Lost in Translation

1. No Rest For The Weary

CHAPTER 1

The stars hung as a sparkling shroud on the midnight sky. The brilliance of the full moon bleached the canyon walls to a Navajo white. A lone fox scampered across a path hewn into the canyon floor and straight above; a small speck flew on.

As the carrier pigeon rounded the final bend and soared over the foundations what would one day become the Tazerdspal, the first of the carrion eaters descended into the empty streets of a once flourishing city.

The messenger though was safe from them. He only followed the longing for home emanating from his very core. Never in his tiny brain could he have comprehended the gravity of the message in the small pack secured on his back. After all, how could a bird know that a piece of parchment would mold the destiny of the kingdom of Tlemismeria for the decades to come?

Four-and-twenty years later

A mother held her babe close to her breast as she scurried up the steep stairs. The freezing sea breeze clawed at her flimsy cloak. Her face, hidden beneath the hood, conveyed no emotion. She barely paid any attention to the roar of the battering waves or to the salty spray from the slit windows along the walls. A faint chill permeated the air, rendering everything damp.

She moved furtively, blending with the shadows. And at every turn, she paused and continued onward only after throwing searching looks all around her. However after passing the fourth archway, she visibly relaxed and picked up one of the burning torches. Guided by the light of its smoky flame, she trudged on.

She finally stood before the seventh elaborately carved ceremonial entrance. Reaching into the mouth of the snake engraved upon the polished sandalwood, she pulled. Creaking audibly, the doors opened inward to reveal the sprawling ward.

The mother walked to a bed on the far corner. As she laid the infant upon it and a stray treacherous tear rolled down her pinched face. She had hoped the illness would not take her son too. Alas, the odds were not in her favor. She cradled his headed and gently kissed his brow.

Though the beds in this ward were empty, she knew that the Mnemocnium was far from unoccupied. The illness ran rampant in the kingdom after all.

Faint murmurs that steadily increased in volume came from the corridor outside. Suddenly, an ear-piercing shriek ricocheted off the walls. The mother flinched, but her babe slept on; uninterrupted. She knew the healers would be there soon. Since the illness had taken hold, the Mnemocnium was open to all and at all times of every day and so the healers were constantly on rounds.

Sure enough, few minutes later a healer walked in through the door at the far end. He furnished a steady stream of instructions to an apprentice who struggled to note it all down on the parchment she carried. On the first bed they passed, he found the infant suckling his thumb and wrapped in a threadbare cloak and as he looked quickly around, he barely caught the giant doors sliding shut.

***

Rhanavan met his sister as he jogged up the stairs. This was no normal meeting on two accounts. Firstly, his sister almost never put herself through the ordeal of climbing up the stairs to his chambers. Secondly, whenever they met, he usually ensured that he saw his sister from the right side up.

"Not a word Rhia!"

She ignored him. Of course she did.

"Why are you on the floor?"

"I tripped. Now stop giggling like a psdarxil and Help. Me. Up."

She pursed her lips together and bent to take his hands. Mercifully, she had stopped giggling, though her eyes still glittered with suppressed mirth.