Melforger (The Melforger Chronicles)

by David Lundgren

  She suddenly flung her hands into the air, stopping the rattling, and then said something to Tiponi which he reacted instantly to with a stream of words, still keeping his chin on his chest. As he gibbered on, she turned to look at Bolyai and then, with one click of her tongue, Tiponi went silent.

  “You are from the forest,” she said slowly, in a thick accent. Bolyai, who throughout the entire event had remained kneeling and watchful, nodded. “You have come a long way, Elder.”

  Bolyai started to stand up but no sooner had he made the tiniest motion when the four pale warriors burst forwards with astounding agility and the Elder found himself staring at the pointed end of four blades. To his credit, the Elder didn’t flinch and Raf was impressed as he continued moving slowly until he was standing up.

  “My name is -”

  “- Bolyai. I know this.”

  If he was surprised at this, the Elder didn’t show it, and instead dipped his head. “You are Shima’sidu?”

  She flicked all her fingers open and at the gesture, the warriors stepped back in perfect unison, their blades still drawn. “It is so.”

  To Raf’s surprise, Bolyai started to softly sing the gretanayre. He was so taken aback, in fact, that it took him a few seconds to summon the courage to join in. It was difficult, and his voice cracked more than once with the wave of adrenalin that held him in its grip.

  When they had finished, the ishranga stared at them with a calculating frown and then, without even looking at him, snapped, “Tiponi!”

  The iMahli scrambled to his feet and stood next to Bolyai. Raf felt a pang of guilt and empathy for the man as he spotted a sheen of sweat all over his body. Even standing, he was unable to meet her eyes and stood staring at the ground between them.

  “Why have you broken the Trust?”

  Tiponi swallowed loudly. “Ishranga, there is a problem with their trees.”

  Shima’sidu rattled her wrists again and ululated, making Raf jump. “You come here to tell me about this? With these others? These strangers?” She opened her mouth and made a strange sound like the hiss of a wildcat. “You think I do not know this thing? I am ishranga; I know!”

  Tiponi quailed under her glare. “Also, the boy, he… he is ishranga too. A powerful ishranga.”

  Shima’sidu gave a choking sound and then ululated again. “This young boy? This child? What is this nonsense?” She suddenly looked up at the ledges. “A trick!”

  As if reading her emotions, the warriors instantly closed together in front of her to form a human wall.

  “It’s true,” said Bolyai quietly. “I’ve seen it. He healed your go-between when he was injured. More quickly and completely than I have ever seen.”

  Tiponi nodded desperately and tapped his shoulder. Shima’sidu made the hissing noise again and then crept through the warriors who danced out the way fluidly to their former positions. She walked up and poked Raf in his chest. Raf felt his hands sweating profusely and tried to subtly rub them dry on his top. She moved close to him, her nose almost touching his, looking into his eyes. Above them, Raf heard the creak of bows being drawn.

  She moved her head next to his and whispered, “Are you ishranga?”

  “I don’t know…” he mumbled. “I think so, ishranga.”

  “Do you.”

  She stepped back and then ululated again, her eyes rolling back in her head. Raf stood shaking, watching as she drew out the noise to an excruciating volume, and then snapped her head back to down to stare at him. With one of her hands, she plucked something from her necklace and Raf noted that it was actually a seed, rather than a wooden bead. She held it in the palm of her hand and then, closing her eyes, started humming a pattern of notes that sounded very unfamiliar and outlandish to Raf.

  He watched as the seed twitched in her hand and suddenly split open. Then slowly, a small green shoot appeared and two delicate leaves unfolded themselves as a tiny white root grew out and wriggled like a worm on her palm. It only lasted a few seconds, before the leaves turned yellow and wilted, shriveling into a crumpled heap. He frowned at it and, when nothing else happened, looked up to see her glaring at him coldly.

  “Show me,” she said.

  “Sorry? What do you mean?”

  “Show me!”

  “What now? Here?” Raf flinched as the guards moved in closer behind her, their blue eyes boring into him. “I… I don’t think I can just make it happen like you did. It’s all new to me and, and… I don’t really understand what I’m doing yet.”

  Shima’sidu hissed in the strange animal-like way again and threw her head back to ululate. Turning to Tiponi, she shook her wrists and spat out a short sentence in their language. His face tightened and his arms slowly dropped to hang at his sides.

  “You waste my time!”

  Bolyai shook his head in frustration.

  The ishranga pointed into the night air behind them. “Go. And take this foolish bhesanté with you.”

  “Do you have an answer about our rotting trees?” asked Bolyai. “People will die if we fail. You must help us, please!”

  The ishranga ululated yet again and then looked up at the skies. “This I can not do.” A faint troubled expression creased her moonlit face. “It is a sickness of all people. Of the land. And of your forest. It is not one disease, it is every disease. All disease.”

  Bolyai’s bushy eyebrows knitted together cynically. “There must be a way to cure it, though. I would have thought you’d want to help. Obviously the things I’ve heard about you are wrong.”

  The ishranga turned around to face away from them. “You will find no answers here.” She issued an order to the guards and then disappeared without another word through the crack in the wall. The iMahlis joined ranks and then bore down on them slowly.

  “Come on.” Bolyai took Tiponi’s arm and dragged him back towards the slope, Raf following quickly.

  They climbed up, stumbling along the way and then sidled past the archers who stood menacingly with their bows still taut. One of them grunted something offensive and Tiponi flinched as if he’d been hit. Raf helped Bolyai support Tiponi’s weight and they made their way clumsily to the path that led back down to their wagon, descending as quickly as they could. As they reached the wagon and leaned against it, panting heavily, there was a noise from the top of the path and a voice shouted down something.

  “What did he say?” asked Raf. He felt nervous not being able to see the archers and kept expecting arrows to come flying through the darkness at them. Tiponi’s head was flopped down onto his chest and he muttered something that was too indistinct for them to hear.

  “Come on, boy,” snapped Bolyai, also staring up into the darkness. “Help me get him on the wagon and we’ll move a little away to get some distance between us and those arrows. I think we may have worn out our welcome.”

  32. CAVE

  Later that evening, Bolyai sat looking pensively into the small flames of the fire he had built. Raf was leaning back against the wagon wheel opposite the Elder, gazing up at the stars which were out in their millions, smothering the night sky with pinpricks of white. His heart had finally calmed down and with the panic of the incident on the hill top over, he felt the twin blow of exhaustion and the icy cold night taking hold. On the ground near them, the dark form of Tiponi was hunched facing away from them. He hadn’t said a word since they had come down.

  “Elder,” said Raf quietly. “What do we do now?”

  Bolyai took a long, tired breath. “I suppose we’ll sleep here overnight, and then tomorrow morning, we’ll try to work out the quickest way to the Pass.”

  “The Pass?” repeated Raf. “Why are we going to the Pass when we need to get back?”

  “But we need to find someone who can help you. Don’t you understand, boy?”

  “My family are the ones who need help!”

  “The best help you can give them is to find a cure. With that dismal ishranga being of no use to us, Miern is the best option now. We can also try
to find someone there who can teach you how t-”

  “- Elder, you said yourself that you aren’t even sure there’ll be someone there who can help me. That’s so far to go!”

  “I’m hopeful. Miern is full of surprises and exactly the sort of place that we’d find unusual help.” He leaned forwards so that the flickering flames lit his face. “Don’t worry about the Forest for now. It will stand for a while longer, despite what that woman said. Personally, I think she’s gone a bit nutty out here in the middle of nowhere. But if she is on to something about the diseases we’ve seen recently, if this is even more widespread and perilous than I thought, then your gift is probably all the more important.”

  Raf picked up a stone from the dirt next to him and threw it into the darkness. “I don’t know why you call it a gift, Elder. Nobody gave it to me, and I certainly didn’t ask for it.”

  Suddenly, Tiponi turned, the blanket he had been huddled under slipping off as he growled, “Selfish!”

  Raf felt a flush of discomfort. “But… Tiponi… I don’t know what you... I...”

  “You are ishranga!”

  “But I don’t know how to do it, Tiponi, I tried -”

  “You did not try!” snapped the iMahli. “You could have showed her just something, anything, and then….” A whimper escaped him and Raf realized with a pang of guilt that the iMahli was on the verge of tears.

  “I’m sorry, Tiponi. I would’ve done it, honest, I just don’t know how when…. there was just so much pressure, and -”

  “But my shoulder…”

  “I didn’t really know what I was doing, though –”

  “You have the gift!” he repeated, his hands raised in front of him. “If you had just shown it, then, -” he shook his head, “- I would not be banished.”

  Bolyai looked up from the fire. “Is that what happened? That’s what they said up there?”

  Tiponi nodded his head dejectedly. “I no longer have the Trust. I am not a go-between. I am shamed.” He sank back into mourning and a silence fell on the group.

  Raf looked out of the corner of his eye at the Elder as a hot flush of guilt weighed down on him, but Bolyai ignored him and stoked the fire. He got to his feet and walked past the ostriches out of the reach of the firelight.

  It’s not my fault, Raf thought bitterly. What did he expect? I can’t just sing when someone makes me. It’s just like the stupid Festival all over again. And doing it right in front of those iMahli guards pointing their swords at me? Forget it.

  His thoughts returned to the scene and he felt a pang of embarrassment as he realized how pathetic he’d actually been.

  I couldn’t even move, I was so scared! Maybe she can just sing and make things grow on the spot, but she didn’t have people standing around shooting stupid arrows at her! I’ve never been so frightened in my life.

  He kicked a stone down the slope of a dune and then sat down on the sand with his arms wrapped around his knees. Apart from the wind and their small fire, he couldn’t hear a single noise in all this openness. It was silent. Too silent. He felt as if the vast silence was crowding him, forcing him to face his thoughts. So he closed his eyes, humming the first song that came to him, the gretanayre. It took a little while, but as he sang and listened to the music, he felt a calmness come over him and the colors came rolling in out of the darkness.

  He immediately registered that there was something unusual. Normally, there was a kind of dark fog that hovered on the edges of his mind’s vision. Here though, there was an area off to his right which was strangely distinct. It seemed to be made up of many different colors woven intricately together. He had no idea how far away it was exactly - and even less idea of what it was – but he stopped humming and, opening his eyes, he stood up and walked towards where he’d seen it.

  As he peered into the darkness, he realized that he had no idea of what he was looking for. With his eyes open, he was blind. So, he started humming again and closed his eyes.

  Hands held cautiously in front of him, he shuffled carefully towards the strange weaving of colors over the uneven ground. It was difficult as he kept stumbling in the sand and over small rocks, but he made slow headway. As he neared the colors, they sharpened into beautiful webbing, forming a rough round shape, behind which the web stretched out in a cylindrical stream. Without understanding how, Raf recognized it as somehow musical.

  Fascinated, he opened his eyes and took a moment to let them adjust to the darkness from the dazzling colors. He found himself standing at the foot of a small dune that was sprinkled with boulders.

  Well, I know it was right in front of me when I stopped, he thought, squinting forwards. All he could see was a large jagged rock set in amongst other smaller rocks, with a few scraggly shrubs growing around them. He touched the rock and tried to see if there was anything odd about it, but found nothing unusual. It was heavy and although he tried to push it, it didn’t budge.

  Maybe it’s covering something?

  Climbing up the sandy slope, he positioned himself above the rock and placed his feet on top, digging his hands into the thick sand for purchase. Then, he bent a leg back and kicked down hard on the top of the rock. He felt it shift a tiny amount, so he got both feet ready and, with a small jump, pounded down as hard as he could.

  He wasn’t prepared for what happened next, and as the rock gave way and toppled forward, he fell with it, only managing to stop himself plunging down the slope by throwing his arms out behind him and grasping for anything solid. His right hand caught hold of something firm and he clung on desperately, swinging clumsily sideways into the shrubs. The rock rolled over once more and then slid to a stop in the soft sand at the bottom of the slope.

  Raf looked back up at what he had grabbed hold of and saw that it was the stone edging of a hole in the dune that he’d uncovered. He hoisted himself up and then used his hands to scoop out some of the sand that had trickled in from above. Ducking, he peered into the blackness behind the entrance. In the dim light he could just make it out extending gently downwards, oddly regular and uniform in width.

  It’s like a pipe of stone, he thought. And large enough to be a tunnel. That’s what the colors were! But how? What does it mean? And where does it go to?

  He clambered up the dune and peered over the top, biting his lip thoughtfully as he lined its direction up. Straight towards the hill with the ishranga and her stupid guards. Just brilliant.

  He sighed and, making his mind up, closed his eyes and started singing softly again. There were too many unanswered questions, and feeling the need for something to distract him from reflecting on the situation with Tiponi, Raf stepped into the tunnel and tried to narrow his thoughts down to just the simple task of following the stone pipe downwards.

  Following the colors in his mind, he moved carefully and managed not to stumble too often as he made his way down. After a few minutes, his feet scuffed against something giving him just enough warning to avoid hitting his head. On opening his eyes, he found that there wasn’t the slightest bit of light to help him, but feeling around with his hands, he realized he was standing in front of a rough wall. It wasn’t made of rock though, and scratching at the surface, he guessed it was just compacted mud.

  The colors definitely carry on past this. And I‘ve been right up till now…

  He crouched down, bunched his right arm up and butted his shoulder against the wall. It didn’t give, but there was a crumbling sound from the other side and Raf guessed it to be only a foot thick, maybe less. Another two blows and a section of it gave way with a crunch. Raf’s torso punched half way through the wall in a little landslide of dirt and stones that left him spluttering.

  He looked up and noticed that there was a faint source of light somewhere nearby which brought to life dim outlines of things closest to him. There was also an unexpected damp, acrid smell that he couldn’t identify. Hauling the rest of his lower body through the small opening in the wall, he stepped forwards cautiously, aware of a looming s
hape directly in front of him that sloped up towards the ceiling. He sidled around it, taking small steps, things slowly coming into focus as his eyes adjusted. His soft footsteps gave rise to surprisingly loud echoes that fluttered back and forth, painting a picture in his head of a very large room.

  What is this place?

  His eyes followed an uneven wall that materialized to his left, bending around in front of him a good fifty yards before closing in and looping back to his right. He could see two small flickering candles set into holes in the wall that provided the meager light supply.

  Well, those have been put there recently by someone.

  His eyes opened in excitement as he scanned the middle of the chamber and spotted what he thought were trees disappearing into the blackness far above – almost large enough to be Ancients – but on closer inspection, they turned out to be large rocks. They were oddly shaped though, with wide round bases that extended upwards tapering, a bit like some of the huge ant-hills they had spotted on the plains. They were very smooth and slightly damp.

  Raf ran his hands distractedly over one. They were peculiarly situated in this room, and he felt the tingle of goose-bumps as a realization suddenly occurred to him that there was something purposeful about them. He moved into the middle of the chamber, turning this way and that, trying to figure it out. Just like it had with the Ash-knell and Orfea and the paodrin, there was something about these giant rocks that he recognized, something that made sense to him…

  And then it hit him.

  They’re instruments!

  He felt light-headed as he turned around slowly on the spot, feeling it all fit into place in his mind. But how had it been done? They looked completely natural.

  More importantly, he thought, how do they work?

  He frowned in the gloom. Definitely not like the Ash-knell. They didn’t feel hollow at all, which meant they couldn’t be drums, either.