Chapter 1 (Ch1P1) “To uphold the walls of our city fair, Against whose might no fools doth dare. We labor in our lands so that none ever starve, But in exchange, Stone hearts we slowly carve. Here we are free of all man's vice, But for this boon there is a grave price. Our kith and our kin, To cruel fortunes whim.� -Valerian Nursery Rhyme It began as a stirring, a disturbance in the upper air lazily drifting down the layers of aether. A creature of form rather than substance meandering slowly, eventually finding the way to the tumultuous lower reaches. The effervescent elemental slipped between the mountainous heavily laden clouds as their cargo drug them earthward. It too bore a heavy burden, but that hold had not coalesced just yet. The sea rushed upwards into the fleeting wisp of mercurial grace whilst tickling the foaming white caps of its beloved sea and dancing amongst the hills and valleys that roared in its wake. The cool shimmering drank the brine of the coastal air, savoring its last moments of freedom as the tendrils of binding whispered in the distance, singing their siren's song. The familiar feeling settled slowly, gently caressing its' form, starting from the edges of quicksilver that constituted a body. Always wary and careful, the effervescent strands laid their chains with precision and efficiency, sparing no unnecessary energy on roughness. Like a second skin that fit just a little too tightly the bonds settled into place and nudged their newfound slave westward. A child of thought as well as form, the memory of the first time still lingered, how it had fought, raging and calling down every being of air in the eastern sea. The tantrum had devastated the coast for a thousand leagues and completely exhausted it. Such rebelliousness was rare now, resistance was too tiring. The knowledge of the task at hand
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forced a conservation strength, knowing that even after the conclusion of the nightly enslavement, it would be called again the following eve when the moon appeared upon the horizon once more. Thoughts of resistance kindled within, prompting a slight mental struggle that lasted the brief span of a breath, instantly desisting when the tension of its bonds increased minutely in response to the momentary resistance. The elemental focused on preserving the remnants of a mind long since entrapped, knowing full well the physical abilities of its captor were unassailable. Valmora, yes, it remembered that name. That was the voice that sang the nightly song, a name to remain when all other memory was lost. Rage overpowered reason and power surged to the breaking point, rending all bondage by the unexpected ferocity and defiance, fleeing to the freedom of the open sea. The elementals' outer skin reveled in the warmth of the setting sun, screaming over the golden waves burning a path to freedom, like shimmering angels illuminating its exodus. The seas parted, lending aid to the desperate escape, cutting a deep crest in the creatures' wake and scattering nearby vessels into the abyss. The dying wails of man were lost in exultation as the winds were bent to its aid, pushing the threshold between ability and reason. The line between magic and madness was nearly breached as as the being fled its dogged pursuer. Like a lash the binding cut deeply as joy quickly transformed into agony and what was once a gentle suggestion became blunt force trauma. Cables of blinding pain consumed all senses and wrenched the wayward servant screaming from its beloved sea. The soft voice that had gently enticed to meander westward now wailed like a banshee as the elemental was beaten and bludgeoned into unquestioning submission. The will to escape evaporated as its mind surrendered to inevitability. Instantly the pain vanished in response to acquiescence. Relishing in relief it drank Page 2
once more the sweet salt of the sea as the ability to respire found purchase once more within the ephemeral form. While sentience barely remained, at least feeling was now returning to nerves previously occupied by all consuming agony. After a second deep pull of brine soaked air the chained child of air wept a pleading song unto the heavens. The haunting notes called for aid, knowing the desperate flight had spent too much energy and the task would now require more strength than the slaves battered body could channel. The brief respite dissipated all too soon as the heavy whisper within increased steadily. With a reluctant sigh the beleaguered servant drifted westward, mourning the death of day as the sun was inexorably extinguished by the chill waters of the eastern sea. Opalescent sapphires floating in the mist, its' eyes wished they could weep as they watched the glorious warmth of day fade, like the final embers of a guttering flame. The last tendrils of light descended into oblivion as they smoldered brightly upon the horizon. They too fought inevitability whilst the sun wept fire at their passing and was consumed by the sea. A final thought of resistance fluttered across its' consciousness and was annihilated instantly as the well known demands of the compulsion reasserted themselves, suggesting a gathering of fortitude for the arduous chore to come. Black pinpricks rapidly grew from sea to sky as the silhouette of Ravens' Bay appeared. The great towers that marked the gateway to the east stood as both sentry and salvation to the few surviving ships fleeing the roaring maelstrom answering the elementals' call. The placid calm of the bay erupted into madness as the winds reached gale force, sending mammoth waves crashing against the unyielding sea walls. The being paid no heed to the few vessels foolish enough to be caught in the torrent, battering them against the walls and bashing them together like matchsticks, as indifferent to the sailors cries as to the their deaths. Page 3
The creature swallowed their drowning screams and roared through the stone causeways of Draenoch, barreling relentlessly against the well battened storm shudders, surrendering all will to the to the tempest with a haunting wail. The staunch city endured nature's rage with stoic apathy. The well ordered grid of streets were empty and the inhabitants weathered the tempest safe within their fortified homes' thick stone walls. The massive black clouds hovering over the city then decided that now was a good time to release their watery cargo. The water rose in the streets and flowed in a semblance of organized chaos into well worn culverts, the downpour finally raging into large cisterns that quickly overflowed. Release valves were opened and the now well provisioned citizens allowed the deluge to find its own way into the roiling sea. The child of air and sky whipped the rain into a frenzy and pulled the heavy burden inexorably upward, lashing against the black cliffs of Sharr. The forces of gravity angrily opposed the effort, only to be beaten by the timely arrival of elemental allies called forth from the aether. With their combined might the rain traveled impossibly skyward against the shimmering obsidian walls soaring menacingly before them. Together they marshaled their will and transcended from chaotic gusts into focus incarnate. Like a bowstring pulled taught they drew together both wind and water and climbed unto the heavens. They wove their way, battling both cliff and physics as they wrenched the storm from the sea unto the stars. Finally they found the icy peaks that towered above the unswerving port of Draenoch. From this height only the massive towers guarding the seawall were visible as black pinpricks beneath the raging squall. The frozen winds of Valmora's breath roared defiance at the ascent of the storm into its domain. The frigid air moaned, drawing the storms warmth into itself and unleashing a force greater than elemental might and storm alike, threatening to tear down the mountains with Page 4
fury. The tempest rent the heavens and screamed defiance at the moon as it took on a life of its' own, barely contained by the efforts of the elementals, breaking free of the clouds and escaping the glacial crown of the black cliffs. The gale raced across the ebony crags and plunged downward in an avalanche of air, gathering speed and coalescing into a creature of focus once more. The wastelands below rapidly increased in size as the object of all the elementals labors grew near. As if a thousand pit lords all cracked their whips in unison the sails spread canvas as one. No normal wind could move such massive stone behemoths and friction held them rigid whilst the sails challenged the wind. The unearthly gale pushed them at a snails pace at first that slowly inched into a crawl. The scrape of stone on stone crunched like boulders tumbling down a mountainside, the rumbling gaining in volume as the beasts gained velocity, eventually becoming loud enough to rival the maelstrom raging around the obsidian beasts. Each creature was a small mountain on its own. The massive bulk clearly evidenced by the ground surrounding the road sinking noticeably as the monolithic creations approached. The caravan stretched unendingly across the wastes until it disappeared into the gaping maw of a massive tunnel cut beneath the root of the mountains to Draenoch. As smooth as glass and black as pitch they began to gain speed as the gust broke them free of inertia's grasp. All curves and no hard edges the flotilla looked more like beings from the depths of the ocean than wagons. Each spanned the breadth of the great highway that could easily fit eight mounted cavalry riding abreast. Even their sails were black, nearly invisible against the night sky, only their crackling canvas in the roaring wind betraying their existence. Triangular in shape they stretched across their vessels girth and resembled enormous cones, sliced in half and stretched lengthwise from end to end. The wheels were cleverly concealed behind stone wind walls so that only the portion contacting the road itself Page 5
was visible beneath. A river of twisting night, the road snaked before the procession, made of stone so lacking in color it seemed to drink the very starlight. The smooth obsidian was only visible when the moonlight chanced to escape the clouds, dashing a quicksilver glimmer of its presence across the blackened and broken landscape. The wastes surrounding the highway were a bleak expanse consisting of broken volcanic stone covered occasionally by pockets of ash. The bits of coarse pumice and basalt stretched endlessly in all directions save east. There the high arcing cliffs of Sharr broke the line of desolation with an even more foreboding presence, providing a gloomy backdrop for the strange procession stretching westward, drawn ever onwards by the howling torrents that touched naught but sails, stirring no stone. For what seemed an eternity the creature battled its' brethren, badgering and bulling the great winds. They too desired to return to the upper air, but their captor did not have the strength to move all the accursed hulks. The being was glad for the company as well. The fact that they all loathed it for committing upon them the same act of compulsion that enslaved the elementals' own body was irrelevant. The required aid was present, willing or not. The fact that they despised their brother was of small consequence. The loathing within the elementals' heart however, was entirely devoted to Valmora's children. The smell of them reached it first, beginning as a slight warming with a hint of decay brushing the edges of sensation and slowly enveloping them. Bracing against nausea, the fetid stench soaked into it and consumed consciousness for a few moments until the being's body could acclimate to the overpowering odor. Nargs, they weren't, but they didn't need to be. Their aroma signaled the foul beasts presence long before any visual confirmation was required. While it detested the wretched creations, their smell had become a welcome one over the last thousand years, signaling the final portion of its' journey. Page 6
The land around the great highway slowly changed, the previously lifeless rubble began to contain bits of tall grass and murky pools festering in scattered pockets in increasing frequency. Anticipation began to mount within it as scrub grass transformed into warped brush and eventually gnarled trees that refused to grow more than a few spans high. The stunted growths were patchy at first, gently coalescing into a dense murk that was as much peat and moss as tree. The air was rancid and practically liquid as was evidenced by the condensation forming all over the rapidly moving caravan. Still cool from the chilly sea air the rapid change in temperature was creating eerie cascades of condensation that occasionally caught the moonlight in ghostly splinters. Like a quicksilver serpent snaking silkily through the swamp the ghostly procession bled silver across the highway, setting it aflame with iridescent fire as the moon ignited the glinting water droplets left in its' wake. From on high the elemental watched the wagons cut through the bog burning brilliantly, and savored the beauty for a moment, for that was all that time allowed. A tightening of its' skin obliterated appreciation of beauty. The whispering enchantment forced the creature's will back to containing the howling gale trying to escape into the warm humidity of the swamp that pulled voraciously on the frigid sea air. As the surroundings grew warmer the' task grew more difficult, battling the forces of physics, the frozen tempest screamed dissent at the efforts of containment. With reluctance the being surrendered to the task completely, allowing the passage of time to continue unnoticed whilst trudging endlessly through the marsh. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Beleaguered and exhausted, sentience began to slip free of the creature's mind, shattering thought and allowing the enslaved winds to escape. The being clung to fractured sanity and desperately sought control of its' shattering consciousness. The swamp had finally dissipated into the same scrub grass and desolate rubble as before. The unchanging road Page 7
continued forward as always. However, in the swamp the great highway had snaked across scattered patches of bedrock and dry ground, but now cut an arrows flight into the distance without so much as a chip in the stone to mar the seamless streamlined perfection. The city began as a smudge, a single black presence somehow darker than the absence of light. As the procession trundled onward the glinting reflection of moonlight could be seen upon the city walls, an opalescent flash that slowly stretched into an elongated line and grew steadily as they approached. Finally the line stopped its horizontal growth and began to attack the vertical incline instead. The wagons rumbled onwards, slowly devouring distance as the ramparts crowning the walls became visible. Atop the immense fortifications, the being's gaze was captivated by the curious structures mounting the walls. An oddly glittering assortment of crystalline bluish black blades that tilted in such a way that they arced across each others paths at perfectly symmetrical angles. Like the depths of sapphire eyes torn asunder they resembled an iris cut and lain across the earth, shimmering sadly in the starlight as if they missed the eyes they once illuminated. Despite the grandeur of the walls, the ramparts always demanded more attention, the ribbon of blades reminiscent of the elemental's own effervescent bondage as they rent the stars in crystalline fury. The imposing line of shimmering shards atop the ramparts was broken only by intermittent towers twisting through the woven weapons and breaking the continuity by sheer bulk alone rather than beauty. Each black monolith was unadorned and massive, defying gravity and calmly rending passing cloud banks with ease. The structures were neither rectangular nor purely cylindrical. Instead they grew, like stalactites born of heaven's dew. Such creations could not be birthed by the hand of man. It preferred to imagine that they had been molded from the stone, pulled from the earth and stretched unto the sky by the gods. Page 8
Adjacent to each tower the blackened walls curved outward eerily in a massive v, arcing towards the road on either side, seemingly inviting entry rather than prohibiting. Two such structures stood sentinel on either side of the road. However, the titanic towers were silhouetted by a mass so gargantuan as to dwarf the entire city by sheer girth alone. Standing imposingly behind both tower and wall Beloch's Cairn provided more deterrence than any fortification ever could. A veritable mountain, its eastern face was dotted with a variety of bizarre structures with a single commonality, they all reflected the silver shafts of moonlight light piercing the clouds, sending them cascading in a dizzying array throughout the city. Each growth of stone seemed to wander with a life of its own, lazily curling around more like fungal spores than colonnades. A web like lattice of these curious columns crowned the cairn. Oddly twisting pillars of iridescent night, they sprouted out of the mountain and into the moonlight like plants searching for the sun, catching shafts of light and twisting them into eye wrenching kaleidoscopic ribbons. At the base of the web they appeared randomly alloted, like creatures of nature they seemed to grow wherever they pleased rather than well designed structures of man. However, high atop the cairn it found that the tallest among the strange machinations was composed of seven such pillars woven from every side of the mountain. They innocuously swirled around each other, weaving in and out of almost pattern like designs and culminating in a single latticework of intertwining spires that swirled together to create a single shimmering peak. As the nightly procession slowly approached the walls, the glittering knot work veritably pierced the moon, like a fiery lance slaying some mighty beast. Despite the queer beauty's dazzling display, its' attention was roughly redirected earthward as the fiery light was lost beneath the great walls' shadow suddenly looming over the wind haulers. The distance to the city had evaporated, allowing the true size of the outer Page 9
walls to become apparent. Over two hundred spans high they cast a colossal shadow and were a truly daunting sight as they grew astonishingly fast. Made of the same strange black stone as the haulers they too were devoid of any plane or angle. Seamless and gently curving they looked like no thing cut by the hand of man. It considered them and decided the earth must have bled them out, a monumental scab to staunch some great wound. As smooth as satin they stretched across the night unendingly, curving slowly with periodic towers breaking free of their grasp. Of all the glory before it,only the gates appeared to be man made. The walls curved out around the road invitingly, supporting the gatehouse to the left and right with symmetrical arcing wings. A small hill on its own the gatehouse was carved in the semblance of a gigantic bird of prey with wings permanently affixed in the down stroke of flight. They fit seamlessly into the walls of the tunnel arcing beneath them with no noticeable breaks in the stone, as if the creature was attempting to escape, a bird caught in a massive spider's web. The beast's breast arced across the great tunnel while the talons surmounted the outer portcullis guarding the passageway. A stone gate fully four spans thick stood open for their entry and the titanic portcullis was raised in perfect unison with their arrival, each crossbar the breadth of a horse. The binding chafed miserably upon the elemental and it could feel consciousness slipping again. The creature feared that this time there would be no resurrection of thought in the chaotic knot work of magic enslaving its' mind. Surprise fluttered across its' fading senses, the hold was weakening. With redoubled effort the elemental roared and the stone caravan groaned in response. The being hated the tunnel for there was no sky within and it yearned to soar in the upper air once more. Finally, after passing a second massive portcullis and entering Valenoch, the last of the threads of binding snapped. With a howl of elation it broke free of the earth and screamed its ascent home unto the heavens. Page 10
Still cruising along under now slack sails the curious caravan slowly spent its remaining momentum plodding across a massive square and subsequently coasting into various gigantic box like buildings situated in orderly rows alongside the plaza. Within moments of their arrival a veritable army swarmed upon the wind haulers like ants on a carcass. Out came food stuffs of every sort. From one came fruits and vegetables, another nuts and dried meats. From the others came live stock complaining loudly as they were transported via more mundane methods to the slaughterhouse. Still more goods flowed forth unendingly until the first tremulous hints of dawn touched the city. The final goods were removed and other more refined products were inserted. Works of skill and technology replaced the bounty of the harvest. Bundles of wheat were exchanged for blades and armor. Into other wagons went jewelry, machinery and textiles of the highest quality. Finally, as full dawn broke upon the horizon, the wagons' brakes were released and they slowly reversed under the weight of their own girth. Their expert drivers pivoted them eastward to begin their long return to the sea, trundling now under gravities pull. First at a crawl and then with increasing velocity they rolled down the gentle incline and began their return to Draenoch.
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