Distant tales of the Dichotomy

They gathered at dawn on the sixth day, at the edge of the village, where the last bridge ended and the mountain fell away into the mist.

Fel had not slept. He had lain in his narrow bed and listened to the bells and watched the ring in his palm glow in the dark, and every few minutes he had gone through the same list. Sword, sword, rope, flint, knife, water, bread. He had been issued a new coat of green-grey wool, a pack, a bedroll, and a very small, very sharp hunting knife. He had been told, with great firmness, that if he lost any of it, they would not go back for it.

Veyra was already there, sitting on a rock with her long white bow across her knees and her pale green braid over one shoulder, watching the sun come up. She had put on a traveling cloak of dark oiled leather. She did not look at him. She only moved her quiver an inch to make room.

“You are late.”

“It’s barely light.”

“Yes. Late.”

He sat. They watched the mist glow pink. Somewhere below, a bird began to sing, thin and clear.

The other two came together.

He heard them before he saw them, a heavy, measured tread that made the stones shift underfoot, and a light, quick, mocking voice that seemed to be talking continuously and to no one in particular. Then the mist parted, and into the light stepped the biggest man Fel had ever seen who was not a Raskian.

He was seven feet tall if he was an inch. He was built like a door. His skin was the deep dark violet of a ripe plum, and his hair, bound in a thick braid down his back, was the dark green of old pine. A great crown of antlers, thick and heavily branched and scarred at the tines, rose from his brow like the branches of a winter oak. He wore a plain tunic of boiled hide, a breastplate of overlapping bark-brown scales, and across his back, in a harness of heavy leather, he carried a war-spear twice his own height and a round shield as wide as a table. There was a long white scar from his left ear to his collarbone. He looked at Fel without expression. Then, very solemnly, he nodded.

“Brannoch,” he said. His voice was deep and slow, like a stone being rolled. “Oakhorn. I hit things.”

“That’s… good,” said Fel.

“Mm.”

That appeared to be all.

The second one swung out from behind the giant like a cat from behind a curtain. She was small, by the standards of her kind, no taller than Fel, lean and quick and tightly wound, with skin the color of dark lavender and a short crop of bright, spiky, grass-green hair. Her horns were two tiny sharp spikes, curved like a goat’s. She wore a short vest of patched leather, a belt of throwing knives, a pair of curved hatchets at her hip, a sling at her wrist, and a grin so wide and so insolent that Fel felt his face heat up before she’d said a word.

“So this is the star-boy,” she said. She circled him once, hands on hips, looking him up and down. “I thought he’d be taller. I thought he’d glow. I was told there’d be glowing.”

“I have a hand that glows.”

“Ha! Brann, he has a hand.” She whirled. “I’m Thara. Ilthara Quickthorn, but if you call me Ilthara, I’ll put a knife in your eye, and if you call me Thara, I’ll tell you a secret. I scout. I trap. I steal. I’m very good at it. I’m also very good at cards, and if you win any money from Brannoch, I’d like a cut.”

“I do not play cards,” said Brannoch.

“He doesn’t play cards because he lost his horn at one.” She leaned in confidentially. “He’s a very bad loser.”

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“I lost the horn in a bear.”

“The bear was holding the cards.”

Veyra put her face in her hand.

“They have been like this since they were children,” she said, to no one in particular. “You will stop hearing it in about a week.”

“Do they ever stop?”

“No.”

“Where’s the mount?” said Fel, turning to look at the empty clearing. “Seluine said something big. I don’t see any…”

The ground trembled.

It was very faint at first, a hum in the soles of his feet. Then it grew, a steady, rhythmic, purposeful thud, thud, thud, and the stones along the path began to chatter against one another. Down in the mist, something enormous stirred. A branch cracked. A tree shook. And over the lip of the cliff, one hooked, chitinous, black-green foot the size of a man’s torso came up out of the cloud and clamped onto the rock.

Fel took a step back.

A second foot followed. Then a third. A long, glossy, iridescent shape heaved itself over the edge of the mountain, dripping mist: a great domed shell as black as obsidian, shot through with veins of emerald and bronze that shifted in the light like oil on water. It was the size of a hay cart. Six jointed legs, thick as tree trunks, ended in curved, barbed claws that bit into the stone like pickaxes. And from the front of its broad, flat, armored head rose two great curved horns, polished and branching, like the antlers of a stag.

It was a beetle.

It was the biggest beetle he had ever seen. It was bigger than a horse. Along its belly, a row of amber lights glowed softly, like a string of lanterns. As it turned its head, two huge, faceted, golden eyes fixed on him with calm, ponderous, vaguely disapproving attention, and a long, low, buzzing drone rolled up out of its chest, rattling the pebbles at his feet.

“No,” said Fel.

“This is Old Clatter,” said Veyra.

“No.”

“He is an Ironhorn. They carry the loads in the peaks. He has been to Sorticia eleven times. He has never lost a rider, and he has only eaten one.” She stroked a hand down the glossy flank, and the beast shivered with pleasure. “He is very gentle, when he is in a good mood.”

“And when he’s not?”

“Ha!” said Thara.

Behind the beast’s shoulder, someone had strapped a high wooden saddle, carved and lacquered, with a ring of railings and two long benches, and a roof of woven reed against the rain. Fel saw packs lashed to the sides, and water-skins, and a net of bright wicker baskets, and at the very top, a small curved ladder. It looked like the house of a very short and very wealthy snail.

“Mount him from the left,” said Brannoch, without inflection. “He kicks if you go right.”

“He kicks?”

“Mm.”

“He has six legs!”

“Yes.”

“Which one kicks?”

“All of them,” said Brannoch.

Fel stared at the beetle. The beetle stared back. It lifted one great claw, set it on the rock beside Fel’s boot, very, very gently, and let out a long, rumbling, contented purr.

Behind him, there was a small, quick patter of feet.

He turned just in time to be hit around the waist by a flying green-haired child.

“You can’t go!” She had her arms locked around his hips and her face buried in his coat. “You can’t! You’re not finished! Mother Osha said you have to eat three more bowls, and you didn’t finish the porridge, and you haven’t even seen the spring festival, and I haven’t shown you the…”

“Pim.”

“I’ll hit you with the spoon!”

“I’ll come back.”

“You won’t.” Her voice cracked. She looked up, and her huge golden-brown eyes were full of tears. “Everyone who goes down the mountain doesn’t come back. Papa went down the mountain.”

He had not known that. He knelt, ignoring the pain in his side, until his face was level with hers.

“I’ll come back,” he said. “I promise.”

“You promise?”

“I promise.” He looked at her for a moment. Then, because he did not know what else to do, he took the small black knife the Ilvari had given him, the one with the bone handle, and laid it carefully in her hand. “Keep that for me. Until I get back. So I’ll have to come and get it.”

Pim stared at the knife. She closed her small fist around it, very tightly.

“I’ll keep it safe.”

“I know you will.”

She flung her arms around his neck, hard. Then she let go, wiped her nose on her sleeve, and stuck out her chin with a ferocity that made Brannoch’s mouth twitch and Thara look carefully at the sky.

“Don’t die,” said Pim.

“I’ll try.”

“Don’t try. Do.”

The beetle hummed. The mist glowed. Fel rose, with a wince, and climbed up the carved ladder into the saddle, and the others followed him, Brannoch’s great weight making the whole contraption creak, Thara scrambling up with a laugh, Veyra swinging aboard like a cat and settling herself at the front with the reins in her hands.

Old Clatter heaved himself to his feet, with a long, slow, shuddering hum.

And as they began to descend, down the long, switchbacked track into the white sea of cloud, Fel looked back once, and saw a small green-haired figure at the edge of the cliff, waving a black knife in both hands like a banner, until the mist closed over her.