The Power Within: The Chronicles of Hollyglade Wayrender

by Steve Barker

  “Nevertheless, I shall always be readily at your side should you need my counsel, or other service. Rest assured, once I have unlocked the secrets I endeavour to discover and to master, you shall never need fear for your kingdom. Together, we shall bring peace to the world.” Slowly, he turned and moved back to the table.

  “My Prince, let us not dwell on politics or the past, just now. Today is a great day for you, your house, and your Kingdom. Take heart. Once you are King, we shall move to set right the wrongs done against your house and your kingdom. For now, enjoy the celebration. Tomorrow we shall begin to shape your Kingdom to be pure and strong, just as its new King is pure and strong.”

  The Prince picked up his cup of wine and raised it. “To a strong and prosperous Loria.”

  “Yes, my Prince. Strong and pure.”

  ◆ ◆ ◆ ◆

  The floor of the cell was rough stone. It was not like the cells below the castle’s keep which were constructed block by block. It appeared to be carved from the rock as a single hollowed out room. Not that it could really be called a room when its occupant could not stand without having to bend to keep from pressing his head against the ceiling.

  Jeron had not seen the sun for a long time. He wasn’t sure if it had been days, weeks, or longer. His back, knees, feet, and hands had developed sores from constant contact with his rough-hewn hollow. The steel bars that made up the one wall that was not rock were no easier on him than the rest of the cavity he was confined to. In all the time he had been kept here, he had not seen his captor. A guard, who was disguised in plain and indistinct clothing, kept his face covered with cloth when bringing scraps of food, or removing the shallow bucket Jeron had been provided as a sort of chamber pot.

  There was no light, but when the guard came in carrying a torch, Jeron was able to catch a glimpse of some of what lay beyond the bars of the cell. It appeared that there was a short hallway on this side of the door which the guard came through and exited from, and at least one more cell opposite his, which was now empty.

  Until a few days ago, or what he assumed were days, there had been a young Elvish girl occupying the cell across from him. She did not speak the common tongue, so he had not been able to glean much from his attempts to communicate with her. He was able to understand that her name was Aleera. He had deduced, by the fact she spoke only her native tongue, that she had been brought here, wherever here was, from the Western Mountains somewhere beyond the source of the River High. That was one of the last strongholds of the Elvish, and a place where men dared not venture without an invitation.

  The Elvish had lived there for longer than men can remember, and from substantially earlier than men began recording their own history. The Elvish fiercely defended their lands, and did not recognize the borders of men. Both the Kingdom of Loria, and their southern neighbours in Sudara, had tried to bring the Elvish lands into their own control, and both kingdoms had failed time and again.

  The Elvish prefer the high mountains, and the thick forests of the foothills. Such places are nearly impossible for an invading force to gain a foothold. The Elvish are long-lived and cunning warriors, and do not fight battles the way men do.

  Whomever it was that managed to capture this girl, must have gone to great lengths to do so, and must have had incredible resources at their disposal. But why? Why a seemingly random Elvish girl? And what could we possibly have in common? The questions gnawed at him.

  In the time he had spent on the unforgiving floor of this crude jail, he had speculated on the many reasons a person could have had for wanting to capture him. Ransom was the chiefest among them, but he had dismissed that once his stay had grown to more than a few days. Ransoms were rare, but were never something prolonged. No one had come to try to extract information from him, so he did not suspect having been captured by a rival. There had been peace in the realm for a generation, and neither of the Kings, nor petty lords had more than small trade disputes.

  The girl had been taken from her cell only a short time ago, yet it had felt like an eternity to him. Having lost the company of this girl, Jeron felt more alone than ever before. Though they could not speak each other’s language, the fact that Jeron had someone else to talk to had given him hope. Even though they had not been able to understand each other’s words, Jeron had felt an immense closeness to her. She had been the only person he had had any real contact with since he had been imprisoned.

  His sense of loss ate at him. He hadn’t even been awake when she was taken. He had fallen asleep, and when he awoke, she had been gone. Was she even real? Had she even been there at all? Have I been dreaming, or hallucinating? Am I saying this aloud? He had lost all sense of time, all sense of reality.

  Jeron was truly alone. In the first few days of his captivity, or what he thought were days, he had demanded of the guard an answer as to where he was and why he was here, but he was given no reply of any kind. In fact, Jeron had not heard the guard speak to anyone. He had begun to wonder if the guard was mute. Over the course of that same span, Jeron had tried to devise a method of escape. He found none. The rock was solid, the steel bars were thick and set deep into the stone, and there seemed to be no door in the bars at all. It was as if the cell had been built around him with the intent that he never leave, neither alive nor dead.

  He slept occasionally. Though he ate every morsel of food he had been provided, he was losing a considerable amount of weight. He had always been strong and fit, but now he felt like a shadow of his former self, weak and lethargic.

  The day he last remembered being somewhere other than in his present captivity, he had been on his way to Westport, to visit his family’s crypt and mourn his father in the Western mountains just beyond the seaside trading hub which lay close to the Demarian border. The journey was a three to five day ride from Magnaville, depending on how a group travelled, and Jeron had wanted to make it a short trip, so had decided to make the trip alone. It was not the first trip he had made on his own. He had spent several summers at the Hot Lake, and along the coast where the River Low meets the sea, with cousins from the southern plains. He had felt that this trip would not be a risk, even though it travelled along the border road, since there had been peace in the region for so long, and he planned to travel light and plainly dressed.

  How wrong he had been. It was on the third night when camping by the roadside, something Jeron often enjoyed, that he had been set upon in the night. While fast asleep he had been taken by more than a few men, odds that he likely could not have overcome awake and armed. The men had rendered him unconscious, the lump on the back of his head had only recently healed. Jeron had awoken in the cell he still occupied. Neither questions nor answers had come since. He wondered how much longer it would be before he went mad. Have I gone mad already? Is this just a dream? Either seemed better to him than wasting away in his personal dungeon.

  Jeron awoke to the sound of the outer door opening. He sat up and slid the shallow bucket to the edge of the steel bars and backed away, as was the expectation he had come to learn. This time something was different. It was not the guard who approached his cell. As he cowered against the rear wall of the stone cavity, a darkly cloaked figure stepped into view. Jeron’s wavy black hair, which had grown noticeably longer since his incarceration, covered his face as he hugged his knees to his chest and pressed his side to the wall.

  With one eye, he peered through his disheveled locks, and began to shiver as the veiled, arcane figure stood at the bars. Jeron could not make out a face through the shadow cast by the hood of the cloak, nor could he see the hands that were hidden in the long sleeves of the robe. Jeron thought about speaking, about posing the questions he had asked himself over and over, but he could not force out the words. He felt cold, fearful like never before.

  Gradually, the sound of breathing seeped from within the hood of the cloak. One of the figure’s hands appeared from it’s sleeve and beckoned to Jeron.

  “Come,” called a deep and commanding voice.<
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  Jeron couldn’t move, wouldn’t move. He felt both paralyzed with fear, and stubbornly defiant. The need to resist and deny the command at all cost was strong, yet something compelled him to his feet. His body started to move, though he tried to restrain himself. He clenched his jaw so hard that he felt his muscles burn as he attempted to keep himself away from the bars.

  “No” Jeron managed to rasp “Who... are…. you?”. He felt pressure on his neck and a sudden dryness in his throat. He thought that if he tried to utter another word, that his mouth would tear and start to bleed. He was on his feet now, moving slowly to the front of the cell. He put his hands up to stop himself for fear of driving his own head into the bars, and when he made contact with the steel, he found himself gripping it with all his strength.

  This was obviously a person of incredible power. Jeron’s mind raced through all the beings who could possibly have the magical strength which currently compelled him. This could not be a wizard, their order did not shave or cut their hair, and Jeron saw no beard protruding over the neck of the robe. This was no Elvish mage, they would not hide their faces, nor their intent.

  This had to be a Sorcerer. Who could this be, and what does he want with me? Jeron had heard that there had been a sorcerer in the capital just before his father died, but he hadn't heard anything other than that, and assumed it was just idle talk. Is this that sorcerer, or could I be somewhere other than in Magnaville? Jeron’s mind raced through all the possible scenarios that could have brought him here, but could come to no conclusion as he fought, and failed to regain control of himself.

  From within the folds of his cloak, the Sorcerer withdrew a small vial with one hand, and a small knife with the other. He stepped toward the bars Jeron gripped unwillingly and pressed the rim of the empty vial against the fingers of Jeron’s left hand. Then with his other hand, pressed the tip of the knife into Jeron’s hand to break the skin.

  Jeron winced and let out a rasping groan as the knife entered the back of his weakened hand. The pain was tremendous and overwhelming. Jeron was normally not a weak man and readily dealt with small injuries with a dismissive ease. After so much time suffering through dehydration and near starvation, he found that his nerves had become extremely sensitive and that he did not have the mental fortitude to endure even the smallest of cuts.

  The blood trickled down the back of Jeron’s hand and into the Sorcerer’s vial. The warmth of his own blood surprised Jeron, as he had felt so cold for so long confined within this stone box. After a moment the vial was nearly full, and the Sorcerer stepped back from the bars. Jeron felt his grip on the steel release as he sank to the floor. He took his left hand in his right, and tried to stem the flow of blood, as he watched the Sorcerer place the knife somewhere within the folds of his robe, and bring out another vial. This vial had a cork stopper and contained a black liquid. Jeron watched as the Sorcerer used his thumb to flick the stopper from the vial, and then raise them both to his eye level. As he did so the lower half of the Sorcerer’s face caught the light.

  Jeron stared into the Sorcerer’s hood to see the scarred and wrinkled face of this mysterious practitioner of the arcane. “What do you want with me?” he wheezed. The Sorcerer gave no hint that he had heard Jeron as he began to pour a drop of the black liquid into the vial containing Jeron’s blood. As Jeron watched the blood and the strange black liquid mix, his jaw dropped at what he saw. The blood began to smoke and turn white. Quickly, the whole vial became as white as ivory, and the Sorcerer’s mouth spread into a sinister grin revealing his graying teeth.

  Reaching into his robe once more, the Sorcerer retrieved another cork and sealed the vial, and without a word he turned and left the cells. As the door closed and blackness returned to the crude prison, Jeron crept to the back wall of his hold, curled up in the corner, and began to shiver.

  ◆ ◆ ◆ ◆

  The morning came with rain from a thoroughly dark sky. Yesterday had been one of the warmest and sunniest days of the summer. The city had been full of people who had come from every region of the country to witness the coronation of Loria’s new King. The festival of coronation was in full swing despite the rain. The tournament to celebrate the new king and give glory to the beginning of his reign was set to last twelve days. Knights and archers, minstrels and players, had all travelled from various parts of the realm to mark the occasion with tests of skill and displays of theatrics.

  The young King sat at a table in his chambers overlooking the city. The desk was covered in various books and scrolls that the King had requested from his Royal Historian. He had been reading the histories of his family and of the kingdom, hoping to learn from the stories of his forefathers how he should rule, and what kind of man he needed become.

  Prince Harford had ascended to the throne only a month after his father, King Jerold The Just had died, ending the longest reign of any Lorian king. Jerold’s reign had brought about the longest era of peace the region had known. For generations the kingdoms of Demaria, Loria, and Sudara had fought over where borders were drawn, who had the rights to the trade routes along various rivers, and who controlled the Narrowlands, which sat between the Eastern and Western seas. Jerold The Just had been known as a wise and patient man.

  In the first days of King Jerold’s reign, the now aged King Dermond of Demaria had massed a large force along the border which spanned the Narrowlands, making many of the Lords of Loria fear an invasion. King Jerold, instead of matching troop for troop, and rather than sending an envoy of negotiators, travelled to the border himself under a flag of truce. The newly crowned King Jerold rode alone, accompanied by no soldiers or knights, and requested safe passage to treat with King Dermond.

  With great suspicion and doubt, he was escorted to the Demarian side of the border, and sat for three days in the war tents of the Demarian army commander while King Dermond made his way from the capital of Rivershore, to see for himself if the Lorian King had indeed dared cross the border alone. They met for an entire day as the seventeen year old King Jerold the Just made his impression upon his northern neighbour.

  Jerold’s father had been a warrior, and it had been assumed that Jerold would follow in his footsteps, looking to make his mark on history by expanding his kingdom at the expense of his neighbours. This assumption by the advisors of the then relatively new Demarian King, was the driving force behind the build up of Demarian military assets at the border with Loria.

  King Jerold was more interested in building a legacy of prosperity through trade, and managed to convince King Dermond that peace was the best climate for all the region’s kingdoms to be able to prosper. History now tells that Jerold was so humbly charismatic, that he and his Demarian counterpart turned a war camp into a two day feast celebrating newly signed pacts of peace and trade.

  Harford was no such king. He was young, a boy of only twelve years old, and had been second in line to the throne of Loria. His brother, a man ninteen years of age, had been groomed for the throne, schooled in leadership and diplomacy, and trained in the arts of combat and war. There had been a plan for Harford to begin joining his older brother in such lessons, once he was closer to becoming a man, that he might support his brother’s reign as many a king’s sibling had done before. But their father had passed before his time, and their mother had long since been taken by the winter fever, when both brothers had still been boys.

  Thus, after the disappearance of his elder brother, Harford was left to rule with the advice of those his father had chosen to serve in the King’s Vestry, and the guidance of the recently arrived and newly devoted Sorcerer.

  Ni’Morstrom had come to Magnaville shortly before King Jerold had passed away, but had not attended court in the castle until the late King’s body was on route to be laid to rest in his ancestral Crypt. It was during this first appearance at court, that the Sorcerer had introduced himself to Prince Harford and pledged his service.

  The young prince was advised by members of his Vestry not to accept th
e service of the Sorcerer, telling him that a King having masters of the arcane arts in their court was an old tradition, and one that had not been necessary since his grandfather had broken with the practice. But Harford was young and impressionable, and was afraid of insulting anyone who offered their service to him, and so the Sorcerer was granted a seat on the Vestry and space to work within the castle walls.

  As the newly crowned King sat looking out over the city from the windows of his chambers, he recalled all the events that had taken place over the last few weeks. He missed his brother, and his father, and wished there were some way he could bring them back. He was so lost in thought that he did not hear the Sorcerer enter.

  “Pardon the interruption my King. I have come with news about the disappearance of your brother.”

  With a look of impossible hope, the young King sprang from his chair and took a couple of steps toward the Sorcerer “Did they find him? Is he alive? Where was he? What happened to him?” The questions flooded from him in a desperate desire for some knowledge of his lost sibling.

  “Your Majesty, I must bear to you unfortunate news. Your brother is dead. I am truly sorry.”

  Despondent, King Harford slumped to the steps at the edge of his bed. Dropping his head into his hand, he began to weep. The King was instantly crushed. Though he was King, and ruled a powerful kingdom which was the region’s centre for trade and its strongest military power, he was still a boy who loved his brother. With the loss of his father, and now his brother, he felt that everything he held dear had been ripped from his life. Burdens, the weight of which he could not have imagined, had been thrust upon him long before he could have hoped to have the strength to shoulder them. “No” he sobbed “What happened?”