Chapter 2: A Conversation with the Coachman

Often times it is not the cold that kills a man. They’re physically strong enough to take it. However, what gets the man is his mind. When belief in oneself strays, or once you start perceiving yourself as a victim, you die. The men that live are not always the physically strongest men, or even the most skilled. The men that live are the ones that grit their teeth and do their damn job.

- 9th Commander of Reachan, Hawk Palko

After the coachman had announced that it was time to depart from the town and head up the mountain the horses began to move. Their tall and thick legs had stood still for a long time, and they had some problems when forced to move on such immediate notice. Luckily, Kregloan horses were strong and had a deep determination built into their souls. With the weight of a heavy wooden cart, twenty one men (including the coachman), and the supplies from the town and personal belongings of the men,  which added up to several tons altogether, the horses moved slow and steady. Kyra finally understood why it was projected to take eight hours to reach the summit. It would be a dreadfully slow trip for the men, and a dreadfully painful one for the horses, specifically the two that dragged their carriage, as Cain weighed quite a bit. Unfortunately, it wasn’t as if the soldiers could just walk up to the summit by themselves. They had all been told by the village folk and the coachmen that they were not to attempt to climb the mountain themselves, as it would most certainly lead to their death. In the end, every man had retired themselves to the carriage, and could only place their trust in the coachmen, who they had been told had been “specifically trained to be able to guide the horses up the mountain even with their eyes closed”, and the horses, who were amongst the strongest breeds alive.

The horses ascended up the mountain path. It was a fairly low incline, but, since the path was covered with snow and ice, the horses had to move slowly to avoid slipping. After around ten minutes of sitting in the moving carriage, Kyra began to notice something about his surroundings. He realised that he could no longer see anywhere further than two metres in front of him, making it difficult to even make out the man sitting across from him. Kyra worried that their travels would be delayed even further, but he noticed that the carriage had not slowed down at all.

“Don’t worry,” The coachman’s raspy voice said from the front of the carriage, “We’re just going through the clouds. Only seven hours of this left. Hahahahaha!”

Even though the coachman was laughing, none of the other men found it particularly funny. Seven hours with no visibility was a nightmare for the average man. When one sense was taken away, all other senses were heightened. A single cough or creak caused the men to shiver and flinch. They knew that no animals would confront them, but what if there was an avalanche? What would they do if the coachman made one wrong moves. No man would enjoy being in such a vulnerable position.

However, Kyra wasn’t a man, at least not yet. Rather than fear the sounds or lack of visibility he actually found it rather exciting. Every time the carriage hit a rock the men would react in fright, but for Kyra it got the adrenaline rushing. His heart beat fast at the prospect of danger, but it was not out of fear. Even when all the men were close to screaming, Kyra could only feel a tremendous energy rise from within him. His entire childhood had been fairly sheltered. He had never been put in a position of true danger, and being exposed to it was something strange and exciting.

Suddenly, Kyra felt a cold, bony hand touch his shoulder. He immediately looked at who had touched him, but he couldn’t see anyone. He looked to his left, where Cain sat. His hand was way too fat to feel like the hand that touched him. He looked to his right, but he sat all the way in the back of the carriage, and there was only a small wood barrier there. After a minute of looking for a potential source he gave up. He was probably just imagining things.

But not even a minute later he felt the cold hand again. Again, he looked around, but couldn’t find anything.

“Who touched me!?” He shouted angrily.

Unfortunately, the men were too preoccupied with other things to pay attention to him. Kyra angrily smashed his hand against the wooden barrier. However, then he finally realised one more possibility. To his right was a small wooden barrier which separated the coachman from the other men. It was low enough for the coachman to have reached over and touch him.

Kyra sneakily looked over the wooden barrier to inspect the coachman’s hand. Sure enough, it was an incredibly thin and bony hand.

‘He must be the culprit!’ He thought.

However, before he could make any accusations, the coachman grabbed him by the neck and placed him next to him in the driving seat.

“Huh?” Kyra looked around, confused by what had just happened.

“Why aren’t you scared?” The coachman asked him.

Kyra regained his bearings and figured out what had happened.

“Umm…” He didn’t really know too well himself either.

“You know,” The coachman said, “All the other men are terrified. In their minds it would only take one mistake and… BOOM! We’d all be dead.”

Kyra wondered what he was getting at.

“But you…” The coachman said, “You’re different. I swear I saw you smile just a bit ago.”

“Oh,” Kyra said, “Well, it’s kind of exciting isn’t it?”

“What is?”

“Y’know, the fact that we could die! Isn’t it kind of incredible?”

The coachman stayed silent for a while.

“Aren’t you afraid of death?” He asked.

Kyra thought for a bit.

“Yeah, I think so…” He said, not really sure.

“Ok, so you are afraid of death, but you’re not afraid right now?”

“But I don’t think I will die.” Kyra responded.

The coachman started to get frustrated.

“You just said that you got excited because of the fact that we could die, but you aren’t afraid because you think we won’t? What sort of backwards logic is that!?”

Kyra thought about it for a while.

“I don’t know.” He said after a solid five minutes of silence.

Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

The coachman couldn’t help but laugh at the strange child.

“You’re very strange, kid.” He said, “What’s your name?”

“Kyra.”

“I’ll remember it.”

“What’s your name?” Kyra asked.

“Huh?”

“What’s your name?”

“I… I can’t say.” The coachman seemed a bit flustered.

“What? Why? I told you my name!”

The coachman stayed silent for a while. There was a strict rule that they were not to get acquainted with any of the trainee soldiers. He had completely forgotten about it, and he had even asked the name of the kid. He could only smile at his own stupidity.

“Tell you what.” The coachman said, “I’ll tell you my name, if you pass my test.”

“Why do I need to pass a test to know your name? Do you do this to everyone?” Kyra asked, annoyed.

“You are merely a child, and yet you desire to know my name! I would say this calls for a test of sorts, to determine if you are worthy!” The coachman tried to play up his superiority.

Kyra looked at him unimpressed, but considering that there were still hours left before they would reach the summit, he decided to do the test anyway.

“Ok, fine. I’ll take your test.” He said.

The coachman sighed in relief. As long as he could make the test sufficiently difficult then his name would be safe.

“Great!” He said, “First question: How does a man train his core?”

The coachman decided to start off easy, and bump up the difficulty exponentially with every question.

“Haha!” Kyra exclaimed in excitement, “That’s easy. You just have to sit down, cross your legs, close your eyes, clench your abdomen, allow your body to fall in a coma-like state, and… then you just wake up after a while and you’ve trained your core!”

The coachman stayed still for a while.

“I’m pretty sure you’re missing out on something, but I’ll consider it a pass.” He said.

“How many questions are there?” Kyra asked.

“As many as it takes to determine if you are worthy.” The coachman said, “Anyway, second question: What type of sword is required to destroy someone’s core?”

“A large one.” Kyra said.

“Haha, nope!” The coachman laughed, “You need a soul sword! How did you get that one wrong?”

“You can do it with a large sword as well.” Kyra said, unamused.

“What?”

“It’s just more efficient with a soul sword.” Kyra said, “You can use any sword, it just takes a long time, and whoever you’re removing it from has to stay still.”

“Oh… Right.”

The coachman slapped himself on the forehead. He had gotten too excited when asking the question and had asked which sword was required rather than which sword was most efficient.

“What’s the next question?” Kyra asked.

The coachman cheered up again. He remembered he could virtually ask an infinite amount of questions.

The questions continued for another hour. Who would have thought that the young boy would have had such an intricate amount of knowledge? However, the coachman had a trump card. Nobody knew the answer to the last question, only he did.

“The next question will be the last one.” The coachman told Kyra.

Kyra didn’t even care much more about learning the coachman’s name. Instead, he found the entire quiz a decent time killer. There were still a couple hours left of riding on the carriage, and without the quiz Kyra would have been bored to death. In fact, he was actually quite sad that the next question would be the last.

“The last question requires a bit of backstory.” The coachman began, “The coachmen riding the carriages up this very mountain are all related. We come from an ancient tribe that far precedes the Kregloan kingdom. The ancient tribe from which I came made a deal with a very powerful beast thousands of years ago. They traded their faces and the faces of every generation after theirs for an incredibly powerful form of ice magic.”

Kyra looked shocked. He couldn’t see the coachman’s face as it was completely covered with a scarf, and he wore a hat to cover his head.

“But how do you eat, or see, or smell?” Kyra asked, incredibly interested.

“Well, that’s the question.” He said, “Please tell me exactly how I eat, see, or smell.”

Kyra pondered the question for a moment. He didn’t care if he got it wrong. There were so many follow up questions which he wanted to ask anyway.

Eventually he came up with an answer anyway.

“I think that you’re blind, you don’t smell, but you speak and eat through some form of magic.” Kyra said.

The coachman was actually rather surprised. It certainly wasn’t the worst answer he had ever received to that question. But alas, it was incorrect.

“Wrong.” The coachman said, “But a good attempt.”

“So what’s the answer?” Kyra asked.

The coachman took off his hat and his scarf, revealing a completely faceless and bald head. Where there would normally be a mouth, nose, or eyes was instead just skin. It was perfectly smooth, and incredibly pale, probably due to the head not receiving much sunlight.

Kyra looked at the coachman’s head in shock. But as interesting and scary as it was, this didn’t exactly answer his question. Luckily, the coachman answered that directly afterwards.

“Eating, speaking, breathing, smelling, and seeing are done through my soul.” The coachman said.

Kyra looked at him in utter shock. How could one eat through their soul?

“You see, one of the powers that the ancient magic gives me, is that I can turn things that are not solid, into something solid.” He said.

Kyra felt the coachman’s cold hand on his shoulder once again, but the coachman’s real hand didn’t even move.

“Simply put,” The coachman said, “I can manifest my soul externally and allow it to become a solid.”

“But that… that’s incredible!” Kyra exclaimed, “Why on earth are you working as a coachman for a damn mountain!?”

Even though it was impossible to see any expression on the coachman’s face, Kyra could swear by the silence which followed that that the coachman was not smiling.

“Well.” The coachman began, “My brothers and I fought on the wrong side in the last war. The Helden kingdom promised whatever was left of our tribe that if we found with them they would give us our land back. However, when we lost my brothers and I were taken in as war criminals before the Kregloan court of justice. In order to spite us they magically bound us to these lowly positions.”

“Why didn’t they put you to more use?” Kyra wondered out loud, perhaps somewhat insensitively.

“Haha, you sure are blunt.” The coachman laughed, “They tried to put us to use in different ways, but we would always prove more trouble than use.”

“Hmm…” Kyra seemed to be deep in thought.

While Kyra was thinking the coachman quickly put his hat and scarf on again. He had completely forgotten about the rule of not getting acquainted with anyone.

“Oh, right!” Kyra remembered what he wanted to say, “What else can you do with your ice magic?”

“Not much at the moment, because they restricted my power. However, I used to be able to turn people into ice just by snapping my fingers. In my army days my brothers and I used to be able to take out entire cities by ourselves just by freezing the water supply to such a degree that it was impossible to melt.” The coachman said it with pride.

“Can you teach me your magic?” Kyra asked.

The coachman laughed at the preposterous request.

“No! Of course not.” He said, “Well I can’t teach it to you. But maybe if you manage to find the powerful beast then he can give you the power.”

“Is that possible?” Kyra asked innocently.

The coachman couldn’t help but laugh at the question.

“Nobody has seen it for thousands of years, but please. Maybe if wander around Hael long enough you might find him.” He said jokingly.

Kyra laughed along with the suggestion, but within his mind he had already imprinted the memory of the beast.

“You should go back to your seat.” The coachman said after a few minutes of silence, “It’s going to get bumpy.”

Kyra hopped back into his seat in the carriage and closed his eyes. The next four hours were bumpy and terrifying for all of the men, but Kyra slept right through.

After those four hours the voice of the coachman sounded once again.

“Dear passengers.” He said, “I hope you had a nice ride. We have arrived at the summit.”