* * *
Aurelius was just reaching around to unbuckle his seat restraints when he saw the old man stir again. Gabrian was still knocked out by the stun blast, but the effects seem to be wearing off unusually quickly. At this rate, the old wrinkle bag will wake up before I can get back. Maybe I should stun him again. . . .
No sooner had he thought it than the old man woke up with a start. His head snapped around, pinioning Aurelius with a frosty blue glare. Aurelius's hand dropped to the butt of his pistol even as the old man’s lips began to move.
“Asharta teru aryms alu mer!”
And in that instant Aurelius's pistol flew out of its holster, traversing an arms length of thin air before slapping into the old man’s waiting palm.
Aurelius blinked stupidly. “What?”
“Your skill with self deception is impressive, elder. I can see it's going to take something truly dramatic for you to see the truth.”
“How did you do that?”
“Rational thought is a better blindfold than naïveté. I expected more from you.” Gabrian unstrapped himself from the copilot's chair and stood up. He gestured with the pistol to the cockpit door. “Let's go.” Aurelius hesitated and Gabrian shrugged. “Very well, if you won't go willingly, I'll just shoot you and leave you here until I come back.”
Aurelius gritted his teeth, but then turned and began walking back through his ship. He heard the old man's footsteps echoing softly behind him. “Where are we going?”
“To Dagheim. I sense that Malgore is near.”
“Dagheim?” Aurelius passed his hand over the inner airlock door controls, and the doors opened with a swish of frigid air. He'd left his helmet in the cockpit; he had a feeling he was about to regret that.
“The village you saw on the way here.”
Aurelius nodded. “Right. The village.” The outer airlock doors slid open and the cold hit him like a punch in the face. Snow swirled into the airlock, dusting his boots.
“Move,” Gabrian ordered, poking him in the ribs with his own gun.
“I'm moving!” Aurelius shot back. The chill cut almost instantly through Aurelius’s flight suit. He crossed his arms over his chest and hunched his shoulders to keep from shivering. They walked on in silence, their breath forming frosty white clouds as they went. They were crunching across a hardened layer of ice which had formed from repeated melting and freezing of the snow. Every now and then one of their feet would punch through the ice layer and they would sink in up to their knees in the soft powder underneath. The clearing was unbroken and undiminished by trees, as though it didn’t lie in the middle of a giant forest. An icy wind was kicking up hazy clouds of snow that obscured the horizon. Aurelius shot a quick look over his shoulder. He could no longer see the trees he’d flown over. Maybe he’d imagined them. After all, in the crash he had hit his head hard enough to black out.
After about 10 minutes of walking, Aurelius’s nose and ears were frozen to the point that he couldn’t feel them. His eyebrows and lashes were crusted with snow, and he felt shivery. Jagged shapes were beginning to slice through the hazy curtain of snow drawn across the horizon.
“There,” Gabrian said as they drew nearer and nearer to the twisted ruins Aurelius had seen from the air. “These ruins, and all the others like them scattered across Mrythdom are all that remain of your people, elder.”
“What are you talking about, Wrinkles? These aren’t ruins. They aren’t old enough. There must have been some kind of battle and . . .”
The broken spires and crumbling foundations of skyscrapers loomed over them now in all their stark reality. Aurelius couldn’t help but gape as they wove around the broken remains of what had clearly once been a modern city.
Once, a very long time ago.
The twisted alloy frames had all but eroded and rusted away, barely a trace of them remained. The concrete was pitted and pocked, the edges worn smooth by wind and weather. Only synthetics remained reasonably undiminished by the elements. Here lay a wedge of muddied styrofoam tumbling through the ruins, there fluttered a tattered sheet of dirty gray plastic, at his feet he saw a broken piece of colored glass, jutting out of the snow—its edges worn smooth by the wind. Last of all he saw a bright orange placard poking out of the snow, still pegged to a giant wedge of marble. It read:
Fogrim City Brigadiers.
Aurelius blinked. Forgim city? He’d been there only last year to deliver a shipment of arms. The Brigadiers were ex-military, and almost all of them had joined Freedom as a bitter consequence of finally realizing how much they’d done for the Dominion and how little the Dominion had done for them.
If these are the ruins of Fogrim city, then . . .
Aurelius abruptly stopped walking and Gabrian jabbed him in the ribs again with his pistol.
“Keep moving.”
Aurelius ignored him. “These ruins are centuries old.”
“Millennia.”
Aurelius shook his head and he felt his vision blur. The world spun crazily, and snowflakes danced before his eyes; then someone turned out the lights, and his thoughts ceased to trouble him.
* * *
Aurelius awoke with a loud, continuous scraping sound in his ears, like someone rubbing sandpaper on wood to scratch off the flecks of paint. He blinked his eyes open and found himself staring up at a cold, blue slice of sky with fluffy white clouds racing to snuff it out. His face felt numb and his head was throbbing. Where was he? What had happened?
As he glanced to the right and left, he saw that he was being dragged across the snow and ice on a dirty piece of plastic.
“Stop,” he groaned.
“You’re awake.”
The scraping sound stopped. He lifted his head to see Gabrian untying him. “What happened?”
“You could no longer deceive yourself about what has happened to you.”
Aurelius’s brow furrowed as he dredged up his last conscious memory. He’d been looking at a weathered placard which read Fogrim City Brigadiers, and then . . .
“So it’s true,” Aurelius said.
“Yes.”
“It’s impossible.”
Gabrian sighed. “Don’t relapse.”
Aurelius blinked up at him for a moment; then shook his head and sat up. He clapped a hand to his face and found he could barely feel the frozen material of his flight gloves against his bare skin. “I’m going to get frostbite if I don’t cover up soon.”
Gabrian stood and offered him the hand which wasn’t holding his staff. “Come. We are almost there.”
Aurelius eyed the old man’s hand dubiously, but he took it anyway, only to find a surprising reserve of strength lurking beneath Gabrian’s frail appearance. They began walking together toward the looming palisades of the town which Aurelius had thought to be a movie set. As they drew near, Aurelius noted the two guards standing before the reinforced doors. They carried wicked looking halberds and were clothed from head to toe in thick furs.
“Who are they?”
“Guardsmen of Nordom. Whatever you do, do not speak to them. I will do the talking.”
“Okay . . .”
They came within ten paces of the heavy wooden doors before Gabrian called out, “Greetings!”
The two guards dropped their halberds in a defensive position, preventing Gabrian and Aurelius from coming any closer. Aurelius eyed the frosted steel heads of their weapons. They wouldn’t pierce his armor, but he had a feeling a good jab from one of those would leave him a nasty bruise.
Gabrian waved his hand and whispered something Aurelius couldn’t quite make out; then he spoke in a strident voice: “We come in peace, men of Nordom. Let us pass to join your hunters, for we are weary with travel and in need of food and shelter for the night.”
The halberds wavered and one of the guards raised his. The other shook his head and responded in a querulous voice, “You come in peace? Yet why should we share our food and shelter with strangers?”
“We are skilled hunters and wi
ll make a worthy contribution to your hunt.”
The second guard raised his halberd and Gabrian started toward the gates. Aurelius followed cautiously. As they came within a few paces of the gate, the guards rapped on the doors in a complex pattern of knocks. A second later the doors swung slowly open with a groan and cracking of ice.
Gabrian and Aurelius started across the threshold, but the nearest guard caught Aurelius’s arm in an iron fist and loomed menacingly close. He was a giant of a man. “You’re not from around here, oudtlaander.” Aurelius blinked up at the man’s snowy blond beard and couldn’t help but notice the angry ridge of scar tissue running from his eye to his ear.
“No, I’m not.”
“Then watch your step.”
Aurelius nodded as the guard let him go with a shove. He stumbled forward and his foot caught on some unseen obstacle. He tumbled to the trampled, dirty snow, and his face scraped painfully against the icy ground. He bounced to his feet a second later and turned back to see what had caught his foot. He was just in time to see the guardsman move his leg out of doorway.
“Sorry. I was in need of a stretch.”
A vein began pulsing in Aurelius’s forehead and he took half a step forward before Gabrian called out behind him, “COME.”
Aurelius felt his body turn of its own accord and he began walking into the city, one wooden step after another. He heard the gates shut with a groan and a thud behind them, and then his body suddenly lost all its momentum, as if an unseen hand had been pushing him from behind and now it had stopped.
Aurelius glared daggers into Gabrian’s back. “You need to stop doing that.”
Gabrian stopped and turned, his lips curving into a wry smile. “Doing what?”
“You know . . .” Aurelius had to force himself to say it, because it still sounded ridiculous to him. “Magic.”
“Ah.” The old man nodded slowly.
“If we’re going to be allies, you can’t constantly be taking advantage of me.”
“Allies? Who ever said were we allies? You can help me, elder, and by helping me you will help yourself. That is all we are, acquaintances by convenience and necessity.”
Aurelius caught up to Gabrian and they resumed walking through the city. “So you’re just going to keep overriding my will whenever it pleases you.”
“I will do what I must. You are but a small player in a game as old as time, and I cannot afford to lose because you got in the way and I was too polite to push you aside.”
Aurelius frowned deeply and cast Gabrian a sidelong look. He realized that he couldn’t trust the old man.
He was going to have to look out for himself.
* * *
The town of Dagheim was one log cabin after the next, there thatched roofs coated in snow. The air was thick with the spicy fragrance of wood smoke and gamey meat. People draped in thick furs walked the streets; mothers carried their children in hammock shaped furs that were strapped around their necks; giant men strolled here and there with long broadswords strapped to their hips and wicked spears or halberds in hand. Aurelius estimated the average man to be two meters tall and the average woman to be only a few inches from that mark. They were all giants, made even more imposing by their thick fur coats. The majority had long golden hair, pale skin and eyes; though a scattered few had red or brown hair.
After a few minutes of walking, Gabrian ducked down a side street and into a busy, noisy square. It was a marketplace of some kind. As they pushed through the crowd, Aurelius noticed all the strange looks he was getting. People were glaring at him, sneering at him, doing nothing to veil their suspicion or contempt.
Their hospitality was underwhelming.
Gabrian squeezed between a pair of hulking men and Aurelius lost sight of him for a moment.
“Come, elder!”
Remembering his experience with the guardsman, Aurelius decided to weave a path around the two men in front of him. He found a relatively clear path along the storefronts to his right and he picked his way along there. He’d lost sight of Gabrian, but he had a feeling that the old man wouldn’t let him get too far away. Aurelius passed by a smithy. It was alive with the clanking of hammers on steel and the crackling and whooshing of a fiery furnace. Aurelius still couldn’t believe it. This was like something out of medieval lore; it couldn’t be real! And hadn’t Gabrian said he’d been brought to the future? So why did it look so much like the past? And what had happened to Fogrim city?
None of it made any sense.
Aurelius strolled past a storefront with an assortment of fur coats hanging up on display. He stopped to admire a few of them. They came in almost every conceivable color: slate gray, snow white, ash black, fire red, steel blue, and ruddy brown. Sometimes the colors were also mixed, and the coats were patched and streaked. Aurelius reached out to run a hand along the furs and found they were surprisingly coarse. Clearly they’d been skinned from some type of animal, but as far as he knew, fur trading was illegal, and moreover, he’d never seen such magnificent coats before. What animal could have produced them?
Yet more proof of Gabrian’s impossible story.
Aurelius moved on. Just as he rounded the rack of furs, a hand reached around and pulled him into the store. A furry brown coat was thrust at him.
“Put this on, Elder. You are attracting too much attention in antiquated raiment such as yours.”
Aurelius snorted at the irony of calling his armored, climate-controlled space suit “antiquated” but he was cold, so he gave no complaint as he shrugged into the coat. It came with a thick leather belt which he used to cinch the coat around his waist. He felt bulky and clumsy in the coat, but he suspected it would do a much better job of keeping him warm than his suit. Without his helmet, the suit’s climate control system was all but useless.
“What about my face?”
Gabrian tossed a wooly gray scarf at him. Aurelius promptly wrapped it around his neck and retreated his head into it like a turtle to its shell. He watched with his eyes barely peeking out above the scarf as Gabrian haggled with the chubby storekeeper. She had darting brown rat eyes and thick gray furs to match her stringy gray hair. He saw Gabrian place a few metal circles on the counter and watched the woman’s demeanor abruptly change from merely frosty to belligerent. Coins? Aurelius wondered. The only use such physical currency had in the world as he knew it was in a museum or a private collection. Of course, in such a technologically backward place, he supposed he could hardly expect them to use digital currency.
The storekeeper was gesturing violently and raising her voice while Gabrian tried in vain to calm her down. “You trying to cheat me, oudtlaander?” she shrilled. “You can’t even buy the scarf for that!”
Gabrian replied in that strange language he sometimes spoke, and Aurelius watched as the woman’s features suddenly went from angry to blank and confused. Abruptly she smiled and waved at them. Gabrian scooped his coins from the counter and turned to leave with a matching smile.
“What was that?” Aurelius asked as Gabrian guided him from the store.
“A bargain.”
“You were negotiating and then she gave up and let you have the clothes for free!”
“Yes.”
“You stole from her.”
Gabrian fixed him with narrow blue eyes. “I didn’t steal; she gave us the clothes.”
“You did something!”
“Did I?”
“Yes!”
“Aurelius. Our need is greater than hers. Were it not so, I would show her charity. And if the world were more as is should be, I would not have to compel her to do what she aught, yet when her life reaches its end, she will receive her due, if not from me, then from the gods she worships.”
“And if those gods don’t exist?” Aurelius challenged.
“That is not our problem. She has placed her trust in them, and there it lies for better or worse.”
“You’re confusing the issue.”
“Then let me simplify i
t, elder.” Gabrian stopped walking in the middle of the bustling crowds. Aurelius felt men and women jostling him roughly as they pushed past, a few turned to look at him, as if anticipating or looking for a fight. Aurelius tried to ignore them. “You will freeze to death if you don’t have these clothes. I do not have the money to provide them for you. She will not give you the clothes if you merely ask her nicely,” Gabrian said, pointing back to the storekeeper. “Therefore, make your choice. You can go back and give them to her, or you can look out for yourself. What will it be?” Aurelius hesitated. “And remember you did not steal. The fault is mine; you are merely benefiting by it.”
Aurelius heaved a sigh. “You don’t make it very easy to do the right thing, do you?”
Gabrian smiled and took a step toward him. His voice dropped to a whisper as he said, “And what is the right thing, Aurelius? Can you see all the consequences of your actions and judge them right or wrong?”
“No.”
“No one can. Not even I. Therefore, live your life with good intentions if that is important to you, but the consequences and therefore the rightness and wrongness of your actions are fundamentally unknowable.”
With that, Gabrian spun away in a swirl of his brown robes and stalked off, leaving Aurelius frowning after him. Reluctantly, he followed Gabrian through the milling crowds. A dangerous philosophy to live by, he thought, glaring at the old man’s back.
Aurelius wondered if the old man would apply the same convenient philosophy if his own well-being were at stake. He suspected not.
Chapter 5
They stood before an arching entrance to a towering chalet. Giant, knobby wooden beams supported the entrance to either side, and an elaborately carved sign hung above the doors.
“The Firestone Brewery,” Aurelius read.
Gabrian walked up to the heavy wooden doors and pushed them open. A raucous noise poured out, men cheering and singing, glasses clinking, and a booming backdrop of drum beats that could hardly be called music.
“Come,” Gabrian beckoned, holding the doors open.
Mrythdom: Game of Time Page 4