Mountain Dream of the Old Times

MOUNTAIN DREAM OF THE OLD TIMES - HISTORICAL FICTION DARK FANTASY STORY - BREDEVOORT VAN DEN BERGIn the shadow of the Dolomites, where rock faces stand as ancient as the world itself and the whistle of marmots marks the passing of days, the forgotten kingdom of Fanes lies buried. This sweeping epic, rooted in the rich mythological traditions of the South Tyrolean Alps, resurrects the oldest stories of the mountains and breathes new life into the legends that have haunted these peaks for millennia.When the marmots fall silent and the mountain holds its breath, the hunter Lidsanel knows something terrible is about to unfold. The dwarves who dwell deep within the stone, wielding their secret magic and whispering cryptic prophecies, granted him three wishes long ago. But he dismissed their most vital warning: that the power to remember is the greatest gift of all.Dolasilla, the beloved princess of the Fanes people, carries the weight of a curse born from loving the wrong man. Ey de Net, the enemy warrior armed with a magical shield and servant to the sorcerer Spina de Mul, stole her unerring arrows under cover of darkness. Now he waits in the valley below, prepared to kill her using her own weapons. The battle that follows stands as one of the greatest tragedies the Alps have ever witnessed. The valley runs red with blood, the sky darkens with arrows, and as twilight falls, Dolasilla lies pinned against a rock, pierced by three of her own arrows. But before she dies, she gives Lidsanel a command that will alter his existence forever.What follows is a journey through time itself. When Lidsanel disappears into the mist, he is carried across centuries by the breath of the rock giant who remembers everything. He awakens in another world, thousands of years before the Fanes ever existed. "e;In the mountain peak cold that precedes the rebirth of twilight, the hourglass between night and daybreak when the world of heroes freezes its breath and then thaws, the mountain marmots of the Fanes plateau fell silent. Not one by one with descending whistles, but suddenly nothing. An absence that opened like a yawn in the abyss, over which reality spins and fades away. Lidsanel stepped out of his hut, the fur still around his shoulders, and the silence drove into him with the deadliness of a poison arrow between his ribs. No whistling from the cliffs. No call. Just his breath cloud hanging before him, brief in the icy air. Just him standing and waiting. His mother, who gave him the name before the fever took her, had captured her love in that single word, and now he had to carry it alone. He listened until the cold bit into his ears, deep into the core of his being, but nothing came. Even the wind, that restless wanderer of the heights, stayed still, as if it too waited with the marmots for the appearance of something promised long ago. The dwarves had granted him three wishes that day in the dark stone shadow of the rocky cliffs, between the glow and the lightning of wet mountain snowfields that burned like captive bright little suns in the rock faces. He had rescued a dwarf who had slipped into a crevice and was trapped between the black rocks. He had pulled him from the chasm, the injured dwarf's hand clasped in his own, and then the old one had appeared before him, the priest with the lightning white beard, his eyes midnight black like the stones from which he was made. "e;Three wishes,"e; the old mountain dwarf had said, his voice the crackle of melting ice. "e;Three wishes, but do not forget. There is one thing you will need someday, one thing that can save the kingdom when all seems lost. It is not a weapon, not a shield, not gold. It is the memory itself, the ability to remember what happened, to carry the story when everyone else has forgotten. Do not let it go. It is your greatest gift."e;