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“Where are you taking me?” I demanded of the stag. “Will you take me to Khalim?”

Gnarled, gray trees pressed in around me. Making my way through them was like shouldering a path through a crowd of people. The bark yielded to my efforts like flesh, but it was cold as death—cold as a Northern winter. I drew my hand back in surprise. Crumbling brown leaves littered the ground beneath my feet, and above, a sickly, yellow-green sky cast eerie light on a lattice of gray branches. 

Despite having spoken before, the stag gave me no answer. It walked with heavy footsteps as the trees parted before it, not even turning its oak-crowned head to acknowledge me. 

Continue reading “Journey to the Water Chapter XXVII: Nagara in Sunlight” →

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For four weeks I journeyed through those mountains, in the shadow of the sacred peak of Abora. At its top, the villagers among the cliffs told me, was the shrine of the great serpent-god, the wisest and craftiest of all the ancient beings that had once built cities in the highest reaches, whose eyes were like rubies and whose feathered wings could blot out the sun. Each morning, sunlight blazed from behind the mountain, and I thought again of climbing it; by the time I had packed up my camp and saddled Bran again, the desire had burned away like fog. I returned to the road north and did not stop again until nightfall. 

The sun set a little earlier each evening, and as I followed the pilgrim’s road, the forest turned from deep emerald to the yellow-brown of the kelp that grew in the warm waters of the south. From the highest places of the world to the bottom of the ocean, the turn of the seasons followed me. I had allowed my quest to stretch on for two years, and I was determined not to let another pass without Khalim by my side. 

Fate, however, had other plans for me. Perhaps if I had sought the aid of the winged serpent of Mount Abora, my journey would have proceeded differently. 

Continue reading “Journey to the Water Chapter XXIV: A Vast, Green Country” →