Jadde - The Fragile Sanctuary (16 page)

The repetitive rhythm of the march left
time for Malkrin’s mind to wander. He viewed the setting sun as he ran and
smiled at remembered text in the Brightwater library. It told how the land and
sea formed a globe that revolved around the sun creating the seasons and the
moon revolved around their globe. It had been a revelation but Malkrin had
instantly picked up the idea along with the purpose of clocks and time
divisions. He thought of his previous ignorance. Especially how Seconchane folk
believed that the setting sun fought with the moon in the ground below them before
the moon rose victorious. Then they considered that with the break of dawn the sun
rose to show how invincible she really was. The Brenna and the priesthood had deliberately
kept the people in ignorance.

They camped that night under a small stand
of trees. Malkrin and Halle had a small cloth cover each that pegged into the
ground; it was a Brightwater adaptation of the Wolf people’s night protection
and was lighter and easier carried. Talgour assured them they were waterproof
and windproof. A text in the library had called them tents.

Malkrin confided his fears about the
plaited haired man to Halle. They decided to keep alternative watch through the
night, it meant each had half the sleep of the rest of the group but it was the
only solution until Malkrin found the right opportunity to confront the Wolf warrior.

The next day the band was travelling soon
after the sun climbed crimson hued beyond the eastern mountain ridges. They
needed this early start before the late summer sun heated the land and
dehydrated them. It was a decision Malkrin would have taken and he envied BerantWolf’s
detailed knowledge gleaned from lifetimes of endless travel.

They continued at a fast jog. Soon Talgour was
running like a living corpse, already he was sweating out the extra fat and was
panting less. Malkrin carried his backpack anyway; tomorrow he hoped Talgour would
be able to take half of his pack’s weight.

BerantWolf carried on the fast pace, Malkrin
quizzed the chief as they ran. Apparently this next night’s camp would be near the
grave of the Goddess’s war-bird. He learnt how the Wolf people paused in their
journey to worship at the grave every time they passed the dead War-bird. It
was an important shrine to them and signified Jadde’s celestial fight with the
dark night.

A flock of honking geese flew past and a
flight of Wolf arrows brought down four. Malkrin looked forward to a filling
meal that evening. Later the sun flashed on something amidst the boulder strewn
valley they were passing through and BerantWolf stopped the group. As the men
came to a respectful halt the Chief put his fingers together before his eyes to
encapsulate the spear of light. He chanted tunefully, later explaining this was
to ask the war-bird’s ghost permission to approach. The song was too much for
one of his warriors, he’d only ever heard the greeting sung when travelling from
the opposite direction. He howled and sank to his knees as if in pain.

BerantWolf interrupted his welcome song at
the second cry.

The shaking warrior held his head between
his arms and shrieked, ‘a curse is on us – we should never view the great Goddess’s
war-bird in this way.’ His muffled words slid from tightly wrapped hands
covering his face. ‘
It will mean our doom
.’ Suddenly he leapt up and ran
back the way they’d come, howling as if he were being chased by a mountain
banshee. Malkrin assumed he would run until he rejoined his tribe.

The other warriors looked shaken and began
muttering to each other again. The weight of change challenging their ingrained
tradition, for once Malkrin was glad of his and the Brightwater’s beliefs.

Malkrin, Halle and the two Brightwater Officials
sat on nearby boulders and let BerantWolf suppress his men’s superstitions.
They passed around a goatskin of water and listened quietly to the ensuing
argument. It reached a high pitched crescendo and BerantWolf shouted an
ultimatum. Malkrin peered over the large boulder in time to see two more
warriors returning the way they’d just travelled. They looked relieved,
presumably because they were running in the correct direction.

 BerantWolf came over.

‘The faint-hearted have left. My bravest
remain and have given an oath to continue and face any ordeal we meet.’

‘The war-bird shrine must have powerful
magic to place fear in brave warriors,’ Malkrin sympathised.

‘Maybe,’ was BerantWolf’s simple answer and
they all set off again. BerantWolf’s
seven
warriors
were re-energised; the plaited haired one still ran at BerantWolf’s side.

An hour later they reached the war-bird shrine.
Malkrin had expected an effigy of a giant eagle or a large bird skull with an elongated
beak. But his every imagined image paled in comparison to what lay on an upraised
ridge. It appeared to be a pile of tangled metal, but as they drew alongside,
sleek lines emerged from the confused muddle. He followed the contours of one
shining wing and a long crumpled body with a central eye made of starred and
broken glass. The eye’s interior was a shadowed hollow. A spindly pine sapling
spread from within and shielded the metal shrine from the blazing sun like a Brenna
noble woman’s sun-umbrella.

BerantWolf snarled assertively, ‘you will
not take any bone from the war-bird. You will not shout or otherwise disturb
the war-bird. You will not touch with hands or feet lest the Goddess’s wrath
falls on us all.’

‘Am I permitted to approach and worship the
ghost up close Sire?’

‘You may, but should you violate the holy shrine
then we will sacrifice you to placate the ghost-guard that inhabits this
place.’

Malkrin nodded and bowed his
acknowledgement. With Halle he walked to the bird sculpture, for that was the
only explanation he could assign to this extraordinary tomb. They locked their
hands behind their backs in a reverential sign that they would obey BerantWolf’s
instructions.

They stopped a warrior’s height away from
the main body where the one intact wing joined the main Bird. It was obvious
that someone had been keeping the war-bird from becoming overgrown with grass
and debris, for a bank of dead grass and bracken lay beyond leaving the area
around the sculpture clear. Only a thin film off dust covered the shadowed
contours with visible surfaces mainly bright but pitted.  Malkrin walked up to
the tree filled eye and looked within. A shout from a Wolf warrior forced him
back – but not before he’d glimpsed more intricate decoration between the roots
and weeds. Circular glass covered lenses were filled with mildew. Glimpses of lettering
behind the lenses had stared back at him. The eye also contained a metal seat-shape
with a grass cushion. It was obvious the Wolf Tribe’s external care did not include
the interior of the bird.

A suspicion formed in his mind, it fitted
in with Jadde’s legend in some way, but how? Amongst the smashed interior he
had spotted thin coloured ropes with jewelled boards laced into them. They felt
dead, the pulses and long streets of energy had left them long ago. Jadde had
deserted this war-bird in times long past.

Suddenly he knew – it related to Jadde’s
altar somehow. He could remember only too well what he had viewed all those
years ago when he was alone beside her edifice.

He looked at the bird’s one remaining wing
where it joined the body. It was one solid structure – but how could such a
complex and heavy bird ever have flown? The Goddess’s presence was here
although not as active as in her altar. Had she actually flown within it? The
matter would need great thought.

Halle interrupted his contemplation. ‘I can
feel the ghost of this place, for this war-bird did indeed fly. It did not have
its own life for in that tree-pit a man sat and I felt him leave the stricken bird.
He had nursed it to the ground believing he could save it, for it was one of
the last of its kind. But as it extended its feet to land a wing dipped and
caught a rock and it died here in a cruel landing.’

Malkrin nodded intently, Halle’s intermittent
highsense was indeed a valuable gift.

‘Do you see anything else my friend?’

‘The man was called Lieutenant-Pilot and he
was important to Jadde in a way I find confusing. I must think on the other
images for they are foreign to me. A presence hovers here; it has great fear of
beings called quarter-men and a great sorrow for what had already been lost.’

‘If the great bird lost a wing then
somewhere out here it must lay undiscovered and unsuspected by the Wolf
people.’

‘That makes sense Sire. But we have not the
time to look for it. The wing will have been lying beneath the grass for a
considerable time and will be hard to find.’

‘Yes indeed. ‘Many Millennia’ are the words
I found used in some Brightwater texts relating to how long ago a tribe called Sioux
existed, I wonder if this war-bird  was theirs?’

‘It would require a lifetime of study to
unravel its secrets Sire. I respectfully propose we leave it at that.’

Malkrin finished in frustration, ‘everything
we read, and lots of what we see and hear relates back to the fight of the ancient
people with quarter-men. I believe they are the same creatures as the Archgry.’

Deep in thought, he wandered back to the
group, and thanked BerantWolf for his permission to worship the great bird
closely.

Too soon it was time to move on. BerantWolf’s
urgency to reach the quarter-men was urging them all to dig deep into reserves
of stamina. According to BerantWolf’s estimates they would reach the lands of
the Sylva tree-dwellers in three days run.

Talgour made it, but only just. Malkrin
helped him stumble over undulating hills, through dense woodland, boggy ground
and through fast streams. It took all Malkrin’s strength and wits to support him
as they traversed a heart thumping rope-bridge over a roaring torrent. Talgour
was too busy mumbling and groaning to notice the flood below; it stretched Malkrin
to within a bear’s fur of his strength to guide him. Then the band negotiated
more streams with placed stepping stones. They mounted a hill via a wide spiral
path and scrambled down the other side on scree broken with boulders and
crevasses. By now Malkrin and Eighth-of-Senate each supported an arm and half carried
Talgour for the last day’s journey.

Malkrin marvelled at Eighth’s easily
regained stamina, for as the Senate member explained, he still regularly led
hunting parties. He could just have lounged with the Senate discussing policy,
procedures and laws, but preferred the exercise and the excitement of the chase.
Malkrin sensed he would be a valuable warrior should a confrontation with quarter-men
arise.

They ascended yet another hill and at the
summit the view tipped down to the tops of giant trees below. Their size drew
Malkrin’s and Halle’s breathe away, for the trees were twice as high as the
largest they had ever seen. The topmost boughs and canopies of large emerald
green leaves flowed in a complex ripple in the breeze and seemed to be waving in
welcome. They started down the slope along a well trodden path with worn steps chipped
into occasional steep banks. Halle was supporting Talgour with a Wolf warrior
to give Malkrin and Eighth a break.

Suddenly Talgour became aware of his
surroundings. He had been here before and it seemed to reinvigorate him. ‘The
Sylve, the Sylve, my friends, my friends,’ he kept repeating, then insisted on tottering
downhill unassisted. It was a firm footing so Malkrin indicated Halle to release
him. He noted a surprising flash of concern from the strange plaited haired
warrior. They locked eyes and the concern was replaced with a stare filled with
spears.

‘Sylva. I’m here, I’m back.’ Talgour shouted.
But The Sylve weren’t listening.

The steep slope and twisting path concealed
the massive trunks. As they progressed downhill they swelled to a girth Malkrin
would not have believed, he now knew what an insect felt like scurrying between
trunks and roots. The behemoth trees were each the breadth of his home in
Cyprusnia and seemed to spread further above them as they drew close, as if
they were expanding to defend the band. Soon small windows carved into the hollowed
trunks could be seen. Some windows were hinged and open to allow the breeze to
filter into the hollow spaces within. Other windows moved unrestrained in the cool
breeze as if waving a welcome. Well kept paths around the boughs and small cultivated
patches of fruit trees and vegetables filled the ground between the paths.

Now they were level with the tree trunks
and Malkrin noted wooden doors flapping on sturdy hinges. As they neared the
first tree-home the expected welcome never formed in Malkrin’s highsense. Then
Halle pointed to trampled vegetables and drew his flint dagger. An unnatural
inactivity seemed to overlay the wood village. Malkrin gripped Palerin ready to
draw him hissing from his scabbard.

Halle massaged his temple, ‘something’s
wrong Sire,’ he hissed, ‘the Redwoods are saddened.’

 Malkrin’s highsense remained alarmingly
empty with the absence of thoughts emanating from any human or domestic animal.
An evil seemed to lay stagnant below the shadowed leaves. The whole party
fingered their weapons expecting a horde of rabid wildcats or wolfs or bears to
leap from the deep shadows.