A Poisoned Land (Book 1: Faith, Lies and Blue Eyes)

by Craig P Roberts

  The Gods’ Age Scripture, The Maran

  Londenia

  From Desert to Forest

  The thirty-strong party traveled on dunebacks through the desert of Last Kingdom, stopping only during the hottest hours of the day and for a short time each night. Londenia found the dunebacks to be crude creatures. Foul smelling, sandy-colored-fur covered their body and large wobbly hump. As mounts, they swayed from side to side as they made their steady plod over the hot sands—their lippy mouths constantly chewing.

  She had most of the comforts that were needed—shelter, warm bedding, food, water, company, protection, but lacked enough water for a bath. She would kill tenfold to sink into hot water and let the sand float from in between her toes.

  They were making their way to the Watch Kingdom where they would meet King Stewart of the Wetlands and her father, King Kalon of Long Kingdom. The thought of seeing her father after so many years, filled her with joy but that was still weeks away.

  One moon-turn had passed since they received the message from the Still City of Mor. Londenia was frustrated by what she had read. The lack of information contained in Magister Caline’s words was troubling. It spoke of the urgency of their meeting, yes, but did it talk of what the urgency involved? No! That would be too simple. Instead, the magister wrote in riddles of why this must be shown, in person, to the seven kings of reason, as he referred to them. It sounded as if the Still Cities had given up hope of a relationship with the other three kingdoms.

  Magister Caline spoke in his message of a group of ambassadors they had sent to the Beast’s Eye as the first point of contact to warn the kingdoms of this threat. The Beast’s Eye was an island in the middle of a lake and was home to the High Council of the Ten Kingdoms. It was where all the decisions were made and only the selected avatars and the ten kings set foot on its soil. Due to the High Council’s location, nestled in the middle of First Kingdom, which was closest to the Gate Kingdom and Peak Kingdom, it tended to favor them. This was a sore point for the other seven kingdoms.

  In the message, it said their ambassadors were attacked by guards from First Kingdom, led by Prince Luxáran. Therefore, they felt it best to bypass High-King Ma’leven, King Zi, King Sáran and the High Council. Instead, they attempted to bring the seven kings of reason to Still City soil—Mor. They need to have a little more faith, instead of running scared at the first threat, Londenia thought, as she bumped up and down on her duneback. The creature’s long curving neck swayed as it trundled along in the late afternoon blaze of the desert sun. The Still Cities may be godless for the most part but they have never lied to the Ten Kingdoms. They didn’t seem to have any desire for lands other than their own. From what Londenia had heard, the people of the Still Cities were kind and generous. It was for this reason that King Romarus, under Queen Londenia’s advice, decided to make the journey across a large part of the Mortal Realm to meet with them.

  That evening, three days of their journey were behind them. The sun disappeared below the horizon and the orange-yellow that had flooded her eyes for the last ten hours was now a cool blue-gray. The world took a breath of cold air. They continued to push on for four more dark hours before stopping to set up camp next to a rocky hill surrounded by the sands of Last Kingdom. Small tents encircled the larger royal dwelling in the middle. Their dunebacks were tied to a hefty stake driven deep into the sands and several fires burned. A smell of meaty stew wafted through the air. Sparkling overhead, the Yod Belt of stars streaked across the clear night sky.

  The broken moon—known as Scarred Nahar—hung in the blackness, glowing white. It was once home to the gods. The High-Ten created the lower-gods in their own image and lived among them on Nahar (as it was then known). But the lower-gods sinned and displeased the Ten, so Nahar was destroyed as punishment. Its destruction was felt even in the Mortal Realm. The ground shook and the seas rose and battered the land. Now, one-thousand years on, Scarred Nahar brightened the nights, it marked the passing of time and it served as a reminder of the lower-gods’ penalty for displeasing the High-Ten. This night, the three great craters in the smashed orb were sharp and vivid in the darkness above.

  Londenia felt quite homely, even out here, so far from anywhere.

  Before they left the main keep of Last Kingdom, her fear turned out to be justified: King Romarus took her sister, Bostonia, as his wife. She still remembered the sights, smells and sounds from that day—an event that should be a joy to watch, but instead filled her with, perhaps unneeded, dread as her sister took her king.

  Londenia remembered the two of them standing in front of her as she conducted the joining ceremony in the middle of the deca outside the capital of Last Kingdom. The ten standing stones of the deca encircled the crowd, of near two hundred, come to witness the joining of King Romarus and Bostonia. Romarus wore the traditional white cotton rapping around his waist. The rest of his bare skin glowed in the red light of sunrise. Bostonia also wore a white cotton wrapping around her waist and Londenia was very aware that Romarus’s attention focused on her sister’s bare breasts.

  She remembered the ten claps from the crowd. In almost perfect sync, the two hundred clapped their hands together rapidly ten times, followed with the words, So’Chor see them, another ten claps, So’Chor empower them. The wife-to-be unraveled her wrapping from around her waist, while Londenia unraveled the king’s. As she pulled off the layers, many in the crowd were watching intently to see Romarus’s manhood. There were also a few staring at her sister’s lowers too, and although she hated her sister, she found herself being angered at them for dishonoring her on her joining day.

  Londenia guided the king forward, pressing the two naked bodies together, face to face and then bound them using Romarus’s white wrapping. “By the power of the Ten Kingdoms and the will of So’Chor, I now join these two bodies within the holy stones of the High-Ten,” she chimed with great strain in her voice. Romarus pressed his lips against Bostonia’s and the crowd chanted the words, they are joined, let the king’s seed flow.

  As was tradition, they consummated the arrangement there and then upon the sands in the center of the ten columns of stone. Most of the crowd departed but as was custom, any were welcome to stay and watch the ending of the ceremony. Around a quarter of them did exactly that. Much to the disappointment of the onlookers, Romarus lasted only a few moments before unloading his seed. There were many repeats of this act in the days after their joining of course—five times a day in the royal bedchambers by Londenia’s reckoning. The boy king’s lust was almost constant.

  The whole arrangement had happened so fast but the boy’s mind seemed to work that way; jumping from one thing to the next, never still.

  Londenia felt her sister’s presence on this journey would not put the king’s mind in the best place. Therefore she used her close relationship with Celóndas, Last Kingdom’s healer, to work the situation in her favor. “If she is with child, the journey will be very strenuous for her, and you would not want to put your first prince at risk, would you?” she remembered Celóndas prompting Romarus before they left. It wasn’t a complete lie. Her sister could very well be with child. The number of times he was inside her, how could the bitch not be carrying his little prince or princess!

  Her twisted sister being so far away from them and the night being so still, calmed her mind as she lay on a blanket in the sand. She heard Romarus wrestling with his personal guard Grey’Gon. “Fuck off! You threw sand.” The king laughed.

  He gets too close to his guards. Especially that one. They are there to protect him, not to be his friends.

  “I’m getting old!” Grey’Gon shouted in jest at the king. “Your Grace is half my age. I need something to give me an advantage.”

  Londenia strained around from where she lay. The wrestling two were lit by a smaller campfire next to one of the guard tents. Bwick was (of course) on hand, brushing sand off the king’s cape. Romarus laughed along with the guard. “Half my age? Try four times, you old fuck! Wha
t are you…sixty or something?” He slapped Grey’Gon’s face playfully then jumped to lock the guard’s head under his arm. The king let go and flicked him in the balls with a backhand.

  Grey’Gon grunted and grabbed himself. “I’ve only had thirty-five years, you bastard,” he rasped and wheezed in jest.

  “Nope… No bastard here! Royal blue-eyed blood, mate. Direct bloodline from the gods!” Romarus joked back, flashing nine fingers behind him as insult, then laughed. “I’ll see you tomorrow, Grey’Gon. You can sleep now.”

  Londenia saw the guard salute his king with clashing fists in front of his chest even though Romarus had his back to him and was walking to where she lay. At least he keeps some of his formalities, she thought, watching the guard duck into his tent. Bwick trotted after the king as he walked towards her spot next to the fire.

  “You can go to sleep for tonight too, Brick,” he said to the shaggy haired halfwit. Bwick bowed and shuffled through the sand towards his tent. Romarus joined her next to the fire. “Do you think Bostonia will be alright just now?” he asked, immediately forcing the conversation as he always did to her sister.

  “I’m sure she is fine. You made a wise decision to leave her in the care of the healers at the keep. We have other concerns ahead of us.”

  “I just can’t get her out of my head.”

  For what reason, I wonder. Are you bored of the women you’ve taken with you or do you truly feel some connection to my sister? “Why don’t you spend some time with Ogla and Lida?”

  “No, they don’t talk. I’d rather talk to you for a while.”

  These words gave her a tingle. She liked being his ears and felt comforted that she was the one who likely knew most about him in the world. Even more than her bitch sister. Romarus put his hands down the front of his cotton trousers as he always did when out in the chill of the desert night. He had his thinking face on. “Who made the stars?” he asked. “What are they?”

  A question about the world and the sky? This is different coming from him! “You should have listened more during your teachings,” she teased.

  “I fell asleep in most of my teachings.” Romarus laughed through his nose.

  She rolled onto her side next to him and pointed at his chest. “Well you will listen to Tal Londenia.”

  “Teach me then Tal,” he answered, playing along as one of the dunebacks, tied outside the camp, made their manlike grunts at the patrolling guards. “What’s the blue one? I remember a bit about it. It moves around more than the others or something, doesn’t it?”

  “That’s right. The Blue Wanderer.” She pointed to the light blue speck of a star directly above their heads. “It has little pattern in its movements across the sky and isn’t used for guidance. It is where Beverine stays to watch over us. She is the only one of the Ten High-Gods that remained close in physical form.”

  “Where are the other nine? I sort of know, but I like it when you explain things.” He smiled.

  It’s as if I’m reading a child a night-time story. “The other nine High-Gods no longer keep a physical form. They reside around us in spirit and can hear our words. The eleventh, the Fallen One, Soju, takes the form of a shadow and resides in the Soju Expanse.”

  Romarus sat up. “Grey’Gon was telling me about the Expanse, how the creatures tried to attack the Ten Kingdoms hundreds of years ago when the Veil disappeared.”

  Londenia was impressed that he actually retained information. Perhaps Grey’Gon should be a tal instead of one of the guard. “Grey’Gon is slightly incorrect. They were not creatures. They were the fallen souls of mortals who did not follow the teachings. It is said they staggered into the kingdoms, crossing the former line of the Veil, after Soju broke through its powers. They limped and dragged their lifeless limbs and stiff jaws into First Kingdom. They would bite and eat people alive, blood dripping from their mouths. But High-King Murnur drew them back with the help of the Peak and Gate Kingdoms.” She quoted the more flavorsome stories that her maid had told her from the histories of the Ten Kingdoms as a child.

  Romarus’s eyes drifted and then locked back onto her. “So the stars… What are they?”

  You really can’t focus on any one thing can you? “The people of the Still Cities say they are like our sun, but they’re so far away they look like dots. We know this to be true also and that Yod’Herem placed them far away so we didn’t get blinded by their light. He placed them in such a pattern that we can use them to find our way across the land and sea. Back in the Gods’ Age, mortals didn’t require the stars to navigate. The gods gifted them with powerful devices that could be held in the palm of your hand that would show the way. When the gods left us, they gave us the knowledge of the stars but took away their gifts. The magisters and other people of the Still Cities don’t believe the Ten put the stars in the sky.”

  “Who did then?” Romarus asked.

  “The Ten did!” Londenia slapped him on the shoulder with a smile. “Most of the people of the Still Cities have no faith. They don’t believe what we believe.”

  “But we trust them so much that we’ve left our home and are traveling through the desert. And I’ve left Bostonia behind.”

  “Yes, but they have great knowledge. My father used to speak of the many wonders they have created in the Still Cities. They too have devices much like our gods once gifted us and took away. Even their own dwellings have luxuries we do not possess in the Ten Kingdoms. But with regards to this threat—they say they have proof of what they speak of and it is imperative we see it.”

  “What does imperative mean?”

  Indeed… She realized why the magisters insisted on face to face contact with the kings. Not that the other kings were as brainless as Romarus, but they had a stubbornness built into them. Words would be unlikely to sway them. It would be seeing that would get them to believe this threat spoken so gravely of. “Don’t worry yourself about such things. You go and get some sleep. I’m sure Ogla and Lida will be waiting for you.” She forced a smile.

  The king removed his hands from his trousers, stood and stuck his arse out at her. “Sure you won’t join in?” he bantered.

  She couldn’t help but laugh and took the opportunity to reach up and slap his arse. “I’m your queen! Now go, or you’ll be wrestling me instead of Grey’Gon, and I never lose.” Londenia winked.

  “Would never happen,” he jested as he pecked her forehead and winked back. She shook her head and another laugh escaped. She watched him jog over to the royal tent. A loud bout of pants and moans proceeded for some time and then she was alone with the quiet of the desert again. Only the occasional chatter between the two guards on duty, walking around the camp with fire torches in hand, interrupted the still night. Strangely contented in that moment next to the fire, she could barely bring herself to move an arm to reach for her cup of wine. Her eyes closed and her heart beat shallowly, as she drifted off.

  After facing six more days of sun, dust, sand, and creeping things crawling out from under foot, the sight of the tall trees ahead was very much welcomed. They stood at the edge of the desert; a wall of gray-blue giants. Hackle Trees, Londenia remembered her father telling her when she visited here as a child. The urge to run to their shade was overwhelming but Queen Londenia kept a steady pace with her party. After what felt like a hundred thousand more footfalls, they were under the shade of the giant trees of Hal’s Forest. The shade felt like a cool mist and a calming hand on top of her head.

  From her visit as a youth, she remembered the sheer massiveness of the great woods and assumed the hackle trees seemed so large because she was but a child. However, even now the huge twisted silver trunks and canopies of blue were as large as ever. They hadn’t reached the start of the forest and were yet to stand under one of the towering beasts, but the waning afternoon sun cast shadows from the forest, over the desert, for two hundred footfalls or more.

  They were close to Hal Tal, the largest place of healing in the Ten Kingdoms. It was here they would res
t and stock up on food and infusions before moving on to the Watch Kingdom. Since the beginning of the Ten Kingdoms, the temple of Hal Tal was where all healers came to learn their trade.

  At the edge of the forest, the party stopped and dismounted the dunebacks. Londenia hopped down onto the last bit of sand, then stepped onto the first shoots of grass she had seen in years. The oversized tree trunks stood in numbers as far as her eyes could penetrate. She reached out and touched the bark. The might of the great tree flowed through her fingertips. The air was fresh and the forest had a tranquil tone in both sound and light. Hal’s Forest had an ancient feel about it and—as with the god of healing, life and death that it was named after—it in no way felt as if its life would ever end.

  From the border of the trees, Celóndas took the lead. She had spent her youth in Hal Tal learning the craft that had allowed her to become the chief healer of Last Kingdom. “It is likely we will reach Hal Tal within a few hours,” she said. The healer turned to King Romarus who was pulling on a slim-fitting burgundy overcoat. For somebody who has only ever known the heat of the desert, he was likely feeling the chill coming from the shade of Hal’s Forest. He buttoned up the snug-fitting collarless jacket all the way to his neck. Celóndas asked the boy king, “Does Your Grace wish to rest here for a while or shall we proceed?”

  Romarus instinctively looked to Londenia for guidance. She smiled and turned away.

  “We’ll keep going,” the king declared. “It will be dark soon and it would be best for our brown-eyed people to not have to travel by fire torch.” He spoke as if it was a speech written for him.

  “It is likely they will still have to use fire for an hour but at least half of our journey will still be lit by the sun,” Celóndas answered. She had forty-two years but the way she held herself, and with the tone of her skin, her bright-blue eyes and her groomed jet-black hair, she could pass for ten years younger. She had an energy and caring nature that Londenia adored and fed off in times of need and sorrow.