by A. R. Wilson
A sudden gust of wind pushed up the canyon face. Heat filled Jurren’s chest as he tensed to steady himself on the step. He turned to look at Kidelar.
“Yes, yes, just don’t interrupt.” The scholar was again facing the cliff with his back to the chasm.
“We’re almost to the landing where we turn back toward to cliff.”
“Hmm-mm.” With lips pressed too tight to speak, Kidelar continued inching his way down.
Jurren started walking again. At the landing, he looked at the vast wall at the bottom of the stairs. Another set of steps led away from the plateau to descend farther into the canyon, disappearing into a mist of fog. Did he dare say anything? Glancing up, he saw the scholar had pulled his right shoulder a few degrees away from the rock face.
Just don’t look down. We’ll get there one step at a time. Even if it takes us all the way to the bottom.
“Are you kidding me?” The scholar’s voice echoed like the drum of a beating heart all around them.
Jurren looked back at him. “What?”
Leaning with his cheek against the plateau, Kidelar gestured to the cliff ahead. “There are more stairs at the bottom of these stairs! What if they go on forever?”
“That’s not possible. The canyon has to bottom out somewhere.”
“Another two sets of stairs and my knees just might give out.”
“If your knees give out, I am not carrying you up to the top.”
“You crack jokes at the worst possible moments, Jurren.”
He started down the stairs again. “Who said I was joking?”
“What is that?” Kidelar’s voice came out in a gasp.
Holding out a trembling hand, the scholar pointed toward the bottom of the stairs. Following the line indicated, Jurren found the mist thinning along the canyon wall ahead of them. More stairs came into view. There seemed to be something etched below them. Jagged lines in the shape of a star stood out on the cliff. As the mist continued to thin, more lines came into view of another star and then another. The shape of a tree rested underneath them as though the stars were perched on the ends of its branches. Somehow, seven stars were carved into the cliff face above a tree tall enough to match a full-grown ghostwood.
Sounds of shuffling feet told Jurren the scholar’s curiosity now outweighed his fear. The image took on more detail the closer Jurren walked. How did someone get up there to do that?
“This is definitely the right place. We’re getting close.” Kidelar’s feet were moving quicker now.
“That’s the first happy tone I’ve heard out of you all day.”
“You don’t realize what this could mean. Not just for this quest, but for me.” His echoing voice was getting closer.
Jurren picked up the pace of his own walk. “Keep at least eight steps back. If you trip into me, neither of us will meet this seer.”
“Don’t you realize? She found a power greater than the Grand Wizards! If the legend is true, then not only can we find Tascana, I might be able to return home.”
Jurren stopped. Something in the scholar’s voice made him look back. “What do you mean?”
“I have already explained this to you.” He shrugged. “As soon as the Grand Wizards learn what I’ve done, I’ll be banished.”
Those words pricked like hot needles in Jurren’s chest. “Why?”
“You know I have been studying to join them most of my life. My apprenticeship was up for consideration within the next year or two. Crossing the Xanz River to help you find a banished seer priestess at the Avian Expanse... Those kinds of things are never forgiven, nor allowed an explanation in the Fortress of Erudition.”
“Then why are you doing this?”
“Because a goblin came to Gaulden Forest. That alone is reason enough to rethink many things. Especially who I trust.” The furrow on Kidelar’s brow suggested his words held more than one meaning.
“Do you think the Grand Wizards had something to do with the goblin?”
“No, but they have the power to foretell its arrival. Whether they exercised such a spell I cannot say. What I do know is a goblin sighting in Bondurant would be reason enough for them to take precautions, including giving us sufficient warning. Goblin infections put the Great Northlands in as much danger as our own country.”
This changed things. If the Grand Wizards possessed the ability to see such things, it was foolish for them not to act. It was the main reason why their corner of the world had maintained peace for so long. The ability to predict challenges gave them time to prepare for situations before they happened rather than reacting after the fact. Surely forecasting the potential arrival of magical creatures was somewhere on their list of allowable spells. Logic demanded they looked for such things, but why wouldn’t they tell anyone in Bondurant what they found?
Up ahead, the stairs butted against the rock face and turned to descend along the cliff. Jurren paused at the landing to look back at his companion. The scholar seemed transfixed on the tree of stars image carved below them.
“You good to keep going? Do you need a rest?” Jurren readjusted his sword.
“No, I’m fine. I believe I have deciphered the meaning of those seven stars.”
“What’s that?” Jurren turned his head to peer down the cliff then pulled back, realizing he had no real handhold to grip.
“It can wait until we find her. Let’s keep going.”
He opened his mouth to insist the scholar share his theory but snapped it shut and started down the new set of stairs. Both of them needed to stay focused on balancing. Though these steps did not have the sandy feel of the ones on the plateau, they were still a mere three feet wide.
Screams blasted into Jurren’s ears. He snapped toward the sound and nearly lost his footing. Leaning forward to catch himself, his eyes glimpsed flapping fabric. Kidelar’s body slapped against the cliff, his right hand clutching the edge of a stair.
“Hold on! I got you Kid, just hold on!” Edging back several steps, Jurren found the right footing to squat and grip Kidelar at mid-forearm. “Give me your other hand.”
“I can’t!”
“Try and... push your feet... against... the rock.” Groaning, Jurren pulled upward.
“I can’t! Ah!” Wind rushed up the canyon. Kidelar’s arm swayed outward then back against the cliff. “Jurren, help me!”
“Keep trying. I got you. Push against... the rock!”
Sharp points dug into Jurren’s back. His right foot slid toward the edge. Skid, slip. His left foot spun to the side, stopping as his heel threatened to go over the edge. No! He was not going to lose anyone else this week.
“Please! I can’t... I can’t get... Ah! Don’t let me fall.”
The anxious cries felt like boiling oil pouring through his ears and into his brain. Jurren pulled with all the might his feet would allow. Sweat stung his eyes, and he clamped them shut to focus on the arm in his hand. He steadied his feet again. Then something moved in his hand. Jurren squeezed tighter as he felt another slip in his palm. Now he had Kidelar by the wrist. Slip. Jurren nearly felt the bones dislocating in Kidelar’s hand.
A sudden lack of weight slammed Jurren into the cliff. Ringing filled his ears as he fell onto his side. Heat gripped his chest.
He failed.
Burning coals of loss swelled in Jurren’s stomach. He never should have talked Kidelar into coming down the stairs with him. What did a scholar know about scaling cliffs?
A voice drifted up as if from a dream. “Jurren?”
He looked up the stairs along the plateau. No Arkose.
“Jurren?”
Was he going mad?
“I’m all right.”
As the fog of pain eased, the nuance of the voice became familiar. “Kidelar?”
“Yes, I’m down here.”
Jurren shook his head then felt for lumps. A tender spot had started to form but nothing too bad. Taking a chance, he peered over the edge of the stairs. Mist shrouded much of the canyon around the
m save for a thin gap against the cliff. Something down there, in the shape of a man, hovered a few feet away from the rock.
Impossible.
Scurrying down, he shook his head in disbelief. When the image became clear, Jurren slowed to make sure he wasn’t hallucinating. Two poles jutted out from the rock with a net fixed between them. Resting in the middle of the net sat a wide-eyed scholar.
“Are you hurt?”
“I’m fine. This netting is incredibly soft.” Kidelar’s voice sounded as though he were talking in his sleep.
Jurren reached his hand out onto the weaved ropes. Why would anyone prop a net into the side of a cliff? And what were the odds it would be in the exact place needed to save a life? This didn’t make any sense.
The feather-like feel of the cords against Jurren’s fingertips brought back a flash of memory. The ropes used on the island of Orison had felt like this. Gentle and smooth, durable with the right amount of yield. Those allowed to possess eternal youth had the patience necessary for the years of study and work required to produce something this fine. Living in isolation for a hundred years could give someone the time to learn this skill. But a seer? Especially one who lived so far away from any resources to make rope?
“Come on, I’ll help get you off there.” Jurren extended his hand.
Kidelar crab-walked his way to the edge and took the man’s hand. “I didn’t see my life flash before my eyes.”
“What?”
“People always talk of their life flashing before their eyes in circumstances such as these. But I saw nothing.” The scholar steadied himself on the stairs with one hand on the wall of rock, his eyes drawn toward his feet.
“Are you okay to continue on?”
Nodding, Kidelar looked up. It was as though ten years of burden had seeped into the lines on his face.
Jurren slapped a hand against Kidelar’s shoulder then turned to descend the stairs. Mist and haze had pulled in to shroud the path. Anything beyond the next twenty steps disappeared into nothingness. Several minutes later, in the dim light of the canyon depths, the stairs stopped. A dark recess to the right suggested they turned into the cliff.
“Looks like we’ve reached a tunnel.” Jurren stopped with his hand against the rock.
“Shall we proceed?”
“The stairs end. We have no choice but go in.”
Kidelar craned his neck to look over Jurren’s shoulder from a few steps back. “We seem to be at a loss of supplies. What will we do for light?”
Unsure what to expect, Jurren picked his way toward the last step then peered into the tunnel. A torch flickered up ahead. “Someone left a light burning for us.”
“Then the legends held true.” Kidelar’s voice caught, and the last word barely came out. “We have found her.”
“We haven’t found that seer yet. Let’s keep going.” Jurren stepped into the tunnel.
Threads of hope laced into Jurren’s heart, weakening the snake of fear that had writhed in his chest since he watched Tascana disappear into the night. A burning torch in this desolate place could only indicate someone had been there within the last few hours. The next question was whether that person would, or could, help him find his daughter.
Torches sat in niches on the wall every thirty feet or so. They led downward then disappeared as the stairs leveled into a hallway.
On the last step, Jurren looked back to make sure Kidelar was still close. Something in the wall caught Jurren’s eyes. Between the span of two torches, in the shadow where the light did not fill the wall, the rock curved slightly inward. Even more unusual were the darker lines within that space.
“Kidelar, look at this.” They both leaned in. Etched into the wall he saw a woman hovering over a man lying on a bed. The faces held detail right down to the individual eyelashes. “That woman looks like Heluska.”
Jurren grabbed a torch and brought it closer. How could someone out here be capable of capturing the image of his wife?
“This cannot be.” Kidelar’s voice fell to a whisper as he stepped back against the opposite wall. “This is my memory.”
Jurren looked between Kidelar and the carving. “Are you implying this isn’t coincidence? That this etching is supposed to look like Heluska?”
“I saw this exact scene on the eve of our first meeting. When I heard Heluska had discovered a stranger frozen in the snow, I came to investigate. To see if she needed my help. This is what I saw. Literally what I observed.”
“But that’s impossible.”
“Not for a seer.” Kidelar took a step forward. “The true question is why she documented your first day in Hess Bren.”
Jurren shook his head then turned to replace the torch to its niche. Another indentation where the light ebbed away sat recessed on the wall. He walked a few more steps to find it too had a scene carved into it. The very scene he remembered when the midwife handed him his firstborn child. Looking back, he saw Kidelar further up on the staircase looking at one they had passed. Their eyes met.
“I believe this is the Fortress of Erudition and you walking away from it.” Kidelar pointed to the wall. “What do you see there?”
“It’s the night Tascana was born.”
The words felt hollow in his mouth. Seers meant magic. And magic always meant someone hiding an agenda.
Kidelar dropped his hand and came to see. “So she truly does have sight beyond sight.”
“Let’s just find her and get this over with.”
Even before Jurren finished his sentence, the scholar was moving to look at the next image. “This one is also of you.”
“Keep going.” Jurren brushed past him.
Who did this seer think she was? Peering into his personal life? The audacity was staggering.
Keeping his eyes centered on the floor of the path, Jurren walked past dozens more torches. A few minutes later, Kidelar spoke again.
“I think you should look at this.”
The tone was different than the awed curiosity of before. Pausing, Jurren willed himself to go back. It was a picture of him holding a sword high over his head. A bright star shone from the tip. Tascana laid at his feet, curled up in a fetal position around an infant child. Tears fell from her eyes, pooling around the baby. Beneath her, a vortex swirled as though trying to suck her into its depths.
Air pulled from Jurren’s lungs.
This was a lie. It had to be a lie. All practitioners of magic were the same. They loved to think they know everything, that destiny was something they could predict. It was a lie! He had a choice all those years ago as to whether to go back to Orison or stay in Hess Bren, and he took it. Destiny was a farce. No more set in stone than... than... Well, he couldn’t think of anything more unpredictable than chaos, but even that was more appealing than the scene portrayed on the wall.
“Do you hear that?” Kidelar sounded a mile away.
A delicate voice danced through the air. It came from somewhere deeper in the passageway, yet it seemed to come from within Jurren as well. Half of him, the half still looking at the carving, was terrified to follow. The other half was ready to rip apart the owner of that voice. Surely, it belonged to the person who believed he would do such a thing as threaten his own daughter.
The voice rose and fell as though singing. Jurren strode toward it, ready to confront this Ellesha Shan Shair.
Soon, the echoing melody became mumbled phrases, then distinct words.
“... and from the darkness will come,
A beast from the Den with a purpose.
He strikes with a smile, knowing the wound will fester.
Within the boy, a sickness ingrains,
The tunnels will never be used by men again.”
Jurren marched on, refusing to allow the words to deter his purpose. Light glimmered ahead. Almost there.
“A father’s pain is not wasted.
Strength will come from healing wounds.
Though memories will overwhelm thee,
His fa
te is not locked within their tombs.”
How he wished she would shut up! Squinting his eyes against the ever-brightening light ahead, he tried to push the voice out of his mind.
“High in a ghostwood, where no one else can see,
His daughter hides a secret of magic and need.
The goblin hid in waiting for the days to be fulfilled.
Then his friend, a dragon, took the one he willed.”
“Get out of my head!”
Jurren didn’t realize he was the one speaking until after the words were out of his mouth. The sound of his own voice stumbled his feet to a stop. He was at the end of the tunnel.
A great cavern opened before him, the full view blocked by a woman in a gray-green robe. She was of medium height with equally medium features of brown hair and gray eyes. At first glance, she was ordinary enough to forget, but with each passing moment the intensity of her presence seared into his mind. Her grin mocked the anger in Jurren’s heart.
The calm expression on her face suggested she was waiting for them. She tilted her head. “The Eternal has finally sent me Hess Bren’s wisest and most cunning to search for the chosen girl. Come with me, Kidelar and Jurren. We have much to discuss.”
What?
As she turned to walk away, Jurren felt someone press on his shoulder to move past him. Apparently, Kidelar was all too eager to follow this seer priestess into her lair.
Taking a few cautious steps forward, Jurren tried to take in the size of the cavern. The room went on forever in all directions. An unknown source lit the entire space as if the particles of air were self-luminous.
The woman walked along a path, followed closely by Kidelar. Pathetic. That scholar was following her like a pig followed a carrot to slaughter. Happily oblivious to the power in the hand of the one leading the way. And yet, what choice did Jurren have but to follow too? This woman was the closest thing he had to an answer for what happened to Tascana.
The words of the seer’s greeting stewed in Jurren mind. “The chosen girl?” Was his precious Little Mally chosen for this? And if so, by who? An answer tried to raise its hand and he slapped it away. He needed to focus on the present, not the what-ifs.