Fractured Everest Box Set

by D. H. Dunn

  Then the snow hit, covering Nima in darkness and pressure so great she felt as if a yak was trampling her. It pounded her into the side of the mountain, both her hands clinging to the ax as if it were the only object left in the world. Her eyes shut and her ears deafened, she waited and hoped the pressure would decrease. She kept waiting for the feeling of openness under her, the emptiness that would signify Varesta throwing Nima off her sides, a plummet to her death.

  Protect me Chomolungma, she prayed. Could the Goddess hear her in such a place? Had she moved even beyond the god’s reach?

  It was only seconds, yet it felt like hours. When the light returned to her, the cold, firm rock of Varesta was still in front of her eyes. Her back felt as if it had been danced upon, but she could feel no injuries. Still gripping the ax handle so hard her hands shook, she looked down the mountain to see how bad the avalanche had been.

  Tanira clung to the mountain a few meters below, sporting a small cut on her head that was likely due to a rock riding along inside the wave of snow.

  Tanira smiled, a small gesture Nima did not return.

  Beyond Tanira, there was a large gap on the line, but that gap had been there prior to the ice breaking. She could see several Caenolan’s still working their way up the rope and beyond that, the remainder of their group was lost to the mist.

  “Not as dire as I had thought,” Tanira said from below. It was possible most of the snow had flown directly over them, arced by the rocky outcroppings Nima could see above.

  Nima agreed, she had expected worse. Still she offered Tanira no reply. She felt bad for the woman’s situation, but the wounds Tanira had dealt to her were still deep and fresh. She was not about to pretend nothing had happened between them. That Tanira seemed to think they could still be friends was annoying.

  Val had told her to look for those stone ledges. They marked the upper caves they were climbing to.

  “Let’s get moving before something else comes loose,” Nima said, pulling her ax out and slamming it up higher. Val was down there somewhere, along with the Scrye. She wanted nothing more than to rush down, make sure they were both all right.

  She pulled herself higher and slammed the ax in again. Those concerns would have to wait. Nima had to lead Val’s people to the caves and simply hope she would see him and the child again.

  The winds blew harsh and strong, pushing her into the cold ice. Mount Varesta and the gales of the Tempest cared nothing for Nima’s worries or concerns.

  Chapter 28

  The noon sun struggled to push through breaks in the departing Tempest’s heavy cloud cover, bathing Val in a mix of light and shadow as he looked out over the assembled crowd.

  Once the people of Caenola had rested from the grueling early morning ascent, High Elder Chantez had ordered the traditional celebration be started early, a cheer going up from the men, women and children who had abandoned their homes to run from the approaching storm and the terrible wave that would follow.

  Now they had gathered on a large, snow-covered overhang that faced the far-off sea, the hundreds of people collected in a rough semi-circle as they waited for the figures on the stage to finish assembling.

  Val was not happy to be one of those figures. With Nima on one side of him and Yanare the other, he felt like the eyes of each and every one of his people were upon him.

  “I don’t like this,” he whispered to Nima, who stood to his left on the platform that had been hastily constructed of wooden crates. “I don’t like everyone looking at me.”

  “They’ve been through a lot,” she replied, fresh strength in her voice. He was surprised how quickly she had recovered from leading his people in the climb up Varesta. In her arms, the Scrye looked around with wide eyes, the tiny infant appearing fascinated by every new sight and sensation. “It makes people feel good to thank their heroes, and that’s what you are, Val.”

  A hero? Him? The idea was hard to accept. Just a few days prior, he had been cast out of his society, destined to be a pariah for whatever short time he might have survived in the wood. Now he was a hero?

  “I don’t feel like one,” he replied as the crowd continued to assemble. He could see Zelquan standing near the front of the group, his friend smiling as they made eye contact. “I just did what I thought I had to do.”

  “Silly.” Nima gave him a playful punch on the arm. “That’s what heroes do. Now try to enjoy this, if not for yourself, for them. They need it.”

  One person he did not see in the crowd was Tanira. Once Val’s people had been safely brought up the mountain, the mysterious woman had crept into the deeper shadows of the caves, stating only that she needed to be alone.

  Val had thought about asking Nima further about Tanira, but decided against it. There would be time for them to discuss all of the many questions on his mind later.

  Tanira was the least of those, after all.

  Yanare stepped out of her position at Val’s right, moving to stand in front of him. Her dark green hair, braided with the shells Zelquan had given her to mark the start of their courtship, blew wildly as the chilly wind picked up.

  Her eyes had lost the fire they had held in recent days. She looked up, her expression bringing back memories of better times between them, the days when they had been friends.

  “I just want to say.” She stopped, shaking her head. “No, I need to say. I am sorry, Val. I am sorry about your father, about not listening to you. About judging your friends and saying some… some truly terrible things.”

  Val thought back to how Yan had blamed his father for the attack by the Thartark, how she even had accused Nima and Tanira of somehow being part of it. It was easy to recall the angry look in her glare, the zealous passion with which she had verbally attacked him.

  “Those things hurt, Yan. They still bother me, like a hook in the skin. The hook can be removed, but the wound is still there. It won’t be easy to move on from.”

  She sighed as she looked down at her feet, the golden light in her crystal as dim as he had ever seen it.

  “Even so,” he said, pushing more kindness into his voice. “What you are doing now isn’t easy, and I respect it. I may still be angry, but I hope it will pass. Anger is not a good place for my heart to live in.”

  She shook her head, Val seeing the dampness and regret in her eyes.

  “Maybe you should stay angry. If our people had listened to me,” Yan cast her hand across the gathering crowd, “they would have died. The Tempest would have destroyed us all.”

  She looked down at the golden shift she now wore, a sign of her advancement to Elder.

  “I am not fit to wear these robes,” she said, looking past Val and towards the raised platform, where High Elder Chantez waited.

  Val placed his hand on her shoulder.

  “Yan, that is not true. That you can apologize, that you can admit you were wrong. That says to me you have the wisdom to lead. Everything you did, you did out of a passion for our people. Just like me.”

  “Besides,” Val added, smiling. “I will be around to tell you when you are wrong.”

  “Thank you, Val.” Yan laughed softly as she wiped a tear away.

  “If you two are done?” High Elder Chantez had hobbled over, giving them a wry grin. He tapped his walking stick impatiently as he eyed Yan. She nodded quickly, falling back in line next to Val. Nima giggled softly, her smile beaming as bright as the sun.

  Val’s heart began to pound as the High Elder slowly made his way to the front of the platform, raising his hands wide as if he intended to embrace the whole of the crowd.

  Again, it felt to Val as if each person there were looking only at him, fresh heat coming to his cheeks as they burned against the cold air of the mountain.

  “People of Caenola,” Chantez said, his voice possessing a strength Val had not heard in years. “We stand here today, higher and farther than we have ever been on the great mountain Varesta.”

  He stopped, gazing upward towards the mountain’s peak
above them. Val followed his stare along with the crowd, the bank of heavy clouds concealing what waited at the top, as they had done for all of Val’s life.

  Maybe someday, I will go up there, he thought to himself. It would be good to see the answers to the mystery of what was at the summit, and now he knew the perfect person to accompany him.

  “Our journey here,” Chantez continued, “was more challenging than any in memory. All of this, to escape a Tempest more violent and powerful than we have ever known.”

  Val cast a quick look over his shoulder. Far beneath them, the great wood sat at the foot of Varesta as it always had, a barrier between the stone of the mountain and the power of the sea. As the great Tempest continued its march west and away from them, the wave would be approaching soon. Val wondered if the wood could survive the force of the imminent water.

  Certainly, their village could not have, and the lower caves would have been just as inundated.

  “Yet,” Chantez said, “We stand here today not because of old thoughts but new ones. Each of us is alive due to the actions of those who were brave enough to break the cycles of the past, doing so the face of exile and condemnation.”

  The old High Elder moved to face them, bowing deeply with his back to the assembled group. He then turned back to the crowd, his arms wide again.

  “We give our humble thanks and praise to these three brave souls, forever more will their tales be told! The rescuers of our people! Climber Nima, the absent Knight Tanira and our hero of Caenola, Valaen a Ola!”

  A cheer went up through the crowd, Val’s people clapping and raising their arms in celebration. He could see hundreds of crystals blazing to life, bringing to his eyes every color he could imagine. Each face was smiling, and carried a look of peace and gratitude.

  No grin was broader than his mother’s, her brilliant emerald crystal shining brighter than he had seen it in years.

  His heart felt it might burst, tears coming to his eyes with the realization this outpouring of emotions was for them. For his father, for Nima. For him.

  Nima threw her free arm around his shoulder, leaning in and giving him a kiss on the cheek, which drew even louder cheers from the assembled crowd.

  Chantez tapped his walking stick on the wooden stage, waiting for the furor to slowly die down.

  “Valaen, it is because of you and your friends that the Scrye was returned to us, that our people are safe, that the future is now and unknown. That unknown frightens many of us, yet you bravely faced the mysterious, the untried, the untested. You have shown us that perhaps these are not things to fear. Our people need a brave mind and a bold heart to help guide us.”

  There were murmurs and nods among the crowd, Val’s spirit lifting again at the sight of his mother’s proud face, seeing in her eyes the end of all the arguments he had grown up hearing. Were he here, Val knew his father would have been alongside her. This was his victory too.

  Chantez turned, addressing Val.

  “Valaen a Ola, will you honor this village further and take your place as an Elder?”

  Chantez made the request with a smile, as if he knew what Val’s response would be before asking it. Val’s father had been an Elder after all, and Val had often thought he might eventually be one as well. Still the request was unexpected, Val’s mouth opening in surprise.

  The answer came to him easily, requiring no thought.

  “No,” Val said, to the gasps of the crowd. Across their faces, he saw looks of surprise and even disappointment. Only his mother and Zelquan smiled back at him, Val happy to see they understood.

  He turned to face High Elder Chantez, the red light from Val’s crystal pulsing, adding a crimson tint to his vision. The energy of Val’s crystal had never felt like this before, it seemed to reassure him as each wave of its magic ran through him.

  “I appreciate the honor, High Elder.” He bowed, then faced the crowd. “The honor of all of you. Yet I cannot accept. I have come to believe that our people should not be led by councils or Elders, but rather by our own hearts. Each of us should find our own path, each test our own limits. There are hills and mountains I want to climb, vast seas I want to explore.”

  In his mind’s eye, he could see himself crossing all the ancient thresholds. Going over Varesta to see what lay beyond the great mountain range, charting past the last known island in the sea, looking for what was beyond.

  Yet he did not want to do so alone. Standing beside him was the person who had shown him his path, helped him find out who he really was.

  He cast his eyes across the gathered group, a rainbow of glowing headcrystals shining back at him. Dozens of hues and intensities, a myriad of separate destinies.

  “Yet I will not ask others to do that just because I wish it. The Thartark are gone. There will be no more Tempests, no more Scryes. For good or for ill, the cycle has been broken, and the road ahead of us, as you say High Elder, is unknown.”

  Val thought back to several days prior, when he had first entered the wood beneath this very mountain, in defiance of the Elder’s instructions. Searching for his father, he now felt as if he had helped complete the work his father had begun.

  “My father was frustrated in our people’s willingness to follow a one path, a single direction. Let us become a people of many paths, many roads winding through the woods of our lives. Let each of us place our feet on the route of our own choosing, set our course on the stars of our dreams.”

  Val reached over, gently taking Nima’s hand in his own. His heart beat faster in his chest, unsure of how she would react. Another unknown threshold.

  Her fingers intertwined with his, gripping his hand with a firm and reassuring strength.

  “I have my own dreams to follow,” he said, casting her a quick look. She smiled, closing and opening one eye in her quick odd gesture. He looked forward to asking her what it meant.

  Turning away from the crowd, Val walked off the platform with Nima’s hand in his own and the Scrye in her arm. Ahead of him lay the expanse of snow and stone that comprised the outcropping on which they had all gathered, and where shortly they would watch the great wave come in from the sea.

  Yet he also felt something else was ahead of him, something else that would have seemed impossible only a few days earlier. Limitless possibilities, a life unknown and full of mystery. Something he and Nima had not only given to his people, but also to Val himself.

  He smiled, pure joy filling his heart. Maybe he was a hero after all.

  Nima sat on the rocky ledge high up on Mount Varesta, looking out at what, for her, was the Khumbu Valley. The wind and snow still blew, but the stone formations around the entrance to the caves provided a great deal of shelter from the weather, rendering the effects of the Tempest tolerable.

  Val was beside her, watching and peering down the mountain and toward the forest. Next to him, Zelquan knelt in the shallow snow, as transfixed as Val. A wrinkled hand on Nima’s shoulder reminded her of the presence of Kelzin, Val’s mother. Since arriving at the cave, the elderly woman had hardly left Nima’s side, fussing lovingly over her every scrape and bruise.

  It was a stark contrast to the memories of her own mother, and it was nice. It felt like family.

  The ledge itself was a wide stone triangle with its tip pointing away from the mountain, toward the sea. Sheltering them from the impressive drop were several large boulders, allowing them to sit or lean comfortably while they watched the waited for the Tempest’s great wave to come in from the ocean. Behind them, a rough, arched opening led to the massive cave’s interior while a single path off the ledge led higher up the mountain.

  The wave was coming, the three Caenolans were both sure of it based on the reactions of the small child nestled in Nima’s arms, the white crystal in her forehead pulsing slowly. The girl suckled at the milkfruit from one of the attendants, her large, dark eyes looking up into Nima’s.

  It was impossible to look at the child and not think of the fate that awaited her. If the Scrye
had any inkling of her future, she didn’t show it. She looked as peaceful as Nima had ever seen her, even as the storm she was connected to raged on in the distance.

  “There it is!” Zelquan shouted, pointing to the edge of their visibility.

  The fog and clouds broke just enough for them to see the great forest, the same collection of trees and bushes where Nima and Val had fought for their lives against rampaging grun. Nima could see many of the trees swaying and shifting with the wind, as if they were walking amongst their kin before the water became more apparent. Nima had expected a wall of water, a wave that might dwarf the forest itself. This rather seemed to be the ocean just moving forward with relentless force, displacing all that might be in its way.

  Pushing forward and ignoring all resistance, the force of the sea was the most powerful expression of nature Nima had ever seen, as mighty in its way as any mountain. Her heart raced with excitement and wonder, her pulse as quick as the frothing waters that approached thousands of meters below her.

  “All those grun,” Val said. “I hope they found somewhere to go. They didn’t ask for this any more than we did.”

  Nima noted that the Scrye turned her head toward the sound of Val’s voice. The infant’s small hand clutched Nima’s while sucking on the fruit.

  “When we return every Calm,” Kelzin said from behind Nima, “the grun are always there. I trust they will be again.”

  The water pushed forward, the forest behind it reduced to just more of the harbor, with the trees swaying just above the waterline like kelp. Within seconds the water reached the base of Mount Varesta, piling onto the rocks and caves with a thunderous impact that Nima could feel as well as hear. The surge pushed itself past the surface and scaled the side of the mountain, coming to rest just below the snow line.

  “The lower caves,” Zel said. “They are completely underwater. That would have been us, had we not sought higher ground. We would have been drowned.”