Chapter 69 - An Oath of Servitude

As quietly as possible, Adam moved through the damp undergrowth of the dark forest-like cavern. There, in the distance behind the trees, the shifting shades of green light became more and more visible. He carefully picked the places where he could step. The dewy green plants did a great job at muffling sound. However, a sharp snap of one of the many sticks, or a crunch from a crushed pinecone would surely betray his presence.

To his right, Emily kept low to the ground as she moved from behind the bushes. Since the cave was so similar to the forests around Gotterburg, Adam couldn’t help but remember the many times they’d played there as children. Tracking their way to their ‘secret hideout’, hunting for small game, or simply finding their way back home when they were way too late for dinner. As if Caine was thinking the same thing, echoes of children’s laughter passed them by in a gust of wind. Adam shuddered.

By the night, do I have a stiff neck right now... To stay quiet, he resisted the urge to crack it. Naturally, this made him want to crack it even more. His left hand hovered near his belt, ready to draw his improvised dagger; just in case.

Their surroundings changed as they got closer to the light. Near the cave’s entry, there were living trees and bushes aplenty. As they progressed through the cave, more and more of the broad pine trees which held up the ceiling were dead. Rotting trunks lay splintered amongst the fallen boulders. Large parts of the cave were lifeless here, silent. Except for the chanting which grew clearer.

Peaking from behind the bushes, Adam and Emily finally had a good view. A group of Thaler was working in the distance. Adam held his breath as he could finally observe the mysterious blue-skinned people and their strange ways.

Most eye-catching was an elderly male Thaler who wore an intricately carved wooden mask. Chanting in a strange, vaguely familiar language, he spread his arms wide. One of the many symbols which hung from his necklaces glowed in the distinct green shade of Reminiscence, illuminating his solemn black robes. At his call, saplings sprouted from the ground, growing before their eyes into trees. Directing his Invocation at a part of the cave that had collapsed, the mighty branches and tree trunks lifted the boulders. Soon, pine trees held up part of the ceiling again.

Adam greedily took in the view, unwilling to miss a single detail. He recognised the Invocation as the same one the Shepherds had used to manipulate the Overgrowth vines in combat. Seems like the Roots turned a tool of restoration into a horrific weapon. Typical. Sadly, Adam was too far away to recognise the symbol on her chain, but it almost had to be the same one the Shepherds had carried on their disturbing banners.

Chanting a haunting song on both the inhale and the exhale, other Thaler were repairing a dimly glowing Association in the ground. Their oddly short but stocky builds made them well-equipped for hard labour, allowing them to lift boulders from the patterned trail. One man squinted his eyes—eerily similar to Caine’s—as beads of sweat dripped down his sloped forehead with the telltale protruding eyebrow ridge. A bald woman with a deeply lined face reverently laid her hands on the leaf-vein-like shapes and added a deep alto tone to the hauntingly beautiful song. Soon, the light of the Association was brightening again, all the way into the entrances of tunnels at both ends of the cave. It seemed like the once-fading connection between the two Nodes at the ends of the patterned trail had been strengthened.

Emily tapped Adam on the shoulder and pointed to the left. There, a Thaler with a green shovel-shaped beard used a wooden staff to herd a group of peculiar fist-sized arachnids forward. Softly, Adam gasped in wonder and excitement as he recognised their segmented bodies from fossils. They were the long-extinct trilobites, or some odd variation of them at least. The trilobites crawled over the dead trees and the bones of large animals, which somehow dissolved under their jointed appendages.

[Amazing,] Adam gestured, using sign language to stay quiet. Smiling in awe, he beheld the fascinating creatures from ancient times.

Emily scrunched up her nose at the sight. [You strange.] She shook her head as if he was beyond saving. [What now? We need Origin.] Since they didn’t have a separate sign yet for the mysterious energy used for Reminiscence Invocations, she used the familiar sign for origin but added the waving sign for sorcery to clarify what she meant.

Adam puffed out his cheeks and saw hesitation in her eyes as well. Both of them knew at least one way they could get it. [We cannot attack or kill Thaler. Deplorable.] Adam emphasised his moral judgement with a wave of his finger.

Emily nodded. [They repair Realm. Without Thaler, Realm crumble quick. We talk them maybe?] By raising her eyebrows, tilting her head, and moving her hands towards him, as if offering him the idea, she clarified it was a suggestion.

Adam cocked his head aside. [Dangerous. Thaler believe we threaten Realm.] He looked back and weighed their odds if the Thaler attacked them. Twenty-eight armed and muscular warriors, including at least one who could use sorcery. [We observe them first?] with his hands, he offered the suggestion to her. [Maybe we learn more. Reminiscence and Realm.]

Emily nodded in approval.

The bald Thaler stood up with a groan. “We can’t heal this whole cave, Jahecca,” she said in a low voice.

The masked Thaler sighed and let his arms hang beside his body. “Agreed. But I can integrate some extra wandering memories in here. The longer we can keep this cavern from collapsing, the better.” Jahecca beckoned the bearded Thaler, who herded the trilobites to him. After their meal, big chunks of the bones and the dead tree trunk had disappeared.

The bald Thaler wiped ground from her broad arms and frowned at Jahecca. “You should rest, my friend.”

Jahecca looked at her through his wooden mask. Little clouds of vapour were seeping through the intricately carved decorations as he panted. “My health is irrelevant, Daeryn. all that matters is the condition of the Lord’s Realm.”

“Of course. And you would fulfil your purpose, dying of exhaustion in His service. But that would be selfish. There are few with your abilities these days; the Lord needs you alive. Perseverance is necessary.”

Jahecca shivered. “Agreed. Just this one, then.” He stepped on the Association pattern and faced one of the pine trees she’d just created: a tree without echoes of past events in its branches. The trilobites huddled close around her and curled into little balls. With chittering noises, they released glowing sprites of Origin from their bellies.

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Amazing, they can release Origin while staying alive! Adam’s hands involuntarily clenched around the branches of the bush he hid behind, making them rustle.

A teenage girl stood up among the Thaler working on the trail, and frowned in Adam’s direction. Ducking low, Adam held his breath. Shit, shit, shit… Beside him, Emily crouched low as well. Her frustration was evident from the tenseness of her jaw, but right now, her expression was primarily one of focus. Although she didn’t gather Oquira yet—probably since the trembling air would betray their presence—her hands already formed the Marrow gesture.

“Akao, that trail will not repair itself,” the bald woman called Daeryn said.

With a doubtful finger, Akao pointed—way too accurately—in Adam and Emily’s direction. “But… there was a—”

“We can’t stop work after every squirrel, hon.” Daeryn walked up to Jahecca. After a final glance at the bush, Akao continued her work, muttering under her breath.

Adam relaxed his neck and shoulders a bit. Bending to the right, he was just able to look between the leaves and see what Jahecca was doing.

Spreading his arms wide, as if welcoming an old friend, Jahecca was chanting during his Invocation. Beneath his feet, a trail of goldish-green light extended from one of the pattern’s side lobes and snaked its way over the ground. It wound itself around the pine tree, altering it. The tree’s colours brightened and began to shimmer. The branches swayed as if blown by wind. Up in the rustling leaves, images formed.

One memory showed Catherine and Caine on a couch together, enjoying a cosy moment of silence. As she set on her husband’s lap, she absent-mindedly stroked Caine’s long hair. Looking up at it filled Adam with a cosy, familiar sensation as if he felt her warmth himself. Adam swallowed, trying to ignore the painful longing to hold her just one more time.

The other side of the tree showed a different woman: Agatha the Red, who would later rule the Penduli, lay down in the leaves. She slowly bit her lip and beckoned Caine with a finger to get closer. Beholding the image filled Adam with a guilt that wasn’t his own; these were Caine’s regrets for his own dirty little secret.

Akao, the teenage girl, pursed her lips as she was lifting boulders. “Why do you pick memories which are so… err… awkward?”

Daeryn raised an eyebrow.

“Hey, I am working, see?” Akao said as she lifted another stone from the patterned trail. “See?”

Daeryn laughed. “I see someone who should’ve paid more attention to their lessons,” she walked by and ruffled Akao’s hair. “Missed the part that every type of memory has a function to keep the Realm healthy, hmm? Guilty and embarrassing memories encourage our Lord to behave better in His social environment. But one doesn’t learn the art of placing the right memory at the right place overnight; it is an art learned through experience.”

Panting with an odd wheeze in his hoarse voice—which suggested a lung problem or two—Jahecca sat down on his haunches. “And, practically speaking: since embarrassing and guilty memories stick for so long, they help prevent this place from falling apart again. And, frankly, I’m exhausted so I didn’t want to gather memories from too far away. This association connects the Utenanga Node with Agatha’s so these were quite nearby." While speaking, he absent-mindedly pointed with his thumb in both directions.

The bearded Thaler walked up to Jahecca from the other side. Due to the wind, Adam couldn’t really follow the discussion. From the bits of words he caught, he assumed it concerned other groups of Thaler.

Adam nudged Emily with his elbow. [Trilobites contain Origin.] By the way he moved his hands to sign ‘contain’, as if holding something precious, he emphasised how valuable they were. [We borrow trilobites?] For ‘borrow’, he made a grabbing motion, as if picking up a trilobite from the ground.

Emily raised an eyebrow. [‘Borrow’?] she signed, accentuating her doubt by curling the tips of her index fingers.

[After trilobites give us Origin, we free them.] After seeing her judging look he added, [You have better idea? Without murder?]

Emily lowered the corners of her mouth and nodded sideways as if saying ‘fair point’. [We get close?]

Adam nodded and they slowly made their way from bush to bush again.

The bearded Thaler looked with a pained expression at one of the blocked tunnels at the cave’s side. “Couldn’t we just clear the rubble here, and restore the Association from the family Node to Safety?”

Daeryn sat down and rested her hands on her belly. “Young Koliko, I understand it’s tempting. But as I said, we—”

“—can’t fix everything,” Koliko finished sourly. “We need to prioritise, be grateful for what’s left.”

Eyebrows were raised among the Thaler. People laid down their work to see what was going on. An odd, wary tension among them was palpable. A young woman made subtle, calming movements with her hand at Koliko, although the other Thaler didn’t seem to notice.

“Well, there must be more we can do!” Koliko exclaimed. He gestured sideways in frustration. “Why can’t the ‘honourable’ regiments from the Gotterburg Node aid us? Too busy looking down on others?”

Jahecca shook his masked head. “The part of them that wasn’t turned into Roots is taking heavy losses while defending the Node from regular Thuraum attacks. Aided by scarce replacements, they’re doing all they can to keep the Node running at all.” He sighed. “Alas, our people are few these days.”

Daeryn laid a heavy hand on Koliko’s shoulder. “These are dark times, and I feel your pain. But by hard work, faith, and acceptance, we can—”

“NO! I won’t accept any of this!” The bearded Thaler shook away. “Entire Nodes are lost! Associations fall apart! Surely we can’t believe Lord Caine will survive if we don’t DO something?”

“We have received our Commands!” Daeryn yelled.

“The Palace of Origin may have its reasons, sure. But we are sworn to serve Caine. And how better could we serve him than by destroying the memories they are… huh?” Koliko shivered and all Thalers around him seemed frozen in shock.

Koliko raised his hands with an astonished expression. The colour of his skin was changing and flickered from blots of a deeper blue to lighter tones.

“DEVIANCE!” Daeryn thundered as she readied her sling.

“No, NO!” Koliko yelled, grabbing the sides of his head. “This isn’t what I… agh!” In a radius of several feet around him, the ground around his feet shifted, growing grass or dried-out cracks and then smoothening again.

Other Thaler grasped weapons as they moved up to Koliko. It was strange; Adam had seen a Thaler laugh in the face of torture and had witnessed regiments of them charge fearlessly towards their own sure demise against the Corrupted. Now, however, Adam saw pale faces of fear.

“The Realm is falling apart and you want to kill one of your own?!” Koliko raged, his unstable voice unnaturally magnified. “You need me, CAINE NEEDS ME!” A gust of wind blew from Koliko, scattering leaves and dirt in the air. Even at the distance where Adam was moving behind the trees, he felt the hair on his arms standing on end as if Koliko emitted a strong field of static electricity.

“You know the penalty of Deviance!” Daeryn bellowed. Like many other Thaler, she swung her sling in circles above her head and threw what seemed like a spiked nut as a projectile.

Koliko rapidly twirled his staff around in his hands, deflecting the attacks that came at him from all directions. Another Thaler ran up to Koliko and swung her staff in a wide horizontal arch. With swift manoeuvres of his staff, Koliko blocked her attacks but was gradually pushed back. “Stay AWAY!” he shouted, with an unnatural echo in his voice. After each move, his body changed and stretched further, as if his bones were growing and bending. By curving his torso sideways in a nauseating, spine-bending move, he dodged a thrown javelin. The woman who attacked Koliko should have been out of his reach, but his arm stretched out twice as far when he punched, hitting her in the jaw with surprising force. Her body flew backwards and rolled a couple of feet. She didn’t stand up again.

After he’d punched his former mate, his right shoulder was dislocated. His arm was hanging limply. However, from beneath his black robes, a small new arm sprouted from the unoccupied socket.