E. B. HEIMDAL
THE DAWN OF SKYE
Book One of The Someday Children
LINDBAK + LINDBAK
The Dawn of Skye
Book One of The Someday Children
Copyright © 2017 by Sara Lindbæk and Lindbak + Lindbak
Published by Lindbak + Lindbak, Nordic Publishing House 2017
Cover design and illustration: Sara Lindbæk & Teddi Black
First edition 2017
ISBN 978-87-999405-4-7
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.
E. B. Heimdal is a pseudonym for the Danish writer Sara Lindbæk. The pseudonym has been adopted in honor of the writer’s late mother, Eva Birgit Heimdal.
www.lindbakandlindbak.com
To Isa
My eternal inspiration
My dedicated believer
My guidance through the dark
The Someday Land
CLANS & GROUPS
Skye & Ecco
Dagwood’s Clan
Carrick - Dagwood - Evi - Fella - Finch - Flo - Hackett - Knox - Miner - Puk - Salomon
The Others
Axton - Brock - Carver - Dane - Hester - Kale - Lark - Merton - Red - Sven - Todd
The Outcasts
Brogan - Egor - Falkner - Konnor - North - Whistler
THE SONG OF SORROW
Oh man, what sorrow you bring
Raping my body and leaving me to die
Greed has blinded you
Greed has numbed you
Slowly I’m losing my faith
Losing my power to heal myself
You are digging too deep
You are digging too fast
Who can ever save me
And fill the hollowness in my chest
My heart is dug out
My veins have dried out
Oh sorrow, what man you bring
You are my own creation
A mind so clever
A creature so destructive
A remedy is needed
To restart my heart
Evil will defeat evil
The line of greed must be broken
I must survive
I will prevail
Wiping the illness away
And reach for a dawn new and pure
Prologue
The night is cold. Colder than it should be at this time of year. The cool air quietly embraces everything – the fields, the trees, the houses. A flock of black birds have settled in a large tree close to the entrance to one of the town’s many copper mines. The warm air that slowly seeps from the mine’s opening makes its way quietly up and gives the small flock of birds a faint sense of the previous hours’ warm weather. The sky is almost empty of stars, and it’s difficult to distinguish the landscape’s many forms from each other. The night has greedily stolen the day’s colors and transformed them into dark shadows thrown down by the light of the moon. In the damp blades of grass a slight whisper can be heard. Or, it sounds like a whisper, but if you listen carefully there are no words in what is said. It is more of a confusion of voices all wanting to speak at the same time. So much to say, so much to tell.
Between whispered words and slurred sentences a damp fog silently rises from the warm earth. The fog presses itself out through the soil with explosive force, like when a prisoner escapes after many years of captivity.
A sleepy, long-eared rodent wakes in its hiding place and feels the fog’s damp grip shroud its warm fur. It lifts itself up onto its hind legs, and gets its bearings in the darkness. Further out in the field a small herd of animals are moving away from the town and towards the dried-out plains.
A sudden unrest grips the small rodent and it quickly runs after the others. The small herd quickly grows larger, and soon a long-tailed tree rat also joins the group. And another one joins. Soon animals from all corners of the darkness swarm forward, as if a large stone had been lifted and disturbed an insect nest. Small animals, large animals, animals that would normally hunt or avoid each other gather in a growing herd. They all run scared from the town, away from the fog, into the darkness, into the nothingness.
Back in the village it’s completely silent. The day’s many sounds slowly die down with the sun’s disappearance, and conversations are sealed behind the walls and doors of the houses long ago. The moon generously lights up the fog and shows it in all its glory and splendor. The fog steadily grows and becomes more powerful, without regard for others’ presence, and soon its transparent body has crept in and taken over all the earth’s folds and hollows. Silently it creeps along, moving purposefully towards the town’s many houses, where the families are getting ready for the final phase of the evening.
The silence is briefly broken by a growing unrest among the town’s work dogs, standing chained in small cages on the outskirts of the town. They move anxiously back and forth, as much as the cramped space allows, and their steel chains rattle in time with their movements. A few dogs whimper in a low voice, and the nervous whimper soon spreads from dog to dog, from cage to cage. A muffled whine from every cage fills the still night, only interrupted by short howls from a few of the stressed animals.
Silently the fog reaches the nervous dogs and embraces them in their nocturnal resting place. They are shrouded slowly by the cool air, and their anxiousness quickly disappears. The wandering nighttime guest feels safe and comforting, and soon all the dogs have laid down to sleep.
The fog creeps steadily forward and reaches the first houses on the outskirts of the town. Without warning, it silently breaks in through doors and cracks like an uninvited guest who insists on hospitality and a warm meal. In the warm, smoke-filled living rooms the fog is invisible to the naked eye and is easy to overlook.
Nonetheless, it’s possible to sense something indefinable in the air. Like when a small insect runs over your arm and you feel a slight prickling sensation. Or like when a lost soul passes by – and gently strokes you on the cheek.
The fog quickly creeps into every room and makes itself comfortable in the chairs and beds. But it’s restless. It cannot find peace and moves around in the living rooms. Slowly, the unwelcome guest finds its way to even the darkest corners and recesses. Nowhere is overlooked or forgotten.
And there are more empty spaces to explore and fill in. The warm bodies in the living rooms are quietly shrouded by the fog and are encircled, almost unnoticed, by the transparent guest. It finds its way over the bodies and in through the damp mouths that open up to a completely new and dark world. The fog consumes the new universe with a keen satisfaction, because it has now found the empty space it has been looking for.
Some empty spaces are small and light. Others are large and dark, and it’s in these deep, dark spaces that the fog is most comfortable. The inner darkness allows it to move around unseen and fill out every part of its new world. And the new universe is large and well-nourished, larger than it could have hoped for or dreamed of. So much emptiness. So much darkness. So many places that can be filled, and so much space to grow big and strong in. And there, all the way out there in the most remote corners and recesses where the light never reaches, extra nourishment can be found that enables the f
og to grow quicker than any other place.
As the days pass, the conquered bodies gradually become weaker. The undefinable feeling that was so easy to dismiss before can now no longer be ignored, and that which felt before like a small insect’s teasing prickling touch has now become an unstoppable itch. It has become harder to breathe, as though a foreign air broke in and took over the lungs. Even if you try to cough the suffocating air out, the invading and unwelcome guest can’t be driven away. It has strengthened its grip around its new inner universe and is holding on tight, because it has finally found the right place to nourish its transparent body and transform it to a more solid form. The fog slowly takes over the lungs, the heart, and the mind.
The day’s tasks require more and more time and effort from the infected host, and conversations between people are limited to single words. It’s difficult to speak when the constant cough has taken over all words and sentences. Slowly the painful itch grows stronger, and to stop the unbearable prickling sensation the host digs its nails deeper and deeper into the skin. So deep that at last the blood bursts forward, and the scratch marks become large and infected. The worst is around the heart. It’s around the heart that the pain is the strongest. Eventually the pain is so intense that if you could tear out your own heart with your hands you would do it. But you can’t.
The last stage is the easiest. The body can no longer feel anything and stopped moving long ago. The transparent and unwelcome guest has now become one with its host. The lights in the eyes have disappeared, and all thoughts cease.
The fog moves from town to town, county to county, and when all potential hosts in a town are occupied and filled, it has to move on. Out to all the populated parts of the world that can be found – north, south, east, west. There are so many universes to be invaded, and it’s in a hurry. Quickly it moves around and discovers every town and every house. It soon seems as though all activity in the world has stopped. The traders of the villages, the workers in the forests, the miners and the workers by the dams disappeared long ago. The farms are deserted, and horses and cows move around undisturbed and graze. The work dogs run around freely, dragging their chains behind them. But no one worries anymore about chaining them up for the night or giving them their daily meal. Even the children playing in the streets have disappeared and have withdrawn behind the walls of the houses.
The time it takes for the fog to consume its new host depends on how much empty space and darkness is found. Sometimes it happens quickly, other times it takes a long time. But in the end the fog always takes over. It’s only in the brightest and small voids, where the darkness cannot find fertile ground, that the fog finds no desire or pleasure in breaking in, because here there’s no place for it to spread and become one with its host.
In a small cabin on the outskirts of a village, two children sit, each on their side of a bed. In the bed lies a woman, their mother. Her eyes are closed, and she breathes with great effort. One of the children, a girl, takes her mother’s hand and pulls it up to her cheek. She leans her face forward and gently presses her lips against the back of the hand. The girl’s lips maintain their pressure, like a kiss that wants to last forever, but the woman doesn’t move or notice her daughter’s gentle caress.
The other child, a boy, slowly stands up from the edge of the bed and walks over to the window. It’s dark and cold in the room, and the fire burned out several days ago. He opens the shutters carefully so as not to make any noise, but the old wood creaks loudly and piercingly. Worried, he looks over at his mother to see whether she registers the noise, but she doesn’t move. The light gradually pours in as the shutters open, and dust dances in the shafts of sunlight. The boy closes his eyes and stands in the sun’s rays. For a brief moment he stands as if made of stone and absorbs all the warmth that he’s had to live without in recent days. A thousand thoughts fly through his mind, while a doubt and crushing sadness fill his body. Everything has changed. Everything is dead. He doesn’t understand anything. The feeling of powerlessness and injustice are so great that his heart is on the point of bursting, and he clenches his hands tightly so as not to explode in a scream. If only he understood.
Suddenly he hears a sound behind him and quickly turns around. His mother has opened her eyes and tries to get up. But she is far too weak and quickly falls again. Her nightdress becomes visible and carelessly exposes the many bloodstains that have soaked the thin material. The boy quickly moves over to the bed and helps the woman sit up. He catches her eyes for a brief moment, but they don’t show any sign of recognition or life. The eyes that once were so blue are nearly white, as if all color has slowly seeped away and disappeared together with her tears and the fever’s sweat.
The girl quietly crawls up in the bed and sits close to her. The little girl’s face is like stone, and only her eyes show signs of hope. Large tears blur her vision, but she doesn’t once remove her gaze from the woman.
Suddenly the girl feels her grip on her mother’s hand reciprocated, and she leans toward her with renewed hope. A rising glow and color fills the lifeless face. The mother’s gaze catches the bright light from the window, and slowly the colorless eyes are filled with a blue intensity, as if they were crystal clear forest lakes on a sunny day. Her face gradually changes right before the children’s eyes, as they sense her strength and vitality returning. The mouth opens slightly and a smile begins to appear on her lips. The girl finally can sense the joy of relief grow inside her. A pent-up weeping is transformed into a light sobbing while her eyes are emptied of tears. Her hope grows.
But just as quickly, the woman’s eyes begin to flutter from side to side while she alternately breaks out in loud laughter and childish giggling. She resembles a small child who manically experiences all her childhood in a moment, and her thoughts can’t keep up. The impulsive glee stops abruptly, and she stares, motionless, out into the room with a fixed gaze.
The boy turns to see what she’s looking at but only sees an empty wall. He looks back at his mother, who slowly opens her mouth wide. A quiet sound rises from deep within her mouth and develops into a lacerating scream. A scream that seems to last forever. Her arms gesture in front of her as though attempting to protect herself from an invisible enemy in the process of attacking her. She’s scared. In a second all strength and color disappear from the mother’s face, and the desperate scream is transformed into a whispering sound. Her grip of the girl’s hand loosens and she falls, limp, into the boy’s arms.
The girl throws herself over her mother’s lifeless body and grips her nightdress so hard it’s torn to pieces. Her weeping ceases and the silence in the room is like in a burial chamber that has long been abandoned by both people and souls. The boy gently strokes her hair, and slowly he calms her. She releases her crushing grip on the woman’s nightdress and accepts the light strokes. She doesn’t notice his hand shaking, or see the large tears running down his cheek. He calmly closes his eyes and collects his thoughts, because now he knows what he must do.
The boy quickly packs a rucksack with the most necessary things and grabs the girl by the hand. They need to get away. Away from the house, away from the village, away from the mysterious disease that has attacked their mother and every other adult in the village. They run out of the door, leaving it open behind them. It seems pointless to close it, because who would come and steal anything now? There’s nothing left but disease and death.
With a small spark of hope, the boy runs to one of the neighboring houses and looks through the window. Maybe there are still some grownups alive who can help them. But the rooms are dark and empty, without any sign of life. Once again, the boy grabs the girl’s hand and pulls her down the street. They approach the large fire pond in the middle of the village.
He sees a bloody body lying by the roadside. It looks like someone he knows, but he isn’t sure. Where there used to be eyes, there are now just two dark holes. He shivers, and tries to hide the gruesome sight from the
little girl. But soon more and more lifeless bodies appear, and it’s impossible to hide them from her. They lie on the ground where they suddenly fell over, dead. The closer they get to the center of the village, the more bodies appear. They’re everywhere, in small and large piles as if they were garbage.
Large flocks of black birds are sitting on the lifeless bodies, greedily eating from the defenseless shells of what were once living people. They caw loudly as they fight over the best spots. Their beaks are colored red from blood as they eat chunks of meat from the open wounds covering the dead bodies. A few are still alive but too exhausted to resist the insisting beaks, and soon they give up the fight to protect their exposed bodies and tired eyes.
Small children cling to their dead parents as they cry in despair. The boy covers his ears to avoid the sound of their tearful voices thundering into nothingness. He shivers at the thought of their desperation, but he has to ignore their cries. He can’t help them all or take them with him. There are too many. He can’t save them. He can only think about saving himself and the little girl next to him, his sister.
A thick smoke suddenly spreads through the streets of the village and they run as fast as they can to get away. It’s hard for the boy to orientate himself, and he has to stop several times to find his way through the labyrinth of the village. The smoke comes from all the burning houses and piles of bodies that the last survivors have set on fire in a desperate attempt to stop the disease. The blazing fires and the cries of the desperate children grow higher and higher, and the two children fight their way towards the edge of the village. No one tries to stop them, because there’s no one left with strength enough or who even cares why they are running. The little girl cries loudly and looks back in despair towards their home where they said goodbye to their mother only a short while ago.
The Dawn of Skye (The Someday Children Book 1) Page 1