The Crystal Chalice (Book 1)

by R. J. Grieve

  He paused, as if for effect. The King stared down at him with a slight frown between his brows. “What did you have in mind?”

  “We will each select a representative of our species to fight on behalf of the opposing armies.”

  Andarion’s eyes narrowed in suspicion. “Now why should I agree to that?”

  “Because, as we both know, it is your only chance of survival. If your representative defeats mine, then we will retire back across the Harnor. If we win, you will open the gates of the city and surrender it to us.”

  “And what if I refuse to agree to such a contest?”

  A baleful look crept into the Turog’s yellow eyes. “Then-we-will-wear-you-down,” he said, pronouncing each word with irrefutable certainty. “We have the time and more than enough resources. We already know that you will receive no help from Serendar. You are alone, and each man that falls will not be replaced. You know that what I say is true.”

  Celedorn, who had been watching with such burning intensity that he had almost forgotten to breathe, turned swiftly to Sarrick. “Tell your brother to delay his answer.”

  One look at Celedorn’s face was enough for Sarrick to obey without question.

  He crossed to the King and murmured something in his ear. Andarion looked startled for a moment, before nodding his agreement.

  “I will consider your words and give you my reply this evening. Come back to the wall just before dusk.”

  Gorth grinned mockingly and bowed in agreement. The King watched the arrogant figure stride back to the enemy ranks, then turned swiftly to Celedorn. Before he could speak, Celedorn, forgetting the usual courtesies, said abruptly: “I must speak with you privately.”

  Without waiting for a reply, he spun on his heel and descended the steps to the city street, then, at a tremendous pace, strode up the hill towards the palace without waiting to see whether they were following him or not. When Sarrick and the King joined him in the royal apartments, they discovered that they had somehow picked up Relisar in their train.

  Without the slightest preamble, Celedorn said: “Agree to his terms, with the sole condition that he, Gorth, must fight on behalf of the Turog.”

  Sarrick gave a yelp of alarm. “Are you insane? Who on earth would we find to fight a Great-turog?”

  Celedorn looked him in the eyes. “I will fight him,” he answered in a quietly compelling voice.

  “He is the one?” Andarion asked, as if in confirmation of something he already knew.

  “He is the one. My search is over.”

  Sarrick looked wildly back and forth between them. “What one? What are you talking about?”

  Andarion turned to his brother. “Gorth is the Great-turog who butchered Celedorn’s family and gave him the scars he bears. He has been searching for him for twenty years in order to exact vengeance and now he has found him.”

  “Vengeance!” cried Sarrick. “No man has ever defeated a Great-turog in single combat! Not ever! Gorth will just be finishing what he started twenty years ago, by killing the last survivor of the Westrin family.”

  “Celedorn is.......” began Andarion, but Sarrick interrupted him.

  “Celedorn is exceptionally skilled with the sword and a man of courage. I have seen him fight and no longer have any doubts on that score, but he is human. What he seeks to do is impossible.”

  “I was going to say that he is more motivated to succeed than anyone else.”

  “It does not matter! This is suicide - except that when he fails, he will bring all of us down with him!”

  The King’s voice grew a little harsh. “Well, what alternative do you propose, Sarrick? Every word that creature spoke was true and you know it. They will wear us down, man by man, and stone by stone, until the city falls. No one will help us. No one will come to our aid. What do you propose we do?”

  Sarrick flung away from him and crossing to the table, began to drum his fingers restlessly upon it. “Gorth will laugh in our faces when he hears that we insist on fighting a Great-turog.”

  “Nonsense,” said Andarion sharply. “They would have sent nothing less.”

  “How can we possibly commit all our fates into the hands of one man? I have no doubt that Celedorn will fight to the utmost of his abilities, but I do not think it will be enough. You have fought a Great-turog, Andarion. Could you defeat one?”

  “No, I could not. In fact, I am fairly certain that Gorth is the Turog I fought that day in the forest and as you know, brother, he broke my arm and would have finished me, if you had not intervened.”

  Relisar, who up until that moment had taken no part in the discussion, suddenly spoke up. “Celedorn can do it. I have faith in him.”

  “As do I,” confirmed Andarion quietly.

  Celedorn looked directly at Sarrick. “If you refuse me permission to fight him on your behalf,” he declared in a steely voice. “I will challenge him myself.”

  An exasperated breath exploded from Sarrick. “Do you have a death-wish?”

  A chill smile touched Celedorn’s grey eyes. “No. In fact, I have never had greater reason to live, but some things are simply inevitable.”

  “Have you ever fought a Great-turog before?”

  “Not single-handed,” Celedorn conceded.

  “Then how do you know you can defeat it? How do you know that you can do what no other man has done?”

  “I don’t.”

  Sarrick turned pleadingly to his brother. “The Turog only suggest such a contest because they know full well that whoever we send will be defeated. They only wish to save themselves the trouble of a long siege.”

  “I am aware of that, but somehow, don’t ask me how or why, I feel instinctively that this contest is meant to take place. In terms of rationality, I cannot dispute what you are saying, but against that, I must remind you that we stand no more chance of success with a siege. All we will be doing is delaying the end and causing great suffering. Whereas this way......this way, I feel there is some hope.”

  Sarrick, who had been pacing the room in frustration while his brother had been speaking, stopped before Relisar.

  “Well, Relisar? You have the gift of percipience. What should we do?”

  “The outcome of this contest has been hidden from me, but like the King, I too believe that it must take place. Celedorn, who once attacked and pillaged Eskendria, must now risk his life to save it. This was meant to be, Sarrick, do not oppose it.”

  Sarrick stared tensely at Relisar for several moments, before suddenly bowing his head in defeat. “Very well. I can see no other alternative.” He looked at Celedorn. “Let us hope that the name bestowed upon you by the Turog proves prophetic.”

  When Sarrick and Celedorn had left, Relisar remained alone with the King. The old Sage crossed to a chair and sat down tiredly beside the bright fire burning in the hearth.

  “I am getting too old for all this,” he murmured. “I never thought to live to see all I hold dear on the brink of ruin. Only one man now stands between us and destruction.”

  Andarion sighed and sat down opposite him. “I only wish that your notion that Celedorn might be Erren-dar had proved correct.”

  “Well in a sense he is our champion, as he goes out to fight on our behalf.”

  “Yet he admits himself that he is not the one. Surely you should try to summon Erren-dar one last time before the fight takes place. Surely now the time must be right, for there may never be another opportunity.”

  “Alas, Sire, I am an old fool who has bungled every attempt I have ever made. Even though it turns out that Elorin is descended from Tissro and could therefore be the key that I had been seeking, I do not know how to use her to summon the Champion. I must accept the bitter taste of failure. I must accept that perhaps we send our friend out to die.”

  A wistful smile softened Andarion’s face. “We do not send him, old friend, in fact, I don’t think we could prevent him. Yet before he goes, he must face perhaps the most difficult task of all - he must tell Elorin.
”

  On leaving the royal apartments, Celedorn did not immediately seek out Elorin, but went instead into the palace gardens, responding to the overwhelming need to be alone with his thoughts. He found a secluded spot by an old wall, where a few late blossoms of a climbing rose opened warm, crimson faces. As he sat on the bench, a long shaft of molten gold broke from between the heavy, grey clouds and lit up the wall with a light that still contained a little warmth in its touch. It touched the blood-red faces of the roses and gleamed like enamel on each glossy leaf. It enveloped the man sitting on the bench with the tenderness of a lover’s embrace. He was only distantly aware of it, for he sat as he always did when deep in thought, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees, staring at the ground between his feet. It was thus that Elorin found him.

  She quietly sat beside him, remembering how she had done something similar in the orchard of the White Monastery, the day she had asked him to marry her.

  He did not respond to her presence but she knew he was aware of her. At last she said: “How long do we have?”

  Swiftly he raised his head, realising that she already knew. “Until noon tomorrow.”

  She did not reply, but reaching above his head, plucked a red rose from the wall and cupped it tenderly between her hands. She said nothing. No word of anger or recrimination. No tears or attempts to plead with him to change his mind. He reached over, and detaching one of her hands from the rose, slid his fingers between hers. She moved a little closer and rested her head on his shoulder. They sat for a long time, neither moving nor speaking, until the sun moved behind Relisar’s tower and the beam of light was cut off.

  That night, the tenderness between them was such that it departed from the realms of the purely physical and ascended into the realm of the soul. In the quiet darkness of the night, they spoke of the year they had shared together, of their journey through the Forsaken Lands. They spoke as those who treasure the past so greatly because they can see no future. They talked of their love for each other and the joy they had found together. They talked of everything - except tomorrow. For the first time, Elorin noticed that when she touched her lips to the hard ridges of the scars on his cheek, he no longer recoiled from her. It was as if he had finally accepted that they no longer mattered, as if he had finally realised that she loved him just as he was. When at last their words fell silent, they lay at peace in each other’s arms, savouring the warmth and intimacy as something that they might never share again.

  Dawn found Elorin awake and watching over him. As the first light began to creep stealthily into the room and the first trill of birdsong took to the chill morning air, she raised herself on her elbow to look at him lovingly. He had drifted off to sleep, his eyes were closed and his chest rose and fell gently. Lightly she brushed a strand of his dark hair back from his forehead and as she did so, the strengthening light caught the slim band of gold inlaid with tiny moonpearls glistening on her finger. She looked at it fondly, remembering how he had given it to her the night before.

  “I make good my omission on our wedding day,” he had said, as he put it on her finger. “Since finding the heart-shaped pearl at Skeris-morl, I can think of no other gem that would become you more.”

  Looking at him again, she knew that he thought her calmness arose from her overwhelming confidence in his ability to win, and she continued to allow him to believe that: but it was not true. Her calmness arose from the fact that she had made up her mind that if he lost, she could not bear to continue living in a word that no longer held him. If he departed from it, then so, too, would she.

  Shortly before noon, they both repaired to the King’s apartments. Sarrick, Triana and Relisar were already there, having announced their intention of coming with him. The companions would not be facing the Turog alone, as Andarion had ordered the entire Eskendrian army to deploy in battle order before the city, to ensure that there was no foul play. The place of contest lay on some level ground, near a small copse of trees, just beyond the ruins of the old bridge.

  To leave the city, the Eskendrians had been forced to build a ramp similar to the one the Red Turog had tried to use and which had been destroyed in the first assault.

  At first, Andarion had tried to persuade Triana to stay within the safety of the city, but her reply had silenced all his arguments.

  “If Celedorn loses, nowhere is safe.”

  Sarrick, who had been staring moodily out of the window, sprang to his feet when Celedorn entered. To the Prince’s surprise, he wore no armour but was dressed in his usual fashion in black breeches and boots and a longish leather waistcoat over a loose linen shirt. Only his sword, swinging in its scabbard by his side, indicated any warlike intentions.

  “Where is your armour?”

  “I have decided not to wear armour, as it will only be an encumbrance. Gorth will outmatch me in strength and I know of no armour which could withstand the power of his blows. The only area in which I may excel him is speed, and I will be relying so greatly on that quality that I must not wear anything that will slow me down.”

  “But surely you will take a shield?”

  “No. My sword will be my sole means of defence as well as attack.”

  “There is sense in what you say,” agreed Andarion. “For when I fought Gorth, he cleaved my shield in two with a single blow. However, I will give you something that you might find useful.”

  He disappeared into a side chamber and returned with two broad wrist straps in his hands. They were beautifully made of the finest leather and were tooled in dull gold with the image of the chalice flower.

  “You will have to repulse many heavy blows. These will help to strengthen your wrists.” Celedorn nodded and made to take them from the King, but Andarion insisted on putting them on himself, fastening the tiny buckles on the underside of the straps.

  “Is that tight enough?”

  “Yes, that’s fine.”

  Their eyes met. “We are all coming with you. The army has already been deployed beyond the gate and the Ravenshold brigands wait to escort us through the city. If this is a trick, the Turog will pay dearly for it.”

  “It is no trick,” replied Celedorn quietly. “Why should it be? Gorth has no doubts that he will win.”

  Andarion smiled suddenly, with the unexpectedness of the sun on a winter’s day. “That is only because he does not know who he is fighting.”

  “He did not ask?”

  “He asked, but I told him he would be fighting the Lord of Westrin - which conveyed nothing to him.”

  “Good. I want to look in his yellow eyes when he realises who I am.”

  “At least the weather favours you,” Sarrick observed.

  “Why is that?” asked Triana.

  “Gorth is over seven feet tall, a whole nine inches taller than Celedorn. He will have a lot of looking up to do, so it is just as well there is no sun to get in his eyes.” As he spoke, he crossed to a table on which lay a cloak of royal crimson fastened with a golden clasp. He lifted it in his hands and carried it to the King.

  Taking it from him, Andarion held it out to Celedorn and said formally: “My brother and I wish you to wear this today, Lord of Westrin.”

  Celedorn, well aware of the honour being paid to him, said: “I cannot wear this.”

  “Indeed you can,” the King assured him solemnly. “You are of the royal blood and entitled to wear it. Do you not realise that after my brother and sister, you are next in line to the throne of Eskendria? Your mother was a princess of the royal house, honour her, and me, by wearing this today.”

  Celedorn bowed his head slightly, deeply moved, as the King fastened the golden clasp to his shoulder.

  When he turned to Elorin, he saw her eyes shining with an expression that pierced him to the heart. Oblivious to his audience, he bent and kissed her as he had never kissed her before. In his touch, he spoke wordlessly of his love and his joy, yet underneath lay the faintest whisper of a message of farewell.

  Triana, watching them,
felt her throat close and her hand blindly sought Andarion’s. Relisar blinked rapidly and looked away. Even Sarrick hung his head, rendered silent by what he saw.

  When Celedorn released Elorin, he turned to face the King and said calmly: “I am ready.”

  The Ravenshold brigands preceded them in full battle array down the winding streets towards the gate. The King walked behind them, with Celedorn to the right and his brother to his left. Relisar and the two women followed directly behind them.

  Word of what was happening had somehow got around the townspeople and they had turned out, en masse, to line the streets. They knew the gravity of the situation better than any, and consequently they stood in silence as they passed. An occasional voice called out to Celedorn from the crowd. “The chalice flower protect you. The Father of Light give you strength.”

  At last, they arrived at the city’s gates, whose massive timbers stood open to reveal an intimidating sight. From the vantage-point of the gate, they could see beyond the dried up river bed to where the Eskendrian army had fanned out in battle formation to right and left of the bridge. Cutting through the centre of the plain that lay before them, ran a white road that diminished into the distance towards the prominence where Andarion and Elorin had once, long ago, viewed the city. To the left of the road, lay a broad expanse of level grass broken only by the presence of a small copse, whose bare branches pointed at the sky. Beyond that area, facing the Eskendrians, lay the main Turog army, drawn well back from the river as agreed. In their thousands, like a dense black forest, the hordes stretched across the plain from east to west. In the space between the two opposing armies, stood Gorth, flanked by a smaller Turog bearing the jet-black banner of the Destroyer, which bore no device or symbol.

  The sky brooded above the scene, sullen and overcast, giving the light the strange metallic quality of liquid mercury. The clouds hung heavily, like the lid of a pot, giving a sense of being closed in, oppressed. The only bright spot of colour in the entire plain was the blue and gold pennant of Eskendria, fluttering bravely on its tall staff.