Authors: Greg Curtis
That was perhaps the worst change between what had once been and what the five kingdoms had become when the Goddess had descended. The air of silence and fear that her armies had brought with them. But suddenly that had changed again. To see people singing openly and falling down drunk in the streets was unbelievable. Harl kept looking for the temple soldiers, wondering where they were and why they weren't dragging people away to the pens to be killed. But they were nowhere to be seen. And when he thought about it, the pens were gone.
Further on Harl came across Hel the seamstress, sitting in her front yard in front of her house, spinning woollen thread for her garments. That was normal enough. Most mornings she did the same. But this morning she was spinning coloured thread. That was far from normal. Normally she spun the thread she needed to mend clothes. Whites and browns for the most part. Coloured thread was for coloured garments surely. Not work clothes. He decided to ask.
“Mistress Hel.” He greeted her with what he hoped was a polite smile. He was out of practice in the social arts. But then he only came to town perhaps once a moon and never stayed longer than he needed to, to sell his furs and pick up his supplies.
“The temple is burnt, men are lying drunk in the street and the priests and their soldiers are nowhere to be seen. What has happened?”
“A miracle, that's what!” Hel smiled as he had never seen her smile before. “One of Artemis' priests rode through town accompanied by a small patrol, half a dozen unicorns and a flock of griffins. They rode up to the temple, killed the beasts, the soldiers and the other priests, threw their bodies inside and then burnt the lot to the ground. The Huntress it seems is upset with her servants and their beasts. She says the beasts are demon spawn.”
But even if the Goddess had been upset with her servants she couldn't have been as upset as everyone else had been with them. Something he could see only too clearly in the smile on Hel's face. A smile that seemed almost too large for it.
“That's … that's...” Harl struggled to find the right words and failed. The Goddess' own priests were killing one another and now they were burning her own temples? It was madness! But it was wonderful madness.
“It's more than that. The same has happened in both Twinford and Meadton. Other towns too so they say.” If anything the seamstress' smile grew broader. “The Goddess has returned to the way she was, and the unicorns have returned to the world.”
The unicorns had returned! She was right he realised, though until just then it hadn't occurred to him. Even though he had recently seen one himself. Once, before the Goddess had descended, there had been unicorns aplenty in the forests while griffins flew in the skies. They were the symbols of her divinity. And they had been a welcome sight. But for five long years as the beasts had wandered the land he had seen few of them. In fact he couldn't remember seeing any at all in all that time. It was as if they had gone away. Now they were back. What did that mean?
“The temples are burning and the demon creatures and their masters are being driven out of the land. Your home town was freed even before us. You can go home and see if you have any kin remaining there.” She meant Meadton he realised, much as he might have wished that she meant Lion's Crest.
“Tis a glorious spring!”
“It is.” Harl felt a smile begin to grace his face as well. He couldn't help it. And underneath the smile there was a joyous question bubbling up in his heart. Could this have something to do with him? Could his freeing the High Priestess be somehow involved? After all it had only been three weeks before. And suddenly the three towns nearest his home had been freed of the tyrant's yoke. And the High Priestess had claimed that it was all lies. That this was all demons' doing. Maybe someone had finally been telling the truth. For the first time in years he felt the beginning of a new emotion stirring in his heart. Hope.
Harl nodded to the seamstress and carried on his way, wondering for a bit if this could actually be real. But everywhere he went it was the same. People were happy. They were out in the streets doing all the things they could never have done before. And no one seemed to be working. There were no soldiers in the streets. The twisted beasts were gone as was the temple itself. And there was hope in the air. It was as if a bad dream had passed and people had just woken up.
In the trading house things were slow. Not because people weren't busy – they were. But because people couldn't be bothered doing the routine things of life. They were simply too happy. So the stock boy who examined and counted his furs kept stopping to speak with other customers and having to start again. The same was true for the assistant who counted out his coin and gave him his goods. No one wanted to do business. They wanted to chatter like excited children. Chatter about things they couldn't normally even speak about in private. Little Nemia's naming day was the main topic of conversation in the trading house.
It was the custom in the five kingdoms for children to be officially named on their first birthday. It was at that age that parents finally had the hope that their child would grow to adulthood. Too many children died before the age of one to have the ceremony any earlier. So Nemia the daughter of Vittus the innkeeper and his wife Tera would finally be given her name in public. There would be a celebration and of course the blessing by their family priest. They were followers of Dionysus, the God of Fertility and Wine, so there would likely be plenty of ale to go with the festivities which was why half the town was thinking of attending. Vittus made an excellent malted ale for his guests, while whatever was left over was sold to the alehouse.
But for five long years that had been something that simply didn't happen. Naming days if they happened at all were held in private. Celebrations of any sort weren't allowed. The festivals of the gods had been banned. And the priests of Dionysus along with those of the rest of the gods and goddesses had all been hunted down and slaughtered. The very fact that they could even be thinking of having a naming day seemed like a blessing from the gods. And it was the reason the other half of the town was thinking of attending. The people simply wanted to revel in their newly rediscovered freedom.
Harl could understand that. He barely knew the family and the child but he wanted to attend just the same.
Of course the other topic of conversation was what would come next. It seemed that the townsfolk believed that the hard times were over. They all thought things would somehow return to how they had once been. That the town would grow and prosper once again. That the school would reopen along with the apothecary and the other alehouses. That the traders would return, bringing luxury goods and coin.
It was madness of course. Hope and relief, happiness and disbelief all talking at once. And if such things eventually happened Harl knew it would be many years away. Life in the small towns and villages had never been easy. Whitebrook was luckier than many in that it was a farming town. There would always be food enough for everyone even if coin was short. That mattered. But as to the rest? He doubted it.
But he doubted more than that. In fact the more happy and excited they became, the more Harl's doubts grew. All he could think was that whatever was going on, this was only the start of it. The false priests and the true priests – if that was what they truly were – would be going to war. And no matter who won, war was bad for everyone.
It was apparent though when he left the store that he was the only one with doubts. More people were out, enjoying the sunny spring day, and celebrating. Maybe some of the sleeping drunks had finally woken up. Many of them wanted to talk and laugh and share a jest with him even though he barely knew them. And for the longest time Harl wanted to join them. But strangely, he discovered, he couldn't. Not for long. The joy it seemed had left him. He simply couldn't smile and laugh as they could. This was glorious. It was a dream. A wish made real. But the longer he witnessed it the more he realised it wouldn't last.
By the time he had left the store and was headed back down the street, the only thought in his mind was that this was at best some sort of reprieve. They were like the fox given its glorious freedom and fleeing happily into the woods thinking it was free – just before the hounds were set after it. There was worse to come.
And that feeling of foreboding continued to grow within him as he walked.
Where the bleakness came from he wasn't sure. Maybe it was the result of five years of having been hunted. Maybe it was from having seen so many people die. Or maybe it was because he had had hope too many times before only to have it stolen from him time and time again – usually each time he thought he was finally safe. But as the hours passed and the happiness all around him grew like an illness, he became more and more certain that it was all only a sweet deception. One that would soon be taken from them as the truth returned, harder and colder than before.
Harl tried to smile and laugh with the others as he walked out of Whitebrook. He tried to pretend that he knew the same hope. But he just couldn't. Not really. Not even with all that had happened. It seemed that at some point he had become immune to both happiness and hope. But that didn't matter half as much as the fact that he was certain he was right.
And if war was coming maybe he should finally be leaving.
Chapter Eleven
The fire was burning merrily in the night as Erislee sat with her sister out under the stars, in the midst of their army encampment – such as it was. Spirits were high. They could hear many of the soldiers laughing as they shared jokes with one another. Some were singing. A few were already snoring.
But then they had reason to be happy. They'd just freed their tenth town from the grip of the false temple, and now instead of a band they were an army – albeit a small one. People were joining them every day now. Some came from every town they freed, and strangely from the wilds around them as well. Word of their fight was spreading.
Now they had fifty soldiers with them. Some of them were town guards who had wanted to take up arms against those who had stolen their lives from them. There were even a couple of actual soldiers who had pretended to be retired farmers and the like. Most though were youngsters who simply sought adventure and who were now learning the soldiers' craft from those more experienced.
There were a score of wild men with them as well. The false priests called them outcasts, but she thought wild men was a more accurate description of them. Frightening was another one. It seemed that those who had been forced to run and hide in the wilds for so long were unhappy about it. They wanted to fight.
And they were powerful warriors. Poor soldiers, but more than capable with their weapons. In fact shockingly so. Fleeing for so long and having been forced to fight so often had made them dangerous. They might not know how to work as soldiers or how to fight together as an army. They might not use the soldiers' traditional weapons of swords and spears. But whether they used an axe or a club, daggers or a staff, they knew how to fight. And they knew how to bring down every one of the chimera. But then they'd fought them for years. Those who hadn't learnt how to kill the beasts had died long before.
To add to their numbers they now had two priests and two wizards with them, again people who had been hiding in the wilds for a long time. And they would be useful in the war ahead. Thaddeus was a priest of the temple of Hera, the Goddess of Home and Hearth, and while his skill with weapons was limited he could do some basic healing and create a few wards to protect their camps at night. The other priest was Iselda, a novitiate of the Temple of Artemis. Finding her had been a true blessing for Erislee. Just to know that there were others out there meant everything to her. And while the priestess might be only a very young novitiate, her skills in hunting and tracking, and especially in the longbow, were unquestioned.
As for their two wizards, they were a more mixed bag. Briggard was a water wizard and only poorly trained. But he could raise a mist when they needed one and he was surprisingly capable with the pair of long knives he carried. He should be. He'd survived for the five years by hiding in the mist, creeping up on his enemies from behind and then stabbing them in the back. It wasn't an honourable or glorious form of combat, but it was effective. And since he was barely nineteen and yet still alive after five years in hiding, she could not deny him his skills in combat.
Yoren on the other hand was more advanced in her calling of earth, and if they needed a wall raised or a bog trap prepared she could craft one in a very short time. She was also capable with her short bow. But what she had in skills she lost in nature. Life had been hard for her and she was very bitter. Anyone trying to speak with her was rebuffed, men especially, and if they persisted there would be a lot of foul language and threats to follow. People gave her a wide berth and presently she had a fire all to herself. But despite that Erislee wanted the woman with them. She had no doubt about her commitment to the war. Yoren might not like people, but she truly hated the chimera and the false priests. She'd been killing them for years – her favourite trick had been softening the ground under them and drowning them in mud.
Perhaps their most valuable recruit though so far was Theris, a large grizzled man with a scar across his face and more over the rest of his body. He had been a captain with the city guard in Feyer, a large town in Northland. How he'd come all the way south through the Kingdom of the Lion and then on through the Rainbow Mountains she didn't know. Nor did she know why. But it didn't matter. He knew weapons and how to use them. He knew tactics and strategy. And he could train their recruits. In fact he was training them. He had made them gather up the weapons of their fallen foes, and was teaching them all the basics of sword and shield. In time she suspected, he would become a war master in their war. And she needed war masters. She needed people who knew how to fight a war. For now he was simply the leader of the soldiers and their trainer.
For the moment she needed the comfort of family as well. And so she was glad that her sister had returned. Surprised too. In order to have made it to the Great Assembly in Inel Ison and back this quickly meant that Nyma must have ridden day and night. And that through lands that were infested with the chimera of the false temple.
But Nyma's ride had been necessary. The Assembly had to know that Erislee had been rescued as they dealt with the incursion of the twisted beasts into their lands. They had to know that the last High Priestess of Artemis had named this temple false. And they had to know that a war had been called by her against the false temple.
It wasn't only about bringing the dryads heart to the battle as things became difficult. It was about making them one people again. One people in the war.
Dryads differed in their faith from the humans. They didn't have priests and temples – faith for them was a personal thing and the stories of their gods were passed around open fires at night and spoken of from mother to child. They didn't have thirteen or thirty gods either. They had only three. The Mother or Giver of Life. The Father or Bringer of the World. And their daughter, Artemis the Huntress. And between the three of them they held their entire world. Their heavens dryads believed were like the rest of their lives, based around family. But when the human Temple of Artemis had abruptly changed, none of them had known what was happening. They had no priests be it high or low to tell them the will of the Goddess. What they had were a few shrines where they could offer a prayer, and the odd pilgrim or holy man, who had embarked on a mission he believed was divine.
That had left them in a tenuous position as they had not known if this was truly Artemis' doing or not. And while most said not, none could speak for the Goddess. If it was Artemis' doing, they could not get involved, no matter how strange and terrible her actions had seemed. And when the refugees had started arriving in their lands they hadn't known what to do. Whether they ought to accept them or not.
So they'd sent envoys to the temple. None had returned. They'd hunted out the priests and high priests of the Temple of the Goddess in other lands. But by the time they'd started doing that, those priests had either fled or died and their temples were burning. All of which had left them precisely nowhere.
And so for five long years they'd stayed out of the matter. For the most part they knew that this had to be some sort of false temple. A heresy. But they couldn't prove it. And because they couldn't prove it they couldn't act. They couldn't risk going against the will of their gods. So they had accepted as many of the refugees who accepted their ways as they could, and they'd sent out riders in secret to scour the five kingdoms, hunting for priests of Artemis. But they could do no more.
Then the temple's twisted creatures had started entering their lands and they'd had to act. But they were unsure. How could you act against the will of your own Goddess? That was if it was the will of your Goddess? Now at least, they had an answer. Now they could stand as one, secure in the knowledge that this was not the will of Artemis. And they could resist the chimera as they invaded their lands.
“So what do we know sister?” Nyma asked Erislee about the war and what they'd learned of the enemy. Erislee only wished she could tell her everything she wanted to know. But what they had learned was precious little, and not much of it made sense.
“We know that all the false priests wear the markings of demons upon their wrists and carry their weapons. We know that perhaps half of the priests are wizards, and the other half simple thralls bonded to the demons. We know that their temples are not temples at all. They are not consecrated to any gods let alone Artemis. Instead they are barracks for their soldiers and pens for their beasts. And we know that they can die.”
That last was important in Erislee's view. Perhaps the most important thing of all. The priests could die alongside their chimera. But there was so much they didn't know. How had they created the beasts? There were endless stories but no one actually knew. How did they control them? They'd found charms on some of the thralls, but charms seldom worked for people without some magic to use them. And why were they killing so many innocents? There was surely no need to keep killing once they'd conquered the lands. And yet they did.
Sometimes it was the outcasts they killed. But there were few left and they were good at hiding. Mostly these days it was the people of the towns and cities they controlled that they murdered. And it seemed that they killed them for any number of reasons. Sometimes they were charged with helping the enemy and were dragged away by the soldiers to be executed. Sometimes they were accused of heresy and were dragged away to be executed. And sometimes they were just dragged away for no known reason. But whatever the reason all of them were executed. There was a reason that all the towns were half empty.
“And with respect High Priestess we know one thing more.”
Erislee looked up to see Theris standing there on the other side of their fire. She hadn't heard him approach. Neither had Nyma from the surprised look on her face. But then the man had been on the run for years. He knew how to not be noticed.
“We know that we're going to need a base. Somewhere where we can stockpile weapons and supplies, meet with allies, organise a war, train recruits and interrogate prisoners. There is an ancient fortress not too many leagues away from here that would serve the purpose. The Fortress of Glass River.”
Erislee knew the name but little else about it. Not much of any great use anyway. She knew it was old and that it had been named for the river that ran through the valley in which it stood. A river that sparkled in the sunshine because of the rocks that formed its base. Rocks that were made of pure volcanic glass. It was said that when the sun hit it at just the right angle it was actually impossible to see the water as anything other than a river of sparkling glass.
“But we're less than a hundred strong.”
“We won't be for long though. As word of our war gets around, and especially of the towns being freed, more will join us. They will flock to us. There are many who want to fight the temple. In time we'll be too large to work as just one force. We'll have to split into separate war parties, taking the towns two and three at a time, and then regrouping into one army to take the cities. We'll need to secure supplies and patrol the roads so that they can get through. We'll also need to leave guards behind in the liberated towns, to make sure the false priests don't try to reclaim them after we've gone. And we'll need to maintain a border watch as well, in case the enemy try to re-invade the Rainbow Mountains from The Kingdom of the Lion.”
Was he right? But even as she wondered Erislee realised that he was. She just didn't want to have to face the truth. That while this for her was a hunt, for the others it was a war. And she knew nothing about war. Looking at his face she knew there was more.
“Go on.”
“This won't last.” Theris gestured at the camp. “Thus far we've had an easy ride. The towns have been small, our enemies few in number and unready, and our forces have simply overwhelmed them. But that will change.”
“Word will already be travelling back to Lion's Crest of our attacks. Decisions will be made there, and word will be sent back, advising all the other towns to be ready for us. To prepare. Soldiers will be sent south to the Rainbow Mountains to reinforce the towns. Maybe even the advances in to the dryad lands will be halted and those armies sent here to crush us.”
“From here on things will only get tougher – and we have to be ready for that. We can't simply have untrained men swinging swords at will, and mostly overwhelming the enemy through numbers and the creatures of your Goddess. We will need leaders. Strategy and tactics. We will need to plan our attacks carefully. Learn the enemy's strengths and weaknesses. Capture and interrogate prisoners. Gather weapons, and in time build siege weapons.”
“Glass River will have to be the start of that.”
“How soon will we need the fortress?” Erislee didn't argue. She knew he was right.