That Risen Snow: A Scary Tale of Snow White and Zombies (Wattys 2014 Award Winner)

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Hays

HAYS AND THE CAPTAIN stand on the platform at the shaft’s bottom, where they pry the lowest rungs from the shaft’s wall. To one side, the lowest passage stretches into the darkness, presumably toward the spiral shaft. To the right and left of the shaft, alcoves extend several steps into the rock, probably so that the lifts can be loaded from multiple sides.

Goose pimples dot Hays’ forearms. He flexes his pickaxe against the well, and out pops another rung. It clangs onto the lift, and he kicks it aside. “I gotta say, Cap’n. These dwarfs don’t seem as bad as folks back home talk.”

“Are you Hopish, Hays?” Captain asks.

Hays shrugs. “My Pappy believed all the old stories. He passed them onto my Pa, and my Pa passed them onto me. Pa didn’t fully believe it, but he never would have told that to Minister Ramsizer. Pa said Moncansas had been at sea for so long they burned all historical records for fuel. So, Cap’n Hardoyan could make up whatever stories he wanted. And my Ma always said not to believe everything I hear. Course, she was probably talking more about my sister Randa. So, I guess my answer is that I’m not sure what to believe. I’m just trying to do right by my family and the world. I hear the Moncansas is still anchored in the bay at Carpaldal. Is that true, Cap’n?”

Captain nods. “The first arks were torn apart for firewood and to make new buildings. But the third ark still floats far off shore. Some of the Hopefuls try swimming out to it each year as some kind of pilgrimage. None ever make it, but the spectacle makes for good gambling.” After a pause, he adds, “For those who would gamble on men’s lives.”

“Why all this talk of the Hopefuls, Cap’n?”

Captain wipes sweat from his brow even though he’s clearly shivering. “You see a man come back from the dead, and it makes you wonder what’s next. And speaking to your point, no, dwarfs aren’t evil. We wronged them terribly by letting the Hopefuls set up their damned kingdom. And you know why we did it?”

Hays shakes his head.

“Politics. That’s why. The Moncansas’ abrupt arrival was like a rude, drunk uncle showing up to a wedding. He has to be accommodated, but no one really wants to sit with him. You have to understand that the Moncansas was at sea decades longer than the first two arks—an extra generation. With little hope of ever finding land, their Captain Hardoyan had to give his people something to believe in, so he created a new religion cobbled from children’s bedtime stories, fever dreams, and some actual history.”

Captain’s going into one of his stories. That’s fine by Hays. He enjoys Captain’s perspective, the experience coming from so many far-off travels. Right now, though, Captain’s breath stinks of sour milk. Hays turns his head away and listens. It’s going to be awhile.

“According to that new religion, Hope, we had been sent in the Arks out of the Heavens, a glorious land, through the Betweenplace of clouds to the World Below to prepare the World Below for its eventual Ascension. Once the World Below was cleansed of impurity, a brilliant white fire would engulf it, burning our bodies and raising our spirits to the Heavens. But this Ascension could only happen if the Hopeful converted the entire human populace to their beliefs and exterminated the wicked dwarfs.”

Captain coughs and continues. “The Ascendio Kingdom was made because no one wanted that drunk uncle to stay at their house. When the Hopeful arrived, they made it their first priority to convert the Eastern and Western Kingdoms to their beliefs. Their second priority was the elimination of the dwarfs. The Eastern and Western Kingdoms debated long and hard about what to do with the Hopefuls. They finally decided to give them their own kingdom and to make Captain Hardoyan’s direct descendants royalty.