Glass Winter | Chapter V

“Where does one even find a beehive in a frozen barren?”

Sevt reapplied the honey onto his scars after removing the bandages of animal skin.

“Old Warwick was a beekeeper in his time before he arrived here.” Aurora told him, “Everybody brought something with them when they were taken. The jars he kept were only used for wounds.”

And now we can use it for food.

When it came to treating, it hardly had an effect. The lantern staff had too been in Sevt’s possession when he was snatched and placed here. Its unnatural flame was burning low.

It might not be enough for crossing the ringwoodite sea.

The caverns Sevt had descended through were festooned with wall sconces brimming with blubber and animal fat. Taking a few off their mounts, he had ventured forward on his own following a heated debate with Quinart.

“I will not traverse the mountains nor their sea. I’d rather face the harbinger than come with you on something so doomed.”

“You didn’t tell me a thing, though, did ya, about why I should be afraid? When you rescued me and I told you of my plans for escape?” Sevt watched the other’s expression closely, “What’s changed? There’s nothing but a slow, cold death that awaits anyone foolish enough to stay on this side of the Mountain Wall.”

“Nothing’s changed, as it so happens.” Quinart did not falter, “I’d thought you’d change your mind after seeing the commune. Rather what it had once been. If I had told you the truth you’d still be out in the barrens, trudging your way to a ‘slow, cold death’. Yet you persist nonetheless.”

“I do. If there’s nothing here and, as you claim, nothing for me on the other side, tell me what is it I should fear once I cross the mountains?”

Quinart said nothing.

Stepping onto the shores of the ocean from a cavernous passage that grew ever wider, Sevt saw that his lantern would do little to guide them across. The darkness so strong in a place so deep beneath the earth – anything beyond three feet of light ceased to exist. Sevt could not see the water, only a perfect reflection of himself. Touching its surface with the bottom end of his staff sent subtle ripples into the blackness. There were no echoes for any sound that was caued.

So high is the ceiling, it seems…

He had descended alone while Quinart and Aurora used the forest as cover from the Smiling Bastard to make it back to the east of the vale. The man was to carve a warning on a slab of stone for any mushers still to return, urging them to avoid the commune and the demon now lurking within. Armed with a lumber axe and with the huskies still at his side, sans their sled which had become too much of a burden, Quinart could defend himself should the need arise. Even so, the man was no fighter.

Judging by the toll my own fight has had on my limbs; I doubt I was much of a combatant myself before I ended up here.

The anchor post that Aurora had mentioned was on the rocky shore, with a rope tied to its end leading into the water. If they were to follow its length, it would lead to a buoy. And then another. All the way to the opposite shore and back to the surface. Three boats, makeshift and crude, were tied to posts of their own. The company would only take one, and leave the rest to the remaining mushers. They had not the time to await their return.

Quinart would also leave a portion of food they had collected from the village by the warning slab. Their current party could not afford to burn through their own limited resources waiting for sled riders. With bears and blizzards in the barren, and with a flying inhuman on the hunt, nobody was safe.

Sevt retreated to the wall of the cavern and, leaning against it, let himself fall to the floor. He watched the embers escape through the grates of his lantern, the flame burning ever lower within.

I still don’t know what you are. How you’ve kept alight for so long…

He untucked a trouser leg from his boot and pulled it up to reveal a rigid, blue limb. Like a capillaceous infection it crept ever higher day by day.

It’s decided then.

He had needed it to cross the barren, he had needed it for his fight with the Smiling Bastard, he had needed it to climb the hazardous snaking stairs up the face of the Mountain Wall while using his cloak as camouflage. Though he might never have predicted these events necessitating his being whole, for the next week, at least, while the company punted and rowed across the ringwoodite sea of eternal darkness, he could spare himself the effort. Sevt knew not of what awaited them after they returned to the surface. He only hoped that he had not foregone losing an asset to life for too long. In this frozen oblivion so unforgiving, any defect could be the end of him. But he had already waited long enough, as he would now be losing all the corrupted flesh from his foot to his knee.

Sevt shut his eyes.

It’s decided then…

“Do it now.”

The shore was receding behind them. The huskies were yapping, looking over the side of the narrow boat, wanting to scurry around the little deck that there was and being unable to do so. Quinart had his axe at the ready.

“You are a decisive one, aren’t you?”

Sevt heard Aurora’s voice from the bow, “Shall I pray for you to help with the pain?”

Quinart commanded her to look away. He had pushed off the rocks with a long quant oar they had found in the boat, while the girl used the lantern staff to light the way forward. The shore had now completely disappeared. Only an oppressive void remained.

“Cut it off.” Sevt bit on a twig from their remaining firewood, which they were not to use until they had crossed the sea.

Perhaps we should have done this before boarding…

The axe swung onto Sevt’s lower knee in a meaty chunk. He felt the branch in his mouth splinter, and he roared against his will like a beast. All the dogs started barking, rocking the punt.

“It’s yet to cut through.” Quinart prepared to swing again.

Sevt spat out the twig, “Wait.”

“We can’t stop now.”

“I said wait.”

He pulled himself up, leaning against the edge of the boat. What little blood oozed from his frozen limb was lazy and thick. What should have been a cold wound was burning like hellfire.

“We’ll take it slow.”

Quinart had dropped the axe to restrain an aggravated Strelka who, unlike the other dogs, had yet to calm down, “Either you’re committed or you’re not, Sevt. There’s no going back with the damage already done.”

“I’m aware.”

“Then commit.” Quinart pushed the husky away by its snout, “It’s easy to commit to something as arbitrary as a glass castle or the nebulous end of a ringwoodite sea, to a wife that may not be yours, yet when faced with pain in the now you turn away? Is that how it is?”

“You know, old man…” Sevt had been watching the eddying reflection of the lantern in the water below, now looking up at the other, “For someone so much wiser than myself in his years… for someone who resorts to personal remarks you’re as insolent as a child.”

“Now I’m the insolent one. If you’d known better then you’d know to listen to elders who have lived in frozen barrens for far longer than you have. You would realise when I tell you that all dreams in this place are prophetic. You’d be wise enough to share your sleepless nights once in a while after everything we’ve narrowly survived thus far. It might illuminate the way forward. Maybe then there can be trust between fellows.”

He walked past the crippled man, taking the lantern staff from Aurora.

“Go rest. I’ll be our navigator.”

All of the dreams are prophetic…?

So, the dreams about Faith and her son…

Am I to make it home to them safe and sound?

The pain in Sevt’s leg pulsed between mild and unbearable. He caught an especially agonising wave, making him keel over.

And the repeating nightmare…

The gaping darkness, the bounding feet, and the crawling things on his arms. The cavern in the mountain must have been the first vision, the second were the dogs now leaping and running across his reclined self in the boat. Perhaps there was gospel to be found in Quinart’s word.

Then why does the dream of Faith feel like a memory and not a prediction? Why does it coincide with the image in my mind during the waking hours, which I had seen long before even having these dreams?

The thesis could not be correct, then, else all reason failed. Sevt retrieved a bandage roll from their supplies and wound it tight around his knee.

~~~~~

Quinart, Aurora, and the huskies were asleep. Sevt pulled their boat along the ropes connecting the occasional buoy during his watch, leaning over the side on his stomach. Several hours must have passed; his shoulders ached from a task so repetitive. He collapsed onto his back, a hand still loosely clutching the tether to prevent their drifting off into the dark. The flame crackled inside the lantern staff which had been positioned among the numerous sacks and bags on the boat to lean against the bowsprit.

How many people have fallen into this frozen barren?

Sevt had not yet thought about this. This had been happening for some time, as children, like Aurora, were being born having never known the world their family hailed from. Only through stories and anecdotes. The commune was small, though this could only mean that others had yet to discover it. These people had been chosen at random by fate, it seemed, and thrown into this hell.

“Who’s to say this hasn’t been planned?”

Sevt revealed his dirk and pushed himself up. He scanned the darkness surrounding their boat, though already he felt his exhausted arms failing him.

“You’re here, are ya…?”

He hadn’t slept decent since riding the sled to the commune all those days ago, and the few hours of rest in the two-day descent through the cavern could no longer sustain him.

“Show yourself…”

Sevt fell onto his back, seeing only the smouldering lantern above him, spitting evanescent embers.

“Why were you of all people snatched and tossed into a frozen hell?”

“Dunno. But I know that I like to converse with someone whose face I can see. Show me that smile, come on, you freak.”

“I’m not who you think I am. Though him and I stem from a similar root.”

Is this something new?

Sevt pushed himself up again. Just out of reach of the lantern’s radius of illumination, a pillar of darkness blacker than the rest stood on the water, watching the boat.

“Yours is a fate you deserved.”

“Is that right?” Sevt dropped onto his back again, “Whatever you are, you’re mistaken. Another harbinger of despair, you claim to be?”

“From truth stems despair. Such is its nature.”

“Bullshit. I know the dream that comes to me every night, and I intend to see it through to the end.”

“A dream you believe to merely reflect a memory that’s no longer real?”

Sevt felt his fist clench, “Look, pal. You’re here to make me end my pursuit. I’m not going to let that happen. Now let me sleep. We’ll leave each other alone.”

“A pursuit which, even if you should see through to the end, will be fruitless.”

Sevt would not respond. There was silence long enough for him to doze off. The voice returned to prevent this.

“There’s a reason why only some have been sent here. A reason why your dream can only reflect and not predict your reunification with Faith. A reason why in every vision you see of her she is looking away. Or turning away.”

That isn’t true.

Of course, he most often than not only focused on the memory of her billowing hair, which could imply that she was facing away from him, but he also recalled the colour of her eyes. Blue like ice.

“Her hair billows so because she is turning away.”

“Shut it. I know what I remember, you’re not going to make me question it.”

“You cannot trust what you remember, nor know what you do not remember. Beyond Faith there’s little else you can recall. But we see it all. We’ve dived into your head and pulled all the truth out, thread by thread. Like a canvas it lays before us. We see it all.”

“No…”

“A select few are snatched and thrown away for their traitorous alliance. You claim that you cannot fight and yet you held your own against the commune’s demon far stronger than you could ever be. You held your own against a white bear of prey.”

“You claiming I’m savvy enough to swing a weapon correctly?”

“That is why you had to leave.”

“Leave what?”

“Your Faith.”

Sevt recalled her turning away, hair against the wind, him standing at the edge of the clearing.

“Why would I leave?”

“Why are men that can fight disposed of unless they’re fighting against something they shouldn’t?”

Sevt shook his head.

Was I… a soldier? A mercenary…?

“You chose a false duty over your family. You chose something you could not understand and your hubris destroyed you. If you were to reach the glass castle, to go through the shallow gate, only darkness would greet you.”

This can't be true. The lights claim that I will enter a world without pain or fear…

“Then why would you assume the gate will guide you home in the first place? Even if this were true, she would not be waiting for you. You have been forgotten. You have been banished to the frozen waste.”

Sevt shut down his thoughts. His nails were digging into the palms of his fists. He relaxed them, looking up at the lantern whose flame had shrunk to nothing more than a spark. He could hear something moving in the water, nearing the boat.

“There’s one thing you did not account for. In my memory of Faith, she’s alone. In my dream of Faith, she holds her son. I do not know if he is mine, I’ve yet to know who the woman is to me in the first place. Memories and dreams can overlap, can they not? I’d like to believe I can return to something you claim to be broken, however true it may be. Perhaps the boy doesn’t even exist, and the dream is just that – a dream, blending with the reflection of a memory. But the boy is new life, and a new chance. Hope. He even shares his mother’s eyes. That’s what he represents, this much I suspect. My friend here claims that all dreams in this waste are prophetic, reflective of the dancing lights and their guidance. There’s truth, then, in my recurring dream which you so boldly claim to be false. I don’t just believe I can change. I must.”

Silence followed. Unbroken, save for the occasional lap of the water. Crushing silence. Sevt pulled himself up by the edge of the boat. The pillar of deeper darkness, as far as he could see, was gone. Furthermore, the light in the lantern had grown. The water shined underneath.

“You alright, son?”

Quin was awake, turning his gaze to the water, and seeing nothing. Sevt responded.

“When ‘morning’, its equivalent, comes, cut the rest of it off.”

Quin looked at the other, contemplating, and nodded.

“Consider it done. Now hand me the rope, and get some rest.”

~~~~~

Sevt would not remember the dream he had experienced that night as he awoke with a start; Quinart shaking his shoulder while Medved, a paw on the sleeping one’s chest, was observing something outside the boat.

“Wake up. We’ve a problem.”

It was their fifth day in the darkness. Sevt, for now, had slept close to the amputated leg as it lay in the corner of their boat, bundled in fur.

He scrambled to one foot after the husky moved away, assisted by Quin who directed him to the bow where Aurora stood. She was pale again.

“What is it? Is the girl sick?”

“No. Look ahead.”

Sevt caught his grip around Quin’s shoulder as he almost fell when seeing the buoy in front of their boat. The rope they had been following was tied around its mast, and that was where it stopped. No further line could be seen.

“We’re…”

They were stranded unless they returned the way they had come, which Sevt would not allow.

Was this sabotage by that thing…? Or did the rope untie from a rudimentary design? Perhaps it eroded?

In the darkness of the subterranean sea, they would have to push on. Helpless and blind.