A Tribute at the Gates

by C. J. Aaron

  Ryl thought for a moment, pondering the right words before making his next statement.

  “So, the phrenic were manipulators,” Ryl said, trying to convey a feeling of praise, as he truly had no intention of offending his new companion. “If so, what did they stand to gain?”

  Da’agryn smiled.

  “An admirable first attempt, Ryl,” Da’agryn proclaimed, clapping Ryl solidly on the shoulder. “No offense taken, my friend. In a sense, some were. There is vast knowledge locked in your blood, an inherent understanding of the world in which you live that, hopefully, you will learn to access in time. The skills were never to be used for personal gain. However, I’ll admit we have walked a very fine line from time to time. Our position was to advise the course of action most beneficial to all. The decision whether or not to act was not our calling.”

  “There were some phrenic that possessed more tangible powers as well, although they were rare, indeed,” Da'agryn continued. “The phrenic were broken down into three sects, intellectual, physical, and elemental. All phrenic show some form of intellectual advance, however, some also possessed great strength, building the architectural wonders the world knows today. Some possessed inhuman speed, some possessed the ability to hold a varied degree of control over the elements at will. Once the alexen in your blood peaks, it works to slow the natural aging process, prevents illness as well as dramatically increases the body’s innate ability to heal itself. It is the ability to slow the aging process that the Kingdom of Damaris has coveted so fiercely.”

  Ryl and Da'agryn exited the narrow path into a massive clearing. At first glance, Ryl estimated it to be several hundred paces across in each direction. The forest on all sides closely bordered the waters of a large pond. Its dark blue waters rippled gently, shimmering as they reflected the light of the moon and stars above.

  True to Da'agryn’s description, the side of the lake closest to them contained a pristine sand beach. The water lapped quietly against the white sand. Da'agryn steered them toward a large flat boulder that jutted out into the water, off the left edge of the beach.

  Ryl was awestruck by the serene beauty of the pond. There was a harmony here. The feeling of peace washed over him with every miniature swell of the water that rolled onto the sand.

  “This is truly one of the world's hidden treasures,” Da'agryn said with an obvious reverence, breaking the silence. “There are few other placed that hold such peace and majesty.”

  Ryl, who was lost for words, merely nodded in agreement, continuing to silently soak in the scene until they arrived at the large rock.

  Following Da'agryn, Ryl mounted the boulder, stopping next to him at its end. He motioned for Ryl to kneel beside him.

  “The Erlyn does more than provide safe harbor to the wayward phrenic you know,” Da'agryn said, pointing to the shimmering waters. “She will willingly provide sustenance. All you need to do is ask. Clear your mind like before, however, this time, picture a fish. You must always take care to be as detailed in your mind as possible. Visualize every scale, how the water rushes through the gills, everything you can.”

  “How will we catch the fish once it's here? I see no net or poles,” Ryl asked curiously.

  “You will see,” was all he received in reply.

  Ryl again forced himself to concentrate on an image of a fish. Having taken part in the annual fish harvest on several occasions, he imagined those. He felt the slippery texture of the scales on his hands, visualized the fins that propelled it through the water. He pushed the image out to the woods.

  He had been concentrating so hard on the image of the fish that when he opened his eyes, his vision blurred and he collapsed forward. Da'agryn's hand caught him by the back of his shirt, gently pulling him back from the edge before he slipped into the crystal clear waters.

  Ryl lay still for a minute, blinking his eyes tightly as his blurred vision corrected. Da'agryn was kneeling a pace away when he sat up slowly, his watchful eyes observing his condition.

  “I think that's enough practice for the day, wouldn't you say?” he said with a smile. “You think you're up to lending a hand? Learning to control your gifts can be extraordinarily taxing, especially at the start.”

  Ryl crawled to the edge of the rock, looking down into the calm waters. A school of large fish moved slowly in a circle, brushing against the side of their outcropping. Da'agryn reached into the water, pulling a fish out with ease, motioning for Ryl to do the same.

  “I've never caught a fish with my hands,” Ryl admitted. “Is there a trick to it?”

  “All that's needed here is a tight grip,” Da’agryn replied. “The Erlyn provides this bounty willingly. I urge you not to overtax her favor though. Her bounty is not infinite. With enough practice, some fish in the wild, as well as small game can be convinced to remain still for a short period of time. However, they will spook easily. Failure of the first attempt will inevitably doom the next.”

  Ryl looked back down at the churning mass of fish. Visually selecting his target, he took a deep steadying breath, then plunged his hand into the chilled water of the pond. He grabbed the fish just above the gills, surprised at the how easily it gave itself in to capture. Just as quickly as they had appeared, the school of fish retreated, disappearing into the depths of the pool. Ryl looked around at the surrounding forest, concentrating on sending out a wave of gratitude for the bounty.

  Da’agryn dipped his head in approval.

  “Well done. Now, let’s bring these back and let's eat,” he said.

  13

  Ryl slumped back against the rock seat near the fire. He stared blankly at the skeletal remains of the fish he had caught and devoured. The food had done wonders to fill his aching belly. The water from the skins Da'agryn had filled from the pond were clean and refreshing. The toils of the last several days as well as the added expenditure of energy attempting his newfound talents had left him mentally and physically drained. He fought back the urge to sleep.

  The walk back had been filled with conversation, albeit brief revealing a history that Ryl never knew existed. At one time, the phrenic had numbered in the thousands, spread out through Damaris and the known world, mixing freely with the population. Some sought employ within the courts, advising kings and nobles. Their skills as strategists, negotiators, councilors and prophets were highly sought after. Others remained within the general public, serving as menders, artists, architects, or other skilled trades. Others still chose to keep themselves, secreted from the general public, living quiet lives of their choosing.

  Seers represented a very small segment of phrenic society, advancing far beyond their peers within the intellectual sect. Over fifteen hundred cycles ago, they began delivering disturbing reports of an evil spreading from the unknown regions of the Outlands.

  In those days, the port city of Cadsae was the last vestige of civilized land. There were no palisades. There were no Stocks. Across the river to the west, only a handful of scattered farms and homesteads braved life bordering the virtually unknown Outlands.

  The fertile land stretched for miles on either side of the river, however, less than four days ride to the west, the land inexplicable changed. Productive soil became barren, green grasses gave way to short patches of withered, burnt-orange vegetation. Trees grew in abundance on the land close to the river. To the west, only small deformed copses survived, dotting the desiccated wasteland. Shrunken brushes grew close to the ground, their razor sharp thorns striking out at anyone who passed within their reach.

  The barren land continued as far as the eye could see to the west running along the Havens and southwest along the coast of the Sea of Prosper. The mountains held claim to a single small strip of green forest that stretched out nearly a mile from their base, holding back the encroaching barren landscape.

  The coastline was dotted with miniature rocky beaches that broke the monotony of the sheer rock walls where the earth stretched hundreds of feet into the sky. The sea itself near the coast was
violent, pounding its furious waves against the vertical cliffs.

  By and large, the Outlands were an unsolved mystery. A mystery that had intrigued adventurers and military alike. Over the cycles, hundreds of expeditions and scouting parties had ventured out into the unknown. The longest known expedition lasted for several moons, traversed hundreds of miles and returned bearing no news of civilization. Yet most, however, never returned.

  The ones that were lucky enough to limp back to Cadsae spoke of horrors in the night and invisible terror in the daylight. Disembodied voices screamed through the darkness, unseen hands ripped soldiers to pieces while dragging them away into the night. Their agonizing screams would linger as they were pulled into the distance. Men would vanish without a sound during the daylight.

  Few at that point had ever glimpsed their attackers. The few rough sketches had depicted radically disproportionate humans. They were described as taller than the average man, long skinny legs with knees abnormally close to their hips. Their arms stretched longer than a human’s and were equipped with clawed hands, just as lethal as the rugged clubs, swords or pikes that they were rumored to carry. Their skin was nearly black with hints of a deep crimson red. Faces were split nearly in half by a mouth filled with razor-sharp pointed teeth, beady eyes set wide apart on their hairless heads.

  The cost to mount these expeditions continued to grow, both monetarily and in human life. The results, however, remained stagnant. Eventually, the expeditions were cancelled entirely. The Outlands were to remain an untamed, largely uncharted wilderness.

  The visions of the seers went largely unacknowledged, so by the time the Outland Horde was spotted, a vast, black and red smudge on the horizon, it was too late. The capital and houses refused to muster a united force, content to bolster their own personal defenses. The port city of Cadsae was preemptively written off as a casualty of war.

  The warnings of the seers did not entirely fall on deaf ears, however. Taben, the fourth son of Duke Martrion, had taken the predictions seriously. He had been working in secret to establish a small expeditionary force that would be ready in the event the dire warnings came to fruition. Taben was a reticent young man, avoiding life in the court, not content with the political backstabbing and lobbying for favor from the throne. This behavior found him shunned at court, allowing him to maintain his secrets with ease.

  Taben was hiding more than merely the formation of his small army. A more powerful secret flowed through his veins. Not only was Taben a phrenic, he was also the last known carrier of active alexen.

  Until Ryl.

  The myths of his exploits in the engagements that followed became known throughout history and lore as the Battle of the Erlyn Woods. His brutal campaign led to the virtual annihilation of the horde and had been exaggerated over time. He possessed a cunning that the hordes could not match. He possessed astounding speed that they could not catch. He controlled the elements in a way that they could not comprehend.

  His army, hand selected from the phrenic showing great prowess in the physical and elemental sects, were virtually untouchable, carrying out raid after raid against a force outnumbering them by an immeasurable sum. Their incursions wreaked enough havoc to divert the entirety of the horde north to the edge of the woods at the base of the Haven Mountains. Here, Taben’s army sought shelter within the Erlyn. No enemy that ventured within her midst ever returned. They were preyed upon by Taben’s ruthless force, reduced to a fraction of their original size. The fall of their leader at the hands of Taben signaled their hasty retreat back into the Outlands from whence they had come.

  The victory over the Outland Horde denoted the beginning of a new era, cycle zero in the modern calendar. The victory at the Battle of the Erlyn Woods was definitive, the long-standing effects of the war were profound. Aside from the occasional brave or foolish adventurer, the realm of humanity stopped at the western palisade.

  The new era harkened with it an altered attitude from the populous toward their phrenic saviors. Those that had been accepted as a natural segment of society became revered like gods. Whereas many had been trusted advisors, skilled craftsmen and scholars, they were now called upon to produce miracles, a feat that they were incapable of matching. One by one, the phrenic went into hiding, withdrawing from public life. The division between the public and the phrenic grew quickly, as did the division within the phrenic community itself.

  This division spurred a young phrenic named Leiroth, the counselor to the heir to the throne of Damaris, to the actions that led to the eventual downfall of the phrenic society as a whole. Leiroth coveted the powers of Taben, believing that all phrenics should be able to access the same gifts. In secret, he conducted experiments, kidnapping both phrenic and non-phrenic alike.

  HIs experiments failed at their intended purpose. All the efforts to augment the inherent powers of the phrenic met with disastrous results. Some produced debilitating illness, while the majority drove their recipients mad. While his end goal of leveling the playing field among the phrenics remained the same, Leiroth altered his approach, instead focusing on limiting the powers of the strongest amongst them.

  Taben was a casualty of these experiments. At a celebratory banquet thrown in his honor, Leiroth secretly slipped his concoction into Taben’s goblet. Within a moon’s time, the hero of Damaris was completely detached from reality. During a cold moon, late in Cycle 55, driven by madness, Taben threw himself off the top of the statue, newly created in his honor, plummeting into the churning waters of the pond below. His death mourned, his body, never recovered. Rumors abound that the Erlyn claimed it for her own.

  Inadvertently, Leiroth had planted the seeds for the demise of the phrenic society. By giving the same draught to a non-phrenic, he found that it would imbue them with a mild degree of the skills the phrenic exhibited. This manifested as a dramatically increased rate of healing and decreased effects of age on the body. When given regularly, every fourth moon, the elixir virtually stopped the aging process altogether.

  The astonishing findings of his experiments were shared with his sire, who happily volunteered to receive the elixir. With the untimely death of his father the next cycle, Lunek the Third assumed his father's throne. The throne on which he still sat to this day.

  The rounding up of the phrenics began shortly after his reign in Cycle 57, although initially done in secret. First came the mysterious disappearances of the known phrenic seers. One after another, all but one were confirmed lost within the first moon. In a mock show of support, King Lunek III created a specialized division of the royal guard, known as the Lei Guard. The public role of the Lei Guard was the investigation of the disappearance and ever-growing crimes against the phrenic society.

  Through a mock set of trials, they gained the trust of the phrenics, inviting any and all they could find to a conclave with the king to better determine their needs and to protect their way of life. Nearly a thousand were in attendance at the conclave in Cycle 58 with his royal majesty, King Lunek III, presiding over the affair.

  Once all were seated, the conclave began. The king repeatedly slammed his large ceremonial gavel to begin the proceedings. The thundering echoes drowned out the sounds of the guard barring the doors. The Lei Guards and soldiers alike stormed the conclave imprisoning all that were in attendance. Those who resisted were slaughtered mercilessly.

  The Ascertaining Decree was soon issued, requiring the testing of every man, women and child over the age of eight. From that moment forward, those phrenics remaining free were hunted day and night, bounties placed on their heads. The systematic erasure of all written record of the phrenic people, their history, their deeds, began in earnest. Their great libraries razed to the ground, their teachings and instructions burned in the pyres ablaze in every city, village and town.

  Throughout the turmoil, Leiroth remained at the king’s side, given free rein to continue his experimentation as long as the precious elixir continued to flow. The phrenics that had been rounded up, were driv
en to the city of Cadsae, forced into labor assisting the workers building the west palisade bordering the Outlands. Construction began rapidly on the eastern palisade as well, officially penning themselves into their own prison. A score escaped over the half-built western palisade, disappearing into the Outlands. Chase wasn't given, only death lived beyond the palisade to the west.

  The construction of the palisades forming the walls of The Stocks was completed by Cycle 200, a crowning achievement and a testament to the prowess of the phrenic laborers. The phrenics were separated from the incoming tributes, methods of teaching and awakening strictly forbidden, and enforced brutally. Hundreds died at the sword of their captors before steel was banned inside The Stocks, replaced by the sturdy wooden batons.

  The true phrenic numbers dwindled rapidly, the last of the original number in captivity died of natural causes in Cycle 303, ending the known Era of the Phrenic.

  Da'agryn shifted, rising from his seat at the fire, returning Ryl’s thoughts from the history of the phrenic to the present.

  “Was the sickness that plagues the tributes today a problem during the height of phrenic society?” Ryl asked.

  “The sickness,” Da'agryn sneered. The air felt instantly felt more oppressive, as if choked with anger.

  “The sickness, like the wall, like the guards, is just another exceedingly devious tool to keep the tributes restrained,” he spat. “The phrenics needed no treatment to prevent a sickness from ravaging the body, for there is no sickness. The treatment that has been forced down your throat since childhood is nothing more than a carefully concocted poison.”

  Ryl felt like the air was sucked out of the room. He struggled to suck in a breath.

  “The regular doses have allowed the toxin to build in your system,” Da'agryn continued. “Your blood is equipped to fight off most infections, and even some poisons, especially one as weak as this. By giving consistent treatments, the poison has been allowed to maintain such a high concentration that it prevents your body from destroying it. The symptoms that you would experience if you stopped taking the treatments at this point would be extreme and most likely last the better part of a moon. While, at points, you most likely would want them to be, they would not prove to be fatal.”