A few moments pass and Dágra has just said, “I would like to continue our conversation later,” whenever he leaps to his feet and casts his glance around the perimeter of the camp.
“What is it?” Hældáris inquires, rising to his feet as well and unconsciously reaching for the hilt of the sword over his shoulder.
“Something comes.”
“I hear nothing.”
“Long have my ears been trained for this. Hurry, wake the others.” And without any further explanation, Dágra situates himself at the edge of the camp, drawing his blade and holding it at the ready. Within a matter of moments, Hældáris has awakened his companions with as little explanation as he was given. It is then for Dágra to give the clarity that is due. And he does it without a moment’s delay: “Stringhûndr. They are hounds corrupted to evil purpose by their wicked masters. I know not if they exist in your lands, but they are far from unknown here.”
“Why now?” Aeyósha asks, rubbing the sleep from his eyes and grabbing his weapon.
“They attack just before first light, though I cannot say why.”
“Speak no more, Dágra,” says Astër with impatience and frustration in his voice. “They come!”
And his warning is true, as within only a few more seconds the whisper of paws pounding against the earth sounds from all sides, and then a flurry of movement and sound overwhelms them, as black shapes in the night pounce upon them, blood-red teeth bared, growling in guttural, vicious voices so hideous that they would haunt the sleep of even the most brave.
Hældáris hears one whimper and fall heavily to the earth near him where Aeyósha stands half-lit in the firelight, and another is struck down by Dágra with an immense slash of his massive blade. More happens around him too, but he is unaware of it, as one of the beasts leaps upon him, paws with claws extended pressing against his chest and forcing him to the ground. Without a thought Hældáris does as he has been trained to do, and he twists his body out of the way so as not to be pinned to the ground, and lets his momentum carry his sword toward the body of his attacker. But the claws have found purchase, and even as the hound falls to the ground, it pulls him violently forward with it. Collapsing to one knee and crying out in the searing pain as the flesh of his chest tears under the grip of the beast, Hældáris is able to plunge the blade of the lightbringer into what he hopes is the creature’s torso. But it would not have mattered either way, as once the blade breaks the skin of the beast, a brilliant light blinds him and all in the campsite. He feels the energy of the light pouring into him and through him, something that until this day he has never experienced, but of which many times he has been told. What he did not expect, however, is that with the outpouring of the light it would feel that his own vital essence was also being drained, funneled into a white-hot exorcism to purge the creature of darkness before him. Even as the light again dims and Hældáris stumbles to his feet, he feels consciousness slipping from him, and he would collapse to the earth were not the strong arms of Aeyósha there to catch him and hold him up.
† † †
When Hældáris awakes the sun is high in the sky, shining full upon his face. He blinks a few times to dispel the fog from his eyes, and he sees the faces of Aeyósha and Îsáric as they bend over him.
“We heard you groaning,” explains the latter, “and suspected consciousness was at last returning.”
“How long…ah,” Hældáris begins, but the pain in his chest silences him for a moment before he is able to complete his thought, “How long was I unconscious?”
“It is a little past noon,” says Aeyósha. “Your wounds are ugly but not particularly deep. It is the light that exhausted you. I remember Rórlain telling me of his experience with such things long ago, when I was but a boy. But you recovered quickly enough, all things considered.”
“Quickly enough?”
“Be glad that the creature did not get you with its fangs,” interjects Îsáric. “It is said among us that they bear a deadly poison that nothing can hinder.”
Pushing himself into a sitting position and looking around, Hældáris asks, “Are all the others well?”
“Aye, well enough,” says Aeyósha. “A few scratches and cuts here and there, but nothing serious.”
“What were those creatures?”
This time it is Dágra himself who answers, stepping into Hældáris’ view and squatting down so that their faces may meet. “I said their name before, stringhûndr, but I expect this meant little or nothing to you.”
“We have no such word in our language, nor have I encountered creatures of their likeness before.”
“I think I have heard of them—or rather read of them,” says Aeyósha, “though in our language they go by a different name. Our people have long called them faemgrûndi; ‘hounds of the blood-suckers,’ it translates, more or less.”
“The meaning is the same in our tongue,” affirms Dágra.
“But what does it mean?”
“I assume that you know little, then, of the stringr.”
“In our language they are called faempíri,” Aeyósha clarifies.
“Faempíri… Stringr…” sighs Hældáris. “I understand the origins of the words now, but I still do not grasp the import. The creatures who command the hounds, these so-called ‘blood-suckers,’ what are they?”
“Precisely that, no more and no less,” says Îsáric.
“Or perhaps a little more,” Dágra corrects. “You see, as far as I have come to understand it, these stringr have made a bargain with forces unseen in order to grasp something of everlasting life, something of deathlessness, and they do so by binding their flesh and their spirit to the desperate need to drink the lifeblood of other creatures.”
“That sounds like a malicious pact if ever there was one,” says Hældáris. “But how is this need different than our own need for food and nourishment?”
“Living men need sustenance to sustain their bodies, this is true,” says Dágra, “but its source is of little importance. A man can live on potatoes if he sets his mind to it. The earth yields up its bounty and we receive it in gratitude. There is something beautiful about this dependence and this receiving.”
“Verily. But we also hunt.”
“Aye, that we do,” says Îsáric. “And perhaps our very killing of other creatures to be our meat and our food is a sign that something is not right with the world.”
“And these stringr?”
“They consume blood not for bodily nourishment but for life itself, as in the very act of taking they find their sustenance and the fuel for their continued existence. And the higher in the hierarchy of being a creature is, the more sustenance do they find. Is that correct, Dágra?”
“Precisely.”
“And what is higher than a living man or woman?” Hældáris concludes. “Is that what you are saying?”
“Yes. Most stringr that we have ever heard of from children’s tales or history books descend into a form of cannibalism, as their insatiable hunger leads them to yearn for and rely upon human blood for their continued life. Such is the price they pay for immortality.”
“Such is the price that others pay…”
“Aye, that is better said. Though for some it must, at least in the beginning, be a burden indeed, even though one that they have freely chosen. But I imagine that eventually the mind and the heart numb to the horror of the act, and centuries later hardly anything more than a monster remains of what was once a living person.”
Rising now to his feet, Hældáris says, “I seem to be well enough recovered to continue our journey, and I have had enough of such topics at present. Shall we be on our way?”
“Aye, we shall,” says Dágra. “However, there is one final thing that needs to be said.”
“What is that?”
It is Aeyósha who answers in the name of all, “If the hounds were sent to attack us, then this means that we are being tracked—or better, hunted—by a stringa, or by more than one. We must take immense care in the rest of our journey to protect ourselves and the two brothers who have asked for our aid.”
“And what is the best way to do such a thing?”
“Stringr despise the full light of day. Many say it is because it burns them. They are creatures of the darkness, and so they shall likely attack only at night.”
“So we set a guard,” says Îsáric, “of at least two men.”
“And yet if the stringa does not attack us, shall he or she not move on rather to another victim less equipped to resist their assault?” Hældáris proffers.
Raising his eyebrows in surprise and in immediate understanding, Dágra says, “So you propose that we make sure we are caught by it?”
“I take no pleasure in the death of one who is, or at the very least has been long ago, a living man or woman,” says Hældáris, “and yet if we have an opportunity to stop their harming another innocent person, I think that we should take it.”
At this moment their converse is interrupted by another voice, that of Astër, “I hear what you are saying, and I do not disagree, but let us not allow any more daylight to slip away from us. If we are being hunted, surely it will follow us even if we travel farther…to a less exposed and more defensible location.”
“Aye, you are right,” replies Dágra. “And I must speak with our dear merchants and tell them of our plan, which I imagine shall please them very little.”
† † †
The afternoon passes as the company continues on its way westward, and at first all are silent, occupied with their own thoughts. The brothers Édvin and Égill were, as expected, not at all pleased to hear of the threat of being hunted by a stringa, nor that their protectors hope to confront them directly rather than to flee from them with all haste. They insisted that events were allowed to play out as they might, and that the travelers did nothing to lure the stringa nor to facilitate a confrontation. And this, with differing measures of agreement, was accepted by all.
As day inclines toward evening, Aeyósha says to Hældáris, “We may be fretting and worrying about nothing. For I have doubts that we shall still be the objects of the faempir’s hunt after the display of this morning. Seeing the light with which their minions were felled, they are likely to look elsewhere for the sustenance that they need, and to trouble us no longer.”
“You may well be right,” agrees Hældáris, “unless of course we are now seen as a threat that must be eliminated. Then we have gained for ourselves a powerful enemy, of whom we shall not be rid until this affair comes to its conclusion.”
“Let us hope that it does not come to that.”
“Better us than another.”
“I suppose so,” says Aeyósha, though his voice betrays a measure of doubt, some unspoken uncertainty about whether wishing for a confrontation with the stringa is an appropriate attitude. Hældáris assumes that it is the same for his friend as it is for himself: even in such extreme circumstances, neither of them desires to take the life of someone who, however perverse their existence has become, remains in their essence and their destiny human. Occupied each with their own thoughts, both men lapse into silence. And gradually Hældáris’ thoughts carry him on beyond the affairs of the day and the considerations they have awakened, and his mind broadens out to the contours of the previous weeks of his life, so full of suffering and loss, of vulnerability and uncertainty.
And as Hældáris walks with his friend at his side, and his newfound companion not far behind them, and those others with whom he travels roundabout, he feels grateful that he does not journey alone. Yet even so, as his chest aches and burns with the wounds he received from the stringhûnda, he feels exposed and defenseless. And despite the evening sun shining full overhead he finds himself looking around cautiously and glancing over his shoulder. Considering all that has befallen him since his approach to the shores of Vælíria, he thinks, it is not unusual that he is experiencing a certain measure of fear and even of paranoia. The assault upon him and all that he holds dear has been frequent and sustained, almost as if some invisible force seeks to set up obstacles to block his way and to turn him aside from his purpose. Or perhaps it simply seeks to maliciously destroy what is precious to him. But surely that is not the case. After all, sometimes things just happen, do they not? And even if forces beyond the ken of man militate against what is good, are they not hindered from laying their hands upon that which the Guardian of all in his kindness has given and therefore protects? And if this is so, then how can Hældáris understand the tragedy at sea, and the loss of Relmaríndë, and the very existence of corrupted creatures such as the stringr, as anything other than a mysterious part of divine providence—like the underside of a tapestry or the shadowed places in an artwork of beautiful chiaroscuro, destined at the end of the ages to be bathed in the fullness of light and to become itself all light?
Turning his attention from these thoughts, Hældáris looks about him as the landscape surrounding is bathed in the vibrant light of the evening sun. And even in the midst of his fear he cannot help being moved by the beauty of the moorlands through which they journey, cloaked as they are in thick grasses and heather and interspersed with trees of various kinds, both conifer and deciduous, though there is a marked preponderance of the latter. Ruined homesteads and watchtowers still litter the landscape here and there, their ancient wood rotting away into the earth and their tumbled stone and cracked masonry overgrown with budding vines and mosses of green, purple, and red.
And yet this beauty stirs within his heart not a feeling of joyful contentment but of melancholy, an aching sadness in the very wellsprings of his thought and affection. But is not all beauty in this life marked by a feeling of sadness and loss? So he thinks to himself. In every taste of goodness and every glimpse of beauty there is hidden some memory of a lost homeland which has never been known but can never be forgotten, even as there is also a hope for the homeland still to come, which is the same as that of the origin from which all has come, though carried to fullness and consummation beyond all imagination or desire. All beauty, all love, he thinks, is always a wound as much as it is a healing. Or rather its healing occurs through its wounding, until the heart itself becomes all wound, all openness and vulnerability, weeping at the slightest song of the sunset or dancing in response to the whisper of the littlest flower, touching thereby in some way, even in exile and longing, the home where longing shall be fulfilled in fullness of presence and belonging and the journey of life shall give way, beyond all shadows and darkness and obscurity, to the radiant adventure of eternity.
But until then one walks in the chiaroscuro of this mortal life, finding light accentuated by the shadows, and by the shadows being impelled to yearn more ardently for the light. Has Relmaríndë already passed beyond the shadows into a place of light, or is she in some place of waiting, expectant of a light yet to come? Is not her death, rather than a loss, a liberation? This very thought, as it passes through his mind, effects a shift somewhere deep within Hældáris’ heart, and the fear that has been oppressing him loosens its grip, or at least changes in its nature. For a moment he sees a path beyond the fear of death and into an acceptance of it, even a longing for it, in the hope that he may venture where she has gone before, and that the hole that she has left in his heart may be filled again with the fullness of her presence, and even more with the presence of the One whom Hældáris has known from his earliest days, but who in the darkness of this life, shattered by pain, suffering, and loss, is all but invisible to his inner eye and inaccessible to the experience of his heart.
And then the moment has passed, and as the twilight of the sky changes into nocturnal darkness, Hældáris loses the threads of his thought and experience and feels a sense of heaviness return to replace the lightness that he has tasted, though the latter sinks into some secret place within him, hidden but not extinguished.
† † †
They set up camp for the night among the ruins of an old watchtower, half of it still standing twenty yards above the surrounding moorland and the other half collapsed and broken, spread where it has fallen and sunken into the soft earth, which reaches out in grass and vine, root and branch, to enfold it in an embrace that over the centuries has assimilated the cut stone into the very earth almost as part of it. The remnants of the tower provide complete protection from the south and the east, while leaving their camp exposed to the north and the west; but even this shall make the watch easier even as it provides a significantly improved sense of safety for the wayfarers in the face of their fear of pursuit. While a fire is lit and a meal is prepared, bedding is strewn about and the men prepare themselves for the night, which is cool though not yet cold. A steady albeit gentle breeze blows from the north and whistles among the ancient stone, for some eerie and for others consoling, considering how much the perception of the heart is colored by the trust and hope that it carries within, or by its fear, by its confidence and serenity or by its uncertainty and trepidation. One reads the world according to what one carries already within oneself; and yet at the same time, a heart truly humble and receptive can listen deeply enough to hear the world itself speak, gentle yet sure, and thus to gradually align what is within the heart with what is outside of it, with the very truth of being and of life.
“Do any of you sing or play an instrument?” asks Édvin, carrying a small pack from the back of one of the wains and setting it beside his sleeping roll. “Perhaps a little music would do us good.”
“Not worthily for your ears,” replies Astër, “nor for any other, I am afraid.”
“I do a little of both,” offers Hældáris after a moment’s pause, “though I have no instrument with me.”
“Well, that is good. I myself pluck the lyre a bit, though I am a pitiful performer,” replies Édvin, “though Égill is better than I.”
“I also play the lyre,” Hældáris says.
“Do you? Well, brilliant! We have one with us now. Will you play for us?”
“Gladly. It has been too long since I have touched the strings, and my fingers long for the touch again, and for the music born from it.”
“Spoken like a true musician,” adds Égill with a broad smile, drawing from the bowels of a cart a bundle wrapped in cloth. When he has withdrawn its contents, he places in Hældáris’ hands a beautifully-crafted nineteen string lyre, its weathered wood richly colored in the firelight.
At first he plays a few simple melodic pieces, some traditional to his people and some of his own creation, while the other travelers sit in silence and listen, no other sounds interrupting the music than the crackling of the fire, the whistle of the wind, and the occasional call of a nearby owl. Then Égill asks him, “Can you also sing for us?”
“I suppose I can. Is there anything in particular you would like to hear? A certain piece, perhaps?”
“I know not what music we might share in common. But even if I did, let us hear something especially Telméric, something that speaks with the voice of your culture and your land.”
“I know just such a piece,” says Hældáris, glad for this opportunity. “It is entitled, ‘The Lay of the Velási,’ an ancient song from days long past.” And after preparing himself for a moment in silence, he plucks the strings marking out the accompanying melody and then begins to sing in a soft yet clear voice:
In days of yore when time was newly wrought
and grass fresh-grown and daylight new and young,
among the woodland and the mountains’ shade
man and woman walked in oneness and peace,
and light was given to them as a troth
binding earth to heaven and heaven earth.
Affixed in the wood of the greatest tree
the Illûstra gave light and warmth freely
in equal measure, a priceless jewél;
it was fullness given yet promise too,
of light eternal, unbound, yet to come,
which sun and moon and stars dimly reflect.
Yet light cannot in the hands be held, trapped,
but must be allowed to shine upon all
in its ungraspable fullness, so near,
yet surpassing all that can be contained,
in the beauty known not in possession
but in intimacy of belonging.
When darkness descended thus on the world
as those first children made the light their own
—forgetting that it was theirs from the start—
grief and division, sorrow and lament,
rippled through creation like a rupture
in cloth seamless woven by one design.
As love knits unity so greed births loss,
the rupture of communion, “I” and “Thou,”
as a butterfly trapped in a jar dies.
But so too promise is given in loss,
that the cocoon, death, bears hidden new life,
and life and light return in darkest place.
Many years of warfare and corruption
follow in the wake of that first taking,
and Gálrid comes, lusting still for power,
seeking the jewél that has lost its light,
a manslayer he becomes, in anger
born of hunger appeased not by goodness.
Warfare, too, follows, and its untold fear,
but mercy intervenes to limit death
that life may be born in the face of loss:
as Hæliána and Neréthion
appear to Sílion and his kindred,
full of shining glory and untold peace.
Spirits of light and beauty before time
into time enter to bring light anew
that what was lost may not be so wholly,
but shall live within man as seed and hope,
awaiting the long yearned-for renewal
when Light pierces the darkness and death dies,
the strains of eternity sung in time.
Whenever his song has ceased there is a moment of laden silence in which the listeners consider its words and also give the appropriate space of respect for the singer of the song. Dágra is the first to speak, “It is a lovely myth, though somewhat pedantic.”
Hældáris laughs quietly. “Such is the bent of our people. We tend to hit you on the nose with the lesson. We like our words clear and to the point.”
“But some things can only be known in the subtlety of experience,” says Dágra, “and not in the summation given by simple words. And certainly not in oversimplified moral imperatives.”
“I agree with you completely,” Hældáris says. “We have a good measure of that subtlety as well. This song is from a very early time in our history, and the translation I have given loses some of the origin, both its simplicity and its nuance.”
“But despite all the limitations in expression, the memory is precious to us,” remarks Aeyósha, “if only we had not forgotten it for so long.”
“A memory? How could it be a memory?” asks Astër. “Surely the remembrance of your people cannot possibly stretch that far back, to the origins of time. As Dágra said, it is myth and no more.”
“Myth it is if you mean that is speaks in language symbolic of realities nonetheless historic,” says Aeyósha. “But if you refer to it as myth in order to say that it is not real, and that it never happened, then we must disagree.”
“Such is your opinion.”
“Such is our knowledge.”
“What do you mean?” Dágra asks.
“My father met the Sílion of whom the song speaks,” explains Hældáris, “and he looked upon the ancient tree wherein the light was once housed, and from which it was taken.”
“But surely this man would be many millennia old by now, and no man lives for such a length of time.”
“If the powers of darkness can grant unto man some taste of immortality, as we know from the stringr of whom we have recently spoken, how much more can the powers of light give him its essence and its truth,” says Aeyósha. “The blessing bestowed upon Sílion and his kindred, of which the song speaks, was precisely that of enduring life, that they may serve for countless ages as the memory and the hope of the people, until the light comes and they may depart to the place allotted for them.”
“Forgive me if I must remain skeptical,” Astër retorts. Dágra is silent, his face thoughtful but uncertain.
“There is no need for forgiveness,” says Aeyósha.
“Is there a song that speaks well of the mind and heart, history or legend of your own people?” Hældáris asks, turning to Édvin and Égill, holding out the lyre to them. “I would be delighted to hear it.”
“I suppose I could attempt one,” says Égill, taking the instrument, “though neither my playing nor my singing can compare with yours.” Laying the lyre across his lap and strumming the strings as if they were those of a lute, he then makes some adjustments to the tuning so that other notes on some of the strings will sound. “Well, here it is,” he says, and then begins:
Young Aldorin tar’Uneyon,
of his father sire and scion,
came one day into the woodland
and met a fairy on a rock.
“What are you?” saith he to her,
“so strange, radiant apparition,
and yet so beautifullý fashioned
all over, foot, and head, and hand.”
“What am I?” she spake unto he,
“I am a fae of yon river;
glass, the arrow in my quiver,
crystal the jewél in my hand.”
“I understand ye not,” quoth he,
“for I see no arrow, no gem,
and, for that matter, no stream,
but only tree, grass, soil, and rock.”
“No river?” she saith, “not yet.
It hath yet to be carved by time
and by water flowing in prime.
But ye shall see, shall understand.
For harbinger am I of life
that yet shall come to this here wood,
and in this place for years have stood,
though, I admit, at times have danced.”
“Fae,” quoth the man, “my people thirst.
Wouldst thou direct thy stream to me?
For father sends me forth to see
if some goodness I can yet stock
and bring back to my family
and our clan-lands during this drought,
searching wide the lands hereabout.
I shall not return empty hand.”
“What wilst thou give me,” spake the fae,
“if I lead mine water to thine?
Thus you may speak to father thine
and say for him this you have gained.”
“What wishest thou? Thou seemst so free.
To think of any lack in thee
seems an impossibility.
Speak, and I shall do as I can.”
“Only that thou, man, comest here
every year until thou art grey
and leave on this stone a bouquet.
Then wealth shall fill thy heart and hand.”
“It shall be done,” quoth Aldorin,
and thus it was confirmed, truly,
and great rain came, incessantly,
‘til the land was again alive.
And river flowed in coming years
to irrigate the Vægo land,
and came the man flowers in hand
and placed them upon fairy stone.
Prospered did he for many years
until, an old man, he forgot.
Appeared to he on near eyot,
then, the fairy, unchanged in form.
“Why come ye not this year, old man?”
she spake, though in her voice was play.
“I jest. I come to ye to say
‘thank you’ for gifts of many years.”
And now the old man recognized,
and upon his face a smile spread.
“Good to see you, old olveäd,
one last time, before mine is done.”
“Faithfulness hast thou shown to me,”
the fae spake one last time to he,
“bringing thine gift devotedly,
though all I sought was thy heart’s love.”
“Lovéd you from the first I have.
In you quenching of thirst I saw,
not of my kin alone, but all,
for who guides rivers but the One?
And you were his harbinger, fae,
into arid depths of my heart;
with me from the earliest start
you shall be with me to the end.”
“Myth?” asks Aeyósha with a smile shortly after the singing has ceased.
“Aye, myth,” agrees Égill, “though the meaning is very much the same.”
