Ashen - Chapter 7: Sea Stories

Chapter Seven: Sea Stories

Ceru and Mookee were looking at the blazing sun in the distance, trying to spot the tiny world of Ashen, somewhere in its orbit when the bell rang and the halfling bid her good night. She climbed down from the rigging and stretched a little, turned her head to crack her neck and headed below deck. There she found Oquee, Bob, and the other regulars on her watch, lounging around, playing cards and shooting the breeze.

    She fell in with the other humans, who dealt her into their game. After losing a fair bit of coin over the past few nights, she was ready to make it back tonight. Someone chuckled at that. Oquee sat in the corner, on his bedding, drawing on his pipe, snout stuck in one of the large tomes he often carried down from the great cabin. After a while, and into her second cup, someone asked about Ashen - the planet to which they were sailing.

    “I know Ashen,” the half-orc Bob said. “The old sages called it Cindre, and it’s the domain of the Walker in the Flames.” There was some eye rolling and more than a few groans from the old salts who’d heard all Bob’s stories often enough, they might each be able to recount them.

    The tortle looked up from his reading, however. “What’s the Walker in the Flames,” he asked. Before Bob could answer, a chorus of groans rose up around them.

    From the shadows of the cabin, another voice half-cried, “oh gods! Really?”

    And then another, “here we go again.”

    Bob’s dark eyes darted around the room in annoyance. From where Ceru sat, they caught the lamplight and gave an air of menace to his already frightening expression. “I’ve been,” he said, thumbing his chest indignantly. “I’ve stood in the dust of civilizations so old even the elven sages no longer have names for them. I’ve looked up at the sky of that burnt world and The Pyre was all that looked back.”

    “Are you suggesting there are civilizations that predate the Alliance?” Adovar, the elf, was standing in the door to the cabin. Everyone froze, scared of the elf - and of Bob’s treasonous misstep. Of course, the official Alliance history proclaims that all was emptiness and savagery before the elven kingdoms; but Adovar shrugged and smiled. He held a leather jack in one hand - elven wine, maybe, or some of the gnome’s rum.

    He strode into the cabin as casual Danael in the Desert and took a seat at the card table. Every eye was on him, wary; but if he noticed, he gave no sign of it. “Listen,” he said. “I don’t think even the Councilors of the Courts of Fleuris actually believe the official stories.”

    Looking around the room, he added, “and you don’t have to worry about me. I’m no more loved in halls of the Great Kings than you are - I’ve dedicated my life to studying a people that my own historians tell me cannot exist.” He set his cup on the table and motioned to the half-orc.

    “There are nine gods,” he said, speaking to Bob, but raising his voice so that everyone could hear him. “I know they have other names in other tongues, but I was raised to honor Anor, whom you call Rao, I believe - the living Pyre, the source of all fire and light, and also his children and grandchildren: The creator, the wind and rain, the earth and the trees, the sky, the giver of life, the other mother, the storm and the night.” He spoke the elven names for these deities, but with the exception of Anor, and perhaps Aiwenor (goddess of the sky and the void beyond it), he did so with the air of someone for whom the gods hold little meaning.

    “Of course, another elf might run me through for saying so, but I also know of Andurlae, goddess of the seas and storms of Quelya, and of Grizzus and the Wylde - the god of the bears of Harbolis, and the Faceless God.” At the mention of this last, several of the spacers made a sign against the evil eye, and one or two let their hand fall to their dagger as their eyes scanned the cabin and the faces of everyone within it - as if one of the famed assassins who worshipped that bleak figure would be stupid enough to conduct their business in such robust company.

    “I know there are other gods - or other names for the gods we all share. Whether there are nine of them or more, I cannot truthfully say; and I never would in the company of another elf.” Adovar turned his attention back to Bob. “What I can say, is that there is more secret lore in the Heavens and the Many Worlds, than even the Elven Scrolls can record. I have heard of this Walker in the Flames; but I know nothing about it; and not enough about the planet on which it is said to stride.” He leaned forward with a strange eagerness in his eyes. “Please tell us more.” No one objected this time.

    Nervously, Bob took a drink, his wooden cup lightly knocking against those two, prominent tusks. “Um,” he says, stammering a bit, and watching the elf with a deferential fear. “I- uh..”

Bob’s Tale

    “Ashen's nothing like the elf world (so I hear). It’s not like Quelya or Bearworld, or even the City of Brass. I mean, it’s hot like the City, but in those places, the sun in the sky is a comforting light - even out here in the black - the warmth of The Pyre guides our way across the stars or the waves, I guess.

    “Ashen is where The Pyre got its name, I think. It’s so massive there. A quarter of the sky is fire, and even at night, the horizons are lit with an eerie red-orange glow, like the whole world has been set aflame, or is about to catch. Even at its darkest, the sky just turns bruised and purple, with the glow of the Pyre flickering on the horizon, and in every direction. Faint, to be sure, but always there. Always watching. Waiting. Burning.”

    Bob’s nervous eyes looked at the elf again, but he was hitting his stride. “The ashes of Cindre are all that remains of ancient kingdoms and terrible wonders the like of which I really don’t care to see again. I only go back for the chance to meet my god. I haven’t seen Him yet, but they say the Walker in the Flames strides across this ruined world. Some think he guards the last vestiges of a forgotten people, driving away tomb-robbers and thieves.

    “The Followers of the Burning Step-” he started; but was interrupted by another voice.

    “Here we go.”

    Bob shot them an angry glare. “The master elf asked for the words, and I’m going to say them. Bite your tongue or I’ll be havin’ it for my supper!”

    It was easy to forget, sitting here in the dim lamp light and the company of an actual elf - and a wizard elf to boot - that Bob wasn’t just another swabby. Every spacer in that cabin ought to have made a mental note. Bob was an officer on the Black Ophelia; and Bob did not forget.

    “We Followers try to make a pilgrimage to Ashen. We’re seeking our god, you see. Most of your other gods; see they dwell in the high places, or the low. They speak to whom they please and all the rest of us can just wonder, or rot. The Walker in the Flames, though…

    “They say the Walker has a plan for each of us. Those who can find him, that is. And when you do find him, he sets you on your path. He casts you out into the Many Worlds, to where your particular talents and disposition are most needed.”

    Someone in the shadows scoffed, but it was either too soft for Bob to hear, or he ignored it. “I haven’t met the Walker yet,” he said. “But I’ve been to Ashen several times, and I will see my god and find out the path he has laid before me.”

    “What have you seen,” Ceru asked. Bob narrowed his eyes at her, perhaps weighing whether or not she was mocking him.

    He decided she was not, and said, “there are whole cities buried beneath the dirt and the ash, mazes filled with strange creatures and stranger artifacts. Magic and traps other dangers. Ancient things so arcane as to be unknowable, if you’ll pardon the expression, master scholar.

    “I even met one of them ‘forged men,’ you know. We found it on Ashen and delivered it to one of the Dukes of Aaqa, who said he wanted to know one.”

    Now a great many sailors chuckled and scoffed. The idea of the forged men was patently ridiculous. But Adovar came to the half-orc’s defense.

Adovar’s Story

“Now, now,” the elf said. “I also knew one of the Forged Men, in my youth - when I fancied myself an adventurer, or a treasure hunter,” his face turned dark, “or a hero.

    “We were pirates, really.” Noticing the scowl Cerulean was trying to hide, he added, “but we were the friendly sort of pirate, I guess?” His fingers caressed the leather of his folding cup, and he shrugged. “We did not really think of ourselves as adventurers back then, though I can honestly say, we defended more ships than we raided.” He leaned toward Ceru and added, “and they were all pirates themselves.

    “We were sailing under the banner of a self-styled vigilante from some place called Crystal Cove. I wish I could remember his name…

    “We were like a lot of would-be heroes back then - always jumping at the chance to find lost treasure, fight the monsters that hide in the deep and the dark places of the Many Worlds. We were looking to discover lost and ancient magics and make them our own.”

    A wistful look fell across his eyes. His mouth thinned, but his lips turned upward as he spoke. “How many adventuring parties and privateer ships have gone looking for the Sunken Star, do you think?”

    He was looking at Ceru again, but it was Juke in the back who answered. “Fairy stories,” he said, and the few other Quelyans laughed.

    “Ah,” countered Adovar, “but fairies are real. Might not some of their tales have the ring of truth? I can’t tell you how many deep drops we took, how many looted, lost ships and death-traps we somehow managed to survive; but I can tell you the Sunken Star is real.”

    There was more chuckling and a snort of derision.

    “That we would be unlucky enough to find the one map that actually led to the most famous shipwreck in Quelyan history…” the elf shook his head and finished his drink, then nodded and held up his cup toward Carver, who was still holding a bottle of whiskey.

    Carver obliged, and after a swig of whiskey and a grimace Adovar continued. “I swam through its towers myself - before I was driven off by the merfolk. We barely scratched the surface of what’s down there. Handfuls each, really. There were treasure stores and equipment lockers - crystal coffins. One of them had a young maiden inside, fresh as a daisy, and decked out in extravagant pre-imperial finery.

    “I couldn’t get it open, but that little bit I came away with set me up for life - paid for my research and started me on the path that led me here.” He turned and looked at Bob knowingly.

    “I was the only one though. Even the warforged… Shiner.

    “His name was Shiner. A miracle of ancient magic and ingenuity; and even he died. He sank into the depths, but I saw his eyes.” The elf’s own eyes were staring off into the darkness, perhaps seeing only the past, “there was no life in him by then.”

    Ceru was leaning forward now. Every one of them was curious about the Sunken Star, but it was she who spoke up. “Do you still have that map?”

    Even Oquee had put down his pipe and his book; but the elf shook his head. “My companion Danforth was holding the map. I’m afraid he fell to the merfolk.” Adovar sniffed and stiffened his posture, shaking his head. “I doubt I could navigate back there if I wanted to, which I don’t. I believe the Sunken Star was actually an elven flagship - the Crown of Anor, one of the first ships in what has become the Elven Armada.

    “There are secrets on that vessel that would tear at the heart of the ‘Verse,’” he added. “And there are dangers in the WorldSea that we don’t often hear about - worse things in the water than merfolk to be sure. Such things are best left alone. The Crown of Anor, or the Sunken Star - whatever you want to call it - it belongs to the deep now.”

    There was an uncanny silence in cabin, broken only by the sound of creaking wood and the snoring of a handful of sleepers in the back, somehow unperturbed by the conversation.

    “I forgot how much I missed that constructed son of a waterclock,” Adovar said, wiping at one eye with his sleeve.

    It was right then that the bell sounded for first watch, and everyone shuffled about to settle in for sleep or for duty. Adovar and Bob stood to leave and the elf led the half-orc out into the passage. “I’m sorry about your friend,” Bob said.

“I hope you get to the chance to greet the Walker.”