The Third Scroll

by Dana Marton

  Around me on the parapet stood many Shahala who watched the scene with horror on their faces. We all knew that once Batumar was defeated, Karamur would fall, and all the men, women, and children within. And with Karamur would fall Dahru, our legacy erased from memory forever. We would become like the First People, carvings on cold cave walls hidden in the dark for future nations to look at with wonder and not understand.

  A great power rose within me, dizzying me for a moment, power great enough to corrupt a person’s spirit. I thought of my great-grandmother. So this was what had turned her heart. Even as I fought against it, the power surged through me, filled me, until I felt more, bigger, brighter than I had ever felt before.

  Then in a moment all the Guardians’ lessons came together in my head like the separate colorful threads of a tapestry come together to paint a story. And I understood that the power was neither good nor evil, but would bend whichever way the person was who wielded it.

  I found a fear under all my resistance, a nagging voice that asked what if I claimed my full power and still failed? And the next moment, I knew that the only true failure would be to run from my destiny.

  Spirit, be strong. Heart, be brave. My mother’s last message came to me.

  With a cry, I sent my spirit into Batumar across the distance and drew his pain, and as I sank to the stones with agony, I watched him rise and defend himself. Blood poured down his back, for he was still injured, only he did not feel his injuries. So I closed my eyes and little by little repaired the hideous wound.

  I opened my eyes just as he ran Woldrom through. The great savage fell at Batumar’s feet, blood trickling from his mouth, his body twisted upon the blood-soaked ground. He was looking at me, hate boiling in his black gaze.

  But the Kerghi Lord’s fall did not halt the battle nor did it slow down the fighting, for the fight was so fierce his men barely noticed his demise. Also, many of his troops were mercenaries who fought under and for their own captains.

  I expanded my power until I could almost see it, a shimmering cloud above me. And then I shared it. Oh, how that drained me. I couldn’t move a single limb.

  But then I felt a hand on my arm helping me up, Leena’s, and as I looked around, I could see the Shahala healers line the parapet, their eyes on the battle, some clutching their shoulders, some their legs, pain on their faces.

  On the battlefield, I saw a young Kadar warrior with a lance piercing his side. As soon as the lance was withdrawn, our warrior seemed to regain his strength and fought on to vanquish his enemy. The Shahala accepted my power and were healing with me.

  The fight went on all day and into the darkness, the enemy not stopping for the night this time, for they felt victory was close. But we fought back with our spirit. We even healed the wounded tigers.

  Every time a Kadar warrior suffered injury, soon he sprang back again. And every time it happened, his Kerghi opponent was either slain or lost heart at witnessing such magic. And soon the cry spread through the enemy that the Kadar were not human, that they were able to rise up from the dead. Woldrom was not there to rally them. That too was at long last noticed.

  Slowly the tide turned, the enemy army pushed back by the fear in their hearts as much as by the Kadar. And it seemed there might yet be a chance for our victory. But a small group, perhaps knowing that the miraculous powers of the Kadar had something to do with the Shahala men and women who stood on the parapets, began to scale the walls with ladders coarsely made from the tall trees of the forest behind them.

  I thought of all the Shahala they had already killed and how they would now murder the rest. The power inside me twisted, the shimmering cloud of it turned dark. A quick urge came to draw it all back to me and direct it at the invaders as a weapon. So I stilled my heart and mind, and I lay down all that power, released it with a slow breath. My mother’s spirit proved stronger inside me than my great-grandmother’s.

  The enemy kept coming.

  We poured the water we had on hand to put out fires, on them, the only weapon we had, but that did not stop the Kerghi. Some people—not the Shahala—even threw the empty water jars. Then boiling water came from the kitchen. That did have some effect.

  Dizzy with exhaustion, by chance I turned toward an abandoned section of the wall. The top of a new ladder appeared in that instant, angled cleverly so that it would be difficult to see by the defending force.

  Whoever came over would be in one step behind a guardhouse, in cover.

  I rushed forward.

  Shartor climbed at the top, leading the enemy, Kerghi warriors, covered in blood, behind him. If they secured a portion of the wall, more could climb after them and overpower the people within, for the men and women inside were not trained to fight. The gate would be lost then for certain, and the city with it.

  I charged as Shartor straddled the wall, and tried to push him back. He laughed at me—his eyes dancing a mad rhythm—and bent me back as if I were a willow sprig.

  I scratched at his face. Not something my mother would have ever done. All my life, all I wanted was to become like her. But I had some Kadar spirit too, from my father, and spirits of the Seela and the First People from the Guardian.

  Spirit, be strong. Heart, be brave.

  “Sorceress.” He hissed the single word.

  “Traitor.” I leaned into Shartor, thinking of one thing only—his feet must not find purchase on the wall.

  But my strength was no match for his. And so I did the only thing I could—I threw my whole weight against him. This at last upset his balance, and as he reeled backward, he took the ladder with him. The ladder and me, for our arms were entwined.

  We fell from the dizzying height, the ladder somehow falling sideways, and I could see the corpses below us. But I did not land on the dead. I landed in the last of the hot embers that still glowed in front of the gate.

  I heard the sound of Shartor’s neck break as we landed, he but a moment before I. All my bones felt broken as I gasped for breath.

  I rolled out of the fire, my clothes alight, and rolled and rolled until the blood-soaked ground doused the flames. Then finally I lay there, seeing little but the shadowy outlines of the corpses next to me, among whom I now belonged.

  I could have stopped the pain, but I did not. The pain of my flesh paled in comparison to the pain of my heart as I lay on the ground among our dead and the fallen enemy I had helped to kill.

  I heard the gate open and felt the ground shake as the manyinga entered the battle. Since he had few of them, Batumar had decided to hold them back until the end, hoping the very sight of the fearsome beasts would strike terror into the hearts of the enemy. They were to fight on the opposite side of the battlefield from Lord Karnagh’s men and their tigers, as the beasts were not used to waging battle together.

  I passed in and out of awareness, the noise of the battle rising and receding in my ears like the tide. And after a long while, as the night wore on, I heard the clamor of the battle quiet. And I heard warriors talking, ours, as they walked among the dead, searching for their fallen friends. Then Batumar found me at last and cradled me into his arms and carried me to the palace.

  The Shahala healers gathered around me, but I forbade them to take my pain—they were much weakened already—so they treated my wounds with salves from the herbs stockpiled in the empty chambers of Pleasure Hall, but they did not use their powers. I could see little of them, my eyes damaged in the fire.

  The next day, the servants brought Onra to me, and her presence soothed the pain better than any potion. But we recovered slowly, Onra and I. And the Fortress City.

  The refugees returned to their homes, the rains washed away the blood of the fields around Karamur, and the earth swallowed it. In the spring, men planted, and the wheat grew plumper than ever before. A new gate had replaced the old charred one. We lived in precious peace.

  But in the fall, bad tidings came again. Emperor Drakhar had somehow bound to his service a sorcerer from the east. Rumor said h
e had spies now on every island. Regnor had been taken in a surprise attack, and Lord Karnagh was believed dead. A warrior queen had risen in his kingdom—a foreigner—holding the last free city.

  “I must go to her rescue,” Batumar said as we stood on the parapets in the late afternoon, watching the last of the harvest being brought in.

  He had let me heal his body with my herbs, but the scars he kept as a reminder, even on his face. In his black leggings and golden doublet—dressed to meet the Guardians at the feast later—he looked like the legendary High Lords of old, his wide shoulders outlined against the setting sun, a warrior lord who stood between his people and harm like a bulwark.

  He drew me into his arms and kissed me. He had scarcely let me out of his sight since the siege. “I pledged my help to Lord Karnagh. In his absence, I owe it to his people.”

  “And I shall watch over our people while you are gone,” I promised before I kissed him back, my heart full of gratitude that we still had our freedom, that we still had each other. The journey that had brought us here had not been easy. The chill of autumn hung in the air, but his embrace heated me as I clung to him, knowing a long road stood before us still.

  When we pulled apart, after some time, his gaze slipped to the scroll peeking from my belt. “The third scroll?” He tugged it free and gave me a smile that made my heart spin.

  “It is finished,” I told him, still uneasy about the idea that I should fill the scroll. But Batumar and the Guardians had agreed on this and thought it best that I record the siege and all that came before it.

  As Batumar turned toward the city, I turned with him, every building familiar, nearly every man and woman known to me by name. My city, my people. I snuggled back into his arms, taking what comfort I could while I still had him with me.

  So Emperor Drakhar’s minions are still coming. Let them come and try to take what is mine. Let them perish.

  Spirit, be strong. Heart, be brave.

  ~~~***~~~

  Dear Reader,

  Thank you so much for picking up THE THIRD SCROLL. The fact that you’re holding this book in your hands is a minor miracle. I began writing Tera’s story ten years ago as a project for college. When I finished, I sent it out to a few publishers, and amazingly, they even got back to me. This does not happen a lot to unpublished writers without agent representation, so as I was dancing in the street, I envisioned a fat publishing contract, followed by a straight journey to the top of the bestseller lists. Or just someone who would be willing to print maybe a hundred copies of my book. Seriously, either way I would have been deliriously happy. I just so wanted to see the story in print and hold my very own book in my hands.

  Reality brought those dreams to a screeching halt. The editor-in-chief at a major NY publishing house told me it wasn’t exactly what they published, but referred me to other publishers and even let me use her as reference. Another editor at another house told me she wasn’t sure how to sell it to her marketing people, but she loved it too much to reject it. To this day, many years later, I still haven’t received a rejection letter from her. Another editor at a big publisher read the first three chapters, loved them and requested to see the rest. By the time I sent the full novel, she moved on, and the new editor wasn’t interested. I’m guessing you have picked up on a pattern here: lots of love, no contract.

  In the meanwhile, I wrote other projects and became successfully published in a whole other genre. But I never forgot THE THIRD SCROLL, and neither had some of the people who read it. From time to time, I would receive an email from a friend, telling me they were still thinking about the characters, asking when the book was going to be published.

  Well, with the advent of direct publishing, THE THIRD SCROLL is now finally available to readers. And I’m back to dancing in the street. (You don’t know how lucky you are that you don’t live in my neighborhood.)

  For more information about this book and my plans for the next installment of Tera’s story, please visit my web site at www.thethirdscroll.com.

  And hang on to your dreams!

  Spirit, be strong. Heart, be brave.

  Dana Marton

  Author

  To find more books by Dana Marton visit danamarton.com.

  BOOK CLUB QUESTIONS:

  --How does the setting relate to the story? Did it enhance your reading experience? Did it add to the story? Did the characters fit naturally in the setting? What was unique about it?

  --Do you feel like the story had a message? If so what was it? Did the author get her point across without being too heavy-handed?

  -Did you relate to the characters? Did they remind you of anyone you know? Did they grab you enough so you are interested in what happens to them next?

  -Did the characters change in a believable way through the story? Who changed the most?

  -Who was your favorite character? Why? Do you wish you could meet him/her? What would you ask him/her?

  -Which character surprised you the most? Why?

  -What is your favorite scene in the book? Why?

  -A lot of the book is about personal growth. Did the book make you think about personal growth and the responsibility some men/women take for others? How is that relevant in our world? How is that relevant in your own life?

  -Did you notice any symbolism in the book? Can you give specific examples?

  -Do you agree with the major decisions made by the lead character in the book? Why?/Why not?

  -Did you enjoy Tera’s story? Why? Why not?

  -How did you feel about the ending? Did it tie up all the major story questions? Did it leave you eager for more?

  -Would you recommend this book to other readers? How about your friends?

  thethirdscroll.com