by Neal Jones
But not everyone was as cooperative. Just as in the other cities, there were many in Quaal who mocked and scorned the visitors, throwing rotten vegetables, small rocks, and even feces at them. But the Prophet and his entourage did not waver in their mission.
By sundown, two thirds of Quaal's population had converted to the new faith, and they left the city. When asked by Oraeko what would happen next, Aamon confessed that he did not know. As darkness fell, Tor'Ahl stood at the edge of the encampment and watched the bonfires on the walls of the city, waiting for the wrath of the Varashok to descend upon the heathens who remained in Quaal.
All through the night the Prophet kept his vigil, even after all his followers had retired to their beds. In the darkest hour of night, just before the dawn,
19 Aamon lifted his eyes unto the east, and he saw a great light, a fire that was not fire, and he knew that the wrath of the Varashok would soon be upon the city.
20 As it drew near, Aamon could see that it was the Warrior, seated upon his black horse, and following him was a host of the Antar'Vess. Their robes were radiant as the sun, and their swords were pillars of flame.
21 They touched upon the earth, passing through the walls of the city, and they smote the heathen as they slept. Not one escaped the holy wrath, and their bodies burned as wood in a kiln. Every man, woman and child was ushered unto the gates of Cho'Vok'Lor, their souls cast into the barren plains for eternity.
22 Then did the Warrior's army vanish back unto the east, their light diminishing as the sun at twilight. Tor'Ahl could keep his eyes open no longer, and he fell into a deep slumber, and could not be awakened for three days and three nights.
The Prophet's three day slumber alarmed his followers, especially in the aftermath of the spiritual slaughter of Quaal, and many of them believed he had succumbed to a powerful and deadly illness as a form of punishment from the Varashok. Only a month earlier, during one of their seven day waiting periods between the destruction of the heathen cities, Aamon had been instructed during a dream one night to establish the Quorum of Twenty. Made up entirely of men, with each given the title of "Elder", the quorum was to function as a ruling body for the rapidly expanding body of believers. It was the quorum's duty to oversee the day to day operations of the camp – gathering food, setting up the tents, posting a rotation of guards, etc.
Now this ruling body was faced with its first real crisis. While the women took turns keeping a watch at Tor'Ahl's bedside, the quorum kept the followers busy with the daily operations of the camp. The elders voted unanimously to not enter the city until receiving some sign from the Varashok. No one knew exactly what Tor'Ahl was being punished for, and they were more frightened now than they had ever been. Some began to speak of leaving the new tribe and setting out on their own. But on the morning of the fourth day, Aamon awoke, and he told the quorum to gather the believers at the city gates. The number was now almost seven thousand, and the Prophet told the Chrisarii that he had communed with all the Varashok at great length during his long sleep. Quaal was to be their new home. That was why the Gods had not destroyed the city as They had all the others. It was to be renamed Lar'A'Tol, which means "City of the Faithful".
Chapter ten details the cleaning of the city, which began with the disposal of the corpses of ash that had once been the heathen who had ignored Tor'Ahl's warning. Within only a few weeks, the believers were fully settled into their new home, and the midlands where Lar'A'Tol was located is known today as the D'Kor province. It is the capital province of the Chrisarii Alliance, and the city of Lar'A'Tol still stands. It has been destroyed and rebuilt many times over the centuries, but there is still a section in the heart of the city where some ruins of Quaal remain as a memorial to the founding of the Alliance's most dominant religious faith.
Aamon Tor'Ahl lived for many generations, so many in fact that modern religious historians have calculated his age at the time of death to be somewhere near a hundred and eighty. He was thirty years old when he returned to Kimnamor to deliver the Varashok's warning for the first time, and he ruled the Children of the Varashok for a hundred and thirty years.
During his reign, Aamon worked with the quorum to establish an entirely new system of government. The monarchy was abolished, and a quorum elder was only allowed to serve for twenty years before stepping down. It was up to him to appoint a successor, one who had to receive a majority vote of the rest of the quorum in order to be appointed to the position. The last book of the Holy Covenant is titled "Doctrine and Law". It, too, was written by Oraeko, and it spelled out for the new government the system of legislative and judicial law that would govern all Chrisarii. The first word of the title refers to the canon of credo that laid the foundation for the fledgling religion. Because of its length, this book is often published separately from the Holy Covenant.
The last two decades of Tor'Ahl's life were spent wandering the plains. He would disappear for several days at a time, clothed in his customary gray robe, his feet bare, a walking staff in his right hand. Sometimes K'Faat, the great-grandson of Oraeko, would go with him, but more often than not he went alone. His people feared for his life, yet despite his age he often seemed as spry and agile as a young man. His final sojourn lasted for two weeks, and when he returned he laid down on his bed and never rose again.
Aamon had never taken a wife and had no progeny. One of the first acts of the believers after moving into Lar'A'Tol was to construct a holy temple for the Prophet. His house was behind it, a single large room with a fire pit, a bed and a table. He refused the opulent quarters that had been set aside for him on the second floor of the temple. Now, in his final days, he laid upon the bed and allowed only K'Faat to serve him.
He had no signs of a fever or other illness, so his followers believed his age was finally catching up with him. In a time when most did not live past forty, a hundred and eighty would have seemed like a true gift from the Varashok. Hundreds kept a vigil outside the temple and his home, and in his final hours Tor'Ahl asked K'Faat to get his parchment and quill. Aamon then dictated six prophecies to the scribe, two pages that form the final chapter of the book that bears K'Faat's name. It is the final book in the Holy Covenant.
Four days after returning from his final sojourn into the wilderness, just as the sun had begun its descent into the eastern sky, Aamon Tor'Ahl gave his last breath, and his life was no more. According to K'Faat, his ink not yet dried on the parchment on which he had recorded the Prophet's final words, Tor'Ahl's body was suddenly consumed with a light "...as bright as the midday sun". It enveloped him as a shroud, and when it faded, the bed was empty.
K'Faat tore his clothing and cried out in a loud voice of such sorrow that it reached the ears of the believers outside. One of them entered the home of the Prophet, and when he was told by K'Faat of what had transpired, he rushed back into the street to spread the sorrowful news. For the next seven days, the Children of the Varashok mourned the passing of their Prophet in many ways. Some continued their vigil outside the temple. Others walked through the city streets in sackcloth and ashes, singing an ancient lamentation over and over until their voices became hoarse and they could speak no more.
A final public service was held in the courtyard of the temple on the evening of the seventh day. High Chancellor Mossif declared that the day of Aamon's death would forever be marked as a Day of Remembrance for all believers. This holy day has been observed ever since, and it is preceded by a week of services, vigils, and great feasts.
Tor'Ahl never spoke of what transpired during the approximately fifteen years between the Battle of Shi-Hyron and his reappearance at the gates of Kimnamor. Religious historians and scholars have long been fascinated by this period of the Prophet's life, but there is no record – written or otherwise – of what he experienced. It is generally accepted by all that the Varashok saved Aamon's life and taught him everything that he then taught to his followers. Given the events of Tor'Ahl's life after he returned to Kimnamor, that conclusion is a logical
one.
But critics of this religious following believe that Tor'Ahl was nothing more than a brilliant, charismatic leader, who spent those fifteen years creating a new religion and then preaching it to a mass of people who were ripe for a change of lifestyle and purpose. As for the supposed "holy fire" that obliterated a total of twelve cities, those were merely the result of unusual weather phenomena. Flash thunderstorms are an uncommon - but not totally unheard of - occurrence in Chrisarii history, due primarily to presence of tose particles in the homeworld's atmosphere. Such storms have been documented throughout Chrisarii history, even up to the early centuries of the third age, before modern technology allowed for the creation of a planetary weather control net. But in those historical instances, there was always debris left behind, and nowhere has it been documented that a flash thunderstorm was so small as to cover only a single city, much less obliterate it so completely as to leave no trace of brick, flesh or bone behind.
That latter fact is difficult to dispute, and as the historian and renowned philosopher, Elt Wornay, once put it,
"One either believes that a man named Aamon Tor'Ahl once existed; that he was a Prophet and Emissary of the Varashok, and that all that is in the Holy Covenant is true and correct. Or one does not believe it, and none of it is true and correct. And, therefore, none of it matters. On this there can be no middle ground."
For those who believe in the Varashok and accept the Holy Covenant as true and correct, the five prophecies that were made by Tor'Ahl will come to pass. Every generation since the second age has believed that theirs would be the one in which the Prophet would return to claim his own. Below is the final chapter of the Book of K'Faat:
1 In the End of Time and Days, there shall be born among you one who shall bear my mark and be filled with my spirit. You will call her daughter, and she shall possess the power to save those who will believe.
2 A great chasm shall open in the heavens, and from its depths shall rise five hundred of the Fallen. The sky shall be turned as dark as the night, and there shall be no rest for the wicked. This shall be the first test of the Faithful. Pray, lest you be caught unawares!
3 The Daughter of my name shall sleep as I once did. For three days and three nights will she slumber, and will receive the signs and portents of things to come, and things that have been. For all of this has come before, and it shall all pass unto us again.
4 He who has defied my name, the Lord of the Fallen, shall rise from the River of Fire to possess the soul of the one who has called Him. The Daughter of my name shall rise up to slay the resurrected. Woe unto them who would stand against the faithful! Heed my words and pray, lest you be caught unawares!
5 In the End of Time and Days, there shall rise in the heavens a Great Darkness that will consume the stars and blot out the worlds. There will be great sorrow and lamentations, and many shall cry for death, but it will not come. You are a chosen and peculiar people, called by my name, and your faith shall make you steadfast, even unto the end. Pray fervently, and pray righteously, lest you be caught unawares! Do not forsake hope, for these are the words of our Gods.
6 And after the Darkness has passed, I shall return in a glorious appearing, and I will gather unto El'Sha'Lor the Faithful and the Chosen. Those who have been called by my name shall have cause to rejoice. But those who cast me out, now will I cast into the outer darkness, where they shall wander for eternity, and their lamentations will be without end. Take heed, for these are my words as given unto me by our Gods. Nerra Tinnar.
Because of that first prophecy, the birth of a daughter in almost all Chrisarii households is regarded as a greater blessing than the birth of a son. Throughout the first age and well into the second, the penalty for adultery on the part of a husband was death. That same penalty applied to any case where a husband was accused of beating his wife or mistreating her in any way.
Whether you accept it as fact, fiction, religion, or myth, the life and teachings of Aamon Tor'Ahl make one hell of a saga, and there's no denying his impact on Chrisarii history.
Appendix 3
The Believers Of Onng Le'Roh
( 1 )
Eight hundred years after the death of Aamon Tor'Ahl, and almost two centuries before the Second Age, a boy named Rynn Seraudu was born to a poor tailor in the eastern province of Delwara. In the centuries since Tor'Ahl had united many of the warring tribal clans, nation-states had begun to form, the largest of them being on Kabold continent, which is where D'Kor Province is located today. That continent is also the second largest land mass of the Chrisarii homeworld. By the time of Rynn's birth, two-thirds of Kabold was under the rule of the people who called themselves Chrisarii. Missionaries from the Church of the Varashok had begun traveling to other continents approximately two centuries before Rynn's birth, spreading Tor'Ahl's gospel to all that they could find.
Rynn was born in the Keep of Velosa, which was located on the small continent of Attana, half a world away from the prosperity and influence of the D'Kor Province. At that time period, towns and villages were built around massive keeps, which were similar to the castles of Earth's medieval age. The Attanites were descendents of one of the more fearsome and warlike tribal clans that emerged from the First Age, the A'ttan, which is where the name for that continent originated. Much of southern lands, which was where Delwara province was located, were covered in thick forests and lush grasslands when Rynn was born.
Rynn was a sickly child, born two months premature, and Tasnin, the healer of Velosa Keep, did not expect him to live past his fifth year. His mother, Grev, refused to believe him, and she never gave up on her son. She cared for him and nurtured him day and night for his first two years after birth. She never left his side, and, when his fifth name-day arrived, Rynn was as almost as healthy as most boys his age. Rynn's father, N'Toth, was a tailor who tried to teach his son the ways of the trade, but Rynn was too weak to work in his father's shop for long periods. Nor did the boy show an interest in clothes making. Because of his weakened condition, Grev kept him home with her instead of sending him to the cathedral with the other boys to be taught by the shil'ra. During this time period only men were taught to read and write, and, thus, only boys attended school, which was usually the keep's cathedral. Since Grev refused to allow her son to attend classes, Shil'Ra Aldus agreed to tutor the boy in their home. Rynn learned very quickly to read and write, and Aldus marveled to his parents about his remarkable ability. By the time he was eight, Rynn was able to read the ancient parchments and scrolls in the cathedral's library.
It was at this time that Grev and N'Toth, at Aldus' urging, agreed to apprentice the boy to the shil'ra. Aldus taught Rynn how to record and preserve the scrolls of Velosa's history, and he also instructed the boy in the theology of The Holy Covenant. At fifteen, the age at which a boy is considered a man, Rynn declared that he wanted to take the Vow of Service and devote his life to the church.
However, three days before the confirmation ceremony, Rynn fell terribly ill with a fever that lasted for nearly a week. For six days and nights he was confined to his bed, sleeping fitfully, unable to eat or drink anything but the few sips of water that Grev would pour between his lips whenever she could. Rynn suffered extreme fever dreams, muttering in his sleep, sometimes shaking violently for several minutes at a time. Tasnin told N'Toth and Grev that there was nothing he could do. He believed that Rynn had become possessed by the cerusk'om, and Shil'Ra Aldus performed several cleansing rituals, but all of it was to no avail. (The cerusk and the cerusk'om are the Chrisarii words for "angel" and "demon", respectively.)
On the morning of the seventh day, Rynn's fever broke. He arose from his bed, pale and thin, and he demanded of his mother parchment and quill. She sent for Aldus, and he brought a packet of parchment and some ink. Rynn sat in the corner of his room on the floor and began to write, ignoring Aldus' questions. For another three days and nights, Rynn wrote everything that he had seen in his dreams. He paused only long enough to eat bits of crusted br
ead, washing them down with cups of water. He used up on the first day all the parchment Aldus had brought him, and Rynn demanded more. His parents, even more fearful than when he was suffering from his fever, believed firmly that he was still possessed, and they demanded of Aldus that he perform another cleansing ritual. The shil'ra did as they asked, but it seemed to do no good. On the morning of the second day, when he brought another package of parchment and more ink, Aldus read some of what Rynn had written. He was astonished and troubled to see that the style of the boy's hand was vastly different than the answers he had written for the shil'ra in his tutoring lessons. Not only that, the content of the writing seemed to go directly against church doctrine. Rynn wrote not about the Varashok, but about another god, the true god of the Attanites, one named Onng Le'Roh. Aldus put aside the papers, trembling with fear, and quickly left the house.
On the morning of the fourth day, Rynn laid down his quill and wrapped the pages in old tava leaf. He called for his mother and begged her to hide the manuscript, to not take it to the shil'ra. Grev was so overwhelmed with joy at Rynn's recovery that she wept. She asked him what he had written, and he said only, "It is the truth." He implored her once more to not allow Aldus to see what he had written, and then he laid himself on his bed. For a few minutes Grev watched her son sleep, wanting to be certain that whatever illness had seized him had finally released its grip. News of Rynn's sickness had spread throughout the village, and Grev was fearful of what they would say about her son - as well as her and N'Toth – should the manuscript be made known to them. Heeding her son's words, she slipped out of the house in the light of early dawn and walked quickly along the edge of the keep's high wall, looking desperately for a place to bury the pages.
