Chapter Twenty-One

The early morning sun glistened off the snow, reflecting its solar brilliance in tiny sparkles that accumulated to brighten the new spring day. Crystallised sap, frozen to the core of the slender mountain trees in winter, thinned and coursed freely in the warm spring breeze. Tiny sparrows and starlings perched on branches heavy with early spring buds, chirped vigorously, lording over the ground that showed muddy where the sun's heat had melted the shallower layers of snow.

Tarn paced impatiently back and forth across the mouth of the cave, waiting for the Sword Chamber priest to complete his packing. Anxious to return to his village, he had travelled to and from the pass every day for the past two weeks. When he arrived this morning, it lay at long last open. Filled with glee, he ran to the cave to inform Torrocka of the news. As Tarn grunted his growing displeasure over Torrocka's prolonged delay, he exited the cave wearing a small pack and laboriously dragged a much larger one.

"I shall travel considerably slower if I am forced to carry both," Torrocka said staring meaningfully at Tarn.

"Then leave it behind. Let us be away from this cursed boar's den."

"We shall not be returning, son of Jayleen. I will not abandon my scrolls and stargazing equipment. We may need them," Torrocka reminded, refusing to be hurried.

"I am son of Connor. Ye well know my people's ways."

"Ye be of two nations lad. Do ye wish to commence a debate on the esoteric doctrines of Atlantean lineage, or do we seek thy village?" Torrocka asked innocently.

"I'll no stand my pace to be slowed. Keep up or fall behind. It matters little to me," vocalised Tarn in disgust, and shouldered the large pack with a heavy grunt. He gave Torrocka a sidelong glance as he shrugged it into a comfortable position. "Vulcan. Do ye bring the whole cave?"

"I thought ye mountain men a tough and hardy breed? Mayhaps I was misinformed."

After endowing Torrocka with a calculated expression of amusement, he turned on his heels and strode away in long, ground-eating strides. Torrocka smiled as he followed the youth's broad back, thinking of the heavy sandbags that he had stowed at the bottom of the pack.

Walking in shared, amiable silence, Torrocka allowed his thoughts to drift. Almost absentmindedly he contemplated the wonders of adolescence. To his astonishment, Tarn had grown a full inch over the four winter months and gained a considerable amount of weight on his already impressive frame. To remember that Tarn hadn't reached his full potential was a source of wonder to Torrocka. These mountains produced large men. It turned out that Tarn was an apt student of the written word; though an exceedingly impatient one. And though Torrocka would never admit it, Tarn had surpassed his expectations by grasping the fundamentals of two separate languages. His mind was quick and sharp, but his stubbornness required curbing. Torrocka was sweating it out of him. A tired body renders a malleable mind, he thought contentedly. A trace of satisfaction crept into his musings.

* * * * * * *

Runoff from the melting snow gathered in muddy pools, turning firm ground to sticky, ankle-deep muck. Fallen trees and boulders were scattered helter-skelter on the belly of the ravine, rendering it an obstacle course to be navigated rather than travelled. The ram trail Tarn travelled coming down the mountain, lay muddy and slippery on the return trip. The spring runoff sluiced off the mountain, transporting loose earth, sand, and scree, changing the trail into a slithering muddy snake. Despite the terrain, despite being weighed down by those sandbags, Torrocka was forced to hurry to match the lad's long-legged pace.

Near mid-morning, on a gently graded plateau, Tarn stopped abruptly. He studied the ground briefly, and shielded his eyes, looking across to a pasture that received the sun's warming rays. The pasture showed empty. For long minutes he scanned the land, searching. No ground was broken. He shook his head and moved on, at a slower pace, continually scanning the trail and the surrounding countryside.

"What is it, lad? What bothers ye such, that ye must stop and peer off into the distance so often?"

"I know naught. The ground shows blank when it should be covered by hunters' tracks, and by those who come and go as they tend the herds," he considered, his voice rife with incertitude. "Where are the herds? The pastures are empty, yet the grass is green. Where is the sign left by village hunters?"

Despite the heavy burden, Tarn broke into a soft lope. Torrocka's mouth gaped disbelievingly. He shook his head, struggling to navigate the treacherous ground and keep pace with the young Atlantean. He failed and fell a dozen steps behind. By the time Tarn sighted his village, Torrocka's breath came in uneven, laboured gasps. The aged priest gained Tarn's side and bent at the waist, resting his hands on knobby knees. Though this would have amused Tarn earlier, more important matters occupied his thoughts. Torrocka was too tired to note Tarn's pensive expression, too fatigued to see him loosen the sword in his scabbard.

Unease radiated through Tarn. Skin prickled. Wariness surged through his system. Every fibre of his being warned of danger. Casting his feelings aside, Tarn noted the absence of smoke from cook fires, from the forge, and the lack of movement. Additional worry pursed Tarn's mouth, his lips pressed tightly together.

Come spring, the village normally bustled with spring fever. After months of reduced activity spent close to the huts, he expected to witness children romping freely. Loud and boisterous laughing, friendly calls to neighbours as they passed by huts, and curses from mothers chastising their children to not drag muck into the hut, should have brought the village to life. Freshly hunted meat should have been roasting on fires, and new hides curing on racks. Instead, the village was frozen in time. Nothing moved. Upon cresting the plateau, the small hairs on the nape of his neck bristled alarm. The warnings he experienced earlier became more acute, more focussed. He shrugged the heavy pack off his shoulder and drew his sword.

"Do not get in my way, and be silent until I return. We are not alone," he whispered and moved away in silence.

Torrocka nodded, too bushed to speak, unaware of the curious danger that pulled Tarn forward.

Tarn slid across the village's outer perimeter. An intense wave of unnatural cold snatched his breath away. Body-numbing frigid air enveloped him. The warm breath he exhaled turned to ice fog, hung breathless, suspended at eye level, before slowly sinking to the ground around his feet. A body shiver shook his shoulders uncontrollably. The river of cold started at his heels and rode up his legs and back until his scalp prickled. When he backed up three steps, he felt himself cross the boundary and the warm air beyond. Sorcery! Supernatural fear raised the hackles on the nape of his neck. Steeling his nerves, Tarn stepped forward where the body numbing wave of sub-zero cold temperatures again assaulted his senses.

Placing his feet with care, Tarn crossed the village. An unfamiliar sound drew him forward. An urge to call out a village greeting to those who slumbered in their huts nearly escaped his lips. A strong desire raged in him to raise his voice, to bring notice to himself, to let others know that danger lurked nearby. He wanted to do anything but keep quiet. A sixth sense, perhaps his hunter's instincts, urged him to silence. Tarn clamped his mouth shut, staying up on the balls of his feet. On the far side of the village, some forty paces from where he left Torrocka, Tarn sighted Nathan's hut. It lay in ruins, the outer hide slashed and torn. The framework poles lay broken and pulled down. Within the centre of the collapsed structure, two white-furred, very large ape-like beasts hunched over a corpse snarling and tearing chunks of flesh from the body with their sharp fangs.

Tarn's eyes narrowed dangerously. Hot fury simmered in his breast. Village loyalty curled one corner of his lip, nearly eliciting a primal growl. The desecration of the man who had been like a father very nearly propelled him into a hasty charge. Almost overrode every lesson Nathan and others had drilled into him. Maintaining some semblance of control, and having reigned in his initial impulsiveness, Tarn moved to the left, keeping a hut between him and the feeding animals at all times. He took a circular route that would bring him in behind the white frost apes. The snarling ceased.

His hunter's sense rang shrilly. Darting behind Korub's hut, he peered around the shelter in the direction he had last sighted the white apes. They were gone! Soft scuffing sounds came from his right. He spun around, pivoting on his right foot, swinging blindly at the sound. The broadsword's razor-sharp edge bit into the frost ape's upper left arm. Blood oozed sluggishly from the deep, axe-like cut. The furry arm, with its all-too-human hand, hung by a ribbon of tendon and skin.

Screaming mutilated anguish, the ape swiped viciously at him with its undamaged hand. Tarn leapt backwards with pantherine speed, but not quickly enough to avoid the long reach of the ape's arm. Though a glancing blow, it contained numbing power and knocked him off his feet. He hit the ground in a tuck. Even as he rolled fluidly to his feet, the wounded white ape charged, accelerating incredibly fast for such a large animal.

With just a few short yards separating them, Tarn barely had time to raise his sword above his right shoulder before the frost ape closed the distance, its uninjured claws extended. At the last possible instant, when the ape's sharp talons had all but reached his throat, he pivoted to its wounded side and swung inward. Shiny steel blurred toward the unnatural creature's throat. Keen silver sliced through its thick, muscular neck to sever flesh and tendons. Fountains of bright red blood gushed from the fatal wound.

In the heat of the battle, Tarn had lost track of the second beast. He went dead still, save for his head, which snapped from side to side, searching. The sound of heavy breathing alerted him. Tarn twisted around, pivoting sideways. Ere he brought his sword to bear, a pair of massive limbs encircled his waist, pinning his arms to his sides in a vice-like grip that rendered his sword arm useless. The polar ape locked its muscular arms around the small of his back and squeezed. Its grip tightened, constricting inch by inch. Fetid breath washed across his face.

Tarn flexed his thews, straining to win free, straining to free his trapped sword arm, straining to draw a full breath. He failed. The intense cold of the creature's fur burned him wherever it met his skin, and sapped his strength, numbing his limbs. If he didn't break free soon, he never would. The white ape's powerful embrace inexorably squeezed the life out of him. Each time he expelled the previous breath to pull in another laboured gasp, the ape tightened its grip. Suffocation would occur long before the unnatural cold froze his flesh.

In desperation, Tarn smashed his forehead into the beast's tender nose. Bone and cartilage pulverized under impact and blood flowed. Howling primeval pain, it screamed several octaves louder again when Tarn stomped on the arch of its left foot, crushing some bones and snapping others. The ape's grip loosened, but not sufficient for him to win free. With his last few shallow breaths, he head-butted the ape again and brought his right knee up viciously between its legs. It bellowed medieval despair and relaxed its hold enough for Tarn to drop out of its clutches to his knees. Free of the smothering grasp, crouched on all fours, he inhaled deeply, already somersaulting backwards—executing tumbling lessons turned instinctive. He rose to his feet, wrists aflame with searing prickles as warm blood flowed into frost-bitten tissue.

Partially crippled, the ape stooped over in front of Tarn. Blood poured out of its smashed nose and face. Tarn issued a heart-quelling battle-cry and charged the pain-wracked animal. A clawed hand streaked toward his face. Steel met the ape's wrist, severing the hand. The arctic primate bawled agonising fury. Blood pumped out of the stump, pulsing with each heartbeat. Quicker than chain lightning Tarn swung his sword savagely at the creature's exposed leg. Keen metal cut deeply into its thigh muscle, arrested by the heavy femur bone. Ere he withdrew his blade, the great ape clubbed him with the back of its uninjured fist. Even severely wounded, the blow contained immense, bludgeoning power that drove Tarn to the ground, swordless.

Regaining his feet in a fighter's crouch, his eyes locked on his opponent, unwavering, waiting for the savage thigh wound to weaken. The enraged polar beast ripped the sword from its thigh with a fleshy sound and tossed it aside with the same ease that one plucks a splinter from the skin. Tarn stared into the leviathan's beady-red eyes and answered with a snarl of his own. Drawing his skinning knife from its sheath, he circled the injured beast warily, watching, waiting for an opening.

Balancing unsteadily on its wounded leg, its severed wrist pressed to its stomach, the ape advanced. Already Tarn felt his endurance beginning to ebb. The extremely low temperatures taxed his strength, numbed his limbs, and stole his agility. Sub-zero cold penetrated his furs and beyond. His movements were quickly becoming sluggish and laboured. The snow snatched at his heels, as though he moved through a quagmire. The perspiration produced by his efforts had frozen on his skin. Hoarfrost coated exposed skin. Soon he would no longer be able to defend himself. Glancing beyond the ape, Tarn measured the distance to the village boundary. If he could manoeuvre closer, he might be able to step outside and absolute zero temperatures and rejuvenate himself, perhaps even lure the ape beyond.

As Tarn took his first tentative step, the wounded primate eyed Tarn through rage-cloaked eyes and swung its good arm at him. Desperation released a surge of adrenaline into his system. Tarn caught the thick wrist in both hands, turned into the ape, and threw it over his hip with a mighty shoulder twist. When the mammoth primate hit the ground on its back, Tarn plunged the slender blade into its eye, piercing its brain. The ape shuddered once and died.

Gasping for breath, he stumbled over to his sword. As quickly as his stiff legs would carry him, Tarn ran to his hut, threw open the hide, and peered inside. Marta sat before a dead fire, bundled under a thick canopy of furs. A layer of ice crystals framed her eyes, nose, and mouth. His hut-mother's skin was perfectly preserved. He reached a tentative hand forth and touched her face. The extreme coldness of her skin burned his fingers. He snatched his hand back and surveyed the hut interior.

The dormant fire-pit caught his attention. It had once burned hot. Beneath a tower of half-burned wood, their edges black with charcoal, lay a thick ash deposit, much higher than was normal. It appeared as though his mother had stoked a fire to stay warm, but it had refused to stay lit. Consumed by an ineffable sadness, his heart heavy with grief, Tarn ran to Tyrell's hut. Much the same circumstance waited. Tyrell, along with his parents, sat huddled in front of a dead fire, frozen solid like Marta. Proceeding from hut to hut, the scene repeated itself. All the adult members of the village were frozen to death. Absent among the dead were the children and adolescents, Shaurii among them. No natural reasons were responsible for cold conditions and missing children.

When he stepped over the village's boundary, the air returned to normal. Tarn carefully circled the frore settlement in ever-widening rings, bent low to the ground, searching for tracks. Fifty paces out he ceased looking. Whoever had taken the children had done so long ago. Not a single imprint remained. A memory stopped Tarn in his tracks. Near mid-winter he recalled looking toward his village and the queasy-sick feeling that pervaded him. He had known then that something unnatural was occurring, that something was evil, it came to him now, had taken place. Penetrating the outer layers of his stubborn denial, he recalled Torrocka's words regarding the Ramka, that he was connected to the earth.

Having watched the events play themselves out, empathic understanding softened Torrocka's withered features, unlike Tarn, who stalked toward him with purpose. Grief and rage coalesced, tightening the youth's stride; the knuckles of the hand gripping the sword pommel strained white. Nearly uncontrollable fury radiated from the young Atlantean. Although Tarn's stoic visage sent a cold spear knifing through his heart, the lad's eyes blazed brilliant green fire.

"The adults are dead, frozen solid by sorcery. The small children and adolescents are missing; no tracks, no sign, nothing." A fierce countenance narrowed his eyes and pursed his lips until he trembled with pent-up rage. Tarn lifted his head skyward, and shouted, "Vulcan, grant me vengeance for my people. If not, then let me die surrounded by those I've slain!"

Torrocka said in a subdued voice, "There is only one explanation. He knows of thee."

"Imaran," growled Tarn savagely, like a death knell.

"There can be no other."

"I claim the rite of vengeance. Blood for blood, he will die. Take me to the Sword Chamber, priest."

"Ye embrace the prophecy?"

The grieving youth answered in pithy tones, "I seek a murderer's death. Speak no more words. We leave, now!"

Tarn wiped the blood from his blade. He wanted to build a funeral pyre for his people but dared not spare the time required to remove more than three hundred frozen bodies and gather sufficient wood to properly send them to Valhalla. There was not a minute to waste to visit the neighbouring village to request aid. Not a single hour would Tarn surrender to his vengeance. And though his conscience regretted not giving his people a proper burial, Torrocka eased his mind, explaining that the sorcery would take months to dissipate. While the numbing cold would keep scavengers away, it would also preserve the corpses for some time.

The Sword Chamber priest remained silent when Tarn neglected to shoulder the large pack. Instead, Torrocka searched through the pack to remove critical equipment only. Non-essential supplies he took within the village to be protected by the cold temperatures.

"Master thy anger, Tarn, lest it masters thy actions. In this pack be crucial tack for our long journey. To what end do we rush away only to fail for lack of planning?"

"Keep up ancient one. We travel all night," he said, shouldering the pack.

"We will stop to eat and rest." Emerald-green death met Torrocka's gaze while he finished his thought. "Rest and sleep are weapons also. We will need both on the journey we embark upon."

Tarn stared at Torrocka for a moment while rivers of hatred ebbed out of him.

"We will need very little rest and food this night," and turned for the trail leading down off his mountain.