The Kings of the Seven Bells

by Marti Talbott

  “Why have we never heard this story before?” Boon Mobbox asked.

  “I cared not to let you live in fear, for if one Lowlander can find a way up...”

  “So shall others – eventually,” Boon Mobbox quietly finished.

  “Perhaps so,” said the king, “You may be put upon to fight someday. However, you must choose to fight the real enemy, and for a cause far more important than a few missing items.”

  Boon Carbollo groaned, “Precisely how old is this story?”

  The King answered, “It happened in the days of King Gillas, a mere two kings before me.”

  “Not so very long ago, then,” Boon Mobbox mused. “Not so very long ago at all. We must post guards.”

  “And put them where?” Boon Carbollo sneered. “We’ve cliffs on all sides.”

  For that, the Mobbox had no answer. Although the king managed to turn their thoughts otherwise, Boon Mobbox was not ready to give up the original argument. “A few missing items truly is not worth the fight, but the way the Carbollo always blame us – is!”

  Boon Carbollo grinned. “Then prove ‘twas not your children and let us search.”

  The annoyed King set his goblet on a nearby table and stood up. “There shall be no searching and so long as I live, there shall be no fighting! Could it not have been an animal? A Slewworth perhaps? In the future, the Carbollo must close their gates at night, just as the Mobbox do. I tire. Be gone with you – both of you!” With the wave of his hand, he sent both men scurrying out of the throne room.

  THE LARGE HINGED CARBOLLO City gates were made of two cross-rods, one upper and one lower, attached to vertical bars topped with simple spires. The gates were not built to keep anyone or anything out because there was never a need – not until now.

  After a disappointing hunting day, Raxton Carbollo set his horse loose, went home, and returned just in time to notice the gathering in the marketplace. Normally, everyone had gone home. The hour was getting late and everything had meticulously been put away, just as it always was. By the time Boon Carbollo returned from seeing the king, most of the residents had already gathered in the courtyard waiting to hear if they would be allowed to search Mobbox City for the missing items. There was one very important exception, however. More than the usual number of Carbollo men were watching from the fourth-floor windows in case the Mobbox were preparing to go to battle.

  The moment Boon Carbollo reported that a Lowlander had once made it up the cliffs, his words were immediately drowned out by a myriad of questions, gasps, sighs as well as a few fearful tears in the eyes of some women. After all, an ancient story told of a dreadful time when the Carbollo had been taken captive by the Lowlanders.

  While news of a Lowlander was troubling, as soon as that was set aside, the king’s decision not to let them search for the missing items renewed the uproar in the Carbollo marketplace. After countless complaints from men and women alike, Boon Carbollo held up his hand to quiet the crowd. “It was mentioned that while the Mobbox close their gates at night, we do not. Shall we not take better care to protect ourselves in the night?”

  “Yes, yes, we must close the gates!” More boisterous than most, the elder woman’s hair was starting to turn from black to blue. “We must fear for our lives now!” Her remarks had the approval of several other women.

  “Fear for our lives?” the Boon asked. “We have not yet been truly harmed, nor shall the king allow us to be.”

  “I see,” the same woman said, expressing a bit more hostility. “’Tis the king that shall stand watch over us in the night?”

  Boon Carbollo rolled his eyes. “The king must have his rest the same as we. Still, if the thief be an animal, I see no harm in keeping it out by closing the gates.”

  It was a boy of fifteen that asked the next question, “I have never heard of animals stealing from us, and I know all the animals living on Extane.”

  “The Slewworth is said to take what food he can from the other animals,” the Boon mentioned. “Perhaps it has become more brazen, or...”

  “Drivel,” the boy’s father countered. “Everyone knows the Slewworth fears it’s shadow even more than it fears us, which is why we see them not in the daytime!”

  “We see them not at night either,” a woman muttered. She raised her voice to be heard over the crowd. “Say if you have ever seen a Slewworth?” Her question was met with silence. “’Tis just another story told by countless kings to keep us in our homes at night, so as not to disturb them.”

  One of the younger men agreed, “I have been out at night and I have yet to see one. The Slewworth are the king’s imagination.” He should not have said that, and when he saw the disapproval on the faces of others, he pouted. “I only went out at night once or twice.”

  The Boon nodded. “Out king swears they exist and I believe him.”

  “Yet,” the young man pointed out, “we light our street lanterns at night which surely casts a shadow. Do the Mobbox report things missing? Why would the Slewworth steal from us and not from them?”

  When the Boon bowed his head as if he was tired of trying to convince them, Raxton finally spoke up. “Because, they close their gates. I for one see no harm in closing out gates at night. We shall sleep more at ease if we know the animals, the Lowlanders, and the Mobbox are kept outside our city.”

  “Especially the Mobbox,” a woman in the back of the crowd shouted. She shook her fist to emphasize her words.

  “Raxton is right,” his father said. “Now that we know the Lowlanders can find a way up the cliffs, we must take precautions.”

  The Boon quickly recovered his exhausted posture and shouted, “I agree. We must close the gates at night and we must watch for Lowlanders less they be hiding in the day. If it be the Lowlanders, the Mobbox are in as much danger as are we.”

  The same older woman who spoke up originally scoffed, “I’d not be surprised if the Mobbox were once Lowlanders.”

  “Not so,” said the Boon. “The king said the Lowlander had no mark above his left or his right eye.” That statement quieted the crowd – but for just a moment.

  “’Tis possible the Lowlanders found a way to remove their Mobbox mark.” someone yelled.

  Boon Carbollo raised his voice even more so all could hear, “Good people of Carbollo, there is no honor in falsely accusing the Mobbox. They say they did not steal from us, and we have no proof that they did.” When the people mumbled among themselves, some agreeing and some still not convinced, he held his hand up again. “The king is right about one thing – we must arm ourselves in case the Lowlanders attack us.”

  Effrin, a young man the same age as Raxton, made his way through the people until he was near the front. “If we had a way to get down, we could see what kind of weapons they carry.”

  The man standing beside Effrin disagreed, “If we got down, they might follow us back up. Far be it for us to show them the way up.”

  Boon Carbollo glanced at the low position of the sun. “’Tis late. Sleep on what kind of defenses we may consider, and we shall meet again on the morrow if need be.”

  When he left the crowd and started to climb the stairs to his home, it was a signal that the gathering was over. That was not, however, the end of the discussion and soon the Carbollos broke into small groups. One such group included Raxton and his father, Lamine, and Raxton’s good friend, Effrin. Nevertheless, instead of talking about defenses, the discussion turned back to blaming the Mobbox for thievery. It was an unsolvable dilemma, and at length, Raxton and his father drifted away, and went home to have an evening meal with the rest of their family.

  RAXTON’S HOME WAS NOT that different from Nerratel’s, except it lacked the multitude of decorations the Mobbox favored. His family of six lived on the second floor of a building situated deep in the heart of the city. Rather than being a maker of furniture, Raxton was a hunter and when he wasn’t hunting, he made metal arrows for his bow. It kept him busy in the evenings.

  At the evening meal, instea
d of chatting with his parents or his three younger brothers, he was thinking about the possibility that someone from the Lowlands made it up the cliff. True, the king said it, but the king was old. Maybe he just misspoke.

  They were half way through the meal when his mother, Delsic, touched Raxton’s arm and asked, “Have you something to tell us, my son?”

  A confused Raxton glanced at his father, at each of his three little brothers, and then turned his attention to his mother. “Tell you?”

  Delsic put a hand on her extended stomach as though to calm the baby inside and said, “We hear you saved the life of a Mobbox this morning. Is it true?”

  “I am surprised Nerratel spoke of it. He said a bull pushed him into a pit, but the bull did not fall in with him. Therefore, he was in no great danger, except that he might have been there for a time before the Mobbox went looking for him.”

  “Then it was Nerratel?” his father asked.

  Raxton nodded. “It was. Surely it is not the first time a Carbollo helped a Mobbox?”

  “’Tis the first time a Carbollo helped the Mobbox who shall likely engage him in the challenge. I count at least twenty Mobbox who will likely enter the challenge, but Nerratel is by far the strongest.”

  Raxton carefully watched the expression on his father’s face. “Was I to leave him in the pit?”

  Lamine shrugged. “As you said, the Mobbox would have gone looking for him.”

  “Son,” said his mother, “I would prefer to hear such things from you.”

  “I thought it not important enough to tell. Are the Mobbox upset?” Raxton asked.

  Delsic laughed. “Some of the Mobbox are upset no matter what we do. If we smile, we are up to something, if we frown we are plotting revenge, and if we ignore them, we are proud and arrogant.”

  Raxton chuckled as did his father. “Father,” Raxton asked, hoping to change the subject. “Has anyone ever found a bell without being chosen for the quest?”

  His father finished his next spoonful of food before he answered, “Not in my lifetime. There was a story when I was a child, but I’ve forgotten all the details. Perhaps you should ask the King. He seems to know far more than he is telling. After all, he might have warned us about the Lowlander long before now.”

  “I do not fear the Lowlanders. Do you?” Raxton asked. Seated across the table from his little brothers, he hid his smile when in unison they looked from him to their father.

  “A man without fear is unwise. You would do well to consider the possibility that the king is right.”

  Raxton nodded and then asked, “Perhaps we should put bulls at the top of the cliffs to push the Lowlanders off.” He grinned when both his mother and his father laughed.

  Annack, the oldest of his three young brothers was unmistakably serious when he said, “Someday, I shall walk all the way around Extane and see the cliffs for myself. If there is a way down, I shall find it.”

  “Even I,” Lamine advised, “am not brave enough to stand close to the cliffs for fear they crumble and I fall off.”

  “But if I tied a rope to myself and then to a horse, the horse would not let me fall,” Annack countered.

  Lamine smiled. “I can see the wisdom in that thinking.” He nodded to his proud second son, but he did not comment further.

  Raxton kept silent on that issue as well, for Annack rarely needed encouragement when he hoped his father would let him go on an adventure. Instead, Raxton asked, “Father, if the king dies, and if I, by some miracle, win the challenge on the Carbollo side, I must choose a man to take with me on the quest. Whom should I choose?”

  “I would wait to see who is second best in the challenge, and choose him. In the meantime, I shall watch to see who Nerratel is with most often. We should learn all we can about the Mobbox who is determined to be the first to find the seven bells.”

  “Suppose Nerratel finds three and I find three. What then?” Raxton asked.

  Lamine thoughtfully answered, “There are no stories of such a thing, but perhaps there are more than seven. Perhaps there are eleven, and the first to find seven wins.”

  “Who hides the bells?” Annack wanted to know.

  “Son, you ask questions I cannot answer. Perhaps it is the king who hides them, for he found them last.”

  “Yet, he claims he cannot remember,” his wife reminded her husband.

  “He remembers his old riddles well enough,” Raxton joked.

  “That he does.” Lamine finished the last of his meal.

  “When will the king die?” the youngest son asked.

  “We know not,” Raxton answered, but if you are very fortunate, he will not die until you are old enough to take up the challenge instead of me.” He enjoyed his little brother’s grin, and then concentrated on eating.

  AFTER THE EVENING MEAL, Raxton took two of his arrows back to the marketplace, sat in a stairwell and began to sharpen the tips with a metal file. His father expected him to win the challenge and then the quest, but Raxton was in doubt of his abilities. Several other Carbollos were qualified, perhaps even more qualified than he, and he could quickly name nine or ten with the intelligence and the fairmindedness to be a good king. Yet, if what Nerratel said was true, the next king simply had to be a Carbollo. Raxton had strength, but no one was certain if strength would be enough. There were the riddles to consider, and even if he found all seven, he had to ring the bells in precisely the right order.

  He did not often leave the city after the evening meal, but it was still light out, so Raxton set his work aside, strolled through the center gate, walked to the gazebo, and sat on the Carbollo side. He had studied the symbols on the inside of the Gazebo a hundred times, and not once did it give him a hint as to which bell to ring first. The symbols were set in the top of each archway and the archways were set in a circle – an unbroken circle with no beginning or end. All but one symbol had seven spears protruding from it. There was a sun, a star, a crescent moon, a small waving flag, a square, and a wheel with seven spokes. The seventh symbol was the strangest of all, for it was a horse with unusually short legs.

  Normally at home in the evenings where he could not hear, on this night there was music and singing coming from Mobbox City. Raxton turned his attention away from the symbols, and listened. He imagined Nerratel there, and was reminded of their earlier conversation. Why did Nerratel feel the need to warn him? That the Mobbox wished the Carbollo gone was hardly a secret, but something had changed or Nerratel would not have mentioned it.

  Raxton closed his eyes, rubbed his forehead for a moment, and tried to clearly rationalize the situation. The challenge, the quest, and a Mobbox attack surely would not happen while the king yet lived – and King Grafton looked healthy enough to live for several more years. That thought eased his mind considerably.

  He smiled when he thought about Nerratel telling his mother what happened that morning, and his mother sharing the news with Raxton’s mother. Raxton was convinced his father did not know, but more than once he spotted his mother sitting on the Carbollo side of a creek, talking to Nerratel’s mother seated on the Mobbox side. The two women probably knew ten times more about each other’s civics than all the men on both sides put together. Raxton could ask his mother if the Mobbox were becoming unusually agitated, but then, he would have to admit he knew her secret. That simply would not do.

  The Mobbox had stopped singing and with the darkness of night fast falling, Raxton left his seat in the gazebo and went home.

  CHAPTER 4

  IT WAS NOT ABOUT THE quest or news of the mysterious Lowlander that Raxton Carbollo was thinking the next afternoon. It was a pleasant day, a good day for hunting, and he was paying little attention to exactly where he was. What had his attention was following the tracks of a deer – tracks that led him to the land behind the sunset side of the castle –the Mobbox side. The moment he realized it, his instinct was to hide behind a rock until he could make certain no one had seen him.

  That was his intention, anyway.<
br />
  Although he had seen her from afar many times, it was through a crack between two large, jagged boulders that Raxton Carbollo took particular notice of Sarinna Mobbox. The diamond-shaped mark above her right eye confirmed that she was a Mobbox, just as an identical mark above his left eye made him a Carbollo.

  Perhaps it was her love song that kept him from looking away. Her words of hope and of longing stirred his heart in a way he had not expected. It was a longing he often felt himself, but could not put into words. Nor did he imagine it to be the same for a woman, and certainly not a Mobbox woman. Yet, there it was – in her song.

  Shoeless, Sarinna stepped from stone to stone on the edge of a small lake as she sang, causing the skirt of her floor-length, pastel-blue gown to sway as she moved. Her hair was black, the same as his, and the strand of diamonds in her loose, waist length hair glistened.

  For a very long time he stayed hidden and continued to watch. Without making his presence known, Raxton turned away and went back to the land of the Carbollo. That night sleep did not easily come, for her song remained in his mind and continued to keep her in his heart.

  THERE WERE AS MANY good and kind people among the Mobbox as there were among the Carbollo, yet there were some Mobbox who cared more about what they did not have, than what they did. Two such men were brothers, Telder and Enor Mobbox. The eldest, Enor was just a bit taller, stronger, and more pleasant looking. When they were young, they looked so much alike they fooled many a Mobbox. After their hair turned red, they strove to look as different as Mobbox traditions allowed. Now both had black hair, Telder wore his shorter, and once he was old enough, he let his beard grow longer than his brother’s. He hated having a mustache and often trimmed his off, while Enor thought his mustache made him look far more distinguished.