Author Note: If this is your first time reading Bridgehouse, you should begin at the Overture, which starts here.
So appeared the Joining Star, merging in the night with moon-star Eetun Bor. A full year the Joining Star remained paired to the Winged One, and the populations of the world cowered with the promise of its portents. Star-birthed anxiety became ascendant, the Chioloran economy was disrupted and its rulers were unseated, and thus the sea-kingdom began its hundred-year decline.
—from The Chioloran Chronicle
PON’S EYES OPENED to darkness. He was laying sprawled on his side in what felt like several inches of foul water. He breathed and immediately began coughing at the hideous odors, then pushed himself to his haunches with a groan. The floor beneath the water was deep with slimy muck.
Where am I? he wondered. He turned his head this way and that, but there was only black nothing. He waved his hand in front of his face.
Am I blind?
Very carefully Pon stood, grunting with pain as he straightened. Slimy, oily liquid glooped off his body and he wobbled as his feet threatened to slip on the muck beneath. He reached out and his hand painfully struck a hard, rough surface. Hissing, he felt out more carefully, testing the obstruction before him. It was somewhat cool and had a gentle concave curvature to the left and right.
Without taking a step, Pon slowly turned in a circle with his hands outstretched. The possible wall continued out of his reach, but when he’d turned about-face he breathed a deep sigh of relief.
He could see a soft blue glow somewhere above him. Not blind.
Cautiously he shuffled his feet through the water—he really hoped it was water—toward the glow, but before he’d gone two paces his feet struck a slimy obstruction. He felt forward and dimly sensed that it was a pile of garbage. The smells were certainly right.
The pit, he realized. He looked up to the faint blue. The peak of the garbage pile was silhouetted by the glow, and above that was some kind of round roughly-vertical tunnel. Visible in the light, several chunks of unidentifiable material dropped from the tunnel to patter down the side of the pile.
I must have fallen from up there. But what is making that light?
Pon breathed a prayer to the Goddess, then started carefully crawling up the hill of refuse. His hands and knees sunk deep into the mass and he debated vomiting at the horrid stenches that repeatedly assailed him. He tried to ignore the crawling and scuttling things, and after several minutes of halting progress he neared the peak. The density of the garbage-mass decreased as he climbed and each movement caused a small avalanche of rot; the glow wobbled and slid, but remained visible.
The source of the light was Pon’s half-buried shoulder pack. One piece of the broken Storykeeper’s Staff stuck up from the garbage next to it; the other was missing. Pon frowned and reached for the pack, causing another avalanche as he dislodged it. He watched the broken Staff slide down and away into darkness, then looked at the object in his hands. The blue came not from the pack itself, but from within. He turned to sit against the pile and looked inside, and his eyes widened.
Shining with half the intensity of a lantern, the blue rod secured to the fabric of his sash was now emitting a slowly-pulsing light from some hidden depth.
Pon reached in and removed the sash, which was resting in a cluster of the Godsleaves he’d plucked. The rest of his supplies were lost to the garbage. He held up the strip of fabric and stared at the rod in mystic awe.
Minutes passed before Pon roused himself. He considered the sash, then carefully wrapped it around his right forearm and secured it with the ring, and with his illuminating arm upheld he looked around his environment.
He was in a large circular chamber perhaps thirty paces wide with a domed ceiling. It’s bigger than some of the houses in Chiolorai, he thought. The tunnel he had fallen from extended up into darkness; either it was now night or the sun did not reach to this low place.
The walls were faintly metallic, and recessed at regular intervals around the perimeter were thick metal doors with round corners. All but one of these was closed, and the other opened into a dark passage. The rod’s light glinted in the murky, rippling water covering the floor.
There’s no going back up, he decided. He took his pack and worked his way down the pile, a process much easier than the climb had been. He first tested each of the closed doors and discovered they were obstructed by the thick layer of slimy silt beneath the water—and slightly rusted besides. And only one way forward, he thought, looking at the open hatch.
He approached. Beyond was a long waterlogged passage extending into darkness. Its ceiling was slightly lower than Pon’s head, forcing him to duck. His eyes first caught on the perfect joining of metal forming the surfaces within; not only was the quality of craftsmanship as far above Chiolorai as Chiolorai was above Angel Bay, the sheer amount of metal around him was staggering. Though there were signs of corrosion, as well as mosses and lichens hanging in thick patches and mushrooms growing in piles of filth at the edges, the underlying decay was of such low degree that it all felt not more than a few years old.
Who could have built this? he wondered. With his arm extended and moving in a crouch he sloshed down the passage, pushing aside hanging moss and breaking isolated spiders’ webs as he passed.
The water seemed to become shallower as he progressed, the ceiling rose slightly and the passage ended at another doorway opening onto a wider perpendicular corridor. A raised threshold prevented the water from escaping the narrow passage, though the corridor was not precisely dry.
A thick muddy silt dotted with stagnant puddles spread out as far as Pon’s light could illuminate. A multitude of tiny bug eyes glittered in the blue glow, and webs made sparkling nets in the corners. Numerous small shadows skittered away from the light. Large wide-capped white mushrooms bloomed in clusters beneath ropes of drooping green and a distant echo of dripping water made a regular tempo somewhere deeper in.
The walls here were covered in strange runes and colorful markings, and the corridor had a slight curvature. Neither direction seemed better than the other, and Pon was suddenly stymied.
He found a reasonably clear spot to sit and grimaced in pain as he lowered himself to the ground. Which way? he wondered. He sighed and reached for the steadying compass of the Stories, but then he was finally struck with realization.
The Storykeeper’s Staff is broken!
Pon slowly leaned forward, face contorting with despair that swelled to fury and back. He gasped and exhaled in a seething rage, and his fingers dug into the soil beneath him. I will kill him! he thought. Wormy crawling creatures oozed out of the furrows he made.
“But it won’t bring the Staff back,” he muttered, nodding his head in time with an imagined Talis. He slowly breathed and fought to accept the loss. It took him several minutes.
Finally he sighed and sat up. “Stories aren’t going to help me here,” he stated, then stood and took the rightward path. He ducked around and under hanging mosses and gingerly avoided puddles and places where he saw many crawling things.
The corridor seemed endless, though as he progressed the floor became less sodden, the silt diminished and patches of the surface beneath became visible. The mushrooms at least became less of a hazard, growing only in sparse clusters, but he saw an increasing number of bugs evading the light ahead of him. Other small doorways lined both sides at intervals, and most of these were closed. He only glanced down the open ones momentarily before continuing on the singular path. Ahead, Pon saw that the fleeing bugs had formed frothing piles in a rough line across the corridor—and he stopped just in time.
From wall to wall and ceiling to floor, a pace-thick curtain of spiders’ webbing made a grey veil over the passage. The legion of crawling things was caught in the webs and a host of large spindly spiders was descending to feast. Pon’s eyes widened and he stepped back carefully.
Why would the Goddess let such things be?
The hairs on his arms stuck up and a tingle ran up his spine; he spun about and stared into the inky black, holding his breath. He felt his blood pumping in his ears. He heard, or imagined he heard, a distant wailing like a memory of grief reverberating through the depths.
Only after convincing himself that he’d imagined the sound did Pon exhale.
“Right,” he whispered. Don’t think about the monsters of the Island.
Pon retraced his steps, giving each of the open branches a deeper—if still cursory—examination. The first two, on the left, opened into more narrow passages. Their floors also were covered in water. The third, on the right, was different; it had an open door but the door was set flush with the floor instead of in a frame. He glanced within and saw a small chamber with grated floors and a descending metal stairway. The gaps in the floor were filled with the cottony whiteness of webbing, and another swarm of bugs had fled over this and was being set upon by yet more spiders. He moved on.
Faint crying echoed up from the stairs behind him, and he dropped to his heels.
Don’t think about horrid things with rotting teeth and endless eyes lurching in the darkness.
He could still hear the crying, and started believing that it was not his imagination. He emitted an involuntary whimper. Slowly Pon shuffled back to the doorway to the stairs and, watching the spider-piles warily, leaned his head over to listen.
There was no doubt: the sobbing echoes came from below.
He shuddered in terror, then looked at his arm. I haven’t been so frightened since I got this, he thought, remembering the tomb and the bones within. There hadn’t been real danger there. If I’m not imagining it, it must be a real person. A real person might lead me out of this place!
Pon stared at the spidery floor and sighed deeply. Maybe they aren’t deadly? Scowling with implicit horror, he stepped wide across the greatest clusters of gorging spiders; his foot struck cold metal with a high clanging then he leapt toward the stairs, not stopping to see what he’d disturbed. He was two steps down when he squealed and fell back, then crabbed down the flight as a shower of spiders drooped from above, forming an inverted forest of webbing.
“Gah!” Pon cried. He rolled onto the landing at the bottom of the flight and scrambled for the next. The spider density diminished as he went down but the webbing still formed a stuffy, claustrophobic tunnel. He stopped only after there were no visible webs, four landings below, flailing at his body to make sure any spiders hadn’t decided to become his companions. His eyes watched upward.
I think I’d rather have monsters.
He satisfied himself that he was clear of spidery riders and, composure regained, listened. The soft crying was nearer, but still below. He continued down with a growing resolve. Again he was awed by the mastery shown in the perfect straightness of the walls and the fineness of the grating at his feet. Every other landing had a metal door but each was shut and rusted from ages of water running over the open edge above.
The stairs ended in another pool of relatively clear water, and there did not seem to be another flight going lower. An open doorway led to a corridor that seemed a duplicate of the one above, though this one was mildly flooded and without an accumulation of muddy silt, fauna or flora. The walls were bare, with the same painted runes and markings.
The crying, which he could now tell came from either a young child or a woman, was becoming softer, as though the person behind it had exhausted themselves. Pon followed it to the left. The water came to his ankles and splashed with every step, and he had to stop at intervals to listen.
He passed another open doorway on the right then halted, turned back and looked within. Beyond a high threshold was a narrow passage that sloped slightly downward. The floor was seemingly dry but stained with water marks. The crying came from down there. Pon swallowed and carefully stepped over the threshold.
The floor, he discovered, was mildly slick with a thin layer of translucent slime, and he braced himself against the walls as he went down. It went on for many paces, though all distances in this dark place were confused. He stared at a distant and warmly flickering light for a full minute before realizing he was looking at the passage’s approaching end.
He proceeded with slow deliberation, his heartbeat rapid. The crying had stopped.
A small pool of water sat at the angle where the passage met another thick-framed doorway, and beyond was a high metal gantry overlooking a great circular space far larger than the refuse chamber. Shining metal ladders and staircases were set around the room’s circumference, leading from the topmost gantry past multiple levels to a polished grey floor. Drainage grating made a ring where the floor and walls met, and the central area was etched with a complex mandala across nearly its entire surface. The far side was barely visible in the gloomy dark.
A holy place, he faintly thought, staring at what lay in the very center of the design. Laying collapsed and lighted by a nearby lantern was a woman. She wore fur-lined garb like that of the Northern People, and her hair was fiery red, and Pon knew her.
“Lilia,” he croaked.
He stumbled, fell to his knees, clambered to the nearest stairs. He moved down, level by level, in an increasing rush and felt the entire weight of the Island above him pressing him on. He leapt the final flight of steps to the floor, tripped on the grating and rolled with a metallic clanging. He pushed himself up and shuffled forward on all fours.
“Lilia!” Pon shouted.
Her head raised; her eyes looked at him vaguely. In the lantern-light he saw the shimmer of tears on her cheeks.
“Pon?” Lilia murmured.
He threw himself before her, disbelieving. His hands grasped forward, terrified to touch her for fear that she was mere misty apparition. The lantern-cast shadows of her face were filled by the cool blue of the rod attached to his outstretched arm, and her eyes glittered as she tried to see him past the bright glow.
“It’s really you,” Pon sobbed. His eyes clouded with his own tears.
“What a nice dream,” Lilia said softly and smiled.
He touched her hair with trembling fingers. Her hand raised and grasped his.
“I wish you were really here, Pon,” she said.
“I am, Lilia!” he cried. “I am here! I found you!”
She shook her head sadly. He could see her eyes were red from crying.
“You can’t be. You’re still in Angel Bay, learning to tell your Stories, and—”
He grabbed her head and kissed her.
Her eyes shot open wide and she shoved him back, her hands grasping his arms. Her mouth worked silently, her head shaking back and forth.
“P—Pon?”
He broke into laughing tears.
“Yes!”
“Pon!” Lilia threw herself onto him, returning his kiss seven times over.
“How?” she nearly shouted as she felt over his face, his body, testing his reality.
He fought to get his words out between her kisses and his own bursts of emotion.
“I followed you—swore to the Goddess that I would! The Northerners—told us you were taken. But I figured it out—followed you. I—” He started to cry and tried to turn his head away, but she held him fast.
She opened her mouth to speak, but the tiny flame in the lantern flickered and sputtered. Lilia started and pulled away from Pon with a jerk, crawling toward the light.
“Shit, shit, shit!” she cried, turning a small knob on its side to douse it. “Shit!” she yelled and threw her head down. The world dimmed with the diminishing of the flame, taking on a bluish cast from Pon’s glowing rod.
“How will we get out of here?” she whimpered, eyes shut. “The oil won’t last.”
Pon moved next to her and petted her hair.
“I have light,” he said. She turned her head and he gestured with his right arm. In the gloom it seemed a beautiful phantasm.
“What?” she whispered.
“It’s the sash, from the tomb,” he said and began his Telling.
* * *
Pon and Lilia lay cuddled on the floor of the chamber, and having told his tale he became bashful. “You are a marvel, darling,” Lilia said, kissing his shoulder. “My Storykeeper, Pon ir Lugal.”
He caressed her face. “It is your turn for the Telling,” he said. “What are you doing in this place?”
Her face slackened and her eyes became distant, and after a moment she sat up and hugged her knees to her chest. Pon moved to sit before her and began gently rubbing her feet, and he took full notice of her clothing.
She was wearing a thick piece of folded linen over a thicker wool dress, the linen secured with a pair of shoulder brooches. The outer cloth was split down the side, and over all was a fur-lined cloak. Her sparkling hair was cut short to her jawline except for a long tail tied in a thick braid that was coming loose, sending frizzy strands in all directions. Around her waist was a thick, buckled belt from which hung several small sacks and one larger, rectangular pouch that Pon could see held the book from the Repose.
The filth Pon had accumulated in his descent through darkness had coated Lilia and her clothes in dismal smears.
She ran her fingers through her un-braided hair and looked around the chamber.
“I—don’t know,” she said, and smiled at him. “I tried to find passage east after Boatmaster Tchiv left but didn’t have much luck. I couldn’t get any of the captains at the harbor to understand me, and I was running out of coin, so I tried to find work. A few men were willing to pay coin for pairing with me—at least I think that’s what they wanted.”
Pon frowned.
“They were ugly,” she dismissed. “I found a nice woman on the lower western side who understood what I wanted, and I did chores for her in return for food and a place to sleep.
“Then, a few days ago I—I don’t know how to explain it. I needed something, but I didn’t know what, so I borrowed a lantern, snuck out and started wandering the town, and I must have gotten distracted, or—. I found myself standing in the yard of this old building, looking at the doors of a basement. I broke in, and inside was a tunnel leading to this place.
“I’ve spent a long time walking down endless damp corridors and great chambers full of ancient things, snuffing the lantern when I get tired and sleeping in the dark. Pon, this place is like a dream, don’t you think?”
Pon blinked in confusion and thought about the spiders. She reached out and took his hand. “A memory of a memory,” she said. “I found this place a little while ago, and I knew when I saw it that this is what I was looking for.” Her voice softened to a whisper. “The Heart of the Mountain.”
“It’s a Holy Place,” Pon said.
“It is,” Lilia nodded.
“Why were you crying?” he asked gently.
She shook her head. “It just struck me, like a sudden crashing-storm off the Living Sea, like the one that took both our parents from us. I stood right here, looking around, and—So much sadness and pain! I couldn’t bear it, Pon. I’ve never felt so sad before, not even when mama and papa were lost, and I don’t even know why!”
She sniffed, holding back tears. Pon sidled next to her and wrapped her in his arms, and she wept quietly for a long while.
* * *
Pon and Lilia were hungry. They had been wandering the deep tunnels beneath Chiolorai for unknown hours; Lilia had exhausted her supplies before reaching the Heart Chamber and Pon’s had been lost in the refuse pile, and so neither had anything to eat. They aimed generally upward, but their path was occasionally blocked by a flooded stairwell, collapsed tunnel or impassable wildlife (spiders), and they regularly doubled-back.
They were now taking a break in a section of passage clear of water and living things. They sat, Lilia to Pon’s left and their arms around one another, staring at the blue rod.
“What if it stops glowing?” Lilia wondered aloud.
“It won’t,” stated Pon, and she smiled.
They slept fitfully, then continued.
Eventually Lilia’s confidence in their path grew and she stated that she recognized the tunnels they were passing through. Pon took her word for it—it all looked the same to him—and through either luck or Lilia’s skill they emerged from the dark into the stony basement entrance. Blinding beams shot through the cracks in the basement’s outer doors. The pair climbed rough steps and pushed the doors open and, hugging, stepped out into the light of a glorious sun shining in the west.
* * *
Lilia and Pon walked hand-in-hand down the wharf toward Heavenly Matron, which they were relieved to see was still moored. Eyes followed them, and had since their appearance on the Chioloran streets, which Pon thought was reasonable given how filthy he was. The copper-skinned Boatmaster was standing at a rail shouting at his crew, who were busy shifting newly-acquired trade goods around. Fadom and Lao sat at the till looking bored, and Lao noticed the approaching youths first.
The navigator leapt to his feet and, yelling, pointed. Tchiv followed Lao’s arm and saw the pair, then shouted wordlessly, jumped from the rail to the dock and rushed towards them. Lao followed at his heels, and the rest of the crew would have joined him had Fadom not barked them back to their tasks.
“Thank the Goddess!” Tchiv exclaimed as he bounced to a stop in front of them. “You’re alive!”
Pon and Lilia smiled at him, and Pon returned Lao’s slight bow.
“We are, thank you,” said Lilia.
Tchiv let out a long breath and ran a hand through his hair. Anxiety fell from his face. “How did you get out of that pit?!” he demanded of Pon, the captain’s intense parental tone taking both he and Lilia aback.
“You knew?” asked Pon.
The Boatmaster guffawed. “Knew? Hah! All of Chiolorai knows, Storykeeper!”
They looked at each other in confusion. Tchiv nodded.
“You’ve been the talk of the town for the last day,” he explained. “ ‘The visiting western mystic beset by the Old Family Dogs and lost to the Endless Caverns!’ It was an important midtown madam who saw the fight and your fall, and the entire political order has been upset. Everyone thought you were dead.” He laughed. “I thought you were dead.”
He pointed his thumb back at the ship. “I’ve had the boys rearrange our cargo ten or twenty times now, holding out hope. They’re not very happy with me right now. Really though, Pon. How did you get out? And Miss Lilia! It is wonderful to see you as well.”
Tchiv threatened to go on in this vein for some time, but Pon interrupted him saying, “I can give you a Telling in the Gulper, after meals.”
“And baths,” said Lilia.
“Happily!”
* * *
Blue shadows coated the town as the sun descended below the western ridge, and Pon and Lilia emerged clean into the Gulper’s warm lantern-lit common room. Tchiv had sent Lao out to acquire new clothing for Pon and to collect Lilia’s items from the woman who had boarded her, and Pon now wore simple, uncomfortable Chioloran garments consisting of dark trousers with legs ending just below the knee and a white long-sleeved shirt. Over all he wore the tomb sash, with its red-and-blue buckle set at his waist, and his feet sported new sandals.
At some point after they had left the tunnels, and unnoticed by either, the rod’s blue glow had faded away.
They met again in the corridor outside the Gulper’s bath chambers. Lilia smiled at Pon, but he could only gawk; she had let her hair down and was wearing the faintly-stained blue Goddess dress that she’d worn at the Gathering.
“It’s nothing you haven’t seen before,” she said and pushed his shoulder.
The pair were met with cheers from many of the Gulper’s patrons, some of whom Pon thought he recognized from his previous Telling, and the mild tumult caused both youths to blush. Almost every seat was filled already, and more people continued to filter in. Lao and several of Heavenly Matron’s crew sat at one table together whistling loudly. Pon saw Tchiv standing just outside the entrance, barking and cajoling passersby to attend. Frowning, he sidled through the crowd toward the man, keeping his hand held tight to Lilia’s.
“Tchiv,” he said to the Boatmaster with voice raised. “I don’t know if I’m up for this much. I was just going to tell you about—”
“Nonsense!” said Tchiv. He had apparently spent quality time with the Gulper’s libations while they were bathing. The captain wrapped an arm around Pon’s neck and put his head close. “Listen. I know you and your pretty Lilia need coin.” He pulled Pon aside and off the entrance steps to allow more patrons to enter. “Right now, you’ve got a perfect situation in this large, eager and sympathetic audience. You give them one or two performances tonight and you’ll have no problem earning what the two of you need. Promise.”
Lilia grabbed Pon’s arm and held it tightly between her breasts. “I think you should do it,” she said gently. Tchiv nodded his head at her and raised his brow at Pon. Pon looked at her and became caught in the play of reflected window-light in her eyes.
After a moment he sighed. “I will do it. I’ll need a moment to choose one,” he said.
Tchiv smirked. “Don’t Storykeepers usually ask the audience what they want to hear?”
“The only audience I care about is Lilia,” replied Pon. “She can pick, if she wants.”
Lilia beamed and kissed his cheek. “You can have the first choice,” she said.
Minutes later Pon stood in a cleared space near a bright lantern. The Gulper was packed, every table filled and dozens of people standing along the walls. Dhobi’s two serving-girls struggled to keep up with the demand. Pon took a breath and flexed his Staffless fingers, then nodded at Tchiv, who said something to Dhobi.
The proprietor drew the room’s attention and began announcing—so Tchiv claimed—that the miraculously saved young man from across the western Water would now regale them with tales, and the social energy intensified.
Several customers shouted at Dhobi, who looked helplessly at Tchiv, who rolled his eyes, leaned over and said to Pon, “They want to hear how you escaped the Endless Caverns.”
Pon looked to Lilia, who was sitting at the table with Lao and crew. She was smiling broadly and kicking the blue dress’s skirts excitedly. His eyes lingered on her breasts and bare shoulders and his mind fuzzed.
Broad laughter brought Pon back to awareness. Lilia was blushing deeply, and the entirety of the room was caught up in mirth at the pair’s antics. He grinned and nodded to the crowd, and shuddered as a familiar sensation tingled his spine.
He turned to Tchiv and said, “I will give that Telling second. It’s better if people stay longer, right?”
Tchiv laughed and nodded, then spoke to Dhobi, who resumed his introductions. When he finished, Pon stepped to the center of the space, then bowed to the crowd and gestured to Tchiv, bowing in turn.
Lacking his Staff, Pon instead raised his hands and called out, “Attend!”
Attend! and listen to this Story of Goddess and Her Celestial Battle ’gainst the armies and might of She-Who-Was, a Story of war, of contest between gods and titans grand, and endless dark days when unleashed upon the World of mankind were all the horrors of Mu’ehshin’s will, and the World-That-Is was brought to ruin. Heed now this Story of the Goddess, Her great Stealing of the Powers of the World from the halls of the Houses of the Gods. As it is Told in the Story of the Descent of Goddess, She came to our World falling to the Land of the Unbounded. In those days after Shining City’s fall and the Burning of the House of Rezha, World and Heavens were yet linked and Battle Celestial oft was levied against the many mortal people of the World. In that time did She traverse mortal lands ever-watchful and seeking to stymie the dark agents of mighty She-Who-Was wherever foul deeds and their menace flared. So it was that in Her Holy Mission a weakness in Her foes She chanced upon, a secret untold and held dear by them, that which underlay strength of gods entire. You ask, listener, ‘What is this secret?’ As She had taken worldly guise and come to us, so too the gods of She-Who-Was claim’d worldly habit—and so the Goddess did seek and find the Houses of the Gods, that place that they did hold the most sacred in all the World’s lands, unreachable peak and highest mountain inaccessible. In the farthest east they in this dwelling leisurely gathered, Celestial Thoughts free to think without attendant onus of divine response. And in Her sojourns the Goddess did find the gods’ secret path bridging peak and plain...
“… one accessible only in the halls of the Time-To-Come,” stated Pon. Several members of the crowd had started speaking up and calling out, and Tchiv halted his interpretation to shout them down in his best captain’s growl. The man seemed to be slurring, and from the audience’s reactions Pon suspected he was adding his own embellishments, but there was nothing Pon could do about it. He raised his arms for attention and waited patiently for Tchiv to nod at him to continue.
“Upon the path She look’d…”
... knowing that She might wait until the Completion of All before that way would yield itself to Her. Only could it be trod among the paths of tomorrow, in the farthest Time-To-Come, and though thought the gods this a clever ruse to secret their ways, to Goddess it was no more than a mere jester’s amusement. O’ listeners, heed, for Goddess now is the Goddess of All, and so always Is and Was, and how could it be that She might not the Power hold to step into the Time-To-Come, and thus reach that lofty place? Truly, She surpassed the gods’ devising and She will come to stalk their golden streets, a hidden shadow among their Houses! Peeked She their windows, their boudoirs espied, divine scrolls perus’d—their secrets She learn’d and vital knowledge untold She heard tale. The tale She heard was this, o’ listener: those which gave each god Rights Celestial to be master of their attendant spheres, treasure supreme, the Powers of the World, within the very place She stood were held! Learning this, She saw the gods’ indolence and so began Her counter-devising. Goddess chose Dthuz, Scaled-Mother’s consort and understood as the gods’ greatest fool, to be subject to Her ministrations. Seven-Divines Dress apparel donning yet to be stain’d its celestial blue She came appealing to slow-witted Dthuz. Appealing to his masculinity, together of the Celestial Wine they drank, and deeply—though Goddess deceived. She feigned Her drinking and plied his nature when Dthuz the Dull had quaffed his filling. Demurred the Goddess, “Tale I have heard of Great Powers found here.” Slurred Dthuz in response, “Ah-Yuh Brilliant-One, Speech of Truth that is!” “Fert’le is my wish,” whisp’d She in his ears, “if only but once to see these Powers.” Thus Dthuz responded, “Thine wish is mine call!” Without further prompt the slow god stagger’d away seeking the Powers’ Keeping Vault, and clever Goddess close behind was led within the mountain, and in the darkest places the Guardian Door was opened by Dthuz. Within were...
“… —were a—all the Powers of the—of the World,” Pon stumbled, eyes caught by a beautiful blue beacon. Lilia sat with her elbows on the table, her chin cupped in her hands, smiling with glistening eyes. The Goddess dress sparkled in the lantern light. The audience cheered and whistled, and Pon inhaled deeply. He turned and said, “Entered Dthuz the Vault…”
... and stood bleary-eyed staring at the vast array, with the task he to himself had order’d grappling. “Unbelievable,” truth’d the awed Goddess. Dthuz gave a great start, Her presence surpris’d. “Ah-Yuh,” said the fool, “Thine wish mine to see?” Said She, “First we drink in Powers’ honor.” Brandish’d She a cup for Dthuz’s sniffing and smiling he drank, and She another, then third and fourth cup and more were produced, and thudding did fall foolish Dthuz the Dull. O’ you who listen, you have heard Telling of task colossal, Powers’ collection— how stymied was Dthuz; should not She have been? Know, then, the wisdom of Storied Goddess: She with greater sight than dim-witted Dthuz the Greatest Power chose of Powers first, in turn each lesser, and came to contain All, and She knew All, and the gods knew not for She had taken their Powers away, to Herself reveal’d the knowledge of the Time-To-Come and ways of the World-That-Was, op’ning morrow-path so that She could Be and always Have Been. Invested thus with the Stolen Powers Goddess retreated from Godly Houses and with Her boon brought peace for Her People and with Her People prepared Divine Reign. From Her Holy Mount setting She to rule, victorious ended Her devising, yet found Herself to be unsatisfied. One Power yet remain’d beyond Her reach. O’ you listeners, She this One Power with others in hand as never before felt powerful lack, felt desire grim for sole Possession of the Power of Death.
“But that is Told in another Story.”
Pon and Tchiv bowed to excited applause. Dhobi’s girls inched through the mob with alternating empty and full cups, accepting coins and rude but well-meant pats. There were renewed demanding shouts.
“They’re still asking for the story of your escape,” Tchiv told Pon.
“It’s not really a Story,” Pon replied.
“Just say what happened, Storykeeper. I’ll make it float.”
Pon shrugged and nodded. Instead of raising his arms, this time he emulated Master Talis by pacing the perimeter of the space, looking into the crowd as he spoke.
“I fell into a dark—ah—place,” he tried. “Darker than any I’ve seen in the west. “The Storykeeper’s Staff was broken—a--and “I thought myself doomed—but that’s when I found “a magical glow. In the west we speak “of the Island’s sp--spirits—so I thought it. “The glow guided me—ah—deep through the caverns “past giant spiders and mushroom forests “and through murky pools.”
Pon’s heartbeat raced as he watched the rapt attention of his audience and their response to his embellishments.
“It led me to the Heart of the Mountain, “and that is where my salvation was found.”
He turned and gestured to Lilia; a shiver ran up his spine seeing the passion burning in her eyes.
“Belov’d Lilia was my deliv’rence,” he continued, his words beginning to flow, “descending herself into the caverns and rescuing me.
“She had come but her lantern was fading, then from the dark the spirit alighted and lighted our way so that together we climbed from caverns up to find the day.”
He finished and bowed, saying, “Thus, the Story of Pon and Lilia in Chiolorai’s Caverns Unending.”
The room was solemn, murmuring softly to one another. Pon straightened and resisted the urge to fidget. He looked at Tchiv and said, “It’s the first time I’ve told that one.” The Boatmaster was staring at him wordlessly. Pon blinked.
“Is that all true?” asked the captain; his eyes were a little bleary with drink.
“There really were spiders.”
“And magic spirits?”
Lilia bounded up to Pon and clutched his arm. “There was!” she said, nuzzling his shoulder. “I saw it.”
Tchiv bowed his head in acknowledgment. “What next, Storykeeper?” he asked.
Pon looked to Lilia. She smiled, demurred and ran her hand along the blue dress.
“Wha—oh!” Pon laughed.
Lilia whisp’d into his ear, “I want to dance for you properly.”
Pon hugged her waist and put his head against hers. “You already did,” he said.
“I want to be able to see your face,” she replied.
“The Goddess doesn’t usually dance for the Storykeeper,” Pon said.
“Then it is good that I’m not the Goddess,” said Lilia, and she slipped away from him, quietly smiling as she drifted into the shadows at the edge of the crowd.
Pon chuckled and nodded to Tchiv, who proceeded—frothy cup in hand—to regain the audience’s attention now that drink orders were in. Pon raised his hands.
“Attend and listen!” he called, echoed by Tchiv’s translation. He was growing used to pausing after each line, using the pause to gesticulate dramatically.
“To these my words, heed the Story I tell, Our People’s Story, being but part of the Greater Story—Goddess’s Descent—itself a Story of Ages Changing, of glory and light, loving and despair, many beginnings and endings entire!
“O’ many Gather’d of Sedhari’s Grief, of the First Gath’ring will be this Telling!”
Pon, remembering Talis’s actions at the Gathering, affected a bow and gestured broadly to the shadows where She waited.
Lilia emerged spinning into the lantern light, blue dress sparkling, skirts twirling wildly. Her loose red hair fanned across the space, and with every rotation her smiling face alighted on Pon. She halted in a stark pose, arms raised in echo of Pon’s initiating gesture, and every eye in the Gulper was captured. The serving girls stood frozen, half-crouched in the process of delivering drink. A cool salty sea breeze flowed in through the open door, causing tiny flames in the lanterns to flicker.
Pon’s breath caught, and Lilia winked at him. His Storykeeper persona broke and he grinned, then began pacing the light’s periphery while she danced.
“The House of Rezha recently Burning by the Sorcerer-God Mu’ehshin’s hand, and Fallen thus Her capital, Her Seat the Shining City in Memory’s Death and the Dying Breath, the Goddess then fled seeking unknown shores and promised safety.”
As Pon spoke Lilia passed in front of a lantern, becoming a sparkling silhouette to his eyes.
“The remaining Four Principles She called for each in turn to furthest Gathering, First Storykeeper there for proposing the generation of a new People—Goddess’s Chosen—and that night She danc’d in righteous blessing of People’s pairing.”
Lilia and Pon passed one another and she lightly ran her fingers across his shoulders. He watched her openly and sauntered backwards around the edge of the crowd.
“It was then that She with Her new People made Her covenant: Through the doors of Night She would step to claim mastery over the Power of Death—Peoples’ life ensur’d. As flames of union faded to embers on Sedhari’s Grief, She marched in Dress blued Seven-Divines across the Bridge of Life.
“At each pass climbing the Mount of Endings She as toll offered one piece of clothing until at the heights—stood She in glory!”
Lilia, in a practiced move, flung the shining blue dress from her body and ended standing on her toes, one arm upraised and entirely naked. Pon inhaled, staring with all the audience at her skin and her shapes.
She is more beautiful than I remember.
Lilia undulated toward him, hands reaching subtly, smiling with enticing eyes.
“She, in shining morning,” said a blushing Pon as Lilia took his wrist to pull him to the center’s light, “across the Bridge returning proclaim’d—”
“—Rejoicing!” shouted Lilia, turning to the crowd, “for I come bearing in hand the Final Power!”
Pon slipped around her, and raising hands said, “Goddess became then sole mistress over the Power of Death—with the End entwined!”
“Death’s Power wielding will I conquer Death!” cried Lilia, and her dance renewed. She weaved and turned and stretched around the margins in place of Pon, and heads turned in a broad wave tracking her.
“Shown in fullness was awesome Goddess-craft,” Pon said, fighting to keep his breath steady, “its purifying luminance searing even Mu’ehshin Sorcerer to ash!—so saved Her People from destin’d end, from She-Who-Was her ceaseless demon grasp.”
Lilia spiraled in, winked at Pon again and feigned a swoon into his arms. An ecstatic shiver ran up his back as he felt her warmth.
“Essence expended,” he said heavily, “the Goddess collapsed upon the stone shelf of Sedhari’s Grief as the World-That-Is shook with destruction. Possession of All of the World’s Powers unseated the World’s deepest foundations; the Void yet threaten’d despite Her triumph.”
Pon grunted as he lifted Lilia into his arms while Tchiv translated. “’s not supposed to be the actual Storykeeper,” he murmured.
“You’re doing fine, darling,” responded Lilia, smiling with her eyes shut.
“First Storykeeper—took up Her shining—form and carried Her—to the Bridge of Life,” he exerted.
Tchiv stopped his translation to say something to Dhobi, who held up two fingers in response.
The Boatmaster said to Pon, “Up the stairs, second room on the right.”
Up the stairs!?
“Though Our People She—gave deliverance,” heaved Pon as he carried Lilia to the stairs, “on the World-That-Is—She could not remain.” At Dhobi’s insistence the grinning crowd bunched to the side to allow them passage. “The Storykeeper—to Mount of Endings—carried Her,” he said as he began mounting the steps, “to the Place of—Lilia! I’m trying to Tell a Story!”
* * *
Dhobi was gently chivying the straggling patrons away and sweeping up the leavings of a prosperous evening when Pon and Lilia returned to the common room. Someone had set Lilia’s things outside of their room while they were consummating their reunion, and she now wore her spare clothes, largely identical to the northerner garments she’d been wearing when Pon found her, along with her belt. Pon rubbed his eyes tiredly; he’d wanted to sleep.
The owner cheered when he saw them, saying things neither understood and gesturing broadly to the mostly-empty room. Pon and Lilia smiled politely and took a seat; Lilia cuddled on Pon’s lap after placing her own shoulder pack on the table. Nearby, Tchiv was half-asleep with his head down. His face was red with drink.
Lilia shifted and Pon grunted as his gut was prodded by a stiff corner. They both looked down; the offending object was the book in its pouch on Lilia’s belt. She removed it, set it on the table and resumed her cuddling. Pon reached out and flipped it open to an arbitrary page covered in inscrutable runes.
“Have you learned to read any of it?” he asked. One of the two serving girls appeared and set cups and bowls of soup next to the book. Lilia took one of the cups and held it up to Pon’s lips, and he sipped and grimaced. She giggled.
“A little bit,” she said, then her eyes opened wide. She hopped excitedly and patted his shoulders, saying, “Oh! Actually, yes.” She pulled the tome closer and turned to a page near the front. “It’s strange,” she said. “The longer I look at it, the more I feel like I understand it, like how I felt going into the tunnels. Look.” She stopped on a page and pointed at a group of symbols.
“I think this means ‘person’,” she said. “And this one, ‘travel’, or maybe ‘walking’. I think.” She looked at him, and a single lantern flame made a solitary pinpoint star in her eyes. He smiled at her, accepting her claim, and she turned to another page. Her finger traced along a single line of text. “I’m certain this says—I think it says, ‘We fell from the heavens into the land of—’ These runes here mean ‘unbounded.’”
“It’s one of the Stories,” Pon gasped.
“I think that tomb wasn’t a tomb,” she said. “I think it was the home of the First Storykeeper, and this book is where he wrote them down!”
“Goddess be,” he murmured, gazing at the pages. His voice took on a note of sadness, saying, “I wish I could read it.”
Lilia kissed his brow. “I will teach you,” she said. He smirked.
“I can’t even read our own tribe’s writing, and I tried.”
“We’ll learn to read it together. We’ll have plenty of time while we travel.”
Pon’s brow lowered in confusion.
She took his head in both her hands and looked him in the eyes. “You swore to follow me, didn’t you? Swore to the Goddess, you said?” Pon nodded.
Lilia laughed. “Well, I’m going after the Angel’s Crest, which means you are too. The Angel’s Crest, Pon! We’ll find it together, and we’ll learn to read the book together, and we’ll be together. Right?”
Pon inhaled slowly, then nodded. “Yes,” he said.
Tchiv burped and slowly raised his head several inches from the table he’d collapsed over. His eyes lazily tracked toward them.
“I f’got about thet’un,” he mumbled. “Tha’ F’st Gath-rin’. I havn’t heard it sinsh I wus a boy. It was… it was…”
Pon understood.
“It was at your Gathering, right? It’s always told there.”
“Yesh! It was. There. Then. Ahh, shit.”
“What’s this about?” Lilia asked.
Pon said, “Tchiv left the People after the Elders refused to pair him at his Gathering.”
“No! Oh, poor Tchiv! It must have hurt to hear it again.”
Tchiv pushed himself up and shook his head, causing him to wobble on his chair.
“It was a long time ago,” he sulked.
Dhobi finished his sweeping and approached the trio at their tables. He bowed to Pon and Lilia, then addressed Tchiv. They exchanged words, and then Dhobi handed two large pouches to the Boatmaster. He slapped Tchiv on the back with a laugh, then went back to tidying up the place.
Tchiv waggled one of the bags at the couple.
“This’s yers,” he said. He tossed it to Pon, who nearly fumbled catching it. From the heft and clinking sound it was clearly full of coin.
“Ease-ly ’nuff to get ya’ east,” muttered Tchiv, head drooping. “An’ mine’ll jus’ about make this whole trip worth it…”
He slowly lowered until his forehead was resting against the table.
Lilia gently took the bag of coins from Pon and stood. Pon watched, curious, as she approached Tchiv and sat next to him. She rubbed his shoulders and massaged his neck. He murmured something unintelligible.
“You say it’s enough to buy passage east?” she said in a tone Pon thought was very dangerous.
“Yus,” said Tchiv.
“Enough that any Boatmaster would be willing to take us?”
“Pro’lly. I wouldn’a turn away…”
“You promise?”
Tchiv turned his head, resting his cheek on the wood. Bleary eyes tried to focus on her. Pon stood, slowly, and quietly observed.
“Wuzzat?” Tchiv mumbled.
“You’ll take our coin, and ferry us to the eastern shore?”
“Uh.” He closed his eyes, brow furrowing.
“You wouldn’t turn away this much, would you?” Lilia shook the bag.
“Nuh,” he said sloppily. Lilia carefully placed the pouch in Tchiv’s hand, then lightly kissed his head.
“We’ll see you in the morning, Boatmaster.”
“Mmgoot—good,” said he.
Lilia stood, collected her pack, then looked at Pon and gestured that he should follow her. She led him out of the Gulper. The streets were dark and only one man could be seen wobbling down the street toward the harbor.
“What are you doing?” asked Pon as Lilia turned left and followed the drunken stranger.
With a pleasant laugh she said, “Stealing the Powers.”
* * *
“You rascals! I agreed to nothing!” cried Tchiv the following morning, regretting it instantly and grasping his temples. The captain’s face was still lined with the impressions of the wood table he’d spent the night drooling on.
They were all now aboard Heavenly Matron, where Lilia and Pon had spent the remainder of the night waiting for Tchiv to wake and arrive.
Lilia smiled and batted her lashes. Pon watched in happy amazement as she worked.
“I believe, Boatmaster,” she said, “that Master Dhobi at the Gulper will confirm you took that large pouch as payment after we had a discussion. You’re in possession of it now.” Her voice took on a singsong quality. “Surely you wouldn’t want me to go accusing you of stealing to the harbormaster, would you? That’s a good amount of coin, isn’t it?”
Pon couldn’t resist a huge grin. Tchiv’s mouth moved silently.
Finally, he spat out, “Take your coin back, blasted woman!” He held out the pouch. Lilia slipped behind Pon, feigning worry.
Fadom, Lao and the crew watched the byplay, chuckling while they prepared the ship to cast off. Their expressions changed when Tchiv barked at them, apparently telling them what he’d supposedly agreed to.
“Please, Boatmaster Tchiv,” said Pon. “It’s more than enough to pay for the journey, isn’t it? There aren’t any other captains who could take us. Nobody can understand us. You can. Please.”
Tchiv stood there, arm held out with the prize depending from his hand. Everyone on the ship watched him, breath held.
The Story continues in Chapter 12: The Big Picture.
You can read more about the life and adventures of Storykeeper Pon ir Lugal and Lilia isc Radhi in Bridgehouse, available now on Amazon in paperback and Kindle editions.
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