December 10, 2025

Fleeing to the Dawn
by Daniel Stride

Click here to listen to this story on the Kaidankai podcast.




            Beneath cold and baleful stars, the chase was on.
            Breath steaming, Harald urged himself onwards. Thank the gods, the heavy snows had not yet come. Neither he nor his brother wore snowshoes. Still, the grim fells were an ill-place to be caught, especially when....
            “Faster!”
            Olaf always had been more athletic, even as a child. As a man, the fox-fur coat did little to slow him. Harald cursed the weight of his own garment. He followed his brother up a hill. The snow crunched underfoot.
            Olaf stopped at the top. He stood silent, gloved hands on hips.
            “How far are they?” Harald panted.
            “Some distance,” said Olaf.
            A cry rang through the night, haunting and mournful. A cry not from this world.
            Harald shivered. He turned, and looked back the way they had come. They were higher now, and could see some way. The Moon bathed the fells in an eerie glow. A night so still, so frozen in time... the world might have turned to crystal.
            Harald narrowed his eyes. Far off, he discerned movement amid the lower slopes.
            “They toy with us,” he said. “Driving us before them like sheep.”
            “Likely,” murmured Olaf. “But to what purpose?”
            “Do they need one?”
            Olaf paused. “Maybe I shall ask them myself.”
            Harald blinked. “Not now, Olaf. Throw off the madness ere it kills us both.”
            “Maybe I am not mad.” The fur hood shrouded Olaf's face, but Harald knew his brother smiled. The dream-spell was on him again. “Or maybe I am.”
            Harald grasped Olaf's coat-sleeve. “No,” he growled. “There is no time. We must run on. The night will not last forever, and hope remains.”
            And so they continued. Running grew easier as the fells flattened. Harald took the lead now. He ignored the stitch in his side, and the leaden heaviness of his legs. Pain be damned, he thought. He pushed on through the night. He'd live to tell a roaring fireside tale. Olaf too, if only his brother could escape his otherworldly musings. The dream-spell, their mother had called it, all those years ago. Those moments when Olaf left the mortal realm behind, and ascended to... somewhere. Harald himself had never suffered such illusions.
            Harald glanced at the sky. He wondered how many hours remained before dawn. He imagined a winter's morning. A feeble sun peering around the horizon. Yes, that would suffice. If only they could last till then... he allowed himself the flicker of a smile.
            Another cry rang out from behind them. Closer this time. The embers of hope cooled, and Harald's smile froze upon his lips.
                                                            #
            Harald and Olaf stopped at the lip of a precipice. Beneath them lay a steep valley. Its slopes loomed grim and treacherous. Harald had never heard tell of this place, though in truth he and Olaf had long since crossed the borders of the chroniclers' maps.
            “There is a staircase,” said Olaf.
            Harald frowned. “I see nothing.”
            Olaf pointed a gloved finger. Harald followed his direction, and nearly let loose a shout. His brother did not err. For a series of wide, flat steps led down the side of the valley. Each step lay dusted with snow.
            “Who would bother to carve stairs in this godforsaken place?” Harald exclaimed.
            “I do not know,” said Olaf quietly.
            Harald tried the first step. It felt sturdy beneath his boots. “It matters little. Let us go.”
             The pursuit had been silent for some time, but it was coming. That Harald knew. He peered down at the valley floor. Little snow had settled there. That would make tracking more difficult. Harald's hopes briefly rose.
             But these were no mortal trackers. What followed them tonight was beyond all ken.
             Harald descended, swiftly as he dared. He stopped halfway down the slope to check on Olaf behind him...
            What happened next would haunt Harald's memory for the rest of his life. Shadowy beneath the Moon, a dark mist suddenly gathered in the centre of the valley. Where the mist came from, Harald could not guess. It was like a cloud had descended to earth. A strange sight on a night so otherwise cold and clear.
            “Olaf!” he barked. “Beware!”
            A dozen steps back, his brother had also paused. Olaf stood, watching the mist. The dream-spell gripped him. Harald hurried back. He would shake the fool out of it. But he had no sooner grasped Olaf's shoulder than something else drew his attention.      
            The valley mist had begun to swirl, faster and faster. A fierce wind was thrown up.
            There was nothing else for it. There was no time to run back up the stairs, nor reach the valley floor. They must take their chances here. For better or worse.
            Harald gripped his brother tightly, and pressed him against the sheer wall. He cursed. The wind billowed Harald's coat, tugging him towards the drop. He gritted his teeth, and held on tighter. He would not fall. Nor would he allow Olaf to fall.
            But just as Harald felt his grip loosening, just as the fury of the gale was ready to tear him off the narrow place, the wind stopped.
            Harald blinked. At first he did not move, for fear of the wind's return. Then he turned slowly. His heart pounded.
            The mist had vanished. It had left something in its place.
            A stone city stood within the valley. High and walled beneath the Moon. Reaching out into the night, spiked battlements stretched like fangs over the main gate.
            Harald rubbed his eyes. No, he was not dreaming. A city, in this desolate place, where before there had been only bare rock for miles. As he watched, the city walls began to glow. A pale blue hue, the like of which he had never before seen.
            This was no place for mortal men.
            “Olaf,” Harald hissed. “We must flee. Now!”
            His brother drew away from him. Olaf pulled his hood back, and looked down upon the city. The pale blue glow illuminated his face.
            “No, Harald. I must see this place for myself.”
            Before Harald could react, Olaf pushed past him, and bounded down the snow-dusted steps like a mountain goat. He was headed for the valley floor. And the city.
            Harald cupped his gloved hands to his mouth. “Come back!” he cried.
            There was little time. The pursuers would arrive any moment, and then... well, that did not bear thinking about. But Harald knew he must rescue his mad brother first. The dream-spell was a terrible thing.
            Harald cursed as he hurried down the steps. Cold sweat beaded on his forehead. But on the descent, he realised something else.
            The city called to him too.
            That pale blue hue...the walls suddenly seemed less of stone, and more of frosted glass. Such beauty, lost in a desolate landscape, amid the rocks and windswept snows. Harald's heart raced. A strange and terrible fever gripped him: a fever for the city. He sensed that once one went in, there would be no escape. But why would anyone ever wish to leave? One could spend an eternity here.
            Then he missed a step.
            For the rest of his life, Harald swore he had planted his boot firmly. He had always been sure-footed, no matter the conditions. But this time the stone was not there. Harald tripped and slid.
            He bounced from step to step. His bulky coat and gloves skimmed the slick surfaces. His hands and feet could not find any grip. At last he reached the valley floor. He skidded to a halt amid a small snow-drift.
            Harald lay stunned and insensible, too sore to move. The snow beneath him felt like a cold bed. The chill seeped through his clothes into his bruised limbs. He looked up at the stars. So far away. Small crystalline specks in the darkness. Things beyond the ken of mere mortals.  
            Harald had never felt more alone. His mind screamed at him to beware. He must rescue Olaf. He must flee.
            But Harald lay unmoved. His will spent.
            Then just as he felt himself drifting into slumber, he heard it once more: the terrible, otherworldly cry.
            It came from the top of the steps.
            That shook him awake. Harald sat up. His heart raced. He had to hide. He could not run. He could not fight...
            He heard a whisper. As though someone sat beside him in the snow drift. Someone who could not be seen, but could be felt. And heard. The whisper told him to crawl.
            Crawl Harald did. His head pounded, his neck ached, but he crawled. On hands and knees through the soft valley snow, towards a line of boulders. The boulders lay beneath the sheer wall, out of the baleful moonlight.
            With the last of his strength, Harald heaved himself behind a boulder. Here the ground was rough and rocky, but he cared little. No sooner was Harald out of sight of the steps than he collapsed like a dead deer.
            The last thing Harald heard--or imagined he heard--was singing. Soft singing, in no tongue known to man.
                                                            #  
            Harald awoke with the sun in his eyes. A feeble sun, on a cold winter's morning... and him wrapped in a fox-fur coat on the fells. By the gods, his head ached. His limbs felt bruised and battered, as though a giant's club had pounded him while he slept.
            He sat up and rubbed his eyes.
            He frowned. The city and valley had vanished. All around him lay flat-topped hills, powdered with the light snow of early winter.
            “I escaped,” he muttered.
            He climbed to his feet. He threw back his hood, and basked in the chill light of day.
            Harald knew he had lived to tell his people of this terrible journey. In after ages, he would tell this story often.
            But search though he might, he never saw Olaf again. Nor indeed has any man from that day to this.

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Bio: Daniel Stride has a lifelong love of literature in general, and speculative fiction in particular. He writes both short stories and poetry; his stories have appeared in Heroic Fantasy Quarterly, Tales to Terrify Podcast, and Eternal Haunted Summer. His first novel, Wise Phuul, was published in 2016 by a small UK press, Inspired Quill. A sequel, Old Phuul, is due out in the near future. He likes chocolate and cats, and can be found blogging about the works of Tolkien (among other things) at https://phuulishfellow.wordpress.com/. Daniel lives in Dunedin, New Zealand.
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