The Hour of Story
December 19, 2001
Original Link (now dead) - http://acdm.turbinegames.com/?cat=0&id=186
The Hour of Story
By - Chris L'Etoile
Aun Shimauri looked out across the shimmering back of Volkama, who turned within his sandy courses toward the Lodge of Karab, ever seeking His Father Sea. The blaze of Au, council fire of this Legendary World, was settling in the west, flickering like the ember of a dying fire. He had learned its name from Palenqual, who had told them much of this land – things even the lost People of the South, the Pale Ones, had forgotten.
He cocked his head and listened to the song of Great Sister Wind. The nuuani are restless this eve, she lilted playfully. As I, too, am restless. Go to your drum, Shim of Timaru, and be with me.
Shimauri pressed two clawed fingers to his forehead, and bowed into Her breath. My apologies, Great Sister. The hour of story is nigh.
Wind pouted, but her merriment faded not. I will wait, then, she whispered in his ear. Come to me after.
I shall, he vowed, and bowed into Her breath again. The Great Sisters passed gently over the back of the Legendary World, but were still not to be trifled with. And Wind was as mischievous here as she was in Ezheret-Hazahtu, the world from which they’d come so many flights of the moons ago.
Shimauri turned and passed within the wooden gates of Timaru, Rock of Aun. Waves of pride, the powers of many strong keh, radiated from the log walls like the warm torrents of Great Sister Rain in spring. This had not been the first akiekie, the first encampment, of the Tonk in the Legendary World. It was, however, the only one that had stood fast before the force of Wharu. Wind laughed in the gaps between the sharpened points of the logs, and the wall, in response, grumbled at Her like an affectionate ursuin.
Aun Dreganaua sat within the old stone ring, the pale dust of the afternoon lightening his hair, his flat palms falling upon the skin of his buadren in tireless rhythm. He did not stir from his nodding concentration as Shimauri passed him, heading towards the tents on the lee side of the council lodge, and the crowd of striplings that had gathered in an attentive semicircle, awaiting him.
The fire stoked within the council lodge caressed the shadows beneath its skins. The heat of it moved the strings of shells and hammered metal that hung from the rafters, calling the spirits of those fathers and mothers long since turned to smoke and worms. Before the lodge, Aun Hareltah sat in contemplation, his nostrils flaring wide to catch the scents of the dying day, the breaths of Wind that preceded the flying of the moons. Beside him sat a young girl, using a smoothed river stone to beat flat some trinket of silver, perhaps traded from the tailless ones that had come, or perhaps taken from the corpse of a Hea.
Shimauri moved on, his feet padding softly across the dark moss.
At his step, the children quieted, backs straightening respectfully. The robes and feathers of their parents rustled at the edges of the crowd. Warriors of the Nualuan, the warrior society, fingered the edges of their stone blades and glowered at the small, pale figure that knelt among the children – Ispar Evaenauri, an emissary of the tailless ones.
Shimauri halted, and looked round at the expectant faces. “I have come to tell you of the paths that were beaten by the feet of the Tonk, and the good and ill seen by their eyes. Will you hear my tale?”
“Hou!” the children hooted.
He settled to the ground. “Before you were dreamed by your mothers, the Tonk sailed across the back of Father Sea on Ezheret, where the Great Sisters Wind and Rain were quick and merciless. There under the Blind Eye Hazahtu we stood, since before even a drum was a trembling ember within the minds of the Tonk.
“Then came the Standing Pools, that flickered in the falling waters and under the darks of the trees. They were as the works of the Pale Ones that had traveled among us long before. So the people gathered and watched, and prepared good kaba meal for the greeting of travelers, for all expected the Pale Ones had come to ask their questions again.
“But no thing came forth from the Pools. This was a worry, and the tahs gathered in their blankets and chewed the issue as a hunter in ambush chews a leaf of huaga. No sense could be made of it. Still the Pools came and burned among us. The shamans were called. They came with the heavy step of great days, chanting in deep voice and wreathed in fragrant smoke. The shamans turned their ears to the Pools, and drummed their patterns of Hearing.
“At last, they turned to the crowds and said, ‘Hou, this burning water cries. The Pale Ones have gone, and the Lightning-Sea beloved of them thrashes with their going. The Legendary World, the islands our people go to sing from after the fire of the belly is gone to a wisp of smoke, lies stooped under the plague of Wharu. Wharu, who turns the flesh of the dead to worms, and causes all things green to blacken and turn to water.’ And so, to save the Legendary World of our ancestors, the tahs counseled the warriors to touch the Pools.
“We came to perform the sacred task under a different council fire, the path hidden from the eyes of even the eldest of shamans. The children of Wharu were many then, and strong. The Betrothed of Wharu lead them from far beneath the shelter of the earth, and her wishes carried forth on the breath of Great Sister Wind.
“The Tonk fought under many moons, holding one patch of earth or another. Though the khe – the drumtalkers – soon learned that the Wharu shriek and scurry from the deep musics that stir the Tonk's heart and keh, always they were overwhelmed, and died coughing blood upon the stones, their flesh in ribbons.”
One of the children whimpered and buried his face in his mother’s arms. Ispar Evaenauri scribbled furiously on one of the strange false leaves his people left their marks on.
“Then the shamans found the circles, and Aun Harelaua drummed within them.” The children murmured, and, like grasses swaying under the caress of Wind, looked as one to the front of the council lodge. “Yes,” Shimauri said gravely, looking them in the eye one by one. “Our xuta’s great Tah was once a shaman, and grappled mightily with the children of Wharu. The marks of honor and courage painted upon his flesh are well earned.
“The Children of Wharu fell like cloud shadows over the far grasses of Palenqual. At the touch of their feet, the ground grew tired, and became dust. The earth purpled like the overripe fruit of a hot summer. Where the grass rotted, the great grey corpse-blossoms pushed upwards, feeding upon the death.
“But the shamans under Aun Harelaua stood forth from the Rock of Timaru, whose walls the Wharu could not scale. They drummed, and the bowels of the Wharu turned to water. The warriors under Aun Tanua painted themselves with red war symbols, and were girded with might lent by the spirits of this land. As the moons sailed and returned, the warriors and the shamans drove the Wharu from the bruised lands and back into their strange places, until all the land above breathed free.
“But such was not enough, for the children of Wharu still plotted beneath the earth, and the Betrothed still birthed more foulness to blight the land. Then it was that Aun Harelaua said, ‘Brothers, we must travel far under the back of great Palenqual, and slay the Bride of Wharu in her lair. Only then may our ancestors know peace.’
“There was a red sky that morning, a sky that brought a day from which to count the flying of the moons. As the sky took the color of Father Sea, the Nualuan and Itealuan gathered. Down by the bank of Volkama, they took their meal. They offered the flesh of Siraluun and Carenzi to Wind, and Rain, and the four great paths of the world. They sang praises to Deru, and to great Palenqual, and to the coming of Au. When the fires of Au flashed above the limb of Father Sea, they gathered their spears and bows and buadren, and ran light as the down of a dusk lily to the north.”
“Oye, oye,” the Nualuan murmured from the edge of the crowd, their eyes filled with the mists of that far-off morn, nodding their goodbyes to those who walked from the gates.
“They descended through the lairs of Wharu, and many died. For this was before the Soulcatchers, the water-colored stones that snare the keh of those violently slain, had risen from the back of Palenqual. The Wharu were as limitless as the waves upon the back of old Father Sea. To strike at them was as useless as striking water, for more would fill the gap in a halfbreath.
“They reached the root of Lady Palenqual. There in the thick and chirruping darkness the Betrothed of Wharu had made her lair. Even Great Sister Wind moaned in despair in that forsaken place. The battle was great, and the dead washed the earth in lifeblood that reached to the ankles of the living. The scent of it…”
He fell silent, his head bowed, remembering, barely daring to breathe lest it come as ragged as that of a dying thing.
A clawed hand touched his shoulder, bringing a wave of sympathy. I remember, brother-kin. Shimauri lifted his chin, and met the eyes of the Dolorous One, Aun Ralirea. They had stood together then, side by side, shaman and warrior, staring into the maw of Wharu’s Betrothed. They had passed through the horror together, stumbling up to the golden light of a new day, finally falling to their knees in the soft snows of the mountain Elyrii to weep and pray, and tell Sister Wind the names of the dead, that she could mourn as well.
“At last,” Shimauri said, “Aun Harelaua landed the death blow, and the Wharu gave a great and hissing cry, a roar like that of the falls below Timaru. It was then, as the Betrothed of Wharu thrashed upon the wet dirt, that her burning breath washed our Tah, and he lost the sight in his right eye.”
“Ahh-h,” the children sighed.
He bowed his head at their dismay. “A small sacrifice for what he gained. Yet still we must watch the lairs of the Wharu, and patrol the lands of Palenqual, for that is our sacred task. To keep the Devourer from consuming the world.”
He looked around at the wide-eyed circle. “This story is told. Tomorrow, there shall be another.”
The crowd, now far larger than when he’d begun to speak, moved out across the akiekie like young siraluun scattered by a charging mattekar. He rocked back on his heels, and stood. Wind tickled his ear with a teasing curl of lily-scented breeze. It was dusk, and the flowers of Palenqual were releasing their heavy, sensuous airs. I come, Great Sister, he told her.
He turned, and saw Aun Ralirea standing silently by the wall of the council lodge, his cheek resting upon the haft of his spear, his keh radiating fatigue. “It is true, then, what the Awa tell us?” Shimauri asked him.
“Hou,” he said softly. “A daughter has been born unto them. Soon she will quicken, and be betrothed to the devourer Wharu. As it once was, so shall it be once more. World without end.”
Shimauri clasped his hands and bowed to him. The hunter once a warrior walked slowly toward the flaming gates of Timaru, moving without ceremony, limping from the wound of the last Betrothed’s emerald guardian, the slash that had nearly severed his leg.
Despair fell upon Shimauri like an early frost: worse because it hadn’t been expected. We are all old men now, and the young are not yet ready for this burden. Who shall be the one to grapple with this dark bride? he asked Sister Wind.
“What was that about?” Ispar Evaenauri said, awkwardly shoving a pile of false-leaves into his pack. “I didn’t quite catch what he said.”
Wind laughed, and her breath carried the faintest scent of the human akiekies that lay upon the coast below.
Aun Shimauri laid his eyes upon the visitor – small, pale, tailless.