Margin Scribble This is an early version of the story’s prologue. I’m currently concentrating on the style and common principles of future texts (and trying to find good English names and terms). I’m not entirely happy with the pacing of the last third, but let it stay that way for now. I’ll come back to it in the future. Any feedback would be very welcome!

Khurkh-zan-ul

8th month of the 480th year since the Return (3827th year since the Creation according to the Brilian calendar)

Two and a half years had passed since the dry summer when Drenan, ruler of the great city of Varmego, united the scattered peoples of the verdant lands under the spear of the Father and bound them with His Word. The Unified Verda now stretched for thousands of miles: from the arid savannas of Bruna to the fertile shores of the Warm Sea, from the foothills of the Boundary Ridge—beyond which lay the lands of the beast-like Kyonnhs—to the coast of the Great Ocean. The wild Tondrantars, the calculating Kromrs, the fierce Malnurs, and even the cunning Varmars of Nordurbo—all had bowed to Drenan’s will. At least for now…

Shhhurkh. Shhhurkh. Shhhurkh. Shhhhu… Pop!

A large bubble, quietly swelling above the lazily bubbling, foul-smelling brew in a stone bowl, burst loudly, distracting Barghyr from his sharpening.

The youth had been toiling over a new needle since noon, and though the sun was slowly sinking toward the horizon, the work was far from done. Perhaps the task was moving so slowly because he was used to working deliberately and thoroughly, infusing every movement with conscious meaning. Or maybe the delay was due to the bones splashing in the cauldron: a large catfish had been caught in the nets that morning, and its bones would make fine belt clasps. Then again, it might have been the fact that, for the past two hours, young and lithe girls had been down by the shore rinsing canvas, and the wide windows of the workshop offered a truly mesmerizing view. Who could say?

In any case, whatever Barghyr was doing—or daydreaming about—the loud pop above the cauldron made him flinch and snap back to reality. Rising from the table, he quickly crossed the room and peered anxiously into the stone bowl: had he overcooked it? Didn’t seem so…

“Cooking up a storm?”

The curtain of roughly tanned leather covering the entrance flew aside, letting in a noisy guest.

“Phew! I was sure I was hungry, but if that’s your dinner, I’ve already eaten,” Ronan grimaced theatrically, waving a hand in front of his face. “Smells like something died. Yesterday. No, even earlier. And anyway…”

He strode briskly to the workbench and leaned on it with his fists, peering out the window:

“…aha, still here. So why were you staring into the cauldron? Had your fill already? Come on…”
“Touch my balls, and I’ll knock you out,” Barghyr threatened lazily.

Ronan snorted in disappointment, stopping a couple of steps away from the workshop owner, and raised his hands in mock surrender:
“What can I do with you… Phew.”

When the two stood side by side, it seemed there were no two more different people in all of Malcona. Barghyr, a descendant of the nomads of the great steppes, the Arydars, had already shot up so tall by the age of fourteen that he had to duck when entering some rooms. Slightly hunched, with awkwardly long arms and legs, he towered over Ronan like a gloomy old pine over a young ash tree.

Barghyr’s long face, with its strong features, was tanned in the Arydar fashion, his narrow dark eyes looked at the world with assessing distrust, and his thick lips, with their slightly downturned corners, seemed perpetually on the verge of a dissatisfied grimace. Every movement of his radiated visible reluctance, and he tended to view everything around him with pessimistic skepticism, searching first and foremost for flaws, threats, and annoyances.

Ronan, on the other hand, was his complete opposite: a child of mixed blood, he had drawn the lucky ticket at birth, inheriting only the best from both parents. Neither tall nor short, at twelve he was already built like a young Father: stately, broad-shouldered, predatorily agile, with clearly defined muscles beneath his bronze skin—give him another year or two, and many men of Nordurbo would have reason to worry.

His face retained the smooth, even slightly rounded features typical of the Prymars, but added the sharpness and expressiveness characteristic of the Arydar people. A straight nose, a strong chin, thin, well-defined lips, and slightly narrow, almond-shaped eyes with an amber-golden hue that gazed at the world with unwavering, energetic curiosity.

Add to this that Barghyr kept his black, coarse hair cut short, growing a small, neat beard, while Ronan gathered his chestnut locks with a golden sheen into a loose knot at the back of his head or left them completely loose. Barghyr wore the traditional leather clothing of the nomads, roughly tanned and generously adorned with intricately carved bone symbols, while Ronan preferred the usual Prymar togas or loose trousers and shirts made of soft fabric dyed with Noctidian purple, and his only adornments were a family amulet and a wide bracelet on his left wrist.

In short, as mentioned earlier, you’d be hard-pressed to find two more different people—but such trifles didn’t bother these two in the slightest.

Shaking his head in disappointment, Ronan glanced around the room and plopped down on the nearest chest.

“A caravan from the Kromrs arrived. They brought spices from Bruna, a bit of this, a bit of that… And a little silver from the Kyonnhs.”

The boy paused dramatically, watching for Barghyr’s reaction.

“Uh-huh,” the dark-skinned youth nodded, bending over the cauldron again. “Heard ‘bout it.” “Heard about it!?” Ronan leapt up from the chest, bounded over to the craftsman, and slapped him on the back, enunciating clearly: “They brought silver. From the Kyonnhs. Sil-ver.” “Uh-huh,” Barghyr agreed again, not taking his eyes off the cauldron. “Like I said, I heard.” “You’re impossible…” Ronan took a deep breath, choked on the stench rising from the bowl, and broke into a coughing fit. “Cough-cough, ugh! Why do I even bother coming to this stinking hole of yours!? You’ve got a perfectly good room in the house! You can see the girls from there too!!!”

Barghyr ignored this remark. After damping the fire under the cauldron, he carefully covered it with a heavy turtle-shell lid, returned to his table, sat down on the stool, and, leaning his elbows on his knees, stared intently into Ronan’s shimmering, enthusiastic golden eyes.

After a few seconds of this staring contest, the dapper boy shook his head in mock offense:

“You’re so dense! Listen up: the Kromrs. Brought. Silver. That means…” “It means they went north through Coppergrass,” Barghyr said with a heavy sigh. “To the Steps. Traded with the Kyonnhs. And came back. Right through Tondrantar territory.” “Exactly!” Ronan enthusiastically slapped his thighs, jumping to his feet again. “Precisely! So, they’re following…” “So, they’re following the Word and aren’t allowed to fight among themselves,” the host continued in the same displeased tone. “Well! Isn’t that amazing!?” “Amazing. I’m sure Mongar-suru likes it too. And when he comes to Shu-Guranbor for the winter, he’ll be in a good mood. And no one will have any trouble because of it. Right?” “Mongar-suru and all the other Tondrans will have to deal with it!” Ronan paced back and forth across the room, energetically waving his arms. “The world is changing, don’t you get it, Barghyr!? The wind is changing! And that means…” “It means there’s a storm coming.”

Ronan groaned in frustration, rolling his eyes to the ceiling as if asking, “Why me, Father?” But then his mood shifted abruptly. He darted over to Barghyr, planted his hands on the table on either side of the seated youth, and grinned slyly right in his face:

“And that too. That too! That’s exactly why I need you around, to whine in my ear and remind me how bad everything really is. So I don’t get carried away. And you,” Ronan straightened up and spread his arms in bewilderment, “for some reason, are never there. Why didn’t you come to the caravan meeting, huh?” “Because a smooth-skinned youth has no place at a council of men,” Barghyr replied with stone-cold calm, and Ronan winced as if from a toothache. “Again… You’re not a youth, you’re my rider! My senior rider! Isn’t that enough?” “No.”

Barghyr scowled, raised a clenched fist in front of him, and began unfolding his fingers one by one:

“A rider is a warrior. A warrior is a man. I’m not a man. I can’t be a warrior. I can’t be a rider.” “You’re impossible…” Ronan groaned again and irritably waved his hand toward the western wall. “That’s over there! But you live here! My riders will be whoever I choose, and let anyone dare mutter a word about those barbutar rituals!”

The dark-skinned boy stubbornly furrowed his brow and rose threateningly from his seat: “I. I’ll have something to say about those rituals. I’m a tribesman of the Arydar tribes. These are my rituals, got it!?”

For a few seconds, they glared at each other fiercely until Ronan finally gave in: “Just kick me already,” he grumbled, collapsing onto a stack of tanned hides in the corner. “Barbutar through and through.”

For a while, silence hung in the room, broken only by the sullen grumbling of the two boys who had once again quarreled. This wasn’t the first time they’d argued about this, and Barghyr remained steadfast: true to his Arydar blood, he refused to call himself a man until he had undergone Khurkh-zan-ul.

Khurkh-zan-ul—the rite of passage—was the most important ritual for any boy born into the Arydar tribes of the Great Plains. The harsh nomadic tribe clearly divided its men into -khur—boys, and -khar—grown men, and the line separating the two was precisely Khurkh-zan-ul.

It took place in the final days of summer, when the beasts of the plains were well-fed and strong. At sunset, a father would come to his son and present him with a handcrafted ancestral talisman, the Sakhyr: a vertebra of the tribe’s totem animal, adorned with intricate runes invoking the ancestors. From that moment until the very end of Khurkh-zan-ul, the future man would not utter a single word.

In silence, he would gather his bow and knife, leave the encampment, and head to the nearest sacred spring. There, he would spend a sleepless night without food or water, listening to the music of the steppe wind and calming his spirit.

At dawn, the youth would set out into the steppe, tracking his future guardian. The stronger the beast he found, the more powerful a protector it would become, and the stronger his entire lineage would grow. But the boy would be cautious: the animal must be defeated openly and honestly, relying only on his bow, arrows, and courage—traps and trickery would insult the free spirit of the beast, anger it, and instead of gaining its protection, he would only invite misfortune.

After succeeding in the hunt, the youth would return to the encampment with his prize. If the beast was too large for a single talard to carry its carcass, the hunter would take only the largest and strongest bone—and he would not forget to dip the Sakhyr into the hot blood, staining it crimson.

The tribe would greet the hunter with jubilation. The bone he brought would be split into two parts: the smaller piece would become the first link of his Tuur-Khurrah—a talisman chain bearing the vertebrae of his guardians. The larger part would form the base of the Krynar: a long knife adorned with prayer runes, a symbol of an Arydar man’s dignity.

Once the Tuur-Khurrah and Krynar were ready, the shaman would inscribe the youth’s first adult tattoo onto his skin: symbols of the defeated beast and the lineage strengthened by this victory. Then, the boy would speak his first adult words, the words of a man: Issar-Khurrah, the “oath to the bones.” The Sakhyr he brought, stained with the blood of the totem beast, would be added to the ancestral chain of the entire lineage, and the new man would take his place among the Arydars.

Faithful to tradition and heritage, Barghyr stubbornly wished to follow the path of his ancestors—and Ronan, for the most part, had no issue with it… except for the fact that the stubborn boy didn’t truly have a lineage of his own. Barghyr was an orphan, the adopted son of Varek, the current ruler of Nordurbo and all the Varmars.

Though the Varmars had drifted away from classical Prymar culture over the centuries since their separation from Varmego, they still adhered to the same principle regarding adoption as the Shield City: adopted sons or daughters became junior to biological children or those adopted earlier, but otherwise enjoyed the same rights and treatment.

This made Barghyr a full-fledged brother to Ronan—and a beloved one at that—while also, in Ronan’s understanding, freeing the stubborn boy from the need to follow Arydar traditions and rules. Instead, it obligated him to abide by the rules established in Varek’s family. Barghyr fully agreed with the latter part, but as for the former…

Ronan sighed heavily:

“Alright, let’s go with a different wind. Sit still and keep quiet. Don’t say a word. Got it, tall one?”

Barghyr raised his eyebrows in confusion as the curly-haired boy, rummaging behind the fold of his toga, deftly tossed something onto his lap. The lanky youth looked down, and his pupils widened in shock.

“If you laugh, I’ll kill you,” Ronan warned. “Or at least try to maim you.”

There was, admittedly, plenty to laugh about: the piece of bone that had landed on Barghyr’s lap was so poorly crafted that even an apprentice would have done better. A jagged, uneven edge, crudely scratched runes… It was a hack job, plain and simple. But laughter was the last thing on Barghyr’s mind: resting on his knees was half of Ronan’s ancestral amulet, made from the bone of the lord of the skies, the soaring Tensus whale. A more powerful guardian was hard to imagine…

The youth looked up at his brother with stunned eyes, meeting his wide grin.

“It’s mine, all mine,” Ronan said, showing the other half still hanging from a leather cord around his neck. “Just don’t blurt anything out, or you’ll ruin it. We’d have to wait another year.”

Barghyr frowned, and the curly-haired boy stretched contentedly, raising his hands in a forbidding gesture:

“No-no, keep your mouth shut! Open your ears instead—I’ll answer all your questions right now. First, it’s my amulet, my guardian, and my lineage! I can do what I want with it. Second, the Sakhyr doesn’t have to be given by a father—any senior member of the lineage can do it. According to our traditions, I’m older than you, right?”

Barghyr, still sitting stiff as a rod, hesitated, then nodded uncertainly.

“Exactly! Next: why isn’t the Warm Sea a sacred spring? Your idea is that lakes give life to the steppe, and the sea is a big lake. It gives life to us. And there’s plenty of wind here—Kaelesta loves the sea as much as the plains!”

Ronan waited for another thoughtful nod, then leaned in conspiratorially and whispered loudly:

“And they’ve seen traces of a shadowboar in the Shattered Bay.”

He winked at the still-dazed craftsman, slapped him on the shoulder, and headed for the exit, tossing back an encouraging farewell:

“Don’t shit your pants, and may the Father watch over you.”

The Evening of the Next Day

It took Barghyr almost an entire day to track down the shadowboar. These wild boars dwell only in the dense forests on the very edge of the Noctarian Wastes: blessed by the ghostly light of the Moon-Protector, Tranka, they skillfully conceal their presence in the shadows, avoiding the bright rays of the sun at all costs.

During the day, the Shadowboar rests in deep pits beneath tree roots. Knowing this—and also that the delicate eyes of these creatures cannot tolerate light—hunters approach such dens during the hot midday hours and throw inside a burning clump of grass, oil-soaked tow, or simply a couple of torches. Awakened and blinded, the boar flies into a rage and charges out mindlessly, straight into the bright sunlight and the sharp spears of the Varmars.

Alas, Barghyr found the den only at sunset, he was alone, and in his hands he held not a spear but a sturdy horn bow. The weapon with which you take down your guardian beast is the one it will respect, the one it will share its strength with, and for an Arydar, there is no weapon more significant or beloved than the bow. But arrows are not the best choice when an enraged boar is charging straight at you, especially one shrouded in shadowy mirage.

The hunter knew all this perfectly well, but the mere thought of missing his chance and shaming himself in the eyes of his ancestors made the youth tremble. After a moment’s hesitation, Barghyr finally made up his mind. Kissing the Sakhyr, he took the oil-soaked tow from his belt and reached for his tinderbox…

“Have you lost your mind!?” Ronan hissed in a fierce whisper, rolling out of the thick bushes to the right. “You’re going after a boar with a bow!?”

Startled, Barghyr turned to his uninvited companion in indignation.

“Here!” Ronan shoved a long spear with a thick shaft into his brother’s hands. Barghyr frowned and pushed the spear back.
“Take it, I said!!!” Ronan was so furious he even started to whistle. “It won’t even notice your arrow, don’t be an idiot!”

Barghyr stubbornly shook his head.

“Take the damn spear!” Ronan finally roared louder than he should have, and a low, threatening growl answered from the dark hole beneath the roots of an old tree. The scuffling boys froze, slowly turning toward the den, now barely visible in the rapidly deepening twilight, and spotted two glimmering points of light.
“SPEAR!!!!” Ronan screamed at the top of his lungs, his face pale.

With an angry grunt, the boar charged at them. Barghyr shoved his brother aside, grabbed the spear, and barely managed to plant it in front of him, bracing the butt against the ground. Well, almost managed… With a ramming blow, the frenzied beast slammed into the hunter, and even the dim light of dusk faded for Barghyr.

Some Time Later
Shhhurkh. Shhhurkh. Shhhurkh.

The scraping sounds broke into Barghyr’s consciousness along with the pain. His head was spinning terribly—apparently, Ronan had given him a brew of sorrowweed… How bad must the pain be if even under the influence of the drug he felt like howling? He groaned weakly and opened his eyes. Above him, the treetops jerked past, and here and there, patches of the dark night sky peeked through.

Shhhurkh, the hastily assembled drag made of branches creaked one last time, and the world finally came to a standstill. Between the sky and Barghyr appeared the swaying, exhausted figure of his brother: Ronan dropped to his knees beside the wounded boy and leaned in close, trying to catch his breath:

“You’re so… Barghyr-khar… Heavy,” he coughed heavily but stubbornly continued. “And stupid. And heavy… And… Stupid… Almighty Father, I… Nothing… We’re almost at the shore.”

The hunter shuddered and weakly stirred, trying to sit up.

“Stay down,” Ronan, still coughing, pressed down on him. “And shut up. The boar’s done for.”

The boy showed Barghyr his own hand, where the blood-soaked Sakhir dangled, tied with a cord.

“We’ll get there soon,” Ronan tried to stand but swayed and fell back down, “and everything will be fine. We’ll draw you… a tattoo… write… heavy… and stupid…”

With an incredible effort of will, Barghyr forced his body to move. He propped himself up on his elbow, grabbed Ronan by the back of the head with his other hand, pressed his brother’s forehead to his own, and hoarsely, barely audibly, spat out his first adult words:

“You’re… stupid… You’re… dragging… and I’m… riding.”

Exhausted, he fell back onto the drag and slipped back into unconsciousness with a satisfied smile, accompanied by his brother’s loud laughter.