by Alexey Pehov
And then the world trembles. The world explodes. The world dies.
I see, or someone sees, the laws of magic collapse, the chains of the millennia snap, I see the world slither back to its first primordial day, when nothing of what we now call Siala existed yet.
Seas roused to fury annihilate countries, volcanoes spring to life, stars fall from the sky consuming entire cities with their heat, the gates of other worlds open wide and Siala is entered by demons and creatures who are even worse. The entire world swirls around in its final dying dance, its death agony, a blizzard of awoken shadows of ancient times. Conflagrations, insanity, epidemics, famine, wars, and the creatures of darkness destroy the world and clear the way for those who have been waiting so long for this sweet moment—the moment when the balance is disrupted. They emerge from Hrad Spein in a black wave, a black flood, treading on the bones and the ashes of dead races—those the Gray One called Fallen Ones, that I called bird-bears.
I scream. I scream until I go hoarse; the world shatters like a crooked mirror and I awake.…
* * *
I woke up in darkness. It was hot, so hot that it was hard to breathe. Every breath threatened to scorch my lungs, my eyes felt as if they were about to pop, and I was genuinely amazed by the miraculous fact that my clothes and hair hadn’t burst into flames. I covered my face with my sleeve, but that didn’t give me any relief, it was still difficult to breathe.
“Thousands of demons!” I muttered. “Where have I ended up this time?”
“Where you’ve been twice before, and now you’re back again. Was it not we who told you that those who have discovered the way to the Primordial World always come back?”
In some incomprehensible fashion I had found my way to the world of Chaos, and been met once again by the last three shadows. It was so dark that I couldn’t even see them, only hear their voices.
“Yes, it was you who told me, my ladies.”
“We are glad that you have not forgotten us. Hello, Dancer.”
“My respects to you. It’s hot.”
“Our world is dying, and what you have brought here is only hastening its final agony.”
I automatically reached out one hand and felt the bag with the Horn in it.
“A dream,” I muttered in relief, recalling the vision in which Siala had died.
One of the shadows laughed bitterly.
“A dream? Perhaps you saw the future? Or the past?”
“Or what will never happen now?” one of her sister shadows put in.
“I don’t know.”
“We don’t know, either, what visions a Dancer might have and where these visions might lead. The pans of the balance are already trembling, and you should hurry.”
“Where to?” I asked the darkness rather stupidly.
“To the final throw of the dice. The place where this round of the Game will finish. It can still be won, even though the Horn has emerged once again from the subterranean halls of the Prison of the Fallen Ones.”
“Go away, Dancer. The presence of the artifact is hastening the death of our house.”
Three rectangles of bright light sprang out of the darkness and I screwed my eyes up in pain. When I opened them again, I saw three exits in front of me, leading out somewhere into a white light.
“What’s this?” I asked, turning to the shadows, who were visible now.
“This? It is your way out of our world.”
“But there are three doors here!”
“We know,” said a shadow—the second one, I think—and laughed. “You will have to choose one of them.”
I sensed some kind of trick.
“There is no trap in this, Dancer. These are simply the doors of Destiny. All subsequent events depend on which door you choose to leave through.”
A fine prospect, no two ways about it!
“What’s behind them?”
“Nobody knows. Choose with your heart and go. Farewell,” said the third shadow.
“Farewell, Dancer.”
“Farewell,” the first shadow repeated like an echo.
Darkness take me! What difference did it make which door I went out of? Everything would turn out badly anyway, I was absolutely sure of that. I stepped toward the door closest to me, the one on the right.
I stopped halfway there. The odd little thought had just come into my head that this time the shadows had shown me the way out of the world of Chaos without being asked. That was probably because of the Rainbow Horn, which was poisoning the Primordial World and threatening it with total collapse. The last time they had asked me to stay, asked me to help them to bring life back to their world, which had turned into a nightmare thanks to the Dancers in the Shadows. This time I hadn’t heard a single word about help from them.
I looked round and saw they had been watching me in silence.
“What will happen to it?”
They understood what I meant.
“The world of Chaos will die. If not today, then tomorrow. It has been clinging to life for too long, but everything comes to an end eventually.”
“And everything must be paid for,” said the third shadow, and I immediately recalled Death saying those words.
The shadows had paid for my life with the death of their world.
“And what will happen to you, ladies?”
No answer. I waited, and eventually the third shadow replied: “This is our world. We are the last and we shall stay here until the end.”
I know it’s absolutely stupid, but I just can’t help it. I don’t like being obliged to anyone, and if there’s a way I can pay back a debt … I turned my back on the exits from the Primordial World, and they were immediately veiled in darkness. But this time the shadows didn’t merge into the gloom, and I could see their silhouettes very clearly.
“You realize you can’t get out of here now?” I could distinctly hear fear in the first shadow’s voice.
“I’ll get out through the fire, like before.”
“The fire has already died, Dancer!”
“Shall we dance, ladies?” I asked, ignoring what they had just said.
* * *
When I left that world, it wasn’t under any kind of threat. The crimson primordial flame was roaring, and the fiery snowflakes were swirling round me in a slow, entrancing dance. Between the eternal void and the insanity of the fire there was a little island, overgrown with tall silvery grass. In the middle of the island a small lake had appeared, with water as smooth as a mirror, reflecting the flashes of flame and crimson snowflakes.
Towering over the lake was a young chestnut tree with leaves of ice and fire, covered in a froth of white blossom. Its fruit would soon ripen and give life to hundreds of scraps of land. But for the time being this island was the first brick in the rebirth of the world of Chaos. For the time being I could leave the Primordial World and get on with my own business. That world would live. Together with the three shadows it would wait for me or another Dancer. I paid my debt to the shadows in full.…
* * *
I awoke, cautiously sat up, and looked around to try and figure out where I was. Everything suggested that this time I’d ended up in Zagraba. At least, this spot wasn’t anything like Hrad Spein. Fir trees, golden-leafs, yellow grass, a blue sky above my head. By some miracle I had been transported out of the Palaces of Bone to the surface. Some prank of the Rainbow Horn’s, no doubt.
The Horn! I felt all around myself in panic. Sagot be praised, the artifact was lying beside me, under the carpet of fallen leaves. I immediately put the relic away in my bag.
I turned over on my back and looked up at the sky through the half-naked branches of the golden-leafs.
Ah, Sagot bless me, how good this was! After those dark gloomy labyrinths with that musty smell of dead time, the sight of an ordinary sky filled me with childish delight. I didn’t have a blind clue how I’d gotten back to Zagraba from Hrad Spein, but it was a good thing, even if I didn’t know which part of the forest I was
in, and how far away I was from the entrance where my friends were waiting for me.
Zagraba was good. A lot better than the Palaces of Bone. I could find some way to feed myself here, and the chances of running into serious trouble were incomparably smaller than underground. And to be quite honest, if I’d stayed in Hrad Spein, there would have been one more dead man in the catacombs, because I couldn’t have coped with the return journey, especially without any maps. And so may all the gods be praised!
On the other hand, it was worth giving a little thought to where I actually was. I was in the Golden Forest in Zagraba, but where exactly, and how long would it take me to reach the group? But then, what was I saying? Reach the group … I didn’t know where the gates of Hrad Spein were now, and wandering around Zagraba without knowing where you were going was like … well, wandering round Zagraba without knowing where you were going.
A stupid waste of time. And in addition, bearing in mind that I’d tramped darkness only knew how many leagues through the Palaces of Bone, and then been thrown out into Zagraba right above Grok’s tomb, I would be walking to the gates of Hrad Spein for quite a long time. I had only one chance—to go northward and hope that I would emerge from the Golden Forest and find myself in more familiar territory, perhaps even somewhere inhabited. And then I could figure out what was what. And, of course, I could put my trust in Egrassa’s amulet. It had saved me from the Kaiyu, and I could hope it would tell the elf where to look for me.
A large golden leaf traced a golden arc across the sky and landed precisely on my face. I removed the pestiferous object and flung it away. The leaves were falling. May the most revolting member of the family of demons devour me! It was only now I realized that while I was underground, September had come to an end. So it was only natural that the leaves were falling and the sky had turned that bottomless pale violet color.
Of course, this wasn’t Avendoom, where it was already quite cold and there was torrential rain at the end of September, but even in Zagraba there was a faint breath of autumn in the air. I had to get out of the forest before the real rain and cold weather came, with the frosts to follow. With no cloak and just a sweater to keep me warm, sooner or later the cold would kill me.
Fortunately for me, although I was a city dweller, For had taught me all sorts of useful things, and I could tell which way was north. I ought to find a small animal track—walking along that would be a lot easier than forcing my way through the brush and dried grass. I was also a little concerned about the chances of coming across some swamp or running into a pack of wolves.
Zagraba was beautiful, as always.
The forest was dressed in its astoundingly brilliant autumn colours, reveling in the colors of decay—gold and fiery red. Bright yellow groves of redbrow that had already lost its blossom merged smoothly into golden groves of golden-leafs, and they gave way to fiery red splashes of Zagraban rowan and aspen. The blue leaves of tears-of-woe were like fantastic fairy-tale islands in autumn’s golden kingdom. Only the gloomy, severe fir trees, with their dirty green color, rebelled against ubiquitous autumn and refused to join in the September festival. The ground was completely covered with a thick, undisturbed layer of fallen leaves. The air in the forest was still and quiet as the giant started falling asleep on the threshold of winter. I seemed to be completely alone in Zagraba.
I walked until nightfall and—miracle of miracles—didn’t feel tired at all. I didn’t find any track, but the walking was relatively easy. No fallen trees, no gorges, no swamps. Only one small stream cut across my path, winding through the massive roots of the golden-leafs.
It got dark quickly in the forest, and I barely had enough time to find myself a place to rest by the broken trunk of an old alder. Dim twilight descended and then in a single moment it was replaced by impenetrable darkness. The sky turned hazy, without a single star, and only the small copper coin of the full moon peeped through the haze, like a pale imitation of the moon that had shone in the sky in the middle of summer.
Although I was thoroughly sick of them, I had a snack of the fruits from the Cave of the Ants. I didn’t feel like sleeping and I just sat there, gazing into the darkness of the forest at night. After a while, little colored lights started appearing on the trees nearby. The forest spirits were starting to wake up. It wasn’t so lonely with the forest spirits for company, and I watched their blinking eyes until I was overcome by sleep.
* * *
I opened my eyes, stood up, and shivered. It was cool that morning. It had been worse at night. By the middle of it I was thoroughly chilled, and it was a miracle that I managed to get back to sleep again. If things went on like that, some night soon I’d freeze to death or catch a serious cold, as sure as eggs.
Judging from the mist clinging to the roots, it was early morning and the sun had only just risen. And I didn’t much like the look of the sky—I hoped there wouldn’t be any rain. Autumn rain is one of the vilest “pleasures” known to the traveling man.
Sagot be praised, there wasn’t any rain all day long, and I covered quite a substantial stretch of the route through Zagraba. Toward evening I came across an animal track and my speed increased significantly. Neither Valder nor the Rainbow Horn gave any signs of life. It was funny really, there I was with one of the most powerful artifacts in the world, and it was no use to me at all. No warm clothing, no trusty crossbow, no food. It could at least have sent me straight to Avendoom and not made me trudge through the autumn undergrowth!
The path dove into tangled thickets of bushes that looked suspiciously like briars, and I stupidly decided to push my way straight through them, with the result that the whole of Zagraba must have heard me swearing. But when the undergrowth came to an end, the track led me out onto the shore of a small forest lake, with dried rushes growing all around and rusty brown water with small ripples running across it.
There was about an hour left before darkness fell, so I had time to find a more comfortable place to spend the night than the shore of the lake. On summer nights and mornings, water gives off a pleasant coolness, but in autumn it makes the air cold, and I certainly didn’t want to get any colder than circumstances absolutely required. Unfortunately, there weren’t any tracks leading away from the lake and I had to trudge on as best I could, with Sagot’s help.
When I’d left the lake and a small bare ravine behind me, quite large bald spots began to appear in the forest, overgrown with low young pine trees. I walked through these as if I was out strolling along Parade Street, and I would have liked to spend the night in that spot. But my nose sounded the alarm—I caught the very faintest aroma of smoke mingling with the smell of autumn.
“Either it’s a forest fire, or someone’s lit a campfire,” I muttered, backing against the trunk of the nearest pine tree and pulling out my knife.
Anyone else lost in the great Forests of Zagraba would have acted differently—he would have gone dashing toward the fire with whoops of joy, to meet the rational beings who had lit it, but I knew better. I wasn’t going to make that mistake. The company of rational beings can be a lot more dangerous than being alone. There was no point in looking for trouble. First I had to reconnoiter properly, and then I could try shouting out: “Here I am, brothers!”
It could quite easily be a patrol of orc scouts or even worse—elf patrols that had infiltrated the orcs’ territory. The Firstborn and the Secondborn were fond of a bit of quiet slaughter on each other’s land. But at least I ought to find out who it was.
I had to advance, guided by a smell of smoke so faint that I could barely sense it. The bald spots came to an end and the forest around me was once again taken over by the majestic golden-leafs, together with low aspens and birches.
That meant I could see less, and now it was hard to make out what might be hidden behind the red and gold wall of leaves and the stockade of tree trunks. Add to the list of difficulties the onset of twilight, threatening to give way to another pitch-dark night at any moment, and things weren’t looki
ng very good. But the smell of smoke was growing stronger, and that told me I was going in the right direction.
A twig cracked treacherously under my foot. The crunch could hardly be heard, but I froze. Ah, that was bad timing! I could thank my thief’s luck that I was still too far from the fire and I couldn’t have been heard.
You ought to be more careful, Harold, I thought for the hundredth time, shifting the knife from my right hand to my left and wiping away the sweat that had suddenly appeared on my palm. It was a long time since I’d felt so nervous. I was just like a novice, preparing to rob his first passerby!
Finally the flames of a campfire blinked between the trunks of the trees. I darted over to the nearest golden-leaf, pressed myself back against the trunk, and started staring into the thickening twilight. The fire blinked again, trembled, disappeared, and then reappeared.
“Careful, Harold! Careful! Make haste slowly!”
Twilight had given way to night. The smell of food cooking, the smell of meat, which I hadn’t tasted for a hundred years, tormented my mind and set my stomach gurgling. The fire lured me toward it, and I approached it cautiously, getting closer and closer. Quietly, inconspicuously.
When the fire was still about fifty yards away, I stopped, hiding behind another tree trunk. I tried hard to make out who was sitting round the fire, but I couldn’t. The view from my cover wasn’t very good, and I couldn’t see anything but gleaming reflections of firelight.
I took a step forward and the sky immediately fell in on me, crashing down with all its weight on my back and burying my nose in the leaves. I jerked and tried to strike out blindly with my knife, but some excessively nimble individual was impolite enough to step on my hand.
I howled and unclenched my fingers. They were more precious to me than the knife. I tried to turn over, but I couldn’t. There was no point in kicking out—the person who had dropped on me out of the tree was perched precisely on my shoulder blades, and I couldn’t reach him with my feet. And I couldn’t throw him off, either—the lousy skunk was really heavy.