Tears of the Mountain: Mountain Trilogy, #3

Song had learned that life’s greatest rewards come wrapped in the tiniest packages. His heart stirred every time a sailing ship nudged its way up the Chin-Yazi, sails billowing and belly bulging with silks and spices from the coast. And contentment settled over his shoulders like a cloak whenever he stepped across the threshold of his new frame house. But when Song knelt beside the tiny forms tangled in the blanket on the sleeping pallet, his ribs ached to contain the swell of love that rose within them.

Good night, sweetheart, he whispered, laying a hand on the nearest child, who still lay awake.

The little girl sat up to hug his neck. I have been waiting for you, Papi.

Have you? He feigned surprise.

You know I cannot go to sleep until you tell me a story.

Even at age five, the child was well-versed in the ancient tales. She had not let an evening slip by without hearing one for the past three years.

Nori, Karina scolded softly from the doorway. It is late, and your father has business to attend to.

But I am not tired, Nori protested.

Your brother is already sleeping, her mother pointed out.

The girl pouted. Li-Min is little. He always falls asleep quickly.

Song reached out and lightly brushed a hand across his son’s forehead. The children shared the goose down pallet as well as the spotted puppy nestled between them. Their home did not boast the grandeur of the manor that once stood upon the site, but it was far different than the tiny hut Song had grown up in. He was pleased that he could provide his family with a few small luxuries.

Nori turned pleading eyes in his direction. Please, Papi.

Song knew when he was beaten. He sank onto the pallet with a surge of pleasure. Your Uncle Keeto can wait a few minutes more. What story would you like to hear?

The one with the music, she answered and hummed a few bars of a melody that flooded Song with memories. It was a tune his grandfather had learned long ago and taught to him. He could piece it out on his daughter’s little wooden flute, but he was much better at carving the instruments than at playing them. He was told his father Quon had an aptitude for music, however, a talent passed down from a gifted ancestor.

Song’s eyes filled with moisture. He wished he could have known his father. But his tears fell for the grandfather whose death had left a hole so great that five years could not mend it. Yet the old man’s legacy lived on in the tales Song recited each night and in the lives of the little ones who listened to them so eagerly. Who knew what stories they might live out one day? The hand of Mutan was not finished writing.

Music it shall be, Song agreed and pulled his daughter onto his lap. The puppy shifted, rolling onto its back with four legs in the air, and Li-Min sighed heavily in his sleep. Song crested on a wave of happiness and began his story.

Once upon a time there lived a young man who wished only to live in tranquility. But when peace proved elusive, he learned that a single act of obedience has the power to change the world…

Jubal’s fingers tightened on the string of his bow as he squinted to make out the boulders marking the mouth of the high mountain pass. Twilight blurred the edges of newly leafed trees and caused shapes to bleed into one another. How was he supposed to distinguish an enemy soldier from a shadow? If an adversary did appear, how could he possibly send an arrow hurtling through a man’s body?

He breathed in a lungful of thin, clear air and glanced at the boy crouched behind the nearest tree. Sark caught his eye and flashed him the secret salute retained from their childhood—three fingers splayed like the toes of a magpie. Jubal could plainly see the excitement in his best friend’s eyes. Though they had gone through martial training together, it was Sark who excelled at physical combat. Sark who had yearned for this, their first call to battle.

According to tradition, their company should not see action for at least another year, not until its members passed the age of seventeen. At that time, a boy was entered in the tax rolls as a man, he was free to choose a wife, and he entered full military service. But tensions with the neighboring kingdom of Ungmar had been steadily escalating ever since Ungmar’s new king had taken the throne. That morning, runners had brought word of an armed force moving quickly from the south. In a last-minute decision, the boys had been called up from the city and placed at the least likely site of battle—a treacherous, winding pass high upon the mountain slopes.

Hold steady, men. A dusky figure passed behind Jubal. He recognized the form of their commander. "We must remain vigilant. Kindolin is depending on our fortitude.

Jubal tried to steady his nerves. Captain Bali, he called out. What will we do if the barbarians come?

The officer was still a young man, well-respected, with a bright future within the service. We will fight like men, he replied. But I do not look for such an outcome. There are few who know of the mountain crossing and fewer who would attempt its perils. For an army to do so would be suicide. No, the enemy will approach there. He pointed over the city below, across fields speckled with cattle, to the far side of the valley.

Jubal grasped a slender branch, pliable with spring sap, and bent it out of his field of vision. In the waning light, he could make out only a dark blotch where the main force of warriors stood guard at the valley’s head.

Jubal let the branch snap back into place. He flexed his fingers and tried to ease the tension from his shoulders. He knew the tales of Kindolin’s past well. Indeed, history was one of few studies he anticipated with pleasure. As son of the grand vizier, he was expected to master a wide range of subjects—court protocol, strength training, battle strategies, astronomy, foreign languages, and mathematics. He would prefer to toss most of his texts off the palace’s highest parapet, but the tales of ancient alliances and long-ago battles held his imagination captive.

Our ancestors chose their location well. Min-Golan has never been taken, Captain Bali assured him before moving on.

Jubal watched the city bed down for the night. It looked tiny from this height, nestled in the center of a wide green bowl and cradled by the encircling arms of the mountains. Novan Tu, the great hall of the king, built of hewn granite and topped with golden thatch, appeared as a child’s toy. Even the turrets atop the city wall, which seemed of dizzying height when one stood upon them, diminished alongside the soaring cliffs.

Min-Golan was shrouded in shadow, peaceful and still. Jubal could almost imagine it as a huge bear that yawned and stretched and now slumbered in a comfortable heap. Yet he knew the city did not sleep. Tiny pinpricks of light could be seen flickering through the dusk, testifying to those who stood watch below, listening for sounds of battle.

A soft scuffle sharpened Jubal’s attention. He cast a glance toward Sark to find his friend no longer in place. Scanning the edge of the forest, he strained to make out shapes in the thickening darkness. There was something—a blur low against the shadow of the trees. A deer? A mountain cat? He peered harder, leaning from his hiding place.

Thwack!

An arrow quivered in the bole of the tree beside Jubal’s head. An arrow fletched with the black feathers of Ungmar. He jerked himself behind the trunk, quaffing in a breath and gulping down his panic. Captain Bali was mistaken. The enemy had chosen the mountain.

A battle horn echoed over the treetops and lingered in the valley. Before the note faded, chaos erupted. A stream of barbarians poured through the boulders, shouting as they came. They were a dark mass, nearly indistinguishable in the dusk. Their cries split the air like battleaxes.

Terror cleaved Jubal’s chest. He gripped his bow tighter, awaiting the command to fire. The wooden shaft grew slippery in his grasp. Still the order did not come. A dozen boys had already bolted. His untried company would have been overwhelmed if the pass admitted more than two men at a time.

Where was the captain?

Then Sark’s voice rang through the forest. Take courage, men! We must hold or Kindolin will be overrun. We have trained for this. Steady now! Aim and fire!

Scores of arrows stung the air, and the stream of men was staunched. Jubal’s chest swelled with pride at the valor of his friend. At the same time, his stomach recoiled at the dark mound of bodies heaped at the head of the pass. He aimed his bow, but he could not force his fingers to let fly the arrow on his string.

The barbarians soon pushed aside their dead and flooded once more onto the field of battle. Some fell, but more took their place, rushing the line of trees that hid the trembling boys. The lines clashed, and the woods rang with the clamor of war.

Jubal’s breath came hard and fast. He watched one of his companions fall beneath a barbarian’s sword. Then an arrow sent the warrior to his death. Jubal’s stomach revolted. His head spun. He forced himself to focus, to stave off the clutch of panic even as he prayed fervently for reinforcements.

Already he could hear the pounding of hooves that marked the company being rushed from the city’s far side. But horses could not navigate the last steep ascent. It would be some time before the boys’ ranks would be fortified with seasoned warriors.

A shadow loomed up before Jubal—the silhouette of a huge man with hair bound in a long black tail, the mark of an Ungmarian warrior. Jubal had no time to think. He loosed the arrow, aiming for the shoulder. The man went down, but another rose up to take his place. Jubal’s hesitancy fell away and his training took over. It was kill or be killed.

He went through the motions of war, sending arrow after arrow into the advancing line. When the combat drew too close, he cast aside his bow, drew his sword, and used it well. Sweat stung his eyes. His muscles burned with weariness. Still the enemy trickled through the pass, relentlessly forcing the boys down the hill. Jubal scanned the forest for some sign of Sark, but the night had grown black. He was alone in a writhing, moaning sea of darkness.

Then the first wave of reinforcements labored past. With cries of fury, they launched themselves into the battle. Rank after rank of fighting men followed, driving the invaders back. With the weight of duty lifted from his shoulders, Jubal sank to his knees at the foot of a laurel tree and retched into the dirt.

Sark found him there twenty minutes later. Jubal could see the gleam of his teeth in the moonlight. We defeated them soundly! his friend exulted. "The barbarians are fleeing back to the southern lands. What’s left of them, anyway.

Jubal tried to respond, but the images of war bound his tongue.

They were only a small force, Sark continued, sent to strike the city hard and fast. They were not prepared for full battle.

Jubal let his friend pull him to his feet. He swallowed hard, forcing words past his teeth. They would have chased us to the city walls if you had not rallied the company. What happened to Captain Bali? Why did he not give the order to fire?

Sark’s tone sobered. The captain was the first to fall. I saw him go down.

You have likely saved Min-Golan. You will be rewarded.

Sark threw his arm around Jubal’s shoulders. "We saved Min-Golan, he amended. All of us together.

Jubal’s knees trembled as they descended the steep slope. I hope I am never called upon to do such a thing again.

Do not get too comfortable, Sark responded. The pass was a closely guarded secret. That Ungmar knew to use it speaks of treachery. War is coming.

Jubal could not focus on his text. The memory of the battle refused to relinquish its grip on him. Images flashed onto the page, disrupting the flow of thought as he worked out his arithmetic assignment, and his skull reverberated with the clang of weapons.

For three days, his company had remained on high alert. Usual routines were amended in favor of extra drills, addresses by ranking officers, and congratulatory speeches given by a number of government officials. Jubal wanted only to forget the entire business. He thought resuming sessions with his tutor might help him return to a sense of normalcy, but so far, it was not working. Fingers trembling, he closed the book and stared into the blaze burning in the library grate.

His tutor pushed beetling gray eyebrows into question marks.

Jubal picked up a lyre and plucked out a doleful tune. Each note dropped into his lap like a tear. "I apologize, Doli, but I cannot concentrate today.

Numbers always rendered a rational answer. He had hoped to take comfort in their predictability, but today only music could offer relief from the senselessness of war. Why can two kingdoms not let each other live in peace? Why must one always try to dominate the other?

The old man leaned back in his seat with a creak of wood and leather. "You ask questions that have baffled men for centuries.

Jubal glanced through the unshuttered window, his melody plodding now like a train of weary funeral-goers. His eyes failed to register the washer woman hanging laundry in the late spring sunshine, the young boy delivering chickens to the kitchen door, or the frescoed walls of the temple rising beyond the courtyard wall. He saw the faces of those who died. Friends. One-time playmates. Young men who should have enjoyed a long journey to the grave. On whose order had their lives been cut short? Had the one responsible given no thought to the cost of his will? 

Doli rose and retrieved the hand-bound volume from Jubal’s lap. His figure was tall and spare, his skin mottled with liver spots. But a drab brown scholar’s robe could not disguise the vitality that still resided in his aged body. Maybe today is not a day for mathematics. Perhaps this session should be spent exploring more relevant topics.

Jubal set the lyre aside. Can we read again of Kindolin’s golden age? He never tired of the old stories.

Doli rubbed his nose with a crooked finger. I thought perhaps we might go back a bit further in time.

To the days when Kindoli went in search of a location on which to establish his throne?

Farther.

Before the birth of the Three Realms? But that would bring them back to the very beginnings of history. How do events that happened so long ago have any bearing on today?

The present always finds its roots in the past. Doli set the math text on a shelf and turned to face his pupil. You have learned about the rise of our people. And you have some knowledge of our neighbors, Ungmar and Miruna.

‘They were the first to lift themselves from the years of shadow,’ Jubal recited, "‘when man roamed wild and lived by no law. Miruna in the east, along the shores of the great water, Ungmar among the southern grasslands, and Kindolin between them in the mountain strongholds. Like jewels of