[Mkguild] Dream's Aria: Dark Interlude (2 of 3)
Ryx
sundansyr at yahoo.com
Sun Jul 11 05:36:46 UTC 2010
“Can you find a light, minstrel? I cannot see but blackness.”
After ten paces on his crutches Egland fumbled about to his right and found
another archway.
“I am trying, but there is neither torch nor striker in the sconce.”
The marten’s tenor growl filled the echoing chamber. “And the name is Dream,
sir Knight, not minstrel.” Something metal and heavy rang with a dull thud
eliciting a string of pained hisses from the unseen minstrel. “Damnation! I
found the brazier; gods curse the thing, in the middle of the floor just there.
We’re in the dressing chamber.”
“I will retrieve a torch from the hall.”
“Nay, ts’amut! There are none in the courtyard, and it is no
little pace to find one in the hall.” Egland felt a hand touch his hip, then
move to his arm as Dream sought him out and forestall his retreat. “Besides, we
needn’t see to bathe, and I need to soak. I’ll soon think misery fine company
when the wine catches up to me.”
“How far to the baths?”
“A dozen paces at most, if you avoid that ambushing brazier. A tun
of soap is usually somewhere near the pool.” Dream’s hand drew him into the
deeper darkness, gently guiding him around the brazier upon its pedestal in the
center of the room. “There’s a bench to use. Doff that tabard and I’ll lead
you on.”
Egland did as he was bade, unfastening the shoulder of his recently
altered tabard. One of Coe’s nurses had seen that his antlers would interfere
with his garments and had some tailor modify his entire wardrobe. Thus, once
unfastened and the sash loosened the tabard fell free. He caught it with one
hand and laid it upon the bench he could feel brushing against his knee. In the
darkness nearby he could hear the minstrel divesting himself of his far fancier,
and far more complicated, raiment.
At the moment Egland felt glad of the blanketing darkness, feeling
suddenly self-conscious at his nakedness. He had always felt such, even in the
bathing caverns of Yesulam among his fellow faithful. As such he had sought to
bathe in the off hours when few if any were present, when he could let his
thoughts wander without the ever-present fear that anyone might catch him
glancing or even staring where he should not.
“Brrah!” Dream exclaimed at last, “I don’t look forward to putting
all of that back on in the dark, but it feels good to be free of it!” The
marten’s hand once again found Egland’s elbow and urged him into motion. “Come,
let us be cleansed.” Egland felt the minstrel’s other hand at his hip, “A step
to the right, the edge of the brazier is not pleasant to walk into unawares.
Nor do I fancy hauling you to your hooves should you trip upon it.” Once safely
around the unseen obstruction Dream lead only by the touch upon Egland’s elbow.
“How fares your recovery?”
“Swiftly, considering such injuries.” Egland supplied quietly while
he shuffled along on his crutches. After more than an hour upon them his
shoulders and hands ached terribly. “The healers say the bones are whole, I now
need only regain my lost strength and figure out a completely new sense of
balance.”
Dream guided him around a corner into the heavy warmth of
water-laden air. “The latter, I daresay, will be more difficult than the
former.” Egland could hear the lazy susurrus of undisturbed water under the
steady plinking of dripping condensation. “Expect many a bruise to pride and
posterior before you once again master the steel dance of war.” A staying hand
touched Egland’s chest. “Two steps down and then sit, the last step is into the
depths and about waist high for you, I imagine.” Egland could hear the marten
splashing about, testing his footing with one paw. The guiding touch left and a
louder splash followed. “Aye, that’s the right of it. Have care.”
War water lapped at Egland’s hooves as he cautiously descended the
two steps and slowly sat down on the rim of the pool. From the echoing of
splashing water and voice he judged the pool to be large. His ears told him
that the chamber was longer than wide. Setting his crutches upon the edge of
the pool Egland carefully eased off the lower step and into the comfortable
embrace of warm water.
“What think you, ts’amut? Better than a little basin of snowmelt?”
Dream queried from somewhere to Egland’s right. “The soap is here in a wooden
tun as well a deeper ledge to sit upon.”
“It’s warm, thank Eli.” Egland leaned there against the pool’s edge
by sinking into the water and bracing his arms along the lip of the stone pool.
“How are such marvels done in such an inhospitably cold clime?”
“Hah! You fear yet more magic?” Water surged when Dream pushed
toward the deeper middle of the pool. “They do the same here as elsewhere; they
put the pool above a source of heat. In this case one of the kitchens, from the
smells and sounds coming through the stones. At the far end of the bath is the
chimney for the ovens.”
Unconcerned at the moment about actually bathing Egland luxuriated
with a leisurely soak in the warming water. “So simple, heh. In the heat of
Yesulam the baths are below ground where the water is cooled rather than
warmed.”
“We are not so different here than elsewhere in our daily lives,
after all.”
Egland stretched each of his legs slowly as the warmth of the bath
eased into the atrophied muscles to chase away the tension. “Perhaps, except
needing a good brushing down as often as my horse.”
Dream laughed from somewhere in the middle of the dark pool. “Yes,
well, there is that point. It adds variety to life.”
“Yashua’s stones, minstrel! Variety? Every man you meet was once a
woman, every woman once a man? You know not if a child is ten summers or
fifty?” Egland snorted derisively, “I’d not call that variety, I’d call it
confusion! I don’t know if the lamb is for slaughter or soliloquy!”
“You read the poetry, first. If they don’t offer appreciation then
they’re just dumb beasts. You are new to this, ts’amut, just as we all were at
one time.”
Egland sighed heavily, “It is too new, too fast upon so much all at
once.” The elk shook his head slowly. “And why do you keep calling me that?”
“What?”
“Ts’amut.”
“Your friend was the steppelander, Bryonoth? I thought from such
acquaintance you would know something of the language. It means –“
“Brother. It means brother, I know. Other than that rat, Sir
Saulius, you’re the only one who has spoken a word of the language. And even
the he did not call me ts’amut. Why do you?”
Dream was silent for a few moments, the water stilling as he floated
motionless. “You need one.” He said at length, quietly. “Bereft, bereaving,
alone among so many unknown and strange to you. The word was taught to me, many
years ago, by a dear… friend. My own ts’amut, if you will. Ajhes ts’amut.”
“That one was close to you.” Egland replied softly with some
surprise. Ajhes had many layers of meaning from the mere closeness of unrelated
friends, to affection, or even love either emotional or physical, or both. It
was a weighty preposition not tossed about lightly. “Who was this ajhes ts’amut
of yours? What became of him?”
“He joined your ecclasia; he went to this great church city of
Yesulam where I could not follow.” Dream intoned flatly. He drifted over to
seat himself on one of the submerged stone benches. “His name was Sahan
Deross.”
Egland blinked in shock at the name that reached his ears. “Who?” he
managed to croak at length.
“Sahan Deross, son of Earl Buran Deross of Pyralia.”
“Who called himself Namir.” Egland felt his heart shrink as if
crushed by a mighty fist as memories flooded from the past to lay their sorrows
upon those still fresh. The words escaping his throat were a whisper.
“Namir, yes.” The marten replied. “Of Lequon en Nahmir, a story of
Steppes folklore, of the forging of peace between the mountain peoples and the
steppes.”
“The Two Princes, by historical treatise, seven hundred years before
our Reckoning. Both became mighty kings who ended centuries of war.” Egland
supplied in a stunned daze.
“For love.” Returned the marten in an equally subdued whisper. “How
came you to know the one called Namir?”
Egland cupped his face in both hands and stared into the darkness
slack-jawed for several long moments. The memories came upon him in a flood if
vivid images, moments of his past flickering across his mind’s eye with
arresting clarity. “He was new come to the novitiate some ten years ago. I was
just past my sixteenth year, four years into the studies for my future role as a
papal knight. As he was beyond his majority, in his nineteenth year, he was one
of the eldest at the novitae. He seemed very lost and in the early months spoke
to almost no one, secluding himself in the libraries.
“As you said, alone and bereft. Sensing that he was vulnerable and
weak certain of the more unruly young brothers sought to use his inexperience to
their advantage. Be that by false friendships, threats of harm, or outright
threat of false witness they pushed and pulled the novices to suit their ends.”
“And what of you, sir knight of Yesulam, bearer of naked steel and
letter of blood?” Dream queried challengingly, knowing that the Namir of his
memory loathed warfare and all who practiced its art.
“When I happened upon a half score of the worst that had cornered
Namir and two other novitiates to… use in contrition of their initiate vows I,
too, foreswore my oaths and vows not to raise hand to my fellows of the Church.
“Three I smote with such violence that their service thereafter was
proscribed by the lasting injuries. Four others were felled but recovered in
time and the last three would have had the best of me but for the arrival of
other novitiates. All were tried, myself among them. Seven were discharged and
bade never seek service to the Church thereafter. Those I injured most
grievously remained, but were sequestered in roles of menial services. As the
one who stood against them with violence I was made to serve penance for
violating my vows but that moment of courage reached the Patriarch’s ear. Five
years ago he called me to the ranks of his personal guard.
“But before I could become a proper squire I had to become more than
a petty nobleman’s poorly educated cast-off whelp. While I understood sword and
shield I knew little of scholarly work. I could read, but not well, enough to
partake in study of the Canticles. I sought out the scholarly, eventually
coming to novice Sahan.
“I liked him easily, for his gentle humor and patience with my
ignorance. The library was his armory, his field of battle and triumph. For me
it was a besiegement that I weathered with ill grace if for nothing more than to
be near him.
“And…” Egland stared down at his hands, not seeing how they had
changed in the darkness, but his past hands with the vividness of memory. “And
I knew why! I dared not say, but I knew why I wished to be at his side.” He
raised his head to look toward the oddly attentive minstrel. To what end was he
telling this strange amalgam of man and beast such things? What brought him to
such revelations, given to none before, even those closest to him in any regard
throughout his service to the Church?
An old familiarity between the two, the link from his past and the
past of the curious minstrel?
!DSPAM:4c395870168811804284693!
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