Dry as dust (Veldrys)

[Bolden Denusk]

Timestamp: 34 Fall, 511 AV

Too annoyed to pay attention to the warnings, Bolden hadn't filled his waterskin so carefully that morning. Nightwind had his fill first as always, and his rider had foolishly opted for wine instead. The severe drought held Endrykas in its choking grasp with no end in sight. The endless plains of grass grew golden, dry and brittle, soon becoming inedible for the countless herds of horses.

Distracted by unresolved issues, he didn't pay any real attention to his surroundings. His throat parched and lips cracked and bleeding, he fell back onto the pillows in a senseless heap. Nightwind sensed something off and boldly entered the tent, moving aside the flap with his long nose.

He tried snuffling Bold's face but the rider stayed unconscious despite the strider's efforts. The enormous horse nickered in concern and laid down carefully by Bolden, keeping his flanks resting against the young man's side. And the Drykas dreamed.

'Bolden crouched nervously in the Sea of Grass with a sword in his hand. A pack of snarling glassbeaks roamed nearby and the Drykas knew they'd make short work of him should he be discovered.

The sun beat down overhead, bearing down on his dark hair and shoulders. Whining, stinging insects rose up in swarms, biting at the sweaty skin so easily available. A breeze like hot breath, abruptly dried and withered up the glassbeaks, leaving bleached bones dropping into the dust with a puff. The grass began to smolder and smoke until they suddenly burst into flame!

He jumped up, ignoring the cramped muscles and started running all out from the fire. The baking hot wind breathed the inferno to a higher pitch and the smoke seared his lungs, making his eyes blind with tears.'

[Veldrys]

The Symenestra had spent the day as always, praying to his god Viratas and treating his patients. There had been a little girl who suffered from a fever. The mother had only reluctantly allowed him near her – everybody knew what the Symenestra did – but in the end he’d been able to take a look at the child. He’d given her some tea made of willow bark and a few instructions. Later he had taken part in a ceremony in the Chapel, and in the evening he’d sat in his home, pouring over his notes.

There were few accounts of the Valterrian, even in Denval. He’d heard people mention earthquakes, fire that rained from the sky for days. Ivak had supposedly been responsible for it, but what about the people that had suffered because of him? He wished he could find a diary, a letter, anything that had been written by a survivor. What had it really been like when the Fire God had destroyed the world?

He needed to know so that he would understand the suffering of his own people a little better, so that he would be able to reconstruct the world as it had once been and save them. You could only understand the present and change the future if you understood the past, if you knew exactly why things had happened the way they had.

He sat there for hours, until the sun set, by the light of a candle, reluctant to go to bed. This here was more important than his own wellbeing, more important than even his own life. His eyelids grew heavy, and he yawned. He decided to close his eyes for just a moment – he would continue his work later – and then he fell asleep, almost against his will.

As he awoke again – or was he still sleeping, dreaming? – the world around him had changed. It was hot. There was fire everywhere, and the air was heavy with smoke, as if the Valterrian had taken place only a moment ago. The Symenestra stared at the flames fascinatedly. It seemed as if he had been transported straight into the past, although he had no idea how exactly it had happened. If he touched the flames, would they burn him?

Was the floating city of his people, somewhere in the jungles of Falyndar, still standing? If he persuaded them to hide above ground rather than in a cave, would it keep them from becoming the venomous murderers they had turned into?

He thought about that for a few moments, while the fire came closer and closer. His eyes started to water a little, and he coughed, but he still kept on staring, almost mesmerized. He stood there until his gaze fell on a man, running from the fire. His eyes widened. For some reason he hadn’t expected to find anybody else here. He hesitated, but if this was the past, then his race wouldn’t have such a bad reputation yet. He approached the man.

Bolden would see a figure coming closer, dressed in precious silk. He looked completely out of place in Endrykas. „We need to get away from the fire.“ The Symenestra’s voice was calm. Even though he had decided that the fire was probably real, the whole situation still had a surreal quality to it. He couldn’t quite manage to be afraid.

As he looked down on himself for a few moments, the Symenestra realized that his skin was not as pale as it usually was. It was more like that of a human. He looked like the Symenestra had once looked, before they had become hated all over the world. Maybe everything would be fine. Maybe the gods had decided to give him, no, his entire race one last chance.

[Bolden Denusk]

Tucked away in the farthest corner of his mind, Bolden knew it had to be a dream. Ever since that fateful conversation with his father, he dreamed of running away from something each and every time. Waking or sleeping, Bolden couldn't escape the empty lie his life had become.

The fire roared and growled with a life of it's own, like a hungry wolf snapping at his heels. The heat singed his back and the smoke roiled and billowed in a darkening haze. He pushed himself to run farther, almost knocking over a man who appeared in his path. Like a horse in a herd, he swerved and barely lessened the straining pace. Bold yelled over his shoulder,

"Run man! Unless you want to be cooked alive!"

His brief glimpse of the stranger revealed a regular blond guy, albeit somewhat thinner than the average Drykas. The man appeared to be more fine boned than his own family's brawny frames. For the life of him he couldn't fathom why the man just stood there in front a raging grass fire! Other than a pack of glassbeaks, what could be scarier to a Drykas than an out of control wild fire?

The young Drykas felt his lungs fit to burst. Between the lengthy running and growing inferno, he was glad to see the wide river stretching out before him. That is, until he remembered he couldn't swim. But he -had- to at least make it to the water to get safe from the fire.

When he surged heavily into the water, he turned to look at the stranger. The fire was nearly upon the man, yet he seemed unafraid! He yelled out above the fiery plains and turbulent river,

"Move it and run man! You'll be toast in a chime!"

[Veldrys]

Veldrys didn’t mind that the fire was so loud that he almost couldn’t hear the things that the other man said – no, screamed. On the contrary, he found it fascinating. He had never been near such a big fire. The Nest in Kalinor had been burned down a few years ago - or was that event still a few centuries in the future? It gave him a headache to even think about it – but it hadn’t been nearly as great as this. He wondered which part of the world he was in. Was he still in Kalea? Or had they transported him to Falyndar? No, this didn’t look like a jungle. It was much too dry here ...

Bolden’s scream snapped him out of his thoughts abruptly. Although he had come to the same conclusion and even voiced his concerns, the Symenestra couldn’t help but be a little annoyed. He wanted to study the fire a while longer. He wanted to know exactly how the people that had tried to escape the Valterrian had felt!

As Bolden ran past him, he hesitated. He looked at the flames that were still coming closer and then at the man. The fire fascinated him, but if he followed Bolden he would get the opportunity to talk to a man from the past! Or was it the present now? Maybe he could help him. Maybe he knew that one thing that would help him save his race!

Having come to a decision he cast one last glance at the fire, and then he ran after the Drykas as fast as he could. He still wasn’t sure if the fire would kill him – could a fire kill somebody that came from the future? – but he followed Bolden into the river nevertheless because the man would probably be able to answer a few of his questions.

Unlike the Drykas he could swim, not very well, but well enough to keep his head above the water. When he had been a boy in Kalinor he had often visited the Blue Grotto because it was one of the few places where he could be alone. The water had always had a calming effect on him. He even enjoyed it now, despite the fire and the general strangeness of the situation.

„I’m here“, he informed Bolden. He tried to get a closer look at the man which wasn’t easy with all the smoke. The Drykas didn’t look that different from the humans he had met in his time. It seemed as if the human race hadn’t changed at all since the Valterrian.

„What now?“ he wanted to know.

[Bolden Denusk]

"We were nearly burnt alive and all you have to say is what now?!" Bolden coughed and sputtered, barely getting out the words.
"What living creature isn't afraid of fire? Are you a ghost or something?"

He churned up the water with each stride until it reached waist level. When he looked over his shoulder, he felt the fire was still a bit too close for comfort and waded in a little further. Reluctant to move too much farther where he had to swim, and too far back, closer to the fire, the young Drykas faltered in the rapids.

Like a stubborn horse, he planted himself about mid chest in the water. Sure he was scared of the fire, but he couldn't swim so that was as far as he would go with the two choices. The Drykas just wasn't a water or swimming kind of guy so standing in the river was only the lesser of two evils.

He looked at the man next to him, wondering at his fearlessness. So distant and removed from the situation, Veldrys' fair hair, skin and eyes were as much an anomaly as his attitude.

'Definitely not Drykas. But if that was true, then -what- was he? Just an average Outsider from Syliras? Not even a Drykas woman was that pale, thin and soft looking.'

He dunked himself under the water for a chime and then questioned the guy.
"I don't know what now. Who are you and what you doing here?"

Bold's voice was edgy and nervous, not quite bordering on rude. Steam rose and billowed in huge clouds as the leading edge nipped at the water. He moved up to his neck and stood with rigid with apprehension. He couldn't move back or forward, and he frowned, feeling thoroughly trapped.

[Veldrys]

„Am I a living creature?“ Veldrys wondered and thought about it. Certainly, the smoke burned in his eyes, he had to suppress the urge to cough, and the water he was in was wet and felt just like real water, but was that proof enough? Was a man that hadn’t been born yet alive in the normal sense of the word? „I’m not sure“, he murmurred. „I think I’m somewhere in between, alive and dead at the same time.“ With that he followed Bolden deeper into the water.

„Why don’t we try to get to the other side of the river?“ he asked as he noticed that the human had just planted himself in the middle of the river and didn’t seem to have any interest in moving forward or backward. „Unless this is some kind of strange magical fire, it will not be able to follow us across the river. We should be safe on the other side.“

With that he made a few steps forward until he couldn’t feel touch the bottom of the river with his feet anymore, but as he noticed that Bolden was still stubbornly standing where he had been before, he returned. He didn’t want to abandon the only person he had met in this strange place so far. Besides, he could always watch the fire a little longer.

„I’m Veldrys“, he answered. He had to raise his voice a bit so that Bolden could hear him. The fire seemed even louder than before now. „And I’m not sure what I’m doing here. Watching the end of the world, maybe ...“ He had no idea why he had ended up in this particular place. He had been in Denval before. Was anything important going to happen here? Was Bolden, this strange, ignorant human somebody important?

Had Viratas, his god sent him here so that he could watch over him? Should he reveal his connection to the blood god to him or try to pretend that he was just another refugee? Should he act as if he were afraid from something he wasn’t even sure was completely real?

[Bolden Denusk]

The utter disbelief showed clearly in his eyes and face at such nonsense, and he shook his head.

"There's no such thing as in between. Seriously right? You're dead or you're alive-you can't get any simpler than that!"

Bolden saw Veldrys head past him to go into deeper water. The wake of his passing lapped the water over Bold's chin and he sputtered and coughed, trying to raise his head as far as he could. He couldn't think what with the fire so loud and close, the deep water around him when he didn't know how to swim and then this Outsider who didn't know if he was dead or alive.

"Veldrys? That doesn't sound like a Drykas name. Are you from Syliras--" The young man stopped, frowned and looked at the other guy. His comment and total lack of reaction stunned him.

A wildfire was a scary thing but they happened, and they most definitely weren't the end of the world. Maybe the guy was just a confused outsider is all. Not smart enough to recognize the danger of a wild fire or the reality of losing your footing in the deep river rapids. The current had been known to float entire herds of horses downstream so quickly, so brutally that not even one survived.

The idea of trying to talk to Veld helped to calm him; well as much as could be expected. With the tone of an adult speaking to a child, he explained patiently.

"The wild fire will not just burn you, it can suffocate you from a distance. These river rapids have strong undercurrents that will throw you downstream and rip you to shreds on underwater rocks the moment you lift your feet and try to swim across it. For the moment, I am alive and you are alive. But one way or another, fire or water, one of them could take our lives any chime now in a very ugly and violent way. Do you understand?"

[Veldrys]

Under normal circumstances Veldrys would agree that there was no such thing as ‚in between‘ unless you were a Nuit – he was a scientist, a doctor – but when you had been transported straight from your home in Denval to something out of a nightmare, the usual laws of nature didn’t apply anymore. And thus he just shrugged his shoulders as he heard Bolden’s words and looked at the human whose intelligence was rather questionable. He didn’t really care what the man thought of him as long as he gave him the information he wanted.

„Drykas?“ Veldrys repeated and furrowed his brow. It seemed as if part of the puzzle had been solved. Apparently he was in Endrykas, and all of Endrykas was on fire. He had met a Drykas once – or an Ethaefal who had been a Drykas in his past life - but Sitkanis had been nothing like this stranger here. Sitkanis had been an intelligent man, if a little melancholic. Bolden on the other hand was completely ignorant.

„No, I’m from Denval“, he said. He knew that Denval had existed before the Valterrian, even though it had just been a small military outpost back then. Claiming that he was from there was probably the better choice. While he knew where his people, the Symenestra, had lived before, he didn’t know what kind of reputation they had had.

„Suffocate me?“ He narrowed his eyes as he looked at the fire that was so close. He had never heard of a fire that could suffocate people, and he wasn’t completely sure what a wild fire was. As for undercurrents, he decided to believe that part, although he couldn’t help but wonder if he could solve that problem with Morphing. But on the other hand, using magic in front of this person would probably be a bad idea.

He didn’t know what the people of this time thought of magic and if his magic even worked here.

„I understand“, he replied. „So you want to tell me that we will be stuck here until the fire goes away or somebody miraculously comes and saves us?“

While he didn’t mind water – or fire – standing in a river in his clothes was a little unpleasant, and he didn’t particularly like the smoke either. He wanted to find out what was behind the fire or on the other side of the river. He wanted to explore the strange place he had found himself in and not drown or burn to death.

[Bolden Denusk]

Denval? Veldrys was definitely an Outsider, but that couldn't explain away the man's bizarre ambivalence toward a painful death.

'He thinks a wildfire is the end of the world, but isn't afraid of it? That makes no petching sense at all! This guy doesn't know that smoke suffocates, fire burns and water can drown a person?! Has no clue that all of Endrykas is enduring the worst drought in memory?' Bold thought in disbelief.

Bolden knew that Outsiders couldn't possibly know Drykas ways, but was anyone really so dumb that they didn't know what dead or alive was? How could anyone not be scared of things that could kill you? All Veldrys did was repeat his words like a parrot. Were all Denval people this slow or was it just him?

The young Drykas sighed, trying to think straight. He couldn't swim so going farther out wasn't an option but neither was staying here or going back. Maybe he could wade downstream and see if it didn't drop off. He was worried about the Outsider though, with his utter lack of comprehension when it came to danger. It was painfully obvious that Veldrys didn't understand or even believe that smoke from a fire could suffocate him.

„I understand“, he replied. „So you want to tell me that we will be stuck here until the fire goes away or somebody miraculously comes and saves us?“

"No that's not what I 'want to tell you.' " He huffed in irritation at he man's ludicrously unnatural calm behavior in such a volatile situation.

Bold watched him for a moment, and began explaining what he would do. This very strange, not very bright guy could choose to follow or not. He didn't want to sound harsh, but Veldrys apparently needed the obvious spelled out for him. Even seeing fire, coughing on smoke and feeling the strong pull of the current weren't enough to convince the Denvali of his own mortality enough to raise an eyebrow for his own survival.

"I'm going to try and move downstream to see if it gets shallower. I can't swim, so I can't go out over my head like you do in the water. Even if I could swim, the current's dangerously strong so I still wouldn't risk it personally. It's safer to keep both feet on the ground. You don't seem to think that smoke can suffocate, fire burns or water can drown, and it doesn't bother you in the slightest. If you'd like to follow me to keep me company that's fine, or if you still believe that deadly things won't kill you, then breathe deep and enjoy your swim Veldrys."

'You could lead a man away from danger, but you couldn't make him fear it, I guess..'

[Veldrys]

The Symenestra’s opinion of Bolden decreased by the second. Were all men of his time like that? It was no wonder that the Valterrian had happened and that Alahea and Suvan had fallen. It was no wonder that Ivak had exacted his revenge on the world. Veldrys wasn’t sure if he would have been able to stand the Drykas‘ presence under normal circumstances, if they had met in Denval, in the present. Even as it was he found it hard to bear.

As Bolden corrected him, the Symenestra just shrugged again and looked at him indifferently, wondering if he should just take his robe off and throw it away as it was beginning to feel rather heavy. That matter seemed to be more important than the human’s growing irritation. But then again, the robe had cost a fortune. It was unlikely that such a kind of silk even existed in this time. Maybe he’d keep his wet robe on a little longer.

As Bolden admitted that he couldn’t swim, the Symenestra’s eyes widened in surprise. He had never met an adult that couldn’t swim. Denval was close to the sea, and thus almost every person was familiar with water, and even in Kalinor people enjoyed going swimming every once in a while. Bolden really didn’t seem to be particularly bright or talented in any way.

„As much as I would like to take a deep breath and enjoy the view a little longer, I think I’ll follow you for now“, he decided after he had given the Drykas’ words some thought. The company of a mentally challenged man from the past was better than no company at all. Besides, his questions still hadn’t been answered.

„Since you seem to consider yourself the more intelligent one of the two of us, you can go first and try and save us“, he added. In case it turned out that this here was dangerous, it was better if Bolden drowned or burned instad of him.