The Dust of Memories by Ian Page

Shared with permission.

The Dust of Memories

 

The Eternal Steppe remembers all.

 

 

Tien awoke with the sun in his face. At first he did not realize the significance. His head throbbed reminding him of last evening.

 

The steppe had been as usual covered with the yurts of the Horde. For many years the rains had been frequent and the steppe green. The Horde had grown and memories of the past dry arid steppe had been left behind with the old people as the tribe moved ever on.

 

Now, for the past few years, the rains had failed and the eternal wind brought nothing but dust.

 

The council of the wise had discussed the problem endlessly. When the horde had been small the eternal arid steppe had seemed like eternal opportunity. It easily supported a small tribe, touching the land lightly. When a tribe grew too large it had split and each found its place in the infinite steppe.

 

In the green years the horde had grown rapidly, but the fertile steppe allowed the tribe to stay together.

 

At one point in the green years a part of the Horde, the Bahns, containing many of the artisans, had split off to become a new horde following the old ways, and had vanished over the flat horizon, but as the arid times returned the people and the council saw the world as threatening and drew together for support against their fear

 

Tien had spoken at length (strangely as time, and breath became shorter for him, his speeches became longer), to persuade the council that the strength of the Hordes lay in speed and mobility, and that the current huge size of the Horde, meant that the steppe could not support them all in one place. However the Council of the Wise decided that the need to move on continuously was a small price to pay for the protection afforded by size.

 

Last night, despite the shortage of food, Tien’s many descendants and friends had gathered for an impromptu party. The fermented Yaks milk had flowed, mainly into Tien. He and his younger friends (strangely over the years most of Tiens remaining friends were younger) had reminisced into the late evening by a fire, which warmed Tien’s bones,  under the eternal stars, which Tien could no longer see.

 

Tien had once again regaled them with his stories of when he was a lieutenant of the Great Genghis. When the hordes had carried all before them and tested the infinite bounds of the steppe. Of the meeting to form the Great Horde of Genghis, where horde leaders one eyed Dilemma, and squinting Confusion had refused to join the great horde. Until Tien had decapitated them with a well aimed Magnetic Hexagon. Several of the young warriors had taken up the long and arduous discipline of Hex Throwing at the time, but over the years the Art had largely been forgotten in favor of the less effective but easier to learn sabre.

 

One of his grandsons brought out Tien’s famous Whiteboard of All Knowledge. It had been handed down over the years from the great artificer Nobo. Nothing had ever been erased from this whiteboard, so that if you half closed your eyes and looked at it in just the right way, you could see the answer to any question. His grandson was still learning its secrets but Tien felt that he would be a worthy successor to the Great Nobo.

 

Another brought out his Answer Phone of Distraction. Tien had pillaged this on one of his youthful raids. It had the wonderful ability to cut ..ff the most imp……..t  part….any mess…     ..ft on it. Tien had much enjoyment from it before it stopped working.

 

One of his nephews told a long and humorous story, whose hero , whatever the problem, always produced a four box diagram to show how to solve it.

 

Finally all his friends had left for their own yurts and Tien had fallen into a drunken sleep.

 

Opening his bleary eyes again, Tien realized what had been nagging at him. He could see the sun. Normally when he awoke his yurt was between him and the sun. Looking around he could see much more than the sun. He could see the eternal steppe, and feel the eternal wind blowing dust across his face. What he could not see was his tent, or the horde. The steppe was empty apart from a small dust cloud over the western horizon.

 

Fuzzily realization came to him. When the tribe was very short of food, it often gave some of the older members a send off to thank them for their part in the survival of the tribe over the years and, for their one off contribution to its future survival, and then left them behind on the steppe.  He had not thought that despite his advancing years and failing eyesight, it was his time. Yet looking towards the dust cloud he realized that he had been finding it increasingly difficult to keep up with the tribe, especially since his plucky little horse Naris had been eaten for food last winter. Naris had carried Tien on many a long days ride, and still been able to raise a charge at the end. When he had finally said a sad goodbye to her last year she was shadow of her former self. Her time had clearly come. Thinking on this Tien realized that his time had also come-he was indeed a shadow of his former self- he just hadn’t seen it before.

 

Sipping sparingly from a water skin thoughtfully left for him, he reminisced over past victories- those many years leading the charge for Genghis, saving his life on more than one occasion, and winning his battles. Finally he built Genghis’ mausoleum and placed him in it. Not much seemed to have happened in the many years since then.

 

As the sun climbed in the sky, and the lazy wind became a little warmer, Tien noticed a cloud on the eastern horizon. It rapidly approached, until he could clearly see a rider galloping towards him.

 

The figure rapidly became clearer- in fact despite his old eyes the figure was instantly recognizable. It screeched to a halt, and bounced off its horse.

 

“Ghengis!”.  “Tien old friend!” They said simultaneously embracing.

 

“Thanks for the Mausoleum- great job” said Genghis.

 

“ The whole Great Horde wanted to remember you and the success you led us all to. However I wasn’t really expecting to see you again” pondered Tien.

 

“ Nor I you” said Ghenghis. “ Never mind “ he said, direct and to the point as always, “ I have a job for you. Are you up for a bit of rape and pillage?”

 

“ um…well pillage anyway. But I’m a bit creaky” perhaps it was the joy and surprise of meeting his old friend, but Tien suddenly realized he didn’t feel creaky any more, and the world seemed clearer. Genghis usually had this way of taking big complicated situations, far too complex for Tien, and reducing them to “ Go get those guys over there”. Somehow Tien realized that as the Horde had grown and matured everything had become so complicated that he and the Council of the Wise couldn’t work out what to do any more. So instead they had eternal discussion’s on the Eternal Steppe and nothing much happened.

 

“ Rubbish, you just need some motivation…and a horse of course..” Tien suddenly felt a soft push in the back. Turning he saw a sleek enthusiastic young Naris. He swung himself easily into the saddle.

 

“Genghis, I’ve tried to keep your memory alive in the horde. But the young men regard my stories as inventions, or just feel that charging down on a foe from out of the sun waving swords was just too unsophisticated for today. They don’t even visit your mausoleum any longer. They are forgetting you.”

 

“ Tien, the Hordes forget real men, and what they remember is convenient myths. Just as you and I will be forgotten by the Horde so the Horde itself will be. All the  Hordes will one day be gone and forgotten. Only the steppe is eternal… But this doesn’t matter” he said with renewed energy.

 

“Tien, I have heard that the Great Golden Hex of Hamarkan has been found by a Horde to the east, lets pick up an army and go get it”

 

Tien, not worrying about the complex issue of “picking up an army”- after all that was the sort of thing that Ghengis handled, wheeled Naris around enthusiastically “ The Golden Hex! Well what are we waiting for! , Race you to the horizon” And away the two men galloped.

 

 

The wind blew dust over the form on the steppe forming a small mound in the eternal plain

 

After a period a little rain fell and the steppe remembered Tien in the flowers that sprouted thankfully on the mound.

 

The short-lived flowers died. The steppe remembered Tien again, as a particularly large and luxuriant shrub grew on the mound.

 

The Steppe remembered Tien by generations of small animals as the shrub provided protection from the eternal wind and dust.

 

Eventually the eternal wind wore the mound to dust and the shrub fell.

 

The steppe remembered Tien as a skeletal shrub, polished white by the eternal wind-borne dust.

 

Eventually the skeleton wore to dust, and joined the dust in the wind, Tiens memory merging with all the other memories carried in the dust.

 

The Steppe remembered Tien in the dust on the wind.

 

 

 

 

The Eternal Steppe remembers all.

And forgets all.

It is the same