[story] lives that are buried by the earth

[ib_archive]

author: kagami shin (misao_kunoichi
email: fragmentedblue [at] gmail.com





My first journey was when I was sixteen. It was the summer Kin and I first made love. He disappeared the winter after.

Kin's face is fuzzy in my memories, but the stars as I lay on the ground in his arms are crystal clear and sharp. They're much bigger than they are here, and sometimes I miss them. I miss them like I miss my old home: a sense of disbelief that those things are gone and distant. Those are the only times I feel old.

I remember Kin with that same ache. I've forgotten my real name, but his is still etched in my mind. For years, I wore his necklace: the small silver chain with a dangling ivory piece, carved in his name. When I left the cave of ice and crystals, I left the necklace behind.

Sometimes I touch my throat in a moment of forgetfulness. Then everything comes rushing back, and I remember Kin, my journey to find him, and the Lady of the Ice. I don't remember all the details; each memory is gently fuzzed around the edges, and melts into the other.





My village comes to mind as a gentle, idyll place. It is a small community of huts; a river to the south, a forest to the west, and wide, open fields to the east. There's a road that stretches to the north, distant and far; nobody travels on that road, except the occasional merchants or traveling actors.

The forest is my favorite place to play with Kin. Kin lives in the hut next to mine, and his eyes are a gentle hazel. Even though I am a girl, he allows me to join in on his games. "Don't fall behind," he teases me as he climbs up a tree, and I scowl and follow him. I want to show him that I am strong, that I am capable. As the years go on, and I become conscious of our differences, this changes: I want to show him that I am feminine, that I am beautiful. I want him to think that I am beautiful, and for his eyes to turn to me only. The summer of my sixteenth birthday, when he kisses me, I feel my heart swell.





The village melts and becomes the forest, which is dark and cool in my memories. Kin and I are lying on a blanket spread across the grass. We are in our favorite place, a clearing in the forest that nobody knows except the two of us. The trees surround us in a close cluster; the night lends a sense of mystery. Kin is touching me, exploring my body, and I close my eyes, letting him. I want to touch him, too, because when he is this close I realize how different our bodies really are: where I am all soft curves and gentle swells, he is hard, flat planes and sharp angles. But when I reach out and trace a hand over his skin, over the necklace that dangles from his neck, he moves away and murmurs in my ear, telling me to let him show me pleasure first. He doesn't say my name: he calls me "darling," or "beloved," as he moves against me. I open my eyes again, saying his name, and the stars burn into my memory.





Winter follows summer too quickly. Kin becomes distant. He does not treats me not like a friend, nor a lover. I wonder if it is something I did that summer night in the forest. I go to his house to ask him, finally, gathering all the love I feel for Kin. It's strong, so strong I think my heart will burst at times. And then Kin's mother tells me, with tears in her eyes, that Kin has disappeared, that he has left a note saying that he no longer wants anything to do with this small, insignificant village, and my heart does burst. The fragments fall to the ground, and I scramble to hold together and save the feelings that overflow. I will need them to remind me to keep going, to be strong, when I, too, take the road north to look for Kin.





There is fear. I am on the road, traveling north. As the bandits surround me, waving their blades, hooting and leering at me, I remember why it is so dangerous for a girl to travel by herself, with no protection. All I have is a short knife that I hold in one trembling hand, as I try to look them in the eye and appear brave, fearless. They know as well as I do that it is a façade, because they draw closer and closer, until I can smell the rank of sweat and dirt on them. I slash at one who comes too close, and my blade tears a gash up his arm. He falls back, and I am momentarily relieved. But then another man grabs my arm, and I know, there are too many for me. I feel a stab of fear that paralyzes me. I already want to die, but then a voice says, "Let go of her, you boors!"

A woman walks towards me, and the men part for her. If they do not, steel flashes in her hand, and blood splatters onto the trampled snow. I have no voice to ask who she is, but my fingers are still clenched around my knife. "There's no need for that," the woman says, smiling, and although the smile is as thin and sharp as the sword she holds in her hand, I trust her.

"Who are you?" I finally manage to ask, in a whisper.

She tells me. I have forgotten it, now, but I still know her title: Queen of the bandits.





"It is hard work to be a woman and a warrior," the Queen tells me. "Men do not respect women, so women must work twice as hard as any man."

"You are a warrior," I say. "You are queen of the bandits."

"Because I worked harder than any of my men, and I am stronger." She smiles at the look on my face. "You think I am lying, but I am not. Perhaps I am not as powerful as a man, but I am stronger. Power and strength are different. You need to learn that."

"I have a journey to complete," I say. "I need to find Kin."

"You will never finish it without learning how to protect yourself."

"Who will teach me?" I ask.

"I will," the Queen says. "You are my student."





The snow is icy, and it stings my face when I fall into it. "Get up," the Queen says. "Pick up your sword. Don't complain. Don't tell me it is too hard. For a warrior, the only limits are the ones she sets herself."

She pushes me until I feel as if I will collapse, and even then my body keeps moving. I have always been stubborn, and it serves me well as the Queen puts me through rigorous exercises, honing my endurance, my strength, my speed. I am only reluctant at first, and then I tell myself that this is for Kin.

Every day, I grow stronger, and I feel closer to succeeding, although I do not travel anywhere.





The Queen teaches me how to fight with a variety of weapons, but when I pick up the twin kodachi in her collection. They mold to my hand, become an extension of my body, and they weave around each other fluidly. "Not many people can handle two blades. It seems I have taught you well," the Queen says, and smiles at me. Her smile is still as sharp as it was when I first met her, and her sword still flashes as quickly when I strike at her. Steel clangs on steel, and she says, "Shall I see how well you've learned, my student?"

We spar, and I push myself harder, faster, stronger, remembering: for a warrior, the only limits are the ones she sets herself. When I feel cold metal prickling at my neck, I smile. I am not defeated, because across from me, the Queen is locked in a similar position, one of my kodachi pressed lightly against her neck. "Good," she says. "You've done well."

"I need to finish my journey," I say.

"I wish you the best of luck," the Queen replies. "May you have a good journey."

I bow to her. When I walk outside, snow coats the trees and ice slicks the road, and I wonder if I have been with the Queen for such a short time. Then I realize: it is not still winter. Winter has arrived once more; I have been with the Queen for a year, perhaps two years, and now it is time to restart my journey.





I do not like killing. But the robbers who waylay me refuse to leave, even after I have threatened them with my kodachi. I am not fearless, but my hands are steady as I parry a blow and thrust forward. My blades work in unison, and the blood splatters onto the snow. It is startling and vivid, crimson blossoming across the ice, and I stand there long after the bandits have fallen, staring at it. I do not like killing. But killing is necessary: I must find Kin, and I cannot be stopped.





"Have you seen a boy?" I ask people. "He has gentle brown eyes, and around his neck he wears a necklace…" I describe Kin as well as I know how to, but nobody has seen him. Finally, as I sit in a tavern, a woman sits next to me and asks, "Your boy. Did he disappear from the village?"

"He left," I say. "He wrote a note and said that he was tired of our village."

The woman looks at me sadly and says, "Perhaps he was taken by the Lady of the Ice."

"Who is that?" I ask, because I am ignorant.

"She is an immortal who lives in the mountains north of here. People say that she is the one who brings winter, and snow, and death. She often takes boys from villages to be her companions. They all disappear the same way: one winter day, they are gone, and their only explanation is a note saying that they are tired of their home."

"How do you know all this?"

"Because," she says, and her eyes are so sad that I want to comfort her. "My lover disappeared the same way yours did. I used to search for him, too."

"This Lady of the Ice must be a monster," I say.

"No," the woman says, getting up. "She is only lonely."

I do not understand, because I am ignorant.





The Lady of the Ice lives to the north, people tell me. The north. Always the north. I keep walking, even as winter deepens. Finally, people do not say, "Her mountain is to the north." They say, "The Lady of the Ice lives in that mountain," and they point to peaks that break through the clouds. I look at them. I think that they are not so far away: they are only a stone's throw, compared to what I have traveled so far.





I stand in front of the mountain, the snow drifting gently down about me, and for a moment I turn around. I look at the road that stretches, on and on, curving into the dark forest. I can go home, if I want. But there is Kin to find, and besides, I think I have forgotten the way to my village. I have forgotten my way home, and cannot turn back.





Ice crunches underneath my feet. Ice melts against my face, stinging the skin. Ice forms in my hair. Ice surrounds me, crystalline and cold, and even before I step inside the cave, I know that I am in the realm of the Lady of the Ice.

She does not look like a monster. She has very pale skin, it is true, and her eyes are a color that I have never seen: a clear, colorless gray. But she has no horns, no fangs, no monstrously disproportional body. She is simply a woman who sits on an icy boulder like a tired queen on her uncomfortable throne. She jumps up when she sees me. "You are here," she says, and her voice is as clear and crystalline as the ice around her. "You are the first person who has ever come so far."

"Where is Kin?" I ask her, drawing my kodachi. "Tell me where you are keeping him."

"Kin does not matter anymore," she says. She gestures behind her, and I look warily. What I see crushes my patched-together heart, the pieces falling to the ground as they shatter into a million fragments.

Kin is frozen. He stands with a beseeching look on his face, encased in ice. He does not move. He does not speak. I know, without having to move closer, that he does not breathe. "You monster!" I scream, rushing towards the Lady of the Ice. "Kin is everything!"

One of my kodachi pierce her body, and her blood stains the ice, just as the bandits' blood stained the snow. But she does not die. "I have been alive a very long time," she says simply, moving towards me, pushing the sword even deeper into her body. "I know that one boy, one man, is not everything. There are others."

"You don't know anything," I sob, slashing at her with my other kodachi. It slices across her chest, but she does not stop. She touches my cheek, and her fingers are as cold as the ice. I flinch and swing my kodachi again. More blood. She smiles.

"I know a lot of things," she says. "I know that you are brave, and strong. Nobody has ever made it this far before. The others always gave up. They found other men."

"What are you talking about?"

"You have come so far," the Lady of the Ice says, and cups my face in her cold, cold hands. "I will reward you for your bravery." She smiles, and her smile is the most terrible thing about her: it is full of irony, of knowing. She knows too much. She has been alive for too long, and she has been waiting. She says, "I will reward you, my dear - how would you like to be the Lady of the Ice?"

I scream, "No!" but it is too late. She is already dying, already leaving this cave.

And I am alive, too alive, trapped in her place.





It is like being frozen. Everything is so cold, and I cannot move at all. Eventually, I close my eyes and let the darkness claim me.

I have to wake, sooner or later. When I open my eyes, everything is the same, and yet different. Kin does not stand frozen anymore. Instead, there are shards of ice on the ground, and his necklace lies a few feet from me. I walk over to it slowly and pick it up. The tears drip down my face, and their heat is startling against my skin. "Kin," I whisper, and the ice vibrates, hums, as if it is responding.

Kin is dead and I am the Lady of the Ice. My heart is frozen, the feelings are gone. Nothing matters anymore.





I am the Lady of the Ice. I do not bring winter, or snow, or death. I am merely the guardian of the cave, and over time I come to know it well. It is a well of magic, and as the years go on and on, I come to understand the Lady of the Ice who came before me. She was no monster. She was a woman who lived too long and saw too much, and she needed another to take her place. It takes power to protect power, and only those who have braved the road and the ice are worthy. But it is no honor, I think. I protect the cave and its magic, but it is not with joy or pride. I have no feelings anymore, and Kin's necklace hangs around my neck, the ivory as chilly as my skin.





There are dark things that surround the cave. They circle around and around, looking for an entrance. Once or twice, they venture inside, and I drive them off with my kodachi. It is a responsibility I do not want, but one I cannot shirk. I know with instinct that these dark things want the magic of the cave, and that if they have it, they will wreak havoc. I know that they will destroy the pristine stillness of the ice, will blight the land below me. I know I must protect the cave because I am its guardian; the longer I am alive, the more I come to appreciate the task of protecting something precious. It makes me feel like I am filling the empty spaces with warmth again.





There is a day when the dark things succeed in destroying the cave. I know fear again, because even though I cannot die, I am failing in my task. I cannot protect the cave anymore, and as the ice shatters around me, it feels as if my heart is breaking again. I could not protect Kin, and I cannot protect this cave. I can protect nobody, save nobody. The cave collapses around me, and I scream in despair and frustration. My blades slice through the dark things, and they laugh at me: I cannot do anything.





The snow I stand in is sullied. Things are falling apart around me as I leave the cave, where I have been Lady of the Ice for so long that I know no other name. I leave Kin's necklace behind. He is so long ago now, I place a hand over my heart and wonder, What happened to the girl I was? I do not know; all I know is that the cave has fallen, and the dark things have won. They have taken the magic of the cave and have spread over the land.





"Demons wander the land," people tell me. I am traveling again. Where, I do not know, but I want to go south. South is where warmth and sunshine thrive, and I think those things would do the tatters of my soul some good.

"What kinds of demons?" I ask, even though I am not ignorant: I know the answer.

"Dark things," the people say. "They creep into minds and hearts, and bring disaster." They look at me strangely as they speak, as if I were a demon, and I wonder if I have changed into something inhuman over the years.

Then, one day, as I am walking through the marketplace, a man calls to me to come see his wares. "With such unusual eyes as yours, it must be hard to find cloth with a suitable color, but I have just the one," he says.

I am surprised. "Unusual eyes?" I ask.

"Yes," he says. He pulls out a piece of glass, backed with bronze. It is a mirror. They are a new invention. Or perhaps not so new. I do not know how long I have been gone. The man hands the mirror to me, and I look at my face. I nearly drop the mirror:

My eyes are a clear, colorless gray.





The days grow warmer. The people are darker in complexion. They speak less and less of demons, and I am glad. I feel as if people look at me and wonder why I could not protect anything, even when given a second chance. Finally, I reach a huge body of water. People call it the ocean, and I am awed by it. There are large boats that cross it every day, and I offer to guard precious cargo, for passage to anywhere. The men who work the docks - sailors - laugh at me, but when I defeat them, they look at me with respect and agree to give me a ride to a place they call Santa Agua.

When they ask, I tell them that I have no name. I have forgotten it.





Sea air suits me. It is balmy and humid, and I like the smell of salt as I walk the decks. I keep an eye out for pirates, but thankfully, there are none. My days are spent talking to the sailors, who eye me with desire. I pretend not to notice, just like I pretend not to hear some of the more sullen sailors muttering about how women are bad luck. I do not try to win them over, but I make them, through sheer persistence, teach me how to fight with a knife, and also how to make my body a weapon on its own. I grow adept at the art, because as the voyage goes on and the sea air heals me, I remember what the Queen once said, "Fighting is an art, if you have the spirit for it." Slowly, I am rediscovering the things I once loved.





A scream pierces the air. A sailor has fallen overboard. He cannot swim. Nobody wants to go in the water after him, for they are afraid, but I cannot stand by and let him die. He has black, curly hair and green eyes, and he smiles roguishly at me whenever he sees me looking. So I jump overboard.

I know how to swim. The summer days of my childhood were spent in the river, and although the turbulent waters of this ocean are nothing like it, I fight against them. I find the sailor's arm and hold onto him, and I shout for someone to throw a rope to us. It whips through the air, and I grab it. Strong hands haul us back up, and we both land collapsed on the deck, on top of each other and gasping for air.

"Your name," the sailor finally gasps. "I have a name for you."

"Oh really," I say. I am coughing up water. "A name is all you can repay me with?" I smile at him.

"You are Eva," he says. "Eva, because you have given me life." He smiles back at me, and an old warmth stirs in my body.





We make love in a cramped space, too easy for prying eyes to discover. But we laugh quietly, and take joy in each other. I am happy, and the sailor's green eyes glimmer in the dim light of the lantern. I kiss him on the lips, and he does not stop me. He says my name as he kisses me back: "Eva," he says. "Eva," and one of his hands rest above my heart, sending heat into my skin.





My sailor with the green eyes leaves me at the port. "I am a man of the sea at heart," he says.

I do not hold anything against him. I stand on the salt-worn deck and kiss him, and say, "Just come back to me whenever you can."

He says my name one last time, and leaves me with a smile.





I am living in a small inn, doing odd jobs for money. This place is so different. It has warm rains and impossibly hot afternoons, and I love exploring the land. I love traveling, I discover. Now that there is no urgency to my journey, I can see the beauty of the landscape: the red of the setting sun is brilliant here, and the morning dewdrops on leaves dazzle my eyes. One night, on the road, I look up, and the stars are large and bright. The pang of homesickness is dull and soon gone, eclipsed by the dark night.





A letter is waiting for me in my room. My sailor with the green eyes has died. He cannot come home to me anymore.

The tears spatter onto the paper and smear the ink. But my heart does not break, and the sun rises the next day, and eventually the wound heals. Time heals everything, I think. Or maybe it is not time that heals my wounds so quickly. Maybe I am just stronge.





I never age, I realize. I am an immortal, still, and I look the same as when I first set out to find Kin, if a little more mature. My eyes are a different color, and perhaps I have a more worldly air to me, but I have changed so little I think my parents would still be able to recognize me.

The world changes. Things seem less pristine, a little earthier. The Mara begin to creep to Santa Agua as well, and I think about what I will do when they arrive in force. Meanwhile, the men in my life come and go. I heal, but no matter how quickly I do, the pain is still as sharp, as piercing as the first time. Every time it happens, I close my eyes and tell myself: life will go on. And it does.





I meet a witch. She tells me that there is a place I can travel to that crosses more than land and ocean: it crosses worlds. There are wonders there, she tells me, and if I tire, I can come back. I am immortal and can withstand more journeys than someone who is not. I think about the offer: there is nobody who waits for me these nights, and I am restless. I have traveled so far already, and to go to another world... It is tempting.

But there is a price. "When you are there," the witch says. "Your help might be required by someone. You will know who he is."

I do not think anymore. I just accept. "All right," I say. "Take me to this new world."





The man I meet has a youthful face, but eyes that are old. "My name is Alan Halifax," he says. "I work for the Asclepieion."

"You say that like I am supposed to know what it is," I say, but Alan's impassive face does not change. I wonder if he ever smiles, or if his face is perpetually solemn.

"We are an organization that protects the weak and gives help where it is needed," he says. "The witch says that you are an immortal, and you know how to fight."

"No," I say. "I know how to fight, but I don't know how to protect."

"You can try," Alan says. "There is a man we have promised to protect. Come with me. We'll see if you can do more than you think you can."





I meet a large, heavyset man who sweats profusely. He is nervous, because, as he tells me, he has offended a very powerful man who wants him dead. I am still confused in this new world, but I follow Alan's orders and stay close to the man. Alan is there, as well, and several other people. They all have old eyes, and I realize that they are immortal, like I am. I wonder: why have they chosen to live, long past their family and lovers? What is the point of being immortal, if it only protects you, and nobody else?





This is my last memory, before the past becomes the present. It is dark, and there is a man who attacks silently. His knives weave through the room, and steel clangs on steel, and I think, I cannot protect anyone. But I must. I cannot give up, and I fight harder than I have for many, many years. I remember what the Queen told me; it breaks through the mists of my past: for a warrior, the only limits are the ones she sets herself.

Blood spatters onto the carpet. But the flash and clang of metal is gone, and I think, I have failed. But I haven't, because the heavyset man is still there, and he is alive, and there is a grateful look on his face. Alan Halifax looks at me, and I realize that I am kneeling with one of my blades embedded into the floor--blood rips down it. Blood stains my clothes, too, and I look up at Alan Halifax. "Is this what you always do?" I ask.

"I do what is needed to protect people," Alan says. "To protect the Asclepieion. I am a Guardian."

"Do you want me to be a Guardian?" I ask, and although I smile wryly, there is a note of seriousness in my voice.

"I know about your past," Alan says. "You were born to protect people."

"I've failed," I say softly. "I've failed in too many ways."

"And is that any reason to give up," Alan says, in his deep monotone.

I am silent, and Alan says, "This is a chance, Eva." His face is still solemn, but I think I catch a flicker of gentleness in his eyes, in the way he holds his hand out to me. I close my eyes and think, For a warrior, the only limits are the ones she sets herself. If I do not accept, I am setting barriers for myself, barriers I can overcome. I have been given another a chance, a third one, and I take it. "All right," I say, taking Alan's hand and standing up. "I will be a Guardian."

And that is how I pledged to become a Guardian of the Asclepieion, a protector of the weak, to pay back for the lives I have lost to the earth.


the end

Comments

[arrghigiveup.livejournal.com]

Heartbreakingly beautiful. Love it.

[ex-dwimmer.livejournal.com]

Oh gorgeous. I don't have words for how much I enjoyed this. Just perfect and stunning and this universe makes me want to read whole series about it, it's so interesting.

[wordsofastory.livejournal.com]

This is really wonderful. I love how you start with the familiar fairy tale, but go far beyond it. The language and images in this story are so vivid. Excellent.