A Bargain in the Dark

I've had many strange dreams, and once in a while there are a few that I don't forget. This is one of them.

*****

I trudged through the snow, the powdery white rising to my waist. It was the darkest night of the Winter, the Solstice, and for me there’d be many long darker nights ahead.

Pulling my cloak tighter around me for the little protection it offered, I forged further through the now covered forest. I didn’t want to be fighting through this high snow in the night, but in this cold I’d freeze if I stood still for more than a minute. No fires, there was no wood fit for fires, all were covered in thick ice that’d take me too long to hack through with my sword.

The forest was dark. I knew it would be several more days till I made it to the nearest town, if I was on the right course, and if I could resist from letting my tired legs from giving out below me. And if I wasn’t on the right course then it’d be a few months till the snow thawed enough for the other Rangers to find my body for a funeral.

I emerged onto a clearing in the forest. Quite indistinguishable from the rest of the world, black and shadowy. But it did give me a strange sense of achievement. At least I was getting somewhere,

Another foot pushed through the snow, another step taken in the dark. I built into a rhythm, lift my foot up, throw it forward, lift the other, throw that forward. Repeat. The snow’s shifting became my lullaby, threatening to lull me to sleep, the impact of my feet on the frozen soil my only constant. Then the frozen soil disappeared.

My right foot fell through the snow but didn’t land against the ground, it just kept falling. I opened my cracked lips and screamed as I fell into the snow, then the snow around me gave way and fell into the earth.

I saw nothing but dark snow, I thought I’d suffocate in its shifting embrace. Then it fell apart and I saw myself falling through into a dark underground place, tumbling through the air and the snow following my pace.

The fall was short-lived, I soon fell onto something soft yet it was still painful. The wind left me and my face was smothered by more snow.

My eyes opened and I looked up. Hundreds of metres above was the hole in the earth where I’d fallen through, a perfect circle within which I saw the high walls of snow, the tall trees looming over so much they looked as if to fall over and tumble in with me soon. Far above was the moon, gazing down upon me sadly. A few trickles of snow still fell through, a few flakes striking me softly on the nose. The opening was too far above for me to climb out.

I’d landed upon a great pile of snow that must have fallen here long ago and stayed intact and cold, chilled by the frosted ground. I groaned, getting to my feet and looking around. I was in a tunnel, stretching in two directions. I looked down one, then the other. Both were the same, smooth walled and the corners filled with snow and dirt. There was a chilling draft that blew down one and I shivered, wrapping my cloak around my arms. The drafts would come from where the opening was. I wrapped a hand around my sword’s handle and slid down the side of the snow mountain. No use staying here.

I felt around through the edge of the snow pile and found my prize, a single thick branch. It wasn’t coated in ice and frost as the ones on the surface were. I knelt and laid it between my knees, reaching into a pouch at my belt and pulling out a flask of viscous green liquid. I tore the bottom of my cloak off and wrapped it around the stick’s head and dribbled the liquid over the cloth. ‘Fool’s Fuel’ most other Rangers called it, yet they all had use for it when caught out in the Winter’s death grip. Few things could fail to light with a few drops of Fool’s Fuel, few things save ice.

The makeshift torch caught light so quickly I shied away at first as the rags upon the branch flared and burnt bright like a Sun, before dying down to a regular flame’s light. I scooped up the torch and held it out before me as I advanced into the tunnel.

The tunnel was huge, perhaps a hundred metres across and twice the distance in height. I came across a shocking sight soon, two skeletons in the tunnel. One on his face and the other on his back. Both had tattered and discoloured cloaks pinned to their backs. Rangers.

I sidestepped their bodies, touching my lips with my three middle fingers and then raising those fingers to my forehead, in respect for them. But still I had fear in me, Rangers were hard to kill alone. Two would be impervious to wild beasts and only the greatest men could fell them. There were other things that could do such things, but I silenced myself before I could think a thought of them.

Further into the shadows I trekked, the fire crackling and flickering before me. My eyes strayed skywards and I saw the smooth ceiling of the tunnel gone, replaced by a craggly cave’s top that was covered with hundreds of stalactites.

A scream. I held the torch out before me and saw something writhing in the dark. I drew my sword with a soft hiss and stopped in my tracks. The creature struggled and thrashed in the shadows. I held out the torch lengthwise in front of me, my sword outstretched and shuffling forwards.

The being stopped struggling and seemed to shift where it lay and two glinting sparks appeared in the dark where its eyes were. The orbs were cold and filled with a strange alien glow, something different and not what should be. It screeched at me and I raised my blade to strike forward.

“Stop!”

Its voice was unnerving, hissing and like a snake’s drawl. I lowered my blade but didn’t sheathe it, keeping it levelled at the creature’s eyes. It struggled a bit more and managed to raise its head to my eye level. “Perhaps Land-Stider can help me, and I’ll help him.”

I edged forward and thrust the torch forward, the flames illuminating the creature. It was a Cave Wyvern, a long bodied reptile perhaps three metres long with its back covered with overlapping brown ridges of scaly armour. It had only two weak hind legs, not even able to support its weight, yet where a dragon would have its front legs wyverns have two strong wings replacing them, outstretched they would be wider than twice the beast’s length. The right wing was all mangled and strange, bent the wrong way with thin delicate bones snapped and poking out of the membranous skin. Its head was like a dragon’s but longer and more slender, its teeth were likewise needle-like and sharp.

The creature’s chest shook with each laboured breath. I stayed silent and didn’t move, this beast was far too wounded to deal any damage to me, or move for that matter. That must explain all the thrashing. It was weak and tired, its neck gave out and its head fell against the smooth tunnel floor. It panted and its tongue stuck out of its jaws, its eyes looked up at me with fear in its eyes. It opened its long and slender snout, “Please, Land-Strider, don’t end my flight.”

I asked, “Give me a reason not to, Bat.”

Its whole body was shaking as it tried to support its form on its hind legs and its left wing alone, before it crashed to the ground. It hissed in pain and after a moment looked back to me. “Land-Strider, he is lost isn’t he?”

“I wouldn’t say so, this tunnel’s goes only one way it seems.”

The Wyvern spoke again, “So Land-Strider says, but I can smell his fear and uncertainty. There are a thousand crossroads between here and the exit, and Land-Strider cannot guess the right way a thousand times. I’d like to make a deal with him.”

True enough. I asked, “So? What is it you propose?”

It looked down to its mangled wing. “I cannot fly with one wing. I cannot even walk without it, and I will starve if I cannot fly or walk. Unless I find my family. Our roost is above the exit of our home, this great cave. I will show Land-Strider the way, and if he carries me there he will find the way out.”

“How will I know you won’t sink your fangs into my neck the moment I raise you on my shoulders? Or that you won’t lead me into a crevasse or maybe let your family fall upon me when I bring you to them?”

He bared his teeth at me and I felt a pang of fear, but there was a series of grunts like strange laughs. “Land-Strider speaks true, and I have no love for Land-Striders. But I do have love for life, and flight, and food and family, and I’ve many more years to live before my last flight.”

I knew about a love for things, for survival most of all. Throughout your years with the Rangers you learn things, about men, about beasts. And I knew this thing here was young, and I took pity on him.

As I sheathed my sword the Wyvern looked up gratefully at me. “Thank you, Land-Strider. Thank you.”

“Save your thanks for when this ordeal is over, Bat.” I bent my knees and heaved the Wyvern onto my shoulders. I thought that I wouldn’t be equal to the task but I was. The Wyvern was surprisingly light for his weight, very light. But I knew that light weight on my shoulders would become a thousand tons after a few hours trek.

It stunk of death and rot, its ridged belly dug through my cloak and into my back. Its fanged jaws hung right next to my head. I wanted to drop it and run off into the dark, heedless of direction or sense, when it spoke again. “Promise me you will not abandon me, Land-Strider?”

A promise? I never knew these beasts had enough sense in their skulls to understand that concept. But something possessed me to reply, “I promise.”

I felt its heart beat against my back, full of hope and dread, fear that its actions didn’t betray. He weighed little more than a young man my age, so I asked, “How is it that you are so large yet weigh so little?”

“To ask this, Land-Strider, is to ask why some are born to fly and others to crawl, some to kill and others to be killed. Some of us are made one way, others in another way. My kind are born to be light, and thus we are not earth-bound like you.”

Soon enough my burden became torment, my mind was filled with the thought of the reek of this Wyvern, the beat of his heart, the pants that came through his jaws. To take my mind off my aching legs and burning back, I asked, “What is it like to fly?”

“Such a proud question, Land-Strider.”

“I must find some way to occupy my mind with something other than your weight and stink.”

He made that strange grunting laugh, before he fell into a thoughtful silence. After a moment he answered, soft as a whisper. “It’s as natural as breathing now…”

He continued to whisper into my ear. “But when I was younger, a tiny pup no larger than you are, nothing was more terrifying than the prospect of the first fall… into the yawning darkness of uncertainty, praying that my untried wings would bear me aloft. But I took the fall anyway. And you? What brings Land-Strider out in the open during nightfall, in the middle of the Cold Times of all Times.”

“Cold Times?”

“Land-Strider would call them Winter, yes?”

But still there was something I did not understand. “How would you know? You live in a cave all your life.”

“And you live on the surface all your life, yet this Land-Strider know of us Cave Flyers? So answer me, why stride through the night in the Cold Times?”

Should I tell him? He wouldn’t reveal my shame to anyone, save other Cave Wyverns. Perhaps I needed someone to confide in now. I sighed, “A girl, the daughter of a nobleman in a human village not far from here.”

My heart panged to recite these memories. “She was the most beautiful and perfect girl I’ve ever known, and I loved her for many years, but only from afar. I never dared to express it to her… instead wishing in vain that I could know the secrets of her fair heart.”

The Wyvern found my story interesting, angling his snout towards me as if to hear better though I was right under him. I continued my recital, “T’was only when I learned of her betrothal to another… that I realised my folly. I wasted not a moment more and went to her side, my intent was to confess my love to her, wishing that maybe she loved me as much as I her. I followed her one day and wanted to speak to her, but…but…”

I hung my head in shame. The Wyven had been holding his breath and released it in a moment, the air hissing softly between his fangs. “And what did Land-Strider do next?”

“I realised I had not the courage to speak to her. My heart gave out, and I left her and the village behind, leaving in the night and into the Winter outside. I quite hoped the cold would kill me and relieve me of the shame, that a Ranger hadn’t the courage to even confess his love. Till my deathbed I’ll wonder if perhaps something would have changed if I had told her.”

The Wyvern was silent and when he spoke his voice was soft and less sharp and hissing. “Why bother? Now that it’s too late?”

Why indeed?

He spoke these words to me and many a night in the future, through many fevered dreams, I’d remember them recited by the wounded Wyvern I carried.

Fortune favours not the Brave, she favours no one…

I dragged him through the dark and heard a shriek from above.

Only a fool would trust the heartless fortune over the hearts of others…

Looking up I saw a thousand stalactites, which I realised were hundreds of Wyverns hanging from the cave ceiling from their legs with their wings wrapped around their bodies.

There is but one way to look into another’s heart…

I gently lowered the Wyvern to the ground and thanked him. Before me I saw a white light far away in the tunnel, my salvation.

And but one way to test your own.