4.77 Doom Scrolling

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Glim stared at what remained of the brittle parchment known as The Legend of the Trine Marauders and felt the darkness surge back. Perhaps his apathy had been right after all. Perhaps nothing did matter anymore. Even the Elderkin had struggled to face what Glim now faced alone.

1 - In times agone, when the world wyre still one land engirdled in sea, three giants roamed Æronthrall. These wyre named Certe, Phyr, ande Æolia.

2 - Certe wyre pale with quicksilver eyes. His legs mountains ande his fists hills. Certe wyre methodical; his mind not easily swayed ande his course could nae be wrested. Certe's wit was ever consumed by consequence, cold, ande inevitability.

3 - Certe wielded a hammer. Its true name has sith been forgotten, but it was known as The Clapping Hand…

…rte's coming was foretold by warped beasts, tremors in the ground, ande a wall of grey cloud that consumed ….

5 - Thay who spied his sorrow became mute ande listless, ande succumbed forever to apathy. Thay who heard…

Reading the words made him sick. Glim’s breath grew shallow, and came fast, until black spots formed at the edges of his vision. He vomited apple chunks onto the floor of the shuttle.

Breathe, he told himself. Glim switched to battle breath. He took a deep pull of air into his lungs and held it, then exhaled slowly and held that. A few more times, then a few more, each time checking in to see if his panic had abated. Eventually he felt calm return. Or some semblance of it.

Three giants. Two named for the essentiæ. According to The Lament of the Elderkin, people and essentiæ had once conversed. Not only conversed, but relied on each other. People had convinced the essentiæ to give them wisdom. And the essentiæ had somehow claimed the people’s essentiæ as tribute? That made no sense. But somehow it had affected the Elderkin’s children.

Which, Glim thought bitterly, meant it affected him. Because clearly, given the fortress he lived in, and the essentiæ in his blood, Glim had some connection to the Elderkin, no matter how distant it might be. What tragedy had befallen their children?

The best hope he had to learn that answer was currently climbing around on a mountain and had stolen his voice.

Could Certe be Algidon? The third essentiæ? He had to be. Something the giant had said clicked into place: My first spoken name, which I think I shall reclaim now, is Certe.

Suddenly, every curse Glim had ever heard or uttered chilled him. Garrick in particular had a way with cursing. By Algidon’s crinkled ball sack! How could Garrick know just how literal those words could be?

So Certe had taken another name at some point. Or the people had done it for him. Names have power. Perhaps the change had something to do with that. Glim did not know everything yet, but these scrolls were burying him in an onslaught of insight he was struggling to handle. The giant he’d awakened had been prowling Æronthrall since the dawn of the written word at least. Unless there were two white giants named Certe looking for hammers, which Glim somehow doubted.

And the Elderkin had obviously wanted Certe sealed away. The very essentiæ they’d sought vengeance against, perhaps? Certe had mentioned a war. Glim had a sinking feeling it had just been rekindled.

And he’d rekindled it.

Enough! his mind screamed.

Glim listened to the voice. Even if he risked succumbing to lethargy, he could take no more. Too much had happened in the past two days. He felt stretched to his limits, physically, mentally, and essentiæly. In a way, his numbed state had become a blessing. Somehow, his apathy was buffering him against these realizations that any sane man would break in the face of.

Glim sat in silence and tried to quiet his scattered thoughts. For hours he rode in the shuttle, comforted by its gentle vibration, which reminded him with each minute that he grew further away from Certe. He wavered between complete exhaustion, and anxiety about falling asleep, from which he might never wake. The only thing that drove him now was a need to warn the others.

That left him with one bit of unfinished business. The third scroll.

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Glim stared at the cylinder with a sickening feeling. He had nothing left. No capacity to handle more truths. His mental bucket had filled to overflowing and leaked all over the floor. Whatever secrets the scroll held might actually break his mind. If it hadn’t already broken. Which seemed likely at this point.

Yet not opening it meant he’d be going home without all of the information. What if the scroll told him how to fight Certe?

The argument over whether to open the scroll or not finally annoyed him into action. He’d already become numb to the magnitude of the truth. What could another revelation really matter at this point?

Don’t ask questions you don’t want the answers to, he chided himself.

The knife trembled in his hand as he chipped the wax away. The third scroll slipped out, as gently as he could coax it. Made of thicker parchment, and yellower, it looked much different from the others. Tattered, creased, and smudged with what seemed to be mud. It differed not only physically, but had been written in regular handwriting. Not like the carefully scribed letters of the other scrolls, this appeared to have been written in haste. Glim imagined the circumstances under which this had been written. Someone in a hurry, writing outdoors. Perhaps a scout sending a report?

Many of the words had faded away with time. Most of them, in fact, leaving only bits he could scrape together:

The Candle Proclamation

A candle raised in

frost's breath,

…..

….

shall wake the Fathers.

…

….

bearing the eye of Certainty

to the eye of Certainty.

….

A candle awakens the unhearing.

The unhearing flee.

The unhearing hear no more.

…

The candle speaks only breath.

The children hear and wail.

The hammer unfalls.

…

The children tremble.

The heavens tremble.

The candle flickers.

…

…

Between the tatters, the smudges, and the faded ink, the rest of the parchment had become impossible to read. He could not tell what the words meant, but they definitely gave him clues. One phrase in particular stood out. He’d heard these words once before: the hammer unfalls. It had seemed like nonsense when Ryn had said it. But she’d seemed so flustered letting it slip that the phrase clearly meant something of importance. The look she’d given him had been so inscrutable, yet poignant.

Recalling that moment in the Elderkin tower brought something else to mind. Another phrase that had stuck out oddly in his mind: engirdled in sea. Both the scroll and Ryn’s lullaby had used those same words. Which meant two things: Ryn had known far, far more than she let on. And the lullaby she’d sung had not been mere nonsense, but had actual importance.

Glim tried to remember the words. It too had mentioned the three essentiæ, and arrows, and Certes. Which, Glim now guessed, meant Certe. The giant he’d unwittingly awoken.

Glim screamed in frustration, but heard only a rasp of air. He no longer had voice; one of the many facts currently terrifying him. Remembering something he’d read, he grabbed for the second scroll. Too roughly, because the brittle parchment fluttered apart under the strain of the movement. For a moment the pieces lay on the floor, like puzzle pieces, cohesive enough for him to read:

Thay who spied his sorrow became mute ande listless, ande succumbed forever to apathy.

The bits of paper vibrated with the motion of the shuttle. The pieces drifted further and further apart, breaking into smaller pieces, until he had no hope of assembling them again. Glim rescued what he could of the other two scrolls and tucked them back into his pack.

Ryn’s refusal to share what she knew had never been more maddening. But he knew of a few others who would know: Minerva and her two “gardeners.” And, Glim suspected, Master Willow knew far more than he let on. Whatever kept his tongue sealed, the time had come to loosen it. Glim would see to that.

The shuttle continued its steady pace towards Wohn-Grab. Time had become more precious to Glim than it ever had. According to the scroll, he’d soon give in forever to apathy. He had no doubt of the words, remembering his urge to lay down in the tunnel.

But the flame had intervened. Perhaps he had more time than he thought. In any case, Glim would not waste a moment of it. When he reached Wohn-Grab, he’d need to be efficient. He had no way to speak, so approaching anyone but Master Willow would be a waste of time. Of anyone in town, the Mage-at-Arms had the most likelihood of understanding Glim. Either through the grudging bond of communication they’d forged over years of daily study, or some device of the Elderkin, or some potion that might restore his voice the same way the mumweed tonic had silenced it.

The shuttle finally reached its upward ascent. Glim gripped his seat and urged it to hurry.