Chill

Chapter 16

Before the chill the Wilds of Maeven were his playground. The hermit Paterion owed allegiance to no one community and took gifts or blows in equal measure from anyone and everyone he encountered.

From the upper reaches of Turnoe Hollow to the caves that dotted the Cut of Doerath Paterion roamed in solitary thought, beholden to no man, respected by some for his obvious learning and distrusted by others for his motives in cutting himself off from society.

Some said he had committed a crime in the past for which he was ashamed. Others knew better. Paterion, elderly and bowed with long years in the open, was a Founding Father. Why he never married and founded a First Family with all the prestige that brought was an added mystery. It was a secret he kept close to his trembling heart, concealed amid the rags and dirt of eighty years. His role of a wandering beggar suited him better than founding families and cursing the world with more people like those he saw around him. Ever increasing, ever demanding. Destroying the old, erasing the past to remake destiny anew with no thought for the consequences of the future.

As he wandered from place to place, with his offworld staff in hand that glowed and hummed softly, suggesting power like a wizard's wand, he allowed these children of Troy to come to him with their questions on matters of high science or superstitious tradition. If answers met expectation they fed and clothed him, if not they sent him angrily on his way.

His curses were soft and constrained when treated harshly, as if the lack of protest should instil a sense of guilt in the offender. Yet when blessed with food, clothing or even the occasional wash, he seemed equally restrained in his thanks. Again implying what was offered to him freely was his by right.

The temperate pleasures of the Wilds of Maeven ended with the chill. The community fractured like ice on a frozen lake, splintering into sullen shards of resentment. Quickly Paterion perceived the way of things. Families devoted to comfort and wealth, finding these reduced by the chill, were eager to depart. Those who had laid down roots deep into the mineral rich soil of the strange world were made of stubborn stuff. The Pamistoes and Poellans, long friends with the hermit and his gruff and uncompromising ways, were people he knew would stay the course. They were not friends, for he owned none, nor allies, for he had no need of such, but useful contacts in the disintegrating world he saw around him.

The chill was nothing to him. He had the means to obviate its worst conditions and knowledge how to withstand the tremendous cold that made others flee, even the thrice accursed northerner now allied to the Sorrell clan.

The latter interested him. They controlled the most accommodating property in the whole of the Wilds and the young boy of the family was a spirit not unlike his own in some ways. A Pioneer in embryo, needing but the resources and guidance to send him on his way to high adventure in the great unknown. If only that thrice cursed Madrullian girl would make herself scarce, with her headaches and blackouts and seducing strip routine that could turn the young boy's head. Make him look the wrong way at the wrong moment. Paterion knew all about that and the memory of it gleamed bitterly like ice in his watery old eyes. He would see Professor Motar Madrullian and his family fall, for the man was a great liar, a false heart, a manipulator of the thoughts and emotions of those who had needed his trust most.

The chill was a blessing, an unexpected blessing from the Space Gods, and just possibly the very thing needed to end all this, to end the curse of the Madrullians and their seductive silver eyes. Only he, Paterion, was not the man to exploit this frozen opportunity. Because of her.

His heart was crushed at sight of her, his blood turned glacial and his tongue to heavy useless iron. He could do nothing to entrap the demon and let the Lumos have their way with her. He could only throw himself face down in the snow before her bare little feet, letting the icy tendrils curl about him until the passion subsided and she was gone, letting him live a little longer. He needed another. And like in times of old, a prayer to the guiding spirit of the Pioneers, brought him the very living soul he desired to fulfil his chosen destiny.

Tam Sorrell had wrapped himself in several protective layers that calm afternoon when but a sprinkling of fine flakes floated in the air. The prevailing winds had turned east, pushing the heavier cold air up the slopes temporarily. Everyone by now knew this would not last and the balance would shift back in but a few hours. Thus Tam's chosen mission to seek out the hermit had to be made quickly but he expected a long and arduous trek through fresh snow drifts beyond Arcadia Valley. Tracking the old man was sometimes easy as his mark was distinctive due to the staff he always carried. It was a case of crossing recent tracks before they were obliterated by yet another heavy fall.

To Tam's surprise as he wandered uncertainly around the outskirts of the Wayfarer Inn, he caught sight of telltale markings across the slope but a hundred yards from the entrance to the Inn. The old man had not been at the hall for several days since the professor's visit, much to everyone's surprise, and there was inevitably the speculation that he had finally succumbed to the harsh climate. Tam was more confident in the man's ability to survive, knowing his Pioneer background, so the discovery of familiar dragging footprints was more a relief on his own account than that of the hermit.

Tam quickly traced the meandering marks across the valley towards the Cut of Doerath. Good, he thought, the man was near his main settlement place, one of the eerie caves that riddled the ridge. They were of course former mine drillings by the minions of the Crystal Lumos. As children, Tam and Teric had explored these cave networks as far as they dared. He recalled one adventure when they goaded each other to leap across a fathomless hollow. It was only four feet across but to their ten year old perceptions seemed a terrifying gap. What was more, dropping rocks into its impenetrable blackness and listening to the increasingly distant and echoey thunder of the plunging mass that faded and faded without ever reaching a conclusion, emphasised the bottomless nature of the hollow. One slip and they would fall, perhaps forever. Like stepping through a Ghost Gate.

Their adventures ended when they stumbled upon Lumos agents and workers still using the caves for storage and speculative tests. Booming explosive charges in distant caverns were an added incentive to leave well alone. Now Tam made his way back to this childhood haunt, hoping to find the hermit at home so to speak.

The trek across what were once lush and valuable grazing lands owned by the now departed Farmer Petaloe, was pleasant in its way. The snow layer was thin and the ground rock hard and firm, so that at times Tam could skim on his board along the sloping sides. Progress was good, slowed only by the increasing incline as the swelling ridges of Doerath soared up before him, marking the southern boundary of the Wilds of Maeven. The white flanks were here and there dotted with what seemed like dark eyes that looked out across the valley at the soaring High Peaks, still grumbling with low thunder and flickering with hidden lightning. These were the many cave entrances, one of which concealed the ragged figure of the man Tam sought, Paterion the hermit.

It was easy to track which of the many caves the man had last been in. In spite of his active wanderings, the multiplicity of tracks being a source of wonder to the young lad, impressed by the elder's seeming boundless energy, it was not too difficult to unravel the mazy intricacies of his recent motions.

Paterion always held his staff in his left hand and Tam's time out among the drifts with Fallow had taught him to read patterns in the snow. The telltale marks of the staff would always be to the left therefore of the man's footprints if he was moving away from Tam whenever the latter came across a blind track. One of these patterned lines freshly laid down led directly to a cave unfamiliar to Tam, higher up than usual, the approach to which was not always covered in a layer of snow due to the steep nature of the black rock. Yet enough of the track remained to convince the teenager he was on the right path.

He paused at the entrance to the dark cave, memories of past adventures rushing back with a thrill of times long ago. Surprisingly warm air rushed past and he lowered his fur lined hood to breathe in the pleasantness of it. A welcoming warmth tinged with savoury cooking smells. He was definitely in the right place.

"Paterion!" he shouted, the sound of his voice cascading through the tunnel, bouncing off the hard rock before losing itself deep inside the ridge. A strange clicking sound greeted this cry and after waiting a few moments longer Tam repeated the call.

"I hear you," an unexpectedly loud and close response spat out from the darkness. A red glow glittered from deep within and painted the dripping sides of the cave entrance with slivers of dark blood. The light source moved in a familiar way and the muted daylight eventually revealed the shambling figure of the hermit as he shuffled towards his visitor.

"Saw you did I," the man said by way of greeting. "From way off there," he indicated with his staff glowing mist that rolled now and again through the deserted valley, a place once green with grass and noisy with the bleatings of fat and contented sheep. Now there was only silence broken occasionally by the rumblings of the outraged mountains above. "Come for a chat have you?" the man grimaced and not waiting for a response, gestured the hesitant youngster to follow. "Mind the pit to your right," he added. "Nothing but broken bones down there and frozen flesh. Still good to eat though. Sheep I mean, not farmer's flesh," and he laughed softly at his own joke. Tam remained silent but heeded the warning. The smell from the pit was unpleasant but tolerable. The hermit's makeshift larder, he presumed, where carcasses of dead sheep were stored. Thankfully beyond the drop a more pleasant smell of cooking mutton pervaded the surprisingly warm cave space. The glow of a heater upon which the haunch of meat sat sizzling and spitting was the only other source of light besides Paterion's staff. He propped the latter up against a hook in the bare cave wall and increased its luminance with a twist of the handle so that a bright blue pierced the gloom. Tam felt before he saw the soft fleecy carpet of skins underfoot, giving the cave a homely appearance. A cushioned crate was offered to him and he sat as bid. The man prodded his cooking meat a moment before squatting before Tam and looking at him expectantly.

"Surprised you're not out and about," Tam said by way of beginning his excited conversation, the reason for his visit. "Seems nice weather at the moment."

"Expecting you," Paterion responded surprisingly, his short offworld sentences reminding Tam that he was in the presence of someone older than Troy Totalis.

"How so, sir?" Tam asked politely.

"It was said long ago, cold wind blows no man any good," Paterion explained. "That was before the chill. Now the cold winds talk to me, tell me things, remind me what needs to be done."

"And what's that?" Tam frowned.

"To help you save this place. High up there," he indicated the currently hidden peaks, "the voices of the frost demons tell me things. Now the Ice Maiden has spoken. It is time we free this land from the curse."

"You believe in her then, for real?" Tam said, clearing his throat uncertainly. The man laughed softly again. He was not one to react abruptly on any occasion. Passions might run deep in his veins but his manner was always subdued, measured, as if his feelings were under strong control. Tam recognised Pioneer training.

"The Ice Maiden has spoken," he repeated. "She has spoken to me. I feel certain," and here a sign of trembling seemed to seize the usually placid features of the old man, "she would speak to you if she could."

"Has she told you why she's here?" Tam asked, excitement growing inside him. He wanted so much to meet her, to converse with this ethereal, otherworldly beauty. What an adventure that would be!

Paterion paused for thought, as if considering what to say, how much to tell the young lad sat before him. His eyes hardened suddenly and he reached for his staff with a swiftness that astonished Tam. The blue light was replaced by a harsh red glow and the man struck up a pose.

"Reveal yourself!" he muttered and for a moment Tam thought the Ice Maiden had come visiting as a female figure entered the ruddy glare from the heater and staff combined.

"It's obvious why she's here," Maena Madrullian said, standing tall and defiant as the hermit remained still, pointing his strange stick at her as if it were a flash rifle. "The Space Gods are punishing us for r****g this world. The Crystal Lumos have to pay for what they did to my mother and to Troy. That's the curse for you old man," and there were tears in her silvery eyes as she punched the air with a small fist.

"It is the Madrullian girl," Paterion said slowly and he resumed his seat, although he did not relinquish the staff. It was as if the young girl represented a threat to him in a way Tam did not.

"In the cave of a foolish old mad man who thinks the wind talks to him and faery creatures covered in icicles have singled him out for tea parties among the glaciers," Maena retorted sarcastically. Tam looked at her in horror as she stood there, panting, wrapped in furs and curious ribbons that seemed to serve no purpose but to emphasise her movements. Her hands were on her hips and she seemed more angry than he had ever seen her.

"What are you doing?" Tam asked the girl. "You know I came to ask this man for help in getting up the mountain so we can find out what your grandfather had been hiding. Now you're ruining it!"

"Sorry, I just couldn't listen to this Ice Maiden nonsense any longer. Grandfather knows something he's not telling anyone and so we have to rely on this mad old man here. It's stupid beyond stupid but it's all we've got." She turned to the squat elder then.

"You hate us don't you Paterion? Grandfather beat you at your own game as a Pioneer. You're a bad loser, griping about it all this time instead of making something of your skills and knowledge. Look at grandfather. Even the Crystal Lumos respect him for all the work he's done on Gates. They pay him big money. Look at you, begging from door to door. No wonder you hate him. He beat you again, didn't he? Doesn't need you anymore. Gone beyond you, beyond everything the Pioneer Guild taught you, just with his mind." She prodded the side of her head with an expressive finger. "Just with his mind!" Then she blinked and staggered a little. Tam rose to catch her. He knew what was likely to come next so he let her gently down onto a bundle of fleecy skins in a corner near the heater. She lay there, very still, but breathing steadily as Tam watched her with gentle concern.

"She got too excited," he said softly in the silence that followed her outburst. The hermit had absorbed it all, as was his want, not letting on how much her stabbing tongue had cut into his soul. He sat there and looked askance at the prone girl occasionally but concentrating his attention mainly on the cooking meat. It was deemed ready and without ceremony the hermit sliced off generous chunks and placed them before Tam and the unconscious Maena on platters next to mugs of what appeared to be pure water.

Between chews of the tender meat Tam resumed the conversation.

"I suppose she followed me here," he said. "She's got an uncanny way of tracking me. Must have been listening in on our conversation."

The hermit made no answer to this but reached for the girl's limp arm and showed Tam a bracelet that winked slowly on and off with a ruby light.

"Recognise this," he said gruffly. "Affinity charmlet. Feed it a flake of skin or strand of hair and it'll track the owner of said organic matter. Uses sentient bora-minerals like plasmatine and coralstatidium. Worth a small fortune. Amazed it works on a tainted world like Troy with its crazy magnetic domains. Has military uses but this is just a toy for a besotted teenage girl."

Although Tam only half understood what the man was saying, recognising the Science Tongue among the strange words, it reminded him painfully of why he was there.

"I would like to meet the Ice Maiden," he said quietly, glancing at Maena whose long lashes did not flicker so he was sure she was still unconscious. Her blackout was timely.

Paterion smiled indulgently.

"I think," he said, "she would like to meet you too."

With that he got up and disappeared into one of the dark hollows that led off from the main cave space where he seemed to live. It was obvious there were caverns deeper inside the ridge, corridors and even different levels. The man over the years had probably accumulated a medley of stuff from various places. After what seemed an uncomfortably long time Tam heard the echoey sounds of shuffling. Paterion reappeared pulling a large trunk with him. The heaviness of it made him struggle so Tam got up and helped him pull the trunk across the soft carpet next to where Maena still slept peacefully.

"Those farmers, and that foolish man with the bear cape, are no match for the Ice Maiden," the hermit said. "This however is something they don't have. A child could enter the chill with the help of this and not feel a thing." With that he opened the trunk theatrically to reveal soft silvery fabric and various gadgets.

Tam pulled out what was obviously a survival suit, but so light and thin he could not believe it would withstand the icy climate of the High Peaks. Paterion noted his doubts.

"A man could walk across the wastes of Cimmeron in one of those," he said. "Self-heating. Self-regulating. Layered with meta-minerals of course. Pioneer Guild authorised, Lumos manufactured."

"Where did you get it?" Tam gasped.

"You think in my wanderings I only receive food and bars of soap boy?" the man laughed. "That Madrullian girl knows nothing of what I've been doing this past year since her so-called grandfather arrived with his devious plans and schemes. She's right about one thing. The Crystal Lumos are so scared of him they try to frighten him or purchase him or both. The chill has changed everything. The curse will end all this."

There it was again, this talk of a curse. It seemed to Tam the origins of Troy were wrapped in layers of mystery intertwined with threads of madness. Whether it be the brain seizures of a teenage girl or the fantasies of a bitter old man. Yet the chill was a reality and the Ice Maiden one very possible element of that. If elk could be bred to survive in such conditions, why not humans? Not a faery creature or supernatural being, but simply a girl lost on a mountainside trying to survive.

More than anything Tam wanted to meet her, to rescue this damsel in distress. Did the professor know of her, or was he solely interested in Gate technology? Driven by the disaster of the Madrullian Mission, driven by his own brand of obsessive madness that threatened everyone on Troy perhaps. A curse that would turn pleasant, temperate Troy into a freezing wasteland like Cimmeron. Perhaps all Tam had to do was persuade the beautiful creature to switch off the chill, once he had found out why it had been brought here in the first place.

"Thank you," Tam said. "For your help." The man nodded and showed him the various gadgets and how they worked. He was amazed at some of the offworld technology stored in the trunk. Weapons that could work in subzero temperatures. Tracking devices and climbing gear powered by cells oblivious to the cold, nay, that worked more efficiently the lower the temperature got. Super-conductivity at near absolute zero, a state where all energy ceased to be energy, paradoxically. Again the science speech was beyond Tam but he absorbed the basic principles of the devices shown to him in that distant cave while a teenage girl slept off another painful blackout.

When Maena revived her combative spirit had fled, the fit having drained her emotional resources. She seemed to have not only forgotten what she had heard and what she had said in response but was unsure of where they actually were.

"You missed a hot nourishing meal," Paterion observed casually, as if nothing had occurred.

"It's okay," Maena responded frowning a little as she tried to back track her memories. Mist and snow tracks and blinking ruby lights swirled in her mind and she shook her head. "I didn't try to, you know, do anything embarrassing?" she asked timidly, blushing a little. The man was pleased to see the colour in her cheeks.

"As you got a bit of a task ahead of you," he said indulgently, "you can finish this other plate of food to keep your strength up." He handed her a platter of mixed meat and aromatic vegetables that smelt heavenly in the confines of the cave. She devoured the proffered food gratefully, without suspicion or concern. The blackout had clearly erased the conversation Tam and he had had about Ice Maidens and curses and the professor.

"Thankfully," Tam added after seeing the girl polish off the last of the vegetables, "our journey is mainly downhill at first and I checked just now to find out the lull is still on so we won't have to fight winds with our cargo."

"Cargo?" Maena asked with a final swallow and burp of contentment that belied her offworld manners.

"Paterion has given us stuff for our exploration," Tam explained, indicating the large trunk.

"Just like that?" and a twinge of suspicion started fraying the edge of her contentment.

"Just like that. Come on, it's getting late. Let's get this stuff to the mansion and I'll show you some amazing gadgets for a change. Better than your skimmer boots."

The hermit watched with satisfaction as the two youngsters manhandled the awkward trunk out of the cave and then let it glide down the slopes towards the bottom of the valley that divided the Cut of Doerath from the High Peaks upon which Maeven sat in glittering splendour beneath its blanket of snow. He smiled as he heard the shrieks of delight when Maena straddled the heavy box and rode it like a sled across the flats towards the foothills opposite.

"The curse of Troy began with the Madrullians," he muttered to himself, "and so it shall end." The smile straightened a little and regret tinged his following words. "I envy you boy. The curse touches you not, unless the Ice Maiden chooses to rest her freezing hand upon you." With that he turned and staff in hand, shuffled back into the confines of one of the many caves he now called home.

The hermit had long disappeared by the time the great trunk had halted abruptly against a swell that told of no more level ground to traverse. The halt had been so sudden the hermit did not hear Maena's shriek of surprise as she was somersaulted into a snow drift awkwardly. She laughed, unhurt, as she dug herself out.

"Wait here," Tam said once assured she was unhurt. "I'll get the trolley from the inn and we'll motor this thing up to the mansion.

"Shouldn't we wait till after dark?" Maena said cautiously. "Grandfather shouldn't know about all this or what we are going to do."

"We?"

Tam had only thought of going alone up the mountain. Of course he was going to investigate the heat source, prove its origin, and for him prove that origin was the frail and magical form of the otherworldly Ice Maiden. The sour demeanour of Maena at the very hint of the faery creature would be counter productive.

"Of course. You'll need protection so I go along too." She glanced over his shoulder at the darkening skies above, made bright now and then by purple flashes of embedded lightning. A roll of thunder louder than usual tumbled down and seemed to make the very air vibrate with its menacing power. It was a sign the lull was about to end. The fine flakes of snow got noticeably bigger.

Tam thought of the weapons in the trunk the hermit had shown him, weapons powerful enough to cut a frost demon in half with but the flick of the wrist. Weapons presumably the Crystal Lumos agents had at their disposal if they were ever so inclined to invade the High Peaks themselves.

"I mean, as grandfather said, there weren't many female explorers during the First Age, and here we are now with the same problem. A siren shaped to please male desires would have no effect on me. That Frost-- Ice Maiden," she corrected herself with a flick of snow encrusted hair, "won't be expecting a fiercely loyal, protective female as part of the reception committee," and she smirked triumphantly.

Tam had no answer to that right then, thinking of what the hermit had said about a besotted teenage girl and her affinity charmlet.

"Look, let's discuss this later. Weather's turning bad. We can wheel this thing up the back way out of sight and by then the snow storm will cover our activities from your grandfather true enough."

As planned the youngsters manipulated the heavy crate up the slope to Upper Maeven without encountering anyone of note, just the occasional muffled figure making brief neighbourly trips between cottages.

"Some food stores," Tam said to one individual who hovered too close, and whom Tam thought he recognised as Merry Dimsoe, no doubt on a visit to the ever welcoming Karanie Fornoe a few doors down. Maena glared at the man when he seemed to linger over long and those offworld silvery eyes of hers were too much for him so that he retreated.

By the time the youngsters had manoeuvred the trunk into a safe storage space on the third level of the mansion after several switchback internal ramps had been negotiated in painful silence, the two of them rested and trembled with the exertion of the afternoon's work.

"I need a drink," Tam said with a puff.

"My waitressing days are over," Maena countered acidly.

"Look," Tam pursued their conversation of earlier, having had time during the latter half of their journey to consider matters. "As much as I would like you along for the journey that trunk contains only enough equipment for one person. No one can survive up there without it."

As he spoke Maena had jumped up and began rummaging through the mysterious contents.

"Careful, that's delicate stuff," Tam warned.

"Suit?" she said, holding up the wadded silver garment that flowed out and onto the floor. Tam nodded. "And this?" She held up an identical garment. She rummaged more, picking up various attachments and accessories and finding what appeared to be pairs of everything, boots included. She dangled things before Tam's bemused gaze.

"Seems like there's enough for everyone on this trip," Maena said. "That's two. And I'm going, as you asked so politely."

Tam bowed his head in resignation.

To be continued...