The Land of Broken Roads

“First thing, do you have any coal for fires? Or do you use wood?” asked Antelmu. “I need to make sure my egg stays warm, so where’s the warmest place?”

“We keep the babies in the wood houses,” said the girl. “We keep the fires burning always. They’re the warmest.”

“What’s your name?” asked Dirt.

“Lila,” she replied. She flitted her ears in annoyance, a gesture Dirt had seen from Socks a million times. Her fur was streaky gray, only a few shades lighter than Socks’s, which made Dirt decide he liked her.

“Dirt, can you help? I still can’t lift very well with...” said Antelmu, raising the arm with the cast on his wrist.

“Sure. Let’s hurry, though,” said Dirt. He walked over to where Socks had left the egg, and it seemed fine. Dirt saw nothing concerning in its tiny mind as it sat innocently in its shell, completely insulated against all the horrors that had transpired. He strengthened himself with mana and used his mind to help lift and make sure he applied pressure evenly. At just over two feet across, his arms weren’t long enough to go all the way around and carrying it was one of the most nerve-wracking things he could remember doing. He couldn’t see where he was stepping, for one. Fortunately, the nearest house was only a few dozen steps across the uneven ground, and when the door squeaked open on wooden hinges, a blast of warm air hit him.

Antelmu stepped around him and led him carefully toward a fireplace on the far end. The egg took up most of Dirt’s vision, so it wasn’t until he put the egg down he saw just how packed the room was.

Simple wooden cradles—boxes, really—sat in even rows across the floor. Wooden chairs were spaced throughout, which Dirt gathered were for the women to sit in while they nursed. Most of the cradles still contained their inhabitants, some asleep and others screaming.

The longer he looked, the stranger it got. Dirt didn’t have much experience with infants—in fact, he had yet to hold one—but from what he’d seen, human mothers were never far from their newborns. Any time he’d visited a public place, young mothers had been in it, gathered to keep each other company while their babies slept or fed or whatever else they did. The chairs here weren’t facing each other, nor were they facing any particular cradle. Just placed wherever was close and convenient. This house, all one big room, made it feel like the infants were being stored, not tended.

While Antelmu was moving the egg closer and farther from the fire to find just the right spot, Dirt went to ask Lila about it but paused once he saw how despondent she looked.

It wasn’t just her; four other girls her size had followed them in and were watching Dirt and Antelmu with wary, distant eyes. From the way they glanced around the room, Dirt gathered they had duties here, but at the moment there was no joy in their faces. No pride or eagerness or motherly affection, just emptiness.

The smaller children howled and screamed outside, already deep in mourning for their loss and horror for what they’d seen. But the older ones like Lila and her friends seemed too calm, too withdrawn, and it made Dirt wonder if there was something wrong with them. Grief was something Dirt understood well, so he tried something risky. He sent out a puff of grief, just a small one, and watched their eyes. The girls each winced as they felt it. Their eyes grew watery and their expressions tightened.

Good. This is what they needed right now. Dirt gave just another little nudge, another hit of the sickening pain of loss, and that pushed them over the edge. The girls shook and started weeping, hot tears running down the fur of their faces and splashing on the bare ground. He stepped over and gently guided them together, and all five huddled in a tight group hug and wept into each other’s shoulders.

“The next thing we need is bottles,” muttered Antelmu, suddenly at Dirt’s side. “I don’t see any around, do you?”

“No, what are they?” asked Dirt.

“Just a moment,” said Antelmu. He gently put his hand on one of the girl’s shoulders, one whose fur was all black like Mother’s, and said, “Sorry, do you have any bottles for the babies? Feeding vessels? Do you know what I mean?”

She turned her face just long enough to shake her head, and Dirt saw the fur getting all messed up already. He wondered if they had to comb it.

Antelmu scowled and said, “Okay, Dirt, follow me.”

“Where are we going?”

“We need to get these infants fed, so we’re going to find the milk animals. I hope they have some. They have to,” he said. “They’re wearing wool so I know they have sheep. Shouldn’t be hard to find.”

The boy left with a hurry in his step and Dirt followed. They made their way across the village toward the far end of the barbican, and sure enough, a respectable herd of sheep were penned in and bleating noisily. Dirt had seen a few before, including wild ones, but they weren’t that interesting unless Socks was hungry. Up close, their faces were slightly charming, and their bleats sounded almost like human voices. Annoying ones. They seemed packed a little too close, but what did Dirt know? Maybe that kept them warm.

Antelmu looked rather annoyed, so Dirt supposed they weren’t supposed to be packed in that tight after all. “Find a bucket,” he said. “Where do they even milk them?”

Dirt looked for, he supposed, some sort of stable or a building that would hold one animal at a time. But there was nothing. Just a fence to make the pen, and a simple wooden gate with a latch on one side. The only other structure in the immediate vicinity was an open barn holding a huge pile of dry, yellow grass, which the sheep must have been eating. And a ring of stones over a well, with a bucket resting on a coiled rope. That was the only bucket he saw.

“That won’t work. Go find one. Ask someone,” said Antelmu. He fiddled with the latch on the gate until it popped open. He held it shut against the sheep who knew what that meant and tried to push their way out. “Hurry.”

Dirt grinned and spun to go find one. It didn’t take long; he found a nice, big wooden one in the first tent he checked.

Antelmu had already gotten a single sheep out of the pen and closed it behind himself, but the animal wanted to go elsewhere. He held it tightly with his good hand and gave Dirt an urgent look.

Dirt wasn’t sure which mind belonged to that one in particular, so he sent them all the idea of just standing around patiently, and it worked. Those in the pen quieted down and the one Antelmu had quit fighting.

“I know you’ve never done this, so watch,” said Antelmu. He snatched the bucket from Dirt’s hands and set it under the beast’s udders. When he squeezed the teat, a squirt of milk shot into the bucket. “There’s a trick to this. You have to pinch the top shut to hold the milk in, then squeeze it out the hole. Don’t just tug downward. Pinch, then squeeze. You can use both hands. Actually, go find another bucket and we can do two at once.”

Dirt watched for a moment, listening to the wet splashes and taking in the scent. It lacked the sweetness of Mother’s milk, but the infants wouldn’t know any better. Once he was confident he understood how it worked, he left to find another bucket.

As he rummaged through the nearby empty tents, it struck him that they looked a lot tidier than he expected, as if they were set up for display rather than occupancy. At least that made it easy to find another bucket, which he did quickly.

Since Antelmu was busy, Dirt had to let his own sheep out, which took more effort than it deserved. Two males had shoved their way to the front and wanted out, and Dirt had half a mind to let them. It was unlikely they’d get outside the barbican, and what harm could they do? But they were penned in for a reason, and since Dirt didn’t know what it was it would be foolish to start making changes. He found their minds easily enough when he brushed his fingers across their thick fur and told them to stay put.

He led a female out and shut the pen, then knelt beside her and got to work. He didn’t get very far, though, because as soon as his cold fingers touched her teat, she jolted and kicked the bucket over.

Antelmu snickered and said, “Yeah, you have to watch out for that. They’ll also try to step in the milk sometimes. You just have to be faster than them.”

Dirt nodded and summoned a hot ember, which he held between his cupped hands. Soon he was sure his hands were warm enough and tried again, and it worked. The ewe didn’t complain, and instead seemed rather relieved as her milk started filling the bucket. Not nearly as fast as Antelmu did it, but he had more practice, and it was tricky. Dirt had hardly gotten ten good squirts out before the older boy traded in ewes for a fresh one.

Eventually, they got the buckets as full as they were going to get, and Antelmu wanted to feed the babies before the milk got too cold. They trudged back up toward the center of town, past clumps of despondent children. They’d broken up into groups now and were offering each other what poor comfort they could. Dirt gave them sympathetic looks, but didn’t stop to talk. He knew he had to do something about their spirits, not just their stomachs, and soon.

Just not yet. Lila and her friends were still in the house, possibly because it was nice and warm in there, and they were no longer crying. They’d begun to move from cradle to cradle patting the little ones and shushing them with a sense of growing desperation. Dirt didn’t even have to glance at their minds to know why—the infants were hungry.

“Okay, Dirt, look at my mind and make seven of these,” said Antelmu. He pictured a strange little bottle, round and fat with a tiny spigot on one side. Milk went in the top and dribbled out the side. Simple enough.

Dirt said, “Lila, everyone, watch this!” He picked up a spare board from a broken crib tossed in the corner and filled himself with mana.

The girls all turned to see what he was doing, and he lifted the board high above his head dramatically to keep their attention. Then he spoke the magic into the world, the first words of power he’d learned, and commanded the wood to grow. The simple sigils pressed themselves onto reality and the wood stretched and shifted into his hands, growing into hollow vessels just like Antelmu had described, stuck together like a bunch of grapes.

Antelmu peered inside and nodded, satisfied, and Dirt popped them apart to clatter to the floor. The older boy picked one up and said, “Okay, girls, wanna help us save all these babies?”

They weren’t sure what to think of Dirt’s magic, but they immediately realized what the feeding vessels were for and rushed forward to grab one. Dirt noticed them reach forward to pick them up, keeping as far away as possible, but there was no hesitation.

“Okay, so, you just tip the milk in so it dribbles in slowly. Like this, see?” he said, tilting one slightly in the air. “It won’t come out that fast anyway, but make sure you don’t feed them too much at once because they’ll cough or choke. Or it can go up their nose, sometimes. Wait, hold on. Look. If it’s a really little baby, then you put your finger here like this, see? They want to try and nurse, but the little nipple is hard and it’ll hurt their gums. So give them something to chew on and drip the milk alongside your finger. Do you see how I’m doing it?”

Antelmu made eye contact with each of them and waited until they nodded before he was satisfied. Then he said, “Oh, Dirt, can you make a ladle, too?”

That was easy enough. The wood wasn’t old and hard yet, possibly carved only last fall, and it responded to his magic without too much extra effort.

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Antelmu took the ladle, poured a small amount of milk into his bottle, and said, “All right, girls, get to work. The milk is getting a little cold so they’ll probably be fussy about it, but they have to eat.”

“Can I do one?” asked Dirt.

“Sure,” said Antelmu, and handed over his bottle.

Dirt stepped over to the nearest crying infant and wasn’t quite sure how to proceed. He looked at a girl and saw her lifting the baby out, so he did the same. Or started to before Antelmu yelled at him.

“You have to support the head! Spirits, Dirt, have you never seen a baby?”

“I’ve seen a few,” said Dirt sheepishly.

“Right. Okay, like this. Watch me,” said Antelmu. He put one hand under the baby’s head and the other under its bottom and lifted it. “Look over at her. You’re going to rest its head in your elbow like she’s doing.”

Holding the baby was easy enough, even if it was a rather nervous experience. Antelmu had to help him get situated and show him how to use the bottle again, but once he got the hang of it, it was pleasant enough. The little one quieted right down and drank its fill, and Dirt enjoyed just looking at it for a moment.

It really was a tender little thing. Its pale fur was thin and soft as a mouse’s, the ears small and shrunken and floppy. No teeth, either, just gums. Tiny little nose. When it briefly opened its eyes, they were a dull grayish blue, not yellow like all the older children, and never quite seemed to focus. He never did learn whether it was a boy or a girl before it was done feeding.

Antelmu said, “Okay, girls, can you come find me if you need more milk? Also, is there more than one house like this?”

“There is one more. We have about, I think, eighty infants,” said the black-furred one.

Antelmu swallowed hard and looked nervous. “Guess we’ll be milking a lot of sheep. Come on, Dirt, let’s hurry.”

Hurry they did, and this time two boys came to feed the sheep and decided to help with the milking, a red-furred one taller than Dirt and a smooth, white-furred one just a bit shorter. They said nothing the entire time, lost in their own thoughts, mostly about their slain parents. Things they’d been taught, affection they’d been given. Signs of corruption the boys had ignored despite Face’s warnings, because they were parents. Fear of an empty future that opened before them like Father’s own maw, toothy and cavernous.

Dirt really had to do something about that. He couldn’t just leave them in despair and assume they’d be over it by the time Socks got back with new parents. But not yet.

They hurried over to the other infant house and found it much like the previous one, all the babies laid in simple square cribs with furs for padding and a blanket for warmth. As before, the room was kept pleasantly hot by a good fire, which one small girl was tending, white fur with black spots. It occurred to Dirt that it would be really easy to learn all their names, since everyone looked so different.

Antelmu sent the little one to go get some bigger girls to feed the babies, and by the time she got back with seven larger girls, Dirt had already crafted the feeding vessels. He and Antelmu each had an infant in their arms, happily sucking down sheep’s milk, and once the girls saw it, they quickly joined in.

“Come tell me if you run out of milk, and you know how to clean up after them, right? It smells like a lot of them are soiled. We need to keep them all healthy, because there won’t be any more. This is all the babies you get until you grow up and have them yourselves,” declared Antelmu.

“I don’t understand… why you’re helping us now,” said one girl, who spoke from behind as Dirt and Antelmu were on their way out the door. Dirt didn’t have to look at her mind to see the turmoil in her heart. She glared at them over the dark-furred baby she fed, a larger one who could sit up on its own.

That was a question both boys had been fearing, and Antelmu tapped Dirt’s ankle with his foot to indicate who was to answer. Dirt said, “The adults were all sick and dangerous. Face was crazy, but he was right about that one thing. You saw they attacked us, even though we didn’t do anything. Would anyone sane attack Socks? But that’s not you. We want you all to survive. I’ll explain more tonight once we’re sure everyone will be fine. Where do you keep the grain and dried meat, stuff like that?”

She thought about that but didn’t answer. She had much to express that couldn’t find its way into words, and all she could do was stare.

“Come on,” said Antelmu, and they left to find it on their own. By now, most of the groups had dispersed and the crying was largely done with, but the mood of the town wasn’t improved. The children wandered through their daily chores with such hopelessness that Dirt almost decided food was less important and called them together early.

But Antelmu hastened him along and they soon found the granary, which, thank Grace, was absolutely packed. The older boy gave an appreciative whistle. “Well, this will get them through the winter,” he said.

He poked around, opening bags and looking into baskets. Taking the lids off pots and unstoppering bottles to sniff them. He found everything he was hoping for, salt included. “Let’s find out how they like to eat it before we start making bread,” said Antelmu.

Dirt leaned out the door and waved at an older boy who was watching for them as if he expected them to emerge with armfuls of goods and run for the fence. His fur was white as well, with a streak of black right down the center of his forehead, and after Dirt waved again, he hesitantly approached.

“What do you normally have for your evening meal?” asked Antelmu. He opened the lid of a wooden box, then closed it again.

“Flatbread and dried meat and fruit,” said the beast child. He scowled as Antelmu opened a much smaller box, stuck a finger in, and tasted whatever it was.

“Really? No oil or anything? Salt? Honey, maybe? Anything like that?” asked Antelmu.

“Plain food is good enough,” said the child, sounding like it was something often recited here.

“Well, it’ll have to be, because I never really learned how to cook. Who was in charge of getting the meals ready? Was that for each family, or did you do it together?”

“We do it together. Everyone lines up and gets their share.”

“When do you eat? Sundown? Earlier? Later?”

“Later.”

Antelmu got directions on where the food was cooked, and what order everyone was fed in. He found the grindstone, a small one with a hand crank, which Dirt found easier to turn with his mind than his arms. They ground fresh flour, even though there was already a dry wooden box full of it, mostly to hide.

After that, the boys split up to go see where they were needed until night fell. They milked more sheep and set the milk out in the cold where it wouldn’t spoil so the infants could be fed during the night, and checked on the supplies of wood and coal for burning.

They learned a lot about the tribe just wandering around looking at things. It seemed the children were grouped by age, not family, and the adults all had their own quarters. A group of six children might sleep in one tent, and a group a few months older would be in the next one over. But despite their strange detachment from their own offspring, at least the town was well-supplied. Furs and blankets abounded, as did good woolen clothing and plenty of leather. Arrows, too, all with sharpened flint arrowheads.

Day wore on into evening and night began to fall, and Antelmu found Dirt and pulled him back to the granary to start cooking the evening meal. On the way, they gathered several more who looked capable enough, since it was a task that required either many sets of hands, or all night.

-Hello, Dirt. I can see you. I made it to the other tribe. They ran away screaming except the men we saw before. I told them what I wanted but none of them want to come. I will try again in the morning, after they realize I haven’t killed anyone,- said Socks. His voice was strong, despite the distance.

“Just do what you can,” said Dirt aloud, to the surprise of several children nearby. They gave him quizzical looks and continued rolling dough and flattening it to cook. “I know you’ll figure something out. See you soon.”

-I am tired from the run so I am going to sleep now. Stay out of trouble, little Dirt.-

“Goodnight, Socks!” said Dirt, and it made his heart ache for a moment. He missed the pup already. It seemed they spent more time apart than together, lately, and that wasn’t fair. Then, because so many of the children were trying not to openly stare at him, he said, “The giant wolf is my best friend, and he can hear me from very, very far away.”

He saw a dozen questions on their tongues that never made it past their teeth, so he held his peace for just a bit longer.

The evening meal was given out shortly after nightfall, and one after the other, in a line that stretched all the way to the barbican and curved to follow it, children of all ages came to get their dinner. Antelmu did his best to make sure each flatbread was warm when he handed it over. Apparently, that was unusual; even in the dark of winter, food was eaten cold. They seemed to appreciate it, though, and Dirt had to admit that Antelmu could make pretty good bread. Maybe nothing else, but he had that down.

Then it was time. Dirt felt almost sick to his stomach and his knees were shaky as he made his way to the center of the town. Antelmu followed, also nervous and quite content to let Dirt handle this one.

They sat at the edge of the mass grave, but not on it. Just at the bottom of the now-sharply sloping incline leading up to the tree that had once been Lepas’s prison. Dirt snapped his fingers and made lights, dozens of them, and let them hover and drift. He summoned more and turned them to embers, which he distributed evenly to keep the whole area warm.

Once that was done, he sat for just a moment longer, doing his best to become old Avitus. What he told them now would write both their future and their past. He needed more than simple Dirt for this. This task needed wise old Avitus, the master of the college of wizards. Caeso had surely been wrong about his character; how could he look with anything but grandfatherly affection on the curious horde of orphans who were now beginning to gather?

“Come,” he said with his mind, speaking loud but gentle across the entire town. “Come, sit with me.” Avitus put warmth into his mental voice, a friendly harmlessness.

He waited and gave gentle waves to each person who came, and one by one, most did. He looked at the minds and measured their size, and said, “There are a few who are yet to come. If they are awake, please, bring them. To you who hesitate, come. I invite you. Come and listen.”

Antelmu stared at the ground, intimidated by the maturity he heard in Avitus’s voice. It gave him a rare minute of alienation and he wondered who this great person was with whom he was travelling. A magical being, friend to wolves. Was Antelmu really worthy of this?

Avitus reached over, took the boy’s hand, and sent him a little puff of gratitude, as if it was Antelmu giving Dirt reassurance. Antelmu smiled slightly and squeezed.

“Listen, dear little ones, for there is much to say. Come, gather. Warm yourselves in my magic, and watch the lights,” spoke Avitus. He still cast his thoughts over the whole village, speaking to even those who were laying warm in their beds and didn’t want or dare to get out.

“I am Avitus,” said Dirt. He paused, wondering how to proceed. He certainly had their attention. “I am an ancient man, born again as a boy. I know mysteries from ages long past, and wander places forgotten to all but me. You see me as Dirt, the child, and that is true. But it is not all I am.

“I am a friend to many things great and small, and now I am your friend. I begin with my grief,” said Avitus, and in that moment his boy body betrayed him. He thought of the loss of so many parents, of all the hopelessness and misery he’d already seen and how much more there was to come. The emotion swelled up and overcame him, despite all his discipline, and he barked out a single sob before he held his breath and stopped. All of it he shared, casting it wide with his mind. It was sincere. Let them see.

He quickly regained most of his composure and continued, which was only possible because he was speaking with his mind and not his voice. “Your parents were good, once, before our common enemy corrupted them.”

To this he added mental pictures of the adults, as beast-men, going about their business. Smiling at each other, waving. Warm and wholesome and good.

Avitus was about to show them the Eye, how it grasped and molded and corrupted. How revolting it was, how deadly. But he did not. They were young, and the day had already had too many horrors.

“They did not become what they were on purpose. They were overcome. But once they were corrupted, it was too late for them,” said Avitus instead. He showed adults as the lights in their eyes went out and they became something else. They grew extra limbs, put on different faces when no one was watching. He didn’t dwell on this for long, just passed along the sense of unforgivable wrongness.

“When they attacked Socks, we had no choice. It might have been better to leave them alone until you yourselves were adults, but now it is too late. But I can tell you this: the good people they once were would not wish you to suffer. And so I, Avitus, have asked Socks to find new parents for you. I do not know how many will come, but some will, surely.”

To this he added a clear note of hope which grew bright as it rose like the sun and lit upon the crowd. Avitus must have been a man who hoped strongly, because it came easy. Bright things coming tomorrow, good and prosperous times eagerly waiting to dawn.

“Remember the good that your parents taught you and cherish it. Remember the bad that you witnessed and hate it. Grow strong and firm. Learn discipline and patience. Remember mercy. Whatever your people were before is gone. When you wake in the morning, you will be a new people. I will guide where I can, for a short time. And when you are grown, join me. I welcome you.”

To the last he added a picture of triumph. Flashes of hateful things, like the goblins or the tentacle monster, quickly thrown down and destroyed by Avitus and mighty Socks. And even Antelmu, riding his gryphon across the sun, spear held high. And, soon after, the beast men, and other humans on horses, some in armor and some dressed like Antelmu’s people. All together, they rode and fought and conquered. The shadows withdrew and the wilderness grew quiet. Fields were planted and people gathered to sing and dance and feast and it was so close to what Avitus himself still felt about his lost Empire, its glory and grace and comfort, its richness and peace and beauty, that his own genuine, well-loved nostalgia bled through and gave every heart that heard it a yearning that couldn’t otherwise be expressed.

It flickered inside each of them like a little candle, a little flame of home, a home to come. A better home. Avitus watched it warm them, soothe their troubled little spirits, help them begin to heal.

This was his great work, he knew. He’d been doing it all along and even started making plans, but as he comforted these poor little ones, much more of it slid into place. In perhaps all the world, only he knew what mankind could and should become. He would lead them. Avitus—Dirt—would guide them. All of them, everywhere.

There was nothing more to say. The children had no questions, and hardly even spoke amongst themselves. After a time, they rose group by group and dispersed to their beds.