Vedientir

  Four steps.

  The air elemental that had thus far been her left wing grabbed Eya around the waist and dragged her to the left and away from the shrieker. Again, the elemental was so quick that they barely saw the movement itself. They saw Eya standing right in the path of the incoming shrieker rider and in the next moment only air remained in the place where she had stood.

  Three steps.

  Eya lifted up her sword.

  The shrieker leader turned right toward her, lifted his hammer high and readied for his strike, but then the air elemental that had been Eya's right wing appeared above him.

  Two steps.

  The hammer was gone. The air elemental snatched it out of the leader's hand and the rider continued his attack empty handed and confused.

  One step.

  Eya swung her sword. It met something mostly soft and the leader's scream was the only thing that managed to reach Eya.

  The rider's arm fell into the dust and the shrieker took him past Eya and toward Dion and Kerkio and while they braced to meet the shrieker the dragon lunged in front of them and both the shrieker and the rider broke on him like a boat on rocks.

  "Zmai?" Dion called him.

  "Ada?" answered the dragon with rage in his voice, but then he looked back at the lyud and saw a worried friend looking at him.

  "Dober," he said to Dion. "I am calm."

  Eya ran back to them while her wings chased away the other fleeing members of the assault group.

  "Vetr's fingers are about to descend upon the world!"

  As soon as she stopped speaking, pillars of dust began rising from the ground all over the field and even between the ranks of the enemy army.

  Then whirlwinds started descending from the sky that now seemed so very low above their heads. They touched ground in places where moments before the pillars of dust had risen from the earth. The whirlwinds grew in size and speed, and their angry roar grew louder, and they turned to the shriekers as if they had a will of their own. Soon they carried not only dust but bats, knives, cloth, and then even the shriekers and their riders, as they grew in size and strength.

  Then burans landed behind the raging whirlwinds, and each had his own small whirlwind that guarded him like a semi-sentient shield. They formed a line of wind and steel and rushed to attack the enemy remaining behind Vetr's windy fingers.

  Burans' charge was the last thing they saw before a whirlwind descended in front of them and they ran down the road back toward the village to save their limbs.

  "Where were the people of your village going?" Dion asked Eya when they stopped, seeing that the whirlwind had given up its chase. He only now noticed then that her wings had returned to her back.

  "They were trying to get to Irgoa. That is a forest village there at the bottom of that hill," she answered and pointed to the left of them and toward the western side of a hill that lifted the forest there up toward the sky. "I hope they have survived the stone rain."

  "I am pretty certain that they are all right if they were not hit by that largest rock," said Dion. Now that he had a better look at the forest, he saw just what a forest that was. Rare was the tree that was smaller than a Great Oak. The branches of the trees were so numerous and thick that he doubted the stone rain could have done much damage on the forest bottom.

  "They have gone again," he said when he looked over the treetops at the sunset colored sky.

  "Gafranihi!" he called them.

  "There's one," said Kerkio when he saw something in the air above the edge of Triboria.

  "An eagle," he corrected himself. It flew south toward the burans and the whirlwind wall that helped the burans close the gates of the Chaos keep.

  "Grak!"

  "And the ravens," said Dion but he had to lower his gaze to see them for they were not flying.

  "Eya, who is that?" asked Kerkio when he saw that the ravens were standing on the shoulders of a man riding on a horse. Both the man and the horse were far larger than any that Dion or Kerkio ever saw in Aelan. Only Eya ever saw a man of that size before, but just as then, there was no doubt in her mind about who that man was.

  "Vedientir," Eya and Dion answered him almost as one.

  "He looks a bit like that statue next to the Oak," explained Dion when Eya looked at him. "And my ravens are sitting on his shoulders just like the eagles on the statue. I think that by doing so they are showing us that we can trust that man."

  "By Allfather's breath!" shouted the stranger with excitement and jumped off the colossal horse onto the road. Even in the dark of the sunset they could see the glint of surprise in the stranger's eyes.

  "Plamensine!" the stranger continued joyously in the old language as he walked toward the dragon who was confused by the stranger's behavior but intrigued by how the stranger had called him.

  "Lyud?" asked the dragon and glanced briefly at Dion, but neither did he know how to react to the stranger.

  "Plamensine?" Kerkio asked Dion quietly.

  "He called the dragon the son of fire," Dion explained. "If we're going to believe Aelan's myths, Plamen is the name of the god of fire or flame, I'm not certain," answered Dion quietly into Kerkio's ear.

  The stranger came closer to the dragon and to everyone's surprise - mostly the dragon's - the stranger took him beneath his front legs and lifted him into the air with ease, like one would lift a small child.

  "Spread your wings. Let me see you whole," the stranger requested in the old language. The joy that flowed from the stranger's smile was almost tangible. The dragon complied without even understanding why and spread his wings, intoxicated and mesmerized by the stranger's spirit. He felt neither fear nor wanted to resist the stranger's wishes.

  Eya looked confused. The stranger, who she did not doubt was Vedientir himself - the wisest of the gods and knower of all things, was using the language of Chaos.

  "Kerkio," Dion called him quietly. "Maybe we have found the dragon's home? It looks like they know each other or at least it seems that the man knows the dragon."

  There was both happiness and sorrow in Dion's voice. He surprised himself when he felt sadness at the thought of having to part from the dragon. Some sort of attachment had already formed in his mind toward that strange creature, and he felt jealous upon seeing how quickly the dragon and the stranger accepted one another.

  "Fly," said the stranger and pushed him up before the dragon had a chance to say anything. The dragon's fearful shout scared and surprised the stranger. He grabbed the flailing dragon as he fell and returned him safely to the ground.

  The stranger's gaze turned to Dion and both Dion and Kerkio prepared for the worst but stayed still to see his next move.

  "Inheritor!" yelled the stranger.

  "Oh, you unfortunate one! Answer! What have you done to him? Why can the dragon not fly?" he asked using the language of Aelan, undoubtedly looking at Dion.

  "It is not my fault!" Dion fought against the forceful questions.

  "How did you even manage to go to the Old World to get him? What are you doing with him and what do you plan to do?"

  "I didn't! I don't understand," Dion fell into a stutter as he tried to answer all the received questions at the same time.

  "Nothing! We merely saved him! He was a prisoner," he managed to throw out of himself.

  "Whose prisoner?"

  "Some old woman, a witch who deals with the abduction of children as far as we understand," answered Dion once more as quickly as possible, hoping to calm the stranger down. "We have old stories in my kingdom of such a woman. We call her..."

  "You saw Roga?" the stranger asked so forcefully that it seemed as if another rock had crashed into the ground.

  "Yes," answered Dion, more worried now about the old witch than he was when he first saw her. The stranger fell silent and gloom cast a shadow over his face.

  "Let's move away from here," said Vedientir. "I have many questions for the man who inherited my ravens."

  "We were on our way home just now,"
said Kerkio loud enough to remind Dion and to notify the stranger. He cared little if this was Eya's and Dion's god or not.

  "We have a chance to reach the Tree now. The stone rain might start once again."

  "There is no danger now, but it will return soon enough," said Vedientir with conviction.

  "We are heading to this village here," continued Kerkio and pointed toward Arvinia. "But, we can walk slowly if you tell us all you know about the dragon. We would like to return him to his home," finished Kerkio, and Vedientir agreed to that with a nod.

  "Charn! Bel!" said Vedientir. Those were the words of the old language for black and white colors and they were also the names of the two ravens. They obeyed some unheard command and flew off Vedientir's shoulders. As soon as their claws detached from Vedientir's vest another pair of yellow claws landed in their place. These claws were much larger and they belonged to the eagle they saw in flight earlier. He was brown-feathered except for his tail which was as white as a swan's.

  "A white-tail. The largest eagle in Aelan," said Dion with wonder. He never came this close to one of these birds.

  "Look at it. It's more than three feet long from beak to tail."

  "Maestra Eya," said Vedientir to Eya while Dion marveled at the eagle.

  "You've grown since I last saw you."

  "You know me?"

  She sounded confused. Not only did he know her, but he also called her a maestra. However, she was certain that she wasn't a fairy, let alone a maestra.

  "I don't come often to Arvinia, but I was there a few years ago," said Vedientir. "It was one of the harshest winters to even reach Arvinia, when the Eternal Storm brought you so much snow that it covered the entire village."

  "I remember that winter. The snow on the ground reached the snow that was hanging from the roofs. You could only see the chimneys, and no one could leave their houses until a stranger came in the night and cleared a path to and through the village. Perhaps he thought we would not see him in the night, but some of us did see him. I was young then, but I knew at once who you were. I recognized you from the statue at the hilltop."

  Vedientir turned his gaze briefly south towards the edge where the burans were fighting.

  "We will have a short time to speak in peace," he said, seeing that the burans had forced the Chaos island to detach from Arvinia and to flee towards another island that was assaulting Triboria.

  "Let's go over there and remove ourselves from sight of any prying eyes," he finished and pointed to a group of large pine trees that outgrew the rest of the forest that bordered the road to the village.

  Vedientir walked with his eyes closed, but he neither stumbled as he walked nor wandered off from the group. Dion watched carefully how his lush wooden-brown beard and mustache swayed left and right when his mouth moved as if his mind struggled with something. He opened his eyes only when they reached the forest and to Dion they seemed less vibrant than they were before.

  Vedientir's bay horse followed them without requiring command - a creature even larger than the long-haired draft horses from the Thin Island.

  The pine needles pricked and poked them as they pushed their way deeper into the forest until they reached the small clearing beneath the tallest pines. Dion, Kerkio and Eya sat into a half-circle with their backs turned toward the village. The dragon lodged himself behind Dion and Kerkio and the two trees that were behind their backs. Vedientir fetched something from a bag that was on his horse and then sat on the ground opposite Kerkio.

  "Vatra," he spoke the old language word for fire and threw an acorn into the center of the clearing, halfway between him and Kerkio. A spark flew out if it and grew into several strips of fire that slid slowly and seemingly with a will of their own toward each person and creature that was nearby. When the strips came close enough to the ones they were supposed to keep warm, they stopped moving and quickly thickened, and in no time transformed into wide fern-like leaves.

  The fiery fern warmed them quickly and its light removed the shadows from their faces. The old pine needles beneath the fire started crackling and filled the air around them with the sweet smell of burning resin.

  "Inheritor of my ravens, what is your name?"

  "Dion," he answered and stopped rubbing his hands above the fire.

  "It's impossible that grandfather was right all along," thought Dion as Vedientir turned his attention to the man sitting next to Dion to ask him his name, even though he had heard it in conversation earlier.

  "Kerkio," he replied more courteously than Dion. "And I am sure that I am no inheritor of anything."

  Vedientir laughed and remembered now to answer Kerkio's earlier request.

  "I know where the dragon is from," he said to Kerkio. "The only place the dragons ever lived was in the Old world, and there they remained after the world had split in two - in the Old world. In Chaos, if we wish to be more precise."

  Kerkio sighed.

  "So we still haven't found his home. For a few brief moments I really thought we had."

  Vedientir mulled over Kerkio's words, still unsure if the men were completely honest with him.

  "So you're telling me you really haven't been to Chaos?"

  Kerkio shook his head and it was enough for Vedientir.

  "Inheritor!" shouted Vedientir suddenly, in a stern voice that startled everyone.

  "I'm looking into your eyes right now," said Vedientir, and Dion felt Vedientir's gaze strengthen and grip him tightly. "I'm looking into the same eyes that I have known from the days when your ancient great-grandfather walked the world, and I see that I can trust you and that I made a good decision back then, but now I need you to answer me. Have you been to Chaos? Have you been to the Old world? Do not lie."

  "No," Dion answered as quickly as he could when Vedientir ended his question.

  "They came to us through the Great Oaks that we could not control any longer," continued Dion without blinking or breathing, feeling the tension in the air around Vedientir as if it was physically manifesting onto the world around him.

  "So that is why you are here," mused Vedientir and turned his gaze away from Dion. Fingers on both of his hands danced left and right, up and down, while his mind leafed through plans and ideas for which there might still be some time left.

  "How were they able to do that?" asked Dion and got Vedientir's attention. "How were they able to control the Trees so completely that we were unable to close or open Paths?"

  "They must have come to you through the World Tree," answered Vedientir after a long silence.

  "The World Tree? It really exists?" asked Dion.

  "Yes, of course it exists," Vedientir answered, surprised for a moment. "And now I am certain you really had nothing to do with the awakening of Chaos," he added. "However, it would be better for all of us now if it didn't exist."

  "Why?" asked Dion and Vedientir decided to satiate the inquisitive spirit of the young man upon hearing the barely noticeable fear in Dion's voice.

  "Not a week has passed since Chaos first broke through the Eternal Storm and brought war to us - the same war that you saw moments ago. They took over the World Tree by surprise on the first day and with it the control over the Great Oaks on all the worlds. They tumbled the entire Grom's island along with the World Tree down into the depths of Chaos, far out of our or anyone's reach. I do not know where either the World Tree or Grom are any more. No one has seen him since he sunk beneath the Storm."

  "Grom is no more?" Eya asked with a shiver in her voice and quickly fell silent to keep her fears for herself when Vedientir shook his head to give her the bitter answer.

  Dion silently absorbed Vedientir's every word and every movement, trying to piece together the picture of their new reality.

  "We promised Brother Allfather that we would never allow Chaos to reach the New World. It seems that we have failed already," he finished with an angrier voice. "I still cannot believe that one of the inheritors would willingly take a traveling acorn to Chaos and so doom not
only your world but ours as well. I would not expect that from descendants of men who had fought against the Nightmares."

  Vedientir's anger had evaporated by the time he finished speaking.

  "But, I am happy that you have come to our aid, inheritor. The hidden Tree you awoke in the hills above Arvinia and the Tree your family received as a gift will help us fight Chaos since those Trees were never connected to the World Tree and Chaos has no control over them."

  Dion leaned back away from Vedientir only just, remembering that the acorn Vedientir was after no longer existed.

  "That means that my grandfather's Great Oak really works, even if all the others do not?" asked Dion, seeking confirmation once more but he found Vedientir unconcerned with his question.

  "Where is your acorn?" asked Vedientir even though he already knew that Dion did not have it anymore.

  "My grandfather planted it in Syevnor, a far-away land to which we were heading to when my - your ravens made us change course to bring us here."

  Vedientir's sigh was long-lasting.

  "Even though I've begun to doubt it, you really are unfortunate," said Vedientir. "Why did your grandfather plant the Tree?"

  "He was saving lives," answered Kerkio in Dion's stead, defending Daedar at the same time.

  "This is the second time that you have called me unfortunate. Why is that?" asked Dion, emboldened by Kerkio's support.

  "Because that is what you are, at least that is what your ancestors surely were, and for that I remember them most. Every bad thing that could happen to them did, and every thing that could go awry did, sometimes less so, sometimes more. However, their frequent misfortunes never stopped them from doing their best or stopped them from helping us in the Separation War. Before the Great Migration of Man began, we awarded the sacrifices of the families that aided us most in the War by giving them gifts to take with them to the New World. There were a few acorns and a myriad of other gifts, but most importantly - we gave them a great gift - we gave them good fortune. I also added two of my raven acorns to your family as a final parting gift. Do you have the chest with you? I'd like to finally see what the others gave and what you have left."