"I hope we will find people out of this accursed city. I hope we can find help. At least it will get us farther away until it starves."
Brone climbed into the belly of the dragon and it sped them over the empty stone paths, cutting a swathe of black into the snowdrifts as it went.
Chapter 11
Ethon was not dead, though she wished herself so. For what had this empty mare to do with what was left of the end? Had she, who had seen more glory than a thousand war heroes, only to wait for the end to claim her? To lie sick and heaving on the ground made green and thriving by her foe? Despairing at this feeble death, Ethon fought with wrath, her blood quickening, warming where it ought to have pooled and stilled. Humiliated, Ethon reached for the sweet green grass around her. She wept tears of rage as she ate, despising herself and Brone, despising the stubborn breath that kept lifting her mighty chest even now. Since her ill timing with the Messenger, Ethon had felt a growing discomfort, an increasing ill ease. She had missed something, something small among the dust and rubble of the place, something that meant the world of man would continue, his ways unchanged, his harms unmended. Again Ethon had it in her grasp when Brone came upon her, but too weak with long labors and want, Ethon had let it slip past again. It was not in her heart to believe that Brone could not derail the end, could not harm the fruits of Ethon's long burdens. Her wrath grew as her strength returned. It rankled to eat at the table of her enemy, but Ethon knew it was the only way to follow Brone, the only way to retrieve that small thing that had been lost. It was another day before Ethon could rise.
On the morning that Brone grew the lotus sea, Ethon began to walk, slow and swayback, the births of her children had broken her at last, made her a bitter nag where centuries of violence had never touched. Deep in the morning, the ashen mist was dissipated, clear and cold the air broke upon Ethon's tired flanks, twisting and tightening the old scars, her exhaustion screaming through her legs and hooves. She walked on, her head never lifting, seeing only the gray dust of the dead land, the scorched, hungry earth that never healed. She came upon the swarms of Kishi in the warmth of the third afternoon, the stench of old death heavy in the air for hours before she saw them. She passed a scattering of carcasses, bloated and charred, split as if from within, their insides silvering in the sun, where ought to have been an army of beetles of larvae and vultures, all was still, no buzzing reached Ethon's ears. Yet she noticed not, her nose grazing the ash, her eyes half closed. Richer and ranker came the smell of rotting fur and flesh and the carcasses pressed in more closely, many piling two or three against the other. At last, Ethon could not step without stepping into the body of a dead beast and she looked up. For miles sprawled the burned corpses of Kishi's horde, a violent explosion of flesh and hull and fur, gray with matted dust and drying in the light of day. Ethon panicked with the sight of such distance covered in soft corpses, panicked with the thought of treading on them, one after another for days. And deeper in her horse heart, Ethon knew Kishi was dead, that something small and strong had killed him, something that had slipped by her in the dark. Wild with fear and then with rage, Ethon heeded not the corpses of the hungry horde, but smashed their bones beneath her hooves, slipping on their fat and fur as she began to run.
She hated Brone and Ganit more fiercely than she had loved even her son, it burned in her, consumed her, as if the song of Hadur had infected her, and Ethon vowed to revenge herself for the loss of her fiercest son. But another of her sons would be dead before Ethon caught another glimpse of Brone.
Chapter 12
The dragon's belly was cold as stone, its fire barely warming its throat to push it on. Many miles spread between Death and Brone, yet still they fled as the dry winter pressed around them. But now Ganit realized the steel dragon would be a dead relic in the snow if they added no fuel. They had passed through the Empty City and many villages of men, each wondering if they ought to stop, but only once discussing it. They had seen a spiral of smoke, the breath of a hearth fire on the air in one of the first villages they came to.
"Should we stop?" asked Ganit.
"My heart says we should be farther from the Death horse before we stop again. There will be no fuel here, so close to the city, there can be no power to draw it from the earth."
"But should we stop to warn whoever has stayed behind? Should we tell them to flee before the horse comes to this place?"
But Brone's face was hard and beautiful, a carven stone of pitiless dawn. The world had changed for Brone, in that death scream, with the unmaker's breath. "We cannot take them with us Ganit. Why should we warn them? There can be no where to run to, it will find them. The Ghost Horse will find every one of us and all of our stories, our memories and homes. We will be as a heavy storm, a forest fire long healed over, an empty era in all the epochs of the world."
"There is a chance that these people could outrun this disaster if we stopped and warned them." Ganit was saddened and frightened. His heart weighed heavy with the need to save the people of this village, of all the villages that would pass between them. Already he knew that Brone would win this battle, but he felt the need to strive against the darkness that threatened to engulf both of them, to twist them into craven beasts, blind to the suffering around them.
"They might outrun it now Ganit, but they cannot outrun it forever. Any more than you or I can. It has marked us and will dog our steps even to the bitter end. These people would spend all that remained of their lives in terror and grief, dreading what they could not hope to avoid. Shall we bring that plague upon them too? Have they not fear and sorrow enough yet?" Brone was savage in her impotence, grieving and thwarted she lashed at Ganit, who harmed her not, but only spoke the secret wishes of her own heart. They stayed silent through the many villages they passed that day.
But the steel dragon shuddered with want and Ganit knew they must stop at last. There were lights in this village, but no souls arrived to meet them. "I have to stop Brone, we will be on foot once again if we do not."
Brone's brow creased with worry, "No, we cannot go by foot, not here. We are many days from warmth, I think we will no find shelter in all this land."
They stopped in a circle of pale light on dirty snow. Many tracks of men ran through this place, crossing each other, melting the snow into dark mud. It seemed indeed, as if something had warned them to flee. Ganit thought a moment and caught Brone's arm as she tried to climb out.
"No, I'll do it. Stay here. And don't talk to anyone, don't tell anyone who we are or what has happened."
"There's no one here. You were the one who wanted to warn them anyway."
"I changed my mind. Look how they have fled. If there is anyone left who does not know what has happened, what's coming- we would be overrun. We would be on foot again or worse. Stay here."
"We should go together. What if something happens?"
"That's what I'm worried about. Stay here, let me see if we are really alone."
"I meant what if something happens to you. Let's go together. We will meet the same future."
Ganit furrowed his brow. He had wanted to do this fast and leave before whoever was left to notice them came around a dark corner or out of a silent doorway. It was too dangerous, Brone had to stay. He'd make her drive the iron beast away if anyone came. The silent, moveless dark crept into his mind and nagged at him.
"No. It's too dangerous. Stay here and flee if anyone should come." He started to climb out and Brone grabbed his arm this time.
"I'm not straw Ganit. We've done all of this together, gone through madness and frost and death and reached the farther shore. Why should that change now in this tiny empty place? What monsters can be more terrible than what we have seen?"
"Must we argue here, in this dark silent tomb of a place? Can you not do this one thing for me? I will go in and get fuel, I'll be back in less time than discussing it will take and this place, this horrid dread will be only memory."
Brone flushed with frustration and she raised her
voice, though the voiceless world frightened her too. "The whole world is a dark silent tomb. Why shouldn't we speak of this here? Are we not equals? Why should I wait quietly behind as a child would do? I have faced harm and death as often as you. Why do you insist on going alone?"
Ganit too, was strained beyond sense and he too shouted. "Might I not protect my family as any other man has done? As any other will do until we are no more?"
Brone's bitterness broke through then, a whip to cut the heart of both. "You mean this child I carry? Oh Ganit, it will never breathe. My body is its grave. You cannot think I mean it to be born into this even should we survive long enough. A baby in this wasteland is no dream. We have no future. It were better that the first plague of man was barrenness." She regretted it before she even spat it out, but her anger was so full that she said it boldly, daring Ganit to seek her face as she did. But he was defeated. He said nothing but climbed out of the steel dragon and walked away, not careful, not quick or furtive. He did not even look around him but kept his face on the frozen ground. Brone sat silently inside the belly of the metal beast and waited.
For a second he hated her. Her constant despair, her unlifting hopelessness ate at him. He was exhausted, as a man who has spent long hours in swimming without rest. He was angry that she spoke his doubts aloud, spilling their sacred terrors into the air, making them real. A second only, and then he was wounded both by her bitterness and his secret betrayal, his hurt over flooded the anger and he waited a moment in the empty shop before calling out for the shopkeeper.
Brone bit back her remorse and let her fury replace it for a moment or two. She watched Ganit walk into the shop, slumped and dark as a dawn overshadowed by storm. That endless spring of hope in him, the cheer without bottom which she had loved so early, made her resent him. He glided through, an untouchable light in all the dark, while Brone slogged through it, was steeped in it, crushed by the weight of the dying world. She had let her meaner spirit win, she had pulled him down to her, had somehow broken that stream of faith she had so loved. And there was a bitter moment that she felt triumph, that she believed it a victory to make him endure what she had so long felt. But after the moment split open and revealed its acid heart, she hated herself, she let her fury burn inward and knew only remorse. As the minutes without him dragged on, Brone began to worry. He would not return. Not after such a bitter battle. He would walk away from her, ever away, to find his own lonely end free of her gall. Brone wept for shame and loneliness.
At last Ganit collected himself and called a greeting to see what would answer him. But no one came. He tried a few more times, and then gave up. He walked back toward the door and stopped seeing a small pile of chocolate wrapped in shining paper. He smiled a little but it faded. He stuffed the chocolate into his pockets. Then, taking buckets, Ganit went to the fuel wells and drew forth the secret draught of the steel dragons. He would bring it up to the well to have a long feed, but they could carry the spare buckets in case they were between wells when the dragon was empty. It took long minutes and he thought of his child and of Brone's words. Perhaps it would have been more merciful to make man barren from the start of it all. Yet his heart could not give up the faith he had that the world would be saved, would be born anew within the seed Brone carried. Within the child she dreaded bearing. At last with a heavy laden heart, Ganit walked back to the steel dragon, back to Brone. He said nothing as he climbed into the belly of the scarred steel beast, nor when he led it to the well to drink. The buckets were full, the dragon fed, and the dark empty road stretched ever on before them. They saw no one, heard nothing. Brone realized they need never have argued at all and rued her words in silence. Ganit was too oppressed with the despair she had laid upon him to speak and so they passed late into the night in deep, private sorrow.
His sadness so wearied Ganit that he had to stop and rest. Brone was already sleeping, warm in the torn belly of the steel dragon. So he closed the eyes of the metal beast and watched the frost make stars on its glass face until he slept. Dropping as a stone into a still, dark pond, he heard nothing until morning. He woke to see Brone watching him in the bright morning. He sat grim as old stones, waiting. But she said only, "Would you like me to steer? You can sleep longer if you like."
He waited a moment and then climbed into the snow. She climbed out after him.
"You've been steering this whole time. You just don't know it. You think we've been running blindly from these terrible things, these beasts and storms, ghosts and madness. Maybe you have, but I have only been running blindly after you. So where are we going, you and I?" His voice came louder than he meant it to be and his eyes pinched and prickled in the brilliant snow.
"I don't know. I have known these few months that you would die, that there is nothing to be done but let it happen. Even if the child were born, it would live only to breathe the poisoned air of the dying world."
"Why did you take it?" he yelled, his voice cracking with grief.
"Why did I take what?"
"Why did you take the seed? If you were truly without hope that something would survive, some memory of us, some secret place, why did you take it?"
"Because I was trying to help. Deep down, where all of us flee death, where all of us are mad and prideful, I believed I could change the fate of the world. But now I have seen how small we are. I know we will not survive this winter. Not even the stone palaces of our forefathers stands against the breath of the Ghost Horse. He will wipe away all memory of us, no creature will dream that we have ever been. We are worse than accursed, Ganit. We are wholly forgotten." She wept to say such bitter things to him when his heart was so heavy with harsh thoughts of her. She sat down in the cold silver snow. Ganit's breath spilled in a warm cloud between them.
"If you want to turn back, to walk back into the disappearing cities, the frozen waste that was the world, to return and seek death out, I will go with you. But I cannot wander knowing it is aimless, no not even for you Brone. If there are to be no more children, no new beginning then maybe you ought to toss that seed aside and stay with me in the time we have left to us, for whatever has bound you to this journey, it is pointless now. Without hope why shouldn't all the earth be barren? Why should this tiny thing get to grow and thrive above our child, above all of our children?" He reached for the linen packet around Brone's neck, ready to cast it off, to consign it to the unbroken ice and cold. But Brone's hand reached it first and closed around it, protecting the seed.
"The Messenger waited millennia to pass this to me. Just to pass it to the next holder. I cannot toss this seed aside, it has been made too dear with suffering and waiting. I cannot wholly say what compelled me at first, beyond simple pity. It cannot be a new start for us Ganit, there is no dawn coming, not after all that has happened, all that we have seen. But this seed is our epitaph, what springs forth will be our monument and child. Maybe there will be nothing to read it, nothing to know what has come to pass. But I cannot let it lie unborn on the frozen stones. I don't know where we are going Ganit, but we must keep this seed, this tombstone of the world out of the clutches of death. I can only go forward, but I can no longer go on alone. If you stay, I will stay, though it be the unmaking of all that we have ever been."
He touched her gently under her heart, where lay their sleeping child. "And this?" his voice was softer now, as if he spoke in the infant's ear, "You would let this go unborn, what we have wrought and shielded so long? Has it not waited to be passed to us? Waited long centuries just to breathe its short span- are we the ones who decide the end?"
She wept without moving, without sound and Ganit's heart was utterly thawed. He said nothing but embraced her, and though neither knew where their journey ought to end, they climbed back into the steel dragon and moved ever forward. They stopped in the empty home of a farmer that even the flocks and herds had abandoned, and there, as if on the brink of a burial pit, they clung each to the other. The warmth of their skin was the only signal of life, as if they already
drowned in the thin, tired air of the dying world. They woke unrefreshed, undetermined, yet climbed into the yawning pit of the steel dragon and continued on. Even Ganit spoke little that day, his heart subdued, his tongue untrustworthy. And Brone, as was her wont, spoke still less but felt all the bitterness she had spilled forth between them. The child exhausted her, though it was not yet heavy, had not yet made her body a waxing moon. She thought of when that time should come, when she should be more of a burden than her bones had used to carry. Brone could not bring herself to think of what must be done to relieve herself of it, but only could strive to finish her mission with quick work, and then to make an end of it for them all.
The steel dragon went through all of its fuel that day, burbling it out of the buckets and swallowing miles as it went. They needed to stop or trust again to their feet. As they approached a large village, Brone and Ganit began to see other men. Their faces were grim and worried but not frightened, and none seemed to flee, yet Ganit was worried. "What shall we do? We must stop or go on foot again. Yet I know not whether these people realize what is coming here. I have no way to buy fuel."
"We must try Ganit, I think it must still be many miles before we find what we are looking for. We must trust in the goodness of these men. We are strangers in this place, their hospitality may yet win out before their mistrust. But what tale shall we tell them? Shall we repay kindness with false comfort?"
"I think we must tell them the truth if they ask. Whether they know why the cities beyond them have gone dark, why they have heard no news from other lands, they must know that there is something amiss. What harm now if they discover truth? They are already in fear, we can hardly tell them worse than what they fear, a great dying is happening and moves toward them. It can hardly overtake them more slowly with a few day's warning- we are but the harbingers, it eats away ever at our tail."
The Jade Seed Page 9