Long Lost... chapter I

Long Lost in Where No Pathway Goes



Chapter I - Midwinter Gates

Jerald (POV)



this is an introductory chapter to a dark fantasy novel I hope to write. the story has moved on and I have not revised it yet, my main focus is learning how to write and character development, not the attributes of fantasy writing itself.

I hope this will keep you entertained, though nothing amazing or magical happens yet. meet my world of Swamps and lifes gone wrong.

English is not my fist language, i know there are a few grammatical errors, but I left them for now.

         

         Life evaporated from the slimy land like the deranged fumes themselves.

         Life which with every day Jerald felt was but a task to be done, as he heard once forty miles North from where he stood and where his elves were heading. After the night of riding in the darkness and green-eyed silence they were to push their horses to the limit in order to get there by dawn.

         The terrain they were crossing was malevolent and so unsettled. The further North they went the barer and more writhed were the trees, the branches twisting tightly together from the growing cold. Four days have passed since his group of two dozen loyal elfish savages left the last Swampland village behind, very little of it. With Jerald’s approval the place was smashed down into ashes in the name of price Skåza after the elves were refused a stay at the inn. As Jerald led them back under the safe canopy of the astride trees, he took a look at the fuming shambles and realised the mistake he has done.

         The news he heard and did not dare to believe were true. What used to be he last village under the Swamplord recently became his patron’s land. The sign welcoming travellers in the Swamplands have been covered with dead Northern crows spiked over the gate. Under the thick, dark blood he could still read the words “you who enter here, abandon all hope.” Travelling through the world was like stepping from one shit to another, everything everywhere was beyond grim.

         Time was not on his side since that day and catching up seemed a daunting undertaking, with nowhere to rest and nothing to hunt. Twice he saw a face from a nightmare slinking in the darkness of the forest, a white muzzle of a beast dripping with fresh blood. Skåza was sending his pet to check up on him, and the fact that the beast found food only made Jerald angry. On top of that he comprehended some facts which seemed futile and impossible before. As the elves remained oblivious to the matters of men, he mastered that ignorance into a virtue, absorbing each and every information like a well. Little there was that missed his pointy ears and the quarrels between king Lucius and the Swamplord did not, although knowing the Northern lord he refused to believe in them. He noticed the weather changes equally well and he could only be regretful for not reconciling the two facts sooner. The bog the swamps turned into at the rims was too dry for this time of the year, as if the frozen ground was glad with its state, not yet weeping its warmed up sorrows into the Lake of Tears. Even the miasmal marches normally clad in swarms of seething insects in the spring seemed bearable.

         Wherever the North put her feet the world seemed to shun away from the coarse winter wind that accompanied her, as if the gods were always on her side. Whose gods Jerald did not know and he did not care. What mattered to him was that the way of life he devoted himself to will only end with his death, for yet more matters were to be left in his hands. Hands he frivolously stained with blood without Skåza’s permission, in his own lands. He missed the times when the walls of Midwinter were a quiet, cold asylum and his part was little more than occasionally getting paid for maintaining that tranquil state, and his patron prince was a good pal to drink and hunt beasts with. The upside was that Jerald was too useful to get rid of, and with his friend becoming the Lord of the snows the elf’s life will swarm with well-paid, first-rate killer employment.

         Jerald removed the moss from the milestone, the pathway he chose has not seen a foot of a traveller in a long time. With his thumb he squashed a spider that escaped straight onto his glove. At his side, his ward Vergil was having a piss.

         “Should have left him to me, I’d wash him down.” The young elf tied his trousers and pulled down the stained, umber tunic.

         Back on his feet and ready to go, Jerald smacked the boy on the shaven side of his head. “Piss off, and get on your horse, we are short of time. All is my fault that is delayed,” he said with disgust.

         “I cannot sleep in a saddle like some, I need rest.” Vergil adjusted his finest pine bow and jumped in the saddle, his thick black hair getting caught in the creepers. He pulled them out violently, breaking the branches, the boy had the strength and grace of and ox. He even looked like one, with the badly sliced off beard and growing back undercut. “I’m sick of this place, and I am hungry. My sack is empty, and I cannot swallow roasted hare anymore. The delicacy for the Lords! They would ban it if they had to start and finished off their day with one. I am sick of it.”

         “Then move faster!”

         Vergil the Grouch Jerald called him, always displeased, always whining. He began to regret taking him, with his constant grunting, moaning and wailing. Jerald has been looking for an occasion to get back at him for days and none came so far. All he could do was to pull back the strings of his greasy black hair and give the young elf a judging glare with his brown eyes. The skin around them was wrinkled from squirting, and the more his pock-marked face cringed, the more the muscles trembled, the nastier his thoughts were, the more visible was the roseate scar obliquely parting his face. He had to get that boy laid, the sooner the better.

         Jerald waited for his elves to move, closing the group. It was a habit of his, never to lead the way like a leader ought to. Knowing every shiver running both through the trees and his companions’ backs, how nothing was hidden from him was how he knew everything.

         Within the next few miles the air began to thin out, and even greater cold found the way through the layers of sweat and dirt that glazed his once finest short frock and the breeches, speckled additionally with his own vomit. His liver insisted on him not becoming a typical rambling tosspot debauchee. It was the neatest set of clothing he had left, another reason to arrive in time and get properly dressed.

         Vergil slowed down to continue grunting right by his ear. If it was not the fat swamp flies, it was him buzzing there.

         “What is it?” Jerald asked at last.

         “I’ve heard of king’s hospitality, is it true, Jerald? We all could do with a bath. And with a good whore, or two.”

         “Or just a whore,” shouted someone ahead of them. “A bad whore is better than none.”

         The elves chuckled and expressed their agreement, Jerald with them, although his thoughts were preoccupied with getting rid of his ward. He turned to him with a sly glimpse for a chance appeared at last. “You would like one too?” he asked derisively.

         The young elf’s green eyes opened wide, a grimace of shock crooking his innocent, smooth face. “I only meant for you,” he protested, shaking his head as if he knew what was coming. “Jerald, you wouldn’t!”

         “Oh, but I will, so you will choose your words more carefully next time,” Jerald replied. There was nothing that could stop him, and the guilt he could feel for embarrassing his ward was jointly suppressible, a small price to pay for his silence. He already said the words in his mind, and as Skåza often repeated, what happened in the thought equated reality. “Make sure you find a good one for the Grouch,” he shouted. “My beloved ward has never been inside of a woman, and a Northern one is a tough beginning.”

         With the disbelief turned into the elves’ guffaw, a patchy, ill-looking blush appeared on Vergil’s face. He was a blithe, soon eighteen-years-old elfish savage whose blustery was always ahead of his thought-process, which made his purity all the more entertaining. Jerald heard him mutter some fine, profane slanders addressed to him and his mother, but he rode off to the front unmoved by the insults. He had no arguments against them, for his mother was a whore and he was quite a rascal. It was time to take the lead anyway, Jerald could feel the wind blowing from an open space ahead of them smear the cold over his face, preventing the blush from soaring it up. The roan dragan squeezed through the other horses with difficulty on the narrow path.

         “There is a chance the Northern women wouldn’t even look at our dirty elvish dicks gentleman,” he corrected.

         They approached the moor which separated them from their destination. It looked more like a steppe and swung like the surface of a lake in moonlight, under the blanket of thick, pulsing fog, with patches of yellow, blue and lilac announcing the premature, bewildered spring barely noticable. Far away, in the middle of what should be the brink of the horizon, where the white tips of the rough dark mountains became one with leaden sky, higher than anything else rose the splendorous city of Midwinter, the king’s dwelling of the realm. It looked dull, coarse and archaic as it stood straight among the clouds.

         Jerald hated the North for looking so unwelcoming.

         “Do not let the North bring your spirits down. We won’t cross the moor before the darkness comes, but we will arrive in time for supper if we don’t stop, and lord Lucius truly is a gracious host. But you are not his guests. You are the guests of prince Skåza, the king-to-be and my only friend, who will treat you point-blank proportionally to who you are. And when he calls your name, you will answer appropriately to who he is. He is a man, a bag of flesh and bones, a vessel of blood in sack of skin, which pours out like any other when pierced, who happened to be borne with the privilege to rip your head off at a whim. You will look up upon his pale face a head above yours, reaching towards the rare sunlight, and you will see the marks of the unfortunate shame that boy wears. When he stares at you with his ashen eyes, weighting his thoughts, you will not turn away. And you will never see him smile when he does that, and don’t try to make him laugh. Once on your own, you will recognise a whore when she flutters her blonde eyelashes at you, for she will be the only one there to smile. No one else will.” Jerald paused, making sure everyone listened, aware that so far his words have not given the best impression. “Yet the Northerners have deep, tranquil and shelled like a pearl joy down that frost-covered bottom of their hearts, which you will find if you keep your own ones sensitive to who they are. We may be warriors, cripples, outcasts, beasts, savages, the most repulsive civilised creatures of these lands, but we ought not to forget who we are. And we are elves, gentleman. We wear out pointy ears with pride.” The leader kept quiet for a moment, tasting what he said, until everyone entered the moor. “Have a look at realm of Nifhimmelheim and the gates of Midwinter, the capital of this damned, hostile land, and let it take your stinking breath away.”

         As the elves absorbed the view, Jerald studied their postures, which for once resembled the idea of his kin. There remained some old grandeur in their long deprived of dignity, scarred and bitter faces as they stretched their backs facing the mountain walls of the secluded, lonely Northern land of Snow and Silence. The peaks piled up sharp and coated in snow, separated from the flat ground by a barrier of perfectly smooth grey rock, reaching halfway to the clouds. It was crowned by the circular city of Midwinter, each of its towers as high as the surrounding tops, but straight and graceful, shimmering slightly at in the thinnest ray of light. The design resembled the crystal structures from the lands of Ice and Sorrow Jerald had a chance to see, rich in ornaments, hanging bridges and gardens, but just like the Northerners, it was rougher, stronger, grimmer, their isolation and anxiety enriched by peaceful melancholy, and the dark hordes of crows. The Midwinter stairway to heavens, the citadel of the city launched above anything else in the spiky horizon, was swallowed by the clouds.

         The commencing dusk moved slowly the fog over the moor. Jerald knew it was wet as water itself, stroking awe in his heart just like when he crossed it for the first time many years back. The thickness of it was almost solid, one could hold it as a fistful. A result of some ancient, unknown force, to the elf’s eye. Without branches over the heads there was sky which though ash tinted, to the East revealed the carmine morning sun, the only coloured patch of the scenery. That pathetic ersatz for daylight was enough for the citadel to illuminate in all shades of silver and gold, a peculiar property of the precious stone it was made of, back in the age when the first of the Northerners came from the coldest of cold.

         In the background of the raising sun, Jerald spotted a darker line. “Gentleman, the need to resemble your kind came sooner than I have foreseen,” he announced. He recognised a retinue, but it was too far away to see the sigil. “Whichever lord that could be, we have company. Exactly what I was trying to avoid,” he sighed, knowing they will not be let go their own speed.

         A small group from the cavalcade approached them when the sun already hid behind the western peaks and invited in the longest shadows. The milky vapours scattered over the hours, but they begun to grow and fill in the gaps over the moor once the warmth of the day was gone.

         Jerald need not pay attention to the banner to recognise the fearsome riders. He encountered them before in a battle and his heart beat faster at the very thought of it. With the swan wings attached open to their backs, they looked like an army set to sweep away every obstacle on their way, the silver armours glowing blindingly in the sun. His own men stepped back on the neighing horses when the envoy and his handful of knights got close.

         The sigil they carried was a crowned white eagle soaked into the perfectly blood-red fabric. There was a different bird at the top of the banner, a pair of wings of a black raven, arrow through. The dead bird belonged to lady Ida, the wife to the white eagle, lord Conrad of the Lower East, barbaric Wrochermians. Their ill fame always seemed to Jerald much of an exaggeration. Crank in character, hot-headed drunkards that they were, they always carried finest beverages on them and offered them kindly to everyone. It was good enough for him, and spoke of the size of their hearts which the elf recognised as big as their love of good food and drink.

         The envoy carried no armour but a splendid outfit common in his lands. In a greeting he took off the hat with a fur rim and long heron feathers on the side, showing off the balding, ginger mop of hair that matched the fuzzy beard. His robes were characterised by dignity and sagacious ripeness of colours, crimson wide trousers comfortable during horse-riding and a silk caftan lined with warm fur of the same shade of red. He put the hat back on and wrapped himself tightly in the auburn cloak.

         Jerald ordered the elves to keep away from their own weapons, in all their varieties. “We wish you no harm,” he called, his voice sly.

         “Would we, considering there is only six of us against your savages, elf?” the envoy replied with the last word clothed in deepest despise.

         “What is it?” Jerald asked straight.

         “Out lord and lady are desperate for company. They wish we joined and continued the journey together,” the envoy shivered and took a sip from a wineskin he carried instead of a sword at his belt.

         “The Midwinter Gates are straight ahead of us. We will wait,” Jerald informed, displeased. It meant there was no way he could arrive in time.

         “So be it,” replied the envoy. Just before leaving, he passed Jerald his drink. “If I had more I’d give it all to you, this damn place cannot be crossed on dry throat.”

         At first, Jerald was not sure if the last words should not be taken as in insult to how poor and filthy his elves looked, but as he started sipping the wine, which though home brewed and murky was strong, he realised he couldn’t care less. The elves dismounted to rested in the moor, some falling straight asleep, others too cautious to even sit down. The fog was thickening, clinging to the bodies.

         About fifty nobleman approached them right after the sickly yellow twilight, lighting up the torches to guide through the falling darkness. A single rider galloped ahead, no one chasing after the dun steed. Cautious at first, Jerald recognised the rider as lady Ida through the threads of her thick, mahogany hair waving like the banners she left behind. The scent of autumn flowers that went ahead of her was oppressing, seizing his senses like heavy smoke and permeating through his lungs into the blood like poison. The lady dismounted while riding, pulling the long black dress high over the strong thighs. Jerald staggered hoping to help her down, and it was not the result of the wine.

         “What a pleasure it is to see you, elves,” the queen greeted, bowing humbly and with a smile. Her lack of hostility made Jerald feel uncomfortable. He kissed her hand, and her vermillion cheeks, and she wrapped her arms around his neck with no hesitation, laughing clearly. Jerald felt more awkward with every split second. “Ten weeks of my life this masquerade took us, ten godfucked weeks!” she shouted and giggled hysterically, the earthy scent more intense as she bent her thin neck backwards.

         The reunion filled Jerald with grief. His chest sunk in, leaving his already stunned lung breathless. She calmed down and looked up into his eyes, and he gazed down at her freckled face and hardly recognised the princess he once met and could not get out of his mind ever since, she was wrapped so thick in dilapidation.

         Ida was withering like the wreath of blossoms she wore instead of a crown. The dried flowers were crumbling and sprinkling her brown hair, matching her once golden eyes, now bleak and covered by a white cloud of tiredness, disappointment and longing for her dreams to come true. Jerald doubted she still had dreams. Even the warm smile of narrow, dark lips could not lighten up her mild face. The queen was the only person the elf ever admired, always wishing her all the best and cursing himself for being helpless watching her fairy tale go bad. Yet all those years her strength and determination in the face of hopelessness remained most worthy of praise, assuring him she was still there. She managed to keep her heart loving and unspoiled by the feelings of all fallen highborn, spite, scorn, malice and conceit, and her every move expressed that.

         “Lady Ida, you look just like you did ten years ago,” he complimented her sincerely. Years seemed to preserve her ripe body, as feminine as it was when she was wed and even with the shadows staining her face like on a bad painting, she was still beautiful.

         Out of all the people, Jerald wanted her to be happy again. It was an unfamiliar throbbing of genuine sympathy which filled him with disgust at his own self.

         Jerald knew she did not remember him, despite those years he has been visiting her land and seeing her love to the white eagle die, and feeling her drift away from life.

         The music got louder as king Conrad the eagle approached with his men, the sounds of flutes, lutes, balalaikas and hurdy gurdy distinguishable between the bangs of war drums. Jerald felt relief for they could now move at last, his elves became restless as the night approached. He was running late but it was good to have company in a place like the moor.

         He was about to mount and ride off to greet king Conrad when Ida caught his glove with her shaking hand.

         “Please, stay by my side,” she asked in a breaking voice, as uncertain as her touch. “If you wish not to listen to me as a woman, I order you as a queen.”

         The only answer he could give was to bow and kiss her soft hand, hoping the gesture would cover the smirk on his face. Her long fingers touched his rough skin, lifting up his shabby face.

         “I remember now. The Marten they call you. But Jerald is your name,” she whispered. Her words echoed in his head, unable to find their way out for the rest of their journey.