From Chapter 7: THE CHARGE OF THE GURROPSU


Deep within the underground realm of Spirits long forgotten a small flushed man who had been left alone in this world for many Returns, had made a contract with a Dark Presence. His entire village of Helena had been plundered long ago by the Ozyumps. Since the fall of Helena he had wandered aimlessly and alone, with only the Spirits of the departed for his company. He had become the Helen, the Keeper of Knowledge of his village, by simple default. For he was the last of his kind. His given name, Placido, had long faded, for there was no one left to speak it.

Not unlike the staid Spirits of the First Hoase of Caleb, the Spirits of the Helena knew not whither nor whence; and so the poor man drifted until he chanced upon the Valley of Steams.

Silent laid that valley. And desolate of human Spirit. The Yeomen known to Luke had long ago fallen to the virulent Pestilence that had wrought the Empty Realm, taking every human for six hundred miles to the south and west. All trace of the Yeomen’s homes and their proper gardens had dwindled away, returned to the natural order.

Yet the natural order of this valley still resonated. Helen could sense it. The geysers and hot springs proclaimed it boldly. Here dwelt the Gurropsu: proud and brash Spirits of Deep places where water and fire contend, Spirits of Heat and Darkness, kin to mighty Kur himself, to Uluru from the land of the Ozyump’s emergence, and to Pele who graces Loihi and the newer Kamehameha Islands. Here the Gurropsu had abided since long before men walked the Earth.

Helen found refuge here in the Valley of Steams; and he scratched a lonely garden row. As the Returns passed in solitary exile, he came to know many nether-places where the Gurropsu held dominion. His own Ancestral Spirits, the Helena, quavered and cowered at the entrance to such dens. Long were the two at odds, the untamed Gurropsu and the gentle Ancestors of men of a quiet land. But in the desperate loneliness of Helen, they found a common cause. One frail and prayerful man, devoutly and humbly beseeching the Spirit Realms for any shred of comfort or protection, forged a bond of partnership between these unlikely Hosts. Gurropsu and Helena united: for now he could no longer always tell them apart!

And so when chance brought this solitary man new purpose—when civil strangers begged for a diversion, frail Helen knew his Call. Diverting the flow, the plumbing, of the complex nether-dominion, was child’s play for a man who now counted the Gurropsu among his kin!

Now it was done. A flow of mild underground water was dammed until it found a new outlet. Now it coursed its guided path toward a long silent Sanctum of Scald hidden deep beneath the Meanders’ hearth: a furnace crypt where no water had entered for aeons, where the Fires of Kur and Pele dwelt unchecked and unchallenged.

The time had come: the dirge of the Gurrposu engulfed the valley. Helen trembled and cowered before them, unable to lift his face to look.

“Run!” Jebden screamed at G’Pahl and Tril, who had tumbled to the ground when his grip was released. “Get away from the fire!”

The slab of stone supporting his weight fell away. Jeb slipped below the surface just as a boulder hurtled past, inches above his head, driven by an outburst of boiling steam and water. Still he scratched, he crawled, he clutched at anything that would slow his descent into the seething abyss. His fingers bled from the clinging and clawing.

His feet found nothing to support him. There was only darkness and the cloying dirge of the Gurropsu. The chasm yawned vast and deep. Scalding water rained down over his head. Hissing steam burned his hands and face. He was sinking. Helpless.

Then suddenly a cushion of support rose from below. It was as if the hand of the Helena had come to the rescue. Snatched back from the pits of doom itself, he arose, lifted by a firm but gentle hidden push. A new rising current of swirling water choked with mud and foam spat him out and cast him upon the solid ground. Quickly then he stood, and limped toward safety, pain gripping his left ankle.

And now that swirl of mud and water met its destiny and its nemesis. Deep within the chasm, the new gush plunged toward the inviolate realm of Scorch. And the fell sorcery of the merged forces sprang forth upon the world of men and beasts.

The encounter stayed the heavens. Beneath the Nomads’ bonfire, the earth’s surface lurched in spasm; it flung open and exploded.

Through huge cracks, a gush of scalding water erupted. It pushed, soared, hurtled, raged skyward. Slabs of rock and earth blasted up and out like shrapnel. Those Meander near the hearth, including the two Warriors, met a quick and brutal end. Wilson and his cohorts were forced to beat a quick retreat as a barrage of scalding spray and knife-edged shards assaulted their position.

And so came the moment when the mortals’ fire extinguished, its remnants rent asunder and flung to the night sky. Engulfed by the force of dark and stifling scald, the last twilight ember was rendered to pale wet ash.

No fire. No light. The Gurropsu reclaimed the night.

The place of fire now became a jet of fuming, spitting, boiling water surging three hundred feet in the air. Billowing steam swallowed all in confusion. And into this maelstrom, a seething scalding rain began to descend.

Prin lept to retrieve her children. They found temporary shelter with Fahr beneath a clump of trees. Prin then returned and helped Jebden reach the same refuge, just beyond where Ray sat, still tethered.

At the same moment the men of Ercildoun appeared out of a cloud of steam and came to Ray’s rescue. Rodriguille severed his bonds with a few deft strokes of an ancient blade made of stainless steel. Emlen and Lars stood alert for Nomad warriors. Ray gazed at the dim visage of the new strangers with a mix of uncertainty and gratefulness.

“We’ve come to rescue you.” Rodriguille explained simply, just as Wilson’s face emerged out of the swirling steam and boiling rain.

Wilson turned to Jebden, knowing he needed to be quick to secure his trust. “We come from Ercildoun. You are a son of Trilly and an honored man of the hoase of Luke. Let us get you to safety.”

Held upright with his arm over Prin’s shoulder, Jebden gazed toward the stranger wearily and without surprise, as if he had already met the man. Then he turned toward Prin and met her eyes. When he spoke, the cacophony of the Gurropsu’s dirge seemed to momentarily relent.

“Sir, your coming is a Blessed gift.” He said, “But let us get everyone to safety.”

A renewed burst of fury from the geyser now gripped the hollow. It spat a fresh barrage of scalding steam and water in their direction. A hissing filled the skies.

“Away!” Helen’s quavering voice penetrated the miasma. “Oh, Oh, Gurropsu! Little did we appreciate our naked force! Everyone move back!”

No one needed encouragement. The blast from the geyser howled in their ears. The heat pierced their furs. Searing rain pelted their heads.

Jeb struggled to keep up with the others as he made his way out of the conflagration. The noise was deafening. It was hard to see, and every step with his left foot brought stabbing pain. Prin continued to support his left arm and Ray came to his right.

Then out of the roiling fumes a new face appeared: hateful, bent on revenge.

“Hidden One! Evil conjurer! I give you your reward!” G’Zatch loomed triumphant, bristling with fury.

He lunged toward Jebden. A black and glistening lance-point accelerated directly toward his heart.

The geyser squealed a siren song. An almost musical cacophony lifted heavenward. A requiem for the fallen. There were choirs. Gurropsu and Helena. The endless bitter sky melded with the deepest graves of the underworld. No fire, no light! The loftiest and the most profane flowed together as one. Scalded spruce and sulfurous stench smothered the nostrils and stung. The air could no longer sustain life. Furnace heat engulfed all flesh. This was the rancid taste of death, palpable and final. The Gurropsu cared not. For Helen was their only living charge.

The spear point plunged true toward its mark.

“BARRRRRGHHHHHH!” At the last moment G’Zatch’s lance lurched aside and missed. A hiss of breath escaped the Alpha male’s chest. The face of G’Rang emerged from the fume as G’Zatch fell limp to the ground: a stocky bone blade pierced through his heart from behind.

G’Rang withdrew the blade as his nemesis fell. He faced Jebden and spat just one word.

“Covenant.”