Chapter 9
“Desolation”
[Authorial Intrusion: taking stock. I know authors are not supposed to do these kinds of things, but the last chapter was exhilarating. Nothing like taking one’s frustrations out in literary fashion. Two good hits with a magic sword by a skilled swordsman and the evil, horse-hungry troll is out of the game for good. Thing is you could tell that Godric really didn’t want to hurt or kill the creature. After all wicked Thrall was just hungry. Of course, his enormous appetite did not justify taking Godric’s lovely horse, Aspen, in order to eat it.
Since I am currently reading St. Augustine’s City of God, I came upon an interesting passage last night concerning order, the nature of good and evil, and involving reason and pleasure or appetite:
“Reason weighs things as they are in their own right, according to the grades of the natural order, while poverty considers only what will serve its own need. Reason looks for what appears true to the light of the mind, while pleasure looks only for what gratifies the senses of the body. In the case of rational natures, however, will and love carry so much weight that, even though angels rank above human beings according to the order of nature, good human beings rank above evil angels according to the law of righteousness.” Book XI: chapters 16-18.
Godric would be a creature operating with reason, quite capable of knowing the difference between good and evil and responsible for choosing good and understanding the world accordingly. While the river troll, Thrall, appears to be rational it is fairly evident that he or it is behaving entirely according to pleasure: “hungry,” he says. That seems to be all he cares about in the encounter, and that makes him evil, according to the law of righteousness. And as we saw in our Chapter One, evil is a privation of good, an absence. A concern: does that mean that the river troll was created good but chose to be a monstrosity or was he always a monstrosity even though he appears to be somewhat rational? If he was created evil, he cannot be blamed, of course. However, according to my research—Supernatural Beings: a Taxonomy—that was not the case.
The truth is that river trolls, like humans, were created good. They may look grotesque, but their function in this world order is to care for and regulate the rivers, keep them bound to their banks, avoid floods, and make certain river traffic moves safely. The eye let’s them see even in the murkiest waters, the horn gives them the power to regulate even the swiftest and most forceful of currents. River trolls are strong, live on fish, and also regulate and care for bridges. Somewhere along the way Thrall let his hunger overwhelm him. He chose to indulge his appetite in ways that made him vicious. He developed a taste for horse! Of course, if he bled out from Godric’s blows the river will likely suffer. Alas!
Thus far into the adventure we have had humans, a creature of fire, the Dragon Lady, and two beings associated with water, Adriel and now Thrall. That leaves two more elements that are likely to weigh in: earth and air, or perhaps just earth since Philip is obviously a creature whose primary element is air. In any case, there it is for the moment, appetite defeated, evil overcome, the Quest continues.]
The land on the other side of the bridge grew increasingly hilly as the road to Ardor led forward. The land itself seemed to be more desolate, the fields that stretched out on either side of the road less lush, the healthy greenness giving way to large areas of brown and here and there a dead or dying tree. Currently the hill before them was the steepest yet, and when Aspen brought Godric to the top, Godric pulled back on the reins and brought the horse to a halt. Before him the road ran down into an unnaturally dark valley; in fact the darkness from the hilltop looked thick and tangible, as if it were touchable. The darkness covered the road and the air above the road, making it impossible to see what was ahead, and it spread out on either side of the road as far as Godric could see. He shivered and hesitated. Philip cocked his head and looked up at the Prince.
“I don’t like this, Boss. Something feels all wrong here. There’s magic at work here again. It feels really dangerous to go down there.”
“I don’t see that we have a choice,” responded the Prince. “I don’t like it either, and neither does Aspen.” Godric reached past Philip and patted the horse’s neck. “Let’s go then,” he said, and shook the reins, urging the horse down the road toward the covering darkness. Though the sun was still high in the west, no light penetrated the darkness that obscured the way before them.
As they reached the bottom of the steep hill, Aspen balked and refused to move. Finally, unable to urge the horse forward into the dark, Godric swung off the saddle, but still holding the reins. He pulled them over the horse’s head, held them firmly, and walked ahead of her, leading her into the dark. Philip stayed sitting on the saddle, crouched down, and looking as unhappy as a black bird can look.
“Come on girl,” said Godric, lightly tugging the reins. Aspen moved forward following Godric who appeared swallowed by the now vibrating dark around them. Philip oddly said nothing.
Inside the dark the Prince led the horse, trying to stay in a straight line and not lose the road which he could no longer see. Except for the horse blowing air out of her mouth, there was complete silence. Slowly they moved forward, stopping only when the Prince heard a loud explosion from the distant right. Having never before heard such a sound, with a whistling before the crash, the Prince froze. Suddenly the same sound occurred again, only this time the world seemed to explode around them, removing the darkness and leaving them exposed and vulnerable in the middle of a strange road in a totally alien world.
The Prince, terrified, found his legs wouldn’t move. He looked around him and saw a world in desolation, a city in ruins such as he had never seen before. The road had changed too into a wide hard-surfaced substance where there appeared a white line down the middle that ran into the distance as far ahead as he could see. For the moment the whistling explosions stopped. Godric, recovering somewhat his courage, gazed in astonishment at what lay around him. There were ruined buildings, tall massive structures missing roofs and windows, some of them were on fire, burning and sending dark smoke and ash into the air. Beside the road ahead there lay a massive metal structure that looked as though it had been hit by some powerful force. It too was smoldering. In a field farther down the road, Godric could see three figures strangely dressed, working with another large structure with a long barrel that pointed into the sky. Suddenly the men ducked down and the metal barrel spit fire and smoke and sent an object flying into the sky. The sound of a distant explosion came to him seconds later.
Godric turned from the road and threw the reins back over his horse’s head. He took hold of the saddle, put his foot into the stirrup and swung up. He looked down at Philip. “Something evil has happened here, Philip, this world is not our world. There’s magic at work here. Do you know where we are or what’s going on?” Philip looked up at the Prince from his place on the saddle, opened his yellow beak, but all that emerged was a raspy croak. Philip shook himself and tried again to speak. Again nothing happened. Wherever they were this was a place where Philip, apparently, could no longer talk.
A sign on a metal pole beside the road had a name that Godric had never seen before printed on it: Kiev, with an arrow that pointed behind them. The air was full of the smell of ash and smoke.
The Prince urged the horse forward, past the smoking metal wreck, past the broken and ruined buildings, following the white line down the road. A hundred yards down the road Godric saw the body of a man, missing both legs and an arm and quite obviously dead. A little farther on he saw a woman up against one of the ruined structures. There was a small child of five or six with her. A man in a strange bulky khaki uniform was harassing her. Godric saw that she was dirty, her hair was greasy, her clothes were torn, and she was bleeding, arm and neck. The child was very young and equally dirty though he appeared to be unhurt. Both were terrified of the soldier who had leaned his weapon against the wall of the ruined building behind them. The soldier had hit the child and was attempting to force the woman against the wall of the building. The soldier, intent on subduing the woman did not hear Godric or the sound of the horse’s hooves on the blacktop.
Explosions continued in the distance. Godric wasn’t sure what to do in this god-forsaken place, but he thought he ought to try to help the woman. He quietly swung off the horse’s back again, letting the reins fall to the road. He hoped for the best and moved slowly toward the terrified woman who was struggling with the soldier. She had turned sideways against the wall, keeping the soldier’s attention away from the road; she had drawn up her legs, trying to protect herself.
The woman watched the strange figure of Godric moving toward them. She screamed something in a language unfamiliar to Godric. Meanwhile the soldier was laughing and also speaking at her in a strange tongue, slapping her face. The soldier had thrown his odd hat to the ground before hitting her again. Godric moved silently up on the soldier, drew his sword from over his back, put his fist around the hilt, and used the hilt to smack the soldier in the side of the head. The soldier collapsed unconscious, crumpled to the ground, the head wound bleeding profusely. Godric made certain the soldier was incapacitated, then turned to the woman, who was still bleeding slightly from neck and arm wounds.
Godric bent down to examine the woman’s wounds. She said something in the strange language and cringed as he touched her. “Let me help you,” he said gently, holding her arm to see where the blood was coming from. Suddenly remembering the sword’s magical requirement, he gently lowered the woman’s arm, turned to the soldier and took the blood from the soldier’s bleeding head wound; he smeared some on the sword’s blade, and watched as the blood disappeared into the blade. Satisfied it was clean, he put the sword back in the scabbard and turned again to the woman and the child who was now sitting up and softly crying.
He opened his knapsack and took out his loaf of bread, tore off a chunk and offered it to the child who stopped crying and eagerly grabbed it and immediately shoved some of it into his mouth. Godric tore off another chunk and gave it to the woman who accepted it gratefully; he put what was left of the bread back into the knapsack; then he took out a cloth, poured some water from his canteen on it, and began to wipe away the blood and grim from her arm and neck. Both wounds were cuts, the kind inflicted by a sharp knife, the kind the soldier had on his belt.. Godric couldn’t understand how a man could treat a woman this way. He suspected she had been cut, beaten and was about to be raped, but since he couldn’t understand her speech, he couldn’t talk to her. Instead he offered her some water from the canteen which she eagerly accepted. He let the child have a drink too, then helped the woman stand. When she smiled her thanks at him, he could see that with her dark hair and her dark eyes she was quite pretty. Once on her feet, she left him and with the child in her arms hurried around the side of the ruined structure and disappeared.
Godric walked back to the horse, still standing where he had dropped the reins, then remounted. “Well, Philip,” he started to say, then heard the whistling of an incoming rocket. Suddenly the world flashed and exploded around them, sending the horse into a gallop with Philip and Godric hanging on desperately. When Godric managed to get control of the horse, he looked around, again in astonishment, for they were back on their own path, having left the thick cloud of darkness behind them.
“Say, Boss,” said Philip, “what just happened? Were we dead for a while?”
Godric laughed, “No. I think we were just temporarily displaced. The darkness tried to devour us, but found we were too stringy and so spit us out. And here we are, back on the right road now, I hope”
“Are you kidding me?” croaked the bird.
“Not in the least,” said the Prince, tightening the reins and urging the horse forward.
“I remember a great darkness,” said Philip. “Then there was a loud flash-bang and here we are. I remember you said something that I didn’t understand. But that’s about it.”
“That’s about it indeed,” said the Prince, urging his horse into a gallop, leaving the darkness behind them in the valley of desolation and death.
