Take the Mountain – Chapter 29

*Scene 01* – 08:15 (Briars and Nettles)

The forest pressed close around the Xarmnian hunters, a living wall of thorns and shadow. Every swing of a blade sent a spray of damp leaves and nettles into the air, with the scent of rot and rain still thick on the wind. Hadeon’s arm ached from the steady rhythm of cutting, but the sight of the cobblestones emerging under the muck stirred something fierce and determined within him—an enraging proof that the old defiant road still lived beneath years of neglect.  The old routes through the woods of Kilrane, though overgrown and succumbing to the creep of the dense forest, once were serviceable enough to allow traders and travelers to pass over them on their way to the old city.  Hadeon was certain that the section of the buried road they had spent half the night clearing would eventually connect to a stone bridge that spanned the northern graben connecting the forested wing to the raised horst, a central flat shelf upon which the old city was built on a descending terrace of earth and stone.

The men of his Protectorate band worked in shifts, rotating down through the narrow lane, uncovering and clearing more of the path, their axes biting into the tangle of roots and briars that had extended from the forested lane’s verge.  Each strike echoed faintly through the trees, swallowed quickly by hiss of the evening mist and dripping from the sodden canopy. The Cerberi shifted restlessly, their hackles raised, nostrils flaring at awakened scents long buried deep in the soil. They whined low and uneasy, as if the forest itself whispered warnings only they could hear.  The three-headed, slack-jawed creatures had tried wriggling through the thick briers, only to be cut and abraded by the thorns piercing through their thick black furry hides.  Finally, the men had had to cut loose a few of the more intrepid creatures when they became entangled and snared in the thickets.  Irritated, Hadeon had ordered that the dog beasts be harnessed and restrained once more, to keep them out of the way, until the barbed impediments could be cleared.  They had spent hours in the darkness, hacking through the thick overgrowth to the point of exhaustion, until Hadeon had ordered Kathair and Tizkon to backtrace through the road and see if another way through the dense wood might be discovered.  Clearly, this portion of the old road was no longer in use, but that was not to say that another part of it remained unserviceable.

Farther ahead, Tizkon’s voice carried faintly through the drizzle, calling out to Kathair as their teams veered westward. The faint glimmer of their sputtering torches flickered between the trunks, swallowed by the gloom. Somewhere beyond that curve, the lost city waited—its name half-forgotten, its stones buried beneath the same creeping green that now resisted their every step.  The portion of the old road, previously discovered, had petered out and crumbled into a declivity where the rains had washed its pavers into a moistened gully.

The rain began again, soft but relentless, drumming on leaves and their leathered armor alike. Hadeon lifted his gaze to the canopy, where the ancient branches intertwined like the ribs of some vast creature, and pressed forward into the dark.  “We’re wasting time in this muck!” he growled, throwing his ax down in frustration with a loud clack and clatter.

Suddenly, there was a distant shout coming through the trees, and Hadeon spun around as one of his men came up from the far end of the brief section of road they had uncovered.  The man had an odd grin on his face, as if he were trying to keep a straight and serious face after having just heard an extremely funny story.  Hadeon scowled as the man approached and waited while the man caught his breath.

“You find this funny?!” Hadeon snarled, leaning over to pick up his discarded ax, hefting it in a threatening manner.

“My Bruel, you can tell the others to stop trying to dig through the underbrush.  We’ve found how these foxes are getting in and out of these woods, undetected.”

“Oh, you have, have you?” he snapped.  “And how, pray tell, did this come about?!”

The man grinned as if he was about to deliver a punch line that he expected would please his taskmaster.

“Funny you should ask that, m’Lord,” he flashed his teeth, “For horse droppings showed us the way of it.”

Hadeon stepped forward, gripping his ax handle, turning the blade outward. “Why to I get the sudden feeling that the information I am about to get from you, might very well be a load of that very thing?!”

Realizing his halting, comic delivery was not playing out too well with his exasperated audience, the man stepped back holding up guarded hands, eyeing Hadeon’s brandished weapon.

“My Bruel, I beg you, let me finish. I will be brief.”

“Brief then,” Hadeon warned, “Or by this ax, you’ll die a brief man.”

The man swallowed the sudden lump in his throat and trembled.  “M-my Bruel, one of our company sighted horse droppings on a patch of leaves.  Th-they were fresh, but there was neither sign of horse, nor hoof print.  The leaves were unbroken, the trail in the brush impassable.  It puzzled us, for none of us knew how the spore might’ve got there.  The Half-Men, as far as we know of their kinds, have not winged horses.”

“And this is brief?” Hadeon grunted, flexing his grip once more.

“Y-y-yes, m’Lord,” the man stammered, “Tizken dismounted and crouched down to examine the dung and when he did, a piece…or rather shall I say, a wet drop of manure fell upon the crown of his head.”

The furrowed brows on Hadeon’s forehead raise, and his grip on the ax loosened, signifying to the man that his imminent danger has passed: Hadeon’s glower now shifting into a half-bemused smirk.

“And…?”

“Well, my Bruel, this caused us to, naturally, raise our eye to the source of the uh…”

“The uh?”

“Well, it appears that there is a false canopy, m’Lord.  There is an upper trail that, strange as this might sound, goes among the mid and upper ledges and…”

“And?”

“A road in the trees, m’Lord.  Touched as that might sound, there is an upper road that is suspended above the forest floor, and sets upon stone outcroppings and bridges through the trees, with its undersides disguised to look like a dense canopy of tree cover.  They’ve been traveling above us, at times and beneath us in others.  Kathair had one of his men climb up one of the stone ridges and discovered what we’d been missing.  All this time we have been digging down to find the old road, while the new one was above us.”

Hadeon exhaled and let the blade end of his ax drop back down to the ground.  He should feel satisfaction, and some degree of amusement at the thought of Tizkin wearing a crown of dung on his head, but he wasn’t.  He’d been fooled, or worse, been made a fool of, and he couldn’t help but seethe.  His quarry had eluded him thus far, and that was not to be tolerated.  Now that he knew their secret, and quite possibly the secret employed by that evasive rogue known as The Storm Hawk and his followers, they would see what would come of their mockery.  And he was certain that it would be him getting the last cruel laugh as a result of he and his men’s violent arrival.

*Scene 02* – 24:04 (Heart of Stone)

Mattox and I walked side by side once all our traveling party were down in the tunnel, and our supplies were loaded onto a wagon, I recognized to be Begglar’s, that had been stationed under the loading shaft beneath the foundation of The Keep.  How it had gotten here, past the Xarmnian hunters, I couldn’t guess, but I let that puzzlement go.  Begglar seemed pleased to see it again, and that was enough for me.

Mattox directed us through each passage and juncture as we made our way towards the ground opening hidden within the mountainside forests surrounding Azragoth above, assuring us that the loaded and re-stocked wagon would be teamed up and waiting for us in a lower place down below.  Since the mountainside sloped getting to the cave opening did not require climbing back up or finding a steadily rising grade towards the surface as would have been necessary if the caverns were beneath a plain or level ground.

At last, we arrived at a cave opening to the outside forest.  Filtered light streamed in from two large openings where the tunnel looked out through the forest.

Mattox directed Maeven to take the others down the path and guide the wagon of supplies onto the canopied and hidden road, while we spoke privately.

In the course of our underground travel, in a seemingly awkward fashion, I finally broached the subject that had held my burning curiosity since discovering that The Eagle was a former nemesis.

“How…I mean, what…changed you?”

Mattox kept walking and directing us ahead but eventually responded to my question.

As we moved down the pathway, out from the other’s hearing Mattox said, “It wasn’t just one thing, but there was a catalyst event that finally broke me down.”

I waited, allowing him to pay out the mystery in installments.

“What they did to The Marker, their disgusting obsession with it, making a mockery of it, forcing abeyances and slaughtering before it, finally made it so that I could stomach the hatred no more.”

Of all the things he could have told me, this was the one thing I never had expected to hear.

“The Xarmnians, of which I am ashamed to say I once was, are power-mad.  They are obsessed with dominating everyone and everything because their own collective philosophy demands suppression of a natural human need that they do not realize is innate.  But in all of their power-seeking, the underlying hatred they have for that Stone comes from a deep-seated terror of it.  The Stone reminds them that they are… and will always be…powerless.” He paused shaking his head slightly at the futility of his once held philosophy, sighing.  “No matter how many people they terrorize.  No matter how many lands they conquer, that Stone reminds them that they will never be its equal and they will never be enough to challenge its ancient hold on these lands.”

“Then why do they persist in doing it?  Why not try to come to peace with it somehow?” I asked.

“Peace?” he smirked, “Because that is who each of us are.  We can never find peace until we come to terms with the implications and meaning from that Stone.  It should come as no surprise, I suppose.  Within each of us, there is a deep need for significance and individuality.  Equality is a myth…or at least, the Xarmnian notion of it is.  Have you ever considered why it is that only underachievers and the lazy seek to make all people equal?   To my mind it is because they cannot compete with those not satisfied with mediocrity, those unwilling to live a life of no distinction.  It is innate in all of us.  Mankind seeks a chance to succeed beyond the level of their peers without feeling guilty for that desire or obligated by it to everyone who does not put forth the same sweat equity and discipline.  Suppress those needs long enough and they turn inward into rage and frustration.  These lead either to despair, conformity, and defeat, or to bloodlust, aggression, and violence.  It’s the difference between subjects and soldiers for the Xarmnians.  The governors know this, and they fuel these fires to white-hot intensity.  They take those who choose brutality for their armies, and the rest they dominate and keep in fearful servility.  We were trained to do this, as military leaders.  Schooled in it from an early age.  Yet, I remember from my youth, a time when it wasn’t so.  A time when the Capitalians were regarded as our brothers and sisters, and we once made an annual, collective pilgrimage to The Marker that first inspired us to settle here in these lands.  The Stone gave us hope that we could build something better and have a place of our own.  When we discovered The Builder Stones, we saw them as a gift of The Marker.  We owe the founding of our cities to the use of them, and the mysterious Marker Stone from which they came.”  Sighing once more, he stared out into the woods and trees surrounding us, before speaking again.  “Though we were never allowed to speak of it, I still keep that old memory and lived in a secret shame of my kinsmen and their behavior regarding it.  They tried burying it under massacred thousands who believed in its promises.  Witnessing that was the last straw for me, the last indignity that I could bear.”

Here he paused and looked off, remembering something that he would not dare share with his Xarmnian cohorts.  He began again, haltingly, “I had visited The Marker Stone before. Privately, of course.  I read words on it that I never expected to come to a Xarmnian.  The Stone spoke to me, or at least its golden words struck me as direct and personal.  The passage was from the prophet Ezekiel.  I remembered them and wrote them down and reflect on them often.”

“I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will keep My judgments and do [them]. Then you shall dwell in the land that I gave to your fathers; you shall be My people, and I will be your God.” Ezekiel 36:26-28 NKJV

Mattox sighed, “At first, I could not believe what I was reading.  But the thoughts somehow lingered in my mind, though I tried to deny that they were intended for me.  Afterall, I was a sworn enemy, I had pledged fealty to King Xarm, and to his successors, whomever they may be.  Could I really disregard that blood oath?  Others would most assuredly kill me if they knew I was even considering it.  So, I broke faith with them in my heart, if not in my open actions, and was left to seek Hope in some other path besides Xarmnian philosophies.  I did not trust the level of forgiveness that could be given me by the God of The Marker, however, I thought there might be some way I could make amends for my past.  To lessen the evil done in my service to Xarmnian royalty.  This was cowardice.  I now see that more clearly. I needed something more than just going through the motions of leading a Xarmnian command, servile to a philosophy I could no longer stomach, to give me purpose and bring meaning back.”

“I did many horrible things under the old rule.  Things that weighed down and haunted me with every step.  I needed what these Azragothians had found in the aftermath of their tragedy.  I needed the kind of mercy Jeremiah gave me as we fought on the mountain side.  I needed a way to cleanse and find hope and forgiveness.  These remarkable people offered me that.  Me, a Xarmnian.  One of the military leaders that, arguably, led to the tragedy of what happened to them.  They showed me a path to The One and a way to be reconciled through Him to hope, despite everything I have done.  I have gained an appreciation for the Living Words of the Marker Stone’s Ancient Text, the ones from before and the ones I have read since. I am still, daily, finding wisdom through them that I never knew was essential to my becoming.”

“When the Xarmnian army showed up to take Azragoth, I was already within the city.  You might not know this, but Maeven had been taken prisoner by some of the Half-Men.  My troop came upon them, and we drove the creatures off, and rescued Maeven,… in some sense.  Under the cover of night, I helped her escape and told her where to hide.  She did not trust me, but she had no choice.  When the others under my command, found her missing, I sent them off to find her, and I, myself, brought Maeven here to live in Azragoth.”

I was stunned. “You brought Maeven here?!”

“We were in the area when we found her, for I had also come to find someone else.  I knew of Azragoth’s continued existence, but I kept that knowledge to myself.”

“Who were you looking for?” I queried, still reeling from these surprising revelations.

“A boy. I am not sure, but I believe that boy is a young man now and is also within your company.  But,” he cautioned, “he need not know that I am aware of him.  He was a little boy when I found him.  Rescued him in the woods.  He may not even remember me.  It is, perhaps, for the best that he doesn’t.  I have not seen him since he was a child.  Before he ran away and disappeared.”

“There are many things that I am ashamed of, that I did in the service of Xarmni.  One particular thing I witnessed with that one, I could not let stand.  His father was a Surface Worlder.  The boy is too.  It does not often happen that Surface Worlders come here with families, but sometimes it happens on rare occasions.

“From what I could gather, the boy’s father was in the military in the Surface World.  He was a long way from home, involved in a war.  They discovered the Mid-World by accident, on opposite sides of the Surface World.  The boy’s father was changed by the war, a different man, but a better man somehow.  He had become a Cleric.  The boy was struggling with that.  He knew his dad from before he went off to war.  A tough guy.  A hard man.  Someone whom the boy idolized and wanted to be like…like the man he was.  But he was uncertain about the man his dad had become.  When he witnessed his dad’s death in this world, he blamed the death on the man’s change.  Resented it.  When I dropped him off with a family in the highlands, he saw my leaving as a betrayal as well.  But I couldn’t deal with a child and do what I had to as a Xarmnian officer.  I had no choice.  Sentiment was frowned upon and viewed as a weakness, so I kept that secret to myself.  When I found Maeven and the others still within Azragoth, I saw in Maeven a need and a chance to make up for what I couldn’t do with the boy as a soldier.  Maeven was my second chance to do something good for someone.  So, I trained her in military survival, fighting techniques, and helped her build confidence in herself that she didn’t have before.  I have taught her much, but she exceeds what I taught her.  And, by the same token, I have learned much from her, in ways that are a side of warfare I did not know of for all of my combat training.  With the boy and his father…  Well, I saw what happened to the man, and why the other Xarmnian commander did not pursue them when they managed to escape into the woods.  He knew there were creatures within that would make quick work of them both.  Especially since the man was injured and leaving a trail of blood in the snow.  As soon as I could get away without being noticed or missed, I went after them but was too late to help the man.  The boy was in the tree above, barely alive, starving, nearly frostbitten and in a shock that made him barely responsive when I took him down and carried him away.”

“I think I know of whom you speak.  The boy’s name is Will.  I saw what happened to him…and his father.  But why tell me this now?”

“Because the boy’s father carried an honor sword, as you do now.  It was taken from him when he and his son were captured.  I believe it is the same one you are carrying.  I took it, from the Xarmnians holding him captive.  It was I who returned it to the city. And… it was I and Lord Nem who took it out to the copse grove near Crowe and drove it into the exposed roots of the tree there, as is the custom when the mission of an honor sword is complete.”

All this weighed heavy in my mind and seemed like the closing of a providential loop coming around full circle.

“I assume you are familiar with the nature of honor swords.”

“To some degree.”

“Then you understand that not just anyone can release an Honor Sword once it has been driven into the roots of a terebinth tree.  It is bonded to the wood.  Others have tried to take it out before and failed.  Only the one who is meant to take up the mission of its previous bearer will be able to draw it forth.  This mission you are called to is a continuance of the boy’s father’s mission.  It is where Maeven also must join in the quest, for she is part of it.  My compassion and sense of duty to her is because of my prior experiences and softening with helping the boy.  I do not know what role she will play in it, but I and the leaders in Azragoth feel that her place is with your company on this quest.”

I was amazed at Mattox’s matter-of-fact demeanor and his openness and candor with me, so unlike what I had experienced of the man in his before life.  I had wondered at his seeming devotion to the Azragothians, but it was all now beginning to fall into place.  His service to them as General and protector was so different from how he had served under the Xarmnian edge of the sword.  He loved them.  His service and duty arose out of gratitude and kinship with them, and out of a joined fellowship in service to the ideals mysteriously carved in The Blood Stone Marker.

A thought occurred to me at that moment, so I ask him, “Tell me how was it that the other Xarmnians were able to wrest the Honor Sword from the boy’s father?”

“There are two ways.  If the Bloodline is not wrapped to the bearer’s arm, the bearer may become separated from it.  The sword wields no power of its own except through connection through the Bloodline and its bearer.  The sword and the bearer are mere branches of a tree, but the Bloodline represents its root joining the two into the power of The One.”

“And the other way?”

“The bearer has to underestimate the Honor Sword.  He must voluntarily surrender it due to his own beliefs in the necessity of surrendering it.”

“And why did the man surrender it?”

“He didn’t.  He had no sense of the danger he was in when he and his son were seized.  His sword was not bound to him by the Bloodline, so we took the opportunity to take it from him unaware.”

“He was pick-pocketed?!”

“What?”

“Sorry.  A Surface World concept meaning a light-fingered thief lifted the object from his person or the pocket in which valuables were kept.”

“Then yes, as you say, he was…pickpocketed.”

I glanced down at the storied Honor Sword in its scabbard on my hip with a new appreciation for it, now that I understood something of its history.  I wondered if I should, in precaution, wrap the Bloodline to my arm while we traveled so that I might not meet with the same separation as the boy’s father had when he bore it so long ago.  Mattox saw my looking at it and was able to discern my thinking.

“It is fine for now, but do not go into a populated area or town ahead without the Bloodline sash attached to your bearing arm.  In the open, you need freedom of movement and cannot bear the battle sword with every task and with every company you keep.  There is an Ancient Text verse that speaks of those who appreciate the words of the sword and those to whom its words cause only offense because they have no receptivity to it. Like cast pearls before swine and rebukes to a mocker.  Bring it to your aid, but sometimes the ground upon which you cast these seeds of piercing truths, you need to be aware, is as hard as stone.”

“The boy?”

“Perhaps.  Perhaps not.  Time will tell you what kind of soil he has become with maturity.  If he is sincerely seeking answers then there is hope for him too… as there was for me.  Even a stone may have a fissure into which seed may fall and sprout.  If the sprout becomes a tree, it will further break up the rock as the roots swell with maturity.  There is always hope, no matter how bleak and remote you might believe it to be.”

I pondered his wise words for some time before speaking again.

“Mattox.”

“Yes?”

“The villages you took over for Xarmni.”

He sighed, not sure where my questioning was headed.

“Did the Xarmnian government authorize and teach you how to cause them to submit to rule?”

“No,” he said and seemed to be pondering painful memories that weighted and knit his brow.

“Xarmnian conquest was to be brutal.  To strike hard and fast and successive and break the people down through might, but this was short-sighted and undermined what they were trying to accomplish.”

“How so?”

“As I mentioned before, Xarmni needs the people, not mass graves,… though they would never acknowledge or admit it.  Brute force can only accomplish so much, but it is a tenuous hold on power at its best.”

I waited, curious to hear his explanation.

“The towns we claimed under my watch, had very little loss of life.  We needed their young men for our armies.  We needed the laborers of the village to continue to produce and plant and harvest crops and raise animals for our collective food stores being depleted by the number of people drawing from them to survive.  To ride in and kill as many people as we could until the town surrendered, was just stupid and short-sighted, though praised and encouraged by the leadership and others.  As I told you, our military is comprised of violent men full of pent-up aggression seeking an outlet.  Decisions made with that level of anger, I learned from my own experience, where almost always the worst decisions made in retrospect and ran counter to what we were trying to accomplish.  Rage is myopic.  Foolish and it has killed far more of our men than I care to think about.  When I took a town, most people yielded without a fight.  Plant a seed and a threat of violence in them, and you often never have to act upon it, if that seed grows into a sense of dread.  Over time, the Xarmnian leadership came to understand why it was that the towns I took for them, were done without losing so many of our soldiers and the infrastructure of the towns did not have to cost Xarmni so much in revenue to rebuild what the berserker army methods would have destroyed in its capture and conquest.  Fear alone can be motivation enough to break a man’s spirit so that he can be ruled by another.  Despair over his inability to get beyond that fear would make him servile until his needs could only be met by us, and he would never remember the fact that he had once lived independently from us.”

He sniffed, “The problem with that kind of rule is that Xarmni has to maintain the threat, for people have short memories.  And to maintain a threat, Xarmni needs a constant show of strength and force to keep it fresh.  For that, they need men.  The mad monarch had two courses before him: Either to maintain a perpetual army, which drains treasuries and resources… or you field smaller band of brutes to fend for themselves, taking their provisions from the remote villages, by force, if necessary.”

“Hence, the Protectorate…” I offered.

“Yes,” Mattox spat, “…the Protectorate Guards, and the Overwatch.  Just enough field brutes to make us look more formidable than we actually are among outskirt holdings.  To maintain a carefully crafted illusion.”

“So, if the remote townsfolk ever figured that out…” I began.

“I wish it were that easy to convince them,” Mattox sighed, his exasperation coming through.  “Some have tried and were pilloried and beaten for attempting insurrection. The numbers of those still willing to work for the Resistance dwindles.  Even townships still with us are seeded with Xarmnian informants, watching our every move.  Some have even turned Maeven, as The Storm Hawk and her Lehi away from offering their people aid.  Every time she rode out the trips become more dangerous.  The townships under Xarmnian…protection…have weak, puppet leaders, who are…shall I say…less than willing to disrupt the status quo.  They have paid their tribute money and believe that buys them protection from the Xarmnian crown.  They have no tolerance for the truth that their servitude is stealing from them their ability to thrive, or their chance to resist the yoke of Xarmnian bondage.  They have sold their liberties for a pitful bowl of rancid soup.”

I took in a breath of amazement.  Mattox, The Eagle, truly did have a far-reaching vision and an understanding of human nature, that I had not understood until now.  His moniker was apt and appropriate.  It made him a deadly adversary and now transformed by the One, a very shrewd and valuable leader with the advantage of an insider’s knowledge of Xarmnian war tactics.  The people of Azragoth, and the secret Resistance fighters throughout Xarmnian occupied territories would be well-served under this transformed and renewed General and brilliant strategist.  I was so glad that he was now an ally.

*Scene 03* – 18:24 (Brothers by Blood)

Since the narrow escape from the meadow of monsters, on the outskirts of the woods of Kilrane, Bayek had ridden fast overland, trying his best to put as much distance between himself and The Pan and his ferocious, motley band of filthy half-creatures.  They rode down a stepped grade, below the village of Crowe, across balding range lands that had once been grassy fields, but were now spartan patches of dried scrubs, with small seeps enough to add a few hints of green to the variegated wilderness.  In the panicked flight, his horse eventually began to flag and tire, its nostrils snorted, flaring, and its body shivered with fatigue and thirst.  As Bayek’s mind began to clear of dread, he realized that if he pushed the animal too much, he would soon be walking to Xarm city, rather than riding.

The road adjoining the western route to Xarm city was a rough path through narrow washouts and dried ravines, skirting high walls of stone along the base of the Zefat mountain range.  The spurs of the mountain forced horse mounted and wheel-bound freight-hauling travelers to pass circuitously towards the northern flats and then the only passable route would cut back again in an easterly drift before reaching the split into the lowland valleys and plains.  The continual cycle of snow and melts, in the upper ridges of the Zefat sawed peaks and crags, made travel at the base of the range treacherous.  Riders had difficulty avoiding washouts, loose gravel, and stony ribs where the winter snows carved and exposed the bones of the mountain range and formed sliding sloughs and shallow shale streams along its northern split before the land folded inward. Beyond the fold was the valley trek of the main route to Xarm City, and beyond the split, to the north, the bifurcated rolling hills ran gently down through the northern gap down to the edge of the fjord lakes of Cascale, the port city of Skorlith and the northerly kingdom lands of Ammon.

The split was a forked divide between Xarmni’s southeastern region near the Cascalian fjord’s delta-fan to the outer sea, and the fishing port further to the northwest through the upper fjords of Cascale and its chambered lakes and natural falls.  Bayek had heard rumors that Capitalian ships had been sighted in the Cascale fjords, heading towards Skorlith, however, those rumors had been circulating for many years, and there was no material need to give them much credence now.  In his mind, the highland holdings had long been abandoned by the Capitalians, when they retreated and hid behind their massive wall impudently assembled using their Builder Stone.  Cowards.  They won one little skirmish with Xarmni and then retreated into their high redout beyond the Walls of Stone Mountains.  They would never venture into the eastern lands and have the temerity or the skill to build ships once more.  It was nonsense to give bar talk much credence anyway.  A bunch of has-been, ale-swigging old men, lingered and loafed there, talking idly about the good ole’ days.  Filling the room with so much nonsense and false bravado, that only fools and young boys might give credence too in their own ignorance.  Yet… his younger brother had been that very sort of wide-eyed sponge soaking up all that he could gather about fairy creatures and questionable acts of bravery, and run-ins with the shadowy Half-Men creatures of the dead north woods in the dark land.  Moon kingdom, they called it.  Bayek thought that silliness might one day pass, when his brother grew up a little more, and gained enough sense to know that old men were too often fools waiting to die, and living on broken dreams and fancies they invented for themselves to prove they had at least once done something worthwhile during their meager span of existence.

Finding a shallow stream of cold water, trickling down a water-stained sheet of granite from the remnant remains of an upper snowmelt, Bayek dismounted carefully, standing on wobbly legs and led his tired horse into the stream.  He scanned the upper rim of the canyon for any sign of malevolent observers: men, animal, plant or otherwise.  He would not be caught unaware as he was before.  He knelt, dipping his hand in the cold water, lifting it to his mouth, while searching for any sign of movement with watchful eyes.  The water was very cold, but its sting was refreshing as it chilled his parched throat, making him shiver as if he had swallowed ice.  A stone dropped into the water on the other side of the small stream and Bayek’s head shot up, and he rolled backward, flinching, his hand reaching for a hilt and sword he no longer carried, searching for a knife he no longer bore.  Someone or something had dislodged the stone, he was sure of it.  Someone was toying with him, and he did not appreciate the humor, if humor was intended.  If only, he’d had a weapon.  Something more than river stones to throw back at this hidden villain humorist.

A voice from above called down to him.

“You there!  Lapping dog!”

Bayek gritted his teeth, eyes casting about for at least a stick or something he might use to hurl up at the male voice hiding in some niche he could not see from where he stood.

“I’ll dog you, you cooing pigeon!  Show yourself, if you’re a man!”

The voice made a tsk-tsk sound, and chuckled.  “Well, aren’t you the feisty one.  Bold and foolish.  Nothing to brandish except your razor-sharp tongue.  But that is easy enough to disarm with a dagger’s blade.  How come you to be alone in the upper wilds, with no sword, and not even a flint knife to poke at an eye?  And…ah, not even a saddle or bridal to steer your thirsting beast.  Not even a water bladder to dip some of that wet for your journey.  Tsk-tsk… a fool if there ever was one.”

Something about that voice was familiar to Bayek, though it did not seem to register immediately.  Something in the taunting tone, also jogged behind his consciousness trying to catch up.

“Are you a bird that you chirp so much?!” Bayek snapped back.  “Come down here and I will catalog your shortcomings with my fists.”

Suddenly a few more rocks fell from the upper shelf where the speaker had been hiding, and a younger man splashed into the shallow stream a few feet from Bayek and unsheathed his blade.  Recognition caught up with Bayek, and he guffawed.

“Shihor!”

The man called Shihor, grunted his own recognition of the hapless Bayek.

“Brother!” he sniffed, ensheathing his blade.  “What are you doing out here?!”

Bayek shrugged, “What anyone does out in this forsaken wilderness.  Looking for suitable drinking water.”

Shihor sneered, “Look at you!  What happened to you?  I thought you were riding in company.  It’s been years since you were around.  Some of the others thought you dead, but I knew you were a tough kill.  That you’d show up and eventually quiet them.  Why haven’t you returned to the city or even sent word?”

Bayek huffed, “I’m going there now. Field work has kept me away.”

Shihor sniffed, “Well, you should join us then.  There is a troop following me into the gap.  Mounted soldiers armed for battle.  We’ve more than enough supplies to get you outfitted and blades enough for your hands and belt.  We can even replace that old nag you’re riding.  Men could use the meat in a stew pot.”

“What brings an army out this far?  Surely the Protectorate and the Overwatch can handle the few rebel hamlets without the need for soldiers.”

Shihor grinned, and there was a kind of savagery to his smile, rather than mirth.

“Capitalians.”

“What?!”

“It’s true. Not just bar talk.  It has been confirmed that a Capitalian ship has taken anchorage at Skorlith, unloading a full complement of rank-and-file soldiers.  They are on a march up through the northern cut valley, heading towards the highlands.  They are bold, but we have a surprise waiting for them in ambush.  The upper villages may have called for help, but their help will not be coming to them.”

Bayek folded his arms, grunting, “What makes you so certain?”

Shihor stiffened.  “I am not a boy anymore, Bayek!”

“What does that have to do with anything?!” Bayek countered, growing annoyed.

Shihor put his hand on the hilt of the sword he had returned to its sheath and strode angrily out of the shallow stream onto the bank, facing his brother.  He was slightly shorter than Bayek, but not by much.  He had grown taller, since Bayek had last seen him, and had put on some weight and muscle.  He had their father’s constitution but still had traces of his mother’s softened facial features, and shape.  A slightly recessed chin, masked by the short beard and scruffy stubble he’d grown to cover that lack of prominence.

“You were always father’s favorite, while I went unseen.  Dad spends his evenings in the pub and rarely, if ever, is able to walk on his own back to our shack.  He talks about you constantly and is ever ready to get into a brawl at the bar if someone even suggests an ill-word about you.”

Bayek dried his hands on his sleeves, glaring at his brother, his brow furrowed.  “I told you to look after him!  Keep him occupied and out of that bar.”

Shihor growled, “Since when did you get to charge me with being his keeper!  I have a life to live as well, you big hero!  You’re not the only fighter in what’s left of us, since mom died.”

“Mom was a…”

“Don’t you say it!” Shihor snarled, reaching for his sword.

Bayek glared, “Keep that thing sheathed.  It takes no courage to bare a blade against an unarmed man.”

“Courage?!” Shihor snorted, “You’d lecture me about courage?!  I am not going to be living under the weight of your shadow any longer.  I am my own man now.  A king’s man.  I am away on King’s business much of the time, and someone else can babysit father into his dotage.”

Bayek folded his arms, scrutinizing his brother, a look of skepticism nearly curling the sides of his mouth.  “What sort of king’s business are you into?  The current one is not the same sort as his father.”

Shihor edged up toward his brother, bowing his chest.  “That’s near treason.  I could have that reported.”

Bayek stared into the gray-green eyes of his brother for a long moment.  The boy…man… was resentful and just bitter enough to do it, and yet he pitied him.

“So, who’s watching father now?”

Shihor blinked, shifting his gaze, looking away and beyond Bayek, avoiding the direct question and implied accusation.  “That your nag?” he muttered, glaring at Bayek’s horse while it drank from the stream.

“Shihor, who’s watching father?!”

Shihor sighed, again avoiding the question.  “Seems like you could’ve taken a better mount from some of the peasants’ plow horses.”

Bayek put his hands on his brother’s shoulders, forcing him to look at him.  Shihor shrugged violently away from his brother’s grip.  “Don’t ever put your hands on me again!” he snarled.  “While YOU were off going cross country, poking your blade at dirt farmers, winching and teasing skirts, Dad was defending YOUR honor back at home!”

Bayek huffed exasperated with his brother’s avoidance and hostility, “Shihor!  Who’s keeping dad?!”

Shihor turned angry eyes on Bayek and moved up under his chin, his hands balled into clenched, shaking fists.  “I expect the graves men are keeping him safely tucked away, beneath the field stone marker where paupers are buried!  He is ever attended by the worms that are eating him!  Is that the answer you wanted to hear…” he spat, “…HERO?!”

Stunned, Bayek stepped back, running his hand through his hair, blinking as the sharpness of the news.

“Oh, NOW you look away!” Shihor snarled.  “At some point, I stopped keeping father away from the drink.  In fact, I went with him…every night.  He was happiest in that place, and happier still after a few pints were in him, to drown and blur his memories enough that he could embellish them and recast them more favorably in your direction.  One night, one of the men, a traveler, visiting the pub, heard father telling his stories of his service to King Xarm, and of fights he was in and of tales from the front when you served under him.  The man tired of listened and confronted father, but both of us had had too many rounds sloshing in our gut to make a fight.  From what I remember, the man said you might’ve been someone one time, but you didn’t do enough to keep the former sovereign and his princes from harm.  Said you served under Mattox’s command and that he disappeared without a word or sign.  That it seemed mighty suspicious to him how whomever you served under, wound up either dead or missing, and how curious that was to make one wonder and question everything father had been boasting.  Father grabbed a bottle and smashed it, but the man had a knife.  I drew mine, but it was too late.  The man made quick work of father, and before I knew it, father was down, holding his gut, writhing.  I drew my blade, but the man was ready and hit me with a bottle and there was nothing I could do.  You weren’t there, and I had no way to find you.  Father had very little crowns left, and I had no way to bury him proper on an apprentice’s wage.  So, I joined the service of the Son of Xarm as a scout.  He sent me to the eastern coast to investigate rumors.  It pays much better than anything in the city, so I have been away as well, thinking I might eventually run into you, and see for myself if you were truly the man father has always claimed you were.  But I see now, how wrong he was.”

Bayek stared off, processing all that Shihor had related.  “So, what now?” he muttered.

“What now?!” Shihor laughed, disgustedly.  “Prove to me, that you are the man, father boasted about.  That he died for.  Fight with us.  Join us in this ambush against an age-old enemy.  The ones that father fought and nearly lost his life in that battle.  The Capitalians are coming through and don’t know we are waiting for them, to settle old blood debts.”

Bayek sighed, “Shihor, those Capitalians are not green soldiers.  We skirmished with them before.  They do not always hide behind their wall.”

Shihor sniffed and muttered, “So you ARE a coward.”

“You don’t understand.  It is dangerous to underestimate an enemy.  Going in without that understanding almost guarantees you will not survive the encounter.  It takes experience to learn that bravado and whatever weaponry prowess you think you have is not enough.  Fighting well enough will not gain a victory.  You must study your opponent and try anticipating what they might do.  Watch them fight and defeat others before you cross swords with them.  Caution is your ally in battle.  Also, knowledge of the skill level of the men around you.  A battlefield is nothing if not confusion.  You can easily get cut off from those you came with.  Some practice and coordinate that very thing to happen so that your focus is divided, while a third moves in with a mace and shatters your skull.  That’s team fighting.  Brave men die every day and often, but it happens far more frequently with the overconfident.  Be mindful.  Be open to learn from experience before you ever draw a blade.  Be willing to endure insult.  Be cunning and sober.  Sometimes the better part of valor is knowing when to walk away.  To seek a better time to take your stand and be smart about it.  That’s how you survive.”

“Easy enough for you to say,” Shihor muttered.

“No!  No, it wasn’t.  You must learn those things to survive, and they are not easy lessons.  Believe me.” Bayek said more forcefully, hoping to get through to his brother.  Make him listen.

Shihor sniffed, “That still smells like cowardice to me.  Look, just come with me.  Bring your nag if you like.  There is a route up over this hill I can show you when you can bring the animal.  Our troops ARE ready for this.  And we’ve got a surprise for the enemy.  Something that is going to shock them.”

Bayek was skeptical, but finally he nodded and said, “All right.  Show me what this surprise is.”

Finally, a grin crept into Shihor expression as he turned and pointed.

“Grab that nag and follow me.”

*Scene 04* – 11:24 (Firebirds)

Birds instinctively understood wind patterns and directional gusts that flowed through valleys, swept up, and fell down mountainsides and descended from mesas into declivities and gorges. They utilized them for rising on updrafts and shifting through cross-directional upper airstreams that ran like currents through an invisible river. Harpies, though not fully bird or human, seemed to perceive both the innate sense of shifting winds and the human cognitive capacity to understand how their functional blows might be used to serve their advantage. With the woods of Kilrane lying under the partial shelf ridge and at the descending base of the high cliffs of the highlands, the ocean breeze from the east would sweep across the highlands and typically fall from the upper shelf into the lowlands below, with Kilrane being the forested skirt cover of the descending grade. The sea winds brought moisture to Kilrane, but the trees grew drier near the highlands. You could see it in the changing colors of the forest as it thinned along the lower edge, where the land briefly flattened before rising again into the foothills and rocky climbs of the opposing Zefat mountain range.

Delitch knew this and knew that their best bet for starting fires that might fully consume and devastate Kilrane would be the drier trees along lower edge of the upper highland cliffs. The airstream flowing over the highland rim and through the smaller forests of Rim Wood would push the resulting conflagration outward and down, driving the fires into the greener areas of the woods. Though they might smoke more as the heat of the driven fires boiled the water inside the leaves, bark and wood of the greener forest, the lower watered tree cover would not be able to resist the scorching heatwave and would also succumb to the blazes leaving very little left of the woods, if any remained at all. The only surviving foliage might be those near the upper and lower edges of the Trathorn Falls, which were protected by the rising mists of the pounding waters falling from the stepped highland cliffs, and into the descending lake basins that gathered, chambered and poured down feeding the lower rivers running to the valleys and into the watered plains.

Delitch knew that the Trathorn river had suffered some when the highland springs that fed it were cut off and ceased to add their contributory veins to its main body of flowing water. One of which, had been the escarpment falls near the highlands main granary works. The levels of the Trathorn river had sunk below its former banks and had left dried, pebbled shoulders that seemed to shrug away from the waters that flowed through its deeper middle. The river stones had dried and had become coated with a white-filmed powder and the grayish residue of dead moss and lichen that had once enjoyed a moisture-rich, shag carpet of green algae, now parched and bleached by the blaze of the midday sun.

Delitch and her two sisters, Neenitch and Remitch, left the forging yards of Xarm City soon after the rains ceased and had flow again over the Zefat mountains and had spotted an encampment of Xarmnian troops in the foothills of the valley pass before winging their way over the descending cuts and valleys towards Kilrane. They had passed unnoticed by the soldier encampment but were curious to see what might be going on with so large of a body of field soldiers gathered in wait, leading so many drawn carts loaded with locked cages. Curious, Delitch thought, and she debated whether she and her sisters might swoop down and try to gather bits of useful intelligence, should she be challenged by her queen, Delilah, who would be questioning her recent rogue activities. Those bits of info could also help her if she were to be brought before The Pan for an accounting… or a reckoning.

Delitch and her sisters swirled for a bit, arguing out of ear shot, but haggled over the merits of their present course of action. In the end, Delitch convinced them that the new fire gadgets they now wore on their shanks and claws would garner too much attention, before they could be put to use, and any further delays might prevent them from carrying out their plans to set Kilrane ablaze. Delilah had suspected that Delitch might not be inclined to restrain herself from acting overtly against their leafy enemies, the Siren Nymphs, even under her strict orders and threats. Delitch could not miss this opportunity. She had been filled with savage glee even at the prospect of it. Now that they had the means with these cresset torches, she would not be dissuaded. The flower of flame would burn. The woods would erupt into a rushing blaze, and she would swoop over the terrified nymphs laughing, and scorching them as they fled the forests that they had finagled away and presumed to claim for themselves. The revenge would be sweeter than honey, and more satiating than fresh morning dew. Once their task was done, she and her sisters could return to the foothills of Zefat and then gather whatever news they could from the Xarmnians. They had to focus on the proper order of things. The field commanders might wonder at the devices they bore. They might not appreciate their new gifts and the ability to bring flames to bear.

So, at last, the Harpy trio flew over fields and dells into Kilrane, swooping through the treetops, dodging the overstory, pivoting around ancient boles, and ducking under shadowy boughs that hung with dried and ancient moss shrouds like a congregation of old bearded men gathering in some wooded enclave plotting nefarious deeds. In the course of their weaving flight, they spotted others moving down in the woods below along the forest floor, and Delitch motioned her sisters to land in one of the dense upper canopies and watch for a moment, and heed her warning to be silent, so as not to give away their perch of observation.

More soldiers, Delitch thought and paused, looking more closely, only NOT soldiers. Xarmnians, to be sure, but these were not like those in the field encampments they had spotted in the Zefat hills. These were a loosely organized band of rovers. A brute squad of ruffians, clad, not in battle attire, but in travel wear and skins of hardened leather, though armed with implements of blade and bludgeon. But where were their horses? There were a few of them, yes, but the main body of low-ranked men were afoot and hacking their way through the underbrush searching… Searching for what? Delitch wondered. And then she saw it.

An upper path. A raised road of bridgeworks spanning the root ribs of the wood, covered by the upper canopies where highfliers might not spot them, nor would those beneath be the wiser, as the man road was lifted over their heads high enough not to impede their passing underneath. Clever. Very, very clever, thought Delitch. But even so, she sniffed, even a lifted road could not escape the path of the fires to come. Her jowly checks bunched into a malevolent grin, as she observed the shadowy patterns along the winding path, as what filtered sunlight there might be, shifted slightly in the breeze upon the bed of the lifted roadway. Whatever was happening in the men in the woods, and whatever was to be soon happening with the troops bearing the strange, wheeled boxes, may or may not be related or known between these desperate groups of Xarmnians. Even this was a scrap of useful information that might prove valuable to those unaware of it. Something she could barter with and tease into merchantable value for those willing to pay for it with favors or, if need be,…clemency if it ever came to that.

Delitch looked meaningfully at her sisters, who seemed too preoccupied with preening their feathers to notice. She scowled, wondering how she could be related to such oblivious idiots. They were gung-ho enough to follow her plan and assist, but too dimwitted to think much for themselves. They were a liability and a threat to the secrecy Delitch needed to achieve her future ambitions of replacing Delilah as queen of the Harpy congress and clans. She might have to arrange a few convenient accidents before all of this was concluded to ensure they kept their squawkers shut…for good.

Delitch huffed and finally caught the eye of Remitch, who then nudged Neenitch, causing the latter to sputter and squawk her annoyance at being interrupted in her feather preening and plucking. Remitch whistle-snorted at Neenitch’s outburst and gestured aggressively back at Delitch whose scowl and furrowed glowering made Neenitch shrug and feign a short smile of apology.

Delitch shifted her gaze downward to where the searching men had been cutting their way through the brush and saw one man looking up at them and then gesturing to the other men who were with him. Delitch gritted her teeth. If it had to be done, Neenitch would be the first to discover that she was the most expendable and would not be receiving any retinue position in Delitch’s forthcoming rise to prominence. Delitch ducked further into the shadows, but the men had perceived movement and were now climbing a rough outcropping and would soon stand upon the grooved surface of the lifted road for a closer look. There was nothing for it now but to fly, and Delitch signaled her intent as she gathered her wings and bounded off the upper bough she had perched upon and flapped away into the higher canopy locating a parting wide enough to slip through. Perhaps, it would mean nothing that these men had seen them watching… Perhaps… But Delitch doubted that assumption. And it rankled her that these men might remember them being here, and in the off-chance remark made of that, it might cause others to wonder at their part in helping along the fiery event that was soon to follow.

*Scene 05* – 21:36 (What’s In The Bag?)

Begglar and my traveling companions were busy helping partially stock and load Begglar’s wagon.  Maeven and the Lehi were coordinating the efforts and my travelers were being generally pair with horses from among the Azragothian riding stock.  The Lehi would help to provide protective cover and serve as staggered chaperones guiding us through the dense woods of Kilrane through hidden trails and would eventually peel off and ride back to the city to prepare to supplement those occupied in defending it.  There were already reports of some strange creatures coming into Kilrane, that would be best for us to avoid.  I had heard nothing definitive about them, and I could tell that these developments were beyond the threat of a mere hunting party of Xarmnian Protectorate thugs.  Mattox received the news and I could tell it was causing him some degree of consternation.  I tried not to react, lest in some way I might unduly alarm my own company, but I noted it and thought it best to just take trouble as it came, rather than yield to dread.

We would be on our own again, with only Maeven to take us through the wilds and beyond, for my memory of the Mid-World lands had dimmed with time spent away in the Surface World.  When Mattox approached me again, saying he had more critical information to impart, I thought he might tell me what news he had received to cause his set jaw and lowered brows.  He led me away from the group once more for privacy.

“Are the Xarmnians getting closer?” I asked.  But he waved that away and looked down indicating the pouch containing the rounded weighted object affixed to my belt.  He then looked down below, making sure no other the others were watching, then shifted his eyes back to me.

“I need to be certain that we are not overheard.  There are at least two in your company who are not Surface Worlders that cannot hear what I need to tell you.  Keep your circle of trust tight and exclusive.  There are some things you alone must keep to yourself.  Yours is a very dangerous mission, O’Brian.  Be mindful that careless lips could be its undoing before it has even begun.”

He led me further away from the group and nodded to another guard of his retinue to keep watch, as we moved into the brush and near a stone outcropping that angled up towards the side of the forested hills beneath the highland cliffs.

“Don’t worry about all that is ahead of you,” he told me as we walked away, “Just be present in the moments given and take each step wisely.  There is a hunger deep within everyone’s soul.  It is what should drive you.  The Ancient Text says: ‘A worker’s appetite works for him, for his hunger urges him on.’ [Proverbs 16:26 NASB] Cultivate that hunger for a deeper understanding of The One and what it means to walk bearing His Presence.  We are both much older than we once were when first we met, but don’t let that be an excuse for you.  Be a Caleb.  Take your mountain.”

I scratched my chin, slightly bemused, “You’ve asked me to step away from my company for another…pep talk?”  Rather than taking my lame attempt at a light-hearted jest, Mattox only muttered, “Don’t discount wisdom when it is freely offered.  When its offer comes again the cost is much more expensive and you will sorely rue the missed opportunity when you could have had it for free.”

He kept walking, leading me further away from the others, and I was strangely sorry I had caused him offense. It took some getting used to the idea that he was no longer an enemy.  When Mattox was satisfied that we were beyond being overheard, he again turned to me.

“There are actually two things I have given you with that parcel you bear.  You know the import of The Pearl, but what you still do not know is the importance of the bag itself.  You will need to use The Pearl to barter with when you reach Skorlith for passage across Lake Cascale to the cities and lands beyond.”

“Barter?!” I reacted, tensing.  “You want me to barter with what you believe is a Quest Stone?!”

Mattox was serious, but I couldn’t believe it.  “Why on earth…” I began, realizing the irony of the phrase, but plunged forward.  “Why would I give up something that was so hard to get?!  A dragon had to practically eat me; in case you’ve forgotten that part!”

Mattox was calm and nodded slowly.  “A tannin who thought to destroy it by attempting to consume it.  But even that failed.  Even evil intentions cannot thwart the purposes of The One.  You should know that by now.  Or…if you do not, you soon will.”

Amazed I stared at him.  Then reached down and unfastened the bag from my belt, hefting the weight of it and could feel the warmth of The Pearl’s smooth solid surface inside the soft leather pouch.  “You really want me to sell this to book passage across the Cascale fjord?”

“I said to offer it,” Mattox responded, “not to sell it.  You obviously don’t understand the nature of that stone, and the virtue it represents.  Tell me again what it is called and think hard about that particular virtue when you do.”

I blinked, and shivered, trying to comprehend him.

“What is it called, O’Brian?” Mattox pressed.

“The Fidelis Stone…” I whispered.

“And what does Fidelis translate to?”

“Faithfulness,” I answered.

“Simplify it.”

I sighed, “Faith.”

“And what does ‘faith’ require? Can you truly ‘keep’ faith?  And if not, what must you do with it to allow it to work as it is intended by The One?”

I squinted, my brows furrowed, and then the answer came to me in a sudden insight, and I released a breath along with the words, “…release it.”

“Faith doesn’t leave you. It grows and does its work as you release it into the world through action.  You will not lose that Stone.  It came to you.  It becomes more the more often you release it to do its work.”

“But what of I lose it?” I lamented, “What if whoever I offer it to takes it from me or contrives to steal it.”

“That Stone is of The One.  Do you really think that if it was used to compel a dust dragon to bring it to you, that it will simply allow a common thief to possess it.  The Stones come to the ones intended for them.”

“That all sounds so well in theory, but you forget that I lost one to The Pan before, or have you not been told the story of my betrayal?”  I sulked.

“I have since spoken with Jeremiah.  There is more to the story than you know.  It is not as lost as you suppose it to be, but I’ve said too much.  What you need to know now is about the bag you carry that stone in.  It is just as important as well, and much blood has been spilt to capture the secrets it contains.”

“The bag?” I asked.

“Yes.  I will get to the bag.  Be patient.  The giant pearl is extremely rare and highly valued enough to purchase several seafaring vessels.  But you need only one.”

“Shouldn’t this be left in Azragoth to help finance the resistance?” I asked.

“As I told you before, this is the spoils of your fight with the Dust Dragon.  These kinds of pearls are not of this world.  That is why they are so rare.  They could only come from a Surface Worlder.  If we tried to use it, it would signify to the buyer that we are in league with Surface Worlders.  The buyer will desire it and be willing to pay handsomely for it.  But if it comes from a Mid-Worlder, that Mid-Worlder will run the risk being followed…straight back to us.”

“But if I offer it…?  Will they know I am a Surface Worlder?”

“Every Mid-Worlder can tell you and the majority of your party are Surface Worlders.  There is no hiding it from us.  Didn’t you know?”

“I didn’t.  How is this possible?”

“We see each of you with a slight darkling shadow around you.  Apparently, only Mid-Worlders can see that difference.  Whomever you deal with in this world, they will always know you don’t belong to it, unless…”

“Unless what?”

“Unless you are somehow one of the Half-Men creatures.  But with them, there is an obvious animal difference.  They have the same darkling edges.  But be that as it may…this Pearl…” he hesitated.

“Yes, the pearl…”

“It came from within the tongue of the Dust Dragon.  They are creatures of The Between and are generally trapped there.  But when they are let into this world, they emerge as a blending of both physical and latent supernatural characteristics.  The pearl is the only thing about them that has any redemptive worth.  As creatures of Deception are wont to do, the Pearl is the part of them that is true; the remains of the good they once were created to be by The One.  Creatures of that sort always blend a half-truth with every lie used to deceive their victims.  The pearl of their tongue forms the unflinching truth, but it is curled in their vile mouths with a lie.  This pearl came from the Dragon you slew.  We carved this pearl out of the tongue you had severed from the beast’s mouth.  As I said, this is the spoils of your kill.  It is yours to barter with.  But you need to be judicious in how you spend it.  Mid-Worlders—and Xarmnians especially—will kill you and your company to possess it.”

“Oh, just great!” I moaned.

“But!” he interjected, raising his hands, halting my objections, and continued. “But they will think twice in doing so when they see you also are bearing an Honor Sword.  Many Mid-Worlders are superstitious.  It comes from an absence of true orthodoxy, and faith.  Mankind, whether they acknowledge it or not, has a built-in need to worship something.  When there is no trust in the Sustainer, there are ample substitutes that will serve this unmet need by proxy.  That sword is a signet of something mysterious to the people of the Mid-World, and paired with that Stone, The Pearl, this kind of sword takes on a significance that will make them cautious, and wary of you.  It will generate talk, if nothing else, and that could reach ears of those who have sworn to thwart any effort made to renew the old quests.  And that is why I want you to keep it secret.  Because of the risk it poses to you and your company if any of the people you meet on your journey catch a glimpse of it.  They may not notice the significance of the sword you carry, as long as the pearl remains concealed.  Its value, however, will come in handy when and if you reach Skorlith.”

“So, what do you suggest I barter for with it?”

“With the pearl, you will need to purchase 3 things together.  A savvy sea captain’s hire, his silent discretion as to the reasons for your company’s crossing, and the seaworthy and armored vessel itself.”

“Armored?”

“Haven’t you heard the tales and legends about the Great Lake?”

“Only rumors,” I replied cryptically, feigning ignorance, careful not to reveal what I had witnessed with Begglar and my former companions during a sea battle, which included the unfortunate drowning of Noadiah back during my prior excursion in the Mid-World under Jeremiah’s leadership. 

“Many of them are, but some of them are not.  There is a very ancient sea beast that swims beneath those waters.  It is called Cetus.  It is hated by the fishermen of the seaports because it disrupts the fishing cycles.  Fishermen have come to blame their bad luck on it, though sometimes the fault is their own ignorance or poor skills.  Sometimes the Cetus can have a positive effect, causing the schools of fish to have a run that drives them shoreward.  If one knows what he is doing, a fisherman can land a great many fish during a run, provided he knows when to come back to shore.  But linger too long, and the Cetus may attack the boat.  This is why you need an armored vessel that has a strong structure and heavy defenses.  Cetus is enough of a problem, but there is known piracy plying across those waters as well.  As I said the way ahead of you has many dangers.”

I’ll admit, here and now that I had not been fully transparent with Mattox.  Yes, I had heard the rumors, but I also had had firsthand knowledge of that sea dragon called Cetus and still had occasional nightmare over the experience.  I and those with me at the time had believed the beast to had died in that battle, but there had been no way to be certain of it.  Our vessel had suffered such damage that Begglar had barely piloted it into a hidden cove before it had to be scuttled.  The beast had not resurfaced or pursued us as out ship flagged and listed to port, so we had presumed it dead.  Honestly, we had hoped so.  We knew we had at least wounded it severely.

It was of interest to me now to hear that the rumors and tales of its continued existence and threat still circulated after all this time.  Somewhere, someone was profiting off of maintain the continued legends and threats, or trying to limit the amount of small-time fishermen from venturing out very far into the wider lake areas of Cascale for fear of encountering that sea beast.  It might be curious to discover who might stand to gain from the rumors.  If the beast was confirmed dead, then the local shipwrights might find it more difficult to justify the added expense of continuing to armor a seafaring vessel.  Or, perhaps, the sheer weight of such vessels might not have the speed to compete with lighter craft in chasing or incepting a schooling run.  The seamen were a strange and competitive lot.  Begglar knew them far better than I did, for seamen recognized and were more open with their own kind and naturally did not trust landlubbers such as I or Jeremiah. They fancied their legends and embellished tales of encountering the monstrous Cetus.  Perhaps too, their pride kept that legend alive.  It would do well to be mindful of that.  Begglar would be helpful in sorting out those rumors and motivations, for he had lived that life before.

Changing the subject to avoid revealing anything more, I queried, “So how is the bag of equal valuable as its contents?”

“Ah yes.  The bag,” Mattox cleared his throat, “Hold it up, will you?”

I untied the gather-string and handed the parcel back to him.

“The giant pearl, though valuable as I’ve said, is actually a clever distraction from the hidden value of the leather purse holding it.  See this seam here?” he indicated a joined-edge laced with a sinew and gut thread.

“The interior of the bag contains intelligence, a map of all of these lands and the Xarmnian and Capitalian territories as well as those lands which still remain outside of their reach.  There are very few of these maps in all of the Mid-World, and these were compiled over many years’ time, often at personal risk, and smuggled behind enemy territories with great pains, artifice, misdirection, and sleight of hand.  Thousands would be sent to their deaths if this ever fell into the hands of the Xarmnians and the secret uprising would be devastated if not crushed.  On the outside, it appears to be fool scraps of material, serving a simple purpose.  Anyone who does not know to look will become so distracted by the contents of the bag, they may toss it away without a moment’s thought, thinking they have with the pearl the greater treasure.  If you are ever in a situation where you are waylaid for valuables, surrender the pearl, but be willing to fight to your death to keep this bag in your possession.  Let no one know of its existence, save only those in whom you have absolute faith and trust.  They too must be willing to fight to the death to keep that bag.  Once you have dispensed with the pearl, tuck the map away.  You will not need it until you get beyond the far shoreline of Lake Cascale.  After that, only unfold it in private and remove the seam.  You will need to warm the leather to reveal what has been written upon it.  Not only does it show the boundaries of the old world, before the Xarmnians and Capitalians settled here, it also shows the modern territories and their current names.  It shows troop strongholds, hidden and in the open.  It shows areas where we have our resistance fighters in place and regional code words to be used within the hearing of our fighters.  Use the words and your traveling party will be made welcome, and you will be received as an ally with those of us remaining in Azragoth.  On our recent trip into the interior and climb up to the zenith of Mount Zefat, I added my own contribution to this map and the one we retain for safe keeping.”

“And what was that?”

“The current progress and positioning of the troops of the Xarmnian held territories and those others of their clan being led by the clandestine night movements of each of their Builder Stones.  I have indicated three possible convergent points where their movements indicate those individual clans might meet upon potential fields of battle.  If possible, in your quest, avoid these places as much as you can, unless you are absolutely certain that The Voice of the One is guiding you there.”

“How should we get around these places?”

“As I told you before.  Be like Caleb.  Take to the Mountains.”

“But we were warned that there are Half-men there, violent rock trolls, and followers of The Pan.”

“That is correct.  But you will need to put that Honor Sword to use.  The Pan’s kingdom is concentrated in the forests below the mountains.  The mountains themselves are the outliers of The Pan’s domain.  You may meet with resistance there, probably likely, but not in such concentrations.  But even so, if you are being led by The One, even if the mountains contained an army of giants, you would be the most protected following His direction.  Have the belief and confidence of Caleb, as he did in the days of old in the legends of The Surface World.  Nothing would stop that old man from claiming what was promised to him.  You need that kind of resolve and determination, O’Brian.  Let that flame be kindled in you and it will inspire those you lead.”

He held out his hand to me and I took it, each grasping the forearm of one another in mutual trust.  How odd I thought, this calling and this journey of faith with its perils and triumphs and its renewal and resurrections.  Here we stood together.  Two men, who were once sworn enemies, now joined together in a mutual bond of trust.

There was nothing more to be said, and we parted ways, me heading down to join my company as we pressed forward into unknown dangers ahead, Mattox returning to the caverns we had journeyed through to this point.  I saw him step behind a stand of trees and disappear for a moment and then emerge from it again now mounted on horseback.  A fine gray dappled stallion standing 16 hands high at the shoulder.  A powerfully muscled animal, equipped for carrying battle armor, and a man of commanding stature.  Mattox turned the horse and waved to me once more, before disappearing into the caverns once again.

“Take your mountain,” he had told me, and I set my resolve and determined that was just exactly what I would do.

“6 Then the children of Judah came unto Joshua in Gilgal: and Caleb the son of Jephunneh the Kenezite said unto him, Thou knowest the thing that the LORD said unto Moses the man of God concerning me and thee in Kadeshbarnea. 7 Forty years old [was] I when Moses the servant of the LORD sent me from Kadeshbarnea to espy out the land; and I brought him word again as [it was] in mine heart. 8 Nevertheless my brethren that went up with me made the heart of the people melt: but I wholly followed the LORD my God. 9 And Moses sware on that day, saying, Surely the land whereon thy feet have trodden shall be thine inheritance, and thy children’s for ever, because thou hast wholly followed the LORD my God. 10 And now, behold, the LORD hath kept me alive, as he said, these forty and five years, even since the LORD spake this word unto Moses, while [the children of] Israel wandered in the wilderness: and now, lo, I [am] this day fourscore and five years old. 11 As yet I [am as] strong this day as [I was] in the day that Moses sent me: as my strength [was] then, even so [is] my strength now, for war, both to go out, and to come in. 12 Now therefore give me this mountain, whereof the LORD spake in that day; for thou heardest in that day how the Anakims [were] there, and [that] the cities [were] great [and] fenced: if so be the LORD [will be] with me, then I shall be able to drive them out, as the LORD said.”  [Joshua 14:6-12 KJV]

*Scene 06* – 00:00 (Gathering the Group)

 

*Scene 07* – 00:00 (Blaze of The Son)