Read by Paul Clarke
There once was an army, led by the Russian Tsar himself, that set out for the bleak wastelands which formed the most northerly part of the Tsar’s vast kingdom. Though he had been told many times that these lands were nothing but snow and ice, and they led to nothing but endless sea, the Tsar could not resist their call.
As a child his father had explained to him how those wastelands were to be feared. Always. Feared not because they harboured enemies who might at some point emerge from them, no one ever emerged from them, but feared for the power that the lands themselves possessed. His father would tell him how they were cursed and cruel, that they cared nothing for the empires of Tsars or those of their enemies, and how they wished only to be left alone. And, the part that had resonated most with the Tsar, they answered to only one person, Hebris the Witch.
The Tsar however was a restless and paranoid man. He could not sleep at night knowing that some part of his kingdom sat open and defenceless. With each passing year his father’s words resonated less and less, while the thought that his enemies plotted and schemed within his borders grew like a tumour. Finally he could take no more. He gathered his generals.
“I will not be the fool who sat still, simply trusting the stories a father tells his son. I must see these wastelands for myself and know for sure that no enemy of mine sits within.”
“But your Highness,” his generals protested, “it is just frozen meadows covered in nothing but snow and ice. Some say it is not even that and it is just the sea that sits frozen, waiting for a thaw that will never come. It is uninhabitable, the only enemy there is the land itself. It is too harsh even for horses, we would have to move only on foot. Please, your excellency, leave your armies to worry about the enemies they know.” The Tsar however would not listen.
*
The wastelands were bitterly cold. For a week the Tsar snaked his army across the barren landscape, finding nothing each day except deeper and deeper snow drifts. Then one day, with food supplies dwindling and frostbite sweeping through the men like a virus, the endless white wall of the horizon was broken by a ladder of smoke rising up from a wooden cottage.
As the Tsar drew closer he could see a young woman stood outside on the doorstep. Like any peasant she wore a simple pinafore dress, with a red headscarf concealing all but a few wisps of her soft brown hair. She radiated a youthful excitement as she held a shawl around her shoulders and looked out onto the mass of approaching men. The Tsar instructed his army to halt as he went forward alone.
“I was beginning to think my father was right and these really were just deserted wastelands,” said the Tsar, admiring the cottage and its thick timber frame.
“Oh no,” smiled the woman, her face kind and warming, “but our visitors are few. Most people it seems choose to believe the stories they are told.”
“Why yes,” said the Tsar, glancing over at his generals. He ran his hand along the smooth wooden beams from which the cabin was made. “We have walked for days and seen not even a shrub poking from the surface, yet your cottage is made from such fine wood.”
The woman smiled again, as if taking the compliment personally. “Would you believe that all the wood that makes this cottage, from the foundations it sits upon to the beams that form its roof, came from just one tree?”
“That is not possible,” laughed the Tsar shaking his head. “Trees that size do not exist. Not in my kingdom.”
“See for yourself. Not far from here,” she gestured into the featureless distance, “you will find a small woodland. The wood burns well and it will be a good place to camp perhaps.” She paused for a moment and pulled her shawl tight around her, “and remember to build your fires high. I feel tonight will be as cold as you have ever known.”
“I will,” said the Tsar, turning to look at the columns of soldiers, each man’s face straining to hide the cold they felt.
As he began to walk back to his position alongside his generals the young woman shouted out, “Is there anything else you require from me? Your highness?”
The Tsar stopped, his face betraying his satisfaction at the recognition. He thought for a moment then turned towards her. He stared into her gentle eyes. “All I ask is that you remember these lands are mine, and all that live here will bow to me.”
“Of course,” she replied. With that she stepped back into the warmth of her cottage and closed the door.
“You see,” smiled the Tsar as he returned to his generals. “There is more to this wasteland than you thought.”
*
By the time the army had reached the woodland, night was fast approaching. The cold was relentless and the Tsar had allowed the men to run the last mile to bring themselves some warmth.
While the generals made preparations for the camp, the Tsar studied the trees that were quickly being turned into firewood. “That young woman must be mistaken,” he frowned to himself, taking an amber leaf from a low branch and placing it in his jacket pocket, “one of these would certainly build a cattle shed, but not a whole cottage. Perhaps I shall enquire with her in the morning if this is truly where she meant.”
Such was the size of the Tsar’s armies, and such was their relief at finally finding an antidote to the ceaseless chill, no tree was left unfelled. All that remained of the woodland was a hundred headless stumps, sticking out of the frozen ground like vacant plinths. In between these, huge bonfires were erected, rising up towards the clear night sky, each encircled by masses of weary soldiers, all eager to feel the warmth of the flames upon their faces. After a week of frozen huddles, waiting for the dawn to bring some kind of reprieve, the men at last welcomed the night and the warm rest it brought with it.
The Tsar sat with his generals, admiring the approval of his men. There were so many fires spread across the camp that he couldn’t help but feel that he and his army sat within one giant flame that raged around them, a forcefield against the cold. He unwound the thick scarf that had become almost part of him over the last week and even found himself loosening his stiff winter jacket. He stretched his hands out towards the fire to warm them, immediately recoiling at the heat.
“I have never seen wood burn so bright and so fiercely. Even the ground itself is warmed by it. I will be wearing nothing but my undershirt if this heat continues,” he laughed, looking to his generals for a reaction. There was none. “Well,” he carried on, “I am starting to take a liking to this place. Not only does it hold no enemies, but I can sense that it is home to many treasures. Treasures that are mine.” The Tsar smiled to himself as he took the amber leaf from his pocket and played with it in his fingers. “And to think all this time I lived in fear of an old man’s stories.” With that he returned the leaf to his pocket and bid his generals goodnight.
*
The soldiers soon fell into a deep sleep, intoxicated by the sweet smell of the fire and the warmth that melted the frost entwined in their bones. The only sounds that resonated were the deep snores of the men and the crackle of the wood that continued to burn fiercely across the camp. So deep was the sleep that no one as much as stirred as a third noise joined the night chorus.
At first the cracks in the frozen ground were nothing but small fractures, indistinguishable from shadows. However before long these had rippled across the camp, becoming great chasms. The once-solid ground, now so fragile and precarious, began to disintegrate, revealing nothing but a bottomless sea below it. The men, so engrossed in their slumber, slipped silently into the freezing water, dragged to its icy depths without a cry.
The Tsar had not been able to find sleep as easily as his men. As he felt the ground beneath him rupture and begin to disappear, he looked around in panic for some kind of rescue or escape. He searched frantically for a tree stump to clamber onto, but found himself thrust into the icy water before one could be reached. His breath was taken from him but he fought against the current dragging him down, battling his way through the water until he felt rough bark against his trembling fingers. He searched for the bottom of the stump with his foot, waiting to feel the security of the ground on which he could push himself up. But there was none. The trunk just carried on down into the infinitely icy depths, the severed tree as tall as the bottomless sea.
At last the Tsar pulled himself up and climbed to his feet. He fought the blinding cold, shivering incessantly as he looked out into the clear moonlight, making out the far edge of what had so recently been his army’s camp. All that had once been frozen solid, packed with sleeping men and raging bonfires, was now water, lapping calmly against the many trees that sat within. The Tsar watched as the last remnants of his army sank into the depths alongside the drowning embers. And now their light had fully extinguished, his eyes were drawn back to the land, frozen once more, where a hooded figure now stood.
The Tsar knew immediately who the figure was and knew better than to cry to it for help. He stared, shivering on his tree-isle, as his father lifted off his cloak. The Tsar could feel his disappointment burning through him as the words he had heard so often as a child echoed in his memory one last time. And as his father disappeared into the cold night air, the Tsar bowed his head, allowing it to fall into his ice-blue hands.
*
It wasn’t until the next morning that the young woman appeared. She walked slowly through the woodland, the ground once again solid underfoot, the trees standing as tall as they ever had. She stopped as she came across a tree which had not grown back, continuing to remain just a stump. Upon it sat the frozen figure of a man. The woman smiled tenderly as she stroked the top of his bowed head, pausing as she noticed an amber leaf protruding from his jacket pocket. She inspected the leaf for a moment before taking it in her hand and placing it in her own. Then she turned and walked out into the bleak white of the wastelands once more.
(c) Jonathan Sellars, 2020
You won’t have heard of Jonathan Sellars before unless you keep your ear worryingly close to the floor in the world of charity accounting. And you definitely won’t have heard any of his stories before unless you’ve hacked into his computer (his dream is that one day it’ll be worth hacking into).
Paul Clarke trained at the Central School and always got cast as a baddie or a monster. Or, for variety, a bad monster. Now a photographer and occasional performer, he finds the League's stories islands of relative sanity in his life.
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