Ibn Sharjar: Stars on the rocks, Choices to make
Posted on 03 Jun 2023 @ 3:20am by Atif ibn Sharjar - Merchant of the Al Ashar & Commander Calliope Zahn
Edited on on 16 Jun 2023 @ 11:23pm
Mission:
Ongoing Mission - Planet Obsidian
Location: Obsidian Lethini dealands
Timeline: M3 D11 1615 hrs
3041 words - 6.1 OF Standard Post Measure
It took well over an hour to reach the base of the outcrop from when he had first sighted it, at first Ibn Sharjar had thought it was like the hill upon which the stone-built watchtower perched back at the oasis. However, as they column of riders closed on it, he realized that this one was not a projection of obsidian but was of rock. A dark hard-looking stone, perhaps some kind of granite he thought. The sides were steep, almost sheer, only a few degrees from vertical and soon it filled the field of vision as the group came close to its base.
The column slowed from the Eralsus’ cruising speed. as Ibn Sharjar had come to think of the swaying canter that the beetles could seemingly keep up for hours on end and settled into a steady walking pace. They had arrived at the southern end of the outcrop and the column threaded its way around the eastern end to the northern face. Ibn Sharjar peered up at the tall sides, the dark stone was marked here and there with lighter strata but was generally smooth, worn so by eons of wind and grit, even at the base there seemed to be little fracturing or debris. The black obsidian glass flowed right up to the rock, in some places it was almost humped against it, and he was again taken by the image of a sea of molten glass slowly cooling against a rocky island. Only in a few places was there the odd pile of glass shards, blown there by the ever-present wind, like frozen waves on a cliff.
Rounding the tip he realized the shape was roughly oval and the column moved along its northern side it, about fifty meters from the base, the sides towering over them, to their right was nothing but an open expanse of black glass as far as one could see, there were no cairns beyond the outcrop. This late in the afternoon they were in the shade now, the outcrop’s shadow extending out over the obsidian and the previously hot dry wind had turned cold as it blew in from the planet’s northern polar region.
When the front of the column reached roughly the widest part of the oval it turned in towards the cliff. As he drew closer Ibn Sharjar started to notice lines and markings on the rock, they were initially hard to discern in the shadow, at first he through they were more strata and pigmentation but then he realized there were linear features and angles, obtuse and acute. Things he knew did not often occur naturally. The lower parts of the cliff seemed to be covered in the strange marks.
His observation was interrupted by a call from ahead, the column had stopped and riders were beginning to dismount. He slowed Fifta and brought her alongside Jelik and Khasta. Jelik climbed down and removed down his leather facemask.
“We walk from here” he said and lifted Khasta’s antenna reins over the beast’s head, ready to lead him forward.
Ibn Sharjar did the same. Ahead of them, the now dismounted, riders were leading their beetles around the cliff out of sight. Ibn Sharjar turned and took a closer look at the cliff, now some four meter’s away. He was amazed to see pictographs, dozens of them, carved into the rock face. Some were small, perhaps no bigger than his hand, others much bigger, perhaps as big as two meters across. Some carved deeply, others shallower, but what they all had in common was their theme, they were all representations of celestial bodies!
Just within a few meters of his position he could see stars, planets, moons, comets, what might be asteroids or protoplanets, constellations and what might even be a representation of galaxies. Dotted here and there was writing, some in Obsidian script, other in symbols and shapes he did not recognize. He stared at the carvings fascinated, until Jelik called him.
“Atif! Come, there are more inside” the tribesman smiled and nodded his head towards the front of the column. They walked their Eraulsu forward and then the cliff opened up, there was a large doorway cut into it. The hole was square, about four meters wide and high, the outer corners were rounded and weathered, but the inner surface was flat and polished. It looked perfectly smooth, not a chisel or cut mark in sight, the stone looked to have been removed by some kind of energy beam, even the floor was smooth, although worn by travel and with some shards of obsidian that had blown in.
The door frame was about a meter thick and there were several notches in each side, as though there had once been hinges holding doors. As his eyes adjusted to the darkness within, he saw the door opened onto a large cave of some kind, the ceiling rose another two meters above the door lintel and the walls disappeared off into shadow on each side, the sounds of the tribal folk unpacking their beetles echoed back to them, the echoes meant the cave was large he realized. Several people were lighting lanterns and as the illumination grew the true scale of the cave became evident, it was enormous. The walls stretched away at least twenty meters each side of the door and it was at least that deep, further in the rear he could see darker openings that might be doorways to other rooms. Looking up he saw the ceiling was blackened and stained with soot and smoke, but, like the walls outside, the ceiling was covered in pictographs of stars!
On one side was a tall bench or altar, sticking up from the floor, carved from the rock, there were three stone urns on it, one on each side, one in the center. Nearby were several iron braziers.
Jelik led the way over to where his sons were standing with Hrada. “Unpack now, hobble Hrad, unsaddle and feed him” He instructed the boys and after taking down his own bags he helped Atif with unsaddling and hobbling Fifta, then they fed her and Khasta from the bags of fodder they had brought. Jelik produced and lit a lantern from his bag. “Come let us find a place to sleep out of the draft. Leaving the Eralsu happily munching away they moved towards the back of the cave.
There were indeed several doorways cut in the rear wall, like the main entrance the sides were smooth and polished, clearly not cut by hand. Walking through a short tunnel from which several doorways opened up into interior rooms, they found one unoccupied. It was some four meters square, perhaps three meters high, there were several alcoves int eh walls, almost like shelves and along the back wall the floor came up to form a half-meter high sleeping platform.
Like the exterior room the ceiling was sooty and stained, but even that could not cover up the deeply cut pictographs.
“Ahh, the Dodecapus!” Jelik commented “R’jinua, the sea-serpent of the twelve arms”
Peering up Ibn Sharjar could see many stars under the soot, he counted them, there were over forty. Some were linked with lines, when he twisted his head, he could see they made a pattern, a sort of twelve tentacled squid like creature, two or three stars for each leg, then a cluster of six stars for the body. Like his own Human ancestors, it seemed whoever had cut the stars in the stone had fancied they saw creatures in the constellations, like the signs of astrology.
Yet Obsidian had no oceans, only a few lakes and none of those of any size to hold what looked like a large aquatic creature. Then he realized that there was no nearby constellation that looked anything like a squid shape either.
“Who cut these and where is this constellation in the night sky?” he asked Jelik curious to know, thinking it was perhaps just a fictitious rendering of an imaginary group of stars.
Jelik explained “The cave was made by our ancestors, in ancient times, the very first Tej-Ka-Jalfa to come here after they were cast out. As for the pattern…” He pointed to Sasil. “You know this one?”
The youngster beamed and recited “It is R’jinua! R’Jinua lived in the deepest ocean of the green circle and battled with T’inua the great shark and with K’itinua the giant turtle. They fought so much and created such a storm that the ocean threw them off the circle up into the sky so that they would no longer disrupt the seas for those of the circle, where they battle still”
“You can not see them from here though Atif” Jabrul added “They are a long, long, way away, but Jethdar saw them when he first left the circle.”
“I see” Atif nodded to the boys “Have you ever seen an ocean; do you know what it is?”
“Noo” Sasil admitted, “But I heard it is kind of like an oasis, only bigger”
“Much bigger” Gabrul nodded “Have you seen one Atif?”
“Yes, I have, it is indeed much bigger” Ibn Sharjar agreed. “If your father agrees, when we return I can show some images of an ocean” While the Tej-Ka-Jalfa were so far much more open to technology than the other tribes he had encountered it was always prudent to check.
The two boys looked to their father. Jelik nodded
“I might be able to find some pictures of some of R’juna’s little cousins from my planet too, they only have eight or ten tentacles though” Atif smiled to the boys.
“Come, it is growing late, we must go and chose your stars before dark” Jelik said. They unpacked their bedrolls and laid them out on the raised floor area, then returned to the larger room where the rest were gathering.
Though she looked thin and frail, Neifle was long hardened enough to continue to make the ride out to the cave, where she would continue the ceremony they had played out the day before. She held her arms wide and motioned with her bony fingers for all to gather.
"Come! All those who have changed watch in your new year. Each be ready for him or herself to choose a new constellation!" she pointed then with both hands to her own face, her fingers fanning over the healed scars of the full set that had sunken with her cheeks. What was intended for the disgrace of the navigators, we assign due honor! That which is forbidden to those who forget, they must witness upon our faces!" Niefel shuffled forward and the company of children and parents split for her to pass and then formed behind her.
The stone wall outside was itself a defense from the prevailing winds, hence the markings having been preserved against erosion. Neifle walked along with her hands behind her back, smiling as if she were visiting so many old friends. "Each, of course, is the bearer of a story. If you tell me the memory of the sign of your choice, you may have it for the honor of Tej-Ka-Jalfa, to call your own and bear before all."
It was the role of the parents to teach the stories of the major and minor constellations and all of their lesser symbols to their little ones, so that they might be prepared to choose which they would bear, not merely an aesthetic, but a commitment. Many often selected the signs they witnessed on the faces of their parents and other relations, making some signs most common. But there were those who surprised her, telling her a tale she had not heard in many a journey around the trickster star.
As the tribespeople broke up and moved towards the entrance, Atif accompanied Jelik and his sons back outside, it was cooler now and the shadows were long in the low early evening sun. “We will go to the left” Jelik said, “Our family has always chosen our scars from this side” He led the way along the cliffside to a patch of rock with a dozen or so pictographs. Ibn Sharjar recognized that the marks on Jelik’s face were like those cut into the rock.
This group were closer to the doorway and seemed to be deeper cut into the stone that some further away, while weathered, the shapes showed the same smooth, sharp edges as the surfaces within the cave. Again, it did not seem, to Ibn Sharjar, as though the marks had been fashioned by hand tools. In between the pictographs, were more of those script characters.
Gabrul and Sasil approached the rock and looked over the shapes, occasionally running a hand or finger over the stars, tracing the outline.
“Is the script the names of the stars?” Ibn Sharjar asked Jelik
“I think so, but we can no longer read it, there are about fifty great constellations, like R’Jinua, we learn as children but who can name all the stars in the night sky?” he shrugged “Neifle knows more than most but even she cannot read all of it”
He continued “When I was Sasil’s age and I chose my first scar, that one there- “ he pointed to a seven pointed shape, that matched the lower scar on his left cheek, “- my great grandfather was here, he told me, that his own grandfather told him, that some of the signs mean how far away the star is, but it was in measurement none knew how to count”
Ibn Sharjar nodded, he knew there were several forms of Obsidian script, some were very old, archaic and had not been used in hundreds or even thousands of years. He had also heard there was a building or a vault near Kalara that was also supposedly decorated with carvings and ancient text no one could translate. It apparently had much to do with the local deity and the fiery one and was covered with symbols and icons.
Undoubtedly the indigenous inhabitants of this world had once travelled across space, as the Tej-Ka-Jalfa tribal legends seemed to tell. Although their technology was gone and even shunned by most, these carvings still held a deep meaning to them.
“This one!” Sasil was standing on tiptoe to point out a shape beyond his reach “That is what Grandfather has on his left cheek”
Jelik moved over to join his youngest son, lifting him up in his arms so he could reach the carving. “You are right, that is called the Journey of the gate that was his first scar too.”
Atif looked to the carving, it was an oval, with several circles within it and a line crossing between three of them. It could be a stylized representation of a nebular perhaps, with a route marked between three planets he thought. “Grandfather will be honored you chose this.” He turned the boy in his arms, putting him on his hip and smiled to him.
“Will it hurt?” Sasil asked quietly, the reality of what he had just selected now coming close.
“Yes” Jelik nodded seriously “It will and so it should my son. For it is a reminder to us of what they did to Tej-Selkar, our prophet. But you will endure it bravely, as we have all done and when it is over, I have a salve which will sooth it. Then you will wear the scar with pride and honor, as your brother does, as your mother and I do, as you grandfather does and as our tribe does. And you have taken the first step in becoming a true Tej-Ka-Jalfa”
Sasil still looked a little nervous but smiled at his father’s words. Jelik gave him a hug and set him down. “And what of your bother. Has he chosen his second?”
Gabrul was peering at the rockface, looking between two carvings, he traced the lines with his fingers. “I cannot choose Father. I want both of these.”
Jelik nodded. “You have three more to select, so you can have both in time. But which will you have first?”
He pointed to one of the two “That one my own grandmother had, her last one I believe. This one…” he pointed to the other Gabrul was considering “…that one we have not worn in my lifetime, it is a very old one, it is of the Green Circle, our ancient oasis and it’s Moon, for which this place was named” The shape was a simple one, a circle, with a smaller half-moon shape next to it.
“I shall chose that one this time” Gabrul said solemnly “The other, next time”
Jelik nodded “A wise choice, it is good you will bring an old scar back into our family. “He put his arms around both his sons shoulders, “One day will you both stand here, with your own sons and daughters and even with their own sons and daughters and will watch as they make their choices and you will tell them of this time”
He turned and looked to Ibn Sharjar “And you will tell them that, when you chose your first scar, and you, your second, that there was a man here, on this day, who had travelled among the stars, who was known to the Tej-Ka-Jalfa and respected as a friend to your family.”
Ibn Sharjar was taken by Jelik’s words, a lump rose in his throat and he looked way briefly. Over the last week these tough people, surviving alone in a harsh and unforgiving environment had welcomed him and shared much of their culture with him. Now his presence here was being passed on through these two boys down the generations.
He bowed to them deeply and said simply in Arabic “Shukra lek, ant cerveny ktera wilkin lek minn yisthak charf.” “Thank you, you do me much honor, but it is to you, whom the honor is due”
Jelik nodded “Come we must join the others it is time”
