Enter The Light
Part Twenty Eight: Iori and the North Village
Standard Disclaimer Thingie: Digimon and all related characters, merchandise, royalties, etc are not mine. Sigh. This plotline is, however, so please don't steal, don't sue, and don't forget to moo.
Moo.
Summer might be coming nearer, but there was a definite chill in the air the further north they went. Iori was used to and grateful for the cold, though he had wisely donned a sweater, but Koushiro was neither and so was shivering slightly in the back of the carriage.
They'd been traveling north for a day now, and the further north they went the colder it became. It was late afternoon, the setting sun bringing the chill of the night, when they finally came to a small village. In the distance, a dark and empty house stood on a hill, showing no signs of life.
"There's no one living up there, is there?" Tentomon questioned, peering through the dark windows of the carriage. "It's dark and scary looking."
"No," Iori answered, shaking his head. "The last Lord of Hida died nearly twenty years ago, and there's been no one to replace him."
"Why hasn't the title been granted to someone else, then?" the bug digimon questioned.
"No one wants it," Armadimon answered glumly. "The manor house is said to be haunted." He grinned darkly and laughed a few times, loudly enough for Koushiro to peer up from his books.
"That's ridiculous," he said, half scolding. "There's no such things as ghosts."
"No, but there's ghost digimon," Iori pointed out. "Bakemon. Lots of them, and they moved in almost as soon as the Lord died."
"Bakemon aren't anything to be afraid of," Koushiro answered, lifting the volume he'd been immersed in once more. "They're frightened of light and warmth – all that would be necessary to do would be to light a fire."
"From what I've heard, they did that," the boy answered. "After the Lord died, the title was to be passed to a niece from the Northern Kingdom. She came south and spent barely a week in the house before she informed the King she had neither use nor desire for the title of Hida, and then she went back home to the North."
"They think the last Lord Hida haunts the manor," Armadimon put in, speaking in his spookiest voice. "No one in the village dares step near it now."
"Ridiculous," Koushiro muttered from behind his book. "Now the village grows poorer and weaker."
The carriage driver opened the door, which creaked on its worn hinges and opened into the village square – or what had once been the village square. Though it had once held a bustling marketplace, most of the shops in the town's center were now shut and quiet, their windows darkened and their doors boarded over. A solitary food stand was at the edge of the street, but although a candle burned brightly in the window, the door didn't look as though it had been opened in quite some time.
"I've looked around, sir, but there don't seem to be any inns left here," the driver said dully when Iori and Koushiro stepped out, the wizard pulling his cloak tightly around him. "I could inquire at some of the houses, see if any of the villagers would put us up…."
"No," Koushiro said, shivering. "There's a perfectly fine building right over there which I'm sure I would be much more interested in staying in than some cramped cottage. If only to prove there are no ghosts there," he added.
"You want to stay in the haunted manor?" Tentomon questioned. "You're braver than I thought."
"Bravery has nothing to do with it," Koushiro returned sharply, turning to reenter the carriage. "I'm cold and tired and I'd rather stay up there."
"Ah, so it's stubbornness then," Armadimon noted, nodding smugly.
"Armadimon, don't anger a wizard," Iori warned his partner. "Are you certain you want to stay in there, Koushiro?" he called after. "It looks rather old and not well maintained."
"I'm sure," Koushiro answered, already back inside the carriage. "I want to get someplace where I can build a fire and warm up a bit."
The manor had once been a fine building, and the village where Iori had been born had once been a bustling town. Now, though, the streets of the village were empty and the only people who had stayed on were those who were too old or poor to leave. The manor itself was old and worn, the paint peeling, the roof cracked, the gardens overgrown and wild. The front door creaked loudly when Iori pushed it open, and a cloud of dust filled the air, causing everyone to go into a fit of coughing for the moment.
"If you don't mind, I'd rather stay in the village, sir," their driver said, not apparently interested in spending the night in such a place. "I've some friends there, and…."
"And you're a coward," Armadimon muttered low enough to not be heard. Iori nudged him not-so-gently with his foot.
"I'll be back at daybreak," he promised.
"Fine, fine, go," Koushiro muttered, already hefting his bags from the carriage. "I daresay we'll manage without you. Iori…," he tugged with great effort on the handle of a rather heavy back, and it obliged him by nearly toppling him backwards, "Help me with these, would you?"
A short while later the bags were piled atop the steps of the manor and the carriage driver was pulling away, heading for the relative safety (so he thought) of the village below. Koushiro heaved a resigned sigh and glanced inside the building. The entrance hall was dark, but there was no sign of ghosts of any sort.
"It's getting rather late," Iori noted. The sun had almost fully sunk beneath the horizon in the distance. The sky was slowly turning from an orange-tinted blue to completely black.
"Dark, too," Armadimon noticed.
"So, we light a fire," Koushiro declared. "As soon as we find a place to do so." He frowned deeply for a moment and lifted his right hand in the air. After a few seconds, a flame appeared in mid-air, hovering just above his palm. "Let's go," he said, stepping over the threshold and into the house.
The entrance hall was grand, with high ceilings and huge columns. A soft, plush carpet lined the floor, which was once a very shiny wood, now covered with a layer of dust. A cool wind blew through the hall and scattered a bit of it in the air. Koushiro shivered. Iori tried to hold back a sneeze. The door slammed shut in the breeze. Tentomon jumped a few feet in the air and landed atop his partner's head.
"It's only wind," the wizard told him sternly. "Leave the bags here Iori, let's go find some place to warm up and spend the night. Shouldn't be too far…ought to be a sitting room right off this hall with a nice fireplace."
Iori sneezed in the dust, rubbed his eyes and followed after him. The hall extended for some distance, opening into a wide room. Above them was a huge chandelier, covered with dust and a few cobwebs, and the second floor balcony, which could be reached from a wide, curving staircase at the opposite side of the room.
"Whoever the last Lord of Hida was, he certainly had plenty of money," Armadimon noted, looking upwards. Koushiro's magical fire made the crystals of the chandelier sparkle, sending miniature rainbows in every direction. "This place is enormous."
Noting another hall branching off from the first, Koushiro made his way in that direction. Iori followed. "I think that the family fortune of the Lords of Hida was rather substantial," he told his partner, trying to remember details of the history of a lost and forgotten family. "I believe most of it was given to the Lord's niece, even though she chose to go back home to the North. She was, so far as I know, his only heir."
"That's right," Koushiro answered, holding one hand high. They'd come to a doorway and he turned the knob slowly. The hinges of this door squeaked quietly as he pushed open the door to reveal a sitting room.
There were two pieces of furniture remaining in the room, the rest having been either taken by looters or the Lord's niece some twenty years ago. One was a rather dusty and ugly-looking sofa, and the other was a dusty wooden end table that wobbled on three legs beside it. The curtains that had once covered the window – a huge object in itself – were long gone, and the carpet had been taken as well, leaving only the stone floor that had been beneath.
"Not much of a room, but better than nothing," Tentomon remarked. "And look, a fireplace."
"Not much to burn, though," Armadimon noted. "Unless you count that half-broken table."
"Better than nothing," Koushiro decided. "It's worth a start. Anything to warm up."
Iori and Armadimon made short work of the table, which was so old and worn that it was very little effort to dismantle, and then Koushiro transferred the fire in his hand to the small pile of wood and the room brightened.
"I'll see if I can't find any more wood worth burning," Iori volunteered. "That won't last much longer. There's probably some more furniture to be taken apart."
"Good plan," Koushiro agreed. "I'll stay here by the fire."
They'd brought just enough food to serve as dinner, and there was just enough wood to be found to cook it before they went to sleep, each huddling under blankets on either side of the sofa. Though ugly and dust covered, the couch, when cleaned, was a huge piece of furniture and rather comfortable for sleeping.
Shortly before dawn there was a sudden loud sound that jolted them both awake sharply. Iori took a brief moment to take stock of his surroundings and remember where he was, and then he got to his feet. Koushiro also got to his feet immediately, glancing toward Iori. "Think that might have been an attack already?" Iori wondered.
"If it's not, I don't know what it is," Koushiro replied. He pulled his cloak from the back of the couch and threw both it and his shoes on over his nightclothes. Iori did the same and then they both ran to the front of the manor, flinging open the door with a loud thud.
"Do you see anything?" Armadimon wondered sleepily, having followed his partner.
"I see fire, and I hear lots of shouting," Iori answered. "Sounds like an attack to me. Let's go." Before Koushiro could say a word against it, he was off and running, dashing quickly down the slope of the drive toward the village.
"We should have known this would happen," Iori scolded himself as he ran. "We should have stayed in the village and kept watch over it."
"There was no place to stay in the village," Armadimon reminded him, but Iori seemed not to mind this technicality.
They reached the village seconds before Koushiro, who had somewhat reluctantly hurried down the drive after them, tightly holding his warm cloak around him. They could see several buildings aflame and the tall, dark shadow of a Tyrannomon hovering over the town.
"No where to go!" someone shouted, and Iori caught a brief glimpse of a young, frightened looking man running quickly past them. The smoke from the burning wood was heavy in the air, and the sun was not yet risen, so it was difficult to see.
"Help!" a woman's voice was calling. "Help! Oh, someone help! I can't carry her by myself!"
"Let's go!" Iori called over the noise once again, dashing off into the fog, Armadimon at his heels.
"Iori!" Koushiro called after him, but he was already gone, disappearing into the fog of smoke. He turned toward Tentomon, who was hovering just behind him.
"Should I try to stop that Tyrannomon?" Tentomon questioned, pointing toward the dinosaur digimon overhead.
"Right. Do it. I'll see if I can figure out a way to put out some of these fires," Koushiro agreed, already beginning to perform the hand movements for a water spell.
"Right," his partner agreed. "Tentomon evolve! Kabuterimon!"
The old woman's voice was coming from a small hut not far away. The roof of the hut was on fire and it didn't seem as though it would be much of a hut much longer. Despite the danger – the building seemed to be about to fall in on her head – the woman was hovering in the doorway. When she spotted Iori and Armadimon coming near, she waved to them. The closer he got, the more able Iori was to see the tracks of recently shed tears on her lined face. Her partner, a rather tired looking Candmon, was trying but mostly failing to either console the woman or get her to move.
"Please help, please," the old woman said, fresh tears appearing on her face. "My granddaughter – she's inside. I can't carry her myself, and she can't walk…."
A section of the roof chose that moment to cave in, and a few sparks showered over them. Iori raised both arms over his head to protect himself. "I'll get her," he told the woman, "you get to safety."
"There's no place safe in this village," the woman moaned, shaking her head. "You're ever so kind, sir, ever so kind."
Iori glanced upward at the sound of a loud thud some distance away and saw that Kabuterimon was flying toward the Tyrannomon, shouting as he did so, "Mega Blaster!"
The Tyrannomon cried out in pain from the attack and blasted a roar of fire back in the direction of the giant bug. Partly relieved, partly overjoyed by the demonstration, Iori glanced again in another direction.
"That way," he told the woman. "Head up the hill to the manor house. It's safe there." When she looked at him as though this was the most insane suggestion possible, he said, "They're not going to attack the house, only the village. Trust me. Head that way. I'll save your granddaughter."
The woman sharply grabbed his arm. "I don't know you. You're not from this village, are you? Who are you?" She pointed toward the sky. "Who's that?"
"That's Kabuterimon," Armadimon told her. "He's the good guy."
"I haven't got time for this," Iori told the old woman, pulling his arm away. "My name is Iori, and that's Kabuterimon. I'm Chosen, and so is his partner, he pointed toward the sky, "who is also a wizard. Do you want me to save your granddaughter before the house falls in or do you want me to stay here and argue with you?"
"Chosen?" the woman echoed, eyes slowly growing wide. Iori didn't wait for any further reaction.
"Go to the big house," he shouted over his shoulder and rushed inside the burning house.
The smoke within was heavy and it was difficult to breathe. Iori felt sweat form on his forehead almost the instant he stepped through the doorway. Belatedly, he realized that he had forgotten to ask the old woman her granddaughter's name or how to find her. "Hello?" he called, and then unintentionally inhaled a lungful of smoke and burst into a fit of coughing.
"This way," Armadimon advised, leaving the kitchen area. Iori glanced up. The ceiling over his head was on fire, and the heat was growing more intense. He held the edge of his cloak over his face to protect him from the smoke and hurried through the doorway into a small bedroom off the kitchen.
A young woman was lying in the bed, looking very pale, sweat beading out on her thin, white face. Like Iori, she had inhaled smoke and was coughing heavily, tears streaming down her cheeks as she struggled to breathe. She looked as though she had been very pale and weak even before the fire began. When he burst into the room, she looked up, blinking at him through the smoke.
"I'll get you out of here," Iori promised, his voice muffled through the cloak, but before he could say or do anything else there was a cracking noise behind him, then a loud thudding noise. He turned to see that part of the roof in the kitchen had caved in, falling to the ground and destroying most of that room.
"Quickly, please," said the girl's partner, a concerned looking Terriermon that hovered near her pillow. "There's not much time before the entire house caves in."
"That's for sure," Armadimon noted, his eyes nervously on the ceiling, which was not looking much more stable in this room.
The girl seemed interested in trying to thank or to help Iori, but when she tried to speak she was overcome with coughing. She put her arms around his neck and smiled gratefully at him when he lifted her from the bed, surprised to find that she weighed almost nothing. Iori smiled back at her, glad to be of help to someone.
And then the roof fell in over their heads and everything was dark.
For a long moment, there was silence. Iori could feel the girl in his arms, could feel his own heart beating, could feel a heavy weight upon his shoulders. He could see nothing. Then, there was a high pitched noise that repeated over and over and over again.
Over the noise, Armadimon called, "Armadimon evolve! Ankylomon!"
Iori saw light – a bright, white light – and then he heard the sound of wood flying and splintering and then the weight of the wood on his back was lifted and he was looking up into the face of his partner, now evolved.
"Can you get out of here all right on your own?" Ankylomon questioned, his deep voice echoing in the empty space that had once been a room, but now was only a pile of splintered, burned wood.
The girl's Terriermon partner shook her massive ears, sending a thousand splinters flying. "Amazing," she breathed, then turned toward her partner, who was miraculously awake, though looking paler than ever. "Ami!"
"I'm all right," her partner answered in a weak voice before she fell victim to another fit of smoke-induced coughing.
"I'll manage," Iori told the massive dinosaur-like creature that was now his partner. "Go and help Kabuterimon."
He was dirtier than he'd been, and a little sorer than he'd been, for his entire body felt as though it had been pummeled with the beams of the ceiling. For such a small hut, the roof of the house had been a rather heavy thing to have collapse on him. With some difficulty, Iori struggled to his feet – not an easy task while he still held Ami in his arms and still found breathing difficulty in the smoke.
"You're Chosen?" Terriermon questioned excitedly, following after them as Iori carried her partner out to the street beyond the house. "Have you fought many enemies? Why have you come here? Why is this village being attacked? What's here that they want?"
"We're not sure," Iori answered, certain that there was no way that he could answer all the questions and so choosing to answer only one. It was getting more and more difficult to breathe. He coughed violently a few times and found that it offered little relief to his beleaguered lungs.
"You…are Chosen, then?" Ami asked, breathing slowly and shallowly but a bit better already. He nodded.
They reached the street before long and Iori set the girl on the ground. There was no sign of her grandmother, and so he supposed that she had taken his advice and gone to safety near the manor house. He hoped that Koushiro had advised some of the other villagers to do the same. He didn't see any other villagers in the street at the moment, but he was not sure if that was a good sign or not.
"Oh no," squeaked Terriermon suddenly, pointing one paw toward the massive Tyrannomon that had chosen that moment to notice the three comparatively tiny creatures on the ground below it. "He's going to…."
Whatever it was Terriermon wanted to finish that sentence with, she never got the chance to. Ami grabbed her partner's paw, pulling her into her arms, and Iori lifted Ami once again and set his feet in motion. Behind him he could hear a deep, powerful voice call out "Tail Hammer!" and then he turned to see that Ankylomon had swung his massive armored tail and scored a direct hit on the fire breathing digimon's knee, causing him to roar in pain and turn his attention away from those on the ground. Almost immediately after this, another loud voice called out "Mega Blaster!" and a flash of what looked like lighting struck the Tyrannomon squarely in the head. In screeched in pain again, even louder than before. For a moment, time seemed to stand still. The giant Tyrannomon was frozen for a brief moment and then deleted in what looked like a massive implosion, gone from the village.
"He's gone," Ami said, her dark eyes huge and wide in her pale face. "They killed him."
"Digimon don't die, they're deleted and reformatted," Terriermon reminded her partner. "They didn't kill him."
"Still," she said, hesitating.
"If they hadn't deleted him, he would have killed us," Iori told her. "Humans do die." He coughed, breathing heavily. "I don't suppose there's a doctor in this village?"
"No," Ami answered, coughing herself. "No doctors."
Iori was reunited with Koushiro, Tentomon, and Armadimon when he finally made it to the manor house. It was not an easy walk to make, having inhaled a great deal of smoke and carrying Ami, and so by the time he did arrive the sun had fully risen and the sky was turning from its nighttime hue of darkness to a pale blue. Both of them were covered in dust and ash from the fire, and their were a great deal of splinters of wood lodged in nearly every inch of their clothing and a few sections of their exposed skin. Exhausted, Iori collapsed on the steps and fell to sleep, though not before he'd set down the girl he carried.
When he awoke, it was nearly noon and he was lying beneath a ragged blanket on the same couch where he'd spent the night, Armadimon dozing comfortably at his feet. For a moment, Iori wondered if the morning had been a dream.
He could hear voices and noise coming from the hall outside the door, and so he sat up, intending to see who and what was out there. As he did so his arms and back moaned in pain, and when he looked down at himself, Iori could see that there were a great deal of tiny pieces of wood lodged in the fabric of his now very dark gray tunic – which had originally been only a light gray. He looked at his hands, which were also looking much dingier than he remembered, and which had quite a few tiny little cuts in his fingers and palms.
"So it wasn't a dream, then," he decided. He swung his legs over the side of the old couch, yawning. Breathing seemed to have gotten easier – he supposed that he had just needed a bit of rest – but the soreness in his body would probably be around a few days. With some difficulty, Iori got to his feet and made his way to the door, for even though much of his body was telling him to return to sleep, his stomach was crying out for food and drink.
The hall was empty, but he could hear voices and so Iori followed the sounds of conversation to the entranceway of the house.
The vast chamber was filled with people – possibly the entirety of the village. A large iron pot was in the center of the room and three or four women (including Ami's grandmother) were fussing over the contents, arguing or perhaps discussing the recipe of the concoction within. A group of old men was seated in one corner, some on ancient chairs that looked as though they had been left in the house, others on boxes or crates that they must have found lying around. Another crowd of people was clustered near the stairs, apparently tending to one another's wounds. For a long moment, Iori stared at the empty hall, wondering what the last Lord of Hida would have thought to see his home used in this way.
Koushiro was, as usual, nose-deep in a book in the midst of the chaos, seated on the floor near the edge of the hall, a massive volume opened in his lap, Tentomon dozing peacefully beside him. He didn't look up when Iori entered, but he wasn't the only one – hardly any of the villagers seemed to notice his arrival in the midst of all the activity. Seeking out the one beacon of sanity in an insane world, Iori attempted to make his way over to the wizard when a young woman about his own age stopped in front of him.
She curtsied low, as though he were some great visitor, and said, "Thank you ever so much for saving our village, sir."
Iori blinked, felt his face grow warm, and said, "I…I didn't save the village on my own…."
"Oh, no, but it would be gone without you," the girl said, brushing aside his attempt at modesty. "Even if the buildings are gone, the people live on, and that's the real heart of the village, isn't it? We've stuck on here when no one would, and it's very nice someone's bothered to save us from something." She smiled brightly, curtsied again, and darted off across the hall for some other purpose. Iori watched her go, her long skirts swishing behind her, and wondered who these people thought he was.
He was stopped by two other young women, two old ladies who apparently were friends of Ami's grandmother, and a few of the men who had been clustered in the corner, and all of them to tell him how grateful they were that he had come and saved their town. By the time he'd reached Koushiro, Iori was feeling confused by all the praise. He sat down on the floor beside the wizard, who was no doubt aware of his presence by now but did not look up.
"I don't think," Koushiro said after a moment, still not glancing up from his book, "that three Tyrannomon are a full attack."
"Three Tyrannomon?" Iori echoed. "That's all?"
"That's all I saw," the wizard answered, pausing to turn a page in the heavy volume. "All Tentomon saw, too, and all that were deleted."
Iori considered this gravely for a few moments. "How much of the village is left?"
"Not much. It was a small village. Three Tyrannomon did a lot of damage. Maybe it was all that was needed. Still…the last few attacks had a massive army. I wonder…."
"I wonder, too," the younger Chosen agreed. "Does this mean that there will be another attack on this village before long? Does it mean that they didn't feel a need to send out a whole army because it's such a little village?"
"The connection between you and this village seems to be rather distant," Koushiro noted, looking up from his book for the first time and turning to face Iori, his face twisted into a familiar thoughtful frown. "Perhaps the Tyrannomon were not connected to the group that's attacked the village. But, if so, why did they attack? There's certainly nothing here a Tyrannomon might want."
"These crystals you think they might be seeking – is there a way that we could find out easily if there are any near here?" Iori wondered. "Some sort of spell?"
"I'm certain there must be, and yet I've no knowledge of any," the wizard answered, his frown growing deeper. "I think I might be forced to construct my own, and I'm rather out of practice at writing spells." He sighed a resigned sigh and lifted his book, turning his gaze back toward the pages within. "Still, I'll do my best."
"And these people?" Iori questioned. "How long can they stay in this house?" He glanced up at the high ceilings of the hall, towering high above him. "How much longer can the village stay like this, with nothing? How will they rebuild?"
"They'll stay as long as they can, I think," Koushiro replied, not looking away from the book. His voice had a distracted sort of tone to it, and Iori knew that the problems of the villagers would not hold his attention much longer, for he was about to disappear into the large volume. "They've stayed this long, with nothing." He paused for a moment, glancing up from the book briefly. "I would say that the title of this place ought to be given to someone else, being that the last Lord had no heirs who wanted it. Still, that's hardly my decision. Send word to the King, I'd say, but who's going to carry it?" Already he was immersed again in the book of spells and magic.
"Who indeed," Iori mused for a moment. Suddenly, at the edge of the room, a movement caught his eye and he noticed that the driver who had brought them northward was standing in the corner, talking to a few women who had apparently cornered him into conversation. Iori smiled to himself and got to his feet.
Finally, poor Iori gets to do a few things. This chapter (and the subsequent Iori-centered sections that will come soon) was fun to write. I begin to think that maybe I should have done something more with Iori a long time ago. Ah well, it's good that I got to him eventually, right?
Sorry for the delay on the posting of this chapter. A few family issues got in the way and then I wasn't much in the mood for writing and even though this chapter was finished a while ago I never got around to posting it. Hopefully the next one won't take so long to get out.
Coming next? A bit more Iori-centered stuff, and then another few battles elsewhere. A new villain on the scene – or maybe he's merely an enterprising businessman. You decide. Till next time, ja ne.