The Longsword Chronicles: Book 02 - Sword and Circle

by GJ Kelly

  “Good Morning, my lord,” Captain Tyrane announced quietly.

  “Good Morning, Captain. Your men seem unusually busy for such an early hour?”

  “Aye. Before your arrival we felt no need of unusual precautions. Our counterparts in Jarn hold the north end of the road, and the Westguard are ever watchful at the borders with the old kingdom, Pellarn. But today you ascend the Pass.”

  Tyrane paused, and suddenly seemed a trifle uncomfortable. “My lord, we all know the stories of what awaits you there at the summit. Before your arrival our task was to hold the Pass closed against any who would deny it to you. Once you begin your ascent, it falls to us to hold it open for your return, and I’m re-deploying my forces accordingly.”

  Gawain nodded approvingly, appreciating the subtle differences Tyrane had made to his defences. The Captain, like Elayeen and Allazar, clearly wasn’t expecting an army of Morlochmen to fall upon them. But, knowing friends of Callodon were about to make the long climb to the ruin above and could survive there only as long as their packs allowed, the commander was clearly making his preparations as though such an army had already been sighted.

  “Thank you, Captain. I don’t imagine we’ll be more than a day or two, though we’ve water enough for ourselves and our horses for three if we’re careful. I appreciate knowing we have a strong rearguard to cover any eventualities.”

  “They’re good men, my lord, you needn’t worry about them, nor about your lady when she and her escort arrive. I have the letter here and will deliver it as soon as she arrives,” Tyrane tapped his tunic, where the letter was tucked in an inside pocket over his left breast.

  “Then there’s nothing more to be done, the wizard and I shall head up. Honour to you, Captain Tyrane, and to Callodon.”

  Tyrane stood to attention and saluted. “Honour to you, my lord, and to the crown.”

  Gawain nodded politely, turned, and walked back to the horses, mounting swiftly. Allazar was already in the saddle and gazing upward. If the wizard was apprehensive, he didn’t show it.

  “Stay close to the wall on the ascent, Allazar, I’ll lead with the pack-horse between us. If you’ve no head for heights, don’t look down, or outward. It’s a long way up. And a long way down.”

  And with that, Gwyn stepped forward, Gawain holding the trailing reins of the pack-horse, and the two men and three horses threaded their way through the makeshift obstacles Tyrane had set at the foot of the pass. Then, as the road began to slope and they were on the Pass proper, Gawain thought he heard Allazar take a deep breath. He didn’t blame him.

  The sun met them halfway up, and Gawain paused for his Remembrance. Last time making this climb, he and Gwyn had sprinted up the pass, almost beating the sun to the top. At such altitude, the sun rose earlier than it did below. But this time, horse and rider knew what awaited them, and were in no hurry. Gawain heard a sudden gasp from behind, snapped his eyes open and twisted in his saddle. Only to see Allazar, himself twisted around in his saddle, gazing in awe at the spectacle of the Sea of Hope at dawn, sparkling like a vast and undulating carpet of glittering blue diamonds in the south. From any other place, at any other time, it would have been a welcome and wondrous sight. But today, Gawain sighed and turned and eased Gwyn onwards and upwards, for today it meant only that they were nearing the horror that awaited them above.

  Near the crest of the Pass, a sharp bend in the track and a gentler slope, the final approaches to the summit, and here, where the track ran almost arrow-straight to the top, Allazar gasped again, and Gawain’s stomach sank. From horizon to horizon, nothing could be seen. Gawain, of course, had expected the desolation, but even he had tried to hide the worst of it in the dimmest corners of his memory.

  They rode in silence past the area where once the large and brightly painted shed had received, recorded and examined all visitors and goods incoming and outbound. Gwyn’s head bobbed, and drooped, and when they reached the cobbled square which had once marked the centre of the bustling market town of Downland, Gawain brought Gwyn to a halt, and let out a long and shuddering sigh.

  Allazar drew alongside the younger man, his eyes watering, head swinging this way and that, but to his credit, the wizard made no attempt to speak. There were no words of comfort in any language which could possibly alleviate the pain and utter desolation of the place.

  In truth, a year’s turning of the world about the sun had wrought some small changes to Gawain’s eye. The obscene white ash which once covered every inch of the land was gone, blown by salt south winds in summer and cold wet northerly gales in winter. Yet though the ash had gone, and no longer swirled underfoot, the land had a bleached and sterile appearance, like hard-baked clay, or vitrified sand.

  Gawain took a long pull from a water skin and offered it to Allazar, who simply shook his head and continued staring about him in utter disbelief.

  “Yonde…” Gawain coughed as his throat threatened to choke on the words. “Yonder is the road we take, southwest, to the Farin Bridge, thence south to the castletown.”

  Allazar noted the bleached cobbled road, wagon ruts worn deep from centuries of travel still plainly visible, frozen in stone perhaps for all time. It stretched away, undulating slightly, and here and there in the distance he could see shadows throwing into relief such contours in the landscape as there were. Here and there, around the cobbled square, were traces and shapes in the ground, marking the foundations of the more substantial stone buildings that had once stood here. Yet nothing taller than a few bleached and blasted rocks could be seen, all the way to the far horizon. And not a blade of grass.

  Gawain shivered, and eyed the sky. It was cloudy, and looking away to the northeast, great billowing clouds seemed to be roiling up over the distant plains of Callodon beyond the forest far below.

  “Will it rain?” Allazar whispered, as though to speak any louder would profane the memory of all those whose lives had ended here.

  Gawain shrugged. “Probably. Most of the rainfall we enjoyed came from the south, warm air from the sea rising up over the cliffs. But in winter, there were gales and squalls a-plenty from the north too. Usually,” Gawain cleared his throat again, “Usually such easterly storms blew themselves out before troubling us, but that one looks big enough to carry all the way. Come,” he announced, sitting taller in the saddle and hanging the water skin back in its place on his saddle, “It does no good to tarry here.”

  Their progress along the road to Raheen Castletown was steady, and made entirely in silence but for the eerie clattering of steel-shod hooves on the cobbles. From time to time, Gawain’s head swung suddenly here, suddenly there, as if remembering a place, or a person, or some event he had experienced long ago, or looking for signs that such a place had even existed at all. Once, Allazar sneaked a look at the young man’s face, and thought he caught sight of tears welling in Gawain’s eyes. But the wizard was fighting his own silent battle against the pricking at the back of his own eyes, and hurriedly turned his attention back to the road, and keeping the pack-horse close.

  For Gawain, this time there was no urge to launch Gwyn into a mad dash to the Keep. How she had survived the seemingly endless gallop from Downland to the Keep along this very same road a year ago, he did not know. Perhaps it was a testament to the wonder that was a Raheen charger, or perhaps some other, unseen force had kept poor Gwyn’s heart from bursting. Whatever the reason, this time both of them knew what awaited them, and neither were in any hurry to reach the ruins that lay at the end of this ancient road.

  From time to time, Gwyn paused, her mount lost in thought, and Allazar simply waited quietly and patiently until they moved off again. Once, they stopped to water the horses, which took a little more time. Neither man seemed anxious to dismount, as though stepping on the ground anywhere here in Raheen were sacrilege. But dismount they did, and while the horses drank their fill, Gawain nodded towards a spot in the road which seemed to rise above the rest.

  “The Farin Bridge,” he declared, shielding
his eyes against the glare. “Another few hours and we’ll be there.”

  Allazar simply nodded, eyeing the storm in the east before securing the water skins and checking the packs before they set off again. They walked the horses for a while until finally the eerie sensation of stepping on the bleached cobbles proved too much for them, and they mounted, and continued at a canter.

  The bridge was low and massively built, and was of simple construction with no side walls. Three arches spanned the Stryris at a narrow but quite deep point in its course where the river began to swing west on its journey to the distant falls. Much to Gawain’s surprise, the waters ran crystal clear, nothing at all like the vile white-brown ooze of a year ago.

  “It seems I was overly cautious with our supplies,” he said softly, pausing at the middle of the bridge to gaze over the edge into the depths beneath.

  “Nature will prevail, Longsword, though it may take many lifetimes. Nature always prevails.”

  Gawain sighed, and Gwyn moved onward, only to come to a halt again perhaps a dozen yards along the road from the castletown side of the bridge. The young warrior king turned his horse and gazed at the foot of the bridge suspiciously.

  “What is it, Longsword?”

  “Those stones. I don’t remember them being there.”

  On each side of the bridge, resting like a recumbent sentry, lay a large round white stone, perhaps three feet in diameter.

  “Some kind of foundation stones, perhaps,” Allazar opined, “Exposed by the blast of Morloch’s Breath?”

  “Perhaps. But I know this bridge well, there’s a stream not far from here where Gwyn chose me, so long ago now.” Gawain looked upstream, towards the south.

  “Covered by grasses then, and now exposed. I doubt you had eyes for such things in your younger days, and I doubt you had eyes for such things last time you passed this way.” Allazar said, gently in spite of his own sadness and horror at the wasteland around them.

  “You’re probably right, wizard,” Gawain acknowledged with a sigh, turning Gwyn along the road again. “Perhaps I’m simply trying to delay the inevitable for a while.”

  “There is no rush, Longsword, if you need to take more time…?”

  “No,” Gawain announced firmly, regally. “We have travelled far together, wizard, and for a single purpose. To delay now would be foolish, and indulgent. Come, let’s put these few more miles behind us at last.”

  And with that, Gwyn set off at a brisk canter, Allazar and the pack-horse not far behind.

  At the outskirts of the castletown, the rubble which had once been the symbolic wall surrounding the town lay bleached and exposed like the contents of a desecrated grave now that the dust and ashes of destruction had been blown and washed from them. Gawain barely glanced at them as they road through what had been one of the several north gates of the town, still following the cobbled road.

  Three miles from the Keep, and they saw its remains, rising at an angle, like a jagged finger pointing to the west. Closer still, and rubble and ruins no taller than a man were all that remained of the once proud stone towers and buildings that ringed the mighty keep, the landscape harsh now that the dust and ashes no longer soften edges and blurred outlines.

  Then through the gap in the rubble that had been the north wall, the wall that had encircled the Great Hall and Keep of Raheen, the wall that had once declared to all: Here dwell the Crowns of Raheen.

  Finally, with Allazar gazing stunned and disbelieving at the ruin all about them, they came to the great cobbled courtyard, and here the horses stopped, and Gwyn let out a low whinny towards the empty space where once the stables stood.

  Ahead of them, warped and twisted, the remains of the massive iron gates once bound and riveted to the mighty oaken portals that gave way to the Great Hall. Allazar, slack jawed, gazed up at the gaping rents in the scorched and blackened walls of what was once the mighty Keep of Raheen, Gawain’s home, home of the Kings of Raheen.

  Gawain dismounted, and held Gwyn’s majestic head, rubbing her ears and speaking softly. Tears filled his eyes, and Allazar’s too, and the wizard dismounted quickly, anxious to place his own horse between himself and the Longsword warrior, so that the younger man would not see the sorrow and pity streaming freely down his cheeks. The wizard sniffed, and wiped his eyes and his nose on the sleeve of his robes, muttering a quiet chant for strength and calm to quell the great turmoil of tears he knew had been but moments away. Small wonder the young man despised wizards so; it was Morloch who had done all this, and Morloch was a wizard.

  “Come Allazar, this is what I would have you see.”

  The wizard took another deep breath, sniffed again, and stepped out from behind his horse with a small bag slung over his shoulder. “Coming, Longsword, just fetching a few things.”

  Gawain walked ahead, picking his way through the wreckage about the arched entrance to the great hall. A year of weather had done the work of many hands, the southerly winds whistling through the rents in the walls sweeping away dust and ash and debris, the rains of all four seasons washing them clean.

  Allazar gazed around the scorched and broken walls, noting here and there a twisted sconce or a cracked socket where once a torch or proud banner had hung. Ahead lay the thrones upon their great marble pedestals, cracked and blackened like the walls all around them. Sea breezes whistled through the ruin from time to time, and but for the echoing of their booted heels upon the stone floor, a cavernous silence demanded respect, and awe.

  “This is what I brought you all this way to see.” Gawain said softly, and came to a stop.

  Behind them, the sudden clopping of hooves made them wheel in alarm, reaching for weapons, but it was Gwyn, of course, and the other horses following behind. There was nothing without the broken Keep, and the loneliness outside had been too much for Gwyn to bear. Gawain nodded sadly, and turned back to face the thrones.

  “There,” he said. “There on the floor.”

  Allazar stepped forward and stood alongside his king, for standing there, before the broken thrones and within those broken walls the wizard knew beyond all doubt that that is what Gawain had become, and not just in name. Before he had seen Raheen, Allazar had bound himself by oath to the Longsword warrior he instinctively knew possessed a destiny, and before that of course by order of Brock of Callodon. But now Allazar had seen Raheen. Now he understood a measure of the forces which had moulded the dreadful warrior who had wrought such vengeance upon the Ramoth. Now he understood what power had driven the young man on his quest into the Dragon’s Teeth, and why, after a year of wreaking vengeance and justice upon those who had done this, why Morloch was right to be afraid.

  Looking down, Allazar saw the slotted home-stone in which the mighty blade upon Gawain’s back had spent so long in repose, undisturbed. And all around, within that Circle of Justice, where petitioners and accused alike had stood awaiting the King’s judgement, strange runes etched in the highly polished marble which bore no sign of any damage at all.

  Allazar wiped his eyes and looked again. No, he thought, not etched in the marble, but within the stone itself!

  “May I?” He asked tentatively, indicating the circle.

  Gawain simply shrugged, and while the wizard gaped up at the sky at the sound of gulls wheeling, walked across the circle to sit upon the polished steps in front of the thrones. He took a lump of frak from his pocket, studied it for a moment before looking around the hall as if he expected Cordell, the Lord Chamberlain, to chide him for eating thus, then pared a slice and began to chew, lost in memories.

  Allazar, still gazing up and about the Keep, turning this way and that, stepped into the circle, and then walked its circumference, gazing at the runes below the polished surface. He had not seen the like, either in reality or in books during his studies at the D’ith Hallencloister. He reached into his shoulder bag, took out a pencil and notebook ‘liberated’ from the Callodon outpost at the foot of the Pass, and with the King’s throne as a point of referenc
e, he began making copies of the runes, moving slowly from each to the next as he worked.

  In no time at all the wizard forgot where he was, forgot Gawain sitting on the steps which formed the raised platform upon which the thrones of Raheen had reposed for countless centuries. There was only the work, the floor, the circle, and the runes.

  There were three concentric circles of runes and one hundred and twenty runes in each circle. Then an expanse of polished marble floor in or upon which Allazar could see nothing except his reflection gazing back up at him. And at last, in the centre of the floor, encircling the slotted home-stone, another circle of runes containing only twelve symbols. When he was certain he had transcribed all of them, in their correct relationship and orientation, he hurried to sit beside Gawain to display his handiwork.

  “You were right Longsword, this is surely unique! See, see here, the three circles, then the fourth around the home-stone…” Allazar, engrossed and completely enthralled turned the pages of his notebook, enthusing over each one.

  Gawain simply stared at the wizard, chewing silently on his frak.

  “… and here, the number and alignment of symbols. I know not what to make of it yet. These are old, Longsword, very, very old, and I confess I know not the meaning. At first, I thought this outer row was simply Old Elvish of some kind, see how the cursive is similar to modern Elvish script? But the verticals are wrong…” Allazar put the notebook on step between them where they sat, and fished a brown paper package from his bag, untying it and peeling back the wrapper to reveal a thick steak sandwich from which he took a huge bite before picking up the notebook with his free hand.

  “Nyummf,” He mumbled, his mouth full and chewing furiously, “Nyummf a thiff…” before swallowing and then “Look at this, this circle has a hint of the stylistic runes which adorn the illustrated Book of Thangar, one of the earliest tomes still legible in the library at the Hallencloister!” He jabbed a corner of his immense sandwich towards the notebook, turning a page clumsily with the thumb of the hand holding the book. “And this third, it has the outward appearance of primina runiform, the earliest of human mystic writings, but there are no serifs! See?”