When Darkness Begins

by Tina O’Hailey

  Aithagg mumbled a reply then stood unsteadily on his feet. Smiled crookedly. Disappeared.

  Cold air collapsed into the place he had stood.

  11 SECRETS

  Eterili moved quickly for someone her age. She urged the adolescent group to move forward as fast as their legs would carry them. They had to move in-between time so they constantly moved at night. There was no safe place to slumber. It would take a moon cycle without sleep for them to reach the coastal land where the ritual site awaited.

  The teens moved well and their enthusiasm for their destination helped them keep up the pace. The universe and time trudged along in its linear existence ahead of them. The ritual site they went to no longer existed even in their home-time. They would have to go back in time to when the ritual moment was forty thousand winters prior to their home-time. The teenage youngsters did not know why. They did not know what awaited them. Eterili followed. She urged them to go further, travel faster, keep moving.

  The moon hung over them, an incandescent sneer.

  Aithagg caught up to the group quickly. The trail ahead of him stood out as bright as the moon. Hundreds, thousands of Vechey had traveled this path in the past ten thousand years and their ghosts filled the woods. He need not have feared being seen. The ghost images of travelers past were so thick it was like walking through an evening fog.

  Absently, Aithagg wondered which one of these bright-eyed adolescents had been his siblings or her siblings. Which had lived? Which were doomed to die at the ritual? He brushed the thoughts away and concentrated through the mists of past travelers to find the most current travelers so he would not accidentally cross their paths. Surely, he was not the first to follow to learn the secrets of the ritual. A particular clump of ghost images ahead in the woods caught his eye.

  A group had stopped here and gathered around a fallen comrade. The injured boy grasped his ankle and writhed in pain. There had been a commotion around the fallen young man and then Eterili had approached. She gestured, and the group fell away. One by one, they turned and left their friend. They looked over their shoulder, then turned and continued on their path towards the ritual site. Eterili inspected the boy’s injured ankle.

  Aithagg turned to look through the ghosts of the past to see what had caused the injury. He focused slightly so the images shifted and cleared but was careful not to shift into the time of the event. He saw the snake that had bit the boy. The boy had tried to hide the bite and continued on. It had not taken long, the pain must have become unbearable and then he had collapsed. Turning back Aithagg looked closer at the collapsed boy. The shell sewn into his tunic was marked with two square shapes: a relation to Catha, part of the Uakig clan. That would explain the snakebite. Snakes and smaller pests did not bother the Vechey. Linear blood, however, was food for more than the Vechey. This ancestor of Catha must have been as she was—not maturing, as a Vechey should.

  In the mist images, Eterili had given the boy a small potion bag and then walked away. He had crawled to a nearby tree and sat without moving. He took the contents of the potion bag, consumed them, and then moved no more.

  Aithagg stared until he shifted into the time and sat next to the boy’s corpse. This was what death of his kind looked like. He considered, death to a kind that was more Linear than Vechey. Aithagg wrinkled his nose at the putrid smell. He shifted back to home-time to avoid the smell. The body had bloated and animals would come to eat at the soft parts first: the eyes, the throat, the lips. Then they would claw towards the bloated stomach. Rats would nibble at the fingertips and the end of his nose. The body would tip sideways and slump to the forest floor. Wolves would tear at the body with their sharp teeth. A larger wolf would take a leg while the smaller wolf pack waited their turn. The bits left by the wolf packs and birds would be covered in snow, then leaves as the seasons turned. The skin would dry and peel back. The jaw, already slack, would separate from the skull. The skeleton would crumble until very little was left.

  Aithagg assumed this boy must have died over a hundred years ago. Perhaps he was one of the first of Catha’s relatives. The newer images of ghosts appeared more opaque than the ancient ones. This boy’s ghost was nearly translucent. His jawbone, nearer to Aithagg’s own time, was less so.

  Aithagg used his toe to stir the leaves where the body had decomposed through the years. He bent and used a stick to prod the ground. Focusing on now, he pushed the ghost images away. The object he sought birthed itself from the dirt. He picked it up and turned the shell over in his hand. With a thumb he pushed away the dirt encrusted on it. A double square insignia had been scratched into the shell’s surface. It was pitted and weathered but still visible. He tucked the shell into a pouch hanging on his hip. When he returned, he would give it to Catha.

  Eager to lose no time he hurried on and tried to ignore the falling of the Linears. Now he knew what the stages of death looked like and the bodies littered the trail in front of him. There were hundreds of deaths. Broken limbs. Attacks by large animals. Snake bites. Others slowed and weakened until they moved no more. So many like Catha who were not strong enough Vechey to survive.

  Thinking on the eating habits of Linears he understood the deaths of those that weakened. They did not eat or would not eat food items, Linear food items, and did not keep pace with the Vechey who had fed prior to the trip. The Vechey would barely need sustenance for the month.

  Aithagg paused at a gaunt, dead Linear. His eyes had sunken in and his cheekbones were gaunt. Aithagg had seen this in the tribes that had gone through a drought and had not enough food to sustain their life. How weak they were. How weak Catha must be then. Aithagg shamed at his thoughts.

  A noise startled Aithagg, and he turned to find a familiar looking young Vechey standing near him. The youth looked at the dead Linear, which had attracted Aithagg’s attention.

  “You are not with the current group traveling to the ritual site,” he said. His long wavy hair resembled Aithagg’s.

  “No. I am from further in the future. Trying to answer a question for a friend of mine.” Aithagg trailed off not knowing how to describe his quest.

  “Icaeph.” The tall Vechey boy held out his arm in greeting. They grasped arms, hands locking at each other’s elbows.

  Aithagg hid his shock at knowing before him stood the brother who would face madness in the future. “Aithagg,” he mumbled.

  Icaeph looked at him for a long moment, studying the contours of his face. “I will not ask why you are here. Probably something Eterili would not approve of.”

  “Or why you are not with the group?” Aithagg smiled coyly.

  “Well, there is that.” Icaeph looked behind him towards where the other Vechey had walked. “I am taking a slight detour, that is true. I will catch up with them soon.”

  Aithagg did not question his brother’s motives but instead looked at the ground, avoiding looking at a bulging sack slung over Icaeph’s shoulder.

  Icaeph shifted the weight of the sack then spoke, his words quick in an embarrassed rush of guilt, “There is a tribe nearby that I found. Usually the Vechey do not go to them. They are a small family. I found them a few years ago. Their elders were struck down with a disease and the children are the only survivors. I—”

  Icaeph shifted the sack again this time to show it to Aithagg.

  “—I bring them food so they survive.”

  “Do they see you?”

  “No. I leave the bundle of food for them quickly and do not stay in their time long.”

  Aithagg considered for a moment. “Will you be able to return to them once you have gone through your ritual? You may be pushed far across this land from them.”

  “They are ready to be on their own now.” Icaeph looked at the ground. “I know I sh
ould not care about Linears.” His voice trailed off.

  “Do you think Eterili knows?” Aithagg asked after a long moment of silence.

  “Either she knows a lot and leaves us to our clandestine affairs or she knows nothing,” Icaeph answered.

  They sat for a moment in silence listening to the woods around them. Icaeph was the first to break the silence. “I need to return to the group and not test my luck with Eterili.”

  “I am going that way too,” Aithagg admitted.

  “It is not your time yet at the ritual though, is it?” Icaeph’s eyes grew wide. “Oh, no it is not. Spying on the ritual to gain its secrets, are you?”

  Aithagg smiled. “Not for myself.”

  He briefly explained the circumstances, relieved to unburden his secret. Icaeph nodded his head and did not seem to judge Aithagg for his plans.

  “Let us journey together until you have to split away and hide,” Icaeph invited.

  They rose and began to walk together mostly in silence. Occasionally Icaeph asked questions about their parents and they joked about what stone, shell, or pig’s hoof their mother might be worrying smooth at this very moment.

  The trip was long and Aithagg began to tire. He was nearing the thirtieth moonrise. The landscape had changed drastically in the past ten moonrises. They traveled from mountainous areas into flat, grassy lands, which were slightly warmer and filled with flying pests. The air was wet and heavy, the ground soft, and the undergrowth was thicker than any he had seen. The stars hung brightly overhead. Aithagg worried. He would have to feed before his return trip. Were there tribes here in this swamp?

  Before he considered the question any further the sight ahead of him stopped Aithagg in his tracks. They had reached the ritual site. It had to be the ritual site. Across thousands of years Vechey had gathered here in this area. Their ghosts formed a wall of white as they congregated around a central mass of white. Aithagg squinted, unable to see through it. Something had existed here forty thousand years ago and it was so large and powerful it erased all images before and after it in its wake. The Vechey had gathered around this central orb. They had all synced to the same time so they saw one another. Existed with one another.

  Icaeph embraced Aithagg quickly and said, “I have to go join the others. It has been good to meet you my brother. Travel well.”

  Aithagg returned the embrace and stayed behind hiding in the tree-line. He watched Icaeph as he moved towards the group and then moved into the past. His movements became ghost-like. Other boys and girls he knew and had played with in the woods became ghosts of the past as they synced and stood with the ancestors. The first ancestors stood closer to the blinding white ball. The newer arrivals added to the crowd in concentric circles.

  Eterili stood to the side, her back to Aithagg. She had raised her hands to the sky and had said something, gesturing to the bright light with her stick.

  Then the group had stepped into the white mass. Eterili’s pale silhouette walked towards the whiteness. Slowly she walked into the light.

  Aithagg saw nothing of what transpired. They were there, then they walked into the white and disappeared.

  Later in time, one lonely ghost image would emerge from the white light: Eterili. No one else emerged.

  Drawn to the unanswered question of what was in the light, Aithagg crept closer. He marveled that Eterili seemed to leave only the one ghost trail. In looking around, he realized she only left her latest ghost trail as if her past and present were all one. It was perplexing. When synced into a time, such as they were in their home-time, they all left trails of where they had been—a veritable sea of Vechey trekking to this one spot. Eterili had led every trip. There should have been thousands of images of her leading the groups here. However, there was only the latest one. He shook the question from his head; tried to dislodge it from his brain. Why did she only leave the one trail? Where did everyone go? Why did no one return? Surely, he should have seen them come out as they synced to their own time and made their own path.

  Aithagg inched closer and watched Eterili begin her solitary journey back through the woods towards home. She stayed in the past and did not sync to home-time. He was glad for it. It was less likely she would spot him. He did not know how much trouble he would be in if she caught him. He would much rather not find out. The air was thick and oppressive against his skin. Aithagg looked back toward the light. He needed to find answers before returning to Catha.

  At this point, what could he tell her? Nothing. He found one of her clan who had died of a snakebite. There were probably others he witnessed in the hundreds of deaths he had seen along the trail to this ritual site. Then he watched everyone join into one moment in time, walk into a ball of white as opaque as milk, and only Eterili stepped out. Eterili left no trails of history, no trace of where she had been, as if she had only traveled the one time, the latest time to this place. His head reeled with unanswered questions, none of which would help Catha know more about her future. He had to know more.

  Aithagg stepped closer to the ball of white intent on giving it a closer examination. Would Eterili see him? Would she see the ghostly image of him moving closer to the ritual or would she pay him no mind? Was he another moving shape in the middle of thousands? He hoped for the latter.

  He walked through the throng of misty-ghosts-of-Vechey-past who had stood upon a solid patch in the middle of swampland. The ground was mucky and sucked at his moccasins but was not as stagnant or murky as the shin deep water he had waded through earlier in his travels. This ground rose from the marshland and stood as a dry respite from the murk. Its width was ten large-tusked-hairy-beasts by twenty lined up tusk to tail. In the center sat a clearing, at the edges—dense undergrowth and gnarled trees.

  The white ball of light was massive. Its brilliance was so bright, even in the past it made Aithagg squint to look at it. It was taller than the tops of the trees. Upon close inspection, he realized it wasn’t a ball at all. It was more like a long streak coming from the sky and then erupting into a blaze here at the ground. The streak from the sky was less bright than the brilliance of the central mass of light. The sphere of light itself filled the open field.

  Aithagg walked towards it and directly into the white light—though he stayed in his home-time and did not dare travel back to when this light had occurred. His teachings informed him it had happened about forty thousand winters ago.

  The white was all encompassing, and he imagined it shut out all sound as he walked into it. He held his hands up to shield his eyes from the brightness. Inside, only the whiteness existed. It shone brighter than anything and rivaled his memories of what looking at the sun had been like as a child. He turned slowly in circles to find any of his tribe as they had stood here in the past. He saw nothing but the brightness.

  “What are you doing here?” Eterili crooned softly.

  He turned, in vain, to find where the voice came from. She was nowhere to be seen. He stood firm and returned a question, “Why do you have only one ghost trail as if you only exist the once?”

  A soft chuckle echoed to him from the whiteness. It swirled around him. He tried not to panic. Blood red sweat beaded on his forehead.

  “Curious one,” she croaked. “Unusual. I do not see many this brave or this idiotic. Looking for clues to tell your little Linear friend?” Eterili appeared out of the whiteness in front of him. Her bent visage hunkered slowly in his direction.

  Aithagg held still and tried to stand at his full height. He chose to be honest. “I am. I do not know if she will live a near eternal life of a Vechey or the short one of a Linear. If I could give her that answer, she may decide to stay with the tribe.”

  “With you, you mean.” Eterili slowly ambled towards Aithagg and stopped three lengths fr
om him.

  “No,” he denied his intentions might be slightly selfish. “I only intend to help her.”

  “You already have your answer. You refuse to realize what you have seen.”

  Aithagg puzzled for a moment, recalling the hundreds of dead along the trail to the ritual site. “The Linears die along the way, weak and unable to keep up the pace.”

  “What else did you see?” She took a step closer.

  “The strong Vechey assemble here and as one enter this.” Aithagg held his hands up. “They come to this place and disappear into the light. Only you return.”

  “This is true.” She took another step closer.

  “You only leave one ghost image as if the last time you went through is the only time. I do not understand,” Aithagg continued.

  Another step brought Eterili closer to Aithagg. She stood one body-length away. Her musty smell permeated Aithagg’s nostrils. Though he did not need to breathe air, he still drew breath enough to smell things around him and speak. He stopped this insignificant breathing to avoid the stench.

  “You may never understand it. I am the oldest Vechey and no longer sync with any time. I am my only time,” she said.

  He tilted his head to one side gauging the distance between them and wondering if she would strike. Would he be able to overthrow her?

  She took a step and the anklets of teeth clacked about her, singing a solemn song of mayhem and death.

  “She will not survive the ritual even if she makes it to here,” Aithagg spoke quietly as if to himself. “I do not know what happens here in this whiteness, but I do not think she will be strong enough to survive it. She will die, most assuredly.”

  “This is also true.” Eterili stilled and came no closer.

  Aithagg ran a hand through his curly, dark hair. “I have to try to help.” He looked down. The whiteness blocked out the ground, hid his feet. He stared for a moment, disoriented, then continued, “She can not die alone.” Looking up he into Eterili’s midnight black eyes he asked, “It is not the way, I suppose?”