Young Writers Society

Chapter 2

The huge peaks of the White Mountains were turning slowly orange with the setting sun, and the sky was changing colour from a light blue to an eerie, glowing pink. Telli and Brakis watched a sight they had never seen before with wonder and in awe.

"The Gods are fine artists," said Brakis, and could have been reading his companion's thoughts.

They watched the changing scene in silence for a while. The mountains looked so near, but the travellers had already realised that this was something of an illusion due to the range's great height, and Brakis had guessed that they had at least another three or four days' walking before they had to worry about trudging through the snows.

This was the end of the fifth day since their departure from Elneside. The journey had been uneventful for the most part, although difficult at times because there were no paths, and they had no way to know the easiest way eastward. They had followed the Elne up river for the first two days, but when they had reached the hills the river had begun to wind, and they were forced to choose between a long route on its bank, or shorter, but steeper cuts between its bends. Now on a high ridge that seemed to lead straight towards the mountains, they had decided to stop for the night by a spring in a small hollow offering them some protection from the wind. A stew, consisting of rabbit and edible roots gathered on their way, was cooking over the fire that Telli had made up earlier, and smelled good to the hungry travellers.

The spring formed a stream, which flowed into a pool a short distance away. Brakis got up, went over to the pool, and started to rinse his face and hair. Telli, watching idly by the fire, saw his friend stop suddenly with his washing and stare down into the water for fully half a minute, before pulling off his shirt and plunging his head and shoulders below the surface. He came up holding something in his hands which he examined for a moment before giving it a good rinse in the pool, then looking closely at it again. Telli could see a gleam of white and his curiosity was aroused. Brakis picked up his shirt and came back to the fireside. He handed over his find.

"What do you make of this, then?" he asked.

It was a skull, complete with lower jawbone which came away from the rest in Telli's hands as he examined it. No animal that he knew of had such a skull. Indeed, it was more like a man's than that of anything else, but could not be unless it had belonged to someone hideously deformed. The nose and upper jaw were one bone, sticking forward and pointed at the end, and the lower jaw matched it, sloping upwards to a point without forming a chin. The eye sockets looked human, as did the large brain cavity. It was like the skull of a man with a beak. Brakis took it back and held it to the neck of his shirt, moving the lower jaw up and down.

"Helleeow Telli, cheep cheeep," he said in a high pitched voice. They both laughed, but Telli was uneasy.

"Do you know what it is?" he asked.

"No. I've seen nothing like it." Brakis looked serious now. "It belonged to something more like us than anything else I have ever seen. The pond is clear with a stone bottom and little mud. There are many bones, not just those of one ma—of one being." He looked at the skull thoughtfully. "Our friend here was about the same size as me, and perhaps around my age when he died. I cannot tell how long ago that was, but it was not so long. The bones of animals lying for a very long time in a stream become slowly worn down, the edges become rounded and they start to lose their shape. This skull is in good shape, so I think that this creature was walking around the area quite recently. Perhaps some of his friends still are." They both looked around instinctively.

Brakis stood up, walked over to the pond and dropped the skull back into the water.

"There are so many bones that perhaps these creatures buried their dead in the water as we do under the ground," he said on returning. "Let's eat. That stew must be ready."

The last light faded as they ate their meal. When it was finished Telli wrapped himself in his cloak and lay down beside the fire to sleep, it being Brakis's turn to watch first. Even when in the familiar forest around Elneside a night watch was a wise precaution as wolf-packs, large brown bears and tree leopards could all pose a threat to the unwary hunter.

Now well away from their home ground, the travellers were more cautious than usual.

Telli took some time to fall asleep, thinking of Elneside without yet feeling homesick. The goodbyes to family and friends had been difficult, but not to the extent he had feared. The fact that he was not travelling alone, and that Brakis, of all people, was to be his companion had gone a long way to calm the fears of his grandmother and sister. His grandfather's support had also been a great help. He drowsed contentedly until, in a half-dream, the image of the strange skull appeared in his mind, and he stirred restlessly, tossing and turning before eventually the tiredness from a long day's march led him into a deep, dreamless sleep.

*

It was still dark when Telli awoke, but the sky had already turned from black to a dark blue behind the silhouettes of the mountains, announcing the imminent sunrise. He sat up sharply and turned to see the reassuring shape of Brakis sitting nearby with his back against a large rock.

"Why didn't you wake me to watch?" he asked. "It's near sunrise."

"I did not feel the need to sleep, so left you to rest well. I shall sleep now, and if we start a little later than usual it does not matter. What hurry is there? It's perhaps better if we divide the night in two like this, instead of four, to be sure that one is always awake now we are so far from the lands we know."

Brakis lay down and seemed to sleep immediately. He appeared relaxed, but Telli knew well that his friend was a little uneasy, and was probably nearly as alert in his sleep as others are when wide awake. Telli waited for a while until the day became lighter, then collected some dead wood from under the nearest trees and made up the fire. Then, nothing else to do, he started to whittle away at a new arrow he was making, pausing every so often to watch the morning light, and then the sun, rise from behind the snowy peaks ahead of him. He would leave Brakis to sleep as long as he could. True, there was no hurry at all. Only when they were in the snows would they need to move as quickly as possible while their food supply lasted, and to avoid too many cold nights.

Brakis woke at about two hours before noon to the smell of cooking, as Telli was boiling a soup of vegetables and grain from the supplies in his pack. They ate quickly and went on their way, following the ridge towards the mountains. The forest was now below them, with only a few scattered and stunted trees growing exposed to the weather on top of the ridge, and the travellers could see fine views all around them. Brakis was well rested and more talkative than usual.

"Drakis found a way over the mountains which brought our forefathers to this side south of the river Elne, where we are now. It was not far from the Elne, because they reached its south bank just three days after leaving the snows behind them, as you know if you remember your reading. We cannot do better than to continue straight ahead where we have as good a chance as any of finding that route. You can see by the break in the trees that there is a river or stream down in the valley to our right, and we know that the Elne is to our left. Brenen the scribe, whose account of the journey with Drakis is the best in detail, writes of how they followed a stream down from the mountains. We know that it did not lead them directly to the Elne, for they cut north to avoid the thick forest, and to march on more open ground. Therefore, I think that the stream they followed must flow down into the one on our right, or perhaps the next one to the south."

Telli, who had also read Brenen, both as part of his learning of letters and again recently with this journey in mind, had been thinking along the same lines. He nodded in agreement, and replied:

"We should follow each stream that flows down to the river below, going upstream as far as we can. If we do not find Drakis's route, or another, we should come back down, hunt ourselves up another supply of food, and then do the same for the next river to the south."

"You have worked it all out," smiled Brakis. "I agree."

He looked at Telli, now walking ahead of him, and thought how different his young friend was from others of the same age, indeed from other people in general. The boy often seemed wise beyond his years and reserved things to himself, so that Brakis was sometimes taken by surprise when he did reveal some of his thoughts. If other children had discovered the ability to raise themselves off the ground inexplicably, as Telli had at the age of ten, they would surely have run around telling everyone and showing off. Brakis could see some of the traits of his sister in law and her husband, Telli's parents, in Telli's looks and his ways, but there was so much more that seemed to be the boy's own, as if he had arrived at birth a complete stranger to the Elneside community. Travelling with him was like travelling with another man, the only difference being that he could not carry as much weight, leaving Brakis's pack the heavier because they had balanced their loads so that both walked easily at the same pace.

The pair marched through the day, stopping to rest only once, briefly, because they had started late. They made good progress as it was easy going along the top of the ridge, and by late afternoon the mountains were visibly much nearer. Around the time they had started to think of looking for a suitable place to pass the night, Telli saw something ahead that seemed unusual, and pointed it out to Brakis. At about an hour's walk away, the ridge rose up to a point. On the top of this was what seemed to them to be a very large rock sticking up towards the sky, with a jagged edge on top and unusually straight sides. They decided to continue towards it and, as they approached, it seemed less and less like a natural feature, and more and more like something made by man.

Brakis stopped at some distance and gestured to Telli to join him behind a low ledge which offered concealment, but over which they could look at the object, now just three to four hundred yards away.

"What do you think it is?" he asked. Telli stared, concentrating hard, and suddenly had a vision in his mind of a great grey building with battlements on top, with shouts, horn blows and drum beats sounding around it, and the glint of armour as men walked on its walls. A vision, perhaps, from the stories he had heard or read of the old country.

"I think it is, or was a castle," he answered slowly.

They both stared. No Elnesider had ever seen a building other than their own wooden houses. After watching for a while and seeing no sign of life excepting an eagle circling above the hill in front of them, they continued to walk very cautiously towards the building they could soon see was obviously a ruin. Both held bow and arrow loosely at their sides in the left hand, and their long hunting knives ready in the right. It had been a castle or watch-tower and, although the battlements were crumbling so that many fallen stones lay at the foot of the weathered walls, all four walls themselves were still standing. It was square at the base, with a round turret running from bottom to top in each corner, about fifteen yards separating each one, and stood about seventy feet high. To the travellers it seemed enormous.

"How did they build such things?" whispered Telli. Brakis shrugged, as buildings of stone were just as new to him.

"Just as interesting is why did they, and who were they," he pointed out, also in a whisper.

They circled the castle slowly and quietly, looking for an entrance, and found it on the far side. It was an archway in the wall facing the mountains, and would have made an easy way in were it not for the fact that it was about twenty-five feet up, and any outside stairway, if there had been one, had long since gone.

"I think these people had enemies," commented Brakis, dryly. "They did not want their guests walking in unexpectedly."

Curiosity overcame caution for Telli. He laid down his pack and stood below the archway, estimating its height. Then, concentrating all of his attention on it, he rose slowly from the ground, and ten seconds later was hanging from the doorstep. He heaved himself onto it and sat there for a moment to recover, grinning down at Brakis who stood below, open-mouthed. He had seen Telli cross a couple of streams on their journey without getting his feet wet, but this effort (which was about the most that his friend could manage without great risk of a fall) was spectacular in comparison. He watched as the boy turned on his seat to face inside, and saw his head moving to look down, and then upwards. After a few moments, Telli seemed to have decided that there were no obvious dangers in the castle, as he turned back and, still too careful to shout down, made gestures with his arms and hands miming someone climbing a rope. Brakis pulled their only rope, brought with the mountain crossing in mind, from his pack. He coiled a few feet of it to make a weight and threw it accurately to Telli then, on the signal that it was secure, showed his agility by arriving on the doorstep in little more time than his flying friend had taken to get there.

Telli watched Brakis as he looked around. The sight was surprising, mainly because while the weathered, rocky ridge outside had few plants growing on it, here, under the protection of the walls, they were everywhere. Climbing ivy covered most of the stonework, and on the ground below them they could see shrubs, grasses, flowers and, most surprising of all, a few trees were growing, two of them reaching well above the point where they sat. It was like a very high walled garden. All that was built of stone had stood the test of time well. They could see the large holes in the walls at every level, made for the beams that would have supported the various floors and the roof. These must have been made of wood and had long since disappeared, presumably becoming part of the fertile earth now covering the foundations. Three pillars, or buttresses, ran from bottom to top of each wall helping to support ledges, about two feet wide, which ran between the rounded corner towers on each level, joining arched doorways in their walls. Telli and Brakis were on the second ledge of six, what would have been the floor level of the third chamber up from the ground.

Having taken all this in, Telli began to move carefully along the ledge towards the tower on his left, then started, and nearly lost his balance, at a sudden noise from above. Looking up quickly, he spotted the eagle they had seen earlier flying out of the top of the castle, and the mess of twigs and moss that was its nest on the highest ledge. Shaking his head and smiling as his nerves calmed, he looked back at Brakis, who was also smiling as he sheathed his hunting knife. The eagle was good news. It would not nest there if it felt threatened by any regular visitors to the ruin, and the travellers felt more confident that they were alone. Telli continued along the ledge with increasing confidence as it felt solid beneath his feet, and reached the arch in the corner tower. Looking inside he could see that the tower contained a spiral staircase made of stone treads attached between the walls and a central pillar. He turned and beckoned Brakis to join him, but his companion signed back, pointing out through the castle entrance. He disappeared for a minute or two, then reappeared with Telli's pack, which he placed on the ledge before descending again for his own. This task completed, he came along the ledge to join Telli.

"Up or down?" he asked, after peering through the arch.

"Up," decided Telli, thinking of the view they might have from the top, and as the lighter of the two he led the way up the staircase. It proved to be solid, and was well lit from the two arches leading out to the ledges on each level they passed, as well as from arrow slits at intervals through the outside walls. They reached the sixth level in a few minutes and went out onto the ledge, which was slightly wider than the others and seemed strong enough. From here they had a fine view through the weather worn and slightly crumbling battlements.

It was now not much more than an hour before sundown, and the colour of the snows on the mountains was beginning to change, white turning to soft pinks, yellows and oranges. Brakis looked down towards the route they would have to follow the next day and spoke, no longer bothering to whisper.

"This must have been built by people from the other side and, from the wear on the stones, must be very, very old. I would guess that its builders were long gone from the area by the time of Drakis, who knew of no settlements in his time or before on this side of the mountains. We can also assume that our forefathers did not pass exactly this way, as Brenen and the others make no mention of a castle, or tower. Indeed, they state clearly that they found themselves alone on this side of the mountains, and discovered no signs of habitation by man."

Telli nodded his agreement, and looked down into the valley below, where he could see the break in the trees that indicated the line of the river, to their right as they faced the mountains.

"They certainly did not find this," he said, "but could easily have come down from the mountains following the banks of the stream down there without seeing the tower through the trees, as we cannot see the water itself from up here." He looked along the ridge below them as it stretched towards the high mountains. "If the castle builders came from the other side, perhaps we shall find their way over to the Kingdom in the east, whether it is the way Drakis found or not."

"True," said Brakis, "but for now I think we had better leave our fellow hunters in peace and make a camp down below for the night." He pointed upwards, where the eagle had been joined by another, and the two circled high above, clearly watching the intruders with their sharp eyes. Telli looked over at the ledge on the wall opposite, and could see the head and neck of an eagle chick protruding from the nest. It was early summer, and he knew that the chick would soon be joining its parents in flight, a magnificent flight that made his own small efforts, however unique, seem absurd, he thought as he made his way down the stairs.

Investigating the bottom of the tower they found, unsurprisingly, that the earth which had accumulated over the centuries to form the base on which the plants and trees were growing blocked the lowest arches. However, they could easily jump down onto the new ground level from the entrances to what had been the floor above. So, after retrieving their packs from the ledge by the castle entrance, they made their camp for the night under the trees inside the protective walls of the building. They found ample firewood for

Telli, the tinderbox expert, to start his cooking fire, and as they had enough water in the flasks they carried with them, started to prepare their evening meal.

While waiting for their food to cook, they made a brief exploration of their surroundings, finding nothing of great interest except for some scratches and writings on the walls. These appeared to contain letters similar to their own, but were impossible to read in the fast fading light. They decided to explore the rest of the castle the next day before going on their way, to see if there were any clues as to who had built it, and why they had done so. Telli, up since before dawn that morning, fell asleep immediately after eating, leaving Brakis awake and watchful in spite of the seeming security of being within four walls for the first time since leaving Elneside.

*

As he had done the night before, Brakis left Telli to sleep until just before dawn, each of them now sleeping on completely different cycles to ensure continuous vigilance as they neared the mountains. Telli started his watch sitting drowsily with his back to the wall, waiting for the light before searching for more dead wood and making up the fire. This chore finished, he decided to continue the exploration of the night before.

Keeping an eye on the camp and on the entrance to the castle from time to time, he first checked the writings they had seen. These proved to be of little interest, consisting of what Telli deduced to be names idly carved on the walls by soldiers who had served in the castle, although none were names used in Elneside. He then investigated the stairways in the three corner towers they had not visited the evening before, finding them more or less identical to the first one. Then he decided to walk along the ledges at every level of the building. It was on the second highest ledge, just below the eagle's nest, that he discovered some more interesting writings.

I CHARICLES AM LASTE KAPTAIN OF THYS FORTE

WE SHALL DESERT -------- AS NO RELIEF FOR 1 YEARE

HE WHOMEVER ---------- READE THYS BE WARE -H---

WORMLING-- AS THEY ---- ---W STRONGE

The writing was ancient and faded, but Telli thought he could understand the gist of the message. Someone had been forced to leave the castle, and wished to warn anyone who understood his language of an enemy in the area. Telli wasn't too worried at the warning as it had clearly been made centuries ago. After searching for a while and finding nothing else of great interest, he went back down to the camp, and started to prepare some food while waiting for Brakis to wake, which he did while the meal was still cooking. Telli described his find and Brakis went up to see it for himself. When he returned, they speculated as to what or who a wormling might be as they ate, and Brakis wondered aloud that the builders of this great tower had clearly spoken a version of the Elnesiders' own language. Telli thought that the discovery raised more questions, rather than giving answers, and he was even more eager than before to complete the journey over the mountains where he felt that some of his curiosity might be satisfied.

They left the castle, Brakis climbing down first with the packs, and Telli detaching the rope before using his strange talents to drift slowly to the ground, Brakis waiting beneath to break his fall if necessary as neither of them yet had complete confidence in his "flying" abilities. However, all went well, and the travellers set off along the ridge towards the mountains.

After about an hour's walking, they noticed that the line of the river to their right was going through a number of sharp bends and was rising up towards them. A while later, they saw a series of waterfalls ahead of them and Brakis commented that it looked as though they would join the river without going downhill. He proved to be right, as they soon reached the head of the falls at a point where the way ahead up river looked promisingly easy.

The water cascaded down several different levels until it reached a pool far below them, from which the river flowed on its way westwards, away from the mountains. Above them, the stream was not large, but was turbulent and fast flowing, swollen by the summer melt water from the peaks ahead. There were a few trees and bushes along its banks, but not enough to impede their progress, and it looked to the travellers as though they had reason to be pleased with the route they had taken so far. It was a pleasant place, and they decided to stop for a while to rest and to eat.

Telli was just about to move towards the river to refill his water flask, when Brakis stopped him with a hand on his arm and a whispered caution, pointing upstream. At about forty yards distance, an animal was moving out from behind some rocks on the opposite bank towards the water, clearly unaware of their presence. The two hunters crouched slowly, and watched what appeared to be a large cat of a type unfamiliar to them. It was a whitish grey in colour, and had a long, bushy tail, clearly used to help itself balance as it moved to a position on some rocks forming a small island in the river. Like a smallish leopard, apart from the colour and the tail, it was not large enough to cause the two watchers, armed as they were with bow and knife, any serious concern.

"A white cat — the Snow Leopard from Brenen's writings," whispered Telli. Brakis nodded, remembering the scribe's account of the beast. Both then thought along the same lines. Brenen had recorded a sighting of the cat on the other side of the mountains, when their forefathers had first reached the heights where the snows still lingered in the summer. This must then be a species that lived on both sides of this natural barrier, and probably one of the few that could easily cross it. The sight of the animal made them feel much closer to their goal.

Still unaware of being watched, the leopard was crouched low on a rock, looking intently at the river beneath it. Then, with a sudden movement, it darted a paw into the water, and the watchers saw a flash of silver as it landed a large fish on the rock.

"Good hunting," murmured Brakis with admiration. "I wish I could do that—a fresh cooked fish would go down well." They watched for a while as the snow leopard ate its catch, and then patiently repeated the fishing performance, this time carrying the fish in its mouth to the bank and disappearing in the direction it had come from.

"She has a young one and is a good mother." Brakis stood up and made a saluting gesture towards the far bank where the cat had been. It was signal of respect amongst the Elnesiders for the beasts with which they shared the land, and which they regarded as fellow creatures of their Gods, only to be hunted when there was a use in doing so.

The travellers ate cold food from their stores, and continued on their way, following the left bank of the river upstream. The going was easy and they made good progress, climbing steadily and, towards the end of the afternoon, beginning to feel that the night ahead of them would be noticeably cooler than the last two. Eventually, following a series of rapids up a steeper incline than usual, they arrived slightly breathless at a small lake, from which the river flowed. On the far side was an impressive waterfall, thundering down some sixty feet into the lake from a huge cave in a mountain rising up sheer from the water's edge. It was an unexpected sight. They had come suddenly to the source of the river, or rather, of the part of it that ran above ground.

Telli was the first to comment when they had taken in the scene for a few moments.

"Well, this cannot be on the way that Drakis came. Brenen would surely have mentioned such a place had they passed this way."

Brakis agreed. This was not somewhere easily forgotten, with the blue lake like a mirror, reflecting the scattered firtrees around its shores, the mountains behind it, and even the waterfall which fed it.

"It's still possible we may find a way up and over, either to the left or right of that," he said, indicating the mountain ahead. "Indeed, with your flying tricks and my rope climbing, it seems almost likely," he added, smiling at his young companion. "But for now, we must make our camp here, and I suggest we leave the decision on which way we shall try for tomorrow."

Looking into the clear waters of the lake, they could see that it contained some good-sized fish. So, while Telli collected wood and made up the fire, Brakis took a thin line from his pack, tied it to a stick and, using worms dug from the bank as bait, tried to catch the meal he had so envied of the Snow Leopard. After nearly an hour had passed, a cry of triumph told Telli that his friend had been successful, and the pair ate a good meal of fresh fish and boiled roots.

This ended a good day. The way had been easy, and the sight of the Snow Leopard somehow encouraging. Yet Telli felt a vague uneasiness as he settled down for the night. A feeling as if they were being watched in their exposed camp on the edge of the lake, as if perhaps the mountains themselves were aware of the two strangers who dared to challenge their might.

He fell asleep later than usual, listening to the roar of the waterfall, then woke suddenly to the sound of a cry from Brakis. Confused with sleep and the dark night, he felt something like a fishing net covering him, then strong arms holding him down as he struggled. A dark figure leant over him, and something with a strong, pungent smell was thrust into his face. Feeling sick and dizzy, he looked up to glimpse a white face above him, and a pair of pale, pink eyes staring into his own, before he lost consciousness.