Gazateer slowly turned his eyes from the spot where his nemesis disappeared, turning to Agathorn saying, “Go ahead, my friend. It is all up to you now. I will not stop you.”
Agathorn looked at the Elders around him and smiled, whispering to them in elvish, “Gabriel did not want to save everyone… only those precious few left worth dying for.” Then he looked at the trap door. “And I wonder if there are any of those still around”…The wind died.
“Azurus...” Agathorn gazed at the trap door whispering. “Listen to my words.”
He silently looked at Iden standing in front of the stage, who clenched his fist on his sword’s hilt, waiting for Agathorn’s move.
That was the moment I found out what tied me to Borg, what that voice was persuading me to linger. We, the Genn, are the witnesses of Talor, and if there was a turning point in its history it would be that one… when Agathorn chose.
And I, Nimtha, was there to witness that choice.
People in the square, in the streets, or in the prisons below listened to what Agathorn came to say. Everyone expected to see his storm of vengeance hailing upon the entire Eredian city. Everyone expected the greatest elf who ever lived to avenge his sons and avenge his land. Everyone feared punishment.
Beside Iden stood Acar. He whispered news to the ears of the Eredian commander. Words speaking of a great bear that bridged Gloor and crossed Eredia’s eastern borders that morning reached the ears of those in the square. Thousands of elven warriors followed the bear punisher. A colossal ape and an ancient wolf close behind.
War between men and elves was just one word away.
The world’s final cry
With awe striking sureness, Agathorn’s words echoed. For a glimpse of time, humanity –a lifeless corpse– sprouted to life, gasping for the last breath of air with a single father’s anguish… and both man and beast remembered.
“Vengeance... is a world I built and designed to reign,
Vengeance is a word I cried when all words were pain.”
The Untherax walked toward an empty spot on the roof where the Horn of Dar used to stand. It wasn’t there.
“Vengeance is a journey taken when all else fails,
Few words are left to say before vengeance spread sails.”
Gazateer opened his closed palms in a manner much like the blossoming of a flower. As he did, the scrolls of Shagoth floated from place to place, in Borg and beyond. They split and multiplied in the air as it carried them across Talor. A glittering few words started to appear on them.
“I came for the few who listen and the fewer who care;
Hold tight to each moment now; we have none to spare.”
Far across the gulf, in the Lantern, Aster, Hidnor, and Gashnor were in deep slumber beside their friend. The light of the Lantern was fading in the stormy night.
“Take a look back, to our burnt ships and our lost dreams;
When we killed the bird, we killed the tree too, it seems.”
Garold silently watched his father’s chamber and then turned to Baneca, the Black Princess of Lorken. She strode around in his ancestors’ castle confidently.
“Tell me, when did we let the will of the world be broken?
Not an act of honor taken, not a word of courage spoken.”
Acar turned away from the square and left to his home. Supremus noticed and let him be. Szene stopped outside the city and turned towards the event. Other emissaries did the same.
“I come now with a message written with a misty eye,
So take all gifts of war away and hear her final cry.”
In Karelya, Lenar watched the elven lands wither away rapidly. The green yellowed and the trees turned to dried husks. The Great Oak was the last to fade, its branches bare and feeble. Its eyes opened.
“Why does it hurt so much? Why all this pain?
Didn’t we all bury the child with no name?”
Somewhere in the Pateran desert, the Dwarves of Kavlot were burying their murdered children. Maloch smirked as he was dragged to prison. From his hands dropped the burnt doll, soaked in his blood.
“My mute scream now holds at bay all voices of reason,
And my son’s empty chair condemns my own kin’s treason.”
Along the coastal road heading away from Borg, Aidus was galloping away, terrified. In Karelya, Ria gazed at Gabriel’s abandoned training dummy.
“The fire in the hearts is calling for the greatest of rages,
Let it burn our shame and end the silence of the ages.”
Far north, holding the floating paper in his closed palm, A’rak watched the ruins of his homeland; broken hills and burnt nests.
“Shed your last tear and rise. Make sure the whole world knows
That the greatest pain for the wind is not to smell the rose.”
In the dark, Sabil silently wept in the lonely candlelight of her cell. In a different cell, Azurus’s hands were chained to the walls, and his storm-white hair covered his face.
“Let a battle worthy to be written in history begin;
All sides will lose dearly, no matter who will win.”
A black monstrosity appeared atop the Wall of Enigmus. Ridvak mounted the broken wall and its roar thundered across the bridge and the ruins of Henya. The Serador peered toward the Dark Mile.
“Then before the final breath of the battle fades,
Through symphonies of valor and dancing of the blades—”
A torch’s light fell on A’tor’s face as he stood with his double shields drawn. Robyn appeared beside him as they stood in front of the bars of a cell.
“In the night sky of the battlefield, a few last words soar,
You may take our lives, but we will kneel no more!”
In their deep slumber, Trador’s company smiled faintly. The pained expression on the king’s face vanished.
Valadas fell to his knees, overwhelmed by his wounds. As he dropped on the floor, two words appeared on the paper he held in his bloodied fingers: No more.
And my daggers whispered, “Salitar.” No more.
Edwin stood there trembling as he heard Agathorn’s words. He looked at Iden — the commander was smiling with pride. Thousands of Neligans poured into the square, flooding between the lines of the Eredian soldiers. They surrounded the stage. Supremus gave his soldiers no orders to do.
Waking up from his rumination, Edwin turned to the Neligans fighting by the pit. “Do not kill the high Dargos! You will ruin everything!”
The several Neligans still on their feet surrounded Valadas by the opening. There wasn’t a spot left in his broken body without a cut or a wound, yet, he turned to the ambassadors of Talor, those who lingered, paralyzed in fear, and he smiled honorably. The Neligans exchanged angry looks, and the bravest of them decided to ignore Edwin’s orders. Several blade tips pointed towards the grand knight.
Their blades were swift ... their blades were merciless.
The White Owl flew away with the message to the Oaken Ring.
Everyone held the paper and read it.
The same two words appeared on all of them: No more.
What Agathorn said did not unleash vengeance on Borg as everyone expected. Instead, he sent a message that flew to the four corners of Talor.
The elven army and the terrible creatures of Karelya retreated to their domain. The war between elves and men would never happen.
Agathorn turned toward the sea. He spread his arms and closed his eyes. The wind blew once more for a brief moment. When it receded, he was gone—vanished as the music died with the screech of a phoenix. The Brave Elders faded against their background. I turned toward the sea and saw the raft turning around and making its way deep into it, and the ships closed the gap behind it.
On the raft, before it faded in the dark horizon of the night, Agathorn appeared beside the Duke.
Iden and Gazateer gazed at Agathorn’s empty spot, and they both knew his choice. All curtains of all stages were down before my eyes, and my job wa
s done.
Edwin screamed “The damn knight was right. We have united all our enemies. We were watching the wrong people. We watched the Order of Eon and forgot their children.”
Yoppa.
When I heard this word, I looked at my daggers and saw the eagle-winged one glowing more than the other. At that moment, I knew what my next move was, and then I took the last choice any Genn would take.
Despite I knew that I had asked too much of Cresh already, I called for Cresh the Swift. Against my expectations, the Duchess of Mount Aerous appeared beside me and started dancing, transforming me to mere wind, and flew into the room toward the opening of the pit. Before I landed behind Valadas’s motionless body, I materialized atop the opening. His palm relaxed releasing the bloodied paper into the pit. Then just before I followed it down there, my eyes met those of Xolis outside the window. He was in the same spot where I lingered the entire meeting. He was one inch from reaching me.
The Neligans yelled, pointing at me, “The Genn”
Then I knew it was done, I’d stepped onto the stage, and into the play.
Sabil … I am coming to you… and the whole world behind me.
Epilogue
“Yes. Vaud whispers to you. They chose you for that reason, the Mergals,” came the windy voice of the Asker. Wings flapped again, and Nimtha’s gaze followed. “They chose you for what happened in Vaud.”
“You know what happened in there?” inquired the Genn.
“I am not called the Asker for nothing. I have all the questions, and I collect answers. And I will continue to do so for your world until it is gone.”
The Genn dares to ask, “So why are you here? You seem to already know all of this.”
“I do. But not from you.”
“I don’t understand.”
The Asker closes in just enough for Nimtha to feel its presence acutely. The entity’s eyes glitter differently as it responds, “I can see everything, and know all the answers. But, in my unfathomably long years, only one was shrouded from me.”
Nimtha stared at the ghastly eyes. “Me?”
“Even the rest of your kin, even all the watchers and lurkers, cannot hide from me. But you... you did something in Vaud that changed that. When you interfered for the first time, your path became concealed from me. I followed you out of Vaud with a question that was not answered till now: When your kin abandoned their neutral stand, they swayed to one side, and you chose the other. Now I am starting to understand.”
Nimtha shifts his stare to the gray frozen stones on which he sits. It was there, in the unearthly world of Vaud, that he did his first choice. Now he remembers what happened in Vaud.
“So it was you whom I felt following me out of Mergal. But why? Why didn’t I recall what happened in Vaud? How did it slip my mind?”
“Because this was the moment when you accepted the challenge. You cannot remember that moment or else your choices after that will be meaningless. When you decided to stay for Taria, or when you took the Rushk. The moment when you set your mind to return to Talor to search for Trador and when you did it again, even when all hope was gone. When you took the scroll and sought to maintain the balance your kin disrupted. You are now the only true Genn. Others became part of the game once they gave in to the weaknesses of mere men, leaving you as the only real watcher. All these choices you took has elevated you to something different than any of your kind. And the crown jewel of all of this was your choice with Sabil. You earned your world something nobody expected. Do you remember what you have been gifted?”
***
Yes, I remember the gift. I wasn’t there when the elves saw it, but the details of the first sighting became known once the news spread.
Far east in Karelya, Lenar strode a shady moonlit path and stopped after passing a tree where the path bent. A few druids followed, reticently humming beautiful yet sad tunes. Lenar stopped to gaze upon the inner sanctum, partially obscured behind vigilant trees. A butterfly flapped beside him, drawing his attention away from the sanctum. He watched as it landed on the ground. Then it flattened, as if dead. The druids halted their chanting as he picked it up. Lenar opened his palm. The butterfly had turned to a paper with only two words: No more . Before he or any of the elves could react to the bizarre finding, a breathless druid came running.
“Lord Lenar, you need to see this,” she said, barely catching her breath.
“What is it?” asked Lenar with concern.
“Please follow me.”
With one last look to the inner sanctum, Lenar and his druids followed her out of the well-hidden glade. She led them to a spacious area, where she stopped and pointed to the sky. Lenar slowly turned to look. When he saw what the druid was gazing at, he murmured with complete awe, “Oh Igna, be merciful!”
Up there they saw new constellations, vivid and clear, stretching across the night sky. They could see none of the star formations they were familiar with.
But one constellation stood out among its peers. It was in the shape of a horn, a long horn with a hand firmly gripping its aperture as if some being was climbing out of it.
Then they heard something.
A sound, barely audible, and resembling the magnified movement of millions of ants on a hollow tree trunk, started to buzz. They turned to its source, to the inner sanctum. One of the druids inquired, “What is this sound?”
Lenar fixated his gaze momentarily at the direction of the sanctum. And then, doubting what he was about to say, he answered, “The writer of the Erante… he has started writing again.”
The elves’ forms started to shimmer as excitement found its way to their weary souls.
“What does this mean?” questioned another druid.
Lenar took a moment to think before he replied, and his form swirled with the color of a sea storm. “There is only one explanation I can find.” After another thoughtful pause, he pointed to the sky. “These signs are a declaration of the birth of a new age. What came before this day was the Final Harvest; the last chance to muster what we can and prepare for what lies ahead. So says the Erante.”
“New Age? Now?” asked the druid gazing at the strange constellation. Then he turned to Lenar asking with curiosity uncommon to the elves “What lies ahead?”
“An age unforeseen by the wisest of seers, a burrowed time that we have been given...the last chance” answered Lenar, a shadow of a smile forming on his lips. “Now begins the Dark Season.”
Chronicles & Facts…
BSC
Dream Age – Obscurus. Before that nothing was recorded except in the Erante.
0 SC
The First Born woke up. Small groups of all races started to gather in several spots across Talor. Evidence of former life on Talor evaded all eyes until they faded away.
100 SC
Denaria, the oldest city in Talor, started to form in the land later known as Lorken.
110 SC
A few large settlements were established across Talor. Varna, Trada and Alkurk were among them. Some towns and villages were built.
115 SC
The Eastern Elves appeared. The first was Agathorn, the Tempest.
120 SC
Mountain Helmight opened, and the dwarves of Helmight appeared.
150 SC
The land of K'ra was discovered, and the eagle-men, the Ekrans, were spotted. The Ekrans were approached by the humans and trade established.
185 SC
The Realm of Gosh was discovered by the elves. The Goshean Bracelet fully encircled the Realm.
200 SC
Narrow-eyed humans climbed the high west of Talor and took up residence in Nelsia, the furthest anyone had traveled west.
230 SC
Aerothia, the mythical kingdom above, was rumored to be spotted from the highest peak in K'ra by the Ekrans.
262 SC
The Order of Eon was reformed (the first time it was formed was sometime before the year 0 SC but there are no solid records for that period). Aeroth
ia was their destination and the rulers of the aerial kingdom were approached.
265 SC
Lorken was formed in the mid-west part of northern Talor around Denaria. The first sovereign to rule a kingdom was Cas, the Targ of Lorken. Cas and the first circle of the Order of Eon drove Itia to her caves.
300 SC
The lands of Carta, Tamos, Tethia and Doster were established in the northern hemisphere, clustered in the mid-east.
330 SC
Sidnia was established as the first kingdom in the Vigoran continent. It was second in size only to Lorken.
350 SC
Verda was discovered beneath the Goshean Bracelet, and the Genn were seen by the elves deep in the Goshean Bracelet. Creatures part earth and part shadow, the majority of those discovered were First Born.
400 SC
1st Age of Thrones: kingdoms formed throughout Talor, trade flourished.
Very few First Born were still living among the long-lived races.
450 SC
The Towers of Cane unveiled themselves and served as hubs for teaching the Seven Powers.
500 SC
The Itians haunted the Ardul Seal holiday festival held in Vigora. They were driven out of the event and chased to their caves.
The Dark Season Saga- the Final Harvest Page 35