Tales of The Nine Lands: The Art of Life

by Darkened Powerslave

Chapter I - The Nomad of the North

I

The sun glared into the ground, almost as if it were angry at it. It seemed as though through a few clouds the beaming sentinel of light shone better on this day than on many others, and it affected the Nomad more than it should have. He stood juxtaposed to a fence-line, tearing into his pocket for a cigarette, and his other for the match. His hands were burnt from the sun, as if he had been in it too much too long, and many times; like his face and neck alike, his legs were a sickly wan, deathly paled and followed by something to cover them up. His muscled legs made up for the fact that he was scarred over a larger portion of his body, most of these coming from adolescence. He bore a coat that strew across his chest and tapered down over his back, almost as if it were a cape, but it had straddled across his front for months after being torn at the tasseled bits. The shirt he wore was a bit too big for him, hanging inches off of his chest and down from his waist, but also hiding what he could be fitting into his jeans pockets. The jeans were faded from their made blue, but now into a sunbleached white, like everything else he wore.

The boots on his feet were leather, and the sheen that used to gleam from the tips had faded into a rough budding crackle out near the sides of the seams.

He carried guns.

These were illegal in the Lands at this day and age, and he wore them proudly with them cradled across his waistline, like a neatly tucked away and resting at his call.

He hadn’t had to draw them in a long time, and he didn’t think of drawing them, usually he just passed his insults with words or with his fists, because killing doesn’t always solve the problems. He had learned this with his past problems he had. Usually passing from town to town he doesn’t get remembered for what he did all those years ago. But that is a story for a different time, (And many know that means the story would almost never be told again.) because the story is old; near a ’hundred years old. Aye, he be a ‘hundred and more in age. The Nomad stood with the cigarette in hand, gazing out onto the field before him, wondering why he had come, why he was there. His gaze turned out to the town, the bustling streets and the drunken clamoring that reverberated from the shops. The people would shuffle from one side of the streets to the other, and the wagons trailed off into the distances.

The man that stood in front of the metal shop seemed a drunken bastard, about 5’4. His gait was off terribly and his footing lost with each step he would take.

The Nomad took all of this into account. Every single detail of every single motion, the True Earth just revolved itself around him; revolving as if it were the chambers in his magnum, spinning and never stopping. He always lost things, firing them off into the clear, and always cooled down and moved on. His life had been subtle for the most part, and he usually never had to stop in a town for anything. His life was not difficult, and his travels were always cut short by the dreams he dreamt on those long nights in deserts. The Nomad was usually off from a place in a day, never stopping to ask questions for anything, and he had no true journey to go on.
He just traveled.

The fire beside him killed down, and the sun shown its ugly face. The grey bags sat in the sand next to him, thrilled with the embodiment of spices and seasons. The sky was a theatre to him, the ground his stage. He whipped out his knife, gleaming and strait he drew it upon the bags slowly and relaxed the strings holding them closed onto the ground. His eyes fluttered around madly, tormented by creation and convenience of abundance, he flung the spices into the thrall of heat, the cooking pot nestled over the fire. His eyebrows sweated gracefully, and dripped onto his palms as he unwrapped the Bantha he had struck lifeless earlier past week. The meat was soft and tender but would burn fast if not readied at right pace by true cook. The day was still soft, and the night farther away, the Nomad stared into the fire that brought life into him, with every second it seared the meat.

He usually never thought to himself while he derided his problems, he left that to his body. Truthfully to him, thoughts were for the people who didn’t have the time to act against what was going to occur. He had never not had enough time, it was his curse. Usually that is the only thing he thinks about.

The sun drew its zenith, a pinnacle of treacherous heat beating the land around him. This heat did nothing to affect the seared Bantha he had worked on for few time, and so he ate. The meat soaked his tongue in flavor he had not known for months, for his only meals have been Rhye Grasses and Valka Wood.
He stood and faced the town once more.

He knew he didn’t have to go to town, but he hadn’t spoken High Speak in over a decade, and he was sure that people had changed since the last time he had spoken with civilized (Or so he would have said otherwise) people. But the people in this town looked laid back, and somewhat reveling. He knew that the people in this town were different, and he wanted to try out History with them. *(Trying out history means to ponder on the things he has missed in years past.) His hair came down after he took out the knot behind the neck, smoothing back into a long feather like mane. His hair was long, yar, but it was a color not often seen in The True Earth anymore. Black. Black was a seldom color lost over the years through cross breeding and sacrifices. The elves were said to have been one of the only races that were able to sustain pure blood with themselves, but ‘twas lie. His face seemed that off a child, young and pure. This pureness made him vulnerable to people who think he is weak; not vulnerable for him to be harmed, nay. But for the mistaken people to be hurt if they ever do so mistake him. He took his feet and moved them towards the opposing side of his fire, eyeing it slowly as he did so. The Nomad took a cloverstained cloth, and choked the fire. Its smoke crept up the body of the Nomad, and brought an ashy smell with it. The people in the town got louder as the day progressed, and the Nomad noticed this change in attitude of the day. The people were very strange of late, it seemed that he was starting to want to move into town and see what was up. But he knew it was still somewhat against him.

10 years on the road, and nothing to show for it? How poor can I get, wandering the Great Lands of our Kings and not claiming my destiny. This True Earth hath no relent on its fury. 10 long years… I stand here now to myself and to this town, how have I changed, tis strange what loneliness doeth unto a man. Punishment and passion I undergo each day through the walk I take, never I look back. Maybe ‘tis time, shall I look forward past what is in front of keen eyes.

His thinking prolonged the day to what he wanted it to, for what he thought on made him sit by the fire he had snuffed out. The dead smoke resonated out to the sky, which was a canvas for the people to paint.

His guns.

He knew he would have to leave his guns if he went onto the town. He might need some food from the market on the main road. But something still nagged at him, he knew that something was wrong. He progressed down the butte he slept on, and dragged his time on through the day. The sun lowered itself through the sky, and dipped to show that it was morally tired of the day.

Blessed be the Nine, I am trekking into a town!

His mind rushed with all of the thoughts that would possess him as he took steps into civilization.

II

The people looked at him as if he were a madman. His dressings of course matched none of the people there, nobody looked as if they took liking to him. They seemed to be disgusted by his looks, and he knew if he acted wrongful, the day would be in for a walloping failure.

A shopkeeper seemed to eye him from the side.

“Mistuh! Ya seem ta be headin somewhere! Got no place ya go for good?”

The Nomad took eying to him, and slowly brought his face to meet the shop keepers. The Nomad already knew that this individual could not speak High Speak. He had no intention of having a conversation with this person.
The tone of the shopkeeper seemed to have been snappy, and somewhat rhetorical. He was going to have fun playing with his words.

"No, I ain't got a place. Nowhere for me to be taken. Everywhere I go, there are things and places that just pass me by like the moons and the suns. And you?"

"God be good to me, I always had myself a laugh or two at people like you! Never been able to settle with a job like me, and always stuck wandering around like something was a bother."

"I never said that something was a bother, I just simply put that I was quickened to move by town and town again, because of the hostile treatment of people like you."

"People like me?"

"Yar, the people like you always tend to slice a few more inches in already deep wounds. I try to avoid the towns as much as possible now."

"You seem like an out of area person, if you know what I mean..."

"I cant seem to catch the sense you make."

"Your tone, your body, your hair... Where you comin' from?"

"An edge of my sanity, long journeys and short nights bring me to the edge of my sanity, kind man. I have been traveling for as long as my god gifted me legs. These legs took me places far too great for my mind to wander." His chin itched him with annoyance, and so did the conversations road. "My birthplace was of long bloodline, and of deep treachery, far beyond royalty or sacred youth. I am what many would call extinct..."

"Are you of Nyumphus blood?"

"Nay, I am no Elf or Gelfling. My blood is a more pure line."

"Speak answers Nomad! What are you? It's a crime in this town to hide your race. Do you wish to be turned in?"

"I wish to be left alone, I just want to pass through... Can a shopkeep like you grant me passage? Methinks you aren't the only one who would be a kind and gentle sir and let me be me to be."

"Stop your tongue twisting and speak me what I want! I reckon you are an Elf, a dirty black haired bastard you are... We don't get many elves around, probably because of the mass executions that occur when they step out of their lands..." He shot the Nomad a dirty look, practically asking for his own death. His breath caught the Nomad to a degree, and a certain familiarity about it brought the Nomad to a recollection. Alcohol... "So what's it going to be?"

"Your drunk."

"Excuse me?"

"You drink like a fish, and you probably have troubles at home with your woman. You are only badgering me for the money you get out of it to please the misses. Do you think the pay would be very good?"

"I don't follow your trail..."

"Of course you do, you aren't daft. You are as slippery as I presumed a townsman out to be. Hold me to a free man and let me go, and I will let you off. I don't have any money, but I have the guarantee of the safety of your life."

"Blessed be me by father Rha! You have threatened me with violence, and as an Elf at that!"

"Your ignorance will be your downfall townsman, please let me pass..."

The shopkeeper turned his gaze out to another point, to a person dressed in fine leather. He was laden in the fashion of a different time, a clever and more peaceful time. His eyes seemed to rest, and shine a dull lust that screamed for something exciting to happen. His breast found a gold star to be rested upon the right side, seeing to it that he was The Sheriff...

As the Nomad studied him, the shopkeeper started to yell, "Hey Sheriff! Hey Sheriff! We got ourselves an injun! (The overall slang term used for the homeless Elves. supposedly an insult.) Come and take a gander at him! He refuses to give his race but you can tell by his locks!"

"I warn you," The Nomad spoke loudly, "Your impudence will cost you what you cannot afford."

The sheriff stepped out to see the merry two, letting each other have it in their each way of words. He had then after a moment, gone in a bar across the street.

"That Sheriff is gonna have your tongue for this speak you Elf. Go ahead and try something... You ain't nothing but a dirty injun."

"Am I?" As if with a cocky glam, he asked this.

"You are, and you are about to be in jail for the next few days before a stoning or stretch."

"Stoning?"

"Yeah, the livelihood of the town! Getting to watch those scum flagged with rocks."

The Nomad didn't like this term, and he didn't like the way that the Shopkeep spoke. Finally, the Nomad had enough.
He waved his hand across his duster, bringing his palm to his side, and revealed the pistol. Shimmering gold ironsights gleamed from the metal stalk of what was a beautiful gun. Its pearl grips hung from the holster and bounced with each step.

"A Gun? Those are illegal! And even an elf should know not to carry a gun! You will be hung and beaten until the life of you is gone!"

"Or until I don't have to look at your ugly face anymore..." He chuckled a bit at that.

"Say one more thing to me I will beat you down! Fuck the gun, I need not worry about anything like that. When you have fists like these you can beat anything."

"Is that what you tell your wife when you beat her?"

That did it.

At this point the sheriff stood watching, across the street and smiling. He held a pint in his hand and shuffled back and forth between the beams of the town jail. The western style of building stood out from the surrounding granite stone houses. He drug himself along, and watched as the event went down, almost as though he cared not what happened to his people.

Or were those his people?
The Nomad was in thought, and the Shopkeeper was still angered by the anti-religious response that he had given him a few moments ago.
“By my lord! Bite your foul tongue you slithering demon!” The shopkeeper delivered these words blindly with his mouth, not knowing the consequences.

“Demon? Have your eyes ever met with that of a demon? Nay? Bite my tongue? Nay… My bullet will bite yours before I bite mine!”

The Nomad drew his gun, because at the slightest moment, during his speak, he watched as the shopkeeper drew his gun. Other people with guns?

Yes.

The buckle on the strip across the belt holding the gun into place released with a flick of the fast finger, and his swift movements of the arm quickened the gun out of its holster. His hands were hot with the fire of kill, and his mind with the cold of think. His brain rushed to find the quickest way to pull the trigger and deliver the blow before the shopkeeper could let out so much as a blink. He watched himself move his own eyes to the opposing mans, across to the forehead, and his fingers to the trigger. Under a second, he had pulled his gun and faster even, was the act of his body moving to the rhythm it was used to. His bullet met bone, as the smoke erupted and tore through the clean air with a shrill sound shattering the silent crowd. The body of the man who was once the town shopkeeper (because he was sure he was dead.) now ejected itself from the position it was last seen in, and flew into the doors, which crashed below him.

The crowd went dead, almost as dead as the fellow shopkeeper they had known to be friend. Of course they knew it was illegal to own a firearm in the Land, only if you were placed under rights by The Kings. True Earth laws say this, and of course the Nomad did not follow True Earth laws. The Nomad swerved around, and looked to where the sheriff stood.
He was gone…

His strange appearance at the small jail was odd, of course the crowd had started to dissipate at this time, so he would get better views to where he might be able to see.

Nobody.

The Nomad walked up to the victim, the short and fat shopkeeper. It was the drunken man he had noticed paroling the roads earlier. His face was bloodied from the wound dealt to him, and his body limp. Observing him, the Nomad looked at his body, and noticed a few things. He had scraggly arms, and tattered clothing on him, which accented the mold stained pants that came down to the heels of his boots. The boots were torn from work, and of course the work that this man would have been doing would be drunken work.

He stood, and walked down the road, whilst people watched him slowly.

Oh god what have I done?

III

The Sheriff was an older man, grey in his face. The wrinkles showed that he was tired, tired of keeping the same show up every single day. His wrinkles were aging every second, showing that he was closer to death. Of course, he too knew this. And there were still many things that he wanted to know! Oh the things to learn…
He slept his body on an oak chair, relaxing back and dreaming of what he wished to dream. His life was so easy, and that is what he wanted it to be. He was waiting for the Nomad to walk into the jail, because he had the intuition that the Nomad still wished to speak the High Speak with him.

A knock on the door.

The Sheriff stood up and eased over to the door. He motioned himself to open it, and of course he found the Nomad standing there. A wide grin on the Nomads face.
“Were you expecting me?”

The Sheriff scanned him over and laughed a hearty laugh, “Hah! Of course I was, you killed one of our own dearest. But I won’t tempest you with law and frivolous lies of court. Soft! What is your name dear Nomad? Gift me this, of all fair things from yonder tongue, I am deaf to you unless you help me now!”

“My name is my own. I keep it as it was a child bearing disease, hidden from the world.”
The Sheriff frowned, and the Nomad noticed this malcontent.

The Nomad spoke once again, “Maybe if you were to let me off without the charges of murder, I feel free to speak of my own charities with softer tongue.”

"Look Nomad... I have seen many things in my life, but I would like to see with my ears now. I am interested in the elvish race. I will let you off, but I want to know about you. I have never seen a gun drawn that fast in my life."

"I am not of Elvish blood, I am of no Nyumphus line. I am from the Northernlands, and from those lands I have been traveling all of my life."

"What is your name young man?"

The Nomad laughed a bit and looked up. "I am not young though I may seem it at the eye. I am a person of again that will not show it for a long time. My name is Asphalon."

"Aye? You are an angel then?"

"Nay, I be no angel, but I am no man."

"Then tell me the story of you."

"I can only tell you what I myself have learned... The rest is still not revealed to me."

“Would you tell the True to me?”

Such a question pried by the Sheriff, of course Asphalon had to answer him. His life was interesting, and he had pity for the Sheriff. Asphalon sat thinking, dreaming almost, as if his life was spilling out like ink before him… and the sheriff was the paper.

“Be you listening, Sheriff! I will tell you what I have done my life. Listen to me and I shall tell you my life’s story.”
The Sheriff said nothing after this, yet he sat back and nodded.

Asphalon grasped the wine bottle and poured a glass, slowly creating a drowsy feeling between the two of them. He stared into the glass and beyond, to what seemed to be a sort of longevity between the two. The fire crackled in the fireplace, and the stars began to come out of their holes in the sky. The night was upon them, and the air was heavy with dark. The dogs were howling in the distance, and the moon was half full in the sky, barely peeking out and visible around the clouds that hung low above the town. A purple glow came from the horizon that spanned the endless desert that surrounded the cluster of buildings, and the sheriff and Asphalon were in the middle of all of this.

The beauty of this brought the desert to an almost near silence, and slowly, the Nomad opened his mouth to tell his tale of his life…