“…From Sorholm, Zera took the Skithiar over the edge of the world and down beneath the very bowls of E’a to a place where the earth was above and the sky below. For many weeks they searched, seeking guidance from cliff tribes and skyriders, but it seemed they searched in vain. Vorn grew ever weaker and still Thoh’s riddle went unsolved. Still, the secret paths into the Underworld went unfound…”
-The Elder Zorath, The Book of the First Time.
A green feathered sparrow landed on the railing just above where Vorn was seated in the nook of the Skithiar’s prow. It chirped and dropped a folded piece of parchment into Vorn’s lap, before fluttering off the rail and descending into the bottomless sea of sky and cloud below.
“Another letter from mother?” Zera asked, walking over to him.
Vorn nodded, unfolding it.
“What does it say?”
“Much the same as in the last one,” he grunted through the stinging in his throat. “The Lowlands are overrun and Tarneb assaults the Walls. She fears they will fall and wants to know when we will return.”
Zera sighed, looking up at the grey expanse of stone stretched out above them. Across the Sky of Stone, Yani’s roots poked through, winding their way across its surface like great coiling snakes. Here and there, were jagged cracks and craters filled with dark, smokey mud and ill formed serpentine shapes struggling to escape. The corruption of Tarneb was manifest even here, beneath the very bowels of the world. Off in the distances a line of huge stalactites hung like a range of sharp, inverted mountains, reaching for the Sky of Wind below.
“They’ll have to wait a little bit longer,” she said at last.
“For what?” Ariana asked, rekindling her ongoing debate with Zera. “We’ve been sailing around aimlessly for weeks.” She glanced at Vorn. “My stocks of medicine are almost depleted. We’ll have to go back soon before Vorn…”
A momentary silence fell between them before Zera spoke again. “We’re not sailing aimlessly. Just because you don’t know where we’re going doesn’t mean I don’t.”
“Is that so? We’ve been going in circles, and the entrance to the Underworld is nowhere in sight. You said you understood Thoh’s riddle.”
“I do understand it. We will find the entrance.”
“Zera,” Ariana said, gritting her teeth. “I know you can’t admit when you’re wrong, but you need to face it. This is a fool’s errand. No good can come of your stubbornness.”
“If we go back now, we’ll be going back without Thoh’s aid. This entire journey will have been nothing… we’ll have no chance against Tarneb.”
“At least we’ll be able to stand united with the others. That’s what you wanted in the first place wasn’t it?”
“It wouldn’t be enough. We’d be going back empty-handed to die with the others.”
“At least we’d be together.”
“So we’re meant to just give up and accept defeat?”
Vorn opened his mouth to speak, but Thalsi put a hand on his shoulder and shook her head. She was right. Coming between them would be pointless. Vorn held his tongue.
“I didn’t say that.” Ariana held up her hands placatingly. “I’m only trying to be realistic, Zera. We do no good down here. We’re not going to find the Underworld, and my ability to care for Vorn here is greatly diminished. If we were to return to Herazeem I’d be able to keep him alive for a little bit longer, and we’d be able to fight beside the other Herazor. You’re right, the chance of victory is small, but if we’re there to help, the chance of victory would be that much greater.”
For the first time, Zera looked uncertain. She glanced at Vorn. He didn’t know what to do anymore than she did. Over the weeks since leaving Sorholm, he’d been steadily deteriorating. He was weak–weaker than ever before in his life–and so tired. He ran his hand over the haft of his axe where it leant against the rail beside him and sighed. Even if they found the entrance to the Underworld, would he even have strength enough to face the trials within?
“Zera’s right,” he said at last. “Thoh wouldn’t have deceived us. There must be a way into the Underworld, some–” He broke off, wracked by a fit of dry coughs.
“But I can’t care for you here, Vorn,” Ariana said.
“And what does my life matter versus the fate of the Middle World?” he wheezed. “Maybe I will die before our quest is complete. But you three can still find Thoh and bring back his gift.”
“You can’t–”
“You heard him,” Zera snapped.
Ariana blinked. “How can you be so callous, Zera? Don’t let your ego blind you. We’re talking about your brother's life here. We need to go back.”
“Do Vorn’s wishes mean nothing to you? I’m the captain of this ship. Not you. The only place we need to go is where I command.”
Ariana’s face tightened. She looked across the faces of her siblings, then turned and stalked down into the hold.
Zera let out a long breath and leant against the rail. In the distance, a smoking mass of mud and silt dropped from one of the cracks in the Sky of Stone. It writhed with the vague impressions of serpentine shapes.
Zera watched it fall in silence. Vorn didn’t dare speak and the crew pointedly kept their distance. When it vanished into the clouds far below, Zera sighed and turned to Vorn. “What if she’s right?” she asked in a small voice.
Vorn hesitated. “You seemed so certain a moment ago.”
Zera shook her head and looked back out over the railing. “I was so sure I knew what Thoh’s riddle meant.”
“If anyone can decode it, it’s you.”
“We’re right where he told us to go. According to my charts, we should be directly beneath Yani, but Ariana’s right. We’ve been down here for three weeks and we still haven't found it.”
“Maybe it’s hidden. Or disguised. What do you think an entrance into the Underworld would even look like? I imagined a cave of some sort, but who knows?”
She nodded solemnly. “Yeah, I’m sure we’ll find it.” She didn’t sound convinced though.
“We don’t have any other choice. The fate of the Middle World rests with us.” He coughed, before leaning back, short of breath.
“Please don’t die, Vorn,” Zera said softly.
He closed his eyes. He was so tired.
Vorn? Vorn! Wake up!” A muffled voice called from some distant place…Zera’s? “Go and get Ariana, quickly!”
“Yes, mistress.”
“Vorn, hold on.”
“What is it?” Ariana’s strained voice asked.
“He’s barely breathing and he won’t wake up.”
Vorn groaned, fighting to open his lids. He managed only the barest flutter. Zera, Thalsi, and Ariana kneeled over him, their forms stretched and darkened as if obscured by a heavy fog.
“He’s burning up,” Ariana said in a warped voice. “Ama, the tapas root, quickly.”
“There’s no tapas root left, mistress.”
Ariana cursed under her breath.
Vorn blinked. Thoh hung over him, his flowing robe caught on some unfelt breeze. A shiver ran through him. His sisters blurred and faded while Thoh grew more distinct.
“Zera did well to bring you here, where the veil between worlds is thin,” Thoh said in a deep, rolling voice. He reached for Vorn. “Now, before you cross over completely and the way back is closed, come with me.”
Over Thoh’s shoulder a silhouette of dark sinew and polished bone peered at him. “Yes. Come with us,” it hissed.
Vorn took his uncle’s hand. Thoh pulled him up with a grip like ice. Vorn was suddenly freed of pain and weakness. He ascended weightlessly from the Skithiar’s deck up towards the Sky of Stone.
“Vorn!” Ariana cried. “Vorn, stay with me!”
He glanced back. She was kneeling over him, pressing desperately against his chest. Zera and Thalsi looked on, horrified. His body was so pale, so thin, so far away.
Above, the Sky of Stone opened into a great maw of swirling shadow, ravenous for his soul. He entered and the darkness took him.
The Nith that had once been Vorn flowed down a narrow stream of starlight. Around it stretched an endless twilight void through which the lights of the heavens spun in an eternal spiral dance. The stream twisted through space, at times as narrow as a pinhead, at others as wide a great plain, yet the Nith always passed with ease, for it was now beyond the confines of form and time.
An eternity passed in an instant and the stream brought the Nith to a raging starlit river, stretching out into infinity. Upon this river swam other Nith, similar in kind, yet different in degree to that which had once been Vorn–the Nith of mortals, imbued with less of Ilo’s light and grace. Together they flowed down towards a distant sea of gold.
Overhead wheeled nebulae and galaxies, coalescing into coiling serpents of dust and fire. A ripple of fear washed through the flowing Nith, for here they found their first test. The serpents descended with rasping maws, drawing in and consuming swaths of Nith as they passed.
They converged on the Nith that had once been Vorn, for it glowed with a light brighter than the rest. But the Nith remembered what it meant to be Vorn, what it meant to be brave. Where the other Nith cowered, this one stood firm, facing the serpents, ready for battle. They approached. The Nith did not waver. And so the serpents turned away.
Up ahead, the river forked. To the left and right, the way was wide, spiralling up into the heavens or down into the abyss. The middle way ran straight and narrow, and above sat the Judge. It had many eyes and many ears, and held an endless strip of parchment in its gnarled hands. To either side of it were the Wardens, perched over the running starlight wielding long jagged hooks. At the whispered orders of the Judge they pushed the lesser Nith to the left or right, depending on their allotted fate. If one tried to break from its path, the Wardens flung it off, into the void to be consumed by serpents.
The Nith of Vorn approached. Would it be sent aside? But the Wardens made no move, and the Judge made no sign. Then the Nith remembered what it meant to be Vorn, to be the blood and spirit of the Herazor Sky Gods, and so it flowed along the middle way, down which it went alone.
At last the starlight river brought Vorn before the One Who Marks the Way, sitting atop a pinnacle of polished stone. Its bones were made of stardust and its skin of flaking rock. It had a single eye and a single ear and tome upon its lap.
“Welcome, Vorn, son of Miraz, of the line of Heraz stretching back into the earliest of days.”
Vorn blinked. His body, whole and strong, returned. The dim chamber in which he stood was carved from darkstone. Its walls were etched with stars, flickering with a dull orange light.
The One Who Marks the Way opened its book and shook its head. “A place is set for you, Son of Miraz, as with all your kin that are and were and yet shall be. But your time has not yet come. How is it that you stand before me now?”
“I seek my uncle Thoh.”
“It is not the place of the living to seek an audience with the dead.” The One Who Marks the Way scratched a line into its book with blood oozing from its finger tip.
“Yet I must see him all the same. It is the only way that I may save the World of the Living from Tarneb’s wrath.”
“If the only way is in defiance of the Great Order then it is not to be, young Sky God. All that is and is not is by the will of Ilo. The Law of the Great Order set in place by Ilo at the beginning of all things is clear. The living and the dead will remain apart until the end of this world and the beginning of the next.”
Behind the One Who Lights the Way, at the chamber’s far end, was another door, dark and yawning, cold even to look at.
“Come to me,” a strained whisper echoed through it.
The One Who Marks the Way followed Vorn’s gaze. “Turn back and return to the World of the Living while you still can.”
“I cannot. Not until I’ve seen Thoh.”
“Go on then, if that is your wish. But if you do, here you shall remain among the dead until the end of days. The choice is yours, young Sky God.”
“Come to me,” the whisper repeated.
Vorn shook his head. “I have no choice. I must go on.”
“As you wish,” the One Who Marks the Way answered, scratching another line into its book.
Vorn stepped around it and walked to the door. Without looking back, he passed through.
Beyond was an endless plain of silver grass. The sky overhead was streaked with a swirling spiral of stars and the distant hills were outlined with the golden glow of dawn, forever moments away but never to arrive. Rising from the centre most hill was a great tower, topped with a shining beacon, reaching for the heavens.
Vorn stood at a crossroads. Around him, twenty-one narrow dirt tracks all snaked off through the grass in different directions. One reached for the lit tower, the others for distant towers still shrouded in darkness. The lit tower was where Thoh awaited. He knew and yet was unsure how he knew. But another path to his right pulled on his attention, calling to him. A tower set aside for him awaited, ready for him to light its beacon and take his place amongst the fallen.
Without thinking he stepped onto that path, then stopped. If he ventured to his tower would he ever be able to find his way back? He turned away, though it pained him to do so, and started for the tower where Thoh awaited.
That way is not for you, a voice whispered in the wind.
But Vorn paid it no heed and carried on his way. The grass reached for him. He ignored it, but it grew stronger and more persistent, braiding itself into thick ropes, writhing around him, encircling and ensnaring. Vorn ran, fighting against it, throwing it off. But it only came back tighter and denser.
Vorn wished he had his axe, and then his axe was in his hand. He cried out, cleaving through the silver fibres like a farmer reaping his harvest. The grass rose up, sprouting thorns then crashing over him like a wave, crushing him beneath its weight. Constrained, still he pushed on, dragging himself along the ground inch by inch. Silver shelled beetles emerged to crawl over him, biting and stinging, filling his mouth, nose and ears.
But he would not give in.
Then he reached out and his hand touched a wooden door.
He blinked, and at once the weight was lifted. The field was still and peaceful. The beetles were gone, and the short silver grass swayed in a gentle breeze. Above him rose the Tower of Thoh, its wooden door inset with a polished eye of bronze. Vorn stood, pushed it open, and stepped inside.
If you have any feedback regarding the story, either positive or negative, don’t hesitate to let me know. I’m always looking to improve.
Thank you for your time and attention, I truly do appreciate it.
I love this setting expansion. The imagery is really rich, I can't wait to see what loop hole Vorn finds to get back.