The Six and the Crystals of Ialana

 

 

The Continent of Ialana

 

El-Azar knew that he and his companions were about to die.

The rocky cave floor dug into his broken knees, and the tight ropes that bound him painfully chafed his swollen wrists and ankles. He could hear the moans of his companions, but he could not tell if Faelan was among them.

Was she already dead?

They’d been captured in the Ozgoi tunnels by the soldiers of the Reptilian King. In spite of their most brutal methods, the soldiers had not extracted the information they sought from him,but El-Azar did not know, yet, if any of the others had broken. The blood dripped down his face and into his eyes. Where was Faelan? If he could have just one more glimpse of her face . . . .

He slowly twisted his head. The soldier that stood behind him slapped his face back around with an open palm. He felt another tooth break loose, but still he could not see Faelan. The others were blurred shapes in the dim cavern. His captor placed a large foot on his back. With a vicious kick the soldier pushed him down, and his head hit the flat stone in front of him. He could hear the crack, a wet, smacking noise that sounded like someone had dropped a gourd. Then he felt it again: the fear. The fear of dying—it was so much worse than the pain, but even through the terror he sensed something else. He sensed his team. Someone had broken through their own walls of fear, and he could hear their thoughts quite clearly.

“Brother, we tried. Faelan contacted our friends before she died. They know what has happened and that our mission has failed. They advised that all is well for our plan. We will be back, Beloved.”

El-Azar bowed his head as tears ran down his cheeks, mingling with his blood. He smiled as the axe came down. Yes, it was all well.

 

***

Jarah

Jarah wished he could make himself disappear. He thought that he would gladly endure the ostracism of his friends—what few he had in Meadowfield—and his family to possess the powers of a sorcerer, even if only for some moments. He’d transport himself to somewhere else.

Anywhere else. His spindly legs strained and trembled as he hefted yet another bag of flour from the mule wagon into his father’s bakery. The blood from his blistered hands mingled with the grain, but he didn’t care. Baking bread was not what he planned to do with the rest of his life, no matter what anyone said.

“Done unloading those bags yet?” His father, Arall, stood in the doorway, unsmiling, floury hands on hips. Mehin, the wagoner, smirked. He’d done nothing to help Jarah unload since arriving with the bags. Jarah had watched him stuff chunks of free bread from the bakery into his mouth as he lolled in the shade of an awning. Mehin took a swig of beer from a mug and wiped his mouth.

“Yeah, he’s taken long enough as it is. I need to be on my way.” Mehin squinted at the sun nearing its midday mark.

Jarah stood in front of his father who had not yet moved out of his way. His neck hurt and his back felt as if it was breaking. With a deliberate motion, he twisted, and dropped the bag at Arall’s feet. It made a sound that echoed his thudding heart, then the bag split wide open and poured its floury contents onto the wooden floor of the bakery.

The wagoner stopped chewing. There was a silence that felt as if it lasted for a century.

Jarah thought his heart had stopped altogether. How had he dared—? He already regretted his action. It was not like him to do something like that, but to watch Mehin sit in the shade, eating, while he . . . it had been too much for him.

Arall’s mouth, which had fallen open for a brief moment, closed again with a snap.

“So, that’s the way you want it, eh?” he said. The look of surprise had left his face, replaced now by red-hot anger. “You’ve been hinting, boy—don’t think I haven’t noticed. You think you’re too good to be a baker, to take over my business one day—the business I have labored over for longer than you’ve been alive—”

“Father, I don’t feel I am too good to be a baker.” He wiped his bleeding palms on his apron.

“I just don’t want to be a baker. At all.”

“So, what do you want, then?”

Jarah thought, as he’d so often done over the past moons. He didn’t really know though what he wanted to do for the rest of his life. There were few options in Meadowfield for a seventeen year old, and wishing for the powers of a sorcerer was not realistic, even to him. When pressed—and that seldom happened because no one really cared what he did unless it had something to do with the bakery—he would say, in a vague way, that he’d go to Three Rivers and find something there. Preferably, something that did not involve physical labor.

He’d had some schooling, thanks to his mother, Mae, and he could read. His mother’s father had been a scribe, and he’d taught her to read and write. She had then taught most of the village children to read scrolls, as well as how to use the sharpened feather pens to scratch their marks on the rough vellum with sooty ink.

“I could be a scribe, like grandfather. I like to—”

A muffled guffaw came from underneath the awning. Mehin resumed stuffing the remainder of the loaf of bread into his mouth. His father merely snorted.

“I think scribes would show a little more respect to their elders, especially their fathers.” The wagoner’s words were barely intelligible as he chewed.

Jarah did not look at him. He was already regretting his display of temper. He bent down and gathered the corners of the bag together. He would try to save as much flour as he could. I should not have done this. It’s not Father’s fault. It’s all he knows how to do. But then again, it’s all I know too. I only wish it wasn’t.

Arall shook his head and retreated into the bakery, but he did not offer to help Jarah. Mehin was now focused on swilling home-brewed ale from a clay pot he’d retrieved from the wagon.  Jarah wondered if he was already drunk, as he so often was. He felt sorry for Mehin’s only son.

Or did he? He and Blaidd—he was interrupted by his father shouting from inside the bakery.

“After you’ve unloaded the bags, I want you to wash out these trays, and then . . .”

Jarah stopped listening, his father’s voice fading as he scooped up flour from the floor into a Why could he not be a scribe? He had learned accounting from his father. It was necessary to understand how much money they made, how many loaves of bread were sold, and how much flour they would need each day. His father expected him to learn the trade thoroughly so he could marry and take over the bakery. His mother had already discovered several bridal prospects for him, all girls from the village. She pressed him daily—Mae lacked subtlety—to make a choice, but he did not feel as if he was ready for marriage. He knew that once a man married he was stuck with his choices and then he would have no opportunity to find his real life’s work.

But there was a tiny voice inside his head that would not be silenced. He thought about that too as he completed his tasks—this time without complaint, and after he had apologized to Arall. The thin voice sounded more like the real he, the real Jarah: the part of himself that ached for something that could not be expressed. But what was that something? He had no idea. He was still confused.

The small village was quiet when he had, at last, finished at the bakery. He pulled the hood of his cloak over his head as he made his way to the well to draw water. It was his last chore of the day: to take water home for their household needs. His breath misted in the crisp autumn air.

The first star of the evening was already out, the crescent moon its only companion. Most of the villagers were already in their homes, their windows not yet shuttered against the cold. The lantern glows and hearth fires spilled warmly out into the village square.

He could see a small group gathered around the well in the center of the square as he drew near. Adain was amongst them, and he was predictably accompanied by several village girls, the very bridal prospects his mother hoped for, along with Blaidd who lately was Adain’s constant shadow. He sighed. The boys summer tunics and the open sandals on their feet defied the bite in the evening air. He felt that Adain would look down his aquiline nose at him, and smile, as if wondering why they had been interrupted by this baker’s son with his cloak wrapped around him like a baby’s blanket. With his red hair and pink skin, Jarah felt inferior to Adain, and Blaidd always seemed to be smiling—like a wolf—carefully looking at him with his humorless eyes as he talked.

It didn’t matter that Blaidd’s father was Mehin, the village drunk. Blaidd always looked so confident, so sure of himself, but Jarah often felt awkward around others of his age. It was difficult to coordinate his hands and feet and he’d once been told by a cruel, but pretty girl, that he walked like a goose. Adain was so graceful compared to him, and his blond hair and hazel eyes easily got the attention of the best looking girls in the village. Adain couldn’t possibly understand how Jarah must feel, and he felt sure he made jokes about him behind his back while the girls covered their mouths with their hands, and giggled. Adain would probably be married to one of them before the year was out.

“Hey, it’s Jarah!” He heard Blaidd call out to him once he’d been noticed. “We’re just saying we’d like to run off and join the army.” Blaidd smiled, showing strong white teeth. “But you’d probably prefer to stay and be a baker, eh?”

Jarah ignored him and hooked the rope handle of his bucket onto the metal hook of the well. The girls giggled, and Blaidd looked pleased. Jarah began to lower the bucket.

“I don’t want to join the Army,” Adain said. “But anything’s better than this place. If the Army’s my only option, then I’ll go. My parents won’t miss me too much with my brothers and sisters still here. What about you, Jarah?”

“I would never volunteer for the Army,” said Jarah, as he cranked up the now-full bucket from the well.

There was a brief silence, as if they were waiting for him to say more.

“Soldiering is not my idea of a life pursuit. War is the worst thing I can think of. You’re right, Blaidd. I’d rather settle for the baker given a choice between the two options.”

“We’ll be in the Army before the winter is over, wait and see,” said Blaidd. “The Army’s going around picking up boys just like us. They’ll drag you from your mother’s arms, Jarah, before you know what’s happening. I can’t wait.” He rubbed his thin fingers together as he The girls began to drift off, bored with the direction the conversation was taking. They weren’t interested in war, or what the boys thought of it. They needed to get home to eat and help with supper, or so they said. Adain looked disappointed as they sauntered off. The girls giggled as one of them said something the three boys could not hear. Jarah left them at the well and walked home with his sloshing bucket. He could hear Adain and Blaidd still talking and softly laughing. Am I the target of their humor? His tell-tale face burned red, again.

Mae looked harried, as usual, when he opened the door. Her once-cozy house was messy and disorganized, and thanks to his three younger brothers, her calm exterior had been replaced by a wild-eyed look, but there was a fire in the hearth and a savory smell that emanated from the blackened pot on the grate. She had spread a colorful tablecloth over the sturdy wooden kitchen table, and the straw on the floor was what Jarah would call “reasonably clean”. Arall was already there, sitting in front of the hearth as he warmed his feet by the fire.

Mae took a sharp knife away from the youngest of Jarah’s brothers, then wiped at a sticky hand of one of the others with a wet cloth. “Get yourself washed up and help me with supper,

Jarah. I saw you loitering at the well with those boys. You could’ve talked more to the girls.

What did you say to them that made them run off like that? It’s time for you to find a wife—you have responsibilities around here. Your father and I are tired of doing work that you should be doing and Idris knows he doesn’t help me at all, he’s so busy with the bakery.” Jarah sighed, and Arall rolled his eyes, but not so that Mae could see. She was right. Perhaps he should find a wife and settle down. It was what was expected of boys his age in Meadowfield—in Ialana.

He walked up the crooked, creaky stairs to the small room that he shared with his brothers, and splashed his face in the dirty water his brothers had left for him. He’d never had a sister, and in a way he was relieved. At least if he did leave the village, his parents could pass the bakery business on to one of his brothers. He felt that, like Adain and Blaidd, he would not be missed.