Gilmreth the Awakening

by Raymond L. Weil

  Carefully mixing the ingredients together, she ground them down into a thick, reddish-tinged paste. Taking up the small sharp knife in her right hand, she marveled briefly at its masterful workmanship. With this knife, she would set Gilmreth free, for it was a spell knife; a special knife created by an ancient sorcerer to enact the dragon spell!

  She then wove the fingers of her left hand through an intricate pattern while speaking the incantation needed to invoke the beginning of the powerful spell. Red fire seemed to radiate from her fingertips in mysterious, nebulous interconnected lines. The small copper bowl began to glow with a soft red spectral light. Pressing the sharp, shiny blade of the knife against the soft yielding skin of her left wrist, she felt a sudden, sharp pain as she made a shallow incision. Instantly, red blood welled up. Turning her wrist over Jalene watched, with a near demonic gleam in her eyes, as the warm blood dripped slowly into the waiting copper bowl. As the final ingredient was added, the bowl began to glow brighter.

  Stirring the mixture slowly, she watched with growing exhilaration as it began to bubble and smolder. A foul, acrid stench rose up, pervading the room. As it did so, she began reciting the rest of the ancient words of the dragon spell, her voice flowing smoothly. She spoke in the old tongue, repeating the words in a steady rhythm, chanting the spell out in a clear, confident voice. Each syllable pronounced with the correct pitch and inflection.

  Jalene’s eyes glazed over with anticipation as the power of the spell washed over her. For a brief moment, the room became awash in a bright red radiance as the fiery weave of the spell was invoked. Jalene became encompassed by a brilliant red glow that seemed to radiate from her body, pulsing with the steady beating of her heart. It drew energy from her very being, penetrating to her soul. She then directed the energy toward distant Firestorm Mountain and the sleeping dragon hidden far beneath.

  -

  In the deep cavern beneath the mountain, Gilmreth stirred again as the mountain groaned and trembled. A fiery radiance played over the massive length of his body, interacting with the protective sleeping spell holding the dragon captive. The great dragon’s wings flexed as long dormant muscles responded sluggishly to the spell. The dragon’s twin barbed tail quivered and rose jerkily above the cavern floor, to fall slowly back down to its timeless resting place. Energy flowed around the dragon’s mind, some of it spilling over to shake the very mountain itself. A red, pulsating radiance filled and flowed through the cavern. The fish in the small pool fled to its deep protective depths to escape the sudden disturbance. The energy pulled at and absorbed some of the power from the potent sleeping spell that held Gilmreth in its sway, weakening it even further.

  Finally, the energy abated and died away, leaving the mountain rumbling ominously in its wake, the cavern once again shielded in unyielding darkness. The mountain would continue to rumble, possibly for hours, as loosened snow, stone, and dirt from the mountain slid down the steep slopes.

  -

  Jalene felt a wave of dizziness wash over her. For a moment, her body felt weak and drained of strength. She stood still leaning against the table, her knees trembling. After a few moments, her strength began to return and the dizziness and trembling gradually faded. She was finished with the incantation.

  Walking slowly over to the washstand by the door, Jalene poured herself a large glass of fresh water. She took a deep drink, feeling her strength returning and began to relax. Going back to the wooden table, she picked up the copper bowl, returned to the washstand, and rinsed it out. Then she carefully put everything back in her backpack.

  Next, she bandaged her wrist with a special poultice of herbs, voicing a simple, ancient healing spell that would cause the small incision to heal completely by morning. Her other wrist was bandaged similarly from the spell she had cast only a few hours earlier.

  The bloodletting was only a minor inconvenience compared to what she hoped to achieve. Her horrid childhood would be avenged a thousand times over before she was through. For a brief moment, her dark eyes glowed in near paranoia at the vivid memories of her youth, but then the glow faded and her face returned to normal. Memories from her past were better left alone and not dwelt upon too often.

  By dawn’s early light, she would scour the old shops of the town in search of more ancient writings. Towns and villages in such close proximity to the ancient mountain were rich repositories of old lore, forgotten books, and sometimes artifacts whose uses had long been forgotten. If she did find any of those things, they would be hers if she wanted them. She had a way of getting whatever she wanted!

  Stepping out once more onto the balcony, Jalene peered out at the stone paved street below. Her dark, sunken eyes were unblinking as they searched automatically for traces of movement. Very few people were about; most of the small shops were closed. She shook her head slowly with her mouth drawn into a tired, taut line. Closing the door to the small balcony behind her, Jalene extinguished the flickering oil lamp on the wooden shelf above the nightstand, sending the room into a dim twilight. Lying down on the bed, she quickly fell into a deep, restless slumber, exhausted by the power the ancient dragon spell had taken from her body.

  She dreamed of her childhood, one spent in poverty and pain, her body shivering in a cold sweat. Her mother had been raped at a very young age, and Jalene was the progeny of that sinful deed. Her mother never let her forget; never showed her the love or attention other children received from their parents.

  Jalene could still remember vividly the numerous beatings and being locked for days on end in her room nearly starving. She would plead and beg her mother to release her from captivity, but to no avail. Nothing she did ever pleased her mother; the woman was always screaming at her in blinding fits of rage, constantly blaming Jalene for her misfortune, for everything that went wrong in her miserable, wretched life.

  Eventually, Jalene ran away from home, stealing her food and clothes wherever she could find them. Then one day, she found a weathered book on sorcery in some forgotten old ruins where she had taken refuge from the weather. Jalene had learned to read from an old woman who had taken her in briefly during the previous winter. Out of curiosity, Jalene had tried to invoke a simple spell. It had worked and from that time on Jalene had taken whatever she wanted, whenever she wanted it! Now she wanted Gilmreth, and with her growing knowledge of sorcery Gilmreth was a little closer to awakening, a little closer to being her servant, her slave. Finally, her dreams faded, and Jalene slept.

  -

  Lynol finished her gardening and returned to the cool stone farmhouse to prepare the evening meal for herself and her father. She felt a frigid chill run through her as the mountain rumbled loudly one final time, as if icy cold fingers were walking slowly across her unprotected back. The sensation vanished as quickly as it had come, leaving her standing and shivering in the fading sunlight.

  She looked with apprehension at the snow-covered heights of Firestorm Mountain, now almost shrouded in darkness. In reality, she knew the feeling was related to the new sorceress. She had sensed that blazing beacon flare up briefly once more a few minutes earlier. What was the new sorceress up to? What did it have to do with Gilmreth?

  Should she tell her father what she feared and why she was so apprehensive? It would mean telling him about her fledgling abilities as well. Should she tell him about what had happened tonight at the Sylvar Stone? Lynol paused, paralyzed by indecision, and then shook it off. It was something she needed to think about and how it would affect her father. She had always respected his well thought out advice.

  Lynol’s gaze roamed across the massive wooden furniture in the kitchen, trying to decide what she should do. She felt like the answer was floating just on the edge of her consciousness. She knew if she told her father it would only worry him. Lynol sighed heavily, her mind a confused turmoil of mixed emotions and thoughts. She wished there was something in the house to help her. What she needed was an old book or scroll that might tell her how to use her new abilities.


  The old farmhouse was built out of heavy gray stones, quarried with arduous tenacity from the base of the mountains. The stones had been chiseled painstakingly into blocks to form the foundation and walls. The Sylvars had lived in the large, roomy home for generations. Many rooms in the old rambling house had been closed off as the size of the family had slowly dwindled, until only Lynol and her father remained.

  She still had a few distant second and third cousins, but no other close relatives. As far as she knew, she was the last of the long, ancient line of direct blood descendants of Malcon. Lynol sighed once more and returned to her work of cutting up the vegetables for the evening meal; she had much to think about.

  Chapter Two

  Lynol absentmindedly stirred the simmering stew in the large, cast iron cooking pot suspended over the glowing fireplace, wishing that she knew more about the ancient ways of Malcon Sylvar. The tantalizing aroma of fresh onions, green peppers, potatoes, and beef mingling pervaded the air. The back of the old stone fireplace was scorched from generations of cooking and burning fires that had warmed the Sylvar family. Picking up a small wooden spoon, Lynol took a cautious sip of the hot stew after blowing gently on the contents. Needs a little more salt, she noticed, with the taste of the stew still lingering tantalizingly on the tip of her tongue.

  Adding more salt, she watched the bubbling stew, realizing there was so much she didn’t know, so much she just didn’t understand. Lynol wished she possessed a book on sorcery. She needed a book that described the potent spells the ancient sorcerers had used and descriptions of how they had acquired their awesome mystical powers.

  There was nothing in their house that even hinted of sorcery. She had searched fruitlessly through the old family books that lined the shelves in the closed off back rooms. You would think with the Sylvar history there would be some type of references in the house about sorcery. It was perplexing that their home didn’t contain a few books of spells and incantations describing Sylvar sorcery, or even Malcon Sylvar and his half-mystical abilities.

  There was so much family history handed down through the ages through stories, but strangely, the Sylvar sorcerers were an enigma, a mystery that was extraordinarily well hidden. Secrets lost in the passing of the ages. Secrets that Lynol so desperately needed to know.

  It had been nearly a year now since her new abilities started manifesting themselves, and Lynol was still struggling to control them. At first, it had been exciting to coax small, colorful birds to land on her outstretched arm, or to get small wild animals to come up to her. She could still recall the first time she had coaxed a squirrel to come down out of its tree and take a nut from her hand.

  Recently, the mountain had begun to rumble, and the possible consequences of having those abilities began to frighten Lynol. Then tonight, the uncanny and frightening incident with the Sylvar Stone had only added to her fears. She needed to know more about the prophecies and the Sylvar legacy. Just what is happening to me, she wondered? Lynol stirred the stew slowly, thinking about what her father had told her about Malcon Sylvar.

  Even to Lynol, many of the stories her father told seemed like fairy tales. She knew the stories her father spoke of were based on truth, stories handed down through the generations, but sometimes they seemed so fantastic! It had been many long years since Malcon Sylvar’s time.

  She wondered how many of the stories were entirely true and how many were grossly exaggerated. Were the earliest sorcerers her father spoke of as powerful as the ancient stories portrayed? She just had to have more information! Perhaps then, she would understand more of what had happened tonight at the Sylvar Stone and what it meant. She let out a deep sigh of resignation at her lack of knowledge.

  Lynol had even stealthily searched the small library in Galvin, but there were absolutely no books relating to sorcery! The majority of the books in the library were boring historical recordings of the lives of the people who had lived in the small agricultural village. There were numerous books on agriculture, which might be useful to the local farmers. There were also books on different medicines and remedies for diseases that still reared their virulent heads on rare occasions.

  Nowhere was there any mention of Malcon Sylvar in any of the village’s long, descriptive histories, nor of Gilmreth. It was as if the village’s most famous historical figure and the dragon had never existed. Lynol knew to most of the people of Galvin, Malcon was just a myth, and the dragon Gilmreth was just a made up fairy tale. It was as if all writings of sorcery or of the Sylvar sorcerers of the past had been meticulously removed. It was extremely frustrating.

  It was a two day ride to the nearest village of Handon’s Ferry at the Crystal River to the north. The trip to Draydon, on the far side of the mountains, took nearly four long, arduous days by freight wagon. Lynol knew that Draydon would be her foremost choice. It was the largest town that she knew of, and Draydon was rumored to possess many old books and scrolls in its large library archives.

  She would love to spend some time in Draydon’s library, if only she could talk her father into taking her there. Perhaps in Draydon she could find the knowledge she was so desperately seeking. Lynol had never been to Draydon, though her father had on several occasions. If only I could find some books or scrolls on sorcery, Lynol thought wistfully. It would at least give her a clue as to what was happening to her, the changes that were taking place; even perhaps explain what had happened at the Sylvar Stone earlier.

  She took several small bowls out of a cupboard and opened a drawer, removing several wooden spoons for the stew. She placed these carefully on the large wooden table as her thoughts continued to dwell on Gilmreth and the Sylvar sorcerers of old.

  Lynol knew other isolated villages lay scattered to the east and northeast, but they were distant and extremely difficult to reach. Due to their small size, Lynol doubted they possessed the knowledge she so urgently sought. The nearest village to the east was Ashton, a grueling, three-day ride which was located on the edge of the Ralle Desert. The desert was a blighted, desolate land, which stretched off to the far distant ocean and was rumored to be impassable. Lynol knew of no one in recent memory who had ventured far into the scorching desert and returned.

  Lynol had already searched the small library at Handon’s Ferry on the Crystal River. Lynol had been to Handon’s Ferry twice with her father. They had gone to barter some meat and eggs at one of the village’s small markets in exchange for some smoked fish the villagers took from the Crystal River. They had also traded for some metal tools her father wanted for the farm. The library at Handon’s Ferry had been remarkably similar to Galvin’s library.

  During her school years when Lynol had discreetly questioned the old women of Galvin about sorcery or Malcon, they had chided Lynol for wasting their precious time with such mythical legends. Everyone knew those old wives tales were made up to frighten unruly children. What parent hadn’t threatened a young child on occasion that if they didn’t do their chores, Gilmreth would come in the night and carry them off to his distant lair?

  If there was any truth to the legend, it should be in the village histories that had been meticulously kept. Since there was nothing there, the women were convinced that Malcon Sylvar and Gilmreth were only fairy tales. They told Lynol not to bring the subject up again. Gilmreth and Malcon were children’s tales only, and young adults shouldn’t be concerned with such even if their last name was Sylvar.

  Using her apron, Lynol took the hot pot of bubbling stew from the fireplace, carrying it to the heavy wooden table near the large open window, which faced Firestorm Mountain to the west. Looking out the window, she saw her father herding two bellowing black cows with their young calves up into the lot by the barn to be milked later. Fresh milk in the morning would be a treat. In addition, Lynol wanted to make more cheese to trade in the village.

  There was always so much to do on the farm, and now this sorcery thing made everything even more complicated. Sometimes Lynol wished she hadn’t been born a Sylvar and her
life could just be normal like her friends.

  Lynol watched through the window as the sun was rapidly disappearing in the west, sinking behind the jagged horizon dominated by Firestorm Mountain. It had been an unusually dry, early summer so far. Dust uplifted into the air glowed in the last rays of the sun, red and gold-red. The entire landscape of the mountain lay bathed in a soft light, with gradually lengthening fingers of purple shadows stretching out from the darkening mountains.

  With the coming darkness, her father would be in for his supper. Going to the table, she ladled out a generous portion of steaming stew into the two wooden bowls to cool, then going over to the pantry Lynol took out some freshly baked bread and cheese wrapped in thick cloth. At least living on the farm allowed them to eat reasonably well. Setting the food down on the table, Lynol sat down, looking out the large window toward Firestorm Mountain becoming lost in thought.

  -

  Damon came in the open door shrugging out of his light jacket. The temperature dropped rapidly this close to the mountains late in the evening. The light breeze coming off the slopes often put a slight chill into the night air. He could smell the tantalizing aroma of the stew that Lynol had prepared. One thing he could say about his daughter; she was an excellent cook! Putting his walking staff up, he saw Lynol staring out the window at Firestorm Mountain with a pensive look upon her young face.

  “Still thinking about Gilmreth, I see,” he stated after a brief pause, walking over to the table where his food waited. He knew from the look on her face where her mind dwelled.

  Damon knew his daughter was really concerned about the dragon, but he just wasn’t sure what he could do to put her at ease. It bothered him that Lynol was so distraught over the rumblings from the mountain. He knew much of her fear was caused by the stories he had told her about their family’s past and their ties to Gilmreth, the ancient dragon. Nevertheless, they were stories she needed to hear. It was part of her legacy, and she was his only child.