by Scott Beith
“To what end?” Anara then snapped towards her weary brother. “So that he can live long enough here to starve to death?”
“That has nothing to do with us!” he argued.
“This has literally everything to do with us!” Anara shot back at him angrily.
“They started this war, and now they’re scared because they’re going to lose it,” Arlo spitefully contested, turning towards the vertical wooden stakes that lowered like stairs. Hollow wooden pieces of bamboo timber plugged like corks that must have had some ulterior purpose as piping down into the pond water. “Fight your own war!” he snarled, looking over his shoulder and up at Helios before he began to bitterly march away, just as Pilly had mere moments before. “You don’t get our soldiers just because you ran out of your own,” he declared with his head turned away from us as he proudly attempted to walk down the stairs unguided.
“Prince Akoni,” Helios said to the two of us from out of the blue, giving a quick glance around as if making sure it was just us two girls left to hear him speak, “is the reason I’m still here today. It was his rebellion that failed,” he said. “He was the one who convinced us to revolt when his father started killing your kind rather than sending them home or feeding them. And the day that our prince died… well, that was the day we knew this world was beyond possible redemption,” he emphasised.
“I speak for all my mother’s subjects when I say we are truly sorry for what has happened to your world,” Anara said, climbing up the small wood blocks to reach Helios and hold his hand. “You have my word that we won’t stop until we fix this,” she said, looking to me as I nodded in agreeance of such a vow, “You will live long enough to see harmony shared between our worlds once again,” she said, only to let go of him and pursue her brother, who had long since disappeared from our sight.
I waved a small goodbye to Helios before following after the others. Still holding the same large red berry in my hands, I walked off to find either Anara or Arlo, turning down a different path than the one we came in on as I turned a corner and yelled, “Wait up,” to Arlo, who I found puffed out by a wooden gate that overlooked the first swamp plantation we were to cross – a field of grass and rice granules layered out.
“None of this is real,” he stated with a mild yet exhausted hysteria, his arms dangling over that small withered fence post as he looked to the water below, too fatigued to move any further than the nearest ledge he could find around the boardwalk bend.
“What’s troubling you the most about it?” I asked, concerned.
“Everything.”
“It feels real enough,” I said, pinching his arm playfully, trying to get him to stop slumping and stand more upright over those wobbly fence stumps, putting my left hand on his shoulder. “Do you want to know what I think?”
“Not really,” he mocked. “But that’s never exactly stopped you before,” he then weakly teased.
“I think you can’t believe it because you’ve been sheltered from it your entire life – raised on an unrealistic expectation of what an enemy looks like. So much so, when you finally saw how familiar they appear… you can’t accept them to be real,” I stated. “They plead a very strong case, I know that, but that doesn’t change what they’ve done all these years – the fact that they were desperate, doesn’t omit them from being savages,” he insisted.
“But perhaps they’re only savages because they’re desperate,” I countered. “Tell me something,” I added. “What would happen if our townsfolk could see what we have seen? What would happen if they knew exactly who was underneath these hoods?” I asked, upon pinching the shoulder of the coat I wore.
“Enemies are so much easier to fight when they don’t have faces,” I ranted, handing over the small bruised piece of fruit Pilly had plucked for me to give to him.
My prince finally raising his right hand enough to hold it, if only to look at the weird-looking fruit, wondering whether or not he could trust taking a bite into it. “They’re still our enemy, Kya. And those who have their back against the wall tend to be the most dangerous to trust. We have to be smart here,” he advised, staring at the fruit, raising himself upright in concern as I licked my hand and tasted the fruit juice residue still sticky against my palm as a testament to my trust of Pilly. If only to smile provocatively at him and rub what was left on the side of his shirt for being the most overcautious and distrusting one for a change.
“It’s not your fault that you fought for what you believed in, or what you did to that doppelganger of yours,” I said to him. “The one thing that’s wrong with both our worlds is that nobody is ever willing to believe that they are the bad guy of their own story. But how, after everything you’ve just seen and heard, could you live with yourself if you choose to ignore their plea for help now? Where is the courage in that, Arlo?” I asked him rhetorically.
“Akoni’s entire family have put themselves on death row just so we could learn what your mother has been hiding all these years,” I said softly to him, knowing full well how interchangeable the words ‘family’ and ‘honour’ used to be to him. And just how much he considered himself a traitor to even consider believing the virtues told to him by his corrupted parents and their ongoing devious deception.
“You really don’t know what you’re asking of me,” he said back, just as quietly. “I disobeyed both my father and mother just to get us here, and now you’re asking me to betray them – and my entire kingdom,” he voiced, revealing the internal conflict weighing on his mind.
“We can save everybody, just like we did Anara,” I said to him, openly and honestly. “I’m not going to try and persuade you anymore, because you need to make up your own mind about where you stand,” I remarked.
“But I know you well… Well enough to know your heart has already chosen what your head won’t allow you to accept,” I said, feigning confidence, despite many silent prayers of hope that I was getting through to him, knowing full well that Anara and me had no chance of an uprising if Arlo wasn’t beside us rallying our country to stand against a whole new level of oppression.
“I’ve always been an open book to you, haven’t I?” he said with a small but upbeat flirtatious smile, choosing to take a small bite into that bright red plum-like berry shortly afterwards.
“If anything, your mind is locked,” I joked, “and sealed in a treasure chest, chained and buried at the bottom of the largest ocean,” I remarked. “… On Pluto,” I added, unable to cover my own grin as he offered me the next bite of that gnollish night fruit. “But then there are some things you do that are just so obvious,” I continued upon tasting the fruit’s condensed sweetness one final time before giving it back.
“Like what? he said, maintaining the same loveable boyish smile, his face illuminated by the shining light above, with Helios back to his grinding task of keeping the lengthy harvest grove alive. Our conversation becoming a little less serious and lighter, if not a little too peculiar, given the severe state of more important things.
“Well..” I stalled unsurely, biding my time as I considered what I could and could not confess out loud, “I know you would rather take a hit than lose your footing in a fight,” I said in compliment to his bravery, while gazing into the dark forbidden forest that was his hazel green shining eyes. “And, um... I know you would dive yourself into an army rather than watch me face one alone,” I added appreciatively.
My nerves were heightening as I had begun speaking my thoughts sporadically, yet somehow coherently, unable to shake the memories of us and all we shared back in The Badlands. Silly moments like idle laughing and teasing each other when we were up all night playing card games, trying to keep in mind how I seemed to lose every game simply because I was too quick to give away what cards I had in my hands. And whether this coy situation was something different or whether I was about to drop one diamond-red heart alone on the table, only to be trumped by a stray wild-card joker because my opponent was too naive to read the game for what it really
was to me.
I took a deep breath upon losing my voice for the moment, my halt clearly noticeable as Arlo stood there patiently in wait. “And that you made a deal with your mother that you regret just to keep me safe,” I continued. “A deal she backed out of when she wanted to banish me,” I added, risking it all on one wild accusation. Probably the bravest thing I had ever done to date, left dwelling to a rejection like fear as I was caught within long suspense wait for a response while Arlo leaned on the post beside me, evaluating what I said and what it might have meant for me to make such a random hopeful conclusion.
“You’re wrong..” he said
“Because I don’t regret it”
“But you don’t know what that deal was, do you?” he finally responded. “Otherwise you would have said it,” he added. “And now you’re wondering whether you want to know how ugly or beautiful the truth is going to be?” he asked rhetorically while also staring at me with some need of confirmation, his poker face revealing virtually nothing but another testament of how blunt he could be when it came to bringing up potentially sensitive subjects.
“More or less,” I admitted, stiff to cowardice, not sure if his answer was something I could return from unscathed.
“After the assault on Ambarvale, my mother wanted you gone for good,” he started to say. “And yes, I made a deal just before my inauguration that would allow you to stay…”
“What did you give her in return?” I prompted shyly, after a long suspenseful wait for him to elaborate further, placing my hand over his to emphasise my need for a response.
“The only thing she would accept... my marriage with Ebony,” he confessed.
I didn’t know what to think when I heard it. It was everything I could have hoped for, but I proceeded to sit there unsure of what it meant, whether it was good news or bad. All I did know was that we had breached into a whole new set of foreign borders – something outside of mere friendship. Our bodies were already close – our faces even closer.
“You’re right about me,” Arlo said in the heat of that suspenseful moment. “But now’s not the time for apologies. We should find my sister and plan what we are going to do next,” he stated, letting go of my hand.
“I’ve been right here all along,” said a voice from out in the cold, materialising upon the post just beside us. “But you’re right, we should go. Things are getting a little awkward here anyway,” she mocked openly to us, her presence beside the boardwalk so unexpected, if not completely typical of her.
Her sudden appearance left Arlo and me to stew in our own silent yet obvious embarrassment, second only to her beginning to walk away. “Not that it’s any of my business or anything, but that would’ve been a pretty cute moment for you two to kiss, don’t you two think?” she then had to further tease, choosing not to look back at either of us as she walked down a new set of pathways still unexplored – one adjacent to the main one we’d entered from, but one that clearly would take us out of their enclosure to the west.
34
Nadir
Arlo, Anara and I marched through the dry arid heaths of the grim and desolate western dirt-field terrain. We were determined to keep motivated, despite the lengthy trek needed to locate the alleged cathedral hall and monastery of Evil Midas’s military camp. The walk was carefree and painless enough, and yet, as a result, I think we were all getting too comfortable with the silence, and thus finding it difficult to keep our minds rightfully scared and alert throughout the ongoing boredom of a very bleak and dusty hillside plain.
Animal traps were our most serious threat out there, as Pilly had warned me just prior that those hidden instruments tended to be most prevalent along the old roads and deserted rural pathways we followed. After an hour or two of soulless wandering along one main rocky outskirts path, it was becoming too easy to forget the danger of hollowed out dirt pits and spiky flexing bent branches.
In many ways, we were lucky to have found peace so easily after jumping the western gate of the large crop paddock and being able to successfully follow one conjoined old deserted path that fortuitously happened to lead out towards the flat muddy clay fields that we needed to head towards.
I felt like we were only ever five minutes behind Pilly’s trail as I tried to use those new amateur tracking skills she gave me to decipher whether a few soft patches of skidded grey dirt could have been Pilly’s very own footsteps, or if they were just a product of my own imagination due to the fact that I wanted it to be so.
For a great deal of time, the lot of us were marching out to where the western mountain ridges meet and divide both of our borders from whatever lurks beyond in the greatly uncharted regions of earth.
With a bright and pale sky overhead, our eyes had adjusted to this world, as we once again, silently lost ourselves to the most breath-taking assortment of stars above us. Clouds were no longer existent out in those heaps, while one strong beaming moonlight helped power and invigorate our journey ahead. As out of us three present, I was the most energetic, and because of it, I walked point, doing my best to remain on guard and most vigilant as I continued to yield the greatest impact upon the dark but highly malleable world.
I had crafted a forest of various baby critters to sweep our sidelines clear, attempting to avoid looking towards those things myself as I could only see such sights as luring distractions non-essential to our task at hand. And so, choosing to ignore all potential delays, I was following my base instincts to keep us safely among the dead road while the others looked towards those open fields on my behalf, only ever concerning themselves with each distant colossal-sized animal bone they seemed to spot and name across the scattered open expanse.
Each minute that passed, meant another pair of sharp horns and lively glowing eyes that would lift their heads and look towards us from the distance. There were roaming scarab and countless other hard-shelled carrion beetles the length of toppled over trees, all casually chomping upon the mouldy bone remains of smelly animal carcasses. Each creature taking its time to examine us passing through their open flatter territory, questioning whether to charge us down or leave us be. I summoned my giant overshadowing ogre from the shady bedrock, and allowed it to loudly crash and collide through forest clutter, scaring anything away from attacking us.
That monster of mine was most effective at clearing each spike trap we came across. It was always willing to step into each area we had previously been avoiding, sending those wooden and metal stakes from traps into it legs like thorns onto a giant’s foot as it burst over old tree stalks, taking the lashing whips of tree nets ineffectively around its torso. Each rope ripped off it violently as the large trunks they were wrapped around and tied to were also uprooted and hurled away into the sidelines by my thickening tall brute shadow.
Unlike all my other creations, which felt like mere puppets to me, I was amazed at how unnatural the ogre’s movements came to me as, at many times, I simply didn’t feel in direct control of its actions. I continued to mend its skin, which tore each time it set off a trap, repairing the ogre like someone adding paper mache to a piñata, making the shadow thicker and stronger, with clouds of dark mist becoming so dense and hard that the ogre’s fleshy hide was starting to represent the appearance of black boulders and pure rock granite.
“Why don’t you ever give that shadow a face like your other cuter crafts?” the princess asked towards me intimidatingly, looking to the miniature-sized four-legged fur-balls I had swiftly sweeping the open fields for booby traps. The first time she had ever asked any question to me concerning my own shadow. A question I felt most strange answering, considering all the times she had intentionally lit a candle and closed the curtains in her room just so the faceless shadow could collect her dirty dishes, sweep her giant room clean and do all of my own duties so we could talk or get ready to go out together for a more fun evening of informal affairs. “It would be less scary if you made that thing just a tad more friendly-looking, you know,” she added, walking lazily behin
d me.
“And what about me?” her brother rebuked. “Should I paint my sword pink while we’re at it?” he said in response to her, before I could say anything.
“No, because that’s not your sword, Arlo. You’re only borrowing it, remember?” she replied to him, the two of them squabbling back and forth while I went back to scouting the journey ahead.
In all honesty, I had never put much thought into why I didn’t add any aesthetic features to my main shadow, other than the limbs necessary to walk or hold things. But Anara made a very compelling point – that it wasn’t exactly hard for me to construct a face that would give it its own name and identity. Maybe I feared giving it a mouth and teeth because it might try to eat me with it. Perhaps I was even a little scared of my own childhood teddy-bear creation, as it was the entity I seemed to have the least control over.
But also, it was just as likely that I never gave it a face simply because I didn’t know how it would look. Each face is unique in its own way, and a sculptor usually builds faces upon the memory of loved ones. So to me, it would have just felt weird giving it a face like mine when I had built it to have the body of a bulky oversized man. Maybe I could have given it the face of a friend like Arlo or Akoni, but I really doubted either one of them needed more of an ego boost and would ever let me live it down.
I thought about what Pilly said in silence for more than an hour of our journey, crossing dry rivers that separated dusty forgotten forests from the hard soil of dried mud turned clay.
As long as I had been alive, I had always had a certain insecurity about how others saw me, and I was left wondering whether the princess thought I should be doing more with my craft. I also couldn’t shake the feeling that she had asked that question because she was suddenly scared of me.
The way my eyes could start to glow along with my necklace as the four corners of open wilderness kept being dragged towards me, my two arms held out wide, taking the shadows in, absorbing them and sending them to my ogre to be swallowed.