The Echolone Mine (68 page)

Torrullin
hauled Torrullin up again, gripped his face in two hands, and began
to murmur. A moment later Tristan drew a ragged breath; it seared
through him like fire, but he could breathe.

“Sorry. I
panicked.”

“The first
time is the worst. Come; let us move from this point.”

Torrullin
started walking, going where there was no direction. He drew his
sword and looked around constantly. Elianas fell in on the right,
sword out as well, and often looked back. Tristan took the left,
eyes moving ceaselessly. His mouth tasted sour and his lungs
laboured like a failing engine. The hand that held his sword
shook.

“Is this
Lethe?” he asked after a few minutes.

“Do not
speak,” Torrullin murmured. “Our presence has been marked.”

Tristan’s eyes
jerked even faster from side to side, the tension hard and brittle
inside him.

“Eleven
o’clock,” Elianas whispered. “Horizon.”

There was a
smudge in the distance and it grew rapidly in size.

“Gods, it’s
moving fast,” Torrullin said. “Stand firm.”

A strange
creature hurtled ever closer, a rolling fur ball, and it issued a
low rumble as it approached. The three men braced for certain
impact, swords raised.

The fur ball,
a mottled green and hairy affair, squealed loud and then lost
momentum to trundle to a dead stop inches beyond a blade’s reach.
Two eyes the size of melons blinked and watched.

Elianas boldly
sheathed his sword and threw his hands out in a gesture of
non-aggression. He stepped forward.

“Hey, buddy,
what are you?”

Tristan
swallowed and tightened his hold on the hilt, palms sweating.
Torrullin stood still and his sword dipped. He watched Elianas,
marvelling anew at the man’s bravery.

The sponge
shook and then undulated; the fur ball exploded in a shower of
needle sharp feathers; a mighty wail rent the fabric of the
directionless realm, and the three went sliding into a massive
funnel, which suddenly gaped open in the ground to swallow them,
herded into a chute that fed them downward at a pace close to the
speed of light.

Tristan barely
managed to hold onto his sword.

They landed
hard in an oval space that smelled and looked like the inside of an
egg.

Elianas swore
and stood up with a gigantic bruise on his forehead.

“What’s
happening?” Tristan asked.

“No idea,”
Torrullin muttered.

“If I ever
catch that bloody fur ball, I will stick his feathers where the sun
doesn’t shine,” Elianas said. He looked to Torrullin. “Tell me if
the healing works.” He touched a hand to his forehead.

“It works.” It
was a relief after the hell of the Shades.

Elianas nodded
and wandered the oval space, hand on sword hilt. He stopped, peered
closely at the ‘wall’ and abruptly punched through. Cracks
appeared.

“Gods, man, be
more subtle,” Torrullin snapped.

“Fuck subtle,”
Elianas muttered. “The bloody Dryads are coming.” He punched again
and a huge piece of eggshell fell outward. He immediately climbed
through the jagged hole.

Torrullin
motioned at Tristan, and the two followed with alacrity.

Beyond lay a
shifting world. Colours moved, air stirred, ground and sky canted -
if there were such distinctions - and sound was in constant motion,
from low to high in patterns severing internal balance.

Elianas, on
his stomach and undulating with the motion of the ground, crawled
forward, his face set in a grimace. Torrullin lost his footing,
crawled also, and Tristan had no option. He crept and, as he did
so, heaved dryly. Sharp pain lanced through his skull, through
every muscle.

Something
slithered towards them akin to a snake and, in fact, hissed.

Elianas reared
back to avoid it and then had his wrist jerked forward as the thing
coiled around him. He found his dagger and slashed at it, but it
weaved knowingly, yanked hard, and Elianas was sucked into the
undulating ground.

Torrullin
screamed obscenity.

Tristan
shouted as another twisting, slithering thing neared, and he was
gripped by the elbow. He, too, was dragged through.

Torrullin
stilled and, when a third slithering thing approached, allowed it
to take hold of him without putting up a fight.

For an
instant, as it touched him, he thought he heard laughter.

They were in a
cage of latticed vines.

Dry leaves
rustled underfoot and blue sky was visible through the interlacing
of hard wood. Somewhere there was the smell of smoke and nearby a
hive of bees droned in the stillness.

“Where?”
Elianas whispered, huddled on one side rubbing his wrist.

“Sun, oxygen,”
Torrullin said. “A reality of Lethe?”

Elianas, on
his knees, pressed against the latticework.

Torrullin
pulled his hand away. “Wait. I want to see who comes … or
what.”

Elianas’ hand
balled into a fist. “I do not like being caged, you know that.”

“Neither do I,
but give it a time, will you?”

The space was
so small the only way to avoid a squash was to stand. Tristan
raised himself up and leaned against the curved wall. He could
breathe normally again and it boosted confidence. He inhaled deeply
and found a well of patience to aid him in the wait.

Elianas,
previously confident, steadily worsened. His breathing grew shallow
and he rocked.

Torrullin
hunkered beside him. “I know the cage, my brother, for I was in one
caught like an animal, prodded with spears, spit at, insulted. Half
an hour, and if nothing changes, we bust out. Can you wait that
long?”

Dark,
terror-filled eyes. “They threw globs of burning, melting metal at
me and it tore through my skin and organs until I was a blubbering
wreck. I could not heal, for I was spread-eagled over a rack of
imbedded glass.”

“Who were
they?”

“Aldari.”

Torrullin
blinked. “The same who named you as Alhazen? The Aldari are extinct
… ah, I see.” He squeezed his eyes shut. “My god.”

“It wasn’t all
me,” Elianas said. “They did it to themselves.”

Torrullin
opened his eyes. “I know. Can you hold?”

“I will hold.
Who put you in a cage?”

“Creatures of
guilt.”

“The
Hounding?” Elianas, distracted, seemed better. “Torrullin, you did
not release all guilt there. How could you enter the abyss as an
innocent?”

“I did not
remember. I guess forgetting can equate to innocence.”

Elianas looked
away. “I wish I could forget.”

Tristan licked
his lips. It occurred to him he knew little of the barbarism in the
universe, and he knew not even a fraction of what made those
men.

Silence
returned, the minutes slow and wearying.

Then the earth
rumbled and shook. The cage slid askew and toppled over. Leaves
came fluttering down from twisting trees; the cage began to roll to
and fro.

“Earthquake,”
Tristan said, bruising along with the others in the rolling.

“Elianas, get
us out,” Torrullin said.

The dark man
needed no second invitation. In the next roll, all three tumbled
out. A moment later a mighty branch smashed down, obliterating the
cage. The three men clambered to their feet and stared at it in
fascination for a second or two, and then commenced a mad dash
through whipping and crashing trees, searching for open ground in
an earthquake.

Mighty
crevasses tore through the forest with an ear-splitting din and
huge trees fell. Birds pelted dead from the sky and wind whipped at
them, whistling insanely. The ground tilted sideways and leaves
skittered, and petrified creatures slid helplessly away.

“This is no
earthquake!” Torrullin shouted over the din, and picked up the
pace. “A Syllvan is fighting!”

They pounded
after him to the edge of the trees and there they stopped in
awe.

On an open
plain, on ground moving like waves, one Syllvan confronted three
Dryads. The tree-like creature was at least two hundred feet tall,
had a girth the size of a volcano, and every time it stomped
massive feet the ground moved. It was not a tree, however; it moved
fluidly, swiftly, intently, and swung mighty arms with flowing
sorcery as if it were made of water. It roared, the sound tearing
at the heavens.

“Sweet lord,”
Tristan whispered.

Torrullin was
running again. The Dryads, while not as big, danced their sinuous
forms and their sorcery around the Syllvan. It was only a matter of
time before they found purchase and commenced the strangling.

Elianas, with
a manic grin, set off after Torrullin, and Tristan, less crazy,
charged with him.

The Dryads
were a shifting grey, as if they could inherently camouflage, with
python-like skin, and, like to a python, were pure muscle. They
were able to coil on the ground akin to a snake, but could also
rise to their full and incredible height like a tornado spout and,
akin to the vines they emulated, could wrap around their prey and
throttle them to death. They flicked out protuberances at various
points, never the same, and each appendage acted as an arm and a
hand and hurled magic. It meant they were hard to kill.

It meant it
was easy to sunder a Syllvan.

Halfway across
the space to the Syllvan’s aid, a Dryad snagged the tree creature’s
one branch-like arm and commenced to wrap around it. Torrullin
snarled his fury and the next instant saw two mighty wings soar out
behind him.

He took to the
sky, launching bolts of sorcery.

Elianas pulled
Tristan to a stop. “Stay here,” he heaved. “Just stay.”

Then he took a
running leap and two wings erupted behind him. He flew swiftly and
caught up with Torrullin. Together they hurtled into the fray,
little ants into a battle of giants, shooting out powerful bolts so
fast it was a continuous stream of light.

The Syllvan
shook itself like thunder and pulled the Dryad off its perch to
swing it up and round and around, and then tossed it to a screaming
point far in the distance. It lumbered forward to attack one Dryad,
while Torrullin and Elianas concentrated on the third on the
field.

The two men
flapped around it, teasing, taunting, one this way, the other that,
and the Dryad lost its sense of supremacy in attempting to catch
them. They ducked the creature’s sorcery, releasing theirs.

The Syllvan
pulled in a mighty breath, which tore like vacuum through the
space, and then released it explosively. No typhoon or hurricane
would ever match the insane power of that breath. The Dryad lost
its footing and went hurtling away.

The other,
fried in many places, wisely chose retreat. It looped like a snake
and slithered away so fast the eye could not follow.

Tristan
transported closer, his breath coming in great gasps.

Torrullin and
Elianas settled to the stilled earth, wings vanishing, and the
Syllvan heaved a great sigh and diminished to its more usual
size.

It bent a
stern eye on Torrullin. “Elixir, you were not to come.”

Torrullin
swept a rueful bow. “When do I follow the rules, my friend?”

The Syllvan
shook with a rumbling chuckle and then, “I thank you. I am afraid
had you not distracted them I would now be dead.”

“They will be
back. How do you stop them?”

“Our very
dilemma,” the Syllvan sighed. He glanced at Elianas. “You are most
welcome, Elianas Danae. We have been waiting.”

Elianas’ face
tightened and then he bowed. “Thank you.”

“And you,
Tristan Skyler Valla, thank you. Watch yourself; nothing is as it
seems.”

“I did not do
anything.”

“You will,”
the creature sighed. He faced Torrullin again. “I am weary. Will
you transport me to our safe place?”

“It is my
honour,” Torrullin said.

The
co-ordinates were silently communicated and he laid a hand to the
tree creature - the first time he touched a Syllvan, to find it
comfortingly warm - and took them away from the plain, masking
everyone in his lack of signature.

Oblivion takes
many forms, although one can say only a minority attains it
consciously. Sleep is a form of oblivion, but is regarded as
imperfect, for the unconscious is more active during that period.
When drugs are used, the user claims oblivion, and yet this cannot
be. Too much changes within for that to be true. Death is not
oblivion, for new journeys begin. What, then, are the forms of
oblivion?

Book of
Sages

Lethe

T
he safe place was a forest.

It was
surrounded by rock, and later the three Valleur would learn they
were in the caldera of a long extinct volcano, where time and
nature had reclaimed an empty space.

Torrullin
released his hold in a clearing and they found three other Syllvan
there.

“One more
gone?” Torrullin murmured.

“Sadly, yes,”
the Syllvan said. He lumbered forward in his stately manner to
subside into the earth in the pose Torrullin was familiar with. The
three others looked at him in relief.

Then one
spoke, the same always in the central position in the grotto.
“Elixir and companions, please excuse us for a time. We must
communicate the latest developments.”

Torrullin
bowed and gestured to Elianas and Tristan to follow him into the
trees opposite the small gathering.

They came upon
an emerald lake so still it was surreal.

It was
circular and surrounded by spruce trees in full leaf. Not a sound
could be heard.

Torrullin and
Elianas turned as one to face Tristan.

He lifted an
eyebrow. “Shadow wings, I assume?”

Elianas sat.
“We tipped the enemy too soon. They will be wary now.”