Walking Legend

Metallic thwangs pervaded Gørgon's dreams, each conjured image set to the same metronome. He grew anxious in its absence. T’was Yorne, knelt by yesternight’s fire, tending a series of swords with hammerhead. One hand struck metal on metal and the other, a banded twist of twigs serving for lost limb, held each blade between his knees. He did not sleep, far as Gørgon could tell. His arm of bark made him kin to the earth, and neither slept a wink.

A simple red cloth clung from the bridge of his nose, to protect the aged skin from stray sparks. He knew a fellow blacksmith who’d lost their beard to scorch. Their scarred chin tissue grew in false patches, never to achieve the same majesty. In-grown stems of hair bubbled at their jawline, unable to penetrate the dead skin. Yorne preferred to be prickly; his pure white-haired maw and darkly mustache resembled the tail of a skunk. In the day, he tied the cloth around his bald head to mask it from the sun.

Two cronies—whose names Gørgon did not care to recall—sullied the camp to kill any trace of their having been there. They scattered the fixings and fire’s ashes among the foliage.

At the moment Gørgon’s body realigned with his mind—that is to say, his eyes opened—the cronies jutted a plank of wood under the crook of his back and cranked him upright. Towering at a near precise seven feet and round as a stump, even two men of decent health could not think to lift him without leverage. A thick fur coat, which he never removed regardless of heat, added several pounds to a chassis of fur and flab, protected from any blade. Sweat dripped from the seams in muskier climates and stiffened in the frisk, but stunk all the same. T’was a stench to curl any frostbitten, flaky nose. Temporary companions used leaves to plug their nostrils, while Yorne grew accustomed.

To the south, the swamp bore a visibly green aura, said to boil skin and drain the eyes. Bordering land belonged to walking legends like Gørgon, who in his prime appeared to flit between prosecutors, swords in hand, a dagger in mouth and boot. A day’s trek for a wee lad took Gørgon—and his company in turn—doubly so. What he lacked in agility, he made up for in brawn. Yorne was old enough to remember when he possessed both, in a bygone era that saw daily prayer and battle.

The worn plank split in half as Gørgon’s heels dug in. He struck a saber into the soil to steady his shifting weight. He spat in one palm, rubbed both together, and ran the grimy fingers through dirt-speckled locks of hair. Saber hilt poking into his gullet, he used a bread knife to remove grit from his fingernails. A humble crony offered an apple, bowing. Gørgon reduced it to a core in two jaw snaps and threw it over his shoulder.

Yorne rolled his tools into a blanket and tucked it between the straps of his pack. Both cronies grabbed either end of a yellowed map, unfurled it in front of Gørgon. He pointed east after examination. With exception to the swamp, all directions seemed to offer the same—barren pines, absent wildlife, and silence.

Their minds wandered amid the crunching leaves. Gørgon glanced at Yorne, both lost in thought as they trudged forth. How could Yorne keep pace without rest? To descend into darkness and emerge in light felt, to Gørgon, like an essential spiritual leap. The body turns inward toward the mind, seems to disappear, until t’is light again. He then stumbled over a root, only for Yorne to catch his arm. They exchanged a grin of wordless acknowledgement and continued on.

A hollow siren blared. Clouds soon blotted the sun and raindrops drizzled as shadows skittered around them. Yorne recognized the call and knew the encroachers to be Soft Brains. Gørgon rummaged into a deep coat pocket and revealed an ink pot. He flicked off the cap, emptied it onto his saber, and whipped it with a separate dagger, setting it alight. Saber as torch, he waved it about, illuminating the encircled area. The scampering ceased but smiling, unseen faces went on whispering.

An upward branch creaked against the wind current—nay, t’was under the weight of a shadow being. “Skyward,” croaked a crony.

“Mind yourself, bonehead,” Yorne said, brandishing an axe. It glimmered against Gørgon’s flaming saber.

“Let us not waste the night.”

Gørgon unclipped a dagger from his belt and sent it careening into the black sky. A shadow groaned and plummeted to the ground, laying still. Aye, they were Soft Brains, fragile but swift exiles.

The first assailants proved the most emotional and therefore tactless; Gørgon split them up the middle in one stroke per. Flames caught on their fragmented limbs and spread to the surrounding overgrowth. Canine-tipped arrows plunked out of crossbows and scant missed. The cronies’ weeping obscured the Soft Brain shuffling footsteps, making Gørgon falter in his next move. Arrows plunged into his coat but did not pierce skin. A figure leaped onto Yorne, who peeled them off his back and cleaved the axe into their torso. Made vulnerable, another swiped a machete—the blade contacted Yorne’s wooden arm, absorbing the blow. An arrow sunk through a crony’s exposed neck, lodged itself between tonsils. As he squirmed, clinging to nearby plantlife in desperation, the forest fire began to consume all directions. Soft Brains disposed of a few more arrows and jeers before fleeing entire. An angered tribalist, no more than twenty, broke through the flame and clambered upon Gørgon, who grasped their shoulders and held them outward. They flailed there, a few feet above the ground. Gørgon lowered them close to his belly and felt their heartbeat decelerate. He planted his hand on their head, then the other, and crushed it with the heels of both palms.

Soot-covered and foggy-headed, the three survivors pushed on, out of the heat. Yorne collected his gear and noticed the last crony limping on a blackened leg, poison to be sure. From an arrow or dagger, it no longer mattered.

Crackling fire grew distant and subsided. Moonlight spotted the way forward, a shimmering haze against the smoke drift. Crimson and sapphire beams from a stained glass window reflected back across the wood. Wailing came from inside the caved-in church and gave the company pause. With each shriek Gørgon’s mind attached a face. He moved toward it, balled hand on blade hilt.

Concrete piled the altar and pews, from which a peach tree had sprouted and apparently flourished. The cries were suspended. Mayhaps a spirit, thought Gørgon. He craned his neck at another throaty screech, up in the balcony. A barn owl clung to the railing and swiveled its head. Its black bead eyes and untainted white coat did resemble a spectre, floating up there in the dark.

It fluttered down to the pile of debris and pecked at a peach, causing it to break from the stem and roll down the bricks to Gørgon’s feet. He picked it up and unclasped his fur coat, letting it fall around his ankles. What at first looked to be additional fur on his bare back began to move and shed. Loose feathers glided to the cold tile. Great flaxen wings, sewn like pieces of straw, unfurled and stretched to either side of the church.

Yorne sank to the back wall, allowing the moment his exclusion, while the crony stood in awe despite his infected leg. Gørgon approached the unperturbed owl and outstretched his hand. His wings then folded frontward to form a feathered sphere around him, the owl, and the peach.