c22: part 1
When they told me this age would be known as the twenty-second century it didn’t make much sense. Our history was lost in the preceding age of cataclysm that both man and nature had conspired to bring. Now there were only rumors that a city remained, that all technological achievement had been preserved. Wherefore we’d seek to find, I and my men.
We left the mountain safety on our sand skiffs laden smartly, provisioned for a fortnight’s scouting to the east, where friendly tribes might be met and trades made. “You’ll have me up,” the men sang o’er nights’ fires: “You’ll have me up, sweet ma-id-en, e’er I arrive. E’er I arrive, greet me kindly, like the dawn, in your bosom warm where a sleep’s made--where an eternity is met, God willing.”
God. That concept’s held, though long shed the vestiges of religion. Its existence irrefutable--the wriggly sand beneath our skiffs when on land, the limbless waves on water, the pale breath of wind from the northeast regardless. You’d come to make your peace with it, eventually, out here, on your own.
Days of swift crossing etched away at the apparent horizon till mountains more were seen. “These are not like ours,” the men said in foreboding tones, but they bore their sails and did as they were told, for tales of my late father’s ventures here were fresh in their ears yet. Aye, the men, their eyes hadn’t failed them--for though beheld were peaks and aeries, glinting surfaces betrayed an inorganic origin: that of the former age.
“All hail, Madaum of the Eastern Rim, whom my father took as friend.”
“All hail, Padua, son of Calaphir, envoy from the Western Ledge.”
“What news from the Outer Lands? What of the Living City?”
“There is much to tell, my son.”
And so we banqueted long on a great balcony overlooking the desert encased in azure sky, my men on the meat and mead brought out, and I on Madaum’s words.
We left the mountain safety on our sand skiffs laden smartly, provisioned for a fortnight’s scouting to the east, where friendly tribes might be met and trades made. “You’ll have me up,” the men sang o’er nights’ fires: “You’ll have me up, sweet ma-id-en, e’er I arrive. E’er I arrive, greet me kindly, like the dawn, in your bosom warm where a sleep’s made--where an eternity is met, God willing.”
God. That concept’s held, though long shed the vestiges of religion. Its existence irrefutable--the wriggly sand beneath our skiffs when on land, the limbless waves on water, the pale breath of wind from the northeast regardless. You’d come to make your peace with it, eventually, out here, on your own.
Days of swift crossing etched away at the apparent horizon till mountains more were seen. “These are not like ours,” the men said in foreboding tones, but they bore their sails and did as they were told, for tales of my late father’s ventures here were fresh in their ears yet. Aye, the men, their eyes hadn’t failed them--for though beheld were peaks and aeries, glinting surfaces betrayed an inorganic origin: that of the former age.
“All hail, Madaum of the Eastern Rim, whom my father took as friend.”
“All hail, Padua, son of Calaphir, envoy from the Western Ledge.”
“What news from the Outer Lands? What of the Living City?”
“There is much to tell, my son.”
And so we banqueted long on a great balcony overlooking the desert encased in azure sky, my men on the meat and mead brought out, and I on Madaum’s words.
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