‹ Prequel: Ninety Days of Water
Status: Active.
Tundra
Chapter I – Bleak – Part III
Sleek, fluid, flawless and brilliant as the waves that sparkled over his back when he dived under them; that was how he felt. The sea was smooth as ice, glimmering like the glaciers that crawled further north, where the fjords were set with sapphires and emeralds. Spread out like a glittering mirror for the sun, the sea was something to be cupped in his webbed hands and feet, engulfed in his stroke, thrown up to net rainbows from the air. The ocean was his plaything, his livelihood, his mother and his home.
For some races, our bleak land was the scene of survival, the background to our every move. For others, land itself was faraway and mythical, something not certain in in the histories of oral tradition or even in legend.
The swimmer’s name was Aais, and he had never seen the shore. Like most of his kind, in his twelve score years he had never touched land, but had frequently met with the boat-rowers. Those strange, finless men hauled out into the open ocean and traded more gold than could be found in the alluvial beds for corals. Sometimes, they also commissioned the work of sinking other flimsy vessels, which the karakos pulled down with their green, kelp-like, clawed hands. Beds of grabbing weeds made short work of the submerged wreckage, and, afterwards, scouts like Aais could salvage the curious pottery and iron weapons left behind.
Presently, he swam deeper into the black, brackish water, peering through the gloom for a glimpse of the rumoured continental shelf. There was a place, legend told him, where the tides grew shallow and the silt reared up to face the sea, in a turbulent world where the water and the great floating fought constantly. Beyond that was something even more seldom spoken of– the great dry. Aais wanted to see it first-hand. He dove deeper, skimming along the bottom where the stones were dark and shiny, winking with coins of sunlight. Slowly, strange masses began to appear– purplish things like coral, only lumpier in appearance, and bleeding like brains. The strange masses girt a pit, which was deeper than a scout could see, and filled with denser, violet liquid. The water around the wastefield of not-corals glowed red with something shed. Aais could not have known that it was spores.
Suddenly, his movement was arrested. His gills seized up, ceasing to breathe the nourishing currents. Above him, the daylight sparkled cryptically, and he was sinking down, down into the salty abyss.
The light flickered out for good, first from above, and then from behind his amber eyes.
For some races, our bleak land was the scene of survival, the background to our every move. For others, land itself was faraway and mythical, something not certain in in the histories of oral tradition or even in legend.
The swimmer’s name was Aais, and he had never seen the shore. Like most of his kind, in his twelve score years he had never touched land, but had frequently met with the boat-rowers. Those strange, finless men hauled out into the open ocean and traded more gold than could be found in the alluvial beds for corals. Sometimes, they also commissioned the work of sinking other flimsy vessels, which the karakos pulled down with their green, kelp-like, clawed hands. Beds of grabbing weeds made short work of the submerged wreckage, and, afterwards, scouts like Aais could salvage the curious pottery and iron weapons left behind.
Presently, he swam deeper into the black, brackish water, peering through the gloom for a glimpse of the rumoured continental shelf. There was a place, legend told him, where the tides grew shallow and the silt reared up to face the sea, in a turbulent world where the water and the great floating fought constantly. Beyond that was something even more seldom spoken of– the great dry. Aais wanted to see it first-hand. He dove deeper, skimming along the bottom where the stones were dark and shiny, winking with coins of sunlight. Slowly, strange masses began to appear– purplish things like coral, only lumpier in appearance, and bleeding like brains. The strange masses girt a pit, which was deeper than a scout could see, and filled with denser, violet liquid. The water around the wastefield of not-corals glowed red with something shed. Aais could not have known that it was spores.
Suddenly, his movement was arrested. His gills seized up, ceasing to breathe the nourishing currents. Above him, the daylight sparkled cryptically, and he was sinking down, down into the salty abyss.
The light flickered out for good, first from above, and then from behind his amber eyes.