Green Light
Arig is one of the Neverhood's five Guardians: the Guardian of Earth. This is the story of how I met him. Today I dare to say that I am his best friend. The beginning of our friendship was, however, as fragile as a butterfly wing.The events of this tale took place two weeks after the Guardians were created in 491. It was a wondrous time, as many of you will recall. Nothing was the same as before with those six newbies around. It was the time when first sunsets appeared, as the Guardian of Invisible Forces was dissatisfied with the eternal blackness of our sky. There were suddenly so many birds around, drawn out by the presence of the Guardian of Air. You could never tell if teleporting into the Lake was safe because the Guardian of Water kept filling it and draining it again. Explosions became daily bread as soon as the Guardian of Fire discovered the Dynamite Shack. And, last but not least. I still remember how crazy everyone was about the beautiful, proud Klaya, mother of the Guardians.
You will notice that there is one person missing from my list. Where was the sixth newbie, the Guardian of Earth?
I asked around and nobody knew. Not even the other Guardians could guess where their brother was hiding. Only Klaya gave me a clue by demanding that I don't look for her missing son. When he was ready to go out among people, he would, she said. Thus I concluded that the Guardian of Earth was a shy person, and nobody knew about him because nobody had actually met him yet.
This was a bit of a problem for me. You see, I really wanted to meet this Guardian. Let me expand a little on that, we'll get back to the main story soon enough. It's a long one, anyway.
As you probably know, I've been interested in geology for centuries. It all began when I thought to climb into a hole a weasel left in the wall of the Arena. I ended up in an underground maze full of caverns, corridors, narrow passages. What struck me the most, however, was the silence. No one knew of this dark, quiet underworld and even though it was a novelty for some time, no one but me grew to care about it. It was midnight black and gloomy, they said, no place for a party. Which was precisely why I came to love it.
I exploited the solitude of the underground to spend quality time with myself, but I still needed something to do there. So I explored the caves. I kept vigilant for weasels at first, but I never encountered one. Instead I found an astounding variety of rocks, minerals, even gems. Why would Hoborg place such wonders below the ground? I asked the king and he replied in surprise: He hadn't. He had created the Neverhood's earth solid and without any tunnels. The underground must have come to be without his intervention. It was a mystery.
Decades changed into centuries. Eventually I became good enough at cartography to realise that it wasn't me who kept messing up maps of the caverns. The underground itself was slowly changing, in spite of the lack of miners or creatures to be held responsible. When I shared this discovery with Hoborg, my father suggested: “Perhaps the Neverhood is, on some level, alive. It is like my sons: it never changes on the outside, but as it makes new memories and experiences, they become gems on the inside.” I asked jokingly if it was alright for me then to mess with the island's head. Completely serious Hoborg answered: “Have you ever felt like you were unwanted in the underground? No? Then the Neverhood doesn't mind you being in its bowels.”
This conversation was long in the past by the time the Guardians were created. And yet, when I heard that one of the five elemental warriors controlled earth, it was the first thing that sprang to my mind. I was looking forward to meeting him like silly. I had so many questions for him, things that nobody else could answer. But then the aforementioned cold shower came. I couldn't meet Arig because he did not want to meet me. Or anybody for that matter.
After two weeks of searching, my patience wore thin. I told my brother Nehmen that in the unlikely case that somebody looked for me, I would be in the underground sulking.
When I made it down under, I was greeted by a nasty surprise. All the explosions set off by the Guardian of Fire had shaken up the bedrock, and my once clean corridors were filled with debris. Most of the pathways had survived intact, luckily, but moving through the rubble was incredibly annoying. Over the centuries I had learnt to depend on touch and hearing while navigating through the underground. Naturally, I could employ oil lamps. But I liked the darkness enveloping me, the switch of senses it enforced. I would trace one wall with my hand, carefully place one foot in front of the other and listen for echoes to tell if there was an obstacle before me. This way, I knew the underground like the back of my hand. But kicking up unfamiliar stones all the time ruined my hearing and made me jumpy. Soon I was cursing like a sailor. To top it off, I had forgotten to bring a lamp!
Finally I lost it when I encountered a cave-in. With an exasperated grunt I flunked down on the pile of broken rocks. Stupid Guardians. Stupid explosions. Stupid me for agreeing to supply Dake with gunpowder ingredients. I rested my face in my hands and I gave in to dark thoughts.
It was then that I heard it. My charitable silence was being disturbed by something. It took me several moments to classify the sound. Chanting. Somebody was droning a slow, dissonant melody. I listened to it for a while, wondering with frustrated resignation. Fate just wouldn't let me get my peace and quiet, would it? Sounds from the surface rarely penetrated this deep underground. There must have been a shaft cracked through the rock, carrying the sound. I brooded over this as the song began repeating. Before long fatigue caught up with me and my mind began drifting.
I can't have nodded off for more than ten minutes, but when I opened my eyes again, something substantial had changed. My eyes were no longer blindly staring into the dark. There was a green glow coming from the junction in front of me.
I froze where I sat. The humming had come closer. Bouncing from the walls I caught a whoosh of air when the singer took a breath. He wasn't on the surface and there was no crack in the bedrock; someone was in the underground with me.
I saw him before I was prepared for it.
Passing across the intersection ten meters ahead, there was a stocky Hoodian figure. He walked slowly, placing one foot in front of the other, arms hanging at his sides. Just after he disappeared from my field of view, he paused in his advance. I held my breath. Slowly, he made a step back. And then he took a turn and began walking in my direction.
Several things went through my head in quick succession. Now that he was facing me, I could see that the source of the steady green light was a large round symbol on his chest. By its light I could see his face. His expression was focused, lips curved around the droning melody, eyes closed. Despite the convenient lighting, he wasn't using his sight.
Following this observation I noticed a second thing. Aside from the monotone chant, the Hoodian wasn't making any noise. He didn't trip over stones or kick up rubble, his feet always found a spot of clear ground. I was amazed. How was he doing that without looking? It looked like he could tell what he was stepping on.
As he advanced along the corridor, the third thing became apparent. He didn't know I was there and sooner or later he would walk straight into me. By then I was certain, judging by the symbol, the strange power, and the fact that we were surrounded by earth, that this was the missing Guardian of Earth. Arig, I reminded myself of his name. I needed to call out to him before he bumped into me. Unexpected body contact doesn't fare well with extreme introverts.
“Hello Arig. I am Krevel.”
The singing stopped at once. The green glow faded. Out of the midnight blackness came a surprised voice: “Do you speak the common tongue?”
“Of course.”
“That's so strange,” he mused in confusion, “I would expect iron oxides to know earth talk rather than the common tongue.”
“My, um... earth talk must be a little rusty.”
The Guardian inhaled sharply. Then he burst into quiet chuckles. “Not only do local minerals speak the common tongue, they also crack jokes.”
I smiled in relief. First obstacle cleared – I had made him laugh. The variety of geological jokes I had prepared to break the ice did not go in vain. “I'm afraid I have to disappoint you,” I admitted. “I'm not actual haematite. I am only a Hoodian who named himself after it.”
Jarringly, the chuckling stopped at once. Instead came a wary silence. Green glow lit up his chest again, and I could see him hunched over defensively, extending his arm toward me.
Even though he was still a good distance away, he gasped as if he had touched me. He lowered his arm and the glow went out, restoring darkness. “I – I'm sorry!” he stuttered. “I didn't realise you were a Hoodian. Please forgive my rudeness.”
“You weren't rude,” I assured him quickly. He had gone from jovial to apprehensive so fast that I was afraid he would make a break for it while I was talking. “I don't mind being mistaken for a rock. Sometimes rocks make for better company than Hoodians.”
After a while of suspense he spoke up: “Who are you?”
“I am Krevel, son of Hoborg. I'm an aspiring geologist.”
Again he took his sweet time time to say: “Do you come down here often?”
“Yes, I do. I know the place quite well. Though, I haven't been down here since you and your brothers were created. Dake's explosions have really messed up the place.”
“Oh, the Warrior of Fire is always a force of nature...” He trailed off. He didn't seem to be keen on small talk. He let out a long, uneasy whimper. Then he sighed resolutely as he made his decision. “Krevel, I hate to bother you, but... if you are an experienced geologist, then I will need to ask for your help.”
I couldn't believe my luck. “Anything. What is it about?”
“There is... a place in the underground. It interests me a great deal.” He spoke haltingly at first but gradually his voice became smooth. “I have spent quite a few days trying to access it. But I haven't been able to get in. You see, I couldn't...” He broke off. I could hear him open his mouth, then close it. “I'm not... sure how to explain this,” he admitted. “I'll make a demonstration for you. It will be easier to understand.” The symbol on his chest glowed dimly as he raised his hand. From the rubble around his feet, two stones flew up in the air and they stayed there, bobbing silently. The Guardian motioned toward me and the rocks followed. I caught the first one, then the other. Even clasped in my fists, I could feel them pulling up and down as he beckoned them with his finger.
“As the Guardian of Earth, I have power over any solid klay. This is called telekinesis,” he said, leaving the stones to lie compliantly in my hands. The green glow faded and I was left only with his voice again. “It's moving things from a distance like I was touching them. My second power is related to this. It is, in fact, that I am able to touch things at a distance. As long as they are solid.”
It came to my mind that I had seen a similar power before. The Guardian of Water had betted us that he could tell with eyes closed which cup among a dozen was filled with water. A lot of Hoodians tried to trick him before he revealed that as a Guardian he could feel the presence of his element. In Arig's case, however, it seemed to be more specific. He had called his awareness of solid klay “touch”.
“Can you feel how many fingers I'm holding up?” I asked, raising my hand.
He hesitated. His chest glowed for the span of two breaths. I didn't feel anything but he answered slowly: “One.” As an afterthought he added: “It's... harder with living beings, since they are a mixture of all three states.” It occurred to me then that he could have been feeling me up without me ever knowing it. I spent a few moments turning that thought over. What a power!
“Is this how you can tell your way around here? You feel the walls and the floor as if you were running a hand over them?”
“Yes.”
“Then why couldn't you tell I wasn't a piece of rock?”
“I was too far away. My range at the time fell short of the distance between us.” He paused. “Um... may I have... an unrelated question?” A question that brought him great discomfort, apparently. I made an affirmative sound. “Is it... a custom here? That when you meet a new person... you immediately start... touching him?”
There was raw fright in his voice and I gaped in shock for a second. Then I nearly laughed. “Oh you mean – did everybody try to hug you?”
“Yes,” he confirmed, and in his tone I heard a distinctly introverted horror. “I can't retract my extended touch back into my skin. Its minimum range is about one metre to all sides. That horrible crowd in the Castle, right after we were created... it was...”
“Quater and Father,” I exclaimed. “Now I see why you couldn't get out of there fast enough!” It must have felt like an unwanted dogpile to him.
“I know that it was not a very heroic thing to do, but... yeah.” He sighed. “I ran. I burrowed underground the moment I got some breathing space and I haven't seen daylight since. To be honest I'm starting to miss it...”
I was reeling. The admission of fleeing from a group of friendly if excited Hoodians was the most honest thing I had witnessed in a long time, and one of the most dangerous. Nobody on the Neverhood would admit that they disliked crowds. Being antisocial was a stigma. Half of the reason why I had got into geology in the first place was to have an excuse for spending so much time underground. If the wrong sort of Hoodians learned of Arig's words, the boy would have been lynched.
I decided right then that I had to protect him. He had given me his trust too easily. We had known each other for fifteen minutes and I had already learned a secret that could destroy him. He just didn't know how to handle people, I decided. Before he learned it, people had to be kept away from him. Luckily, this was exactly what keeping him occupied in the underground would accomplish. And so I resumed following his train of thoughts.
“Right, so...” I gave him a sheepish smile. “When it seems like you're standing too far away, I won't try and close the gap.”
“Thank you,” he said with relief. While I was wondering if he grasped that welcome hugs weren't the worst thing Hoodians could do to him, the Guardian picked up where he had left in his lecture. “I can extend my range of touch if I focus. I can also point it in one direction or expand it significantly at the cost of losing accuracy. As to everything, there are limits.”
“That's really cool,” I said weakly. “And also stressful.”
I could swear I could hear the Guardian smile. “I was born with these powers. It's not like I can do anything about them but learn to live with them. Alright... Now that you know all this, I can move on to the real issue.” His voice was becoming more animated. “There is a reason why I had to tell you how my powers work. It's that there's one place in the underground where they stop working. I have spent many days trying to find out why, but I am no closer to an answer.”
He walked toward me and the green light swelled from his chest as he lay his hand on the largest stone in the cave-in. Conscious of his personal space, I moved aside.
“When I feel my way through the rock,” he explained, the glow gaining in intensity, “suddenly it gets hard to maintain focus. I can't grasp at the klay. It's elusive, like water or air, but the transition doesn't feel the same as an element boundary. The solid klay seems to go on, but for some strange reason my hand goes numb.”
Recalling his commentary on how many fingers I was holding up, I suggested: “Could it be transition to a mixture? Something like living klay?”
“Yes,” he smiled, “I drew that conclusion as well. But what would a five metre ball of living klay be doing underground?”
It was my turn to pause. The old conversation with Hoborg sprang to my mind. Perhaps the Neverhood is, on some level, alive. “Oh my Quater!” I all but squealed. The Guardian of Earth really did have the means to determine if the Neverhood was a bland chunk of klay or a living organism! And he had noticed it and begun investigating even before I had the chance to ask him about it! Excitement got the better of me. “I think you're onto something big!” And I nearly grabbed his hands to shake them.
“W-what do you mean?” the Guardian stuttered, pulling away from me quickly. That cooled me down like a slap. I took two polite steps back, apologised, and told him the story of moving corridors. While I was recounting the tale, impatient curiosity was taking a hold of me. Was Arig's living klay truly a fundamental part of the Neverhood, or was it just a hoax, a big bird nest for all I knew? But I wasn't the only one who longed for answers. At the end of it, Arig's eyes were sparkling.
“Can I see the maps you've made?” he asked.
On the way to my room, we didn't speak. For one, Arig had clamped up and it was awkward to carry a conversation by myself. And for two, my hearing was already impaired by kicking rubble fallen from the walls and there was no need to make it worse. After I stumbled for the third time and uttered a curse, a faint green glow broke out behind me. In the dim light I could see stones and pebbles lift from the floor a stride before me and float to the side, where they rested soundlessly on the ground. I turned around in awe. The Guardian was wearing a focused expression, one hand raised and commanding. With the other he beckoned me to move along.
So I did, while the thoughtful Hoodian behind me swept the way silently.
After what felt like a lot longer than usual, we arrived at my room. I let us both in, instructed the Guardian to sit on the bed, and began rummaging through my chest of treasures.
“Here they are.” I produced a stack of broad sheets of paper. “Complete maps of the underground from year 124 onward. Here you can actually see how the corridors drift. I couldn't believe it myself at first either, but today I know it for sure: The underground slowly moves as if it were alive. That's why I keep making a new map every ten years or so.”
The Guardian's brown eyes were wide with interest as he flipped through the maps. He was green-skinned... So strange to look at. And his stems looked like roots. All the Guardians had uncommon forms. “Fascinating,” he murmured. “How many of these have you drawn?”
“Twenty-ish, not counting the unfinished ones.”
“That's a lot.”
“Four hundred years is a long time.”
He began to lay the maps out around him. When he ran out of space he suspended the rest in the air with telekinesis. I watched for the tell-tale green light from the symbol on his chest, but I saw nothing. Its glow must have been too dim compared to the bright electric lighting of my room. Seeing this I theorised that the symbol on every Guardian's chest glowed when his elemental powers were called forth, but it was too weak compared to broad daylight. Only in the midnight black underground was the faint glow enough to make a difference.
“Look,” Arig pointed at the latest issue of the map, “this is where we met. And this,” he moved his finger to a nearby spot of solid rock, “is where the living klay is. At the centre of the Neverhood.” He looked over the different versions. “Here it is on the previous map... and here on the one before that... say...” He trailed off as he noticed the same thing as I did. Even though the surrounding corridors changed substantially, they never crossed the space which contained the living klay. I marked its current position on a sheet of translucent paper and I used it to trace the twenty three maps. After we consulted all the errors in them, our theory was proven true. The living klay had always been exactly where it was on that day in 491, some thirty meters below the barrier wall separating the North Plane from the Lake.
“What's fascinating,” the Guardian said, his voice rising with excitement, “is that while the living klay itself never moves, it's actually the centre of tectonic activity. Around it the corridors change rapidly and the speed drops the further away you get. It's like... a control room. Like a heart.”
“Why would the Neverhood need a heart?” I objected.
“Why do living beings need a heart?” Arig countered as if it were obvious. I got a little triggered at that, and I decided to play the wise guy.
“Well, in a Neverhoodian the heart is the life core of his body. It's usually located in the chest, but there are Hoodians whose heart is in their belly or even in one of their legs. You can tell where the heart is by splitting the Hoodian in half. Whichever half regenerates contains the heart.”
Disturbed, Arig objected: “That is morbid! Has that been actually tried?”
“Not on purpose. But there have been accidents.”
“And... what happens if you cut the heart in half?”
“You... probably kill the person. But,” I hurried to say when he opened his mouth in horror, “that is highly unlikely. A Neverhoodian heart is too tiny to hit. You can harm it with a potent poison or acid, that's why we run from weasels, but otherwise a Neverhoodian is quite impossible to hurt or kill.”
For a while the Guardian was silent. Finally he said: “I see.” He was brooding, and I left him to it. All Guardians did this – they got so alarmed that we Hoodians would come to harm, even when there was no real danger. They also hated when we did silly things, such as the traditional drop-off-the-cannonball. Catcher birds had always been reliable, even without the Guardian of Air leading them. I waited patiently until Arig spoke up again.
“Then...” he said softly, “I wonder if I am even right to be here.” He sounded so dejected, it made me sad. “Even if the heart of the Neverhood was made up of living klay, I should retain some power over it. I must be blocked out because it's protected against such meddling. I could harm it, and harm this land through it...”
I gave him a sympathetic smile, again recalling the fateful conversation with my father. “Many years ago I asked Hoborg the same question. The answer is – when you're around the heart, do you feel like someone wants you to go away?”
The Guardian hesitated. Then he sighed. “I did,” he admitted. “At that time I was too single-minded to pay it any mind, but when the earth came tumbling down on me, I did realise that I was unwanted.”
I gasped. “The cave-in where I met you!”
“Yeah,” he said unhappily. “It was the closest corridor to the heart. I understood that I had been too forceful only after the tunnel fell right on top of me. I gave up digging and I have been trying to apologise to the earth ever since. I suppose you heard me speaking in earth talk? That is what I've been doing for the past, what, three days?” He stifled a yawn, illustrating how dull that had been. It occurred to me that he must have been quite out of ideas to resort to speaking to rocks. But at least it explained why he had assumed me to be a piece of talking haematite. After all, I answered his call.
“Then...” I hesitated, trying to come up with something to cheer him up, “how about now? Is the earth still hostile toward you?” Just to be sure I looked around. My room felt the same way it always had: quiet, cool, and comfortably empty of anyone I hadn't invited.
Arig considered this. “I don't think so. I would have to check again when we're close to the heart. I reckon I have spent enough time walking around the entire underground to let the Neverhood know that I was sorry for attempting to dig a hole through its gut.”
I chuckled. “Then how about we go down again and see?”
Arig got up, once again full of vigour. “Yes. Let's go.”
It took us some twenty minutes to reach the cave-in. Along the way the Guardian collected the rubble he had swept aside. When we arrived he dropped it at the foot of the pile of loose rocks. Then he just stood there, unmoving, the symbol of earth on his chest glowing faintly.
“I think it's alright,” he whispered finally. “Everything's quiet. I'll try and fix the cave-in first, see how that goes.”
“Can I help?” I asked.
“It is kind of you to offer,” he fidgeted, “but I would rather ask you to sit tight and watch. It will be faster if I work alone, and if the ceiling comes down again, I don't want you to be caught in it.”
I mumbled something about being a small-time miner as well, but I obeyed. Soon I was glad that I had.
It was captivating to watch Arig work, as was the case for any Guardian in his own element. He looked like a conductor, moving chunks of earth by swinging his arms in the air. Upon closer look, his telekinesis seemed to require physical effort as well, since picking up larger boulders took him more time, a wider gesture, and occasionally a grunt. He collected a fraction of the fallen rubble into a large hovering ball first. Then, with a motion like crushing something between his palms, he compressed the stones into a single boulder. He paused in his work, listening. Apparently he didn't hear or feel anything disconcerting because he resumed cleaning up the debris. With the boulders he had compacted, he rebuilt the ceiling and walls. Sooner than I had thought possible, the cave-in was cleared.
“Now for ensuring structural stability,” the Guardian mumbled. He proceeded by making silly poses that included picking fruit from a non-existent tree, pulling invisible ropes, and a lot of emphatic praying. I guessed that he was feeling up cracks in the bedrock and forcefully meshing them together so that they wouldn't one day rip open and cause another cave-in, but it was more entertaining to think that he was a mime and I his audience.
Finally he was satisfied with his work. He walked over to the newly fixed wall and laid his hand on it. His green glow was slowly brightening and dimming in turn.
“Is that the way toward the heart?” I asked, getting up.
He startled a little. “Oh, yes,” he replied. “I'm deciding where to lead the tunnel.” He smiled. “The earth is whispering to me. I think that it has accepted my apology.”
I listened to the stubborn silence until the Guardian straightened and patted the rock. “That will do,” he announced. “Stand back. I will dig a new tunnel toward the heart.”
He braced himself on the soles of his feet, stance wide. He reached out with both arms and gripped firmly. His chest flashed brightly as, with deep rumbling and high-pitched scraping, he pulled a huge block of stone flush out from the wall. It was so big that it obstructed the entire corridor.
“H-hey!” I exclaimed, watching with wide eyes as he manoeuvred the slab deeper down the hallway. “It's too big, you're going to block the way with it. Again.”
“Don't worry,” he called over his shoulder, carefully setting the enormous thing down at the bend of the hallway, “it's only temporary. There's enough space here to hold all gangue from the excavation. I'll clean it up later.”
“I sure hope so, because there's no way I'm digging through that,” I grumbled, watching the ten-tonne slab of solid stone with grudging admiration.
The flash repeated every time he tore a new block from the tunnel's end. His working pace was, quite frankly, amazing. He made for an outstanding miner. When I needed to dive into the bedrock, it involved a pickaxe, a wedge, a hammer, and a large amount of patience. His way of doing things was much more effective.
With nothing else to do, I took in the underground with all my senses, trying to pick up any sign of hostility. But nothing came forth. Either the theory of a living, conscious heart was baloney, or the Neverhood didn't mind having a tunnel carved straight through its gut. Whichever worked. I wasn't above the end justifying the means. I was anxious to see just what the mystery klay in my underground was.
Finally the green shine softened into a dim glow and all sounds of working ceased. The Guardian walked out of the fresh tunnel. He was carrying an armful of small stones.
“I can't dig any further,” he explained, setting his final load aside and wiping his forehead. “The rock feels heavier than lead and trying to move it sends my thoughts scattering in a thousand directions. Come with me and see.”
The tunnel was just high enough to walk in, its walls rough and flat. At the end it widened considerably, giving us both enough space to stand next to each other facing the slightly bulging end wall.
“This is the heart of the Neverhood,” Arig said with no small amount of reverence. Green glow illuminated him briefly as he placed his hand against the wall. So that I could examine it properly, I produced my oil lamp (yes, I had remembered to grab it while we were in my room) and I lit it up.
“The surface is ragged and pointy in places,” I observed, “it looks like splintered wood.”
“That's because I couldn't get a good grip on the klay,” the Guardian explained. “Those are the marks of the stone being torn in half.”
“Hm. So you're saying that your Guardian powers won't get you any further?”
“Yes, I am. This close to the heart my sense of touch is so numb it's nearly gone. When I try to use my powers for anything, my head fills with static and I can't focus for the love of mother.”
“So we're back to old school, huh,” I said, bringing out my hammer and wedge. As I have mentioned earlier, I was a small-time miner and an oil lamp's golden flicker was all I needed in order to see.
After a while of inspecting the wall, I uttered in dissatisfaction: “I can't find any cracks to exploit. It might take some time.”
“Go on,” the Guardian encouraged me, moving to the mouth of the tunnel so that he wouldn't get in my way.
My progress was slow. So slow, in fact, that when I checked the floor after a couple of minutes, all I found were a few stone chips and splinters. “What the hell is this wall made of?” I muttered under my breath and switched to the pickaxe I had brought. There wasn't enough space to get a good swing but Arig was most helpful with that, widening the end space by carrying two more blocks of stone out.
Finally I threw the pickaxe away in frustration and, instead, took my hardness kit out of my chest compartment. “I should have done this in the first place,” I commented to Arig.
A hardness kit, for those of you who don't dabble in geology, is a small assortment of stones of varying hardness. When placing an unknown mineral on its scale, you try and see which of your samples can scratch the mineral, and which ones will be scratched by it in turn. The hardest mineral I had at the time was topaz, and I was amazed (but, by now, not so surprised) that the wall left scratches on its smooth surface. What did surprise me was that when I performed the same hardness check on the bits of stone fallen from the wall, they only rated as high as quartz.
“Now this is strange,” I said as I told Arig about my findings.
After a brief consideration he said: “It must be that the heart reinforces the stone around it. This way it's made exceptionally hard and sturdy, and to top it off it interferes with Guardian powers. Quite a clever defence. I wonder what would be able to penetrate deeper...”
“Explosives,” I suggested something that had been on my mind for some time already.
“By mother, no!” Arig exclaimed so loudly that it startled both of us. “I'm sorry,” he said in a much quieter, embarrassed voice. “Let us not use explosives. I don't know the first thing about them and I wouldn't be able to control the consequences.”
“Your brother could, though,” I pointed out. “I've been supplying him with gunpowder ingredients and I can attest that he is very knowledgeable in the area.”
The Guardian fidgeted. “I... I would really prefer if we didn't bring Dake into the fray.”
“Why?”
He didn't answer for a while. Then, in an anxious tone: “Please. It is my wish.”
“All right,” I raised my palms in resignation. It was no good to force the issue. Maybe I could try and persuade him later. “Then suggest something else we can still do.”
“We can try and talk to the rock,” Arig suggested. Ah, the old “let us speak to stones and be convinced that they answer us”.
“Well, yes, you do speak earth talk, but your powers are still being blocked.”
“And?”
“Won't it be way too difficult to keep up?”
“No,” he replied in surprise. “It's a language. You don't need any powers to speak a language.”
I frowned. Then I gasped in excitement. “So you can teach it to me?”
“Umm... I'm not... sure...”
“Oh, it doesn't matter,” I said quickly to escape the unease in his voice. Geez, this guy had such a small comfort zone. “Could you ask the heart to... open up a little, I guess?”
“I will. But, um... there is a small problem. You see... Earth talk is much slower than the common tongue. What you heard before was a simple sorry and it took me three minutes to spell out. I can never be sure when the earth is listening, too. That's why I have to repeat everything many times over. In other words,” he sighed, “if we're going to resort to earth talk again, we are in for a long wait.”
“Oh.” I contemplated this, weighing pros and cons. Three days, he had said, had it taken for the earth to forgive him. Finally I shrugged. “I'm up to it if you are. I'm told that I'm great at sitting tight and listening to people. Especially my brother who has me for a willow all the time, and he can talk for hours upon hours. I can probably take a day or two of earth talk, no problem. Let me just blow out the lamp to save oil.” Pausing I added: “Is it alright with you if I stay here?” I hoped sincerely that his loner instincts wouldn't kick in and he wouldn't ask me to leave.
A short consideration later Arig said: “It's fine.”
At that time, I didn't know what I had got myself into by asking to stay. You see, earth talk is plain boring. It's all long notes at a very precise pitch, and while some phrases are pleasing to the ear, they offer little food for thought when they're being repeated for the fifteenth time. I would have tried to memorise the tune and sing along but I knew that I would ruin the language in it. And thus I waited, and sat, and mulled over different things... until finally I fell deeply asleep. That's about the only thing earth talk is good for, in my opinion. Listening to it will, inadvertently, put you to sleep.
I have no idea how long I was out. I had weird dreams, that's for sure, but I didn't remember any of them when I woke up. The Guardian was still singing. I noticed that the tune had changed – it was now longer and even more dissonant. After a while of aimless listening I realised that I was incredibly bored. I decided to break the silence.
“How is it going?” I asked.
Arig jerked. The melody, or rather lack thereof, was resounding in the small space.
“Crap, sorry. I didn't mean to startle you.”
“No... it's alright.” His voice was still quivering from the shock, but he recovered within a few sentences. “It's, ah, going well. I think. I've sent out greetings and I've told the heart that we were friends. Right now I was asking it to tell us what it was. I might as well check if it has yielded any results.”
I watched lazily from my sitting position as the familiar green glow bathed the small space. The Guardian's expression was deep in focus, eyes closed as always, tracing his fingertips along the wall.
Due to Arig's hampered senses, we both noticed it at the same time.
“There's something on the wall,” I was saying, but Arig was already inspecting it.
“It's precipitated magnetite,” he murmured. “Almost a monocrystal, it's got to have a huge magnetic moment. Ruze would like this.” Suddenly he broke off in his mumbling, self-conscious, and he moved away for me to see. “Look.”
I reignited the lamp, and in its light I could see there was a shiny, smooth drawing of a simple tree on the surface of the wall. It definitely hadn't been there before.
“Do you know the symbol?” Arig asked in awe.
“I do,” I confirmed eagerly. “It's the tree of life. It's one of the symbols on the Coded Door, but its use is far more general than that.”
“Could you elaborate of that?”
I wrecked my brain for information. “Hm. Basically it's a symbol associated with belief. Not necessarily in the religious sense, but also in the sense of inner conviction or dedication. My friend decorated all her cradles with the tree of life because each of her children is a miracle. I have also seen a tree of life on the cover of books. For example, uh...” I strained my memory for something non-religious, because those were all self-explanatory. “I think that one was called Gerard, the Warrior of Fire.” I snickered. “I guess Dake would like that one.”
Arig shifted. “Not... necessarily,” he spoke reluctantly. “It might be about him.”
Thinking him to speak figuratively, I shrugged. “Nah, the similarities stop at the fire thing. Gerard is an antihero. Dake's much more positive.”
Arig blinked a few times. Then he looked at me, confused and inquiring, brows drawn high. I grew nervous. What had I said?
“I take it that you don't know about reincarnation,” the Guardian said carefully.
“I... no, I don't. Sorry.”
He relaxed. “It's alright. Let me explain.” He thought for a while. “Let's see. Do you know what happens to a soul when the body dies?”
I knew that, of course. “It goes to the other side.”
“Correct. Does this happen to all souls?”
“Yes.”
“That is where you are wrong, I'm afraid. Six souls are forbidden from crossing to the other side. These are the souls of the Guardians and their mother.”
“How can that... what happens to those souls then, after their bodies die?”
“They are reborn on another world as new people. This is what's called a reincarnation.”
He said it all so matter-of-factly, like he wasn't talking about eternal damnation. It was surreal. I grasped for words for a while. Finally I said: “And you're okay with that?”
“Naturally,” he shrugged. “We chose this destiny long ago. In exchange each of us Guardians was allowed to form a contract with one of the five elements that make up the universe. I have a contract with solid klay. It is what makes me the Guardian of Earth.”
“Uh... huh.”
“Each time we are reborn as new people. We don't have any memories of our past lives. I might have been brash and outgoing in my previous reincarnation for all I know. But I am not that way now. If someone happened to find historic records of the person I used to be, I wouldn't be happy to be compared against him. He might have been a hero, but I am not a hero. He might have been a villain, but I am not a villain. The same goes for Dake and Gerard.”
I must admit, I wasn't listening to him very closely. I was still thinking about how horribly cruel reincarnation was. Everyone, no matter how painful or miserable their lives, could go to the other side to be happily with Father for evermore. The Guardians were denied this release. How horrible... Luckily, Arig gave a speech long enough for me to calm down. So, instead of indignant arguing that elemental powers for eternal damnation was a bad trade, I tried to return to the main topic. “So... what you're trying to say is that Gerard the Warrior of Fire is a previous reincarnation of the Guardian of Fire.”
“There's a chance. What are the details of the story? Does he have an albino mother, no father, and four brothers who also have elemental powers?”
“I... think so?”
“In that case it's a story of a Guardian,” Arig concluded. He put his finger to his lips in thought. “You said the book had a tree of life on its cover. Can I have a look at it?”
“Unfortunately no, I read it in a library in Smark. I still remember most of the story though. I can tell it to you if you give me a moment.”
“Go ahead.”
I spent a while recalling the story and stitching it together. I am the Neverhood's storyteller, after all. Telling stories is what I do. And so I will treat you to a story inside a story.
Once upon a time lived a boy named Gerard, who liked playing with fire. One day the fire escaped from him and it set the house his family lived in ablaze. His mother died in the hot flames and Gerard and his four brothers became orphans. Gerard couldn’t take the shame and he fled his home. He wandered through the land until he was starving and began seeing things that weren’t there. He saw a tree whose branches were heavy with apples. He tried to pluck one but the apples were raised out of his reach. The tree told him:
“You will not eat the fruit of the tree of life until you have proven yourself.”
Gerard tried to climb the tree but the wood burst into flames under his hands and the entire tree burned to ashes. Gerard woke up near a water stream. He quelled his thirst and washed his face and he decided to become a knight in the king’s service.
Soon Gerard was known throughout the land as the Warrior of Fire for his fiery attitude and love for battling. He had tried to suppress his urge to conjure flames but in the heat of battle he often lost control of himself and he set fire to trees, his enemies and most often his own weapons. The sight of Gerard swinging a red-hot sword around, slashing and burning his enemies at once, was something that one could never forget.
But everything comes at a price. Gerard’s red-hot swords were always melting and breaking. At the peak of Gerard’s career, there was no sword that he could use for longer than a few minutes. For a knight this was a bad misfortune and Gerard asked the king to release him temporarily from his service until Gerard could find a sword that wouldn’t melt in his hand.
Gerard spent many years travelling the land in search for such a sword. He travelled North and South and West and East and also in several other directions, he met many people and had many adventures, which I omitted for the sake of keeping the story short. In the end Gerard found the sword he was looking for. It was at a shrine dedicated to the tree of life. But he was an old man by then and he didn’t even have the strength to lift it from its altar. He gazed at the sword and he wished that he could pick it up and once again feel the heat of battle. His fire had nearly left him and there was no power in his arms anymore. But he wished dearly that he would be allowed to battle his foes one more time with this wonderful sword in his hand.
And somehow… Gerard convinced himself that he could do it. When his faith was strong enough, he picked the sword up and he held it above his head. Heat rushed through his every vein and he knew that his belief had saved him. He had proven himself and he was ready to pluck fruit from the tree of life – to find his long lost family and to make amends. In the next second the sword fell out of his hand and hit him on the head, killing him on the spot. When Gerard’s body was found, the word “faith” was engraved on the hilt of the sword. Gerard was buried with the sword in his hand and with the sign of the tree of life on his grave, for it had led him on a journey to the greatest secret, the power of belief.
“And that’s why there was a tree of life on the cover of the book,” I concluded the story.
The Guardian began tapping his finger. “Dake probably wouldn’t wish me to tell anyone…” He weighed his options and then sighed. “But you should know that he is in possession of that sword.”
I blinked several times. “Really? How is that possible?”
“He made a contract with that sword in one of his past lives. That way he bound his soul to it, so it follows him through reincarnations and he can summon it when he's in need of its power. Every Guardian can make one such a contract.”
“So... you're saying that the book wasn't supernatural fiction, but rather a historic record of a past Guardian of Fire.”
“I, um, don't dare to say that the story is historically accurate,” Arig conceded. “But the fact is that Dake's second contract involves a sword called Faith which doesn't turn to ash no matter how long it burns. The book you read may be a sort of embellished biography.”
“But then,” I protested, “how did the biographer know what was going through Gerard's head seconds before he died?”
The Guardian sighed. “That isn't the point, Krevel.”
Ha, I thought, I have caught you trying to invent things. I smirked and I didn't say anything.
“The point is,” Arig continued, “that the power of belief might help us in our struggle with the heart of the Neverhood.”
“How?” I asked, sceptically.
“Gerard's and my situation are very similar,” the Guardian explained. “We both have discovered something valuable which is associated with the tree of life. The way to get it is, obviously, to have faith.” He beckoned to me. “Haven't we been able to advance because we believed that the heart was conscious, and thus it could communicate with us? I have spent hours talking to this stone, willing it to answer my call, and it has! With this drawing it has shown us that to proceed we must use the power of the tree of life, the power of belief.”
Dear listeners... you should know at this point that I am not keen on religion in any form. There is one objective reality, and that is described on the Walls of Records provided by Quater himself. Imagining anything else on top of that is harmless delusion at best, blind fanaticism at worst. While the Guardian had been speaking of his powers over earth, I had believed every word. Granted, the idea of elemental warriors was strange, but their powers obeyed certain principles and they could be easily demonstrated and understood. When it came to blind faith with no proof, however...
“I... have some doubts about that,” I said, trying to keep acidity out of my voice.
“Why?” His genuine puzzlement made it hard for me to be sarcastic.
“Well... look, how is this even supposed to work? What are we supposed to do?”
“We will believe in something and it will happen,” he answered without skipping a beat. I tried not to groan.
“But why should it happen? If we just sit here and strongly believe in something, what will that change about the hard reality of this hard rock wall?”
“Anything, I suppose,” he replied, making the most non-committal shrug.
I gave up. It wasn't worth it convincing him that this wasn't going to work. Stories were stories, he was silly to believe everything he was told, but I had to give it my best shot, and only think of the next step afterwards. Maybe dynamite would be the answer after all.
“Right.” I sighed. “Right. Let's try that.” I set the lamp down and heaved another sigh. “How... exactly do we do this. I'm a newbie to this faith stuff.”
“Surely there are things that you believe,” Arig said, bewildered, “even though there is no evidence.”
Something deep in my gut moved. Oh yes, there was a thing like that, I thought, willing the dull pain to subside. My brother Nike had been missing for nearly a hundred years. There was no evidence... ah, no evidence that he was still alive. And yet, I chose to believe. I chose to believe that he would come back without fail, tall and loud and apologising for being horribly late.
How was I doing that?
I turned the feeling over in my mind. I believed in his safe return because doubting it would hurt too much. I told myself that it was the only option and I tried my best to push the others away. This was my own private blind faith, in spite of how I took pride in wanting a sound explanation for everything. The stubborn atheist that I was, I still made a small secret wish – or prayer if you like – every time I remembered Nike. I hoped that he was safe on his travels.
“I... got something. Yeah,” I muttered, trying to hide the sudden downturn in my mood. “What exactly are we going to believe in?”
“Let's start small. Let's try and find out how the heart looks.” Arig ruminated for a bit. If he noticed my glumness, he didn't comment on it. “I suppose the easiest way will be to believe that the heart is a living, conscious entity, and it can tell us about its layout. What do you think?”
I estimated how willing I would be to believe such a story. “It's plausible,” I agreed. “It has managed to draw a tree of life on its shell, so why not its blueprint.”
“Alright,” the Guardian said energetically. “Let's do it.”
It was easy to say, but harder to carry out. In the four centuries I had been alive, I had grown used to asking questions about everything. Why was the sky black? Why did things fall down? The moment I tried to establish blind faith in the life of the klay before us, dozens of question of how that actually worked filled my mind. I was still busy answering them as best I could when Arig exclaimed at my side softly:
“I've got it.”
I was happy for a distraction. “What is it?”
“The heart has told me what shape it is. It's hollow, and there's something important in the middle. The shell, here,” he knocked on it, “is barely thicker than a palm.”
“It just... told you?” I repeated, confused. “How?”
“The image just popped into my head,” the Guardian explained. “I was expecting another drawing on the wall, but this must have been faster for the heart to do.”
“Are you sure,” I said trying not to sound too sceptical, “that you weren't just imagining it?”
Arig gave it some thought. I was ready for arguments about how he hadn't expected telepathy himself, but he just knocked on the wall again, more sharply. The sound was most definitely hollow, and the depth of it indicated a rather large space behind it.
I snickered in surprise. “Alright, I guess I'll trust you on that.” The wall hadn't sounded hollow until then, not in the slightest. I had hit it with a pickaxe enough times to know. Was the power of belief real after all?
“I have noticed,” the Guardian mused in the background, “that it's so much easier to believe when you make yourself the small one. When you ask for a favour and trust that it will be granted.”
“Sounds an awful lot like praying,” I commented.
“It is praying.”
I wanted to say that praying was talking to a booth that might as well be empty, but I abstained. “So what do we do next? Will you try and believe that you can open a door in the wall with telekinesis?”
He was silent. His voice betrayed a deep disagreement when he finally replied: “I'm sorry... I don't think that I can do it. It's just too violent.”
“But...”
“Krevel...” he sighed. “Please, let's try something else? Something non-destructive?”
I scratched my head. It was so hard to tread carefully around my new friend! “Sure, but... is there any way to get inside other than to break in?”
“We could pass through the wall,” he suggested eagerly.
“Pass...” I gaped. Pass through the wall. Pass through the palm-thick, harder-than-topaz wall. He was crazy. “Isn't there something less impossible that we can do?”
“Every way is impossible,” the Guardian argued. “The heart is protected by an enclosed spherical shell. Either we break it, or teleport inside, or we walk in.”
I groaned. “I suppose it would be too much to believe that there's a teleporter inside, would it.”
“...Teleporters are real?”
“Later,” I dismissed the question. “I am still trying to imagine myself passing through a wall.”
“Keep trying,” he encouraged me. “Imagining it brings it closer to reality.”
“Oh my Quater,” I moaned. I was busy panicking when Arig spoke up again, in a quiet voice.
“If we're going in together, we need to be synchronised. So that one doesn't pass while the other gets stuck. So uh... can I take your hand?”
It was such a cute request that I complied immediately. In contrast to his gentle personality, his grip was firm. It felt... reassuring.
“Okay.” He took a deep breath. Then he exhaled in a huff. “Let's do this. We can pass through this wall.” He sounded so calmly convinced that he convinced me a little, too.
I took a few deep gulps of air as well and, steadied by his hand, I sank into concentration. I wondered what it would be like, to pass through a wall. I told myself, calling upon every ounce of my willpower, that we would make it. We had Arig's naivety backing us, and that was a force to be reckoned with. He was so dedicated to solving the mystery of the heart of the Neverhood that he threw his doubts away in order to proceed. In the back of my mind, I wished to be like him a little.
My hand twitched. Arig didn't say anything, but he gripped me stronger.
Slowly a decision crystallised, like snow flakes settle in a snow globe after you shake it.
I wouldn't believe in the heart's benevolence which allows me to pass through its wall. No. I would believe in the Guardian. I would believe in this person who was too shy to meet anyone on his own, and yet who had shared so much with me. In the one-day-old who was both crazy and wise for not doubting what he needed to believe. If there was a person who could get through to the heart, it was him. I knew that. And in knowing it, I believed it fully.
I closed my eyes. It was alright, resonated through my mind. If he could pass, I could follow. I made three steps forward. I opened my eyes.
We were standing in a round chamber. Its walls were smooth and decorated with ornamental carvings. On a pedestal in its centre, there was a bright crystal jewel. It was shaped like fire but its flames were unmoving. It was glittering like a brilliant with all the colours of the rainbow, and I couldn't tell where the flickering light was coming from as it refracted from its million facets. It was the most beautiful gem I had ever seen in my life. The Frozen Fire.
Arig took a step forward, his hand slipping out of mine. The light of the jewel tinted with leaf green. He made another step forward. The green glow intensified. He grasped the jewel with both hands.
“I think I need to sit down,” Arig said in a shaky voice and he all but crumpled to the floor.
“Whoa whoa whoa! Are you okay?” I tried to grasp for him in the pitch dark, careful not to topple the jewel. I had left my lamp outside! And I hadn't brought a spare one. Quater I was so dumb with lamps on that day.
I found the Guardian lying on the ground. His entire body was shaking. “Okay, you don't seem okay,” I mumbled in near-panic.
“No, I'm -” Arig gasped, “I'm fine. I'm not hurt. It's just-” He gave a full-body shudder and he started taking deep breaths.
I knelt by his side. Neverhoodian bodies were not supposed to collapse like that, ran through my mind back and forth. To my relief, his shivering didn't take long to subside. Presently my eyesight recovered as well and I noticed that the symbol on his chest was glowing. It wasn't, however, the steady green light I knew. Its intensity was fluctuating as it brightened and dimmed erratically.
“Stop using your powers,” I chastised him, “focus on breathing.”
“I'm not using my powers,” he murmured.
“Yes, you are. Your chest is glowing.”
The rhythm of his deep breaths faltered as he glanced down. “You're right,” he said in surprise. “But I'm not doing anything, believe me. I'm just trying to breathe.”
“Oh. Since you're good enough to speak now,” I seized the opportunity, “would you mind telling me what the hell has just happened?”
The Guardian took one last deep breath and exhaled in a sigh. “I'm trying to figure that out myself,” he said. “As soon as I stepped inside this chamber, I felt I was being pulled forward. I stepped closer, it got stronger... I touched the gem and then... then... something happened. But I don't know what it was.” After a moment he added, his voice quaking: “Which... scares me quite a bit.”
“What did it feel like?”
“All the muscles in my body contracted at once. My hands started prickling, and I got shivers all over... It was unbearable for a few seconds. It's wearing off now, thankfully.”
“Oh,” I relaxed. I knew that sensation. “That's fine then, you just got an electric shock. It's what happens when you touch a power outlet. It must have packed a punch if it made your legs buckle.”
While I was talking, he felt out with his extended touch on instinct, and a steady green glow overlaid the flickering. “There's no power outlet here,” he objected. “Oh...” he realised, “I can use my powers again. The interference is gone.”
“Huh.” I looked back at the Frozen Fire. For all its previous glittering, now it was dim and lifeless.
“The gem isn't shimmering like before,” I noted.
“Ah...” Arig breathed. “Shit.” He jumped to his feet.
“Maybe it was the electricity that made it glow,” I suggested, disturbed by the sudden profanity.
“If the heart is powered by electricity, and I've just short-circuited it...” He looked at his hands, clenched them, and opened them again. “I have to try and restore it.” In the dark chamber, his chest seemed to be blazing with anxious light.
“Electricity is Ruze's domain,” I mumbled. He paid me no mind. Stepping close to the precious gem, he cupped it in his palms for the second time.
The Frozen Fire began glittering. But it was no longer all colours of the rainbow. This glow was faint, and green. And when I looked properly, I realised the truth. It wasn't the gem glowing. It was refracting the gleam of Arig's chest.
Come to think of it, Arig's chest flickered in a very similar way to the Frozen Fire.
“No, no,” the Guardian groaned, stumbling back. “Nothing of the pull is left. It's a pretty piece of stone now for all I can tell. It's howling empty.”
“Arig,” I piped up. “You might want to consider something...”
“Yes, obviously!” he retorted, his voice rising to a panicked yelp. “I don't know what I've done, but apparently I've just – destroyed the heart of the Neverhood!”
“You don't know that,” I insisted, rising to my feet as well. “Just because it isn't shining, doesn't mean it's dead.”
“It is,” the Guardian sobbed in horror. “It is dead. I've killed the heart of the Neverhood. I shouldn't have done this!” And he started crying.
I stood there, dumbfounded. I needed... I needed to calm him down. “You're scaring me witless, man,” I muttered shakily as I moved in for a hug. It was the only thing that came to my mind. “Look,” I said, trying to get his attention. “Listen to me. I think I know what has happened. Stop crying for a bit and listen.”
With a great effort, he stilled his sobbing and nodded.
“Right. If the heart really was dead, we'd see some consequences. Do you still hear the earth whispering to you?”
“I can't tell,” he keened.
“Well that's just because you're upset, but really, I think that if we managed to kill the Neverhood, we would know it. Something would happen. Like, ground shaking, rock falling apart. Apocalypse, that sort of stuff. But nothing has happened.” I fought to keep my voice steady.
“The gem is dead...”
“Have you noticed that suddenly your chest is glowing in exactly the same way the gem was?” I asked plainly.
He looked down at himself and gasped in shock. “By mother... you're right. That...” he sniffed, “that shouldn't be possible. I...” He hid his face in his hands. But instead of more crying, he stilled, as if listening to something. “I can hear the earth,” he whispered hopefully, “more loudly than before. And... my body's tingling and warm. It's... nice. Soothing. Like my mother is here with me.”
“I am happy for that, because I didn't like your breakdown,” I said with relief. “We should get Hoborg. We should get Hoborg as soon as possible. He's the only person who will know for sure what's happened.” After all, I had no idea if I was right about Arig absorbing the heart of the Neverhood. Perhaps apocalypse was just slow on its legs. It had done well to calm him down, but for me the horror was just settling in. What had we done?
Arig nodded, nervously. I continued.
“He should see this... and he should see you. Stay here, I'll fetch him. I'll be back...” I made the necessary calculations, “...in about an hour.”
He made a pained grimace.
“It's the best I can do, sorry, it just takes time a long time to get through the caverns.”
His voice made it clear that he was just about ready to burst into tears again. “I'm sorry,” he said weakly, “I just... I don't want to be here alone for an hour...”
“Then come with me.”
“But you'll be walking on the surface... among people.”
I threw my arms out. We were losing time. “Then what do you suggest?”
He jerked, and tears rose to his eyes again. Have I mentioned that I don't do that great under stress? “I can dig you out,” he said shakily. “The Lake is not far up. It will take me five minutes to make the shaft.”
“Ah... okay...” That was actually a sound plan. “Okay! Yeah, there's a teleporter in the Lake, it will take me straight to the Castle. Right, let's get to work!”
True to his word, it really did take him five minutes to dig a narrow shaft up to the surface. Working with his element calmed him down. He even smiled while he was waving goodbye to me. I waved back, stepping onto a small platform that sent me up through the fresh shaft like an elevator. I just hoped that he wouldn't manage another breakdown while I was away.
Outside I briefly greeted Gome, who was playing in a muddy puddle with a yellow rubber ducky, and I sprinted to the teleporter. Fetching Hoborg from the Castle was a matter of minutes. Luckily the king was used to Hoodians scrambling madly into the throne room and demanding that he come with them immediately.
Politely I let Hoborg descend into the dark hole first. When I arrived at the bottom after him, the king was holding a white glowing flower in his palm. “Now there, shine a bit more,” he told it, rubbing its petals. The flower obeyed, brightening enough to illuminate the entire chamber. Hoborg nodded in satisfaction, set the flower down where it took root, and began examining the room. I checked Arig. He seemed spooked, eyes wide, but he was holding up well. I found my father's presence a balm on my soul. If he was here, nothing more could go wrong.
The flower shed new light on the situation, pardon the pun. I found out that the ornaments on the walls were, in a large part, writings. They detailed the history of the Neverhood from the moment Klaymen pulled out the pin and reconnected its two halves. On this day, called The Day of Forming in the records, the first speck of the Neverhood's life force crystallised in its belly. Slowly it grew, and as a heart needs veins, it created a net of caverns and corridors around itself to deliver life to plants and wildlife everywhere. The records were interwoven with exclamations of devotion and humility. Kneel before your king, for he is the one that gave you life. Kneel before the tree of life, and you shall thrive on its faithful fruit. I was too engrossed in reading to answer Hoborg's many questions, but Arig made a good job of it in my stead.
“Well, my friends,” my father announced finally, tearing me away from the writings. “I must say. You have embarked on a dangerous quest! Both of you were more than right to be worried. But you have been fortunate. There has been virtually no harm done. As it seems, the heart of the Neverhood is beating safely within you, Arig.”
“How do you know, sir?” the Guardian asked timidly.
“I can feel its creative intent radiating from you. It's familiar, like the voice of my child. It's the essence of the Neverhood. Its soul, its spirit, what I intended it to be when I created it. The heart is this land's source of life energy. Before you came, it was housed in this lovely gem, making it glow. Now it is embedded into you.”
“Then... I am a suitable vessel for it?”
“It seems like you are,” Hoborg shrugged. “After all, you are alive. If you want, you can come to my castle later, and I will have a good look at you.”
“I will, sir.”
I stepped into the conversation. “I can't believe our wild hypotheses were actually right,” I shook my head. I leaned down to examine the Frozen Fire up close. “About this being the heart of the Neverhood, about how to get past the tree of life, about the transfer of the heart...”
“I would expect nothing less of you, Krevel,” Hoborg chuckled. “You posses a most inquisitive mind.”
“Er, thank you,” I replied, “but really, isn't it weird? I've been frequenting the underground for centuries. I've noticed that the walls move, but that's about it. There has never been anything extraordinary here, nor magical. How come that...” I shook my head. “I don't know. I still can't believe I passed through a freaking wall.”
“I wouldn't worry about it,” Hoborg waved his hand. “Since the Guardians were born, I've been learning all sorts of things about my land. I never knew there were so many birds. There are droppings everywhere...”
“Yes, but this is downright magic!”
The king addressed me in a grave voice: “Krevel. Your mind might be inquisitive, but sometimes you doubt too much. The power of faith is real. You have seen it with your own eyes, twice now! Or do you not remember the shadow that tried to crown your brother Nike as the king? Do you doubt that it was the shared belief of all Neverhoodians that summoned the ghost?”
“No, I was there,” I hung my head. “I just... I don't like it. It's too convenient for you to say 'well you meant no harm to the heart, and so you haven't done any, all good'.”
Hoborg patted my shoulder. “You can stop by later to talk as well.”
“Yeah, I know,” I grunted. “I guess I will. I can escort Arig there while I'm at it.”
“Oh, that reminds me,” Hoborg smiled. “Arig, I have been told that you haven't met any of my children yet. Perhaps you could do that on your way to the Castle.”
“I, er...”
I interrupted the exchange. “I'm sure that Arig will do it in his own time, father. He is rather shy around new people.”
“But he has been here for over two weeks,” Hoborg said, astonished. “Surely that is time enough.”
Arig coughed. Hoborg laughed. “Alright, alright, I will leave it up to you. At least it seems like you have made friends with Krevel. That is very good. You will find him a great friend.”
Not too long after this compliment, Hoborg departed. He left us with the order to seal the shaft so that the underground wouldn't be flooded when Gome filled the Lake again. Arig walked over to the dazzling flower Hoborg had left growing on the floor. He squatted next to it.
“Interesting,” he murmured, brushing its leaves gently.
“What do you make of it?” I asked him. “How is this whole thing possible?” I gestured around me.
Not taking his eyes from the flower, Arig responded kindly: “I think that your father is right. You are too distrustful of miracles. But,” he said before I could protest, “I have one thing to reveal to you. It might make the situation a bit more bearable for you.”
“Yeah?”
He stood up, presenting his open palms to me. “Shortly after Quater bound our souls to the elements, he gave us the opportunity to make a second contract. It was a lesser one, he said, but it would persist through reincarnations just like the first one. At first all of us contracted the destructive sides of our elements. Ruze can still call up a huge thunderstorm that will scorch an entire land with bolts of lighting. But the interesting thing about the second contract is, it can change. Has Usha shown you his wings?”
“Yes, he has. He got so much attention that he swore never to grow them again.”
“Why am I not surprised,” Arig said dryly. “And Gome and his fish tail?”
“He transforms every time he's allowed to fill the Lake.”
“He should only use it when necessary,” the Guardian frowned. “Anyway. Then there's Dake... he has Faith, the sword made of volcanic rock.”
I nodded. I had yet to see that one, but I trusted the Guardian's earlier words.
“And, finally... I am fairly certain that I've just crafted my second contract anew.”
I gaped at him. “Really? Damn, I wasn't listening while you were talking to Hoborg!”
“No no,” he chuckled. “Not with Hoborg. I made a contract with the Neverhood. I did it when I first touched the gem, even though I wasn't fully aware of what I was doing. That's why I was able to absorb the life force in it. The heart of the Neverhood is at my disposal now,” he tapped his flickering chest, “just like Faith is at Dake's.”
“I don't know if that makes me feel better or worse,” I admitted. The day had been a lot to take in.
Arig laughed and he set about sealing the hole in the ceiling.
I took to brooding and studying the Frozen Fire. When he was nearly finished I asked: “Would you like to come over for a cup of fresh fountain water?”
“I'd love to, thank you,” he replied. “Though I hope that it isn't another Neverhoodian group ritual, like the hugging...”
“No, it's just going to be the two of us, and I'm going to sit at a polite distance.”
“Then, by all means,” he grinned. “If you happened to have any food, that would be lovely, too. I haven't eaten since I was born.”
And that is, ladies and gentlemen, the story of how I met Arig, the Guardian of Earth. In time he discovered that his new second contract gave him the power of healing. But that is a story for another time.
