wings fluttered as he jumped up and glided to land on the ledge. He turned to the crowd. “Velana,” he sang in a high, clear voice.

  The drummers hit their drums once…twice…

  Pause.

  Once…twice…

  Pause.

  Now they pounded out one-two…one-two…one-two…until it was a regular heartbeat rhythm. The tomb-keeper burst out singing a verse. All the Eletsol repeated it with a roar, the tune and unfamiliar words amplifying around the chamber.

  The song began as a slow call-and-response that picked up as the drummers pounded more and more often. Soon they were singing without pause. The voices swelled and the drums sounded on every beat. It might have been Matil’s imagination, but it really seemed that the reds, pinks, greens, and yellows of the plants began to glow vividly.

  Over the body on the bier, in the fragile light, the air shimmered. Joining the chorus of Eletsol was another voice, faint at first and then growing strong, a voice that sang recklessly. It slid in and out of the song, almost a drumbeat itself. It stirred in Matil the ache to sing as well, though she didn’t know the words; to laugh, though she wasn’t sure why; and to fly, though…of course…

  The new voice came from the shimmering air, which resolved into the cloudy specter of a man spreading muscular arms and expansive wings. His wings splayed out from his back, each a half-circle made up of many layers of smooth leaves riffling in a gentle breeze. The dark orange hair on his head stood up, so unruly it seemed to defy gravity, and his eyes were closed with the passion of his singing. His ears curved back like those of an Eletsol. The only clothes he had on were baggy pants rolled up at his shins and a wide sash wrapped around his waist.

  This was Dyndal.

  The song fell in volume, turning from a gale of sound into a zephyr, soft and warm. Dyndal’s voice disappeared below the quieting Eletsol voices until the Eletsol brought their melody to a close. He hummed the tune one last time, making the once-rousing chant sound almost sad. When he, too, finished the song, his mouth spread in a smile. He opened his eyes, and Matil was taken aback.

  His eyes didn’t have pupils. Instead they were like pools of water lapping at the shore, green as grass in a meadow and flowing with fathomless, whispering life.

  Chapter 25

  Velana

  Dust motes swirled within the nebulous, golden form of Dyndal. His eyes were the most substantial part of him. His body was like a ray of sunlight itself, as transparent as Khelya but gently illuminating the area around the bier. He considered the Eletsol looking up at him in wonder. He smiled wider, showing his teeth, and then his extraordinary eyes found the four sign-bearers. He burst into full-bellied laughter.

  “Ki
itras,” he said between guffaws. “Ah, to wake up and laugh. Thank you.”

  All of the Eletsol fell to their knees with shouts and cheers. “Ferra palikun!” they cried. “Ferra Dyndal!” They bowed their heads to the ground and went quiet. Khelya and Simmad quickly clambered down with them, though Matil hesitated.

  Dask had his eyes narrowed at Dyndal. He noticed Matil glancing at him. “It’s a decent illusion,” he said in an undertone, “but just watch. He won’t step out of the light.”

  Dyndal once again looked across the crowded chamber, appearing quite pleased. He glanced at the bier over which he floated. His body lay still beneath him. “Ah myska,” he said, startled. “Is that my flesh?” He spotted the pendant on the bier and moved down through the air until he stood beside it. With a quick movement he grabbed the pendant – but the pendant didn’t move. He looked down at his tenuous arms and spoke something in another tongue. Again he tried to touch the pendant, succeeding in picking it up. Distress turned down his mouth. He set it down. “Not yet,” he said. The wavering green color of his eyes was disturbed by an influx of blue. “I am not myself.”

  What did he mean? Why was he…standing beside his own body?

  Simmad reached up and tapped on Matil’s arm. “You really ought to bow,” he whispered.

  Dask shrugged. “Hey, we’ve got bad knees.”

  Matil shifted her weight. She had been standing so long that kneeling now might look funny. Either way, it didn’t seem that Dyndal cared. He was focused on the pendant.

  The tomb-keeper lifted his head and spoke to the specter in a halting, awed voice. Dyndal looked blankly down at him. The boy repeated himself.

  “Ah!” Dyndal said. He replied in slurred Eleti.

  Now the tomb-keeper looked blank.

  “What language would you like, great Lord Dyndal?” Uro said, rising into the air.

  Dyndal laughed in relief. “Common Alvishu, yes. It seems the Eletsol languages are much changed.”

  “True, my lord. Eleti became the Eletsol tongue only a few hundred years ago.”

  Dyndal leaned forward. “‘A few hundred’? How many years has it been in whole?”

  “A thousand at the least,” Uro said.

  “Much time has passed.” He gazed around the chamber. “It is also kind of you, but you need not bow any longer.”

  Uro relayed the word to the rest of the Eletsol. They looked at one another and then stood up to give another cheer.

  When the shouts ended, Uro gestured at the young tomb-keeper and three very old men in green robes on the other side of the bier. “The Dyndalsada greet you with the host of the ancestors,” Uro said. “They wish to show you every honor and beg that you lead us to a new age of prosperity.”

  “I would very much like to,” Dyndal said. “After I find my sister.”

  Uro’s eyebrows drifted upward. “Sh…Shora?”

  Dyndal nodded. “We must wake the others.”

  “Others?” Uro said.

  Dyndal stepped off the ledge and landed without impact in front of Matil and the sign-bearers, standing a head taller than Khelya. The group of leaders who stood closer to the ledge turned around to face him with heads still bowed. Dask blinked. Matil inspected Dyndal. The specter no longer stood in the light, but he was holding together perfectly. He didn’t seem like an illusion.

  Dyndal turned to Uro while pointing at them. “Would these carnival alva be the ones who brought my frog?”

  “Yes, your greatness!” Simmad said. “But, er, I believe it’s a…toad…” Forehead turning bright red, he moved halfway behind a stunned Khelya.

  “Toad, frog, doesn’t matter,” Dask said. “He called us carnies!”

  “Oh, are you not?” Dyndal scrunched up his mouth. “That is unfortunate. Carnival alva are my favorite sort of alva. Who are you, then?”

  Dask cast him a dismissive glance, but held his hand out to each of the four as he said their name. “Dask, Matil, Khelya, Simmad.”

  “Some time you will have to tell me your story,” Dyndal said. “The four of you look like the lead-in to a very funny joke.”

  “A-a-are you a ghost?” Khelya said.

  Dyndal turned his green gaze on her transparent face. “Are you a ghost?”

  “No, no, no-no, I…” She winced. “They said you were dead, sir.”

  “Who did? I will show them I am not dead!” He flexed his arms.

  Uro’s voice shook. “You did, Lord Dyndal.”

  “I did? Hah! No. I would never make sport of life and death.”

  “Our history tells of the day so long ago, when you took us to this place and asked us to guard your body. ‘The Elders and I now die,’ you said. ‘Valdri ja vi tega kaalu.’”

  Dyndal looked impatient. “That is not what I said.”

  Dask’s ears shifted toward the spectral Elder in surprise.

  “But…so it is written,” Uro said, slowly descending to the ground.

  “Valdri lae ifen kaana tag,” said Dyndal.

  Uro balked. “I am sorry, I do not understand.”

  “That is what I said, in the Eleti I knew a thousand years ago.” Dyndal glanced through the room at all the quiet Eletsol. “This ‘ja vi’ that you speak…I remember it not. Valdri lae ifen kaana tag: ‘The Elders and I sleep for now.’”

  Simmad looked up sharply. “‘Drivaldri ir mu nu julan.’”

  “The same thing in ancient Alvishu, yes,” Dyndal said.

  Khelya’s expression lifted with a puzzled smile.

  “That’s what’s written in our oldest manuscripts of the Chivishi,” Simmad said. “Did any writings survive from before, to compare the old form of the Eleti languages to the new?”

  A stunned look stole over Uro’s face. He called to the tomb-keeper and the three old men on the ledge. They flew down, keeping a respectful distance from Dyndal, and exchanged words with Uro.

  When they were done speaking, Uro said, “When Emperor Ivu united the clans and chose one language for us, he directed translations of the old language, but we have no writings from before.”

  Simmad jabbed a finger at him. “I’d bet that the lost writings match up with the ancient Alvishu manuscripts. If I could research it more deeply…”

  Dask snorted. “So the Eletsol think the Elders are dead because someone switched the words around?”

  Matil squeezed Khelya’s hand and grinned up at her, but Khelya couldn’t tear her eyes away from Dyndal.

  “I am alive,” the radiant specter said. “The Eletsol faithfully kept me safe, and it is a thing to be grateful for indeed.” Dyndal lifted his arms and faced the crowd. “I am not dead!”

  Some of the Eletsol understood and began whispering to those beside them, but they were still baffled.

  “Great Lord Dyndal,” Uro said respectfully, “whatever you told us in the past, you are now a ghost. There is your body. Does this not make you dead?”

  Dyndal examined his own crystalline arm. “Mm, I see where there is confusion. No, this body sleeps while my mind wakes. My magic allows part of me to appear in the world separate from myself. The Hibernation has yet to end, but…I am not dead.”

  Dismay began to steal over Matil. They hadn’t woken him after all?

  A dubious-looking Uro translated to the Eletsol crowd. Some stared, others gasped, and several yelled joyfully.

  “Before I leave,” Dyndal added, “we shall celebrate! I declare a seven-day feast!”

  “Seven days?” Matil said. “We can’t…” She looked up at him while her hopes fell. He couldn’t save them. Not like she had hoped. “Um, Lord Dyndal, I don’t think we have seven days.”

  “I am finally, finally in this world again and you say I cannot live?”

  “No, but—”

  “Then let us begin festivities!”

  “Hey, Your Roy
al Green-ness,” Dask said. “You heard of the Book of Myrkhar?”

  Uro lifted one eyebrow to stare at Dask.

  “Of course I have.” Dyndal frowned. “Featherlord.”

  “Featherlord?” Dask said.

  Simmad raised his shoulders. “You did start it, Dask.”

  “There’s an alva named Nychta Olsta who has the Book,” Matil said urgently. “She’s trying to take over Nychtfal with the Skorgon.”

  “They always do that sort of thing,” Dyndal said. “We put in place someone to contend with Book-bearers. He has never been defeated.”

  Simmad tugged his goatee. “D’you- do you mean Bahantros?”

  “Yes.”

  “Two hundred years ago the hero Bahantros fell, Lord Dyndal. He died from his wounds after killing a Book-bearer.”

  “Bahan is dead?” Dyndal stared at Simmad. Sharp silver streaks ran through his eyes. “Then…the Book-bearer can no longer be killed.”

  “That’s why we need to hurry,” Matil said. “Nychta and the Book are close. If they find you or me, we’ll be in trouble.”

  “Why are they looking for you?” Dyndal said.

  She twisted her fingers together and took a breath. “Because I’m part of Nychta. When she cast the Book’s spell, she split in half.”

  He nodded with dawning realization. “You are the outcast portion? The spell failed? That is even more cause for celebration!” He began to sing. “The Book-bearer can be slain!”

  “She…can?” If they had only known sooner, they could have saved Amacht.

  “It is not easy,” Dyndal said, “but I trust it can be done. Because of you, she is not yet full of the Book’s power.”