The Land of Broken Roads

Socks wasn’t concerned about her strange language. Mostly he was amused by the fact that she hadn’t spotted him, despite being right there. He said, -I want to hold very still and see how long it takes for her to notice me. You distract her.-

Dirt schooled his face to keep from grinning. He peeked at her mind and she thought Socks’ legs were part of a building, or something like that. Pillars, maybe. Fuzzy ones. Her thoughts were jumbled and confused, which made sense. She was barely conscious. But even so, all she had to do was turn and look upward to see Socks leaning over her, and she hadn’t yet.

She seemed to think she was lying on the ground, or maybe on a bed, and not floating in mid-air held up by Socks’ mind. Dirt couldn’t blame her for that. It wasn’t the sort of thing one expected. To keep it going, Dirt made sure all his warming embers stayed out of her field of vision, just in case.

He smiled kindly and patted her head, then gently pushed a few loose strands of pale brown hair out of her face and back under her soft fur hood.

“How are you feeling?” he asked, in his language.

She scrunched her face a little, perplexed. “Chì avete dettu? Quale si?” She shifted restlessly, squinting her eyes in pain. “Ind'è mi trovu?”

“Hold still,” said Dirt gently. “You’re safe now. The birds are dead.”

The young woman squirmed and turned to look upward. Dirt quickly covered her eyes with his hand and said, “Rest. Sleep.”

Socks almost snorted in amusement but stopped himself. That had been close. She’d almost seen him.

She tried to raise her arm to push his hand away, but it was the arm with the shoulder injured from the bird’s talon and it was still too sore inside, so she gave up.

“Take it easy. Just relax for a little while. If you want to, you can sleep.”

“Dormi?” she said, catching the last word he said. “Cumu possu dorme avà?”

It was almost the same word in his language, which was a relief. Maybe it wouldn’t be so hard to learn to talk with her after all.

“Dormi, si,” he said. “Dormi.” Sleep.

“Siete in periculu sè site cun mè,” she protested, her big brown eyes turning back to him and getting a bit more spark. They held fear. “Per piacè, scappate.”

Her voice was so cracked and dry it was almost a rasp. It probably hurt to even speak, so why wouldn’t she relax? Dirt decided he’d had enough guessing and looked at her mind.

He found that it wasn’t herself she was worried about--she thought he was in danger from being around her, which was silly. She wanted him to run away before she caused his death somehow. She’d already resigned herself to dying, too, and if there was any one emotion she felt more than the others, it was guilt. He could learn some of her words later, but that was the general idea.

“Listen,” said Dirt, a bit more sternly. Not unfriendly or domineering, he hoped, just sternly. “You need to stop complaining and trying to get up.”

He poked her injuries to help make the point. Each of them, one by one. She squirmed again and he wagged his finger at her. She seemed to resent being scolded by a little boy, even in her state, but she got the idea and relaxed. With an air of consignment to her fate. And Dirt’s fate, she presumed.

Dirt continued, “You’re warm, and you’re safe. You need to rest. You’ll heal because Socks licked you but that doesn’t mean you’re healed yet. So just lie there for a while and get better. You look thirsty. Water?” asked Dirt. He made a drinking motion, and the girl nodded slightly.

She licked her dry, cracked lips. It did no good. Her tongue was too dry. She said, “Acqua…” which was the same word as Dirt’s language. Water.

“Aqua,” he said. Knowing there were two words he recognized was a bit of a relief. That meant she was descended from his people, and he was still within the old bounds of the Sunset Empire. Which, now that he thought about it, must have been huge. He’d known it was, but not really. It was one thing to know a fact and quite another to experience it.

She nodded and repeated it. “Acqua, per piacè.”

Dirt smiled and nodded, saying, “Okay, some water coming right up. Now just relax, please.”

She forced a half-smile of eager gratitude but couldn’t very well without cracking her lips more. Poor thing.

-I’ll lick her lips after she notices me. I didn’t think of those because she wasn’t bleeding there,- said Socks, remaining silent as a statue. He still sounded amused. -I bet she screams when she sees me.-

“I bet she doesn’t. I bet she doesn’t believe her eyes and ignores you,” said Dirt.

The girl shifted again on her bed of nothing and gave a quiet groan of pain. Dirt glanced at her mind again, and it was her legs that hurt. Socks subtly adjusted his grip to take some of the pressure off, and that helped. She didn’t notice the bed moving, but it reduced her discomfort.

Dirt watched her for a moment to make sure she wasn’t about to try and get up. She finally closed her eyes and relaxed in a more convincing manner. Glancing at her mind, she was sure she’d die before she opened them again. She still felt bad for Dirt, even while wondering where he’d come from. She kept thinking of the giant birds, expecting them to come back. And remembering things shaped like humans, but with horrible animal faces, each different. She pushed those from her mind too fast for him to see what they were.

Now that she wasn’t looking, he picked up some snow with his mind to keep from freezing his fingers. He gathered a respectable ball of it while Socks watched, impressed at Dirt’s control, and put an ember in the middle to melt it. To his dismay, it melted down to about one tenth of its prior size. That didn’t seem right. Snow was ten times more poofy than water?

Well, it was a start. He wasn’t trying to drown her. Now, how to get it into her mouth? She’d probably be concerned if he made it float in front of her face. He pulled his arm brace off, and decided it looked enough like a cup. He put the water inside and held the thinner end closed with his mind.

Dirt lifted the girl’s head slightly and slowly poured the water across her parched lips. She let it trickle in without complaint, understanding the need to drink it slowly. He looked at her mind again, and while he couldn’t understand any of the words racing through it, he saw enough to know what she was thinking of. She was just beginning to realize that she was warm, and so was the water. But it was so bright! Where was she, and why wasn’t she dead yet?

She opened her eyes and squinted against the brightness of the sky. Her mind struggled to make sense of the giant dark shadow over her, until she saw the pup’s eyes. Terror filled her, but she shut her eyes again and made no sound. Her face scrunched up and her chest shook, and Dirt realized she was about to cry. Her courage had failed her.

He patted her head and said, “There, there, it’s okay. Nothing’s going to happen. He’s friendly. You don’t even know what you were looking at, do you? Here, drink a little more water.”

When he held the cup to her lips, she resisted and tried to speak, but Dirt tightened his grip and poured anyway. He didn’t stop until she finished the cup.

Once he pulled it away, she shook her head and said, “Morte. Era a morte. Aghju vistu l'ochji di a morte in u celu. Hè quì per noi.”

From her thoughts, it seemed she was sure she was about to be carried off into the world of the dead any second now. She had a mental image of how that would happen: giant fingers grabbing her and pulling her spirit into the ground, leaving her dead body behind. Her imagination was taking Socks’ eyes and filling in a giant spirit in the shape of a man, rising out of the ground to collect her soul.

Well, now Dirt was starting to feel bad. It had been a funny thought, tricking her and seeing what happened, but it wasn’t going well.

-I guess you were closer to correct than I was,- said Socks. He leaned down and licked the girl’s face, startling her terribly.

When he stopped and pulled back up, her eyes focused and she finally realized what she was looking at. She screamed, and it was a hopeless, miserable sound that tugged painfully at Dirt’s heart.

Socks huffed and pushed her mind, forcing her to sleep. Then he gave Dirt a little lick and said, ­-Don’t feel bad. There is no right way for a human to see me for the first time. It would have gone poorly no matter what we did. At least this was kind of fun.-

“I guess that’s a good point.”

-And if she gets mad at us, we will remind her that we killed the birds and saved her life, and then she will stop.-

Dirt and Socks watched her sleep for a moment. Socks had only given her a nudge, and her natural exhaustion had done the rest. The stress and pain faded from her countenance as she sank deeper and deeper into the dream, and soon her face relaxed into a relieved peace.

“I’m going to wake her up and give her more water before too long. She didn’t drink enough.”

-Melt this for me. I want some now,- said Socks. He gathered a pile of snow as tall Dirt with his mind and rolled it into a ball. Dirt obliged him and melted it, resulting again in a disappointing amount of water. But it was enough, and after Socks drank what he wanted there was plenty left for Dirt to finish off.

-Now let’s go have some food. I know you’re hungry and you’ve waited long enough.-

“First, I think I’m going to try talking to the wind. Maybe I can figure out how to ask for her language. It shouldn’t take long if it works, and I want to be able to talk to her when she wakes up.”

Socks huffed and gave Dirt a mean look, saying, -I do not like you talking to the wind.-

Dirt reached up to pat him on the nose and said, “Want to come watch? You can grab me if something happens.”

-No. You can try it if you want. I will go by the birds and take your knife and cut them up. We can pack the meat in the snow and preserve it. Then I’ll eat some. And then you should be done and come eat some, too. If you take too long, I will stop you. We will wake her up then.-

“Okay. I’ll stay where you can see me.”

Socks gave him one last little lick, which counted for agreement. Then he pulled Dirt’s knife right out of its sheathe and started trudging up the side of the enormous nest.

Dirt put some mana in his legs and jumped like a grasshopper back out of the basin. He made his way up to the flat top of one of the hills that overlooked the battle scene, which had the only color from horizon to horizon. Broad splashes of blood, black feathers everywhere, snow churned to reveal the brown rocks beneath. It looked every bit as messy as the fight had been. And, of course, the ruined bodies of the giant birds. They looked even larger now than they had in life, with their wings all splayed out and broken.

The plateau wasn’t hiding anything dangerous. Not boulders to stumble between. Just snow up to his waist and flat ground beneath. He went to the edge where Socks could still see him, turned his face to the sky, and opened his mind sight as wide as it would go. The pup’s mind burned bright as ever, growing day by day as fast as his body did. And there was the young woman’s, much dimmer. That one was quiet. She hadn’t started dreaming yet.

And not much else. Dirt knew there were plants around, buried under the snow. But it seemed lots of them were dead and the seeds that would grow in the spring were so pale and tiny they may as well have been sleeping bugs. He watched for elemental minds, but the air was too still today. The storm had passed and left the skies quiet and serene.

Well, there was one last thing to try. Dirt turned his mind inward to his mana body and drew the great elemental’s name in the world of magic. Or, rather, as close to it as he could remember. If one of her kind saw it, Dirt supposed they’d be smart enough to figure out what was going on.

Then he waited, trying his best to hold her name together. Part of it faded and had to be restored, and they didn’t look the same the second time. Truthfully, it was a mess. Drawing the whole name perfectly might be beyond him. But finally, something saw him.

Sigils flared into being in the world of magic, unpowered ones meant to communicate. It was a hello, but with a different set of beginning points than the air elementals used. Well, Dirt could do this. He drew his responses, filling in with the shape of himself as the air perceived him to indicate what he was.

The other being stumbled over his answers, unsure what it was being told, and gave up. Its words faded quickly leaving Dirt standing there confused. He came to himself and shook his head. Opening his eyes, all he saw was Socks starting to butcher the nearest bird, and that lost girl hovering near him. Not even another mind had approached.

Or… no, one had. A mind he hadn’t noticed the first time, or which hadn’t been there before. Something large and quiet, so broad and dim Dirt had mistaken the wide light it cast for the background itself. It had no center and what Dirt could see from its thoughts were patience and certainty. Indeed, there was so little going on in its mind that he wondered if it was asleep.

Now there was a thought. Something with a mind as large as Father’s, or perhaps even larger, sleeping somewhere nearby? Curiosity kept him watching, but the longer he did, the more he started to wonder if there really wasn’t anything there and he was imagining things. One thing was sure, though—he didn’t want to wake it up.

Unless it was already awake? Hadn’t he just communicated with it in the world of magic? How could something be awake and asleep at the same time?

“Socks, do you see this?” he asked. He sent Socks the mental image he had, and it got the pup’s attention.

Socks perked his ears up, tilting his head slightly with curiosity. Even with the two of them they couldn’t figure it out. That great mind was probably real, and if so, it had thoughts in it. They just weren’t moving.

-I have no idea. You said you talked to it with magic?- said Socks.

“I’m pretty sure I did. Wait. How about this. Can you watch for a moment and I’ll try again?” said Dirt. “Let’s see if it’s the same thing.”

-Okay.- said Socks. He sniffed the air and didn’t find anything out of the ordinary. -Go ahead.-

Dirt nodded and turned his gaze back to his mana vessel. He cycled a bit of mana to prepare himself and tried again. Instead of trying the wind’s name again, he started with something the wind had taken up easily to begin the dance: motion. He drew the sigil and waited, holding it steady and bright, while being careful not to put any mana in and make it do something. Around it, he left open spaces for the other being to fill in.

No response. He drew more. Motion, motion from nothing, motion from here to there, transformative motion.

Just as he was about to give up, a new sigil appeared in the midst of his own. Ceasing motion. That was all. It was planted in the perfect spot to negate all the rest, signifying motion that arose and vanished without having any effect. Dirt’s whole message collapsed, and the other being drew nothing further.

Dirt sighed and gave up. He blinked against the bright sunlight as his mental focus returned to the physical world. “So did you see anything?”

-I think I know what you found. An earth elemental.-

“Oh. Well, no wonder it doesn’t want to talk. All the earth does is just sit there,” said Dirt, annoyed. It should at least have been polite and talked a bit. “How does the ground even have elementals? What forces do they need to monitor and facilitate?”

-Mother never told me about those. She only mentioned a few elementals and we never tried to talk to one. But sometimes the ground moves, and it’s called an earthquake. And maybe they do other things. Maybe they have to make sure the ground stays together. I don’t know.-

“Hopefully the trees can tell me more about them after we get back.”

-Probably. Trees live in the ground, after all.-

Dirt hopped over the edge and bounced down the hillside, hopping from boulder to boulder and sliding where he could. He made his way across the messy battlefield, carefully stepping around the blood and viscera to keep his pants from getting any dirtier. He made his way to where the girl was, a short distance from Socks. She still rested motionlessly except the gentle rising and falling of her breathing.

Socks tossed Dirt a nice chunk of pale meat, which Dirt turned over in his hands before taking a bite. Too bad they had no salt. Without any salt or spices, most things were still better raw.

-You are getting spoiled,- said Socks, teasing him.

“I am getting civilized,” said Dirt. He dug in with relish. It tasted milder than some of the other bird meat he’d had, but wasn’t as soft. Not quite stringy or tough, but tougher than he’d expected. Maybe in a bit, he’d try some of the blood and see how it compared to other things.

Waving the knife through the air, Socks resumed cutting whatever meat he could from the birds, and in the process, dug his snout in to eat anything he found tasty. The hearts were good, and he liked the livers. Intestines less so, unless he was particularly hungry. Dirt didn’t like those either. Too hard to chew.

Socks lifted a slab of meat longer than Dirt was tall, probably the entire breast. He tossed it onto a clean spot of snow and said, -Can you cover that up while I keep cutting?-

Dirt nodded and scarfed down the rest of the meat he was holding. Then he braced his feet and started tossing as much snow as he could pick up at once. He made a big scoop with his mental fingers and lifted more snow than his arms would have been able to handle, but bracing his feet and back solidly kept the recoil weight from knocking him down.

He threw clump after clump, and each time it sent a poof of powdery snow floating on the air that stuck to his face and made him shiver. Finally Dirt had tossed enough to cover it in a thick layer. The effort left him panting and the muscles in his back were tight. He turned back to Socks, groaning at the soreness gathering in his muscles. That was more work than it looked like. His body wasn’t even moving.

Dirt stretched with a groan and turned to watch Socks continue his butchering. He sniffled and realized he was leaking water out his nose again. That had to be normal, right? Something that happened in the cold? He looked at the girl to see if she was doing it too, and she was watching him.

The girl was awake, her face dripping wet and bright red. The rest of her clothing was coated in a layer of powder snow. Dirt kicked himself mentally, realizing he’d been the one to wake her up.

She didn’t speak. Now that she had his attention, she raised her good arm and made the same drinking motion he’d done before. Dirt nodded and picked up a bunch of snow, then melted it with an ember.

After that, he floated it over to her face and let her drink it right out of the air. No point hiding anything now, after all. She tilted her head and shifted her eyes downward, looking at the nothing she was lying on. Then she pointedly looked back at Dirt. Are you holding me up, she seemed to be asking.

Dirt shook his head and pointed at Socks.

She glanced back at the giant pup, and he hopped twice through the snow to land nearby and licked the melted water off her face. She shivered again, but a shy smile appeared on her face.

-She is handling this better now,- said Socks.

Dirt snorted in amusement and replied, “It probably helps that she can’t run away. But you’re right.”

-Are you going to let her find out you can see her mind? Since she knows you can do magic already,- asked Socks.

Dirt pondered that for a moment and replied, “Not yet. I’d still have to learn her language for that to do much good. Maybe we’ll find an air elemental later on.”

Socks tossed a slice of flesh over and Dirt caught it and showed her. He held it to her lips, but she went a little pale and shook her head.

Wasn’t she hungry? Dirt looked at her mind and gathered that she thought raw meat would make her sick. He chuckled at that. Sick was the least of her worries. He caught her eyes and took a bite himself, then nodded and held it back toward her mouth. She gingerly took a nibble, managing to hold down the revulsion he saw on her face. Oh well. She’d learn.

When it didn’t kill her, she took another bite, and another, and by the end she was eating it as pleasantly as if it were bread.

-I guess our next stop is some of the human places around until we find out where she belongs, so we can give her back.-

“Yep. I wonder how she ended up like this.”

-I suppose we’ll find out,- said Socks. Then he went back to butchering.