Shadow of Dawn

The winds skirled about the rounded hilltop, engulfing it in fierce flurries of snow and swallowing the distant howls of the old kin. Silhouettes paced around the stone circle, their shadowed heads constantly moving, searching, watching. Others were still as trees, feet planted firmly on the rocky summit, arms crossed against their chests. None spoke, knowing all too well that unnecessary sounds could put them all at risk. Half the northern bloodrings had already refused the call, not daring the journey from their lands to the westerhills in such treacherous times.

Valmyr watched from behind his father’s towering shape as the last men and women crested the hill and made themselves known. Obscure figures embraced each other, whispering warm words of greeting and relief.

′Thank Fyr you made it,′ Valmyr heard a wild-maned man murmur as he took someone in his arms.

′We were lucky,′ came the soft answer.

A shudder went down Valmyr’s spine as the winter wind pierced his thick furs and stung his bare skin. His father’s hand gripped his shoulder and, though he was still freezing, his trembling ceased almost instantly.

‘Breathe, son,’ Thorval whispered. ‘Fan the flame Father Fyr gave you.’

Valmyr breathed deeply, letting the icy air needle his throat and lungs. Spectral plumes wreathed his head, but the sharp claws of winter seemed to loosen. He wiggled his numb toes until he could feel them once more. Thorval twisted his frozen ears playfully and grinned, his teeth a white crescent in the darkness.

‘No cold can challenge that flame,’ he said, his voice no louder than the soughing of the wind.

Valmyr nodded, freeing his ears from his father’s fingers, and glanced around. There was no moon to shine the hilltop—which was why the last elder had chosen a night of new moon in the first place—and no fire. The old kin were dull-witted, but not blind. Some said that the hungriest of ghônts had been known to smell smoke from a day’s march. There would be no flames to warm their limbs and light the darkness.

‘What are we waiting for?’ Valmyr asked nervously, eyes darting around, trying to make something of the silent gathering in the murk.

‘Nothing,’ Thorval replied. ‘The last of us have arrived. There are Umskar and his wife Haefyr. And there is Heltmar. A good man, but a better hunter. He has grown weaker since his son, Skald, went east winters ago and has never been heard of again. Come, Vyrda will speak soon.’

Valmyr followed his father’s outline towards the gathering of shapes in the center of the stone circle. As he approached the great hewn pillars, Valmyr could not help letting his hand trail, dragging his fingers against the smooth rock. He had never climbed to the summit of the sacred hill before, only heard his mother and father’s descriptions. The circle was tighter than he had expected, barely wide enough to fit a dozen huddled figures, but the pillars themselves were astounding, even in the darkness. They loomed high above them all, three times taller than Ygrom the Bear, their broad trunks thick enough to blot entire spans of the starry sky. Who had carried such behemoths up the hill? Or had they been carved from the hill’s crown itself? If so, why?

Younger, Valmyr had assailed his father with these questions. Thorval had simply assured him that the stone circles were raised by Father Fyr and Mother Mhor themselves when they had wrought the earth from nothing. It had satisfied him then, but now… seeing the immensity of the stone obelisks, he was no longer certain. How could anyone, even the gods, move the immovable?

He did not have time to ponder the might of Fyr and Mhor before he was ushered between two of the pillars and into the relative warmth of the circle. Faceless shadows shuffled about, nudging their way through the gathered men and women. The wind could not whisk away the rancid odor of sweat and filthy furs. After shouldering their way through, Thorval and Valmyr found a spot where they could hear the rasping whispers of the last elder.

‘Is that…’ Valmyr began before his father interrupted him.

‘Vyrda the Crone, yes,’ Thorval said. ‘She brought you into this world, and most of your siblings. There are none as old as her left in the Dawnwood.’

Valmyr had heard of Vyrda many times before, though he did not recall ever meeting her. She was a gifted giver of life, a sought-after elder who knew how to soothe the pains of childbirth and coax breath from babes. She had not come to birth Valmyr’s youngest sibling. The snows had fallen deep and heavy this winter. Though the first folk knew how to navigate the frozen expanses of their forests, even they could be thwarted by relentless storms. When he closed his eyes, he saw the blood-drenched furs upon which his mother had lain, heard the echo of his father’s encouragements and the long-awaited screeching of a newborn. He wondered whether his mother and all his siblings were warm and asleep now. Was the haven sealed shut? Were they safe?

Vyrda’s grating voice drew him from his thoughts.

’They have come… They are still coming,′ she wheezed, her breath coming out in faint bursts. Valmyr had to focus to catch the crone’s words before the wind sucked them into the night. Though his eyes had long since adjusted to the darkness—they had walked all day and half the night before reaching the circle—he could hardly make out the elder’s face. Her pale skin glowed stark against her dark furs, matching the snow’s white. Everything else was shadow.

‘Are they all here?’ she asked, raising her voice slightly. Someone leaned towards her and murmured in her ear. She nodded and chuckled softly. ’Of course they did not make the journey. They will be dead by now.′

Some of the listeners gasped at this, though nobody knew who exactly she was speaking of. There were many northern bloodrings who had not dared make the journey to the stone circle. Perhaps they were still holed up in their havens, waiting for the frost to thaw and the old kin to scatter. Others had dared, but had not survived.

‘Have we sparked the Flame yet?’ she demanded. The small crowd shifted, their fur boots trampling the snow. Thorval remained stoic, watching her over the heads of shorter men.

‘Vyrda…’ someone said warily. ’We cannot.′

′We can,′ she replied, ‘and we must.’

A ripple of dissent passed through the gathered listeners, but it was quickly quelled by Vyrda’s long silence. Thorval bristled at his son’s side and Valmyr thought he heard a prayer come out as a sigh. It seemed that, despite the first folk’s fervent adoration of Fyr and cold devotion to Mhor, none dared risk an open flame atop the hill. The slightest flicker of light could be seen throughout the surrounding forests and vales by a lucky eye, and most eyes belonged to the old kin these days.

Vyrda stirred from her furs, surprisingly vigorous, and tore something from a nearby man’s trembling hands. Mumbling to herself she began to move her arms. The sound of scraping stone carried on the wind, terrifyingly loud in the silence. Valmyr squinted, trying to make sense of the crone’s actions, but it was too dark. It was not until he saw the first sparks spraying from her hands that he understood: she was making flame from stone, making use of Father Fyr’s greatest gift despite the likelihood of drawing unwanted attention.

The sparks sputtered a dozen times, showers of white and gold floating uselessly to the rocky ground. Every time she drew flint against stone, the grating whine and flash of light made the watchers cringe. Her face became visible in blinding bursts, the pale face and sunken eyes appearing in fleeting flickers.

When the sparks finally caught, she tucked the flint in her furs and dropped to her knees, blowing softly, breathing life into the spark, murmuring a prayer to the Flame…

The flames swallowed the dry tinder, minuscule orange tendrils rising from nothing, growing as Vyrda spoke to them. She cupped her crabbed hands around the proof of Fyr’s generosity and grinned, the light dispelling the shadows from the grooves in her wrinkled face. With her hands and her breath, she kept the fire small, no more than a fist of light in the overwhelming darkness.

‘Gather around,’ she croaked. ‘Say your prayers.’

The already close-knit throng shuffled towards the flicker of light, their heads lowered in hallowed respect.

‘Father protect us,’ some whispered.

‘Almighty Fyr,’ others said, clenching their eyes shut.

‘We thank you for the Flame,’ muttered the rest.

Valmyr did not voice his prayer, but let his eyes wander into the ever-shifting flames. He marveled at the warmth such a small fire could provide, at the power it had to lift the fear from his shoulders and light the darkness. What such a small flame could do… For a heartbeat, he forgot that he was on the summit of a hill surrounded by the untamed forests of his home. He nearly forgot about the creatures that stalked the shadows.

‘Our prayers are said, elder,’ Thorval startled Valmyr, and others, as he stepped forward and spoke. ‘Now, tell us why we are here. My wife and children are alone and the winter nights are long.’

Other men grunted their agreement with Thorval’s desire for haste. Some had traveled many days across the deep snows of the Dawnwood, braving hunger, storms and roaming packs of ghônts to hear the crone speak. Though the many bloodrings of the first folk crossed paths when fate willed it, never had such a gathering been deliberately called before. Vyrda had sent only the most fearless messengers to brave the wilds and bring word to the others despite the fierce winter that had come. And all Baerym the Fleet had said upon delivering the message to Thorval was to make haste.

What was it all for?

‘You are right, Thorval, son of Lothur,’ Vyrda replied, her gaze still lost in the flames. ‘I asked that you all make haste, now it is I who must be swift. But first, we must speak of Mother Mhor…’

The flames sputtered, threatening to gutter out before Vyrda fanned them with her hands and they regained lost vigor.

‘How many did not survive the past winter?’ she asked. ‘How many could not join us tonight?’

No one answered her, though Valmyr could not tell if they did not know the answer or if they were afraid of speaking the numbers out loud. He did not know, though his own father had spent the winter mourning two lost sisters and several other patriarchs. How many more had perished to the claws of cold, of hunger or of the old kin?

‘The Cold Mother has reaped her dues,’ she whispered. ‘Too many have fallen in her final embrace, too many have had their Flame snuffed out by the very darkness it was meant to light.’

‘What are you saying?’ Heltmar asked. ’Fyr gives and Mhor takes, that is the way of the world. What of it? My father was taken by the old kin and my son by the fury of love. He went east and never returned. Do I mourn? Yes, but it is the way of the world.′

‘It is,’ Vyrda nodded. ’Yet once again I ask how many? How many fewer are we now than we once were? How many havens abandoned? How many bloodrings decimated, if not entirely ended?′

‘Harsher times,’ Ygrom the Bear grumbled. ‘Colder winters. Hungrier ghônts.’

‘It will come to pass,’ Thorval added.

‘Will it?’ Vyrda challenged. ‘Do the winters shorten? Do the snows lessen? Do the old kin dwindle?’

‘No, but—’ Ygrom was not allowed to contest.

′No,′ the elder hissed. ’I have watched our people diminish for many a season, praying, hoping, knowing that the world turns as it always has. I waited, but I have waited for too long. The time has come.′

‘For what?’ Ilva of the Frozen Lakes asked. She stepped into the feeble light and stared into Vyrda’s dark eyes.

‘To leave.’

The words hung on the icy air, strong without sound, lingering without echo. Then the circle burst into frenzied, but hushed discussion between men and women. Valmyr was shoved aside by his father as Thorval rushed towards the crone, hissing his dissent. Others stayed on the edge of the circle, staring into emptiness.

‘Silence!’ someone warned when the frantic muttering grew too loud. ‘The old kin have keen ears…’

Though the wind whined loud, the first folk immediately lowered their voices until the sounds of wintry forests reigned unchallenged. Who could say whether a stray ghônt crept in the woods beneath the hill? Or if the dreaded druh riddled the hill’s very heart? Fear made them wary, each more than the last. Valmyr glanced over his shoulder, past the looming shadow of the stone circle, as if the old kin would come spilling over the ledge at any moment. He waited and watched, but nothing moved.

’Leave? You want us to leave?′ Heltmar asked. ‘And go where?’

‘He is right,’ Ygrom mumbled, smacking his fist in his palm. ‘The mountains stretch forever to the west and north, farther than any man could walk, higher than any bird could fly.’

‘Beyond my lands, the Dawnwood dies to the north, fades into a barren white waste haunted by great bears and giants that do not fear the frost,’ Ilva added. Of those who had answered Vyrda’s call, she had journeyed the furthest. Her lakes dotted the vales, some so vast that the far banks were invisible.

‘We must go east,’ Vyrda replied after a short silence. ‘We are the first folk, the people of the Dawnwood, the children of the Flame. We must journey into the dawn.’

‘There is nothing in the east,’ Heltmar spat. ’Nothing but open grass as far as the eye can see. Do you not think I went after my son? There is nothing.′

‘And beyond the grass?’ the crone challenged.

‘I will not go,’ he argued. ’Not north or south, not west or east. These forests are our home. We will live here, and we will die here. Fyr watch over you all, but I am done.′

Vyrda glared at the man as he strode away, beyond the faint halo of light and into the darkness. Others grumbled and cursed aloud before following after Heltmar.

‘All this for nothing,’ Ygrom growled as he stomped away. After him, the stone circle emptied drastically and Valmyr waited for his father to move, but Thorval remained planted. Umskar, Ilva and a half-dozen others glanced nervously as their brothers and sisters vanished into the night.

‘East?’ Thorval asked when those who wished to leave had all left. It was colder now, as if the wind suddenly found gaps in the small circle of men and women, gaps that had not been there before. ‘What is there for us in the east?’

‘A future,’ Vyrda answered. ‘Life and hope. A new beginning.’

‘How do you know this?’

‘The Wanderer told me,’ she croaked, turning her head to the heavens. Valmyr craned his neck to follow her gaze. Clouds blackened the already moonless sky, but the crone lifted her gnarled hand and, somehow, her pale finger found a single, shimmering star. It shone white on the eastern horizon, larger and brighter than any other star, almost blinding in the obscurity.

‘The Wanderer…’ Thorval and the others repeated.

‘Fyr’s youngest child,’ Vyrda breathed. ‘The Light of the First Folk.’

‘A star?’ Valmyr lowered his gaze and shook his head, daring to speak for the first time in the council of hardened men and women. ‘You want us to follow a star?’

’Yes, child. I want to see my people survive before Mother Mhor takes me from this world. I want to see babes grow without knowing the fears we have known. The choice is yours. You may hide in your havens while you wither and watch your children wither around you, but we will not survive much longer against the old kin’s fury and the winter’s wrath. Yes, I want you to follow the Wanderer. I want us all to follow it.′

‘Into the east?’ Thorval asked, putting his arm across Valmyr’s chest.

Vyrda smiled as she caught Valmyr’s wary gaze, her dark eyes flashing in the dancing light of the fire. ‘Into the east. Into the dawn.’