The Call (10 page)

This isn't working.

Katja's back met the door and Serdra closed in before she had a chance to get out of the doorframe. She thrust with the stick, Katja forced the attack slightly to the side and the thrust wound up going under her armpit. Serdra was too close for Katja to swing the sword, and held her own weapon across her chest with both hands.

The woman pushed the sword up, towards Katja's neck. She knew it would mean a loss and pushed back.

This isn't working!

Serdra drove her knee brutally into Katja's side, but she could take it better than before. Katja dropped her stick-sword suddenly and grasped Serdra's weapon. She gave a battle cry and drove her elbow down with all her force. The wooden blade snapped in two.

Serdra punched her in the face but Katja had been expecting it and got a grip on her mentor's left wrist.

She reached behind for the latch and yanked and twisted Serdra's arm to the side. The woman kicked her in the gut, but Katja had braced for such a hit.

The latch opened a moment before Katja was thrown backwards and outside. She landed in the snow but twisted and used the momentum to propel herself into a reverse roll and back up on her feet. Serdra followed her out into the cold night and jabbed at her with the broken end of the stick.

Katja got a cut on her arm but finally had enough space to manoeuvre and retreated from her mentor. The snow reached above her bare ankles and slowed her down, but of course affected Serdra in the same way. They circled one another, barely dressed in the snow and winter darkness.

Katja avoided close combat. She both feared the broken stick and didn't want to get into a grapple with her mentor. It would all be over then. So she waited for Serdra's attacks, tried to slip blows past them and then retreat. She took some more hits and scrapes but evaded Serdra's attempts to bring her down or pull her closer.

Fatigue was mounting as Serdra took more glancing blows and Katja took solid ones, and the cold wasn't helping.

I need a good hit! I need one good hit to stagger her and then I can-

Serdra threw the broken sword. Katja sensed it and sidestepped. Serdra had, of course, foreseen that and reached for her. Katja had herself expected that and batted the hand away with all the strength needed against Serdra. She then took a step closer and punched the woman in the gut. Her fist sank in right between the ribs and hip and the air burst out of Serdra.

Katja sent the other fist into a powerful swing and roared as it smacked into Serdra's face.

Her mentor lost her balance and staggered back two steps. Katja knew she would recover quickly and charged at her with a kick to take advantage of this brief window.

A trap!

Serdra ducked faster than the eye could see, the kick went over her head and she kicked the leg out from under Katja.

Katja landed on her hands and knees and began to get up, but Serdra sprang back up with her knee leading the way. Katja tried to dodge, but just succeeded in taking it by the temple rather than between the eyes.

The night exploded and she fell limply backwards into the snow.

Serdra was on top of her almost immediately. She sat on Katja's chest and caught the right-handed blow Katja attempted. The woman pressed the hand down left of Katja's head and leaned down so her weight went on the upper arm and pressed it on Katja's throat.

Katja felt she was choking under her own arm and tried to get her knees up between them but had no room. She tried to jerk about like Serdra taught her, but the woman was too strong and agile for it to work. She tried to punch with her left hand, but Serdra caught that hand as well, a hair's breadth from her own temple and pressed it into the snow.

I will not lose!

She strained. She let fear and excitement and battle rage flow through herself and pull out every stopper. She pushed up with everything, everything, she had and Serdra's grip on the left hand wavered. Katja was able to breathe a bit as Serdra reacted to this. The air gave her an extra smidgeon of strength and the arm moved a bit more.

A bit further and then...

Her strength gave out completely, and Serdra had plenty left. The chokehold resumed with full force and she could do nothing to fight back. Her body was out of energy, her head was rattled from the blows, she was freezing in the snow, she couldn't breathe and Serdra was so very strong.

She gave up. She relaxed what little tension remained in her body as a mark of defeat.

Serdra released her immediately and sat up.

Katja coughed air down into her lungs.

So much for that.

“You have improved,” Serdra said calmly.

“I... lost,” Katja croaked.

“Of course. But you did as well as I hoped. You have gained the necessary skills and the reflexes to use them. Congratulations. You are now ready to learn from experience.”

Her tone couldn't really be called tender; not for a normal person. But perhaps coming from Serdra it was.

The woman gently held the back of her neck and lifted her into a sitting position. She used her other hand to wipe melting snow from her back. It was good to get rid of it. She was quite cold enough.

“I will tell you the history of the world,” Serdra continued in that relatively gentle tone. Katja thought she sensed satisfaction in her demeanour - unseen since the first time Katja sang. “And after that we will be done here. Let's go and obey the Call, little raptor.”

“Don't you... want to hit me one last time?” Katja mumbled with all the sarcasm numb lips and air-starved lungs would allow.

Serdra head butted her between the eyes, though not very hard.

“Was that your sense of humour?”

Katja almost managed to laugh, and Serdra lifted the girl up in her arms and carried her inside.

Chapter
6.

Katja rose early in the morning as usual after passing the test, but Serdra seemed to wish to take things rather easy. It was so unusual as to be almost spooky but she was nonetheless glad. She didn't know how in the world she'd avoided breaking bones in the fight, but she was more bruised and weary than she'd been for a month. She'd fallen asleep before Serdra placed her in the bed.

Katja had fought as never before. She'd often thought she was doing her best, but she'd never maintained such speed, ferocity and power for so long. She'd been pounded into the ground as usual, but Serdra had also never been so brutal towards her except to bring her down immediately. The woman had been more dangerous than anyone or anything Katja had ever met.

And she'd held her own for a good long while. She had discovered the outermost limits of her capabilities, and lost. The feeling was rather bittersweet, but she was excited about what was to come.

Her mentor walked to one of the chests. She took a big paper scroll out of one of them, unfurled it and turned towards Katja. It was a map of the entire known world. From the ice sea of Northrim to the southern coast and from the Outskirts to the east to the westernmost shorelines. It was also divided into the nations of the world, each one of which was marked by name, except for the wild Outskirts and the northernmost spits of Northrim.

“This map is outdated,” she said. “It looks to be about fifteen years old. But it will suffice.”

She put it on a stool and sat down. Katja sat on the bed and waited with anticipation for this ending to the beginning of her training, or just what exactly was coming.

“What do you know of the old world?” Serdra asked. “Before the Shattering?”

Katja gaped a bit. It felt quite strange enough to be asked about the Jukiala-era, rarely mentioned outside of song evenings, let alone the far distant past.

“Um,” she thought and tried to dig some information from her memories. “It...” She threw up her hands and shook her head. “You know, we never thought of such things back home. I only know that the world was different before the Shattering and the Lady. I've never wondered about the details.”

“I don't know all the details myself, they hardly matter anymore,” Serdra said. “But by all accounts things were different then. Simpler for our people, fewer enemies and mankind's knowledge is said to have been amazing. Buildings, weapons and medicine were far ahead of what has been achieved since. Vastly different. At least in this world.”

“This world?” Katja asked.

“There are others. Differing in their distance and incomprehensibility to mankind. The spirit world, to which the souls of men vanish, is an example of an existence a step above ours. But there are also underworlds, corners of existence where terrible entities dwell: Dark spirits and the creatures men call demons. They are not like you and me. Thought and existence are different from what mortal men know, and they hate us. They hate lingering in the darkest corners of the universe and wish to climb upwards.”

“Between these worlds are divides. Walls which prevent people, spirits and entities wandering where they don't belong. During the peak of the old world a hole was torn into the wall between our world and the lower one. Incredible energies burst in all directions and all sorts of creatures flowed in.”

“Some wandered about in a mad frenzy and have long since been slain. Others took up a shadow existence, like the wretches on the hill by your village. And those who were here before changed.”

“In short, the world was changed for the worse, and not only regarding monsters. The cities collapsed, people died in droves, lands rose and sank, mountains moved from place. The face of the earth itself changed, and out of all this chaos rose the Death Lords; terrible abominations with power over the walking dead. They established their own order far to the east and harried what remained of mankind.”

“Where were the Redcloaks while all this was going on?” Katja asked.

Serdra smiled.

“That name didn't exist then. Much of our kind fell during those times, both in the cataclysm and the ensuing battles with the demon hordes and servants of the Death Lords. In addition the Lords commanded entire armies. It was hard for our kin to do much about the situation alone.”

“But then Jukiala arrived on the scene, the woman later known as the Lady, and as you know she led an exodus out of the ruins, out of the grasp of the Death Lords and to the west.”

“The journey took years and was slow going through ruins and wastelands. But our siblings did their part to defend the people, and more and more joined the horde until a great portion of the people who hadn't gone mad in the cataclysm were marching west under the Lady's banner.”

“Many old historians praise this. They called it proof that humanity deserved to survive, a time of unity and brotherhood when the old matters of contention were dropped to the wayside one by one.”

“What do you mean?”

“Jukiala changed the world. All modern nations have in common to have once been part of Jukiala, with a similar past, and to speak the High Tongue to at least some degree. Many states of the old world had nothing in common. Most had their own language, naming conventions, customs and history. Even people's appearance depended on their origin.”

“Their appearance?”

“Height, skin colour, facial features, hair colour, eye colour and body type. All of these could mark where a person was from.”

Katja found it a strange thought and stroked her face absent mindedly. Her parents looked nothing alike but both were Baldur's Coast folk. She had inherited her mother's flat face, pitch black hair and almond-shaped eyes. What would that have meant in that old, bygone world?

“But in any case,” Serdra said and pointed at the map's westernmost portion. “In time the horde arrived at the white beaches of the west and settled there. What had been preserved of old knowledge went into building houses, forging weapons, seeding fields and breeding animals.”

“But the Death Lords did not accept their herd founding something which might stand up to them. They gave chase and assaulted the new nation. Humanity gathered an army and met this menace on the Blue Plain and won a victory through great sacrifice, our power and the magic which only the Lady could command.”

“After the loss the Death Lords retreated over the Tooth Mounts and all the way north to Kreven, where they built their stronghold and planned. Jukiala still had to battle mad humans, corrupted by contact with evil forces and dark spirits in the wilds; the people who later became the Vegraine tribes. But those wars were a lesser problem, and as the years passed the nation began to flourish.”

“As people multiplied it became both possible and necessary to seek new territory, so we and Jukiala's soldiers invaded the wilds and beat away anything we encountered. The nation expanded greatly and assimilated some small communities which had formed. Generals led searches for good farming areas, woods, mines and rivers. Lands were named after those who founded the first colonies, and we guarded the borders.”

“The Death Lords returned of course, as you know. They were more cautious this time and were aided by the Prelain-people which they'd subjected.”

“Prelain?” Katja asked.

“It's doubtful they are ever mentioned by the public these days. They have long since stopped existing as a nation. But back then the Death Lords saw the advantage of commanding agents which could travel among mortals and spy without being noticed. The next wars were far longer and more difficult, thanks to the spying and sabotage of these traitors. The rulers of Jukiala responded to this as well as other subtle dangers by founding and training a special order whose role it was to gather information on supernatural foes and spy on them. They've acquired the name Shades, and weren't too dissimilar from us, except they were more hidden and used different methods. The stealth language and the signs were developed for them and us.”

“This order often worked with the Redcloaks. They benefited from our second sight and knowledge of the otherworldly, and we benefited from having allies which could cover more ground than we and hide among ordinary folk.”

“So it's they who maintain this cabin?”

“Yes, among other things. They also sometimes maintain the evil reputation of places where monsters have been slain, so we can use them as havens. But as I am saying the One Nation was threatened by more than the Death Lords. Vegraine-men were pushed farther and farther into the east until they could only be found in the Outskirts, but each generation still carried out raids. And the larger Jukiala grew, the harder it became to hold it all together.”

“States quarrelled with their neighbours on various matters, or complained about them getting special treatment from the senate. Others demanded independence after the Vegraine were driven far enough from their borders and some suffered under the rule of corrupt and greedy governors, which then caused widespread dissent.”

“Then there were the demons. Dark sorcerers always existed but became more powerful after the Shattering. The divide between worlds never recovered, which made it easier for them to contact demons and malevolent spirits, which gave power in exchange for service and sacrifice. These men formed a secret alliance, to share secrets and better serve the will of their masters.”

“The sorcerers caused havoc now and then but on the whole weren't as much of a threat as the Vegraine or revenants. That changed during the third century of the old calendar when along came a man named Zakari Manso, who was both a brilliant sorcerer and a clever leader. He and his followers established greater order and discipline among their brethren.”

“This new implementation of ancient customs was given several names: The Brotherhood of the Pit, Zakari's Heirs, and the Black Blood. They wrote many tomes on sorcery and evil spirits, and turned the Brotherhood into a real threat capable of far more than install the occasional person into powerful, or perform sacrificial rituals in basements and clearings.”

“They even went so far as to openly seize a territory they named Vendyha and more than a century passed before that nation was destroyed by force. Have you heard of the Night of Fire?”

“Yes,” Katja answered. There were a few poems about it. All about death and devilry and a day as dark as night.

“It marked the fall of Vendyha. Most of their leaders were slain, their library was burned and Zakari's Heirs were scattered to the winds. Redcloaks and Shades were more alert to their kind after that and the Brotherhood has never regained full strength since then. They still managed to preserve various tomes and kept on teaching their children Zakari's art in even greater secrecy than before, and dreamt of the realm they'd been denied.”

“So was everything just a total mess?” Katja asked.

“I wouldn't say that. Jukiala preserved mankind, maintained order and rebuilt what remained of the world. If the One Nation hadn't lasted for as long as it did you would live in a much darker and uglier world, I can assure you.”

“But difficulties nonetheless existed. Their severity waxed and waned, but about three hundred years ago the Death Lords made their greatest offensive yet. It came at the worst possible time regarding internal stability for Jukiala. The Vegraine had been pushed up into mountains long ago and droughts had ravaged several states, which put strain on relations.”

“The destruction left by the Death Lords and their servants was terrible. Umer, Balos and Ermen were levelled, The Black River states lost their glory and the Skymounts... well, they have become an evil place where the living have no business.”

“They lost though.”

“Did they?”

Katja's eyes went wide.

“Ah... yes. At least that's how every tale and song I've heard goes; that Jukiala and the Death Lords destroyed one another.”

“I'm afraid we aren't so fortunate,” Serdra said. “It is true that the Death Lords didn't manage to conquer the world and lost many of their mightiest servants. But the Lords themselves only went into hiding. And Jukiala, the union which held them back for so long, fell apart. Too many states lay in ruins for trade to continue as before and the armies were too busy protecting their own lands against desperate refugees and bandits to support their neighbours.”

“The years after the Dusk War were very dark and difficult, and the unity of old was forgotten. And so we have the current situation, Katja.”

Serdra held the map up.

“Borders flit back and forth like drunken snakes. Upper-Breth and Lower-Breth were a single realm in my youth. Orkan has changed hands four times in my life. The Stonefoot lands are locked in constant conflict between ruling families. And I could go on.”

She let the map fall on the table.

“But that is none of our concern. What is our concern is that the new way of things in many ways makes things easier for our enemies. The Night Hand, human servants of the Death Lords, still do their bidding, hidden among ordinary citizens in most if not all lands. Possibly except for the Outskirts.”

“That's eerie,” Katja muttered. She didn't know what else to say to something like that.

“The Brotherhood did not fare quite as well,” Serdra continued. “At first they kept many of their secret territories, where they could perform their ceremonies in peace and dispose of people likely to cause trouble, but time has worn those away.”