The Great Darkening (Epic of Haven Trilogy) (32 page)

Cal was overwhelmed with gladness to see them. In the days since the Oweles bid him to follow, he had carried the dread of the green-eyed evil close to his thoughts, fearing the worst for his woodcutting friends. He had wondered often about their well-being, and more than anything else, he had deeply mourned the loss of Yasen. He sat gratefully at the table in the company of red-faced smiles and red-eyed laughter. A bowl of Keily’s steaming stew warmed him up from the inside out, and for the first time since leaving the Poets of Kalein, he felt the providential hand of the great Father guiding both his heart and his steps.

“How is it that you are alive?” he asked Yasen. “I mean, I saw what that bear did.”

“It was Filip, my horse … it was he who took the brunt of the bear’s attack.” Yasen took a draught of his ale, pausing to control his roiling emotions. “My wounds gave way to fever though, and it is only thanks to the efforts of the healers and by the hand of the THREE who is SEVEN that I am still here among the living.”

“Perhaps He is not quite finished with you yet, old friend!” Cal said with a deeper sense of conviction than Yasen had ever seen out of the young groomsman.

“Well, you may be right, for I have just been given an assignment to lead the woodcutters west, across the Dark Sea,” Yasen said. “King Jhames wants to seek the light, and He is sending us brave and mighty woodcutters,” Yasen said with mock arrogance, “to lead the way for the rest of Haven.”

Cal’s eyes went wide with wonder, the words of Iolanthe ringing in his head.
For out of the west a new hope will come.
He knew as assuredly as if she had told him herself that this was it;
this
was his passage to find his way to the west and continue his journey.

He spoke to his friend, excitement dripping from his words. “Do you have your company filled as of yet? For I would like to join your voyage westward and seek the light alongside good friends.”

The men looked back and forth at each other, clearly taken aback to see anyone this anxious to rejoin the ranks of woodcutters. Smiles crept across their bearded faces as they began to recall the uncommon tenacity of the young groomsman.

“I still have my restitution to finish, and well … I would be able to look after the horses for the camp!” Cal told them. “Besides, I have gotten to be pretty competent with an axe!”

“Well!” Yasen exclaimed, clearly amused by Cal’s eagerness. “This is a day of surprises indeed. First my friend comes back from the dead, and then he willingly requests to journey back into its black jaws all over again!”

The table erupted with laughter. The men struck up a half-shouting, half-singing toast in his honor.

“To Cal the fearless,

to Cal the brave,

to Cal who goes as he pleases

to and from the grave!”

Keily brought him another flagon full of ale, and then shocked the room into momentary silence by kissing Cal right on the lips, feigning irresistibility towards the exaggerated bravery of the man the men cheered about. The table doubled over in laughter, some of the men spitting out their ale, unable to contain themselves as Cal turned a deep shade of red. Keily smiled brightly and gave Yasen a knowing wink as she turned and left the men to their revelry.

Yasen peered after her for a moment, rather undone by the sight of her lips upon Cal’s, but quickly brought his attention back to the friend at his side. “Alright then. We could use a brave, axe-wielding groomsman like yourself. Tomorrow when the rest of our company arrives, we will leave for the Capital and make ready for our voyage west.” He clapped Cal on the shoulder. “And I shall be glad of your company, my brother. Of that you can be certain.”

Something hard and metallic caught his attention as his hand rested briefly on the shoulder of his friend. A glint shone from underneath the half-sodden cloak that Cal had refused to take off before sitting at the table. Curiosity overtook Yasen’s thoughts at the bright speck of reflected metal.

“What kind of treasure does a once-dead groomsman, who braves demon-bears and disappears for months, wear concealed and close to his chest?” He asked the question quietly, unable to dismiss the mysterious gleam but respecting Cal’s obvious desire to keep it hidden.

“Well, friend,” Cal said in the same low whisper, “perhaps it is time that I tell you my own tale.” Cal picked up his flagon of ale in one hand and his small leather pack in the other and stood. “Let us speak outside, for the storm has passed and I am in need of some fresh air.”

Cal led Yasen out the front door and onto the covered porch. Yasen adjusted his bandage a bit and took a draw from his long pipe, staring out into the twilight as he puffed the fragrant smoke in the pregnant silence.

“Tell me, Cal,” he asked again, “what kind of road leads you out from the jaws of death clad in this shining metal of such significant worth?” Yasen looked him in the eyes, waiting to hear the truth of Cal’s story.

Cal took in a deep breath, met the gaze of Yasen the North Wolf with his own, and then began his telling.

Chapter Thirty-Five

Y
asen’s
eyes were wide in wonder and disbelief as Cal recounted most, but certainly not all, of the details since their parting. Cal wasn’t sure if it was fear or embarrassment that kept him from spilling the whole of his unbelievable last few months, but regardless of his motivation, he mostly kept to the parts of his tale that could be more easily explained. Cal trusted Yasen, for he had seen his worth in the heat of battle and he had felt the same overwhelming amount of respect that every single one of the woodcutters had for the North Wolf; so he did not want to wholly omit the parts of his journey that teemed with unexplainable magic either.

Cal told him of the Oweles, not everything about his encounters with them, rather just of how they had defeated the demon bear and of how they had cleaved the Northern Altar of the Priest from top to bottom. He spoke of the witch and the bridge and the pounding force of the mighty river Abonris; when it came time to speak of his Poet friends, Cal did not withhold even the slightest detail.

Yasen took in his friend’s unbelievable story, letting the tale play out in the theater of his thoughts. He puffed, and thought, and weighed the telling, knowing full well that Cal had to be deliberately leaving parts of his story hidden, though he did not feel the need to press the young groomsman on the matter.

“My friend, most men would give three lifetimes to have had even half the adventure that you have condensed into just a handful of months,” Yasen said with a wide smile. “It would seem to me, as it once did on the North Road, that there is more than meets the eye when it comes to you, groomsman.”

“I don’t think I was ever looking for adventure,” Cal said, brushing off his compliment. “But I do know that I have always wanted to seek the light. I have always believed in the ancient words and, well, I have always hoped that somehow I might live to see the day when His new light would finally come.”

“Sounds to me like you have indeed been spending quite a bit of your time in the company of the Poets!” Yasen said in a smoky chuckle. “And it looks to me like they did not leave you empty handed.” He made a deliberate nod of the head in Cal’s direction.

“What do you mean?” Cal asked, not altogether sure what his friend was implying.

“I saw the gleam coming from inside that cloak of yours,” Yasen said as he pointed with his pipe. Cal’s face went as white as a ghost, his fingers gripping his chair with tense concern over what exactly Yasen had seen. “No groomsman I ever heard of has armor that shines like the suit you are doing your best to hide.”

Cal breathed a deep sigh of relief, and this in itself was not lost on Yasen, even if he only had one good eye to see and take notice of it.

“You are right, I was trying to hide it underneath my cloak. It was a gift from my Poet friends and, well, I would hate for some jealous eye to be taken with its beauty and find a way to separate me from it,” Cal told him with a nervous laughter.

“Well, come on then, let’s have a look at this gift of yours,” Yasen pried. “I won’t kill you for it, if that’s what you’re worried about.”

Cal carefully unbuttoned his damp, grey overcoat and revealed the glinting shine of the very same piece of bronzed armor he had discovered in the wreckage of the library of Petros. The scalloping of metal feathers was of another time altogether, an age of beauty and power. This work of artistry and craftsmanship, this armor of Terriah, was an unlooked for relic of the forgotten past, and by its beauty alone it lit up the greying sky of this shadowy present.

“How did you manage to come by a gift such as this, my friend?” Yasen spoke in slow, disbelieving words. “I have only heard rumors of armor like this even existing! May I touch it?” Yasen moved closer to his friend, hand outstretched, pulled in by its shine. “Come on, get rid of the cloak, there is no longer need to keep up this charade.”

Before Cal could protest, Yasen grabbed the damp shoulder of the grey cloak and pulled him free of its concealment. Nervously, Cal reached and carefully took back his cloak from his friend, gently hanging it up on an iron nail that stuck out from the wall of the tavern’s porch. He arranged the cloak awkwardly, patting down the sides in an effort to straighten the bulges in the fabric.

Yasen peered at Cal curiously for a moment until something else caught his eye. “And what is this?” the North Wolf exclaimed. “The groomsman has a sword, too?” He shook his head in disbelief. “And look at the workmanship of it! You certainly did not get this from any Poet, did you?”

“No,” Cal said as he looked off into the distance behind Yasen. “I … pulled this from the bottom of the river.” His eyes betrayed his wary guardedness for the blade that hung from his belt.

Yasen studied his friend, knowing full well that there was something more to this story. “Well then, that was certainly a lucky find. Perhaps the next time you go fishing you can catch me one too? Huh!” He laughed, hoping to break the tension that hung between them there on the porch.

Cal smiled again, and Yasen was a bit relieved by it. “Come on then, why don’t you tell me all about this Poet gift of yours.”

Cal took a long draught of his ale and looked to his friend, nodding in assent. “I knew my time with the Poets had come to an end. My arm that had been badly wounded was mostly well, and although they had been so kind to me and Moa, I could sense that my journey would not end at Kalein.”

Looking out down the dark streets of Piney Creek, Cal continued. “My mother and my father raised me with the wisdom of the Poets. She would sing anthems of hope, and my father would tell me tales of King Illium. And more than anything else … they instilled in me a desire to seek the light. That is something that has always made me seem a bit odd here in Haven. But for me, that hope is part of who I am. And there, with the Poet brothers and sisters … it was different.” Cal looked back to his woodcutter friend.

“With them, hope was normal, as normal as breathing is, and I learned much of the beautiful power that hope wields. Yet I knew … no, I
know
that beauty like that is not meant to be hidden away in ruined palaces or buried under mountains of cold forgetfulness.” A light burned in Cal’s eyes as he spoke, a light that Yasen had never seen before in all his travels and battles and encounters. The illumination that shone from the young groomsman was not a tangible radiance, but rather one that blazed from the depths of something beyond the physical realm.

“That kind of strength, Yasen, is meant to
stand
for something … or if necessary, stand against something.” Cal’s voice cracked with the weight of conviction in his words. Yasen looked at the young man, who here now on the porch of this tavern looked as if a lifetime of wisdom and experience had been etched into the faint lines of his face.

“My Poet friends wished me to stay with them, but deep down they knew that I must continue on my own. After we had broken our fast together on my last morning, Elder John, the one who fished Moa and I out of the river, came to me with this very gift.” Cal looked down at the resplendent bronze armor that he wore. “He told me to take it as a reminder of my time under the mountain, and of the great battle I would fight, and of the true prize that I seek.” Cal’s eyes had grown damp with the remembering.

Yasen raised his eyebrows. “It seems to me that your Poet friends are placing all of their pent up hopes onto your shoulders. Perhaps it is not a fair request of a greenhorn such as yourself.” Yasen spoke with the casual concern of an older brother, not wanting to truly reveal the full measure of his empathy.

Cal allowed a slight smile to cross his face as he looked at his friend. “Their hopes are not a burden for me … nor do they rest in me alone, Yasen. The Poets are of the mind that there is One that will bring the powers of mystery and magic together to orchestrate His purposes and reveal His light. And, well … I am of the same mind.”

“That is plain enough to see! The like-mindedness, I mean,” Yasen mused out loud. “But tell me Cal, what is it that makes you so certain?” Yasen asked.

“Tolk, the wisest man I know, brought me this,” Cal told Yasen.

Cal reached down into his leather pack that was resting against the log walls of the tavern and retrieved the bronzed bird helm from its safekeeping, then placed it upon his head. Cal stood before the hero of the North, garbed in the ancient suit of bronzed armor from the warriors of old, and looked very much like a hero in his own right. Yasen’s eyes went wide for the second time, there in the faint, silver light on the humble porch of the humble tavern, as Cal recounted to him his impossible story.

“When he brought me the helm, he put it on my head, then took me by my shoulders. I can’t fully explain what happened when he did it, but … I saw something in his eyes, Yasen. And somehow … magic was in the air. It was as if the words being spoken and the gifts being given had been—I don’t know—
prearranged
by the THREE who is SEVEN himself. As if somehow they were meant for the specific purpose of being exchanged between us, then and there.” Cal shook his helmed head, still even now trying to make sense of the gravity of the moment that had taken place just a couple days ago. “All of them, the brothers and sisters alike, gathered around me. The air glowed violet and strong in the presence of so much hope, and there was wind …
wind
, Yasen! There under the mountain, a breeze blew over us, moved on the wings of beauty, brother!”

Yasen looked at Cal, perplexed and yet captivated by the story he told. The hope that Cal carried with him now was of the contagious sort, and Yasen could feel his own heart being caught in its gravity. “One of these days, my friend, if we have light enough to see it by, you must take me to see this ancient mountain palace that you speak of with such wide-eyed wonder,” Yasen mused out loud.

Cal smiled and nodded to him. “I must tell you the words that Tolk, the old Poet, spoke over me.”

“What did he say?” Yasen asked him.

“He told me, there with everyone gathered around, ‘May you lead courageously, and may you fight victoriously, and may you, Calarmindon, Bright Fame … love immeasurably.’ He told me that it was those three things that would wake the light of hope in man again.”

Cal removed his helm, and looked hesitantly to his friend. He knew that he had not told him everything, but even what had been spoken seemed out of place in this greying world, and Cal was afraid the awkward sense of skepticism would hang long between them after the tale was told.

“Well?” he asked him.

“Well what?” Yasen responded with a touch of playful sarcasm to his voice. “I am not calling you Bright Fame, if that’s what you’re asking!” The two friends laughed together, and Yasen couldn’t help but feel the smallest crackle of magic as he regarded his friend in the ancient, bright armor.

“Tell me though, whatever happened to Moa?” Yasen asked him. “That horse watched over you better than my mother ever did me!”

“That was the hardest gift of all,” Cal told him. “So much had been given to me by all there in the mountain palace, and I felt as if I needed to give them something special in return for their kindness.”

“So you gave away your horse? I could understand your giving a gift, of course, but that was beyond extravagant—it was downright impractical!” Yasen said, a bit shocked. “Besides, you loved that big black Percheron, and she you! That doesn’t happen often, brother.”

“I know,” Cal said with misty eyes and a somber smile. “The gift I gave was meant for
Moa
. You see, her mending was not yet complete, and I knew that if I took her with me, there would be no way for her to make the journey without great pain.”

“I am sorry, my friend, I know how much her loss must pain you,” Yasen lamented alongside him. “Even now I still grieve for Filip.”

Cal let out a deep sigh, knowing he did the right thing, but still saddened by what it cost him. “One of the old Poet sisters had a gift for singing to the horses, and she promised me that she would keep her company. That day, I hugged Moa’s neck and brushed her mane, and sung her a sad song of farewell. I told her not to fret over me, that the THREE who is SEVEN has plans for me beyond my knowing, and that I am sure He will protect me in her absence.”

His eyes filled with tears even now as he thought about what that horse had meant to him, and Yasen could see plain enough the bond that only trouble and hardship could forge between two friends.

“I promised her that if it is in His plans, I would come back for her once the light has been found and all is well again. Besides—and Moa knew this too—a mother would be the last thing I need for this next leg of the journey,” Cal told him, trying to humor away the thickness of his emotions. “I still have a way with horses, so don’t you worry,” he told Yasen. “I’ll find some horse to befriend, or perhaps one will find me.”

“Aye, I am sure of it,” Yasen agreed and smiled through a thick haze of pipe smoke.

The two friends stayed out there in the cool of the twilight for quite some time, sharing stories and pipe alike. After most of the tavern patrons had finished their flagons and stumbled their way home, Keily came out to check on the pair. “Well, does the hospitality of my tavern displease the two of you so much that you would rather wait outside in the cold than sit by the warmth of my fire?” she teased them.