Peli's Journey : Chapter 5

In the ancient chinese scripts, Danger and Opportunity always appear as one word.
Communication between the men and the lizards was difficult at first. But soon, they worked out a peculiar language that was a combination of simple gestures and drawings. It satisfied the need of day-to-day conversations.

The grassland, surrounding a vast, nameless lake in the middle, was bigger than what the travellers had originally imagined. The lizard folks survived on the plain as roving nomads. They shifted with the seasons, living near the lake during spring and summer, and stayed close to the forest during autumn and winter.

On the other side of the plain lay a great river. It had once run through where the lake was, but after ages of shifting riverbed, it had changed its course and left behind a still lake and vast patch of marshland.

There was no way to find any kind of sensible directions from the lizard folks. All the three could do was to follow the tribe around. At least food and safety were relatively well taken care of. And as the tribe moved about, the three travellers started to get familiar with the lay of the land.

Han'li seemed happy to learn about a new kind of wilderness. He was always exchanging hunting tips with the lizard folks, learning about the indigenous animals and plants. Rossa was miserable at first, but after a few weeks, she started to get use to living in the wild and taking care of herself.

Cleaning herself was a big challenge at first. She insisted on cleaning herself everyday, but it was nearly impossible under the harsh conditions. It took a while for her to get used to living with the grim of outdoor living.

As for Peli, he was still thinking about Elyia. No one could tell the directions since the supposedly Lamp Bearer had no direction to give.

It must had been a few months after the initial encounter that the three travellers reached the bank of the great river with the lizard folks. It indeed was a great river, as Peli could hardly see the other bank from his side.

“What was on the other side?” was the first question that pop out of Peli's mind. With some sort of conviction that could not be explained, Peli knew beyond a doubt that Elyia lay on the other side of the river.

The lizard folks settled at the river bank, on a spot they seemed familiar with. Peli pointed across river and made a questioning gesture at one of the older lizards. The old one pointed at a stack of rare animal skins and then pointed across the river, then made an exchanging gesture. Clearly it was a trading post.

When everything was settled, the sun was setting in the west across the river. It was a magnificent scene, looking at the sun submerging into the seemingly peaceful water surface, the sky tainted a quaint purplish orange, and it was hard to tell how much of the sun was still above the horizon as it seemed to melt into the skyline, and when the last ray disappeared from the sky it felt sudden. The bonfire burned brightly and the stars started to blink innocently in the sky.

The three sat around the bonfire with the rest of the lizard folks.

“Do you want to cross the river?” Peli asked, looking from Han'li to Rossa

“What for?”

“To continue to Elyia, of course!” Peli exclaimed. “Don't tell me you want to stay here?!”

“Makes no difference to me, as long as we know how to cross the river.” Rossa shrugged. She just had a good bath in the river, so she looked particularly refreshed. Compared to when she first left the city, she appeared a lot calmer and steadier.

“I guess I'll go wherever you want to.” Han'li said, although he had just started to grow to like this plain, it still wasn't home.

“I have a feeling we'll meet someone from across the river soon. It is clear to me that the lizard folks are waiting for someone.” Peli said, hugging his knees and looked across the river.

The unknown held a special draw to certain kind of people. For such people, finding out what they didn't know was always more important than holding on to what they've already known. Peli was one such person; to him, as soon as he knew about something, that thing lost all magical touch and meanings.

For Rossa though, it was a total different experience. She had come to realize one thing: sometime she could not direct everything in life. Sometimes, changing her own way of behaving and thinking might be the best way to take control of a situation. She embarked on the journey full of confidence, full of the desire to prove herself capable to her parents. However, as she sat on the riverbank surrounding the bonfire, she started thinking about her parents. What were they thinking at the moment? How would they react to the news that their daughter had embarked on a dangerous journey without their consent?

Rossa had to smile at the last one. Even though she could see how pointless it was, the act of rebellion still sent shivers down her spines. She still wanted to go to Elyia, if for nothing else than to know she had accomplished something that she had set out to do, but the feeling of no turning back was gone. She no longer felt like running away from her city and her home.

The nightwatch had started and majority of the lizard folks had fallen asleep. The humans were gracefully spared the duty of night watch, but they stayed up and talked. The few months of living together, facing the harsh grass plains and having no one else to turn to except each other had made the three into some sort of true comrades. Rossa and Han'li still did not see eye to eye about certain things, but they had learnt to count on each other. Since forming the truce with the lizard folks, the three human had recovered some of their possessions with the help of the tribe. The food stuff they gladly shared with the lizard folks as a token of goodwill, the relic however, even though proved useless, they kept.

At the brink of dawn, as the sun again rose from their side of the river, the conversations had come to a halt, and all three were looking across the river with tired eyes.

It was Peli who first spotted the small black moving figure on the water surface. Like a sharp knife which sliced through the flat surface of silk cloth, the black dot glided through the river and became bigger.

When it was big enough to be seen clearly, the travellers found out it was actually a small boat. Only one person was on the boat and he seemed to head right at the direction of the camp.

“Must be the person the lizard folks were expecting!” Peli was excited to the prospect of meeting another human.

It took a while for the visitor to reach this side of the river. By which time most of the lizard folks had woken up and was ready for the trade.

The man seemed surprised to see other humans among the lizard folks, but he did not say much. Instead he carried on with exchanging goods with the lizard folks. His wares were mostly iron-made weapons which obviously were much prized by the lizard folks.

After the trading was done, the merchant lighted his smoking pipe and turned to the three humans waiting impatiently at the side.

“Heya, what business are you guys about?”

“Erm, we are going to Elyia.” Peli said. “What is your name?”

“People simply called me the River merchant.” the 40-ish stocky man smiled, cascades of wrinkles lined his weathered face. “Elyia, eh?”

“Yes, you know the way?” Peli asked eagerly, something akin of hope brightened up his face.

“Of course. I once looked for the same place.” The river merchant smiled fondly at some distant memories.

“So have you reached Elyia? Can you tell me how to get there?”

“Unfortunately, I cannot. The way to Elyia might have changed. You have to find your own way!”

“Is it across the river?”

“Well, that is one way...”

“Can you help us cross the river?”

At which point, the River Merchant pointed at his small and shabby boat and laughed throatily, “Do you think such a small boat can carry so many people?”

“We can make a boat ourselves.” Rossa said calmly.

“Do you know how to?” The River merchant winked.

“No, but we will figure something out.”

“Well, I can help you with building a new boat, if you want. But once you have crossed the river, you'll have to give me the new boat, what do ya think?”

“Fair!” Peli said before someone else could react. Not that anyone was likely to object at this point.

Possessions, as the troupe discovered, sometimes were really useless except for sentimental reasons.

XXX

It took a week or so to build a new boat under the instructions of the River Merchant. The lizard folks had left them with the Merchant after observing their actions, and no doubt decided that the humans were up to something silly. They left behind a sack of food stuff as goodbye gift, and then proceeded to go about their own business leading their own life.

By then, all the humans were quite adapt at surviving on this harsh plains. They used the encampment the lizard folks left behind as a base and started to build their means of crossing the great River.

The new boat, or rather a raft, was built of thick branches from the nearby low shrubs, and tied together with thick vines. They were quite happy that it floated on water.

As the sun rose again on this side of the river, 4 humans embarked on the newly built raft and started crossing the river, it was beautiful to see the raft left the shore and floated towards the horizon of unknown future.

What awaited on the other side? Not even the River Merchant could claim to know the answer.