Darkin: A Journey East Read online

  DARKIN

  A Journey East

  By

  Joseph A. Turkot

  Cover Art by Joseph A. Turkot

  Copyright © 2012 by Joseph Turkot

  All Rights Reserved

  ISBN: 978-1-3000-7435-9

  PREFACE

  This is a work inspired in no small part by Tolkien—at a young age he took me from my world and placed me firmly in his. In pursuit of creating a similar sensation of wonder and awe I continue to write today. This work began when I was fourteen years old: I wrote the first two chapters, after which it lay dormant for many years thereafter. I would go back often times and wish to complete the work, but it wasn’t until seven years later that I set to the task earnestly. Now you hold in your hands the definitive edition of the first story in the Darkin saga. May it enchant you, take you on a journey, and give you many strange new acquaintances.

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  Thanks to Paul and Lauren—two who read this novel to its completion when I thrust it upon their busy lives. Thanks to Jeff, who did so in one sitting. Thanks to all who encourage my writing.

  I would also like to dedicate this book to my loving and caring family: to my mom, Mary, Tom, Karl, and Paul—thanks for your constant support.

  PROLOGUE

  I sicken of burning flesh. Freedom rots here, persists as a parasite of the mind. A withered dream. The lords oppress us forever—no one fights. We are scum to them.

  Why don’t we fight back? Why don’t we believe life can be better, or imagine a way to survive without them? We depend on them for all things—they understand this. There is no questioning their control. We must need them, we must love them. Hope is lost, freedom forgotten. Tales of old, whispers, rumors—they serve only to pain my heart now. To hang, or toil away in the confines of hell, which choice better serves me now?

  ~ excerpted from Remtall’s diary

  I: BREAKING THE FARM

  Something snapped inside Adacon. He sat in his wooden hut, late at night by a glowing fire. Scraps of bread had served as dinner, along with saved wine. It had been a long and hard day on the farm, but no harder than usual: of all things, he knew he should feel happy, for today was the first of the month—the day he received his meager allowance of bread and water. But something stirred inside him, like a flame igniting, and he stood from his rotting stool, filled with defiance. He stared into the burning embers of the hearth; the fire returned his gaze. Something inside him fought to get out—a feeling he had ignored since childhood, something he always felt buried deep within his soul.

  He was barely twenty years of age, a muscular young man. He pushed his fingers through maple-bark hair, staring with granite eyes, set into a face sharply featured and mature. He had no family, nor recollection of one; time clouded his earliest memories, though he could at times recall pieces of life spent in a dirty boarding hall where farm slaves were trained. The lords crammed more orphans there than the dwelling could house. Veteran slaves taught him skills for farm work, and everyone whispered that the lords saw all things. Swordladen guards maintained order at the hall, proving the existence of the lords’ power over all men that lived upon Darkin. When he matured to his earliest manhood, they sent him to the farm he lived on until present; he worked as an earthtender on the seasonal harvests. Slaves spread tales of farms abroad, far across the wilds unknown; a great many farms existed, each meant to fulfill some desire of the lords. The crop work was grueling, and the labor unending.

  He once had a friend, a fellow farm hand, who was hanged for defiant behavior. The young man, named Remtall, had spoken boldly about the despotism of the lords. The day of Remtall’s death had burned itself into his mind, buried into his heart. He could remember some of the things that Remtall had told him: freedom was a thing worth having, and without it, life was not. He told other slaves that life was better than what they knew it as; he claimed a rebellion was needed. He said that life on the farm ought not be called life at all. Remtall’s ideas roused the guards, and proved worthy of an unusual length of torture. The slaves gathered round to see his last moments before he hanged, so that they would know the price of insurrection.

  Adacon knew his friend was under suspicion for some time, for he had talked of freedom too often, and too many times to the wrong slaves—for that, he had died. Adacon continued to labor, companionless, paralyzed by what had happened, until this moment: a strange force had taken hold of him this night. Death, it seemed suddenly, was no worse than the tireless slavery he endured each day. Something snapped in his head: he could no longer deny the fire Remtall had lit in his spirit; instead he would tend it, help it grow, until it consumed him, even if to his death.

  The bravest of slaves stole literature from passing wagons, and learned to read what words they could by poring over the forbidden tomes at night. Rumors abounded that all the parchments ever written were to be burned at the bidding of the lords, and that each passing wagon was journeying toward a great fire in the West, where flames would consume all the knowledge of the world. Some books described a better age, a brighter time in Darkin’s history. The books told of a time before slavery and oppression, a time when all who lived possessed a right to craft their own fate. The lost ideas of peace and happiness found in those yellowed scrolls had always meant a great deal to him, but harsh reality pushed such fantasies to a dark recess of his mind.

  To be aware of his slavery was to suffer, and life was easier when he ignored the literature; but something inside him had broken this night, something that could not be mended. The fire was now lit, and Remtall’s death no longer lingered purposeless in his mind. Life in its current mode seemed unimportant now. His life as a slave appeared without value. The idea of being free forsook his better judgment, and grew more powerful in him than the fear of death. And feeling so completed with his old mode of life, he planned a course of action.

  Sentries watched over both exits of the farm; indeed the knowledge of slaves told that all the face of Darkin was covered by the mighty guards of the lords. Some slaves spun lore of rogue settlements, far to the east, where natives lived of their own accord, separate from lordship, but such people were only myth to Adacon. Elders taught those who were young in their labor that the lords kept a close eye on slaves all hours of each day, and that there existed no unseen patch of land before the guards of the lords.

  He would take the northeast gate. Armed sentries stood guard there; swordsmen stalked the ground and archers stood atop wooden towers. The guards monitored all travel in or out of the farm, and any suspicious presences were taken captive; slaves whispered that the malodorous stench of burning that permeated the farm came from the bodies of those taken hostage at the gates. The elder slaves taught that it was through constant surveillance that the lords maintained order on their farms, and kept themselves in power above all others. Before his death, Remtall spoke of the arrogance of the lords: “They think themselves an undying legacy of power, that we cannot thwart them, but their sway does not darken the whole of this world yet, nor the hearts of all its creatures” he had pleaded. The very heart of Darkin’s structure, it seemed, was fixed to keep the lords in power.

  And a slave would always be a slave—he knew there was no chance to rise in the eyes of the lords. Elders preached that a good slave should value every opportunity he is given to work for the benefit of the powerful: a slave should always follow his superior’s orders without question, and a slave should always be happy with his condition of living. The lords made sure that the slaves were happy, at any rate.

  A tall, grisly man came each month, and stood coldly upon the step of his hut. He would ask the same questions—are you happy with how life is on the farm? Adacon was always happy. The dar
k man carried a spiked club at his side—if a slave voiced a grievance, doubted the satisfaction of slavery, the spiked club might find its way into the hands of the scary man. The visitor restored balance by any means necessary, even if it meant death. The whole structure of the world seemed unbreakable, just as Remtall had preached.

  But something had snapped inside of him. Remtall’s silenced yearning for a revolution grew anew in his own heart; it seemed the soil itself sent him courage, so that he might enact some bloody escape. As a young man he had stolen a sword from a wagon, and long kept it hidden under his cot. Nicks in the blade betrayed any look of sharpness, but it was a sword nonetheless. Adacon grimaced into the dying fire and almost smiled. He sat down on his creaky bed, tucked away in the corner of the small hut, and pulled on his boots. The embers in the hearth flickered out a slow death, and the air grew cold. His boots were sturdy, made of leather, and a rarity for slaves to have; his dedicated slavery had earned his right to them. He buckled them tight. It was night, nearly an hour from dawn; no slave was permitted out onto the fertile earth until sunrise, lest they sought a swift execution. He took his sword from its hiding and fastened it to his hip, and then he opened his door and stepped outside, breaking the law of the lords.

  * * *

  The farm covered many acres, but Adacon knew his way around it by heart, with or without sunlight. He did not know the wilds beyond; he hadn’t set foot outside the gates since before his manhood. Sentry towers rose from two corners on the farm, one to the northeast, and one southwest. Each was built next to an exit gate that led away and across the countryside by way of small dirt roads.

  His hut was located nearest to the northeast tower, and from his door he began a slow pace north along the dirt path that ran the length of the farm. The sky was blackened grey, without stars, and the night wind carried a pungent odor of burnt flesh—the ever-present stench of the farm. Time had dulled his repulsion to the rotten air. Slave lore told of large incinerators hidden inside the restricted building, wherein was housed some dark form of energy whose fuel required the flesh of men. He never dared enter the building, but he often watched curls of thundercloud-grey smoke roll from its chimney. The guards escorted slaves and captives into the building at odd times, young and old alike; none left.

  The path continued straight, northerly along the edge of the crops. On either side, as he walked through the dead quiet, rose high cornstalks, too dense to see through. In the distance, the northeast sentry tower jutted above the crop line, a white silhouette cutting through the deep grey. A solitary light flickered near the top; an archer stood watch by an ever-lit torch.

  He walked slower at the sight. A thought, of origin not his own, came into his mind: a guard patrols the edge of the cornfield, just where your path runs east toward the tower. No noise broke the silence save for the sound of his own footfalls. He trod as soft as he could; no fear forsook him at the warning, as fear ought to for a slave outside past curfew. A bold, immeasurable courage possessed his will, driving him forth, pushing him in a direction cloudy and perilous. His consciousness was no longer that of a normal man—he felt as if a beast of wilds unknown.

  As a young man, he had played with his hoary sword, and by some measures had become a novice—but years had passed since last he held the cold steel: still, somehow, he felt as if his arms would know the motions should a strike be necessary. He glanced back in the direction of his hut, and saw the dull light of dying fire glow against the panes. Strange thoughts engorged his mind; his awareness sped from thought to thought, and, strangely, he felt a great calm sweep into his spirit. Time stopped for an eternity, and questions formed from a void: what was the start of all this? When, in the eternal flow of time, did the cogs of fate start to turn? And at what point did they turn ill the fate of so many men? Adacon turned from the hut and looked northeast; the calm in his spirit boiled away, and the passion of Remtall set him ablaze.

  He came to the edge of the corn. A sentry stood against a small tree, puffing on a slender black pipe; tufts of smoke filtered into the night air. The sentry did not look roused, or in an aware state at all for that matter; rarely did the sentries have anything to do at night except stand about and look at shooting stars. Adacon froze for a moment and unsheathed his blade. In his right hand he gripped the handle tightly and walked eastward.

  Instantly, he ducked to the ground, lying flat against the cold earth. His nose pressed into the soil and he breathed deeply, replacing for a moment the smell of burnt flesh with that of tended soil. He rolled onto his back and looked up at the night sky, and in the direction of the sentry, let out a soft yelping noise.

  As quickly as the sound had left his mouth, he rolled sideward into the last thicket of corn, concealing himself. Hard shoots grazed his flesh, releasing his blood along their stalks. The guard withdrew his pipe at the sound of the yelp and spun around quickly to face the direction of the noise. Through a gap in the undergrowth, Adacon saw a dumbfounded expression wrap round the guard’s face as he looked for a source, baffled. The tower archer had been too far to hear the yelp. The man extinguished his pipe and looked up and down with great curiosity. Wearing an expression of unease, he trod slowly along the path southward, in the direction of the noise. He examined the ground around his feet as he walked; Adacon experienced a thought not his own: he will see the broken earth, and where you lie hidden. He readied his sword and clenched his teeth. The guard strode along with careful steps, coming within a single yard.

  Looking closely at the crop line, the guard spotted the matted cornstalks; it was too late. Before the guard could draw his broadsword Adacon sprang up and hewed the man’s torso at its center. Blood misted and the guard let loose a howling cry, unexpectedly loud. He quickly silenced the cry for help by slicing the sentry’s throat with a quick thrust, causing him to fall dead to the earth with a thud. The strike had been fluid, precise—his body was not using its own faculties to battle, it seemed, but those of an alien bloodlust. His adrenaline, his passion, his body—they performed in accordance to what had to happen now, what had to be accurate and fatal.

  He stood up, a wholly different being than last had stood upon the earth of Darkin in his shape, a murderer of men. He looked high enough to see broadly again over the top of the corn. The tower had heard the death cry; the noise had been too loud. He froze for an instant, paralyzed by a fleeting panic: something is wrong, he thought—I did not mean to be discovered. His adrenaline surged. A thought arose, and unsettled him: they are coming. Still too far away to be seen, he kept his eye on the tower, two archers manning it. One of the archers climbed down the tower ladder and the other stood in place. Adacon quickly ran out past the end of the corn trail and through a small clearing; the archers didn’t spot him. Just beyond the clearing was an old barn, and to its west stood the restricted building, heaving rotten smoke from its chute. He darted to the far side of the decaying barn, safely out from sight of both guards.

  As soon as he arrived on the side of the barn, a light struck out through the night air, shining down on where the first sentry had fallen. The light remained there, illuminating the surrounding area, as the archer now on the ground made his way toward the newly lit area. Adacon drew a quick glimpse of the area, edging to the end of the barn wall and peering around to watch for the guard’s arrival. Blood had splattered onto his thin clothes, making them dirty and red; his face dripped with its warmth, and the taste of it possessed his tongue. Still, he felt calm and collected again, and he was not enraged. The possibility of freedom started to take on strength. It was almost tangible now, and only the guards stood between him and the unknown wilds beyond the plantation.

  The archer on the ground stepped warily to the head of the trail that led south to the slave huts. Adacon watched the archer arrive and stoop to the ground to retrieve something—the dead sentry’s pipe. The archer then turned southward and discovered the slain man’s body; he gasped. Adacon wasted none of his opportunity for surprise, and sprang from his
hiding.

  The archer rushed toward the mangled body on the ground, shaken by the gruesome sight. Adacon ran at a full sprint for the archer’s exposed back. With a clear motive, he raised his sword overhead and adjusted his momentum so as to strike down with great force upon the nape. A terrible horn sounded as his sword fell toward its target; the tower had seen the trap, and issued warning. The archer spun around fast enough to meet the falling edge with his neck. He slumped to the ground amidst a red fountain that steamed the cool air. One archer left, Adacon thought. He knew he would have to overpower the last archer from lower ground. He stole the bow and arrows from the fallen archer and found quick cover in nearby brush, dodging an arrow that whizzed by his head. The archer on the tower did not make a move—he stood atop the balcony and pointed the great light toward the foliage he had vanished into. Adacon waited quietly in the foliage for a sign of movement.

  Minutes wore on, and his mind slowly trickled doubt about his situation. He wondered what would keep the archer up on the tower, as the lords bid their servants to fully control slaves at any cost, even that of their own lives. Then it hit him—with a shiver he realized that the archer was waiting for fellow sentries alerted by the horn. Three more would come at least. He decided not to wait for the incoming guards, and he dashed from his hiding place to a new one, closer to the tower. As he ran briefly into the open, another arrow slid by his frame, nearly tricking up his feet.

  He crawled on all fours past huge thickets of ivy against a low stone wall. The wall ran southeast in a looping curve, out to the path leading directly to the tower, and the gate beyond. He remained unseen as he made his way east, face grappling with the earth in stealth. As the wall rose some, he turned his back against it and sat down, slowly removing an arrow from the slain archer’s quiver. He knew his shot would depend on whether or not he could steady his hands enough to aim at the high target on the tower. The archer eyed the thick growths that hugged the north face of the wall, unable to see where the slave hid; the beam of light emanating from the tower revealed nothing. Adacon’s face grew stern as the time for his deadly task came. He straightened the arrow against the string and centered its feathers in his sight. He decided to aim high and hope the arrow would arc; though he knew their make and purpose, he had never before used a bow and arrow. Still, he doubted he could hit the high target, despite a strange assurance overcoming him again. His attacks had been fatal and accurate thus far—maybe I can hit him, he thought.