The Saga - Chapter 1

Chapter 1

Circa 3305

The sun rose and Luce just about fell on her face. She was well beyond appreciation of spectacular Dawn playing on crystal-laced rock. Luce was both drunk and exhausted.

Her fellow travellers, however, held her between them as they stood in quiet reverence before the portal. The ‘Gateway to Beyond’ was hidden within a narrow fissure splitting the cliff wall and extending some thirty man-heights above them.

Finely crafted traceries of mythical creatures embedded in vines and berries surrounded the entire entrance and appeared to flit in and around the ochre rock, white crystal and black granite as light warmed their outlines.

Even the rock floor seemed carved, thought Luce, trying desperately to focus on her surroundings. She couldn’t understand why the images suddenly stopped about two metres in front of her. Something black and heavy cut them off in mid stride. She felt, rather than saw the imposing wall of polished black granite that blocked her way into the cave. Winged forms and cloven hooves hovered on the edges of her blurring vision. The black granite seemed to both welcome and repel her and the alcohol, which had flowed so strongly in her veins, now left her weak and increasingly nauseous. She gulped thin air and fought her rising panic.

The climb had seemed interminable. Yorrin’s insistence that alcohol would ease the trauma of transition ensured that she was well and truly pickled by the time they set out in the pre-dawn murk.

She had departed eagerly, if somewhat unstably, certain of her courage and of her invincibility. Now she was not so sure. After miles of relatively easy walking through fields of milk weed and crab apple she had rejoiced at the beauty of first light, convinced that this spectacular dawn was an omen of bright promise for the task ahead. It was only some time later, when faced by a barrier of boulders and a treacherously narrow pathway leading to the first ridge that she acknowledged tiredness and let insidious doubt creep into her heart. What if Yorrin was mistaken? What if incineration rather than transformation was waiting? The elders had clearly outlined the dangers of her undertaking but she had swept their concerns aside in her haste to prove her worth and redeem her father’s name. Regret now rippled through her, pounding against the growing ache behind her eyes. She would have turned and fled but for the strong arms that guided and urged her on.

Yorrin suggested that she take another drink from the flask he had continually passed to her during their long climb.

“No,” she cried weakly. “Any more and I will drop where I stand. Just get me inside and let us be done with it.”

Yorrin shared a worried glance with their companions Marrin, Melthorpe, Angus and Yaddrick. In a flicker their minds met and decided they had no choice but to continue.

Yaddrick moved to the granite wall and bared his wrist to the sun. A symbol engraved on his skin met with the sun’s rays and began to pulse with dark light. In breathless moments an answering glow flickered in the granite above his brow. Relief etched his tense face as he raised his arm, matching dark glow to pale beam. As the two began to throb as one a low rumbling began in the bowels of the mountain and gradually the granite began to move. Inch by inch it sank into the stone at their feet.

“Quickly,” growled Yaddrick. “The gateway is open and we must make haste.” His face was pale and he was sweating.

Gentle hands grasped Luce firmly and directed her into the cool interior beckoning from beyond. Their path was lit by a dull glow that emanated from walls uncommonly smooth and light in colour. Luce became oblivious to the many twists and turns along their way. Suddenly Yorrin said quietly, “You’re on your own now child.”

Opening her eyes to mere slits she saw nothing but wood – great piles of wood encircling a throbbing mound of crystal. Some fifteen metres from floor to summit it emitted an eerie glow of welcome. In a daze Luce found herself before a small opening between the massive trunks. A staircase of multicoloured crystal wound up the pyre to a small platform crafted from one single, white stone. Yorrin hugged her briefly and nudged her toward the first step. It occurred to her that her task was to climb the staircase and sit on the top crystal while her friends set the wood alight.

With fear threatening to buckle her knees she glanced a silent farewell to the tense white faces surrounding her and began the lonely climb to meet her destiny. As she settled herself on the dais at the summit, the gap at the foot of the stairs was plugged and the ring of trunks surrounding her some thirty feet below was set alight.

Fear rose like gall, bitter and threatening, as she battled with panic. She wondered if the intense heat would kill her and she had visions of her heart slowly filling with noxious gases and exploding in a blood-red burst that would shatter her ribs and make splinters of her skull. Swallowing the bile, she shuddered. Other than gutted pigs roasting on a spit she had never seen the effects of gradually increasing heat on exposed flesh.

A slow chanting crept up the sides of the mountain of wood and battled for her attention against the crackling of the fire. The chanting grew louder and the crystal on which she sat responded in delicate descant. Her panic diminished somewhat and was slowly replaced by a faint glimmer of hope. She made an effort to take up the chant. Feeling much like a goldfish nibbling at a piece of weed, she mouthed the words in silence as the flames below her licked hungrily at dry wood.

Fighting a fresh bout of panic she thrust her face to the pinhole of light falling in a straight line from the cavern roof some twenty metres above her head. Perhaps this narrow beam of sunlight, jabbing and bouncing vivid reds, violets and greens from the splinter of crystal hanging from her neck, would pierce her breast and dissipate her essence in a hissing cloud of steam? She writhed in agitation. Was the sun’s ray a premonition of hope sent to settle her or was it the final twist of doom highlighting the folly of her decision? Wishing she had drunk less and could concentrate more she strained to see beyond the gloom of the now raging fire.

She found that the chanting figures on the far side of the flames had faded into vague outlines swaying in a haze of smoke. Disembodied apparitions of light, wafting in a steady pattern to what had become a sepulchral moaning. It reminded her of the waking chant of graveyard ghosts rising to meet a new moon. As sweat poured from her brow and skin crawled in shivering waves of reaction she was conscious of a deep yearning for the comfort of her familiar gully-cave. It’s solid wood benches and cool, dark corners seemed too far away to be real and too starkly etched to be of comfort.

Heat dispelled notions of cool, fresh water dripping into shallow pools, pulling her thoughts back to the mantra that Yorrin had etched remorselessly on her mind. She shook her head violently. She must concentrate or be lost. Yorrin had told her many times that absolute focus was her only hope for survival. It was the only road that would lead from here to there; from now till then; from her to it. Please don’t let me fry she begged the world of higher beings, suppressing a sob and struggling to pick up the rhythm of the chant. Again she reminded herself that Yorrin had promised she would come to no harm from the flames. Fire was a necessary part of the ritual. If the Patterner was to be found she must endure the discomfort of the process. She had been chosen and she had agreed.

For the sake of her father she had been chosen. For the sake of the land in which he had believed she had agreed. She remembered the shock at discovering the truth of his life before her.

Forgetting the fire, forgetting the chant she drifted back to the day Yorrin had arrived at her gully-cave home…

*********

…The arrival of a stranger at her door was a surprise of unprecedented proportions. Luce had been hurrying to check on her very pregnant dog, Ruby, when she stumbled over an untidy heap of rags and bone stretched across her doorway. The heap groaned and lifted its rat-tailed, wrinkled head onto a skinny elbow that balanced awkwardly in the wooden cat bowl. Ignoring the look of horror on Luce’s face the apparition had squinted into the morning sun and calmly rasped, “You look much bigger than I imagined”.

Luce was speechless. For twenty-four years she’d not seen another human. If it hadn’t been for the small store of belongings left behind by her mother and father she could easily have believed that she had really grown out of the earth - a stray seed blown by the wind and grown in the garden. The shock of an unknown presence on her doorstep unleashed absolute terror. Had she finally tipped over the edge? Had her ghosts become real? The voice coming out of the man reminded her of someone. Her father.

As the figure struggled to its knees she fled in panic. Once in the relative safety of the animal shelter she allowed a flood of distant memories to overcome her.

Her father’s voice rang in her ears. ‘Now Luceanda, if I’ve told you once I’ve told you a million times, the seed MUST be dry before you pack it. Next year’s survival is dependent upon this year’s care.’ Little had she realised that her fathers rigorous insistence on competence in all matters practical would be all that stood between her and certain death.

With a gulp she swallowed down emotions long since locked away. Who was this stranger with the familiar voice? A quick glance in the intruder’s direction showed her that he had resumed his prone position on her doorstep. What was it that reminded her so strongly of the father she had lost that bitter autumn so long ago?

It was the morning of her tenth birthday and she had been let off the usual lessons and tasks allotted to her. Full of joy she had scampered into the forest to collect a basket full of glorious autumn leaves as a present for her dad. When she returned her father was nowhere to be found. There was no special birthday feast bubbling on the fire nor was there any sign of the traditional seed cake he normally prepared for her. Anxiously she went in search of him. When she found him amongst freshly dug earth, pumpkin seeds spilled on the ground around him, eyes bulging and skin icy in the noonday sun she refused to believe what her eyes told her. Moonrise found her still stretched beside him, arms around his body and lips praying feverishly that her warmth would revive him by morning. Hope died in the night and despair twisted her in its cruel hands, as she lay exhausted by his side. It was only the insistent licking of Ruby, her dog, which had shaken her from her grief.

It had taken many days to collect enough rock to cover his massive form. With no hope of moving him to where her mother lay wreathed in wild roses, she had left him where he had fallen, carefully washing his face and hands with clear spring water and covering him in his worn leather hat and favourite black-wool rug. Oh, how she had missed the warmth of that rug and the company of her father during that first winter.

Her first winter had been the worst. Wretched with remorse at not having been there when he needed her and devastated by what she saw as his abandonment of her, she had entered those pitilessly cold months totally unprepared. The only thing that had stood between this life and the next was a small store of grain, the pumpkins, which her father had religiously planted every year, and the animals that relied on her for their survival. Numbed by grief she did the rounds mechanically, repeating to herself the lessons her father had drummed in to her over the years.

‘Chop the wood at the beginning of the day when you are still fresh. It warms you up and gets you going.’

‘A kettle of soup on the stove is better than a pumpkin in the cupboard.’

‘Small amounts of regular food are better than one huge amount then nothing.’

And so on.

In time she began reading stories from the substantial library her parents had left behind. It consisted of children stories written by her father and illustrated and bound by her mother. There were fantastic stories about magic and power battling evil creatures in places mythical; sad stories about lost tribes and many volumes on how to make things, grow things and treat various ailments. They helped fill long hours of nothingness and distracted her from her solitude. They also gave her the instructions she needed to build a life without a parent, friend or fellow human to guide her.

As she shared meagre provisions with the goats, ducks, dogs, cats and chickens she refused to hope that the seeds she had helped her father collect the previous summer were still good. She had always been impatient with the drying process and she was sure that her lack of care would result in them not germinating in the spring.

The animals also suffered over that interminable winter. Ruby’s litter had been stillborn. Jedda, the old sow, had become weak with hunger and had finally died. Luce recollected how, in grim determination, she had hacked at her pet and roasted the meat, bitter tears mingling with scorched flesh. She had had no choice. She had lost her chickens for lack of seed, the cattle had disappeared and the food supply had dried up. By the end of winter she had her dog and cat, two goats, a small herd of sheep and one piglet. She also had her sanity. Even at the age of ten her iron will was her greatest resource.

She marvelled at her sense of achievement when she realised that the snow was melting and she was still alive. She also remembered her determination as she stabbed at the still frozen soil in the garden bed; her joy as green sprouts pushed their way through carefully tilled soil and her delight at her first tomato. A smile crept over her as she recollected the sensation of stuffing the first tomato into her mouth and revelling in the juicy rivers that flowed down her chin.

Memories of her father were less clear. The pumpkin seeds, which had spilled from his hands, had grown into a mantle over his cairn and she added small plants of wild herbs amongst the gaps in the rocky crevasses that covered him. Gradually they had found their way through and over the rocks, a perennial tribute to her only source of advice, love and comfort since the death of her mother some three years earlier. She had loved them both so much and each, in turn, had left her.

Since then she had made a life from what she found around her. She cared for her animals, nurtured her gardens and gradually lost all hope of human contact. She finally convinced herself that love only led to betrayal and so she was much better off alone. Aloneness was her saviour from the bitterness of abandonment.

A sharp yelp from Ruby the third had her remember the intruder and she realised that she couldn’t just remain behind the hay. Having rediscovered her courage she eased toward the door, shushing Ruby as she passed. Ruby was close to dropping her first litter of pups and had made a nest for herself in the hay. What a pity Ruby’s mate Grrrrr was out hunting. He would have protected her from the stranger. Anxiously she peered through the gaps in the wooden door and observed the creature on her doorstep lift itself onto bony knees and lever itself onto unstable legs. Swaying in the early morning light he roared across the yard, “I don’t suppose a bit of sustenance could be found in this fine establishment?”

Fire lashed as clear blue eyes transfixed her through the knotted wood. She felt like one of the fish she had often caught, gap-mouthed and panic stricken as it came to terms with being stranded on the riverbank.

“Well, girlie. Get a grip. I’ve had a long trip and am in definite need of food and wine.”

Before she could decide on a response he had turned and wobbled towards her front door. Suddenly anger replaced fear. How dare this stranger go into her home uninvited? Gritting her teeth she eased herself from the animal shelter.

“Who are you and what do you want?” She yelled. But she was too late. He was already inside.