by Dean Cadman
Myself and several other monks from our order have been called before the High Priest of Aysha in Lamuria. We have been instructed to maintain absolute secrecy regarding our visit to the capital, and even instructed not to wear our sacred robes for the journey south. We will travel at dawn, disguised as simple merchants. It has been many years since I have left these walls, and I feel no small amount of apprehension at the thought of doing so again. May Aysha bless our journey.
Judd II—Fourth cycle—Sixth-day—Four
It has been over two months since I wrote in this journal. I was forced to leave it behind in Ula’ree when we travelled to the High Temple. We were sworn to secrecy regarding the true nature of our visit to Lamuria, but I feel it is my sacred duty to the future monks of this order to know the truth. We are to begin construction of a new room within our temple. Complex spells were taught to our delegation during our visit to the High Temple. Spells to be used in the construction of a strange new room within Ula’ree. We were also told to expect a visit from one of the five surviving Guardians, and he would instruct us further. On a more personal note, I was pleased to lay eyes once more on my old childhood friend, Isidro, whom I have not seen since he left to join his order at Lohlaen many years ago. He was leaving the High Temple as we first arrived, but unfortunately he did not seem to recognise me after so many years. At least he still appeared in good health for his years, far better than myself, I fear. Maybe it can be attributed to the clear air on The Pearl Isle, but whatever…
Lusam was suddenly startled from his reading by Renn’s voice.
“Are you alright, lad?” Renn asked, sounding a little concerned.
“Yes, of course. Why wouldn’t I be?” Lusam replied, slightly confused.
“I’ve been calling to you for a while. I thought you’d gone out alone somewhere, then I noticed your light in here,” Renn said, noticing the book Lusam was reading. “What’s that you’re reading, lad?”
“I’m pretty sure it’s someone’s private journal. I think it was written by one of the monks who used to live here. It seems to have been written just after The Great Rift was closed, and it even refers to the construction of The Sanctum of Light, and the creation of the paladins,” Lusam said excitedly.
“May I see it?” Renn asked, eagerly stepping towards the book.
“You can, but I doubt you’ll be able to read any of it. It’s written in the same language as the Guardian books.” Renn visibly sagged at the news. He was obviously very anxious to learn about the creation of his holy order of paladins.
“Would you like me to read you the passage?” Lusam asked, grinning at the look of disappointment on Renn’s face. Renn nodded eagerly, and Lusam obliged by reading the passage to him.
After he had finished reading Renn the first three entries, he paused. He very much wanted to continue reading the journal, but wondered if it would be better if he read it alone first. There was no telling what information may be contained within this book. And although he trusted Renn completely, he still felt an overwhelming and inexplicable desire to keep the contents to himself—at least for now.
Lusam closed the journal, and seeing the look of disappointment on Renn’s face, actually felt guilty for not continuing to read.
“Don’t worry, I’ll read some more of it later. If there’s anything else of interest, I’ll let you know,” Lusam said.
“Okay, lad,” Renn replied, nodding slightly. “There was something else, but you said you would explain later.” Lusam looked a little confused, as he tried to think of what Renn could be referring to, then he suddenly remembered.
“Oh, yes. It was about the Guardian books and the pedestals.”
“Yes, you said you’d discovered something about them,” Renn replied patiently.
“That’s right, I have. As you know, since reading the Guardian book in Coldmont, I’ve been able to read the ancient language they are written in. When I first touched the—actually I don’t know what to call it—green light emanating from the pedestal in Coldmont, and I found myself back here in Helveel, I noticed that I could read the name on the Guardian book for the first time, and it read: Freedom. Then I also noticed a name on the pedestal here, and that read: Absolution.
“At first it didn’t mean anything to me, but after I returned to Coldmont, it all became clear. The Guardian book in Coldmont was called: Absolution. And the name on the pedestal was: Freedom.”
“I’m not sure I follow you, lad,” Renn said looking puzzled.
“Well, at first I thought I’d somehow missed seeing the writing on the pedestal in Helveel when I first read the book here. But the more I thought about it, the more certain I became—it just wasn’t here before. I believe that for each book read, a new name relating to that book appears on the pedestal. More importantly, the pedestal then allows you to travel to any given book you have already read. You simply choose where you want to go by touching the green light emanating from the name of whichever book you wish to visit. Put simply: if you have read the book, you can travel to its location using the pedestal,” Lusam said.
“So, Lord Zelroth couldn’t follow us here…” Renn started to say, but was interrupted when Lusam finished his sentence for him.
“Because he’s never read the book here in Helveel. It’s quite possible that he doesn’t even know it’s here. Or at least I hope he doesn’t.”
Renn remained silent for a few moments, thinking about Lusam’s words carefully. “If Lord Zelroth and his Darkseed Elite travelled to Coldmont using the pedestals, that would mean he had already previously read the Guardian book in Coldmont.”
“Actually, it would mean he had read at least two Guardian books, including the one in Coldmont. He obviously travelled from another pedestal to get to Coldmont,” Lusam replied.
“No wonder he’s so powerful,” Renn half-whispered to himself. “If he doesn’t know about the book here, then that means he knows the location of at least one other Guardian book—one that we don’t.”
“I’m certain of it. And I’m pretty sure I know the general location of the other one,” Lusam said confidently.
“Really?”
“Think about it. It has to be somewhere in Thule, otherwise Lord Zelroth wouldn’t have arrived in Coldmont so quickly.”
“No, it can’t be in Thule, lad. The Guardians would never have have hidden a book there. The book would have been far too exposed after the withdrawal from Irragin…” Renn took a sharp intake of breath. “Oh, no… I don’t believe it. It’s been right in front of our eyes the whole time, and no one has ever realised—until now.”
“What has?” Lusam asked. Renn didn’t reply to his question straight away; instead, he paced back and forth around the room with his hands clasped above his head, occasionally contorting his face in strange ways. Eventually, he came to a stop at the opposite side of the desk where Lusam was sitting, and leant against it. He then pulled a chair over to the desk and sat down opposite Lusam.
“Lad, it all makes perfect sense now,” Renn said, still resting his hands on top of his head. Lusam was about to ask what exactly Renn was talking about when he began to explain.
“No one ever understood how Lord Zelroth had gained so much power. Many theories have been put forward over the centuries, but none have been proven—or even agreed upon—but now, I think you have just uncovered his secret.”
“I’m sorry, I don’t quite follow you. I thought you just said that the Guardians would never have left a book in Thule, so Lord Zelroth couldn’t possibly have one there.”
“I did—but I was wrong, lad. Let me try to explain. After The Great Rift was finally closed, Afaraon quickly destroyed the Thulian forces stationed here. Our armies crushed the Thulian soldiers, forcing them to flee back to Thule, or die here. The King, however, wasn’t content with simply letting the enemy retreat back to Thule. Instead, he pursued them remorselessly, right to the very heart of Thule, killing and destroying everything as he went. Their government soon co
llapsed, and their country fell into anarchy. Local warlords sprung up overnight, taking control of small pockets of land, and they fought amongst themselves for the scraps left behind by our forces.
“The King ordered an outpost to be built in Thule, and the location chosen was Mount Nuxvar. Thousands of Thulian slaves were used to build the outpost, and once it was completed, its barracks contained over twenty thousand troops. At first it was used to put down any potential uprisings, or overly ambitious warlords that might raise their heads a little too high. After a while, it was also used by the church. The High Priest of the time had somehow got it into his head that it would be a good idea to try and convert the people of Thule to worship Aysha instead of Aamon. His plan met with little success.
“Thule remained in chaotic upheaval for over a century. People starved by the thousands, and plagues ravaged their population. Unfortunately, the plagues didn’t discriminate between peoples, and little more than a century after its construction, Irragin was abandoned. Its occupants were wiped out by one of the many infections, and our leaders declared it a lost cause. Thule was no longer considered a threat to Afaraon, and the church’s attempt to convert its populace was viewed as a complete failure. The cost of maintaining an outpost so far away was deemed unnecessary, and at the time, potentially deadly, as the previous occupants found out to their cost. Also at that time, Afaraon faced another potential threat from a land to the far north. So the attention of the King, the council, and even the High Temple was firmly focused north, and not south towards a broken continent.
“Irragin was forgotten, but not for long. One of those warlords took control of Irragin and renamed it Azmarin. That warlord was Lord Zelroth. His rise to power was incredible. Within five years he had killed all of the rival warlords. Within ten, he had established his control over the entire continent and formed the beginnings of the Thule Empire we know it today. His movements were watched carefully by our spies, but none of them ever discovered the source of his power. He also seemed to be more focused on rebuilding the society of Thule rather than being any particular threat to Afaraon. With the new threat looming from the north, it was decided that we couldn’t start a war on two fronts, so Lord Zelroth was left to do as he willed.
“Looking back now, it seems like a lost opportunity to rid the world of a tyrant, but you have to understand, Afaraon was a mighty nation back then. One man was no threat against the thousands of magi we had. Once The Great Rift had been sealed, and the Netherworld creatures contained or destroyed, we had easily crushed the forces of Thule.
“What no one knew, of course, was the fact they had just given him access to one of the Guardian books. It seems that by keeping the locations of the books such a secret, it actually worked against us in the end. If we had only known Irragin contained a Guardian book, it would never have been abandoned. But I guess the same could be said about this place, or even Coldmont for that matter.”
Lusam tried to imagine a time when Afaraon was so powerful. A time when magic was commonplace, and the constant threat from the Empire didn’t exist yet. He remembered what Renn had told him, about how the Empire had secretly been killing newborn magi in Afaraon for at least two centuries, and probably much longer than that. How the Hermingild had been formed to protect newborn magi and their mothers. And how his grandmother had in fact been his mother’s Hermingild, and not his actual grandmother at all. Then another thought struck him.
“Renn, were the magi in Afaraon powerful back then?” Lusam asked.
“I suppose they varied in power, just like they do today. Why do you ask?”
“Well, when I say powerful… I mean, were they as powerful as I am now?”
Renn laughed loudly. “I’m not sure, but I doubt it, lad. I’ve never read about anyone doing some of the things you can do. The battles that are documented were fought using magic as you would imagine, but only in the normal sense. They would hurl magical-missiles at each other until one side ran out of power and their shields failed. Sometimes several magi would concentrate their firepower on a single mage, overwhelming them with brute force.”
Lusam nodded, but didn’t seem convinced by Renn’s words.
“Let me ask you something, lad. If you were on a battlefield, and there were paladins fighting against you, how would you defeat them? How would you bypass their shields and weapons?”
Lusam thought about it for a moment and easily came up with several methods to quickly dispatch a paladin.
“That’s easy. I…” Lusam began to say, but was cut short by Renn’s laughter booming out once more.
“You see, lad. A paladin wouldn’t pose much of a problem for you, but to an Empire agent, we’re a real threat. I saw how easily you dealt with those agents outside Coldmont, and I can say this—no mage I have ever read about in the history books ever made such light work of killing another mage, let alone several at once,” Renn said, still chuckling to himself.
“If you’re right, then that possibly answers another question we might have,” Lusam replied.
“Oh?”
“Well, before I read the book in Coldmont, I wasn’t much more powerful than some of the Empire agents. I might have won a battle against a single agent, or possibly two, but I certainly couldn’t have done what I did outside Coldmont.”
“And?” Renn prompted.
“Isn’t it obvious?… Lord Zelroth wasn’t powerful enough to challenge Afaraon until after he had read the book in Coldmont. I suspect it was just after reading Coldmont’s book that he first started killing newborn magi in Afaraon. If that’s true, it would mean he discovered the book over two hundred years ago,” Lusam said excitedly.
“I’m not following you, lad. How does that information help us now?”
“Don’t you see? Lord Zelroth hasn’t changed his tactics for the last two hundred years. Nothing has changed. He’s continued to try and exterminate our newborn magi, simply trying to make us weaker and weaker.”
Renn shot to his feet, knocking over the chair as he did so. “Aysha be blessed! You’re right, lad. That must mean he hasn’t found a third book yet. If he had, he would have become even more powerful and stepped up his attacks a long time ago,” Renn said, sounding even more excited than Lusam had.
“Exactly!” Lusam said grinning widely.
“So, if we could find a third book, potentially you could be even more powerful than Lord Zelroth is.”
“Possibly—but he’s had centuries to practise. I, on the other hand, barely know what I’m capable of yet. Not to mention the fact he’s also had centuries to look for the other books and has still not found them.”
“True, but we have one thing that he doesn’t,” Renn said grinning.
“What’s that?” Lusam asked confused.
Renn leant over the desk and tapped on the book in front of Lusam. “The journal, of course. Who knows what secrets it might reveal?”
Neala and Alexia returned to The Old Ink Well just before nightfall. Even though they had left the horses and supplies behind in the eastern forest, they still carried several bundles with them. As they entered the basement, they noticed that Mr Daffer had brought down two more mattresses for their sleeping cells, along with a fresh supply of lamp oil. There were already a few lanterns lit within the large chamber, but an even brighter light spilled out from inside the book room. As they got closer, Neala could clearly hear both Lusam and Renn’s voices coming from within the room. Strangely, they seemed to be discussing ancient history, both in Afaraon and the Empire—something Neala knew little about, nor did she wish to learn about it.
“It sounds like you’re both having fun in here,” Neala said, entering the room, closely followed by Alexia. Lusam stood up from behind the desk and quickly went to greet Neala with a big hug. He’d been worried since she and Alexia had left earlier that day, but now she was back safely, he began to relax again.
“Don’t I get a hug too, lover-boy? I did do half the work you know,” Alexia teased.
/> “No, you don’t,” replied Neala, wearing a fake scowl and making everyone laugh.
“What have you got there?” Renn asked, nodding towards the bundles Neala and Alexia had been carrying when they entered the room.
“We thought it best if we bought some fresh clothes for us all. We don’t have time to wash and repair the ones we’re wearing, and let’s face it—we all stink,” Alexia said, wrinkling her nose, as if to demonstrate her point.
“She might be right,” Renn said, surreptitiously sniffing his own armpit. “We do smell a little—ripe.”
“Speak for yourself,” Lusam replied laughing.
“There’s also another reason we bought new clothes. If the Empire has already circulated our descriptions, you can bet it also includes what clothes we were wearing,” Neala said.
“Good thinking. It certainly can’t hurt, anyway,” Renn agreed.
“There’s a small wash room upstairs that Neala and I used the last time we were here. I’m sure Mr Daffer and Lucy wouldn’t mind us all using it before we eat dinner. In fact, I’m fairly certain they’ll insist on it,” Lusam said chuckling to himself. “Talking of dinner, I hope it’s ready soon. I’m starving.”
“Nothing new there then,” Neala said rolling her eyes. “To be honest, I’m more looking forward to a good night’s sleep for once. I can’t remember the last time I was able to close my eyes and not have to worry whether we were about to be attacked or not.”
“Talking of sleep. It looks like Mr Daffer has brought another two mattresses down for us. I noticed them at the bottom of the stairs when we got back,” Alexia said.
“Maybe we should take them to the sleeping cells while we wait for dinner to be ready,” Renn suggested. They all agreed and headed back out into the large chamber where the mattresses leant against the wall. Renn and Lusam grabbed each end of one mattress and lifted it off the ground.
“Where should we put it?” Renn asked, nodding towards the mattress.
“At least four cells down that corridor,” Neala replied, glancing sideways at Alexia, who burst out laughing as she remembered their earlier conversation. Lusam’s face flushed as he too understood Neala’s meaning, but he remained silent. Renn also wore a wide grin as he and Lusam set off down the long corridor towards one of the cells at the far end. When they returned—slightly out of breath—Neala and Alexia were still standing in the exact same spot, and the second mattress remained leaning against the wall untouched. Renn didn’t seem to notice that the girls hadn’t even attempted to move the mattress, and instead, simply picked up one end and waited for Lusam to grab the other.
