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The Spirit Caller - Chapter 1 Written by: Cymrick Ravenfoot FLEETING DREAMS, ARMS OUTSTRETCHED Worse than living in darkness is living in the shadows of others. I grew up an angry and desperate boy striving to grasp the long shadows thrown by my departed father. Driven by the deeds of my ancestors... but reaching out to a destiny that was not mine to have. Eighteen years after the day of my birth my life began, when I realized an important truth... Our ancestors live through us, not in our stead. The snow slashed at my eyes and filled my world with emptiness. Try as I might all I can see is snowdrifts and blizzard. The only sensations remaining now are the hollow thud of my footfalls and the pain of the icy air burrowing into my flesh. I’m trudging alone through a blizzard in the middle of the featureless tundra, focusing only on an eternity’s worth of white, driving pain and the tireless approach of my own demise. My hair and the furs on my shoulders are blanketed in snowflakes, my skin is pale and my motions awkward. I must seem like a ghost haunting these wastes, not a man who’s only just seen his seventeenth winter. I’m freezing to death. I would be the first full grown clansman to do so in nearly thirteen years. I don’t know whether my kinsmen would laugh or cry. The last had been old Hadden McMir, drunk and wandering alone. Looking for faeries they say. What a buffoon. That is, they were fairly sure he had frozen before the bears ‘et him. My own story was hardly more noble and I had no drunkenness to hide my folly. I wished with all my heart that I wasn’t in this snare because of my own poor judgement but there was no denying it. I’d had nearly an hour to rant and fume as the weather worsened and my prey continued to elude me. An hour was all it took for me to lose my way. Half that again for the weather to become threatening. Now I had no lies and half truths left to tell myself. Oh no, my dire predicament wasn’t unforeseeable, it was entirely predictable. The thought of being second to any of my peers was more poisonous to me than the thought of death. Strange, though I’ve never been that afraid of death, the actual process of dying terrifies me. The horrible prospect of freezing to death alone on these barren plains has’nae disappointed me so far. After my behavior with my friends none would mistake the true cause of my passing either. Hah! Between the pain and the shame, oblivion seems the least of my worries now. It had began as a simple hunting trip in the Everfrost Peaks and the Lords of the Hunt had been smiling upon us. We had planned, prepared and practiced well, and our success told the saga of our diligence. The weather was fair when we began but winter loomed near. This was made obvious by the distant clouds marring the pale blue beauty of the sky. ‘Twas the last hunt of winter and we had an impressive prey in our sight, a young mammoth. It was strong but was keeping it’s distance from the randy youths of Halas. To the mammoth’s misfortune we had Mariel with us. The daughter of a stonemason, Mariel has strong arms and a bow with a pull of a hundred catties. Her aim was true, her arrow falling on it like a thunderbolt, driving it into flight. A very long flight. In the fullness of time the miserable calf had led us across much of the Everfrost and was fleeing into the Permafrost. It still led us by at least two hours when wiser heads began to consider ending the hunt. Of my hunting group, composed of my childhood friends and rivals, I was the most determined that we track down the beast and finish it. Mabel and Mariel, both practical as ever, wanted to abandon our ludicrous chase. Rohnan, the leader of our group and my chief rival in all things, was leaning towards discretion rather than valor. Jordan and Derrick both yearned for the kill but most often differed to Rohnan’s decisions. Mabel kept mentioning the weather until I finally derided her for it, "Thchh, exactly the flaccid mewlings I’d expect from a soft bellied woman." Her caustic reply was instantaneous, "No amount of boasting will prove your manhood swelled enough to serve as your brain, Cymrick!" Nor would any amount of sense-talking convince me to see reason, with that jibe said. I went on alone, a thing never done by hunters at this time of year. I was angry with Mabel. She and I had been fighting constantly during the past years. Once we had been close, even sharing some tender adolescent moments when we were younger, but now there was a distance between us. Mabel would never pass up an opportunity to belittle or contradict me in front of my peers, even understanding how important their respect is to me. We rarely ever spoke plainly to one another now, and if Mabel had problems with me, she certainly wouldn’t air them. It was plain that she had little affection left for me anymore and the only joy my company afforded her was the pleasure of seeing me play the fool. So, no longer in the company of my friends, I marched into this bitter snowstorm with only the trail left by a wounded mammoth to guide me. I have no idea where the nearest lodge is and the blizzard had long since obliterated the watch towers from my view. But the trail leads me to the mammoth calf and to its lair. Certainly a beast of this tundra would find shelter from this storm. I’d much rather face a creature 20 times my size than face this cold anyhow... Perhaps the calf would expire from its injury, peacefully pass away in its lair. I could return from near certain death with ivory and a fabulous tale to be told. The thought warms me only briefly. The cry of a wolf pierced the air, sharp and insistent. My father, Robert of the Clan Ross, was a great warrior. My mother, Anna of the Clan McMarrin, was once a leader of my people and a wise woman. Father died in a storm like this... Feeling the gorge of panic rose in my throat, I forced it down with difficulty. When I was very young there was a terrible plague in the north. Both man and beast perished without sating its hunger. The clan elders had called it a jagged splinter of The Plague Bringer’s contempt for the living and with good reason. It was a contagion unaffected by the prayers of The Tribunal’s priests, inevitably leaving its victims dead, covered in bleeding boils with their flesh putrefying. My mother had tended the sick faithfully during that terrible time. Her diligence was rewarded with tragedy. I can only guess at the grotesque depths of her grief and guilt when her infant son took ill with the malady, herself a likely means of communication. Father knew that his wife loved their child deeply and that a part of her would die with me should I perish. With his wife and baby son both threatened, my father was helpless. He swore that God of Disease, Bertoxxulous, wouldn’t threaten his family while he drew breath! Seeking some weapon with which to strike at his ephemeral foe, Robert traveled to Surefall Glade to seek the wisdom of the druids. He was given a tonic with the power of the Earth Mother Tunare and was told to hurry back to his family. Time is short. I force myself ahead. Pushing through the wind and ice using sheer force, willing my body forward like a plow. As my march grows steadily more arduous, I am careful not to let my gaze wander from the tracks left by the fleeing mammoth. Robert was very weak from his journey when he finally returned to our lands. He met his old friend Scon McDaniels just within our territory, near the lair of the Sabertooth Clan in the Everfrost Peaks. The brewer had braved the winter to aid his friend and had not come a moment too soon. Giving Scon the tonic, Robert bade him to race ahead to Halas and deliver the lifesaving draught to his wife. Stricken with anxiety for his fatigued comrade, Scon McDaniels nevertheless did what any warrior of Halas would, he obeyed the request and left my father to his fate. That plague. The very reason my father died long before I had memory. I will always have scars from that sickness. The pockmarked flesh on my hand and neck from the killing fevers and a cleft in my heart I can never fill. I stare woodenly into the storm, only noting the endless procession of marks in the snow ahead of me and again hearing the forlorn cry of a wolf. The weather is strangely silent. The wind buffets me yet there is a perfect stillness in the air, like a funeral wake. They found my father’s corpse in the crags after the storm. Not dead from the freezing temperatures, nor the fangs of beasts but from the same disease which had threatened his own son. I continue my stubborn march, eyes on the broad footprints of my prey turned savior. Afflicted with a lethal sickness and assailed by the fury of the elements he thought only of his family. Stricken with pain and clearly dying, he held the cure in his hand. He sent it away. I felt sick, a nausea set deep within my bones and fear gripped me, a terrible, terrible fear. I can’t die here... it means nothing... just betrayal. I stop as if struck. The tracks have disappeared! My fear vanishes, shouldered aside by the sudden arrival of alarm. I turn madly on the spot, peering into the contemptuous blizzard with maddened eyes. Could my mind have wandered? Did I leave the trail somewhere behind me? One look answers my question when I spot the mammoth’s trail not ten feet back, accompanied by my own diminutive prints. I feel no relief, only confusion; the footfalls left by my prey have not changed course but have simply ended. My brain slowly finds the meaning in this as I realize my less-than-epic hunt has at last come to an end. The calf is dead. A snowdrift I had passed a moment earlier was only a layer of snow blanketing the coarse hide of the child mammoth. I hadn’t noticed. I circle the fallen beast, mind and body numb, the implications not lost on me but feeling strangely distant. Examining the corpse, I can see Mariel’s arrow still lodged in the creature’s flank; the wound is not mortal, the poor animal died from the exertion and the bitter cold. Slumping down by the mammoth’s corpse I rest my hand on its black tusks... and let loose a futile cry of rage... that dwindles quickly into a dry, maudlin cackle. Its lair was in the crags, not the tundra... It was only here because it was hurt and fleeing from me. It died only because I was chasing it. Not long ago I would have rejoiced at this outcome, now I found it sad and strangely ironic. Driven from safety by an unreasoning force. Flexing my hands, I realize the freezing pain isn’t so terrible anymore and the thick curtain of white engulfing the landscape seems more luminous, more peaceful, less threatening. Not long now... Again I look at the child mammoth before me. Not even time to take the tusks... I once had a brother, so I’m told... stillborn... only half the children in the north survive birth... I can feel eyes on me. Something has changed. Pulling my leaden gaze away from my prey, I see that I am not alone. A wolf, an enormous she-wolf, is poised only a stone throw behind me. Her fur is thick and bottomless, white and blue, streaked with silver, the snowflakes resting on it like waves on the sea. Her eyes are the purest amber – ageless. I fumble for my spear, momentarily forgetting where I left it, my hand finds it after one failed grab. Wheeling to face the wolf, I put my back to my deceased mammoth sibling. My heart leaps in my chest when I behold the she-wolf again and it strikes me that she is a beast that could easily slay a man. I set my spear... Death in battle! Defending my catch! The wolf rises from her haunches and crouches, her tail erect and playful, her head lowered only slightly. Her posture is relaxed and her eyes dance with amusement. "Don’t take me lightly wulf! Ye shan’t have me or me prey without a good wounding to ‘member it by!", I roar, my wild cry shattering the stillness. Pushing myself away from the shiftless mammoth corpse I lunge at the wolf, driving my spear at her flank. Easily dodging my clumsy lunge, the wolf’s eyes taunt me. ---No easy death here cub.--- My limbs are as stone as I circle the wolf, but I no longer care. "Then I’ll die hard", I cry. ---Why would I kill you manchild? The old crone of winter will soon enough claim you and then I feast.--- Like a mad puppet I charge her again and thrust my spear at her muzzle. Eluding me with ease, she pulls back her head and my spear misses its mark. She dances around me, circling me, her jaws cracking open to reveal black canines, her eyes fixed on mine. ---You think to leave behind your shame, boy? Cleanse yourself in my jaws? I don’t think I’ll eat you after all, the mammoth child is better grown and not riddled with disease.--- My spear finds only the tip of her tail, no more. ---When you fall perhaps I’ll bury you in the snow, a urinal for the orcs come spring.--- With a roar of rage, I hurl my spear at the mocking canine. She merely ducks and my weapon flies over her back, sailing into the blinding white. I charge her, my arms spread wide. Turning swiftly, the wolf dashes away from me, glancing over her shoulder to watch me pursue. After a chase that stretches on forever, I stumble and fall to my knees. Sauntering back in my direction, the she-wolf seizes my fur cloak in her jaws and gives it a sharp tug. I land in a sprawl. Somehow finding strength, I burst up from my prone position and lunge at the canine again – and again my outstretched hands find only the cold air. Scrambling after the wolf on all fours I try with all my will to seize her, but she stays out of reach at every step. At long last I fall onto my belly, my face pressing into the snow, my anger spent. Hearing soft paws approach, I lever myself over, rolling onto my back and covering my face with my arms. ---No play left in you cub?--- I feel her hot breath on my throat. Her whiskers almost touch me. ---You disappoint me.--- With that she turns away and I’m alone again. Laying in the snow, soaked with sweat and driven to exhaustion, I know now I’ve reached the end. Breath catches in my throat and, with the dark closing in to take me, I have only my thoughts for company. My mother has had a hard life, losing a husband to gain a son... and then losing the son. A full circle. I’m so sorry Anna, I’ve taken everything from you and I never once knew better... And then nothing is left. Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4 | Chapter 5 | Chapter 6 | Chapter 7 | ||
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