The Song and the Serpent

Minutes turned into hours. Hours turned into days. Day’s turned into an eternity.

Adan couldn't fall asleep since he couldn’t properly rest while sitting on the keel. Whenever exhaustion threatened to overwhelm him, he would nearly fall forward into the foul water at his feet. Then he would jerk awake and rest his head in his hands again, and the cycle would repeat itself.

A dull throb began to permeate his skull. The smell of the hull and the rocking of the vessel turned that throb into a stabbing pain, and soon the air was full of groaning. The ship groaned, the other men groaned, and Adan groaned with them.

After what seemed like a week of groaning, the trapdoor was opened above them. The sliver of light seemed blinding and Adan closed his eyes as another stab of pain flooded his head.

Have we arrived? he wondered.

“Drink up!” A voice shouted into the hull.

Adan squinted to see a bucket, lowered through the trapdoor on a rope.

Adan saw Rocco stand and take hold of the bucket.

“How long have we been sailing?” he asked.

“Through the night,” the captor responded. “The sun is rising now.”

Rocco nodded. “How long until we arrive?”

Adan heard the warrior laugh, and then the trap door slammed shut.

It’s only been one night? Adan winced as he got to his feet.

The bucket was passed through the dark from man to man, each of them drinking deeply of the sweet water. Once the pail was empty, they settled back into their seats.

The drink had brought Adan’s head some relief, and he hoped he would be able to properly rest. He longed for a flat dry surface he could lie down on. A stone floor would be more comfortable.

Finally, he resigned himself to the prospect of soaking himself in the water at his feet.

The floor of the chamber curved upward into the walls, so Adan sat on the floor resting his feet against the keel. Then he leaned back against the sloping floor. In this reclined position, he was submerged in putrid liquid up to his waist, but he didn’t care. His bare back rested against pitch coated wood, and he breathed a sigh of relief.

He put his bound hands behind his head and relaxed, soaking in abstract filth.

When Adan awoke some hours later, the pain in his head was almost gone, and replaced with stiffness in his neck and back. He sat up slowly and stretched his sore muscles.

The blackness around him was unchanged. How long had they been down here, and how long would this continue? Would they be fed as well as given water, or would they slowly starve?

Adan lay back and resigned himself to wait again.

An endless succession of lifetimes seemed to float by, filled with nothing but pain, stench, and darkness. The other prisoners would occasionally groan in pain or whisper together. But for most of the journey, anxious silence prevailed.

Twice more, a bucket of water was lowered into the hull. Never did they receive any food.

Finally, to Adan’s complete surprise, the trap door was opened, and they all heard the voice of Commander Hugo say, “Alright, everyone out!”

The captives were weak, hungry, sleep deprived and half blinded by the endless night of the hull, but they nearly leapt to their feet and scrambled to the door.

At last! Adan thought. Out of this hellhole!

He squinted at the dim light that felt blinding as they clambered out. Several warriors were waiting in the sleeping chamber above with swords drawn. Hugo stood at the fore, his broadsword sheathed at his side.

“Line up!” Hugo shouted.

They obeyed without question.

A warrior produced a length of rope.

“Hands out!”

The prisoners held their bound hands out in front of them. The captors wound the rope in and around the knots that held their hands, and soon they were all roped together in one long string.

“Out!” the commander barked.

The captives complied, marching between hammocks and litter. Sunlight was blazing through the hatch that led up on deck, blinding them further as they awkwardly climbed the ladder.

As Adan climbed out, he felt cool air on his face, and noticed the salt smell on the wind was gone. He tried to open his eyes, but the sunlight stabbed his head like blades of white fire. He heard the sound of ropes being tightened and footsteps on the deck.

“Keep moving!” Hugo yelled.

The prisoners stumbled forward, tripping over each other. They were led from the open hatch to the port side of the ship.

Adan was forced to open his eyes to keep from falling over his comrades. Tears streamed from his eyes and his head felt like it would burst.

They stopped at the rail and awaited further instruction, standing among the benches for the oarsmen.

Adan’s eyes began to adjust, and he looked out past the rail to the landscape beyond.

The ocean was gone. They were docked in a large river or lake that sat between the arms of two curved mountain ranges. Snow covered the peaks of the giant behemoths that surrounded them.

The lake or river was teeming with ships. Adan saw sail upon sail rising up out of longships docked along the bank, each of them sporting the ghastly standard of the serpent wrapped around a humanoid beast.

Adan looked ashore and saw docks and piers along the bank, sturdy and well built. Beyond the docks, Adan could see thatched roofs and chimneys running for several hundred paces away from the bank.

Rising above the roofs and chimneys, towering over the sails of the ships and the small village that sat on the river bank, Adan could see a circular stone wall. Adan could see men pacing the battlements and flags flying in the clear breeze. Behind the wall, the only visible landmark was a giant black tower, like a spike, thrust upward from the earth like an ebony tooth.

“What in the name of all that’s good…?” Adan heard Rocco mutter beside him.

“I admit, I never expected this,” said Kian, gazing at the ships, the village, and the fortress.

“Welcome to Undelma,” Commander Hugo said. “Home of Sithril and his followers.”

Adan glanced at him. To his surprise, the warriors around him had removed their helmets and the cloth from their faces. Adan looked around and realized that all of the captors had removed their helmets and masks. All of their heads were shaved clean and their faces bare. Not one of them had a beard or long hair, and they all stood holding their helmets and looking toward the black spike with reverence.

“From flesh to spirit, from spirit to flesh, all will see the domination of the One,” they all chanted together. Then they placed their helmets back on their heads, but their faces remained uncovered.

“Now to shore!” Hugo barked.

Most of the enemy warriors began leaping over the rail onto the dock nearby. The prisoners were ushered over the edge with them and lined up on the pier beside the ship. Hugo’s men surrounded them on all sides with their weapons drawn.

Hugo stood at the head of the group and gestured toward the city. “Follow.”

In this manner, they marched down the pier, past the busy docks, through the village and toward the city gate.

There was little to admire about the village sitting under the shadow of Undelma’s wall. The buildings were hastily built, and they looked like recent additions to the landscape. Stones had obviously been stacked in a circular shape before saplings and heather were thrown on top to make a roof. Adan saw very few people in the village, which had nothing but a mud track for a road leading between the huts. The people he did see were ghant and pale, as if malnourished, and covered in grime and filth. Their clothing was scarce, and when they saw the troop heading toward them, they rushed into their homes or out of sight.

“Quite a welcome,” Kian muttered as they marched.

As they approached the wall of the city, Adan saw stair step cracks in the wall, and sections where the stone had recently been replaced and repaired.

“Did you know of an ancient ruin in these parts?” he whispered to Kian.

Kian shook his head. “Never.”

“Well, they aren’t ruins anymore.”

They passed through the village, covering their boots in squalor. An open field lay between them and the city wall, no longer than three hundred paces.

Two great iron doors sat open to their approach. Three men stacked together couldn’t reach the top of the gates. Unlike the village huts, these were built by a master craftsman.

A dozen warriors stood near the gates with spears and shields in hand. Their armor matched that of the captors now escorting Kian’s men to the city, even up to the spiked helmet.

“I come with Estan prisoners to present them to the High Priest,” said Hugo, when they were within earshot of the guards.

The sentries nodded and stood aside without a word to let the troop through.

As they passed under the arch, Adan’s eyes widened. Several of the prisoners looked around in astonishment and whispered among themselves.

Stone edifices larger than they had seen met their eyes. They had passed into a large courtyard surrounded by three and four story buildings like miniature citadels. Adan saw chiseled arches lining doorways and elegant verandas on every building. Images of animals and humans and strange mixes of the two were interwoven in spirals carved from the rock. These images adorned the balconies, columns, railings and great archways throughout the city.

Warriors and soldiers, dressed in the customary armor and brightly colored, long flowing tunics, could be seen walking in and among the stone structures. Their faces were uncovered, but they also wore the spiked helmet on all their heads.

As Commander Hugo entered the city with his prisoners, many heads turned, and several of the soldiers paused whatever they were doing to catch a glimpse of the newcomers. They didn’t seem either surprised, pleased, or displeased at the sight. Their faces were harder than the hewn images around them.

Hugo led the troop across the courtyard, through an archway into a cobblestone street that wound deeper into the city. They passed staring faces looking out through doors and windows, always marching toward the black conical tower at the center of Undelma.

“Where did all this come from?” Adan whispered to Kian. “It’s obviously been here for a long time.”

“This city has been here for some time,” said Kian, “but I don’t think our captors have been. Look.”

He gestured to a building to their left. Adan looked and saw large sections of stone that had been repaired recently. He began to see signs of newer masonry in several places where the elements had eroded the old stone to the point of crumbling. He could tell the new work from the old not only because of its cleanliness, but also by its shoddiness. Compared to the original architecture, the new stonework looked more like a child playing with mud and pebbles.

Adan saw an old archway leading to a courtyard encompassed by a stone wall. The arch and the wall had once been a beautiful boundary, crafted by an artisan who cared for beauty more than functionality. But someone had taken spare rocks and mortar and hastily filled the spots in the wall that were crumbling. Now the barrier was a mockery of its former beauty.

A rusty iron gate hung open in the archway. As they passed, Adan looked through the arch and saw a gathering of women in the courtyard in front of a large house. He realized that they were the first women he had seen inside the city. These women were milling about the courtyard in tattered dresses and frocks. Their clothing was so ripped and frayed that Adan felt compelled to look away in order to preserve their modesty. He saw several of the enemy warriors allowing their gazes to linger in the women in the courtyard as they passed.

They saw no other women in the city for the rest of the journey, and they found no children; no children, that is, until they reached the center of Undelma.

The black spike loomed overhead as they approached, towering over the buildings like a shadow whose presence couldn’t be ignored.

Hugo led them around the corner of yet another three story building, and Adan was faced with yet another strange and unexpected sight.

The buildings and the cobblestone street ended and they stepped out into a large circular opening. Fine, black sand coated the ground for hundreds of paces, and the black spike of Undelma sat in the center of the empty sand-field. Adan thought it looked as if whoever designed the city layout didn’t want to build anything too close to the spike. From this distance, the surface of the conical center looked smooth, almost polished in the bright sunlight. The sandy ground around the huge barb was flat and clean except in one place.

Adan could see a small gate, an entrance into that giant ebony thorn, made from the same black material.

Large flat stones, as white as bone, lay in the black sand, spiraling out from the gate, like a long path leading in concentric circles around the spike.

Hugo halted when he reached the end of the cobblestone road and the rest of them followed suit.

“Remove your shoes,” Hugo said, turning toward them and pulling his leather boots off. “No human foot may remain shod in Undelma.”

Adan and Kian exchanged puzzled looks. Their captors began to follow Hugo’s example, removing their boots down to the last man.

Rocco watched them with a wrinkled brow. “What? Why?”

“Do as I say!” Hugo roared, laying a hand on his sword hilt.

The imprisoned men began pulling and kicking their shoes off, leaving them laying on the stone street. It was difficult to remove their waders with their hands tied together on one long rope, but they managed.

“A bit touchy, isn’t he?” Kian said, nodding toward Hugo.

“Cast them aside,” said Hugo. “You will not need them anymore.”

With curious faces, the prisoners tossed their boots to the side. Adan noticed that Hugo’s men had held onto their foot wear, keeping them in hand or slung over their shoulders.

“Now why do they keep their boots but we have to lose ours?” he whispered.

When the last boot was punted off of the last prisoner’s foot and thrown aside, Hugo turned right and began following the white paving stone path that led in a large circle around their destination. The prisoners muttered in confusion as they began walking in a spiral around Undelma instead of walking straight to the gate.

“I don’t much care for this,” Kian muttered. “A lot of unnecessary walking if you ask me.”

“Why all this ceremony for a troop of prisoners?” Adan whispered back.

“This doesn’t bode well,” Rocco had overheard them and leaned in closer. “It gives me a very bad feeling. I don’t like it.”

Adan nodded. The sun shone above him, but the sand and the white stones felt unnaturally cold under his bare feet.

They continued their journey, circling the black spike while slowly drawing nearer and nearer. Adan began to feel his gut churn and his heart rate increase. The closer they got to the gate, the more afraid he became.

Two men stood by the entrance, armed and wearing flowing white robes. They stood in sharp contrast to the strange black stone around them. When the group finally reached the door, Hugo stopped in front of them.

“I bring a gift for Dias the priest,” he said.

The two men nodded and gestured into the doorway. Adan looked inside and could see only blackness. When Hugo began to walk inside, he felt panic rising in his chest. He did not want to go into that place. He could see by the looks on their faces that the others were as terrified as him.

Their captors began to pull on the rope, dragging them inside. Several of the men started to resist and protest. They planted their feet and tugged back, away from the entrance.

Swords were drawn, spears were lowered, and several more men tugged on the rope. The pitiful captives gave up the struggle, and allowed themselves to be led into the yawning mouth of Undelma.