CHANNELS

Ash’s sandals dangled from his fist as he carefully made his way barefoot down the darkened corridor. Suddenly he paused in the middle of the hall, listening attentively for a moment, before silently cramming himself into an alcove where a statue of the ancient Hero, Page, stood. Although no small man himself, Ash was more than a full quartra shorter than the huge statue, and he hid himself proficiently in the space between the statue and the wall. He was careful to keep even his breathing quiet as he listened for the faint noises he heard growing steadily louder.

“… only a matter of time before he wants to leave. You cannot expect him to want to stay here forever, Elder,” came one voice echoing down the hallway.

“And why should I not?” replied a second voice, one Ash easily recognized as the cold, gravelly voice of Elder Uliden. Ash peeked around the statue’s torso and saw a glimmer of light on the stone floor just before Elder Uliden and his companion turned a corner, appearing at the far end of the corridor. Ash hastily pulled his head back into the alcove as Elder Uliden continued. “Never before has he cared to leave.”

“That was when Elder Sari was still with us,” replied the other monk. Now that they were so close, Ash easily identified the other monk as Brother Tortin, a tiny, bald man whose face was half-obscured by an absurdly bushy moustache. Brother Tortin was Ash’s favorite among the monks who instructed him in his education. “Tir Asher and the former Elder had a unique bond. In fact, I would not be surprised if it was to locate Sari that the boy decided to go in the first place.”

Ash perked up at the mention of his name, suddenly realizing that the two were discussing him. He risked a peek over the statue’s shoulder as the two elderly monks passed by him in the hallway. Elder Uliden, a man with a large forehead and stone-gray hair that flowed back and stopped just above the cowl of his light gray robe, was carrying a torch and lighting the sconces along the hallway, while the diminutive Tortin bopped along just behind him on his short, twisted walking stick.

“Find him,” the Elder chuffed mockingly. “What shall he find? His corpse? We both know that Sari is gone, Brother.”

Ash peeked around the statue again, watching the two monks as they retreated down the hallway. “What we do or do not know is not what matters, Elder,” said Tortin. “The boy believes Sari is alive. He still believes he will return. It is perhaps his primary motivation for staying here even now. That is my very point. It is not enough to keep him here forever.”

“Are you suggesting we institute Sari’s contingency plan?”

Ash, who was slowly creeping out of the alcove, not wanting to lose their conversation as they moved farther away, nearly let out a startled yelp in response to Brother Tortin coming to a sudden stop, clomping his walking stick loudly down onto the stone floor. “N-I… I have no idea of what you speak…”

Ash ducked back into the alcove just as Elder Uliden was turning around to face Brother Tortin. His heart was thundering inside his chest as he clung to the wall, praying that the Elder had not seen him. There was a long pause before Elder Uliden spoke. Ash didn’t dare to look, but he breathed a sigh of relief when the Elder continued on, apparently having just missed seeing him.

“You, Brother, have been here as long as I. And you were probably the closest to Sari after Tir Asher. I have no doubt he told you of the plan he discussed with the other Elders. I do not reference it in an attempt to trap you. I seek your honest opinion. Do you believe the time has come?”

It killed Ash not being able to look around the corner. He desperately wanted to see the monks’ faces. What could they possibly be talking about?!

“No,” said Tortin finally after an interminably long pause. “No. And shall it never come to that. He may yet return for him, you know.”

Ash couldn’t make out what Uliden said next. They were on the move again, and had already turned another corner. Ash hurried after them, stopping at the corner to listen, and he heard the latter part of Uliden’s response, “… not coming. You know that is why Sari left.”

“Perhaps, perhaps,” Tortin muttered. “But as I said before, something is coming, and it has to do with Tir Asher. I can feel it. Something is changing.”

“And as I said before, I feel nothing. I shall bring it before the others as you requested, but…” Uliden’s voice faded away again. Ash peeked around the corner, the torches in their brackets along the wall now brightening the hallway. He could only just see the two far down the long hallway, their voices a distant muttering once more, too far away to make out clearly. He considered following them, but he suspected the part of the conversation having to do with him was or would soon be at its end. Instead, he continued the way he had been originally going, not even bothering to sneak anymore. His head was whirling, wondering about the unspoken elements of the monks’ conversation.

He was still lost in thought when he arrived at the atrium. Stepping into the cool, early morning air, Ash blinked and looked around for a moment, startled to find that his feet had led him there, even though it was where he had been heading in the first place. At the heart of the monastery, the atrium was a large, open courtyard, blossoming with all kinds of beautiful plants and trees. The walls surrounding it created a maze of narrow stone walls, and mostly barren rooms, but the atrium was a vibrant, breathing place, and Ash always felt at peace the moment he stepped foot there.

He sat down on a bench and strapped his sandals back onto his feet. The clattering of the hard soles against the stone floor that accompanied wearing them anywhere else in Wirksind Abbey would not be a problem out here in the soft grass and fertile soil. Strictly speaking, the atrium, as with most of the monastery, was off-limits so early in the morning. Although many of the monks were early-risers, it was expected for them to remain in their rooms in silent prayer until breakfast. But for Ash, it was among his favorite things to do to sneak out to the atrium in the early hours and watch the mist which spread out thinly above them light up with the early morning rays of the rising Az-kah.

When he had set out to do that this morning, he never would have imagined the conversation he overheard. With these new wonderings clouding his thoughts, he was no longer even sure he could enjoy the majesty of the sight. But as he breathed deeply, pulling the cool, fresh air into his lungs, he felt his worries slowly melting away until he was once again at peace. He would simply confess to Brother Tortin what he had overheard later in private. Tortin might be upset with him, but he would be forgiving. And then, he would answer his questions.

Feeling better, Ash made his way to a very tall tree that rose high over the roof of the monastery in one corner of the atrium. He reached his long arms up and grasped one of the lower branches, swinging himself up onto it with the ease of someone who had done this many times before. The tall, lanky young man scaled the tree as naturally as he had moved through the winding hallways of the monastery, and was soon stepping out onto the roof. There, he crept along to his favorite spot, a tiny little nook in the roof of the monastery where he could lean back and stare up at the sky.

The sky was light with the white mist which blanketed it, but Ash knew the Az-kah had not yet risen. When it did, the mist would brighten far more than it was now, and the mist would glow with waves of various-colored lights as the strange light danced across it from above. Ash just leaned back and continued taking in the air as he waited for it to begin. Until, that is, a loud tearing sound rent through the quiet, morning air, like something massive being violently torn in two.

Ash was sitting up in an instant, staring down the hill from atop the monastery, into the wall of mist below. Down there, the mist was not nearly as thin as it was in the sky above the monastery. It looked almost solid, it was so thick, except for the way it swirled, as if held at bay by an invisible barrier, rising macktras up into the sky until it finally began to thin out and stretch in a slight dome above the monastery. Ordinarily, Ash could see nothing through the wall of white mist at the bottom of the hill. But now… Now, the mist was glowing.

A wide amorphous section of the mist pulsed with a mysterious light only for a few ticuits. Just long enough for Ash to see it and then it flashed again, and it disappeared, a faint sound somewhat like the rustling of leaves accompanying its leaving. Ash stared at the spot of the mist that had been glowing, unsure what to do. He wanted to go check it out, but as off-limits as the atrium was at this time, the mist was absolutely forbidden. He knew how dangerous it could be. The knowledge had been impressed on him quite severely when he was still very small.

Elder Mour heaved the heavy door open, and then waited for Elders Sari and Uliden to step outside before following them out. From his hiding place behind an open door leading into the library, Ash watched them leave, waited a few moments and then quietly crept after them. He stopped at the massive door they had left open and leaned against it, curious to test his might on the heavy door. Even throwing all his weight against it, Ash barely managed to move it an inklet or two. Ash crossed his arms, shook his head at the door, and then peeked outside.

In his entire life in the monastery, Ash had never been outside the outer walls. The only fresh air he had ever breathed came through windows or out in the atrium. Not that the world outside the walls held much interest. The grass grew high and thick, covering the downward slope, but had no other foliage to accompany it. No flowers grew, no trees stretched high. It was just an open field down a steep hill. And beyond that, there was only white.

Taking a few steps out from the doorway, Ash looked around for the Elders, but they were merely strolling down one side of the building, moving slowly and casually as they talked amongst themselves. They didn’t look back toward the door they had left open. Ash looked away from them and back toward the wall of mist. He knew little about it, only that it was there. He wondered why it didn’t move in closer toward the monastery, why the air up here was so clear when the mist spread so thickly down there. Without ever actually making a conscious decision to do so, Ash found himself wandering down the hill, closer to the mist.

Ash was about halfway down the slope when he tripped in the high grass and flew forward. Before he knew what was happening, the young boy was tumbling down the hill, screaming his lungs out, as different parts of his body slammed into the ground, one after another, until all of a sudden, he came to a messy stop, flying headfirst into a thick mud. Still screaming, some of the muck slushed into his mouth and down his throat, choking him. He hacked at it as he struggled to stand, but the ground all around him was watery mud waist-deep, and it was a few panicky mitracts before he finally got his feet under him and pulled himself at least partially back out of the mud.

He was still hacking, trying to regain his normal breath, but the air was thick and hard to breathe. He could barely see in even a few cartras before him before the heavy fog coalesced into a white blanket. Tears streamed down his face, and he continued coughing uncontrollably, scared and unsure what to do. Suddenly, a shadow appeared in the mist before him. Big. At least three times his size. It started out faint, but slowly grew more distinct as it grew steadily closer. And then: eyes, huge and yellow, and at least ten of them, all fixed on him.

Ash tried to move backward, but the mud clung to his legs and he just tripped backward, falling back into the muck. He hacked up one final gob of mud, drew in one mighty rattling breath that hurt his lungs just to breathe, and screamed as loud as he could. Despite the effort, the scream somehow became muffled even to his own ears. The mist seemed to swallow his scream whole, and the thing in the mist was almost upon him. Its mouth was bigger than Ash’s head, and seemed to be overflowing with razor-sharp teeth. Glistening spikes flowed down its back. It moved slowly on five, long stick-like legs that bent in three different places as it lifted them one by one out of the deep mud, all the way up until he could see its massive hooves and then laid them each down again.

Ash tried to pull in breath again for another scream, but his lungs ached as he sucked down what air he could, and only a weak whine emitted from his throat, as the creature stopped, less than a cartra in front of him. He could see his own reflection in its watery, yellow eyes. A deep grumbling like thunder rose up out of its throat, and it opened its huge mouth, hundreds of carnivorous teeth were actually gyrating in its mouth, and Ash was too petrified to even try to move anymore.

Ash closed his eyes and quietly began muttering a prayer to Mercy.

But then, just as Ash was sure the creature was about to clamp its jaws down onto his neck, he felt something slip between his arms. His entire body spasmed, at first certain that it was the creature taking him, but then he felt the arms close around his torso, hugging him from behind and lifting him up. Finally, he realized that he was not the only one praying. Three more voices had joined his prayer though they spoke in the ancient language, and he opened his eyes to see Elders Uliden and Mour at either side, surrounding him. Both had hands up toward the creature, and their eyes seemed to be glowing with a strange white light. Ash looked up over his shoulder and saw Sari holding him, also speaking words in the ancient language, his eyes also alight.

The creature roared, rising up on its back two legs, and splaying its front three up, kicking at the air. As it fell back onto its legs, it snapped harmlessly toward them, but was already backing away. The three monks continued their prayer, but they two started backing away, Sari dragging Ash back along with him. Almost immediately, they fell back into fresh air, and Ash heaved it hungrily down his lungs as Sari fell back into the grass, and Ash fell on top of him. The other two monks knelt beside them, and they all just sat there breathing for a few mitracts.

Finally, Sari sat up, pushing Ash up with him, and then gently turned Ash around to face him. The old man’s eyes had returned to normal, no light shining out of them, and yet they blazed with anger. “What in drael did you think you were doing, boy?!”

“What am I doing? What am I doing? What am I doing?” Ash repeated in a constant stream as he barreled down the steep slope, sure that he was going to trip and start rolling at any moment just as he had done all those years ago. Somehow Ash kept his feet where they belonged, beneath him, but he was still practically flying by the time he reached the bottom of the hill, and he glided right through the barrier of mist.

Immediately, his lungs started to rebel, and his feet sank into mud. The mud, waist-high on him when he was a boy, now didn’t even reach his knees. He had only just decided to ignore his impulse to check out the mist and go find Uliden and Tortin, consequences be draved, when another noise reached his ears. It was very faint, as if far away and muffled on top of that, but Ash was sure of what it was: someone in the mist had just screamed. Without another thought, Ash had flung himself off the roof of the monastery, which was thankfully only one story high, and raced down the hill.

Now, standing in the mud, unable to see anything but white all around him, Ash had second thoughts about what he was doing. He was only just in. He could still just take a step back into the fresh air and find help.

Ash closed his eyes, took as deep a breath as he could manage through the thick fog, and took one step forward. The mud resisted against his foot, making it almost impossible to walk without tripping, so Ash had to lift his feet up in the air and take slow deliberate steps down. The movement reminded him of the creature that had almost gotten him when he was a boy, and a shiver danced down his spine. That creature and others like it were still in here. And far worse, if Sari’s admonition after that incident had been any indication.

Still, Ash moved forward. With each step, his feet started to sink in a little deeper, until he was struggling to wade through mud that came up to his thigh. His sandals had already been sucked off his feet by a hungry vacuum of mud as he had repeated pulled his legs up out of the mud to step forward. Now, he could no longer even lift his feet up all the way out of the mud, and trying to do so was only tripping him up. He resigned himself to forcing his legs forward the hard way, and his muscles burned as they fought against the unforgiving mud.

Not far into the mist, he came across the first tree. Its bark was black and twisted. Its limbs looked weak and spindly. Nothing grew on it. Ash felt his foot hook under what he suspected to be a root, but it just snapped off as he tried to lift his foot. He reached out a tentative finger toward one of the branches, and the whole thing just collapsed right off the tree at the barest touch. Ash frowned at the tree, wondering how anything could live in this place at all, and he wondered if there was any life left in the tree. The next tree he saw, however, was bigger and stronger. Its bark was just as black, its limbs just as ugly, and still nothing grew, but it grew high and disappeared into the mist above. Nothing broke off when he touched that one, although he did hear a faint flutter from above, and he hurried away from the tree as fast as his legs could move.

He saw a shadow moving in the mist to the side, and he froze, wondering if it was the same creature or something even more frightening. But the shadow just stood there for a moment and then disappeared back into whiteness. As Ash moved slowly forward, he started to feel the air grow warm, and soon his skin started to feel like it was burning with heat. A strong burnt odor invaded his nostrils, there was a light buzzing in his head threatening to start a headache, and Ash thought he had come to the place the light had originated from.

“Birna… Is anybody there?” Ash called out. His voice seemed to bounce back from the mist and come back to him, muffled, but he knew the sound must travel at least to a degree, or else he couldn’t have heard anyone scream in the first place. He coughed on the heavy air, but managed to breathe in deeply, and called louder still, “Can you hear me? I am here to help!”

As he called, he heard the faint swishing of watery mud, and he snapped his head to the side to see. Another shadow had formed at the edge of the mist, but it didn’t move forward. Instead, it pranced back and forth from side to side, as if afraid to move forward. There was something strange and choppy about the way it moved, and Ash was sure it was another creature.

“What am I doing?” Ash whispered to himself. “This is madness!”

Ash started to turn to head back, but then he heard a spluttering cough, and he quickly started back in the opposite direction, toward the sound. He nearly fell face-first into the mud in his rush forward, but he gritted his teeth and forced his legs forward, one after the other, until he saw a faint shape through the mist. Barely more defined than the shadows he had seen, he could just make out the shape of a person, half-buried in the mud, its upper body leaning back against a blackened trunk, the tree that had once been attached to it having broken off and fallen to the side.

Ash rushed forward. As he neared the person, he could see that it was a man, small compared to Ash, with light brown hair cropped close to his head, and a thin, though muscular body. Even the part of his body that was not buried in the mud was caked with it, and it was even streaked across his face. Ash kneeled in front of him, burying himself in the mud up to his torso, and reached toward the man’s face, gently brushing his fingers against his cheek.

“Are you awake? Can you hear me?”

Suddenly, the man’s eyes flung open, and they blazed with sparkling silvery light. Startled, Ash flinched backward, but managed to hold himself where he was. The man leaned forward away from the trunk, and gripped Ash’s shoulder’s tightly as he looked him in the eye, and said, “Page! Page, is that you?!”

Ash’s jaw gaped for a moment as he tried to gather a response, but before he could say anything, the man’s eyes closed again, and he fell back against the trunk, evidently unconscious. Ash leaned forward, and touched him again. Carefully, he reached up toward the man’s eyes, and gently lifted one eyelid. Ash gasped when he saw that the eyes which were shining like silver coins with pupils a moment earlier were now a dark blue.

“I…” Ash began, then realized he had no idea what he was about to say. He snapped his jaw back shut, stared at the unconscious man for a moment, and then leaned in, whispering, “We should get out of here.”

Ash took a deep breath that burned his lungs. His lungs instantly tried to reject it, but he held his breath in as he reached forward and lifted the man up onto his shoulders. He rose back onto his feet with some effort, and slowly released the breath.

“It is a good thing you are not too large a man, or I do not think I could have lifted you myself,” Ash told the unconscious man as he laboriously pushed forward, back the way he had come.

As he pushed forward, Ash again saw the strange shadow moving back and forth in the mist to the side. It was now accompanied by two more shadows which moved in the same way. All three stepped back and forth from side to side, raising bulging arms above their bodies as they moved. Although they were not in the path of the way Ash had come, he diverted his direction to move farther away from them as he pushed forward.

A few mitracts later, he saw another shadow to his other side, this one moving in a way that seemed frighteningly familiar to him. His heart roared against his chest, and he diverted his direction again, this time away from that shadow, though he was sure he could still hear it moving behind him. He thought it was following him. All the hair on Ash’s arms was standing straight up, his flesh riddled with goose-bumps. He thought he could hear more sloshing through the mud behind him than just that one creature, and he felt as if his legs might rip apart as he tried to push them faster through the mud.

Finally, the mud began to lessen, and he could once again lift his legs out of it, which did little to help him move faster, though it at least made the movement easier on his screaming muscles. He could see the mist thickening ahead of him, and he was sure that was where it pushed up against the invisible barrier that seemed to hold it back from the grounds of the monastery. Just before he could get there, though, he felt something sink into the back of his upper left thigh, and he tumbled forward. The man on his shoulder flew forward, his upper body disappearing through the wall of white, leaving only his legs partially submerged in the mud.

So close! Ash thought as he tried to focus his eyes on where the man had fallen through the mist wall, and crawl toward him. The pain in his leg was fierce, though, and he could not help glancing back to see what had happened. He screamed as he saw the monster that had haunted his nightmares since his last trip into the mist, lifting its head as it swallowed back the chunk of flesh it had just torn from Ash’s leg. As its head lowered again, its horribly wide mouth seemed to be grinning, its many eyes were all fixed on him, and it started swooping in for another bite.

Just then, though, another creature sidled out of the mist from the side, throwing its body hard against it. The first monster was knocked to the side, but not off its feet, and it was quickly turning around to face the second creature head-on. But the second creature was not alone. Four more that looked just like it rose out of the mist from different sides, partially surrounding the first creature. Their bodies were long and circular, made of a hard maroon exoskeleton. Their legs were long and thin, spider-like, wading through the thick mud easily as they offered little resistance. Up in the air they each held up a pair of pincers, larger even than their bodies, so that it looked like they should topple over from the weight, thought they didn’t.

As the four new pincer-creatures attacked the monster of Ash’s nightmares, the one that had come first rounded on Ash, snapping its pincers threateningly toward him. Ash let out a grunting scream as he kicked his uninjured leg as hard as he could straight into the creature’s body, sending it flying back into the other fighting creatures.

Ash wasted no time. Gathering up the last bit of strength he had in him, threw himself forward, toward the white wall of mist, his teeth clenched, his injured leg screaming in agony. His face hit fresh air, and a moment later, his chest clumped to the ground. He could still feel his legs in the mud, and he knew he was lying half out, just as the unconscious man was. Grunting in exertion, he pulled himself forward with his arms, clawing at the ground. He felt a swish of air on his ankle just before he yanked it through the mist, but nothing connected. In no time, Ash was revolving around on his belly, to face the man he had rescued from the mist.

He seized the man’s hands, and with one last grunt of effort, Ash yanked the man fully out of the mist, pulling the man on top of him as he collapsed onto his back in the grass. He heard a shrill screeching as he pulled the man, and he quickly looked down to see that one of the pincer creatures had locked onto the man’s leg and was pulled through. Ash groaned and was about to start kicking it, but the creature had already released the unconscious man’s leg. Steam was rolling off its body in heaps, and its screams pierced Ash’s brain as it stumbled drunkenly back into the mist and disappeared into the white.

Ash sighed, rolled the man onto the grass beside him, and then allowed himself to fall back against the ground, breathing heavily and feeling as if he might never move again. His leg was pulsing with horrible pain, and he was sure he was losing a lot of blood, but he couldn’t quite bring himself to move. He just lay there, panting. His fingers were touching the fingers of the unconscious man. He slowly extended his arm and slipped his hand around the man’s.

The strength quickly drained from his fingers, though, and he could feel his mind slipping into blackness. He opened his eyes, but the world around him looked dim, and his eyes soon closed again of their own volition. He breathed slow shallow breaths, no longer quite sure where he was or what had just happened. Just before he lost consciousness all together, Ash thought he could hear a distant thumping, and someone shouting his name.

Then, there was only black.

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