Uncle Kevil told me this tale just after I became a man. I had pretty much decided that I wanted to join Issaries, and so I went to visit my uncle and talk it over with him. As things turned out, I stayed late, drinking, and after a while I asked him about the last trip he took with my father. This was something neither of them had ever said much about, and I was a little surprised when he agreed to tell me.
I'll tell it the way he told me, as close as I can remember.
KEVIL'S TALE We were headed for Day's Rest, two days out. About midday, your father turned to me with a look of terrible joy on his face.
"Storm's coming", he said. "A big one".
He had this big fierce grin on his face, which was really annoying under the circumstances. It wasn't the season for rain, so I didn't think we'd need to worry about flash floods and such, but a man can choke to death on the dust that gets kicked up. Him being a a storm bull though, he thinks it's just the finest thing in the world.
I didn't want to leave the trail if I could help it, because of my Path Watch, so what we did was pick up the pace to see if we could find somewhere to shelter. By midafternoon we still hadn't found anything that would serve, and that was when the storm hit us.
I tell you now, if it hadn't have been for your dad, I'd have been dead that day. That monster storm just came howling out of nowhere. As it was we had a little warning, so I took off up the ridge we'd been following hoping to find something we could use for shelter - a cave or a big boulder would do at a pinch. I didn't see anything directly useful there, but the prospects seemed better, and I figured the lee of the hill should buy us some time. So I headed back to get your father and the animals, and that's where he nearly gets us both killed.
Instead of staying put, he's wandered off toward the heart of the storm, shouting and yelling like he's cheering the storm on. I could barely see him through the dust, and I had to drag him back. Not always a good idea with a beserker. Just for a second, I thought he was going to kill me himself and save the storm the trouble. Then he pulled himself together and we managed to get ourselves and the animals over the ridge. Once we were behind the ridge, things weren't quite as bad.
What we had was one of those winding, twisting gullies, and I reckoned there was a good chance it might twist back sharply enough somewhere to give us a wall to shelter behind. So we set off following the gully. While we did, and since I could now make myself heard, I asked your dad what sort of foolish notion had got into his head back there.
"You don't understand", he said sadly. "To me that storm is a scared
thing. Somewhere beyond Time, the Storm Bull is killing the Devil all
over again. This Storm is just the echo of His Rage and His Fury and
for the sounds of it He is doing Greivous Damage to the Force of Chaos
this day!"
"Now don't get yourself started again", I said quickly, because he'd
been getting that light back in his eyes again.
"The thing is", he said, a bit quieter, "were I to stand at the heart
of that storm and perform the ceremony of worship, I could join the
battle..."
"And get trampled into mush by the Urox himself in his rage to get at
the Devil, most like", says I. "That's if you don't drop dead first
with your lungs full of dust. Come on, this isn't the time or the place
for such stuff."
"No", he said. "It never is somehow".
Well, I shut up after that lest I start him off again, and we pressed on, heads down against the dust, and all the time, the storm is picking up around us, until we come round one of the bends in the gully and it opens out into more of a valley with what looks like a town in the middle of it. By this time it was blowing so hard I had to shout to make myself heard.
"You ever hear of a town around here?" I shouted at your dad.
"This close to Day's Rest?" he shouts back.
"This close to the trail! We'd have heard of it".
"Then what is it?"
"Shelter, I hope!" I yelled at him. "Let's check it out". Which we
did.
Now that town looked pretty strange from what I could see of it, which I admit wasn't much. From what I could see, this place had a wall built around it, and it was all towers, rising up towards the middle, like it was built on a hill or something. What was stranger still though was to find a pair of dragonewts guarding the gate. Great big brutes they were, all spikes and horns and armour plate. Didn't seem bothered by the storm neither.
Now at this time the only Auld Wyrmish I knew was a few bits your Uncle Fillif had tried to teach me one time when we were both drunk. So we're stood there in the storm and I'm wracking my brains for something useful to say. Then one of the 'newts spoke to us. What surprised me most was that I could understand him.
"Greetings, strangers", says the 'newt. "Welcome to Tikillitikkari.
Enter and find shelter." Believe you me, I didn't need asking twice. We
piled through those gates just as fast as we could go. Once we were
inside the noise and the dust stopped dead..
"Must be some sort of warding spell", I said to myself.
"They'll need one", says your father. "These walled places can get
filled full of dust when it blows like this. I saw a place where it had
happened once".
Another 'newt, one of the little crested ones this time, comes running up to welcome us again and tell us where we can stable the animals and what's a good tavern for visitors and suchlike. Just as polite and normal as then ones outside. When the little fellow had gone, your father says to me "There's something funny about these dragonewts".
"No there's not", I said. "What there is, is something disturbingly
normal about these dragonewts". This gets me one of your dad's famous
don't-get-clever-just-show-me-what-to-hit looks, so I pressed on
quickly. "Think on those two at the gate. They were almost casual.
They were relaxed! Did you ever see a relaxed dragonewt?"
"I saw one had gone to sleep in the middle of a road once. We couldn't
wake it so we had to roll it over to the side".
"That's not relaxed, that's asleep. Possibly Dormant. I don't think
anyone ever saw a relaxed dragonewt. It's like looking for a relaxed
sparrow. They're either hopping about full of nervous energy, or else
they're standing stone still, or doing some ritual dance or something.
I think if ever anyone does see a relaxed dragonewt it'll be because
it's part of some higher weirdness that they just aint seen yet".
"Now there's a cheery thought", said your father.
"Hmmm. Good point", says I.
Well, we stabled the animals and found storage for the goods, and then we set off to find the Inn we'd been told about and swill away some of the dust from the storm. Inside, the town was living up to it's promise of weirdness, with human type people and dragonewts all mixing in the streets. The 'newts all seemed friendly enough, but the people seemed a bit stuffy. When we found the inn (the Draconic Principle it was called, a snappy name if ever I heard of one), it was mainly full of humans, all sitting down and minding their own business by and large, which just went to confirm me in my opinion of them as a miserable bunch of so-and-sos.
I went up to the bar and ordered two mugs of ale while I tried to size the place up. I figured we'd want to stay overnight, and I wanted to work out how best I might bargain for a place. The kid who served us, he'd be about as old as you are now I reckon, fills the mugs without saying a word, then he stare straight ahead and says "silver piece" in this flat toneless voice. I had to chuckle.
"Son", I told him, "I don't know what you put in the beer around here,
but back where I come from, we expect change from a clack. Do you want
to run that past me again?"
"Silver piece" he says just the same as before.
"Look, kid: We've all got to make a living, huh? Just don't feel you
got to try _too_ hard."
"Silver piece".
"Right son. I'm in a real good mood right now, so I'm going to put not
one but two coppers down here on the bar. Any time you want to start
talking sense..."
I didn't get to finish what I was saying here, because as soon as I put the coins on the counter he just slams the mugs down on the bar snatches up the coins and hurls them into the fire like I'd mortally insulted him. Then he turns his back on us and stands there all quivering with rage. I heard a scrape of chairs and stuff, and when I looked round, most everybody else in the room has turned their backs on us as well.
"What? What is the matter here?" I said, getting a little peeved
myself. "Have you people got some sort of cult prohibition on copper
coinage? What?" No reply.
"My brother asked you a question", rumbles your father. "I'd answer it
if I were you".
"Better not", I whispered to him. "We just got here, and this would be
a very inconvenient time to get run out of town, what with the storm
and all. Drink up and we'll go find someplace sane". There's was never
anything that calmed me down faster than your dad getting heated up.
The thing about me and your father was I could generally talk him into
most things. What I couldn't do was make him like it.
"Kevil", he says, "I don't know how you talked me into this trip, but
if you ever ask me again..."
"I know, I know. That's what you said last time. Drink up."
Well, we got out of there and took ourself off for a look round the town. Old Man Yelm had finally suffled off into the Underworld by this time, and I noticed that they had lots of little dragon heads carved high up on the buildings which were lighting things up by breathing little jets of fire. Your father was in a similar mood, I reckon, and I let him cuss me out for a bit. Eventually he stops, takes a deep breath, and then says. "This place is _really_ weird.
"What way in particular?" I asks.
"These buildings aren't like anything I've seen in Prax. Not ruins nor
oasis. It's more like some of the ruins I've seen in the Pass. Then
there's the folk here. We've got the dragonewts acting like regular
folks, and the people are all acting like dragonewts."
"Must have been a bit like this in the Empire of the Wyrm's Friends", I
said. "Hey! That's it! This must be some remnant or somthing".
"Yeah, apart from the fact that the Wyrms never settled Prax, and apart
from the fact that the they all died of being eaten by dragons. Apart
from that, I'd be inclined to agre with you".
"Well", says I, "you just this minute said how this looks a bit like
the ruins in Dragon Pass. And now I think about it, the buildings here
have all got that EWF pattern running along them, just like in the
ruins in Dragon Pass".
"I am never coming on another trip with you again, Kevil. Hear me?
Never again".
So we walked and walked and now I was thinking about the Wyrm's Friends I kept noticing more and more bits of dragon symbolism, like the way the streets were cobbled in this diamond pattern like they were scales, or the way the towers had this zigzag crest spiralling up them. After a while, I also realised we were lost. The streetplan, and calling it such is a mortal insult to anyone who ever so much as laid out a campsite, was real confusing, with streets spiralling up and down and looping over and under each other. Eventually, we wound up near the top of one of the towers where there was this balcony thing that would let us look out over the plains.
"Good", says your dad. "I want to watch the storm for a bit". Which was
fair enough by me, cause he looked like he could use a bit of cheering
up. When we got up there though:
"The storm's gone", said your father, sounding dull and tired.
"It can't have blown out yet. Where's it gone?"
"That's not all", I said. "What phase is the moon tonight?"
"Empty-Half" he says without even spitting, which just shows how down
he was feeling. I really hated to do this to him.
"So where is it?"
"Hah! right where it's always been. Right over ...there?" He stood
gawping at the empty sky. "Kevil, they've taken the moon. The
bastards! _I_ wanted to destroy it."
Thinking of your father right then is one of the saddest things I know. I mean I know he was a brave man. I believe he'd have challenged a rhino to a head butting contest if he'd have had half a reason to. Right there and then though, he didn't have a clue how to handle the situation, and he just looked lost and frightened. I don't mean that I was much better, just I was used to feeling confused like this. Your father wasn't and it had rattled him badly.
"I don't think its gone exactly", I told him. "It just hasn't risen
yet. The Empire of the Wyrm's Friend was before the red moon".
"How can that be?" he asked.
"I don't know, it's just my best guess. Come on", I said, trying to
break his mood. "Let's look around a bit more and see if there are any
more surprises."
"There had better not be", he said with a touch of his usual
truculence, "or I am going to get very angry with someone".
So we set out again, and I decided to try and navigate towards the centre tower, since it seemed the most likely place to find anything important. When we got there, the street sort of spiraled up around the outside. Let me tell you what it was like at the top.
First of all, the top thirty feet or so was shaped like a dragon's head and neck. There was a ruff around the neck that was fanned out to make a broad platform you could stand on. On the platform were two to three dozen dragonewts, all milling about and chattering, just like they were dignitaries at a civic convention somewhere.
In the centre of the platform, the dragon's neck continued up like I said. There was a zigzag crest running along the back of the neck and because of the way it's neck was twisted, this crest formed a set of stairs spiraling up to where it had its hands (if that's what you call them on dragons) held out in front of it to make a much smaller platform. On the hand platform, there was a big brass bell hanging from a stand, and the dragons head was facing it, as though this bell was an object of beauty that the dragon had decided to contemplate. Although, to look at it's face, the dragon had evidently dozed off in it's contemplations.
I wanted to take a closer look at this higher platform, but when I tried to climb the steps, a couple of big warrior types blocked my way.
"I'm sorry, sir", said one of them, "but you may not go there".
"May I ask why not?"
"When that bell sounds", said the 'newt, "the world will end. We don't
allow people up there in case there were an accident. We wouldn't want
the world to end before its time, would we?".
I was all set to try and talk my way past these two, but your father had had enough.
"Everyone listen to me!" he shouted. "On account of my brother here and
his tender sensibilities, I have tried very hard to be patient.
However Patience is not a virtue my cult cultivates, and mine is now at
an end. Somebody around here knows what is going on, and somebody is
going to tell me. Either that or I will start killing people until
someone does".
I groaned to myself and set out to try and calm things down. Before I could say anything this tailed priest comes lightly tripping through the crowd and says something. I once saw an Uleria priestess at a party, where she was just breezing through the crowd dropping pearls of wit and wisdom to everyone she passed. This 'newt was acting just like that, except instead of some little joke, she said:
"The Cosmic Dragon unborn lies, still sleeping in her shell, And in that sleep, She dreams the world, and dreams us all as well".
"That's not an answer", said your father.
"Oh yes it is", I told him. "Come away from here and I'll tell you
all about it..."
[ To be continued... ]
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