Sayvensdee, the 27th of Frost, 768 A.E.
A flash of color through Tuari’s mind woke him up. While he still thought in terms of colors sometimes, he knew that life would be black, white, and shades in between for the rest of his life. At ten Yarres of age, that meant a whole twenty or thirty more Yarres if he were lucky and lived a full life - twenty or thirty Yarres without color. The onset of color blindness could not be battled, it was just a part of reality for an Uleaut, and to even try to fight fate was a futile waste of energy better used to stay alive.
Still, the colors he had seen in his head had woken him. He had felt a tug at his heart and being the likes of which he had never felt before. He’d had urges or intuitions before, like when he saw Istas with her hood pushed back and cheeks reddened from the wind, or when he knew that a band of seals was waiting over on the next ridge, but this was something entirely different. He wasn’t sure what the colors he felt, as much as saw in his mind’s eye, signified, but whatever put them in his head was nearing their village. Also, he knew he had to go to it, because it would not come close enough on its own.
Rolling over, Tuari glanced around at the members of his hunting party that he shared his dim shelter with. They were snoring in alternations heavy and light as they rested before the next sortie out onto the ice shelf, another of the hunting party’s almost daily raids on the local wildlife. They were all older than him, which was pretty commonplace being that he was one of the younger members of the hunting party. He’d moved up to one of the hunter’s tents two Yarres ago, when he reached the age of eight, which meant he was a grown man and had to start pulling his weight or starve to death. It had been put to him that plainly, and the choice, although not much of one, had been entirely his. This wasn’t out of cruelty, just necessity. No Uleaut eating a full share was allowed to not hunt to replace what he ate, and when times were hard, even the young had to accompany the hunting parties to help haul kills or supplies to and from the camp.
Yet it wasn’t necessity that made him slip out from under his woven pile of sealskins and bear furs. And it certainly wasn’t necessity that made him quietly tug on his snowshoes, hide overcoat, heavy gloves, and face scarf before he slid out into the biting cold with his pack of gear on his back and a saw-edged spear in his hand. It was curiosity and need: what he’d seen beckoned to him and he could not help but answer the call.
Out in the cold, he narrowed his eyes to slits and blinked frequently, lest he invite the cold to freeze his eyelids to his eyeballs. The sun hadn’t come up over the horizon and likely wouldn’t for another Ouer, as he figured the time from the position of the moon. A quick smear of dark grease beneath his eyes and across the tip of his nose both kept his cheekbones from taking to frostbite and would absorb the light and heat from the sun when it rose. This was more of a comfort than a necessity for a Uleaut, though, since their skin was naturally quite resistant to the elements in all but the most severe cases of exposure or storms.
Closing his eyes and spreading his arms to the winds, he opened his nostrils and his mind to what would come, turning slowly in a circle to expose his senses to every direction. He smiled inwardly as he felt his spirit rise out of his body and peer around and beyond him. Afieldsight was a gift of Aaren, and a rare one at that. He kept his secret from his people for now, as insurance should he become injured and need their help while he recuperated. They’d save a man with Afieldsight from starving, but not a regular one. Yet if he told them, they’d never let him leave to seek his fortune with another hunting party should he choose to do so, rare as it was for a man to do that. He’d become the property of the tribe-like camp.
After more than a Mynette of trying to feel what was on the winds, he felt his spirit tugging him toward the northeast. Whatever he was searching for seemed to have left a wispy contrail of steam or vapors through the sky that lead right to it. It was too thin and too white to be smoke from a fire; he could tell that much even with the backdrop of a slate grey sky and the twinkling eyes of the stars in front of him.
He followed his intuitions and the vapor trail northeastward, hunching his shoulders against the cutting winds and the sting of ice crystals that they threw at his eyes. He counted steps as he went and poked his saw-edged spear at the ground before him. One never knew what kind of faults might occur even in ice that had been safe just Ouers before. Many a careless Uleaut had died from trusting the ice to be as it always had been, and ice was anything but predictable.
Tuari continued to put one foot in front of the other, shuffling, as he must with snowshoes on, for the next half an Ouer, growing ever closer to the source of the colors in his head. As he moved, the colors had begun reoccurring in his head; almost as if whatever it was that was making the colors come into his mind was cheering him on as he grew nearer to the source. So, he put his eyes on the ground and his spear on the ice and moved a bit faster every time it came to him.
As the colors entering his mind came more and more frequently, almost until the point where it was a constant succession of waves, his eagerness grew and he began moving less cautiously. It was this same lack of caution that caused him to almost run headlong into a great white bear, a Nanuq, waiting just over what he knew to be the final crest of ice between him and that which he sought.
A grunting issuing forth from the maw of the great beast as he came over that crest and it espied him was enough to bring him to a skidding halt. He ceased his rush toward his goal, which he could now see from the corner of his eyes as a shiny mass a couple hundred Mayters distant, but he dared not take his eyes off the bear to examine it more closely.
He grimaced upon taking in the size of the beast, probably two and a half Mayters from the tip of its nose to the tip of its back feet toes. Its fur was thick around his well-fed body, for this was a male, and his face was scarred from what had likely been numerous battles with others of his kind. The scars might even have been from unwary Uleaut hunters - hunters who were a great deal larger, stronger, and more experienced than a mere ten Yarre old hunter of modest accomplishments. An arc of grayish fur splashed around the bear’s breastbone, a rather unique coloring for an animal usually completely covered in white or off-white fur.
Rather than make any warning feints of his spear that might inspire a charge, he backed away slowly, not lifting his feet. His snowshoed feet slid back across the ice and he breathed slowly, praying silently to Yenis that the bear would not decide he would make an excellent breakfast, though in doing so he had to resist the urge to touch his palms together in obeisance to his people’s mother Goddess since his hands were gripped very tightly around his spear.
I can’t be nearly as tasty as seals, he thought to himself, willing that the bear understand his argument for not eating him.
The bear grunted again at him, regarding him with apparent disinterest as it wheeled its great head away from him to gaze with its two dark eyes at the steaming object two hundred Mayters distant. It made a noise that was half a bark and half a growl.
An answering noise from behind and to Tuari’s left made him jump in fear. He’d been so intent on the one bear that he’d not seen or heard the other. A quick glance over his shoulder showed the second animal sitting on its haunches just a stone’s throw away. It, too, was gazing down from the rim of the fold of ice, which had formed as two sheets of ice met and pressure made them buckle. A third, fourth, and then a fifth bellowing answer rang out, quickly joined by a few others. Tuari looked out at the shiny pile of metal lying in a heap in the center of the depression surrounded by scattered pieces that must once have been attached to it. He saw no fewer than nine of the great bears, but they all seemed content to watch the craft from the ridge rather than scavenge around within it for something edible.
Colors invaded his skull again, this time strong enough to cause his eyes to water and his knees to weaken. In his mind’s eye he saw that this was not just a pile of rubble, but some sort of craft. He knew at once that he had come to rescue what was inside.
He gasped in a deep breath of frigid air, not yet warmed by the still-absent sun. He immediately regretted it and paid the price for it with a fit of coughing as the freezing air made his lungs seize up momentarily. While he struggled to get his breathing back under control, he noticed the first bear watching him again with a look that seemed incredibly close to a look of appraisal a human might give something of interest.
Will he try to eat me if I move toward the craft? Is he guarding it or merely lying in wait for fools like me?
Tuari shook his head and threw caution to Aaren’s winds and began running down the slight slope toward the craft. Truthfully, it was more of a waddle than a run since he had to swing his hips wide to keep his snowshoes from tangling with one another. He knew that if he had been meant to come here and do this then the ice would hold for him, and he also knew that the bears would easily catch him if they tried. Still, they’d have to take him in mid-stride instead of just trudging along, and that would be a slight comfort to him as he was being torn limb from limb and gobbled alive. He grinned at this, for the Uleaut people, ever living just a step away from death, have a strange and macabre sense of humor.
As he slid the last few paces toward the craft, still amazed that he had not just been killed and eaten, he was overcome with another wave of images and colors that seared his retinas and burned into his mind. He dropped to one knee and blinked his eyes, waiting for the stream of images to pass. When they did, he gasped painfully once more and slumped over to sit with his back to the craft.
Around him, the bears had begun to converge on the craft from their lookout posts on the edge of the ridge. Clearly, they’d tired of waiting and were now hungry enough to begin their scavenging. Tuari grunted in disgust at being let into such a trap and surveyed the wreckage around him for a good place to make a stand, that he might at least inflict some pain before he became an appetizer for whatever the craft might hold. Yet they didn’t descend on him with hunger-infuriated paws, maws, and claws.
Instead, they started to gather and line themselves up into two columns with their backs to the craft. Tuari just stared in wonder, for what they were doing was in accord with his vision, which had shown the bears pulling the entire craft back to his hunting camp. There was a full dozen of them now, but how he would lash the craft to them, he did not know. He caught himself then, and laughed lightly, covering his eyes with his gloves. It was all just too ludicrous. There was simply no way this could be happening. Bears don’t work for hunters, they certainly don’t pull ships back to camp, and they certainly don’t let Uleaut boys walk up and tie them to things. That was a recipe for disaster. Nelius must be chuckling rather loudly right about now, and when Tuari concentrated hard, he though he heard laughter at the very edge of his perception, though he figured he was just imagining it.
Yet there had to be a reason for all of these colors and images he was seeing, or so he told himself repeatedly as he uncovered his eyes and saw once more that the bears were readying themselves for hauling the vessel. It was that or they had suddenly grown much more cunning and learned how to play very elaborate tricks on foolish Uleaut boys. Sighing, he pushed himself up and walked around the craft, seeking some hole or portal to look within the craft.
The vessel had been badly battered, and he could not assemble an image of the complete and undamaged craft in his mind’s eye. Initially it had seemed like a sort of shelter or home, but the fact that it had apparently fallen from the sky seemed to rule that out. That made it a sort of boat, or even more implausibly, an airboat. Various struts and panels and what might have been some sort of sails, as far as he could reckon, were lying strewn around the central piece of the ship. The front had a jagged and broken sort of material across it - something he had immediately assumed was ice - but from tapping it and examining it closer clearly it was not. He frowned at the strange material and looked within the dark interior.
Being Uleaut, he had superior night vision, and his dark eyes could pierce the dim interior as if it were dusk or even lighter within the craft. A strange looking dark-skinned woman lay slumped across an odd chair surrounded by a forest of poles and devices. The way her limbs were contorted in clearly broken fashions made her think at first that she was dead, but her chest still rose and fell. Beside her was a man with long curls of dark hair, and had his face not been so obviously masculine in its bone structure, Tuari might have mistaken him for a woman. He clearly was not of the same breed as the woman beside him. He, too, lived, but he would not live long in the cold, neither of them would. Both were already showing signs of exposure, despite their heavy clothing; they must have come from somewhere reasonably cool he deduced. Behind them both was a wedged door or hatch that had buckled and folded in place, seemingly barring any traffic of humanoid size from passing into the next chamber of the vessel. It certainly did not move when he poked at it with his spear.
Tuari scratched at his cheek thoughtfully with his gloved hand as he tried to decide what all of this meant. He moved around to the side of the craft then, where he found a large section, possibly a door of some kind, had been ripped free. Lying in the snow beside the door section was a squat man with dark skin that looked strongly Uleaut. Tuari’s eyes widened and he rushed to the man’s side, kneeling beside him. He still lived, but he was half-frozen to death. He would live only a short while longer if he were not taken out of the elements and warmed up. Every Uleaut, even in a young age, is familiar with the symptoms and conditions of freezing to death.
Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.
As he quickly pulled from his pack a layered hide cloth of a sort that all hunters carried with them to warm themselves should they fall into water, he regarded the dark man. While he looked Uleaut in many respects, Tuari decided as he covered him with the hides that he was not actually Uleaut. Yet he did not know enough of the world to place any of these people. Where they had come from, he did not know, but this man was also different from the two strange people he had seen before.
He sat beside the man for a few Mynettes, forcing some of Yenis’ Milk into the man’s mouth. He swallowed convulsively but quickly began to warm and take on a healthier coloring. The restorative fluid was normally saved for children because it was a limited resource, but each hunter carried a small pouch of it with them in case of an emergency. If it could save a life of a skilled hunter, it was a small price to pay, one that an experienced hunter might repay many fold over the course of his life or even a season.
After the man warmed up enough that he was not in immediate danger of dying, Tuari went back to the craft and eyed the hole in the shell where the door panel had been torn off. The ship seemed to be nearly almost on its side, because the entryway was pointing nearly straight skyward, so Tuari could not see within without climbing up to look within. So, climb it he did. He unstrapped and then kicked off his snowshoes, and then he scaled the four Mayters to the ‘top’ of the vessel by taking advantage of various protrusions, buckled creases, and outright holes in the hull that were offered to him.
When he pulled himself up on top of the vessel, nothing could have prepared him for what he saw. A rush of color struck his eyes, so painful that it made his head snap back and his lungs seize. Eyes that had not seen color in Yarres suddenly saw in a full spectrum. To him, it felt as if someone had driven a thousand tiny icicles through his eyes and into his brainpan.
He slipped from his perch and tumbled into the open hull, landing on something indeterminable until he could open his eyes again, which wasn’t for several Mynettes. The whole of those several Mynettes, he could not shake the image of a girl with hair the color of silver streaked with hues of blue, purple, and pink. The picture of her was burned on his retinas; he could only think of her, reach for her, and help her. He knew then that if she ever asked him something, he would do it, unless it would carry her away from him.
His hands felt around blindly as he lay there trying to ignore the pain in his back and hip from crashing down so awkwardly. At last, his hand touched her hair. It seemed alive in his hands, even through his gloves. He shivered, wondering what it would be like to touch her with an ungloved hand, but somehow that felt blasphemous to do so. Perhaps this was Yenis herself, in physical form, and she had chosen him to rescue her. His heart leapt with the prospect, and he forced himself to sit up and make his eyes work once more, as they should, though he half expected another painful stab of color.
The expected pain did not come. Instead, the colors seemed to soften, until they were merely the normal hues of grey and white and black, except tinged with colors around the edges instead of writhing and alive with them. As much as he mourned this dimming, he knew it was less painful that way and it allowed him to look around the cabin he was in.
If the girl was Yenis, than surely the huge beast that lay in a shivering heap beside her was Rishalt, even if obviously wounded or burnt in some manner. That a God could be wounded in such a serious way seemed to discredit the divinity of either of them, as did the furry-faced man wearing a sling that stirred beyond the great beast-man.
“Help…” The man groaned in a strange tongue.
Yet it was not all that strange. Somehow, unbeknownst to him, Tuari understood the man, even though he knew he could not speak any foreign tongues and assuredly it was a foreign tongue.
“Save… Anthea.” The man spoke through gritted teeth, staring directly at Tuari in such a way that cut him to his core.
Surely if he did not do as this man said, he would be cursed. He felt that within the core of his being. “It’s what I’m here for, friend. I will save Anthea, and you.” Tuari promised, savoring the way the girl’s name rolled off his lips. He did not take the time to wonder how he could speak the man’s tongue, for the man had lapsed back into unconsciousness, and it would do none of them any good to stay out in the elements any longer than they must. Even Uleauts have their limits.
He stood up carefully in the off-kilter cabin and began searching for anything that could be used to lash the bears outside to the craft so they might haul it back to camp. But if it came down to it, as Yenis was his witness, he would whip the beasts until they walked upright and carried it all the way home.
For Tuari, the dawn brought with it mild hues of oranges and pinks that shaded what had been monochromatic sight just Ouers before. It was a breathtaking sight that lightened his heart as he walked along the dual columns of bears he’d hitched to the craft with yokes he’d fashioned from some of the strange cords and braces from within the craft. It had seemed to him as if the pieces needed for this very task had been waiting for him, as unlikely as that seemed. Yet it was surely not beyond the Gods to provide for their servants.
People had long since stirred from their warm beds by the time Tuari returned to the camp in the light of the morning sun, since his return had been slower than his going. The Ouer meant that his coming was seen long before he reached the actual camp, and at the sight of a group of Nanuq nearing the camp, half a dozen hunters were sent out to defend the camp from what they’d first thought to be scavenging bears. Upon nearing the group of bears, herded along by one of their number, it quickly became clear that this was not the case.
“Tuari, what is it you do?” One of the hunters called out to him nervously. “When you were gone from your bed, we worried you might have Sinnik’s affliction.” He said, referring to an Uleaut boy who had developed an unfortunate malady that caused him to wander in his sleep. On one night less than a Yarre ago he’d wandered out and frozen to death.
“It’s no affliction that puts me alongside this sloth of Nanuq, but rather divine command.” Tuari called back, his voice carried to the hunters on the winds and was seemingly magnified for it.
The six of them gripped their spears and whispered amongst themselves. They eyed the bears, who now sat in a neat pair of rows, and the strange thing they were dragging behind them, which was greater in size than any of their hunting shelters, called Apuyyaq.
“I ask again,” Chogan - a proud and revered number of their party - called over, “what is it you do? You consort with creatures that are as often our enemies on the ice as our competition for meals.”
“Yenis visited me this morning with visions carried by Aaren if none other. It could have been none other than the mother of our people who spoke with me.” Tuari replied, touching his open palms together in front of himself with his elbows pointing outward from his center. “She sent me to rescue the people of this strange craft, and she had these creatures aid me. They are not mere bears, but rather the servants of Yenis and Rishalt. Treat them with due accord.”
Chogan shuffled nervously and leaned in to speak to his companions once more. After more than a Mynette, one from among their number, indiscernible to Tuari from the distance since most Uleaut looked the same when wrapped in their outdoor gear, ran back toward camp. Only the colors of his furs would distinguish him, but as Tuari’s eyes were not their normal selves, he could not tell.
“The matters of the divine are best not determined by one such as me, Tuari. It surprises me that you would deem yourself worthy of interpreting their desires. I have sent for Nantai. He can better choose a course of action.”
Tuari swallowed hard. Nantai was the oldest and most-respected member among their hunters. At thirty-six Yarres of age, he was older than many Uleauts ever achieved to be, and all among their group deferred to his wisdom. “I may be young, Chogan, but I am not so blind that I can not see the hand of the divine mother. She has restored colors to me in payment for service to her.”
“You are mad, boy.” The hunter called back, hints of fear shading his words darkly.
“I am not a boy by the reckoning of any in this party, and you know it. And is it madness that places these bears beside me? Do the fathers upon ice heed your word?” Tuari demanded of the hunter, naming the bears using another of the names the Uleaut had for the Nanuq. “I know they heed not my words but follow the direction of the greater beings.”
Chogan would not respond. Instead, he stood there conferring with his fellows while they waited for Nantai and the other hunter to return. Already Tuari could see the pair approaching, and he had to wait but a few Mynettes before Nantai had arrived.
“What is it you bring upon us?” Nantai demanded upon seeing with his own eyes what Tuari traveled with.
“Strangers from the sky, whom Yenis herself asked me to deliver into our camp that we might care for them.”
“You know the ways of our kind, Tuari. Those who cannot hunt for themselves cannot be cared for. To do so puts us all at risk.” Nantai said spitefully, as if the boy had taken leave of his senses.
Tuari frowned. “And you think that the Gods cannot make our hunt rich while we will care for them? Would they ask more of us than we could do?”
Nantai was taken aback that one so young would speak to him thusly. Chogan leaned in and whispered to him, and what he said startled Nantai even more. “Your strange company aside, there are always other answers for what is occurring here. How is it that you know it was Yenis who asked this task of you? And what is this you say of your restored sight?”
“Who else but the Gods would send visions to me that lead me with true steps to a place where those who need me are waiting as foretold. Who else but the Gods could also allow me, a humble hunter, to go among the Nanuq as a friend and servant and tie them to this craft? They have restored my sight of colors as payment for faith, and I will not fail them in their tasks.”
“And what of the bears? Are they to be taken as sacrifices to pay in meat, sinew, fur, and fat for the resources that your charges will need to eat while they are among us?”
Tuari thought upon this for a moment, eying the two columns of bears. The lead one, Grey Chest or Siarnak as Tuari had named him, turned his broad head to regard him as he thought. That was enough to make him decide. “As the Gods are my witnesses, I cannot allow you to harm these animals. I will die to protect them. You would bring curses upon our hunters should you do them harm. They would be the last animals you will ever kill, as all others would flee long before we could reach them to take them as food for our people. This, I swear.” Tuari called back to Nantai, his voice rising powerfully out of his small frame.
Chogan shook an angry fist at Tuari. “You would curse your own fellow hunters, Tuari? You are a faithless cur.”
“No, Chogan. I am not faithless, nor would I gladly curse my own people. I would do so with the greatest of weights on my heart, for it would likely doom me as well. I simply cannot allow us to break faith with the Gods, who have provided these creatures as friends in this time. They are not our enemies. The Gods will provide unless we do harm to their servants.”
Nantai held out a hand to restrain Chogan from further outbursts. “You ask a great deal of our people, Tuari.”
“Life is not without trials.”
The elder shook his head in surprise, and carven bone ornaments on his costume of furs tinkled together. “I wonder how you ever grew to be so wise in one morning. It frightens me as much as it gives me hope that you speak truth.”
“Then let the Nanuq complete their task and go in peace. I will help tend to these strangers, and I will hunt harder and longer than any other to see that they do not go hungry.” Tuari promised.
“What other boons might you ask of our people on their behalf so that the needs of the Gods are met?” Nantai asked.
“As they are newborns in our land, if not in body, I would ask that they receive a measure of Yenis’ Milk until they are stronger. Some are wounded in body and must recover.”
“For how long we must provide for them?”
“It is my hope that they will help provide for our people when they are better. Yet if it is not the will of the Gods, who can say? Perhaps they will return to the sky whence they came when they are ready.”
“Strangers from the skies and the help of Nanuq. I would never have though to have seen this Dee, Tuari.”
“Life is not without wonders to offset its trials, and it is a greater thing for it.” Tuari replied.
Nantai laughed. “We must speak at greater length later, for I feel that you have much to teach even an old man like me. They may stay among us. We will ready another shelter for them and measure out rations for them. They will be in your charge and the care of them will be entrusted to you and others who would help you willingly.”
“You will bless our hunters for this, Nantai.” Tuari offered with a smile. “I feel it strongly.”
“I would believe as you do, but the events of the next few Dees will show the truth in what you have spoken. Let us do as you have been commanded from our Mother.” Nantai replied, touching his palms together.
Tuari nodded to Siarnak. He stood again, as did all the others in unison. They began pulling the craft toward the hunting camp once more, slowly at first, but with increasing speed until they came to a regular pace again. With a nod from Nantai, the wary hunters split into two groups of three, flanking the bears to either side. Nantai himself walked at the front of the column with Tuari, lending the young hunter his support by visibly accompanying him on his task. Neither of them saw the dark looks Chogan cast at the bears, especially Siarnak, who seemed to him to be the leader of the bears.
Once in camp, Nantai busied himself explaining to the collective camp what was to happen. It took but a few Mynettes for the anxieties of the hunters to subside and be replaced with wonder and curiosity that the Nanuq were sitting quietly along the outskirts of their camp. And once they had learned the whole of the story, Tuari was bombarded with questions about the colors he saw, the visions he had seen, and what tasks they could help with to better serve the Gods.
Within an Ouer of his return to camp, the six strangers were resting within the largest hunting lodge they had. They had needed to use the bears to pull the craft down to its intended orientation, so that the wounded inside could be carried out instead of lifted out as would have been required when it laid on its side. Once they’d been moved inside the lodge, they were searched for wounds, which were treated, and their broken limbs were splinted.
The beast-like creature, by far the largest and heaviest of the six, had caused great concern for several reasons. By appearance alone, he was not like the others, being more beast than man. He was badly wounded. They could determine that even if they’d not seen a healthy specimen of his kind before. Burns covered most of his body, and his eyes and face were badly scarred, and his features had melted into a shapeless gob of ruined flesh. How he still lived was beyond most of them. Also, while the others responded well to Yenis’ Milk, strengthening and growing haler with each passing Mynette, the beast-man did not. His body rejected the fluid, though he would take in water at least.
Afterward, when he sat alone among the strangers in the dim room, Tuari fretted over the beast-man. He wondered how best to care for him, but there were no other visions to show him how. He resigned himself to waiting until one of his fellows was awake so he might ask them how to tend to the breast-man.
As he waited in the dark, his eyes fell once more on the girl. Anthea, he mouthed her name. She was the most perfect creature he’d ever seen, and in those quiet moments alone with them, he dared to touch her hair with his bare hand, reveling at its texture. Eventually he cast off into the sleep of the exhausted. His mind raced with the tasks before him, and he dreamed in colors so beautiful that tears came to his sleeping eyes.
