Black Sea Gods: Chronicles of Fu Xi

by Braden, Brian

  ***

  Behind the children, the villagers came running, the fields and rice paddies forgotten in their rush to welcome me home.

  I never grew accustomed to the changes. Like a splash of cold mountain water, there was no way to brace myself for it. Boys were now young men, sweet maidens were now mothers, and mothers were now old women. Absent smiles were freshly carved stones in the burial ground, but there would be time for mourning later.

  At midnight on the first full moon after my return, long after the wine and merriment were over, I would walk through the stone garden and remember. Sometimes Mother joined me, arm in arm, and spoke of how my friends lived and died in my long absence.

  At each grave stone, Mother recalled a name and story. Here was an old man who passed in his sleep, a young bride who died in childbirth, or a stillborn baby. In the moonlight, away from the eyes of sleeping mortals, my tears ran freely. Mother never cried, though I often heard sadness in her voice.

  I once asked her why she never cried.

  “The day when the gods finally weep for the woes of mortals, the world will drown in our tears.”

  The Chronicle of Fu Xi

  ***

  Fu Xi carried many woes. He had witnessed dark and mysterious things since the last time he saw Tortoise Mountain. The icelands were retreating. Vultures and maggots ignored the dead and black demons stirred in the streams and rivers. The previous night the stars fell from the sky in sheets of dazzling light. What would she tell him of these signs and omens? What would she tell him about the men of Wu?

  He sorely needed his mother’s council, but his troubles could wait a little while longer. The happiness of the present demanded his full attention. Fu Xi rode in silence for a spell longer, savoring all the expectations of his imminent homecoming.

  “Yes, the peasant daughters of Nushen are the fairest in the land. Ahh, they are so well-fed and beautiful.”

  Fu Xi frowned for a moment and patted his horse.

  “You know, of course, I cannot consider the pleasures of soft flesh without the delights of rice wine. Please, do not be offended, but you are definitely my favorite thing in the world except for women and rice wine.”

  Suddenly, he remembered the women of the Palace of Wu and a cold wave of shame interrupted his happiness.

  Fu Xi gazed upon the temple longingly and sighed. “Perhaps I shall sleep upon my own bed tonight.” He thought about the silken bed roll, stuffed with the softest wool, sitting next to the family dinner table. He wondered if his mother had already unrolled it.

  Of course it is unrolled. She always prepared for him.

  “Perhaps I am too hasty.” He smiled, his good mood reasserting itself. “You are my favorite thing in the world except for women, wine and a good night’s sleep.”

  Fu Xi readjusted his numb bottom, ready to stretch his legs. Only a thin, roughhewn blanket separated him from the animal. He guided the beast with a simple harness and bit of iron, wood and rope.

  The bridle is adequate, but perhaps some type of leather seat strapped to the horse’s back might be in order. His mother taught him the skill of leather craft and he, in turn, introduced it across Cin. He would put it to good use fashioning some manner of cushion.

  The trail widened as he rounded a bend. Up ahead, a small stone bridge arched over a defile, at the bottom of which ran a stream. Usually, it was almost dry this time of year. However, now it bubbled vibrant and full.

  As Fu Xi crossed over, he suspiciously eyed the water. No black shapes slithered through it. He breathed a sigh of relief that his mother’s realm hadn’t been defiled. The stone bridge marked the boundary of his mother’s domain. Nushen, the Village of the Goddess, lay about a half a mile beyond.

  I’m home.

  ***

  The gong sounded from the heart of the sanctuary, announcing my return. The convent’s gates flew open and the acolytes rushed out of the compound. The Holy Mothers could only smile and get out of the way. From the youngest acolyte of six summers to those on the cusp of womanhood, the girls were usually dressed in their white cotton work clothes.

  When I returned there was no ceremony or pomp. On those glorious days the acolytes could be children again. Like small white flowers in a summer field, they intermixed with the jubilant crowd of peasants surrounding me.

  Drums and flutes joined with laughter as I let the crowd carry me into the convent courtyard.

  The Chronicle of Fu Xi

  ***

  Smells, more than the sights of home, warmed his heart and filled his spirit with nostalgia. Fu Xi took a deep breath and closed his eyes, letting the familiar scents fill him. Heavy foundations of musky earth and moss supported the crisp, airy scents of falling leaves and honeysuckle. He knew these would give way to the warm odors of harvest fields, jasmine, and the cooking fires of Nushen. It wasn’t just the smells that made this forest unique in all of Cin, it was its gentleness. Other forests were dangerous. Nuwa, the Goddess of Tortoise Mountain, protected this one and all who dwelt here were safe from harm.

  Excitement stirred in his chest, and for a fleeting moment, Fu Xi wanted to spur the horses into a gallop and race into Nushen.

  On second thought, perhaps not.

  He laughed softly as he remembered the first village he travelled through on his journey home. They fled in terror when they saw him approaching on horseback, thinking him a two-headed monster. He quickly learned the wisdom of dismounting and walking the horses whenever he approached a settlement.

  No, I will go slowly and savor the moment.

  Judging by the colorful leaves, harvest was underway. The acolytes, under the watchful eyes of the Holy Mothers, would be busy pouring freshly reaped grain into the granaries. The village courtyard would be packed with large pots of rice waiting to be placed in the cellar storehouse under the kitchens. In the cool of the evening there would be music in the air and rice paper lanterns hanging over the courtyard.

  Fu Xi always preferred the Harvest Festival to spring’s Offering Festival. Food, drink and light-hearted celebration marked the Harvest Festival. Offering Festival’s somber purpose tended to put a damper on things.

  Fu Xi always spent the first few months home catching up on village gossip. The Holy Mothers and his friend Tiejiang would fill him in on everything he’d missed.

  Tiejiang will be getting along in years. Is he too old for blacksmithing? Fu Xi didn’t want to consider the possibility Tiejiang might have passed into the stone garden.

  Fu Xi knew he’d been gone several years, though how many he wasn’t sure. Time was like water added to the painter’s brush — too much and the pigment of life becomes pale and diluted. Time slowed even more so in the Palace of Wu.

  Fu Xi thought again of what he witnessed in that land across the Sunrise Sea, a place he once thought of as the edge of the world. He knew better now. The world was much bigger than he ever dreamed, far grander than the land of Cin. Now home was more precious than ever.

  She sends me abroad more often, as if she wants me away from Nushen. Maybe this time I can stay. There are enough names in the world and my soul is no longer restless.

  Heise suddenly stopped and pranced nervously. Huise whinnied and pulled against the rope.

  “Whoa...” Fu Xi pulled back on the reins and halted the horses. He sat high and looked about.

  Sometimes mother allows predators into her forest when the deer become too numerous. It’s likely a bear or a wolf, though I do not remember them hunting so close to the Honey Lotus Bridge.

  When Nuwa permitted predators into her domain, she always lingered nearby to protect the village, but Fu Xi didn’t sense her spirit.

  He’d come to trust his horses’ instincts and pulled the lance from the pack tied to the Heise’s flank.

  “Well, my friends, if it’s a wolf or tiger, I’ll wager I can spear it.”

  A whiff of smoke assaulted his senses. It wasn’t the wood smoke of a cooking fire or a smoldering forest, but the acrid stenc
h of hate, of something aflame which had no business burning. Objects fashioned by the hand of man were being destroyed for no other purpose except a blood lust.

  Disbelief seized him. Those smells, so common beyond these sheltered lands, were impossible in the goddess’s dominion.

  He quickly dismounted and led the horses into the trees; all the while carefully looking about to make sure he wasn’t being watched. Fu Xi loosely tied the horses to a tree. If they needed to escape they could pull free with one tug. If danger truly existed up ahead, he didn’t want to endanger them.

  Patting Heise’s nose, he whispered to the horses, “Be still, be silent. I will return for you. If danger comes, run and I will find you.”

  He returned the lance, a tool for slaying animals, to Heise’s pack. Fu Xi needed a weapon to kill men...or monsters.

  He pulled a lanyard and opened the heavier pack on Huise’s back. Fu Xi half-expected to see the familiar leather-wrapped hilt of his trusty bronze sword. That blade, however, lay broken on a distant shore. He drew the Red Sword from his pack.

  Fu Xi hadn’t removed the precious gift during the entire journey home. The slender, slightly curved orichalcum blade felt good in his hand. The blood-colored metal gleamed dully in the cool shadows. He lightly flicked his wrist to and fro as the light blade cut the air with a metallic whoosh.

  He put his hat on top of Huise’s pack, which also held the Red Armor. For a moment he considered donning the armor, but chose the speed and stealth afforded by his soft wool trousers and loose cotton tunic.

  He turned and peered into the dimming forest. The reek permeated the windless air like an invisible fog, an abomination assaulting his boreal sanctuary.

  Fu Xi knew Nushen had been violated, though by what he did not know.

  Until I fully grasp the scope of this threat I will avoid the road and cut through the forest to the village.

  The youthful twinkle in his eye vanished. The God of Names raced into the forest, sword in hand, toward his home.

  ***

  As always, we eventually found our way under the willow tree in the courtyard. My friends crowded around me. Above us, festival lanterns softly glowed as fireflies blinked amongst the willow’s branches. Hugs, tears, and laughter pressed upon me from all sides. A cup of rice wine appeared in one hand and a sweet cake in the other. I was home and, for now, my restless soul content.

  If the gentle reader of these words wonders why the script is less than graceful or the ink might smear across the parchment, I humbly seek your forgiveness. My strong hand trembles and my keen eyes mist. Each memory is a sweet cut, fresh and cruel. I must put down my brush and listen to the desert wind, for these words fill me with unbearable pain.

  Nushen will forever be my home.

  The Chronicle of Fu Xi

  12. The Beast And The Black River

  Beware, oh Children of the Sea.

  Death is the sudden chill in a warm summer current. It is the rotten smell along a lonely shore. It is the slime that unexpectedly slips through the toes on a sandy bottom, or black ice on a cloudy winter day.

  Mothers, watch your children as they play on the dock. Fathers, tread the deep with vigilance. For the water demon rises from the depths to steal your next breath. - Chant of the Patesi-le

  The Chronicle of Fu Xi

  ***

  “Wuh-What is it?” Ood-i jabbed the hairy mass of dead flesh with his spear. His spear barely penetrated the shaggy, dark brown hide.

  “A giant, of course,” Ba-lok said with smug certainty.

  “It is huge, but it doesn’t look like the giants in the stories of my youth,” Ghalen said.

  “I’ve seen something like this before,” Aizarg muttered as he circled the hulking corpse. “Only it was somewhat different.”

  “Yes, I remember now,” Levidi said. “There were several of them in the Valley of the Beasts, only they weren’t as hairy.”

  At first, Aizarg had thought it a pile of sticks and brush coated with dead grass and mud. Only when they neared the bank of the swollen river did they realize they gazed upon a dead beast of breathtaking size. Its four legs, which still lay in the water, were like tree trunks. The rest of the beast lay on its side on the grassy bank. What Aizarg thought were dry sticks protruding from the pile were instead two large horns curled back into each other with a long, snakelike nose curled on the ground between them. Even on its side, the creature loomed over the party. In life it would have been twice as high as a man and might have weighed more than fifty horses.

  “I wager it drowned far upstream,” Ghalen said. “I do not know what manner of creature this is, but it’s been dead for some time. The eyes are gone and its belly is burst.” He wrinkled his nose at the putrid smell.

  “It must have been a muh-magnificent creature in life,” Ood-i said. “Imagine trying t-to hunt such an animal!”

  Setenay poked it with her stick. She sniffed at the carcass and looked to the sky with a wary eye.

  “Sarah?” Aizarg asked. “Do you know what this thing is called?”

  Sarah faced the river. She wrapped her arms tightly around her shoulders as if cold, though the late morning sun shone pleasantly warm.

  “Sarah?” Aizarg repeated.

  She turned around as if snapped out of a trance.

  “What is wrong, child?” Setenay asked.

  Sarah ignored the dead creature and looked out across the swift river. “This river...every time I made this journey it was only a delicate stream, barely knee high and only a few paces across.”

  Aizarg came alongside her and looked across the water. The ridges on both sides were sliced open by the river, exposing sheer cliffs of rich black soil. The river cut through cliffs in the ridge to the north, flowed wide and swift across the shallow valley for about a mile, and then disappeared through another set of cliffs in the ridge to the south. A low roaring sound filled the air and seemed to emanate from both sets of cliffs, though Aizarg could not detect the source.

  Aizarg surveyed the immediate area of the river. The soggy grass outside the banks bent over in the direction of the current, as if recently under water. Clumps of dead grass, flotsam and sticks formed a high water mark several dozen yards away from the bank, which continued to expand away from the river as he looked toward the southern cliffs.

  “This river was even bigger a few days ago,” Aizarg commented, pressing his sandaled foot into the squishy ground. “This whole area was covered in water.”

  “Why wouldn’t it just run along the low ground we’ve been traveling through instead of cutting though the high ridge?” Ba-lok said.

  “Because, young sco-lo-ti, that means the ground we’ve been traveling on has been slowly going downhill, and on the other side of this river it must go back up hill,” Aizarg jabbed the ground with the dull end of his spear. “Water spirits eat soft clay like this easily. When enough water backed up against the southern ridge and could not easily flow through the small pass, the spirits simply made a bigger hole in the ridge. I suspect the water backed up on the other side of the northern ridge until the spirits opened those cliffs. The water gushed through and flooded this low land, and then ate away at the southern ridge.”

  “Hmm. Perhaps,” Ba-lok said, almost dismissively. “Or this river has always been here and Sarah is lost.”

  “I know where we are!” Sarah snapped back at Ba-lok. “The river is larger.”

  “Stop it!” Aizarg commanded and scolded Ba-lok. “Even a child could not get lost following the low ground. The path is clear. I believe her. The question before us now is how to cross.”

  “Uros,” Okta said. “The river’s current is as swift as I’ve ever seen. It will push us significantly downstream as we swim across. If we enter here, there is a chance we could get swept beyond the southern cliffs and to points beyond. We don’t know what lies on the other side of the ridge, and there may be no place to pull ourselves out of the water. I suggest we cross as close as we can to the northern ridge, givi
ng us the whole expanse between the ridges to gain the opposite shore.”

  “An excellent idea, sco-lo-ti,” Aizarg nodded. He turned north along the shore and the others followed.

  The northern ridge rose only about a quarter mile from the dead beast. Aizarg could smell the freshly exposed dirt of the soft cliffs as they approached. The grassy shore rose to a sharp, crumbling embankment and then transformed into cliffs with no shore. Shreds of grass overhung the top of the cliffs, as if the ground was ripped out from underneath its roots. The water boiled and roared as it rushed over ragged exposed boulders between the two cliffs. As it moved away from the cliffs it settled down, but still moved rapidly.

  Aizarg stopped where the flat shore gave way to the embankment.

  “Have you ever seen water churn and boil like that?” Levidi asked Aizarg, raising his voice to make it heard above the water.

  “Never.”

  This was the dull roar he’d heard while standing next to the dead beast. All the rivers and estuaries in the marshes were slow and lazy. Their bottoms were sandy and giant rocks of this magnitude were unthinkable. Here, the water washed away the hill and exposed the very bones of the earth.

  Aizarg and the men silently considered the river. Setenay walked as far up the embankment as she could and examined the cliffs.

  Aizarg didn’t like this river; it had a wicked look to it. Sticks and small logs quickly drifted by. Downstream of the rapids, silt completely blackened the water. Eddies and swirls formed and reformed in the dark water, testifying to back currents lurking just below the water.

  Eddies and back currents indicate deep water. This wild river has many secrets. Aizarg looked back downstream at the dead animal. If this river killed that giant, we must give it proper respect.

  Aizarg pointed to his immediate right, where the white water settled down to flat water. “This is a good place to cross,” Aizarg shouted above the roar of the rushing waters to his left, trying to exude confidence. “We have a long stretch of flat shoreline on the eastern side to make a landing, though I think it will only push us downstream perhaps halfway to the dead giant. Everyone, prepare to swim.”