by Oxford, Rain
“You said something about there being more gravity?”
“I wasn’t lying. With the same density and greater size, the mass of Duran is greater.”
“Therefore, more gravity,” I concluded, nodding.
“You’ll get used to it,” he assured me.
I noticed him chewing on something and remembered my shriveled up stomach. “Is there anything to eat?”
“Well, apparently you don’t like volcram or milwyd.” He made a face and I almost laughed. “You’ll probably like murk, but they’re rare this time of year. We can find something when I’m done.” He bent over the pile of split logs and snapped off a piece of bark. “Chew on this while you wait. It’ll help you with your dizziness. How’s your arm?”
I looked at the bandage around my arm. “I had actually forgotten about it. It doesn’t hurt.” I took the bark and eyed it suspiciously. “What is this?”
“The bark of a Wigknot tree. It has excellent medical properties, but it is an acquired taste. I used the leaves in the medicine I put on your arm.”
I cautiously stuck the small piece of bark in my mouth. “Peppermint,” I said. It was the best bark I ever tried. Edward shrugged and continued chopping. There was a dishearteningly large pile of wood left to be chopped. “Is there another axe?” I asked.
He glanced at me but continued to chop. “You’re not ready for much physical labor. If you don’t remember it, I can describe to you how you accidentally cooked yourself.” He stopped. “But don’t take me as someone to let you slack off. When you’re healed, I expect you to be ready to work harder than you ever have.”
“Mother said the same thing to me about fifty times. You can’t be worse than her,” I said. He continued to chop with a new smirk on his face. He must have had a long time to work on his expressions to perfect such a smirk. “How old are you, exactly?”
“Probably older than you will ever be.”
I sat on the steps of the porch and asked Edward questions. The wood pile shrank quicker than I thought it would have, and by the time it was very low, I had decided that I really liked Wigknot bark.
When I asked him about the other lands of Duran, he gave me a bunch of names and descriptions that were challenging to remember. Besides Shomodii, Anoshii, and Canjii, there was also Banjii, Tumordii, Mokii, Mijii, and Zendii. Zendii was the Hawaii of Duran; it was the always sunny place of beaches and paradise. In other words; a place to avoid. Tumordii was a farm land, where it was sunny every day and rained every few nights. Banjii was a place of military and strict discipline. The schools there were hard to get through, and cost a fortune. The people in general tended to be jittery, stuck up, and suspicious. Mokii was the only land with kingdoms, which sounded very medieval when Edward described them. And Mijii was pretty much the opposite of Banjii, sort of like Shomodii without all the wizards and erratic weather.
Out of all of them, Shomodii sounded like the most fun, minus the unpredictable weather that consisted of windstorms, rainstorms, snowstorms, sandstorms, radiation storms, and firestorms. There were several small villages here, but they were few and far between.
I was also horrified when I found that on the other side of the cabin was an outhouse. That was going to be aggravating. I was even more horrified when I had to ask Edward where the bathtub was.
“What’s a bathtub?” he asked innocently.
I thought I was going to break down again. “It’s a tub you fill with water and clean yourself in. You know, with soap and all that.” He stopped chopping and gave me a look. “You’re joking.”
“Of course I am. I know what a bathtub is.”
Thank god.
“I just don’t have one. On Shomodii, there is no plumbing, so people must heat their bathwater manually.”
“So I’ll never get a warm bath again?” I asked, my fried heart breaking.
“There is a natural hot springs on my territory that is warm and very sanitary,” he said. He continued chopping and had only a couple logs left.
I thought about what I would need at Anoshii other than clothes and could only think of one thing. “Anoshii doesn’t have any ketchup, does it?” I asked when Edward was finished chopping. “I’m going to miss ketchup. Do you even have tomatoes here? Can we get food now?”
He regarded the clear sky and leaned his axe against the cabin wall. “Alright.” He went back into the house and I waited for a moment before he came out with two shot guns. The look I gave him made him frown. “You aim the barrel at the animal and push the little trigger. I know you have guns on Earth.”
“We do, it’s just… you have no indoor plumbing, and yet you have high-powered guns. I find that ironic.”
“How did you suppose I hunted?”
“Magic?” It felt silly coming out of my mouth and Edward rolled his eyes. I guess some things really are universal. “What are we hunting? Anything in particular?”
“No, nothing in particular. Avoid the… just ask me before you shoot. Don’t even bother with things that fly.”
“I think this is going to be a long hunt.”
We headed off into the woods. There were no bugs at all that I could see, though there were many birds. Some were small, some were large, and just about all of them were very colorful. The small ones flew like bats from tree to tree while the larger one soared high above the trees like hawks. Edward enjoyed pointing them out and naming them, but I only remembered one; a dull black one called a phoenix.
After an hour or so of strolling, I got tired of Edward complaining that I walked too loudly, so we sat down by a tree. “Perhaps, if you’re quiet, the animals will all come back. Seriously, you need to work on your footing.”
“This world is so heavy I’m surprised I can walk at all. How am I ever going to get used to this? I’m never going to be able to hunt on my own here if I can barely walk fast. This will destroy my bone structure.”
“You complain a lot. Give it time. After a few weeks, you’ll still feel heavy, but if you were to go back to your world, you’d feel much lighter than you did.”
“Can I see my book?” Edward shrugged and took it out of his bag. He must have replaced the strap of the bag, because it didn’t look sewn. I opened it and considered the names. “The god of Earth… What’s his name?”
“Her name is Tiamat,” he answered. I stared at him with wide eyes. “What?” he asked, startled by my reaction.
“I’ve heard of her.”
“Don’t believe anything you’ve heard about her. I’ve never met her, but I hear she’s the most pleasant god. She doesn’t torture her Guardian and she cares about her people more than the others do. Ronez knew her, and he never had anything bad to say.”
“In mythology on my world, Tiamat, also known as Thalattē, was the Sumerian dragon of chaos and the personification of saltwater. She and Apsu, the personification of freshwater, were the creators of the first gods, Lachmu and Lachamu, who went on to have more deities. Then Apsu became frustrated with their children and decided to kill them. The deity Ea killed him in his sleep before he could do this, though and Tiamat became angry and decided to kill her descendants. She made an army of monsters and convinced her new consort, the god Kingu, to lead the army. She gave him the Tablet of Destiny. Supposedly, whoever possessed the tablet ruled the universe.
“The gods knew they couldn’t defeat Tiamat, so they bribed Marduk, the storm god and son of Ea, to fight her army and destroy her, with the promise that he will become their supreme ruler. He defeated Tiamat by cutting her in half to make the sky and the earth. Out of Kingu’s blood he created humans. He took the Tablet of Destiny, but gave it to Anu as a gift.”
I understood the dead stare Edward gave me; it wasn’t the first time I got that response. People usually couldn’t figure out if I was a nerd or some history nut. Then, when they found out how prone I was to accidents and natural disasters, they usually avoided me altogether.
“You…”
“I love psychology, philosophy,
and mythology.” As well as paleontology and ancient scripture.
Edward thought for a moment. “I haven’t heard a human’s version of this story in a few hundred years. The people of Duran, of course, have a much better version, which is just as wrong. Supposedly, the truth is as unpopular with the gods as the tales told.
“Tiamat was no dragon, but they were some of her most beautiful creatures. She wanted to protect them, but the humans insisted on killing them off. Tiamat was creative, smart, and was very protective of her dragons. To some, this is enough to call her chaotic. She was much like a brilliant child. She would destroy species not because it was logical but because they didn’t work.
“The Tablet of Destiny was actually a set of five books. As an all-knowing god, she didn’t like keeping her knowledge to herself; she wanted to share it with her world. When humans had advanced enough to learn, she went to Earth, divided up the knowledge, and gave each part to four humans. There was too much for any one of them to know it all. They wrote this knowledge in four books, given to them by her, and gave them all the language of Enochian. These are the Tablet of Destiny.”
“But you said there were five books.” He gave me a deadpan stare until it dawned on me. “The book. Tiamat’s book was the fifth?”
He nodded. “After they were given the knowledge, though, the humans realized she never told them one thing; how the gods were created. They asked her but she refused to tell them. She had made the humans too curious, however, and they kept asking. Tiamat became frustrated, so she took the Tablet of Destiny and left Earth. The humans started teaching the knowledge to others and that angered the gods. Apsu, who was a demon, decided to kill the humans. Apsu was no consort to Tiamat but a foe. She gave the four humans incredible powers- even more power than a Guardian had. One of the humans, the one you call Kingu, was the leader, and she gave him her own book. With their knowledge and power, they destroyed Apsu.
“Apsu’s companion was horrified, so she sent her son, Murduk, after Tiamat and the humans. Tiamat didn’t want to fight Murduk because the humans would then learn to kill, so she made a deal with him that if he would forever leave the humans alone, she would take the four and leave to the Land of the Gods.”
“Angels!” I said.
“That’s right. The four humans had children of their own, though not many. Sometimes they would visit Earth and the humans began to call them angels.
“Murduk was afraid to fight Tiamat and her humans, so he took her deal under the condition that he got the Tablet of Destiny. Tiamat added that he must stay on Earth to protect the humans from the other gods. He agreed and Tiamat left with the four humans.”
“So she left a demon in charge of protecting humans?”
“According to mythology, she had many unorthodox allies. But Murduk was not a pleasant demon and he was jealous of Tiamat. He told many tales of Tiamat being a terrible creature. Many years later, the daughter of Kingu came to Earth and met Murduk, who quickly fell in love with her. He gave her the Tablet of Destiny and she returned it to Tiamat.”
“Well, that’s… a much cooler story.” I let it soak in for a few minutes. “How do you know all that if you never met her?”
“Not even the Guardians know everything about the gods. This is no more than one of the bedtime stories told to Ronez and me, but it is far more accurate than the stories told on Earth and Duran. Even sago know there are only twelve gods. On Duran, twelve is a number of magic, and a child’s twelfth birthday is special.”
“So Tiamat was willing to give power to the humans and side with them over another god. Is it unusual for the gods to turn against each other like that?”
“As far as I’ve gathered, very. Sometimes it seems like she is an innocent, playful, naive child compared to the other gods, and sometimes it seems like she is much more powerful, lethal, beautiful, and wise than them.”
I considered this for a while. “What are the other gods like?”
“The only god I’ve ever met was Erono, the god of Duran.” He turned the pages in my book to the very front and pointed to a name. It looked Hebrew. “That’s Tiamat’s signature. Each god signs their own book, but no other god can sign his name in it. The gods don’t need the books to travel between worlds.”
We sat in silence for a while. At first, it was a comfortable silence, but then it slowly came over me just how different my life would be. I didn’t know the culture, the language, the food… I couldn’t call Vivian. “Vivian loved the rainforest. She would have loved to see this. She’s going to be so mad at me when she finds out I’m not coming back.”
Edward frowned. “I thought she would be upset, not mad. Did you love her?”
I leaned my head back against the tree. “I never said it, but I think so.”
“You’ll fall in love again someday. The first time you lose someone to old age, you’ll realize what immortality is.”
“Time is a great healer, but an even greater thief. You gain the power and the history, your life becomes rich with the joys of the world, and your soul becomes empty with the ripping away of everything that made those joys enjoyable.”
I couldn’t discern Edward’s frown. “Have you ever tried seeking a therapist?”
I laughed. “How do you deal with immortality?”
“What else would I do? There’s no way around it, so I have to accept it.” He pointed to a spot deep in the woods, where a creature resembling a deer-sized cow was grazing. It had the black-and-white pattern and shape of a cow, but was much smaller and skinnier. “That’s a yorkie. It’s tough and sweet, but very satisfying.”
“A yorkie? Mother had a yorkie that tried to eat me.” I nearly laughed at his startled expression. “A yorkie is a small dog on my world.” I raised the gun at the animal and imagined it barking at me. I tried to pull the trigger, but it wouldn’t budge. Edward’s gun went off and the animal burst off at a run.
I lowered the gun to examine it, but I couldn’t understand why it hadn’t gone off. Edward very slowly reached for a little button behind the trigger and pressed it. “That’s a safety button. You can’t shoot with it on.”
“Why do guns even have safety buttons?” I growled, completely humiliated.
“It’s safer. Let’s get the yorkie and get home.”
“Are you certain you got him? I was sure he took off.”
He started forward, so agile and light that I felt even clumsier than I was. “I never miss,” he finally said.
Sure enough, the animal was only a few feet from where it’d been shot. It looked more like a deer than it had from a distance. Its fur was long and white with large black splotches. Luckily, it was actually dead, because to see the animal suffering on the brink of death would have been too much.
“What? Death doesn’t make you sick, does it?” Edward asked regarding my mien, which must have expressed my pity.
Of course not; I welcome it with open arms. “No, it’s just that Vivian was a tree hugger. She was anti-hunting.” And so was I, even if I wouldn’t admit it. I thought hunting for food was different than hunting for sport, but a dead animal was a dead animal, and I didn’t want to be the cause of its death. I just didn’t want to starve, either. Besides, I was no vegetarian.
Edward nodded his understanding. “This is different than your world’s love of sport hunting. Meat is a necessary part of the diet, but maybe you would prefer fishing,” he suggested.
“I hate fish.”
“That’s fine. There are no fish around Shomodii; they’re afraid of the bigger sea creatures here.” He picked up the yorkie easily.
Once back at my new home, Edward started breaking down the yorkie while I started trying to build a fire. Edward told me Duran did have matches and lighters, but he didn’t have any since most wizards just used magic. So I tried the stick method. Soon, I came to the conclusion there was no such thing. Friction from sticks couldn’t really make fire; the ancestors were lying.
Edward came to see my dry, cold logs. �
��Why haven’t you started the fire?”
“The logs are faulty. They’re not flammable.”
Edward set the clumps of meat on the large rocks surrounding the burn logs. He picked up the grill gate and set it down on top, then arranged the meat on it. When he took his hands away, the wood suddenly came alive with flames. He had set the fire without any work.
“Show off.”
He grinned and sat down on the ring of logs placed around the fire. “Fire is easy for most people, especially emotional people like you.” I glared at him, but he ignored me. “There is magic energy, much like the physical energy you know of, that is in everything. Your mind is able to control this energy, which enables you to impact your surroundings. However, you put your soul into what you do, so the magic you do shapes you. If you use it to kill a person, you will be hurting or even destroying your soul.”
“What about that creature I killed?”
“It was not a person; it was a mindless killer with no soul. You have a lot of raw power that you need to learn to control. The energy reacts to your emotions when your mind is not in control.”
The yorkie was done by then and I got a decently large chunk, but I waited to see if there was any weird Duran way of eating. He raised it to his mouth and mumbled something before he bit into it, but otherwise ignored me. He didn’t seem to like to talk while he ate.
The food was tough, lean, and very red, though cooked thoroughly. Edward had glass plates and knives, but no forks, and he didn’t seem to notice that it was very hot. It was sweet, as Edward said it would be, but he should have warned me that it was pretty salty. My eyes were watering before my hunger had subsided enough to stop eating.
“Is there anything to drink?”
“There’s water, milwyd juice, and Kamitsue juice. I don’t suggest the milwyd juice; I think you’re allergic to it. Stay here.” He got up and started for the porch.
“Do you think I’ll run off and get lost?”
“Possibly. If you do, an animal will take the food, so don’t run off,” he said. I gave him a sour look as he went inside. He came out a few minutes later with a large, black clay jar and two small matching cups. When he handed me one of the cups, I was surprised to find it as heavy as stone, and I imagined what the large carafe weighed.