The Longsword Chronicles: Book 02 - Sword and Circle

by GJ Kelly

  “But there must be something…?” Allazar mumbled.

  “Yes. I learned that shortly after we left Ferdan, a D’ith Sek wizard in Callodon Castletown was challenged on his way to a hastily-arranged meeting with Queen Elspeth. The wizard refused to comply with the orders of the guardsmen, who became suspicious and drew arms, but the wizard ran amok. He killed several dozen people in the courtyard and almost gained entry to the Keep before being shot in the back by a crossbow bolt and then promptly beheaded before he could do further harm.

  “There have also been stories of similar atrocities in Juria, and some of the larger towns. There has been no official word, just tales from merchants and travellers, but they are all too easy to believe. Only Mornland and Arrun, it seems, have been spared such attacks.”

  “They are such inoffensive lands,” Allazar sighed, “Gentle people with gentle pursuits, there’s not much of interest there for the brethren. There was no news from your own land, my lady?”

  “No,” Elayeen sighed, “We have been so inward-looking and have guarded our borders so jealously for so long, there are few if any travellers and merchants to bring news from Elvendere. But there is more, news which you may welcome even less, though it be more travellers tales. If you would hear it?”

  Allazar nodded solemnly. “Please.”

  “Traders at Callodon reported passing south of the D’ith Hallencloister, on their journey from Arrun across the southern plains of Juria. They said at night, there were many streamers of lighting in the sky, though the stars were clear, and they reported the glow of fire and rumbling as if of thunder. Further, they later met a Jurian horse patrol, long-rangers, who had passed closer to the Hallencloister. The patrol said the gates were all drawn up, and no banners flew from the curtain walls or ramparts.”

  “All the gates were drawn up?” Allazar gasped.

  “So it was said. But Allazar, none of these reports could be confirmed by any officials at Callodon Castle, at least not to the knowledge of my escort at Jarn.”

  “Yet I had imagined there would be strife within the ranks of the brethren,” Allazar sighed, as though his worst fears had come to pass. “If every gate has been raised and shut, then the D’ith Sardor himself must have given the order, to contain any rebellion within the walls, and prevent the dark traitors from fleeing into the world to spread more evil and destruction.”

  “Or,” Gawain added ominously, “To secure the Hallencloister against our forces, and make of it a traitor’s citadel against us.”

  “We will not know, I fear, not for some time. Nothing short of riding on the back of Graken could get you in there to find out. With all its gates drawn up, the Hallencloister is as impregnable as once was…” Allazar’s voice faded.

  “As once was Raheen.” Gawain finished for him, and the wizard nodded.

  They were silent for a time, and then Elayeen took a breath. “There is news that has been confirmed, however, though of what use it may be to us here and now I do not know. It seems that there was some dispute within the Council at Ferdan, about moving to a place of greater safety in Elvendere.”

  Gawain gasped. “I can well imagine the dispute! Can you see Eryk of Threlland and his honour-guard and entourage marching down the road to Elvenheth! In full view of all!”

  Elayeen smiled weakly. “Yet, I was told, in spite of the protests of wizards and advisors, the Council has indeed moved to Elvendere. I believe it was Lord Rak’s doing, only he could have persuaded King Eryk to take such a course.”

  “And your father? He allowed it? Well, clearly he did, since you say the Council is now in Elvenheth?”

  “No, not Elvenheth, mithroth, that is forbidden to all except elves. It is why you caused so much…consternation when you trespassed there to bring me out of faranthroth.”

  “Oh. Where then?”

  “Shiyanath. A province in the north east of Elvendere.”

  Allazar’s chin visibly dropped in shock. “Shiyanath! Is that not the old winter palace of the Crown of Elvendere?” he asked, wide-eyed and agape.

  Elayeen smiled sadly. “It is not so grand as you might believe from history books, Allazar. It has not been used as such for a very long time, though it is maintained after a fashion for the sake of tradition.”

  “What’s so special about it?” Gawain asked, “I haven’t much idea of lowland history at all, much less that of Elvendere.”

  The wizard was quick to reply, before even Elayeen could frame an answer. “It is one of two regions in Elvendere with stone-built buildings, Longsword. The other being Ostinath, wherein lies Toorseneth, the Great Round Tower, if I am correct, my lady?”

  “Alas, the Toorseneth has lost much of its greatness in the many centuries since its construction. I had forgotten how isolated my homeland has been of late, Allazar, if the D’ith Hallencloister still teaches of the grandeur of Shiyanath and Ostinath. The old winter palace is still serviceable and will provide for crowns and ambassadors. It also has stables and accommodation for a company of Thalangard. I would imagine additional accommodation would be easy enough to find for the honour-guards of all kingdoms attending Council. But grand it is not, its former splendour long faded, the walls grey, and slowly crumbling.”

  “Still,” Gawain nodded, “It sounds much more comfortable than Ferdan, and a great deal better protected too.”

  “Indeed,” Allazar agreed. “Can it really be true the entire Council is now there? In Shiyanath?”

  “Yes,” Elayeen confirmed, “The guard commander at Jarn was quite certain. He even made a remark to the effect that all at Callodon Castle were perplexed, since they could now only receive word from Brock by pigeon, and had no way of replying except by horse, since they possessed no birds which know the way to Shiyanath. And Brock himself has expended all his birds but one, it seems, the last kept back in case of emergency.”

  “Which also explains the subsequent lack of news from the Council,” Gawain grumbled, “It’ll take time for messages to be sent to and from castletowns from Shiyanath, assuming no wizardly means are employed, and after Ferdan, I doubt anyone will be in too much of a hurry to entrust confidences to their whitebeards.”

  “And,” Elayeen added, her voice rich with concern, “There were many wizards in my homeland. I marvel Rak was able to persuade Council to move there at all, much less that my father and the other crowns would agree.”

  “And there was no other news, of wizards or of your homeland?” Gawain asked gently.

  Elayeen shook her head. “Beyond the fact of the Council moving to Shiyanath, only rumours and speculation. It was rumoured that the Callodon Westguard had engaged a band of Gorian troops who had made an incursion across the border from the Old Kingdom. And rumoured also that Gorians dressed in Callodonian garb were crossing into the region from there, for what purpose no-one knows, but everyone had an opinion. There was also a rumour that people in the Old Kingdom were finding their old strength, and there was talk of an uprising against the Imperial forces there. But the commander assured me it was only speculation at best and gossip at worst, and there were no facts from the Castle to support any of it.”

  “Then we have learned very little of real import,” Gawain sighed, “And for this you endured all the hardships of hot food, hot baths, duck-down beds…” And for that remark Gawain received a slender elbow in the ribs.

  “You overlook something, Longsword. And you too, I think, my lady.” Allazar said softly, smiling like the cat that got the cream.

  “Which is?”

  “There is perhaps a great deal more than simply the safety of crowns behind Rak’s success in moving the Council to Shiyanath, and a great deal more than powerful politics in Thal-Hak’s allowing it.”

  Puzzled, Elayeen glanced at Gawain to see if he understood the wizard’s meaning.

  “Out with it then, Allazar, or The Keeper of The Stick will shortly become The Wearer of The Stick.”

  Allazar smiled broadly. “Is it too simple to see? Perhaps
that is the beauty of such powerful manoeuvres. Sometimes, people are so busy searching for hidden agendas and traps and wheels within wheels, they fail to see the obvious one. The Council of Crowns is now at Shiyanath, in Elvendere, and who do I see sitting before me upon this pedestal, but the two Crowns of Raheen, both of whom are of course entitled to sit upon that Council, and have been ever since the entire Council ratified their recognition of Raheen and those crowns at Ferdan.”

  There was a brief silence while Elayeen and Gawain simply stared at the wizard, and then Gawain felt Elayeen’s smile washing over him even before he saw it on her face.

  “Then,” she said, her voice full of hope, “For as long as the Council is there, I may return to my homeland?”

  “Yes,” Allazar smiled, and reached out to rest a gentle hand on her shoulder, “For which you may thank Lord Rak of Tarn, and his skills of diplomacy, and doubtless those of your father too.”

  oOo

  8. The Darkness and the Light

  “Then,” said Gawain, standing and helping Elayeen to her feet, “Unless there is something more about the circle you need to see, Allazar, we should leave.”

  “Then you have found what was important, mithroth? The reason for our unseemly haste across the plains?”

  “Ah.” Gawain managed, “Well…”

  Elayeen blinked, and cocked her head slightly, looking up at Gawain and folding her arms dramatically.

  “The wizard will explain all. He himself has declared the circle most important. And, in fact, was saying something about how the knowledge of this modern age trumped all previous attempts at unravelling the mysteries of the circle.”

  “Ah.” Allazar managed, “Well…”

  Elayeen turned her creditably stern gaze upon the wizard, who clumsily fumbled with the Dymendin staff while trying to sling his bag over his shoulder.

  “Well, wizard?” Gawain smiled wickedly, still too full of the warmth he felt radiating from Elayeen at the prospect of lawfully being able to enter Elvendere once again, even though faranthroth.

  “Well,” Allazar said, smiling, and then regaining his dignity and composure. “In truth, my lady, Longsword was quite right to bring us here.”

  “Really?” Elayeen was suddenly excited, though whether at the prospect of discovering the source of Gawain’s ‘something important’ or the prospect of imminently heading for Elvendere, it couldn’t be said.

  “Really?” Gawain echoed, hopefully, though retaining a generous measure of scepticism.

  “Yes. The very fact that Morloch commanded Salaman Goth to rise up from his lair within the Gorian Empire not once, but twice, is proof of the fact that he fears Longsword more than any army Lord Rak might persuade Council to raise.”

  “Twice?” a confused Gawain asked, frowning.

  “Twice. Once to lay the guardstones at the Farin Bridge, which alerted our dark enemy to your arrival here, and again, once you passed between them.”

  Elayeen drew in a sharp breath. “Then we may expect another attack, for I too passed over the bridge…”

  “No, lady,” Allazar smiled reassuringly, leaning on the staff now as though he’d carried it all his life. “The guardstones served like a single strand of a spider’s web, alerting the spider, in this case Salaman Goth, when the bridge was first crossed by Longsword and I. The spider had already left his lair and was winging his way here to the Keep when you crossed the bridge, and thus he did not receive the trembling of that slender thread to warn him of your passing. If he had, I fear the outcome of our encounter might have ended badly for us all.”

  “Indeed.” Gawain’s voice too was serious now. “I could not have held much longer.”

  “Nor I at all,” Allazar nodded sternly. “In that, Salaman Goth’s outrage at being summoned by Morloch to do the work of an apprentice, as he put it, was not far off the mark. We were beaten, Longsword, but for your lady.”

  Gawain agreed, wrapping his arms around Elayeen and drawing her close as they both faced the wizard across the steps.

  “But send Salaman Goth Morloch did, and though Morloch may yet be much weakened and wounded from his encounters with you, Longsword, even that dark fiend would not summon so powerful a servant to carry out so simple a task as killing one man and his D’ith pat wizard. Unless there is a very, very important reason to have that man destroyed beyond all doubt.”

  “And you have found the reason, miheth?” Elayeen smiled twisting around to look up at Gawain hopefully.

  “Uhm…”

  “Well,” Allazar announced. “It was hardly hidden. It is here,” and still leaning upon his staff, both hands clasping it securely, he smiled and nodded towards the circle.

  “Then you have succeeded, Allazar, where all the wizards of Raheen had failed, and unlocked the mystery of the markings?”

  “Ah…”

  “Dwarfspit, miheth, between the two of you I could go mad waiting for a simple answer.” Elayeen pouted.

  “He’s a wizard, Elayeen, this is how they behave. Now you understand why one day I shall probably have to cut off his arm and beat him to death with his own hand. But in all seriousness, Allazar, you said before Salaman Goth’s attack you had some notion?”

  Allazar’s eyes sparkled, and for a moment, the tiniest of sparks fizzed and danced atop the staff, which gave them all pause for consideration, not least the wizard. But the sparks soon disappeared and Allazar turned and descended the steps, talking as he went.

  “Your lady has not observed the circle when someone enters it, Longsword, as I do now. Behold, your Majesty, the Circle of Justice…”

  Allazar stepped into the circle, and the runes at once flowed and changed to a new pattern. Elayeen blinked, astonished. Gawain explained to her how the three concentric circles of runes always took on a new pattern whenever someone stepped into the circle, and had done so throughout Raheen’s long history. He also explained that the reason why they had done so had eluded wizards, mystics and scholars for centuries, the knowledge long forgotten.

  The elfin queen of Raheen no longer looked so excited, nor as hopeful as she had. “But you have discovered its meaning, Allazar,” she announced rather than asked, “And the reason why Morloch fears mithroth so.”

  Allazar was about to say ‘Ah’ but thought better of it. Instead, he nodded. “I have an inkling, a notion, an idea as vague and insubstantial as Longsword’s belief that this is something important enough for us to abandon kings in their hour of need. Yes.”

  “Then please, Allazar,” an earnest Gawain asked, and hope seemed to radiate from himself and his lady, “Tell us.” And his use of the word ‘please’ for the second time in as many months was not lost on any of them.

  Allazar nodded again. “If I am wrong,” he said, equally earnestly, “I shall go to my death by your sword knowing it was richly deserved for conceiving such false hope and seeing it shine from the eyes of the two people in this world I hold most dear. Behold then…”

  Allazar stepped quietly to the very edge of the circle, directly in front and below them. “This,” he said almost reverently, “This is the outer circle, whose runes I took to be a corrupted form of Old Elvish, and then believed to be even older, the language of the Eldenelves of myth, a tongue which passed from all memory millennia before this Dymendin I hold was a seedling.”

  He took two large paces backwards, and looked down. “This circle bears a form of runes which at first I thought I had seen illustrating The Book of Thangar, one of the oldest books in the library at the Hallencloister, a book which itself tells the story of a great wizard of legend. I now know these runes to be those which the legendary Thangar himself would have named Old Cerneform, the ancient mystic script of wizards from the days of Zaine himself, said to have founded the first order of brethren and creator of the Codex Maginarum, whose first tenet survives to this day: no wizard may harm the kindred races of Man, save in defence of his realm and of himself.”

  Gawain’s left eyebrow arched at that, speak
ing volumes which Allazar himself recognised, though the king himself said nothing.

  “And here,” Allazar took another two steps backwards toward the centre of the circle, “The third ring, which I thought primina runiform, earliest of human mystic writing. It is, though I now believe it also contains symbols derived from the source script from which the primina evolved.”

  Then the wizard turned, still carrying the iron-heavy staff, and moved to stand behind the home-stone, the small rectangular block in which was cut the deep slot wherein had dwelt The Sword of Justice for perhaps as long as the circle itself had existed.

  “And finally here. The home-stone, Longsword, resting place of your great blade. These runes around the home-stone, twelve symbols, runes which do not change no matter who steps into the circle nor how many times. These are constant. I confess I was completely baffled by them at first, for they are not the runes of the first, second, or third circles, and have no similarity to any in common use today or those I encountered in my studies at the Hallencloister.” Allazar paused, and then smiled a smile which seemed to announce the revealing of a great secret…

  “But yesterday, after the battle with Salaman Goth, after the rains had abated, and you and your lady were changing from your rain-soak clothes into dry, I stood here, at this very spot, watching the rain pools, and the reflections of the passing storm-clouds in the marble and the water as those clouds scudded, light and dark, overhead.

  “It was then I noted again the depth of the sheen possessed by this Dymendin staff, and saw in it the curved reflections of the thrones and the walls and myself. On a sudden insight I placed the staff thus,” And the wizard placed the burnished staff exactly in the centre of the small ring of runes surrounding the home-stone.

  “And there, in the curved and polished surface of the staff, I saw reflected the runes graven deep within the floor about the home-stone. And by walking around the staff, read them. For that is the only way they can be read, by placing a burnished cylinder at the centre, and observing the reflection of them. They are not one set of twelve runes in unknown tongue, your Majesties, these are the runes of the three kindred races of Man: Elf, Human, and Wizard. And here, at the centre around the home-stone, are the Elvish symbols for friyenheth, Freedom, and the human primina runiform symbols for Ceartus, Justice, and the wizards’ Cerneform symbols for Omniumde, For All.”