Psalms of the Black Diamond: An Overture

1. A Fall Into the Abyss

ON THE NIGHT of her first bleeding, it was foretold that her second child will tear the world asunder. He will, as depicted of the monsters in the first era, with his mere voice raze armies 'til the lands are mounds of bones, 'til the oceans seethe with blood, 'til earth itself is the radiance of a thousand suns.

'You must kill him before he is of age...'

Ψ

Brae Lynne County, Vóri Astéria
Solar Winter of 1603 SE

The wind spoke on his behalf, as he climbed to the summit of his castle tree of oak, where he was king, where the birds were his subjects. Though their eyes turned upon him with admiration and respect, they felt no terror when he sat among them. Then the little birdie would say, a ruler must be feared rather than loved, if he is not both. In these words, as he came to from a vision of battle and glory, of the lands conquered and peace made with the sword, he understood that his path would be strewn with thorns, and the weight of his crown would bear the burden of unyielding choices.

Red moss spread across the fields to the ends of the earth, patched with snow and ancient bones on which crows perched, cawing to the dead. Their beaks were stained with the blood of elk and lamb; their eyes sought more prey. In truth, he was afraid. But to the world he fronted a look that had no mercy, a look shaped out of the monster he was meant to be.

One day, you will have to subdue the crows to ease the burdens of your reign.

To the west the hills stood tall and black, and dark clouds moved across the sky and across the land 'til the land was a sea of wraiths.

When he looked at this scene every morn, the imagery reminded him of what laid ahead. Mother had pledged his soul to the world, to save man, to toil in vain for a thankless race that would sit so idly as he bleeds white, a race that would feed on his remains like worms 'til there is nothing left of him but bones and myth.

Maybe that was just her delusion, he often thought. The woman was so vain she believed her womb was an altar from which to summon the soul of our saviour, the lord of air and deity of the avian kind. But her eyes were sad on some nights, 'cause he did not come alone.

Tyden Aerius was a vessel of many things. He had a feeling, which came over him once in a while, that what he did and said had been done and said before in a time that was still to come. He had seen the terror of his reign; the peace and silence the belied the smoke and the ravaged lands, the dead piled high as he laid a laurel wreath to coronate his victory.

It would seem futile.

But if ever you should hate him for the petty things he does out of necessity, remember that other gods have cursed us 'cause a woman ate an apple.

The wind spoke on his behalf, as the cold wrung his flesh and the fine hairs rose on his back. He sat on the oak tree, icicles leaking from his nose. His ears bruised where his fur cap did not reach. But the teeth of winter, even this far north, could not bore into his nerves. It could not deter his will. It could not douse his fire.

The oak tree was where he learned the Rákid Arts: to be as water, which has no form of its own but shapes itself into its vessel. Wild as the falls, then calm as a lake. It made him so fine he could not be held, and when struck he would not suffer, he would not be wounded, he would not be broken. A hundred feet aloft, he leapt across the snarled limbs and swung on the lianas and vines, every fibre in his little body trembling as he channelled his inner-monkey to snare a robin that had been grating his nerves.

Eukrates the Pot Stirrer. It sang in protest to him and his aunt, the queen eagle. It flicked thru the horsetails hanging on the leafless oak, its beak twisted into a grin, a sneer, a mockery of his rule—the weakness of it—and the sense that his iron fist was fading at the seams. He wanted to put this fowl in a broth, to show that he was still in control, that he could decree the birds with the magic of his voice, as though their spirits were bound to his will.

And no, this was not childish folly. As with all things that had come in his thirteen years of life, Mother the Seer and Little Birdie the Warder of Time had said it was an omen, a trial, or some parable of a future in which he would also have to subdue the humans when he comes of age.

A great leader must turn the pyramid onto its head and serve others, mother had said during her sermon of drivel in the shed, where the stench of cattle dung and her words were alike, and where Tyden often searched in vain for a knob to turn her off. But sometimes it is necessary to rule with an iron fist, the little birdie had argued, 'cause if man will not accept your way thru kindness and reason, they will have to conform thru pain just as wild animals are trained to obey with a red-hot iron bar.

Heeding the latter, as ever, Tyden had been trying to snare the infidel robin, and he made his intent clear if he was to succeed: "I will tie an anchor around your neck and drop you into the ice lake to see whether you freeze or drown to death."

In the past, he had lost his footing, crushed his ribs and bruised his face during the tumbling descent, only to latch onto a branch and spare himself, and the rest of us, the story of a boy who fell off a tree, broke his neck, and died.

A shame, the little birdie had said, o' that would be an utter shame for one whose glory has been foretold; for whom eulogies have already been written, for whom fields of battle have been lain, and blades tempered and soldiers initiated; for whom many concubines are in wait for his adoring gaze, and for his rather large...

Trust them, mother had gone on, for they are connected to you by the red thread of fate. And it is with that soul-deep bond that the Lord Ariâ and the Ladies of the Nocturni will lead the world out of the age of the black sun.

And now he spoke for the wind, as he took aim at the first heretic to his cause: the robin. It swooped gay and wild, humming to the tune of nyah nyah nyah nyah nyah...

"I will catch you and roast you over the coals, you fowl beast."

He drew a deep breath—slowly released it. Steadied himself. Move with nature and attune yourself with the harmony of the cosmic field, the little birdie had said in his teachings of the arts, and then you will be internally singing the same song as all surrounding entities.

O' fetter the throat of thee who speaks such folly. Tyden was a mad boy who didn't adapt to reality: he adjusted it.

He dug his boots and fingers into the wet bark, then latched onto the oak limbs and rushed along the robin's flight path. Its brazen song cut thru the howling wind, thru the shrouds of coiling mist. The cold clung to his lungs and stifled his breath—breathe—as the air brined in his haste, making his eyes bleed with salt. Twigs lashed out at his face like a mob of the undead reeling him into the nether world, but he did not care. He scolded his lungs as a stitch tore at his side, as his puny muscles cried out for rest and his sinews melted amid the friction of his bones, but there was no respite, nor an ounce of fear in his godly veins; in his quest to kill this rebel and gain absolute rule over all avian things.

He went at full pelt and threw everything into a leap; caught the bird by its tail and reeled it into his chest as his feet clipped a branch...and he fell into the abyss.