The Ruens of Fairstone (Aeon of Light Book 2)

by Sethlen, Aron

  THE RUENS

  OF FAIRSTONE

  BY

  Aron Sethlen

  Copyright © 2015 by Aron Sethlen. All rights reserved.

  This is a work of fiction. Any similarities to actual persons

  living or dead, business, events, or locales is coincidental.

  Reproduction in whole or part of this publication

  without express written consent is strictly prohibited.

  A Station Press book.

  THE RUENS

  OF FAIRSTONE

  AEON OF LIGHT

  BOOK TWO

  CONTENTS

  MAP

  ONE

  THE FALCON CREST

  TWO

  NERO

  THREE

  THREE MORE YEARS

  FOUR

  SLANDEROUS ACCUSATIONS

  FIVE

  YITCH’S REPOSITORY OF YITCH

  SIX

  THE LOWER LORD OF THE NORTH

  SEVEN

  EXTRACURRICULAR EXCURSION

  EIGHT

  HINER’S FORMULAIC PHYLUM

  NINE

  MYSTERY & MISCHIEF

  TEN

  A MARLOW SECRET

  ELEVEN

  INSIDE INFORMATION

  TWELVE

  A WHIP, A SCAR, A STAR, & A GOAT

  THIRTEEN

  SOMETHING FROM THE CESSPOOL

  FOURTEEN

  THE OFFER

  FIFTEEN

  TA-DA—SURPRISE

  SIXTEEN

  A NEW LIGHT

  SEVENTEEN

  EYES ON THE PRIZE

  EIGHTEEN

  CROSSBONES

  NINETEEN

  DELUSIONS OF GRANDEUR

  TWENTY

  THE TRIAL

  TWENTY-ONE

  ROUND TWO

  TWENTY-TWO

  A STARRY-EYED PLAN

  TWENTY-THREE

  NASTY LOVE

  TWENTY-FOUR

  TAKE A BOW

  TWENTY-FIVE

  SCORCHED STONE

  TWENTY-SIX

  NO JOKING MATTER

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  CLEANING UP

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  A HEAVY HEART

  TWENTY-NINE

  SLAVE DRIVER

  THIRTY

  LES & RAD

  THIRTY-ONE

  HAWKE EYE

  THIRTY-TWO

  CORNELIUS CRAY

  THIRTY-THREE

  PAST MEMORIES

  THIRTY-FOUR

  ESEN’ER

  THIRTY-FIVE

  A CASE OF THE HICCUPS

  THIRTY-SIX

  OLD FRIENDS

  THIRTY-SEVEN

  A GUISE OF ICE

  THE FALCON CREST

  A bitter wind howls as it sweeps through an enormous circular courtyard surrounded by thick blackish castle walls. A dusting of crystal-like snow lies upon the smooth cobblestone paths winding through the evergreen shrubbery. Drooping stems and limp brown grass peek through the thin white cover. Varying sizes of regular and stained glass windows, from tall lancelets, to wide and panoramic are inlaid in the castle’s massive stone blocks. Icicles droop precariously from their eaves, daring anyone to pass underneath do so at their own risk. Barren trees with peeling grey bark dot the park-like surroundings, and granite benches line the walkways next to copper lamp posts with green-and-orange patinas. In the center of the yard lies a small pond with a crust of translucent ice floating on the surface. A cobblestone bridge arcs away from the intersection of three paths and it extends to a miniature island with two benches and an Ida tree on it. The withered and ancient tree with crooked wide branches, two thousand years removed from its natural habitat, its spirit all but a faint memory. The bark is the color of bone, pure white as the falling snow around its knobby base. A single bright-red leaf dangles from one of its arthritic limbs. A gust of wind howls, and the leaf detaches with a slight flutter, descending as a feather and coming to rest in a bed of snow. Near the entrance of the bridge, directly in the center of the intersection of paths, snow swirls around a weathered brass plaque embedded in the stone, reading: The footsteps of greatness begin here at Fairstone.

  Pard Wenerly’s worn black shoe strikes the center of the plaque, landing on a raised crest molded in the shape of a falcon. The sole slowly lifts an inch off the ground and crashes back down as Sully, a dwarf-like handsome blond boy wearing a similar black robe with a yellow falcon crest patch over the left side of his chest, pops out from behind a stand of evergreen shrubs; he yells, “Hey, Wenerly, I got something special for you today!”

  Startled, Pard’s shoe twitches on the icy plaque and the sole locks in place on the wings of the falcon. The tattered bottoms of his black robe rest on his shoelaces.

  Sully launches a high arcing snowball at Pard crouched over and standing out in the open, a floppy wool hood attached to Pard’s robe obscures his face. Excited, Sully jumps up and down watching his snowball tracking its target. “Take that!”

  Pard shifts the large stack of thick textbooks in his arms and lifts the lip of his hood to see who’s yelling at him. Wayward strands of his medium-length disheveled brown hair droop over his hazel eyes while other unruly locks flutter in the bitter breeze. He squints from the bright morning sunlight reflecting off the ice and snow.

  The snowball falls from the sky in slow motion and explodes with a splatter a few paces in front of Pard’s feet. Pard shuffles backward as he stares at the snowball meant for him. His feet slip again on the slick plaque and his body twists in place.

  “Not like that, Sully,” Nox, a tall, buzzed-cut, muscular boy says. He tilts his giant body to the side, winds back his arm, and whips another snowball at Pard still standing in the center of the courtyard, looking around and oblivious.

  The fastball zips with ferocity through the whirlwinds, barreling toward an unsuspecting Pard.

  Pard lifts his gaze as the projectile races straight for his forehead. His eyes widen and legs shift to run but all they do is slip on the brass plaque and slick cobblestones. His upper body undulates as he tries to keep his feet underneath him. His arms shoot out to the side to steady himself and six textbooks fly out of his numb hands. Pard regains himself in time for the snowball to strike him on the side of the head. He groans and crumples to the ground.

  “Nice one, Nox,” Sully says as he jumps up and punches the ugly boy’s shoulder.

  Nox sneers at Pard squirming on the ground in a daze. He grins and lets out a couple puffs of sarcastic air.

  Sully slings his leather backpack and angles his body toward a giant set of double oak doors leading into the west wing of the castle. “Come on, Nox, lets get to class, you know how Professor Lames gets if we’re late.”

  Pard fondles the ground and his palm finds the brass plaque of Fairstone. His skin burns from the cold metal biting deep into his bones. He slowly shakes his head regaining his senses, and he blinks from the bright sun glaring in his face. “Why me?”

  An outline of an outstretched hand hovers in front of Pard, the rest of the body is obscured by the sun’s rays.

  “You should know better by now, Wenerly,” a boy says in a half-mocking and half-serious tone. “Got to keep your head on a swivel around here.”

  Pard sighs and grips the boy’s hand. “Says you, Miles, since when did you ever have to keep your head on a swivel from snowballs?”

  “Well, we’re not talking about me, right?” Miles chuckles and yanks Pard to his feet.

  Pard’s shoes slip again on the slick stones as he tries to steady himself. He mumbles, “Only three more years.”

  Miles’s eyes narrow. “
Did you say something?”

  “Nothing, never mind.”

  “So are you all right? It looked like a vicious hit from where I was standing.”

  Pard rubs his sore head and takes in Miles, a boy around the same age as him, fourteen or fifteen, taller, jet-black hair and good-looking in a carefree and confident way, aquamarine eyes, almost translucent, and a pedigree and demeanor very different from himself. Pard forces a smile back at Miles. “I’ll be fine, just slipped on the ice is all.” He scans the ground at all his textbooks and papers strung out over the cobblestones and patches of dead grass and snow, some of his loose papers fluttering away in the breeze and sweeping over the surface of the ice-crusted pond.

  Miles slaps Pard’s back. “Let’s go, I’ll help you gather your things. Then we can take on Professor Ames together and both be late for history class.”

  “Thanks,” Pard says as he bends over and picks up two of his textbooks. He glances around the elegant, ancient courtyard in a slight daze, still woozy from the headshot. A snowflake strikes his eyelash, and he blinks. He turns around, toward north, away from the main body of the horseshoe-like castle, and barely outside its walls to the left, a vast linear greenhouse. The glass walls sweat with steam, and inside, small trees and a lush garden of heirloom plants. Next to the greenhouse to the right, east, also detached from the castle by only a cobblestone road, the Lower School where all the students under the age of thirteen attend and live, and is a miniature castle in of itself, though with grey walls instead of black. The walls rise forty feet with two large turrets as bookends. In the center of the Lower School, a clock tower rising into the sky like a beacon above both castles. Much further to the right, another detached building, circular, known as The Eye, housing all the science classes; and in the center of The Eye, a four-story cylindrical tower, an observatory with a large telescope poking out its domed roof. Dotting the small paths and roads throughout the northern grounds of Fairstone, the Fell Village, a collection of twenty small-to-medium-sized cottages where the professors and their families or guests reside.

  Miles lifts a worn tan leather-bound book unlike the other textbooks. A claw and a wide-branched Ida tree is branded in black on the front cover along with odd letters and symbols which Miles doesn’t recognize. “Hey, this doesn’t look like any textbook I’ve ever seen, is this for next year’s class?”

  Pard flinches his attention back to Miles and snatches the book out of his hand. “No, it’s a book I found in the library and I’m reading it.”

  “Looks interesting if you’re into reading that stuff.” Miles points at the mysterious text. “So what’s it about? Hey, you aren’t into any of that wonky witchcraft, are you?”

  “No, it’s history.” Pard snaps up the last of his reachable errant papers tumbling in the breeze and jams them with the rest of the others into the bindings of one of his books.

  “What kind of history?” Miles says with a touch of suspicion. “Those symbols don’t look like any history I’ve ever seen or read.”

  Pard ignores him and shakes him off then angles his shoulder toward the west wing’s oak double doors. “Just history, come on, we better get to class before we’re really really late.”

  A blast of warm air hits Pard as he enters the west wing, the north entrance of the castle. His lungs open, free from the bitter cold constricting his chest outside. A long, tall, wide hallway with immaculate, shiny birch wooden floors extend away from Pard as far as he can see. At regular intervals, except for the occasional door leading to a side classroom, glass-encased lanterns jut out from either the stone or the mahogany paneled walls, followed by paintings of either a landscape or a portrait. Massive iron chandeliers with gas lights on them droop from the ceiling followed by slow moving fans, and then the pattern repeats. In between each door on either side of the corridor, a shiny-winged cast iron radiator rests next to the walls.

  Pard stutter steps forward, haphazardly hugging the giant stack of books tight to his chest. He groans. I could really use a backpack right now, that damned Nox, I can’t believe he stole it and tossed it into the grand fireplace last week. With every awkward step and skip, a book almost tumbles out of his arms and then he readjusts the stack to maintain control.

  Miles, leather backpack slung over his shoulder, strolls with a swagger, grin on his face, and glancing at every painting as he saunters by without a care in the world.

  Pard peeks behind him and toward Miles. “Why are you moving so slow? We’re already late, history started almost five minutes ago.”

  Miles shrugs and rubs an apple on the yellow falcon patch fixed to his brand new black robe. “Exactly, so why should I hurry?” He chomps down on the lush red apple and the crunch echoes through the corridor. “I thought that would be obvious.” He points the apple and a finger at Pard. “Hey, I thought you were supposed to be the smart one.”

  Pard rolls his eyes. His heart races faster with every passing second, and he leaves Miles far behind as he darts through the hallway. Ahead, on the left side of the corridor, his eyes lock onto a double door with a large capital H etched in granite. Easy for him to say, he’s not at this school on the good graces of charity. And the headmaster and most of the boys don’t have it out for him, and his father, if he was still alive, isn’t the king of the Northern State of Latvin—of course he doesn’t have to hurry. Pard grimaces and grunts as he slows to within arms length of the double doors. He inhales a deep calming breath, firmly secures his books in his skinny arms, and nudges open the door with his hip and slips inside the back right corner of the giant lecture hall. He peeks to the left down an aisle extending along the wall of the sloping classroom. Professor Ames is on stage speaking and pointing to a map. Pard hunches over and makes his way forward along the back wall until he reaches the center aisle sloping from back to front through the main body of student chairs.

  Large windows inlaid in stone along the far right wall let in light from the courtyard. In between each window and lining the entire opposite wall, copper and glass-encased gas lanterns at the ready. Pard tiptoes down the center aisle. On either side, boys sit in their chairs with folded overlap desks. They furiously scribble notes as they hang on every word from the young blond-haired professor lecturing at the front of the class who wears small oval glasses and a purple robe. The teacher’s back is toward the students as he jabs a stick on a canvas map of Vetlinue, each jab punctuates an important fact and place as he recounts the military movements of a famous battle between Lasteane and Erden over five hundred years ago. “And then Erden attacked! Here! In the dense Forest of Muro, just beyond Striden’s Pass. Rexus, the Erden Commander of the Northern Army, with overwhelming forces in size and strength, made a grave miscalculation, allowing his forces to be funneled into a choke point, here! His over confidence, haste, and hatred for Gacin, the Lasteane Commander, whose force was all but annihilated three days prior, led to his doom. Gacin exposed himself in the open within the Corridor of Muro, here! Pretending to give up; this emboldened Rexus, seeing his arch enemy within his grasp and alone. But Gacin was a brilliant tactician that knew his enemy. He had laid a trap in the surrounding Mazes of Muro, here! And while Gacin occupied the attention of Rexus, his soldiers weaved through the tight sandstone corridors of the Muro Maze and surrounded the Erden forces, taking the high ground and entrenching themselves deep within the mighty rock defenses. Once the entire Erden force was within the Muro Corridor, Kleso the Elegant, a rooted one, somehow created a blast in the rock, causing a landslide of rubble taking out Rexus’s rear guard and blocking the main forces retreat. This signaled the attack, and the small dispersed forces of Lasteane let loose a flurry of arrows and darts and blades from all avenues of approach, which drove Rexus and his forces back into the rubble blockade and into Kleso the Elegant, who unleashed the trees with all their might.” Professor Ames chuckles. “And from there, Rexus and his forces were no more, completely annihilated. But! The war was far from over—to the east—”

  Pa
rd continues to creep forward toward the middle of the lecture hall. His eyes find his desk on the right side of the classroom, and his gaze darts back and forth between the teacher and his chair while praying that Professor Ames doesn’t turn around before he gets to his seat. He reaches his row and steps in front of Sully sitting next to the aisle.

  Sully winks at Pard.

  Pard wobbles and sways side to side, nudging and bumping the back of the boy’s chair in the next row up as he tries to maneuver over Sully’s short outstretched legs.

  Sully snaps forward as if to attack then quickly sinks back in his chair and giggles.

  Pard flinches and knocks his elbow into the back of the boy’s head sitting in front of Sully.

  A muscular boy with red hair named Gor, one of Fairstone’s top harpastum athletes and from one of Bastin’s finest military families, he lurches forward, grabs the back of his head, and turns around in his chair, scowl fixed on his face. “Wenerly,” the boy says with a growl in his voice.