The Basin at Trathorn Falls – Chapter 32

*Scene 01* – 00:00 (The Jengu)

Nothing could have prepared us for the spectacle of the fire on the mountain.  Nor could we dismiss the savage and agonized roars from seemingly all sides of the forests and hills, striking terror into our company.  From the open field, we could see tongues of streaking fire, moving out and away from the now illuminated walls of Azragoth, flashing through the slight breaks in the tree cover, igniting some of the dried brush.  Conflagrations erupted with a crackling and popping noise as dried pines caught fire, sounding like the whoosh of a rapidly approaching rain. The ground and brush shook as large animal creatures moved swiftly, scalded by the bath of the liquid oil fire, licking them all over in agonizing blue and orange flame.  They would be upon us within minutes, we realized, so we all rushed to our horses, spinning up and over into the saddles, gripping pommel and reigns tightly, giving our horses their heads.  The animals were wide-eyed and terrified as well, stamping nervously and desperate to be given the slightest nudge to run.  And run they did.  I was worried about our younger travelers, but I need not have been.  They quickly acclimated to the bounce, jolt, and stride of their bolting animals like they were born to it.  Feet firm in the stirrups, legs bent and crouched, their seats slightly lifted over the churning saddle, knees pressed into the polished leather, their hips forming a central spring to absorb each footfall of their racing steeds.  The wagon rattled and bounced over the stonewashed basin, the metal-rimmed wheels clacking, spinning and shuddering through alternating silt beds, stone and gravel, and splashing noisily through shallow pools of standing water, water wings lifting in wet disturbed flight.  The wash had evidently been cleaned out of impeding detritus to allow wagons a relatively covered and passable transit along the shallow watercourse.  With any sudden mountain rain, however, the dry riverbeds could be filled at an instant, expunging all evidence of the passage of wheel ruts and shod hoofprints.

Fast as we were able, we could not escape the cacophony of the growing noises behind us.  Whatever was happening to or with our friends in Azragoth, we could no longer bear to think about it.  In the immediate, we had to focus on fleeing the aftermath of the destruction if we were to somehow manage to save our own skins.  We had to get further down to the valley.  All eyes in the surrounding villages, though still many miles away, would be turned in our direction, curious and unnerved by what was happening, but also clearly attuned to discovering us fleeing away like bandits from the scene.  The danger to us, and the chance of our being discovered, followed, ambushed or captured by the suspicious onlookers was real.

I rode alongside the wagon, with Begglar and Nell alternately driving the team of horses, holding fast to the side railing of their spring-balanced bench seat and to the tracer reins and straps of the charging team.  Mud and water flew and spotted everything in their wake.  Gravel ground, popped and peppered from the wheels, as the weight of the jostling supplies, threatened to slide out from under their tied and rope-bound canvass sheet and ditch the wild ride of the wagon altogether.  Dominic and Will and another young man I had yet to speak to were doing heroic yeomen’s work, attempting to hold and contain the supplies in the back of the wagon, while not also being ejected from it themselves.

Maeven, Christie and a man who had introduced himself to me as James led the charge through the riverbed, as it yet wound around another embankment, turning into a further slope downward.  Tall trees flanked us on either side as I heard a shouted message get relayed back to me from many mouths to my ears, just above the uproar.

“We are headed to where this stream joins and feeds into the area just above Trathorn Falls.  The stream bed ends there.  There is a hidden path near The Falls, down to the basin below it, but we will need to stop just short of there, before proceeding.  Be ready to stop soon.  There is something we need to discuss.  Mr. O’Brian, you are wanted at the front.”

No doubt the relayed message had originated from Maeven.

In response, I nudged my mount forward into a steady gallop.  Just enough increase to still allow it to find its footing on the alternating stone, silt and gravel stream bed, but to progress to the head of the line.  When I came within range, I matched pace with the lead horses and rode astride Maeven.  She glanced sidelong at me but continued to re-focus her shifting gaze on the path ahead.

“I need to tell you about the Jengu,” she said, just loud enough so I could hear her above the heavy breathing and snapping footfalls of her horse.  Pronounced, /Jenn-Joo/, by her.

“I’ve heard of them.  They are some kind of water sprites if the tales were true.  Tell me what you know.”

“There are a series of enchanted basins below Trathorn Falls.  They are recessed under the cliffside.  Deep pools behind the curtain of The Falls.”

“Okay.”

“No one knows how deep those pools run.  They are like chimney chutes in the granite.  No light at the bottom, though the pools are filled with clear water.”

“What of it?”

“It was said that mystics guarded these sacred pools because they were underwater passageways to another world.”

“Another world?”

“Some say, it is the Surface World.  Our world.”

She let that and its implications sink in for a moment.

“So where do the Jengu come in?”

“From time to time, the surface of these pools act as mirrors into our world.  It is how so many of the people here learned about our world.  The mystical order, a sort of priesthood which lives in proximity to The Falls and studied the pools and chronicled the happenings of what they witnessed within them, were known to interpret the signs within to have meaning for the Mid-Worlders living here.”

“Yes?”

“They used their study of the pools, to their own advantage.  They charged people to be taken back behind the waterfall curtain to witness the strangeness of the images shown in the pools.  And for additional fees, they would interpret the images for the people.  Sort of providing personal fortune-telling services.  There were a few mystics that were sincere about their study of the pools, but then, over time, there were far more charlatans numbered among them, than there were sincere and humble chroniclers.  It was a profitable business bilking people based on their superstitions, and eventually, the protestations of the sincere students were drowned out by the opportunists profiteering from the enchanted pools.  That is until the Jengu came.”

I pondered this a moment.

“The Jengu never leave the water of the pools.  It is rumored that they cannot, but one never knows for sure.”

“Where did they come from?”

“As I said the pools are deeper than anyone knows.  It is believed that these came up from within the pools far, far below.  They are water breathers but have a way of temporarily breathing surface air.  The enchantment of the pools always shows up at sunset and sunrise.  No one is sure why this is, but that is when the otherworld images can be seen.  The surface of the water glows from below, but not so much as to completely obscure the hazed, rippling view of the surface images.”

“What caused the mystics to stop taking advantage of these pools.”

Here Maeven turned her focus away from the front swale and regarded me calmly and soberly.

“The mystics believed that the pools might imbue them with personal powers, so when the waters began to reveal the images of the other place, they routinely stripped down naked and would dip into the pools and swim across the basins from end to end, over the swirling images, hoping to absorb some of the power from the enchantment causing the images to appear.”

“And did they?”

“Not a whit.  One particular night, in practicing this custom, the acolytes living in the forest camps heard their elders screaming.  Splashes and gurgling cries greeted them as they rushed up the passages to the cut behind the falls.  The pools swam with a cloudy oily substance, that appeared greenish in the ghostly light.  It took some time before the acolytes realized the substance was blood, tinted by the strange luminescence.  Only five of the twenty-four elders lived to tell the tale of that fateful night.  The five who were the most reluctant to profit in the superstitions surrounding the mysterious pools.”

“Owing to the tragedy of that night, the decision was made to wall up the side entrances to the pools in the recess behind The Falls.  Superstitious people from the surrounding communities, found the priest camps cleared out, the bodies and whereabouts of their fortune-telling gurus nowhere to be found.”

“A group of fortune-seeking youths once tried to remove the collapsed walls to the hidden pools but were unable to do so.  Attempts to navigate the lip of The Falls to enter the recess from the front always proved fatal.  The sheer weight and strength of the wall of water falling over the spillway above sluiced away anyone or anything beneath it, down slippery wet-moss to be raked, crushed and mangled in the pounded rocks below.”

“Is there still danger from the Jengu now that the access to the pools is sealed.”

Maeven nodded.

“A few years ago, scores of dead fish began to flow down into the lower streams emerging into the valleys beyond.  The lower Trathorn river tributaries were choked with the bodies of the fish and the forked rivers that were too narrow to allow the floating fish to pass began to stink.”

“Foresters tracked the trail of dead fish upriver to the large basin pool below the main feed of the Trathorn.  They believed that somehow the Jengu had escaped the pools and made it down into the basin and were lurking somewhere deep below the green water.  Many people who relied on the Trathorn as a freshwater source were afraid that the river and all streams below the basin were being poisoned by the Jengu.”

“Few there are who will go near the great basin pool.  Legends have arisen, as they often do until one can no more sort out the facts from the fictions.  There are tales of animals being pulled into the basin when they arrived to drink.  There are stories of spirits gliding across the surface of the water looking out above billowing mists, watching all who cautiously skirt the shore.  It is amazing how even a few fireflies buzzing over and waterbugs skating across that basin can cause a few well-primed and nervous travelers to panic.”

“So, did the Azragothians make use of the superstitions, somehow?”

“At first, we did, until we learned that the legends had an element of truth about them.”

That gave me pause.

“There is some kind of very strong and carnivorous water creatures living within the Basin.”

“What evidence do you have of this?”

“Some have claimed to see them, but those were initially dismissed, but others have witnessed and corroborated the presence of muddy prints and great tears of earth and clawed up grasses, as something pulled fairly large animals into the basin from the shore.  The bones of these animals have been recovered and drawn out from the water with grappling hooks, and there are signs of gnawing and slashing on them as the carcasses rotted underneath the shallows of the shores.  Something was pulling them into the water, there could be no doubt about that.”

“Could it be a freshwater crocodile, like in the Surface World?”

“I wish that could be the explanation, but the condition of the recovered bodies does not easily comport with the evidence that would be left from a crocodile attack.”

“How so?”

“Crocodiles and alligators like rotted meat.  In fact, they rely on their meat to tenderize before they can eat it and rip the flesh off the bone.  A gator or a ‘dile will launch out of the water, grab a bite hold of an unsuspecting animal and then wrestle it back into the water, thrusting away from the shore into the deeper water where they use that powerful tail to take their victim into a drowning death roll, spinning them over and over until their meal ceases to struggle and finally drowns.”

“Well, that doesn’t sound so inconsistent with the marks on the shore you described.”

“You’re right.  It’s not.  It is the fact of where the carcasses were found that is the inconsistent part with a croc attack.”

“In the shallows?”

“Precisely.  It takes time for a body to decompose, but it is quite a bit faster submerged in water.  Crocs and gators will haul their victims to undercuts below a bank or submerge them in a shallow cave so that they can eat them later once the water-logged meat softens.  A croc tears long strips of meat off of the body.  Their upper jaws are fixed so they have to tear and chew in a side to side motion.  That is why gator hunters are able to subdue them with a loop around their upper and lower jaws.  A gators bite is often secured from a lunge to the side.  They strike from beneath and below, like a shark does if they are swimming, but with feet planted it will be a sidewise strike.”

“And the bodies…?”

“Much smaller bites.  Too many to count well enough.  The victims were alive when they occurred and most likely died of blood loss.  The savage attacks started close to shore but the feeding occurred within fifteen to twenty feet of the shoreline until the torn body sank and was abandoned.  Its attacker’s hunger finally slaked and satiated.”

It was a lot to take in.  The detached description of the account came forth in a monotone recounting as if Maeven had completely removed her emotion from the telling.  Somehow this made the description that much more chilling.  But even that did not put ice into my spine as much as what she told me next.

“If I did not know these creatures were water creatures, I would swear that the bites I saw in those carcasses came from a human mouth.”

The pit of my stomach turned, and I felt my gorge rise.  I steadied myself on my horse and leaned forward to keep from swooning at the thought and possibility.  The Jengu, if that is what these creatures in fact were, were far more horrible than I could have imagined them.  A thought crossed my mind that nagged at me, but I mentally struggled to reject each time it surfaced throughout our conversation.  Could these creatures also be part of that cursed brood of half-men?  With the bite and mouth of a human, it was a little too probable for me to be able to dismiss or ignore.  Soon we would be heading into The Pan’s territory, and the odds of us surviving a journey through it was growing ever more out of our favor.

*Scene 02* – 00:00 (Scene Title)

 

*Scene 03* – 00:00 (Missing Rainbows)

We rode in thoughtful silence for a piece until the stream bed began to shallow and rise up even with the bank and fan out into a delta with more rounded stones and gravel.  A portion of the bank extended upward in a smooth packed-earth grade to join a forest trail above it.

We turned the wagon and team out of the swale and up onto the graded path, and then upward further onto the forest trail road.  The wagon threatened to pivot and tilted off of its wheels momentarily, but the boys were able to keep the weighted load in the back of the buckboard from shifting further and overturning the wagon as the team of horses struggled to pull it back straight again.  More than once the horses’ hooves lost purchase on the dirt grade and threatened to pull the team off balance and backward into the swale, but Begglar and Nell continued to encourage their efforts, and several of us tied draw lines from our mounts to our saddle horns and were able to assist the team and wagon with the load upward.  Once on the forest trail, in no particular hurry, we followed the rutted trail upward until we reached an overlooking ledge and were able to take in the full magnificent view of the power and grandeur of Trathorn Falls.  These were the lower falls, descending down from the high mesa.  Another set of Trathorn Falls was higher up, spilling over the lip of the mesa and high plain, and those were nicknamed the Headwater Falls, even though they were fed by the same major river.  Since the lower falls were much larger, however, these took the principle moniker of the river, because of the greater volume of water that moved down its rock face and into the larger basin below it.

The hissing roar of the Falls grew louder as we approached the overlooking pass that eventually wound down through the trees to the large round basin beneath it.  The wide pool frothed with the churn of water as if a giant, white, out-of-focus, thumb pressed and extended into the center of a large, bright-green disk.  It was a visual pavilion of dancing sparkles.  Rays of the sun pranced across its surface.  The effect was dazzling and awe-inspiring as our company peered down upon the spectacle from our high prospect.

It was hard to imagine that any dangers lurked in that scene of serenity and peace.  The susurrations of the moving water were soothing, almost hypnotic.  The white noise of the falling water lulling and sleep-inducing.

Tall pines lined the sides of the basin and continuing riverbanks in regimental evergreen, silently shepherding the flowing water downward into the lower valley, beneath the trees.  The stone face of the cliffside alternated with white and black banding from the water stains as the volumes of water pouring downward ebbed and flowed through seasonal changes, rain, and snowmelt.  A haze of moisture rose and descended from the wet pounding, blanketing the foliage and rocks and grass with dew causing it to glisten and gleam.

Then I noticed something missing that would have been germane to any similar scene such as this in the Surface World.  Despite all of the resplendent moisture and light dancing upon the rippling pool below and the reflective watery sky mirrored from above, there were no rainbows.  No customary arc of refracted light, spreading the white spectrum apart into its blended components.  The thought struck me as odd at first, but with deeper consideration and intimate knowledge of the Ancient Text, it made sense.  The Mid-World was not a place of rainbows.  The lights that shone above were not the same lights that occupied the heavenly canopy of our Surface World existence.  The whole of the place was something of an inversion of the Surface World, occupying a dimension similar to, though distant from, our world.  Connected but still distinct, similar yet not exactly a carbon copy of the world we know.  An echo, Nem had said.  Yes.  That explained it in some way yet it created more questions in others.  A world without rainbows.  A world without certainty.  Yet a world still under the curse of mankind’s original stain.  The reason was painfully obvious to me.  Wherever mankind went, the curse followed.