Chapter 3

5 Noel 1061

Bastion looked away from his father. His stare held Bastion’s thoughts on a tight loop, a silent argument against his father’s position on Sterich. “Conquering Sterich to save Sterich is nonsense. It’s just a pretense to hide his real ambitions: to rule unopposed. This isn’t how it must be,” he thought. “He murders to bleed his way to loyalty. His soldiers rape, children are sold and enslaved. And he tells me, this is how the world works, following some natural law which he’s powerless to break. We are the law. We choose how it works! And there he sits, sipping his wine, picking at his food, while in razed and burned villages people, sterish people, are scattered, hungry, cold. They would be better under the fist of the giants”.

Bastion repeated this litany, each time, it evolved subtly. If he veered too far from a line of reasoning that supported his conclusion he’d back up, correct the misstep and take another go. “There is a better way, maybe a simpler way. One lost to time. My father must see this, and must change.”

He felt a tap and looked over his shoulder. A noble’s daughter from Wogen whom he’s known since childhood smiled fondly at him. Wine flushed her cheeks, she swayed on her feet. She pointed at another table where a man lay slouched in his chair, sound asleep, mouth agape, drool trailed down his brown beard. “My husband refuses to dance,” she giggled. “Give me a dance, Bast.”

Kathe gave Bastion a playful push of his shoulder, “Go, hero of Fael, and rescue her from the doldrums!”

They danced two songs, when abruptly the music stopped. Through the Fues Tor (River Doors) entered a small troop pulling a cart loaded with several barrels. Axles groaned under the weight, the cart sagged in the middle. Iron shot wheels scraped against the stone floor. At the head of the troop walked a fay dressed in whites and greys. In the dim torch light, his eyes glowed turquoise, like two lamps. The fay had confident and serene look marked by a slight, contented smile. His prominent cheekbones cast deep shadows down his gaunt cheeks. His long, straight, white hair was pulled back and tied in a bun atop his head.

The rest were all welkings (humans). The fay was shorter than the others, lither as well. Like the fay the members of his company wore greys and whites with silver embroidery in honor of the Noel festivities.

Waes Langhaus (Great White Hall) fell silent. The sight of a fay shocked all those in the room. Fay were a mysterious people who long ago had been driven into the dark shadows of the great woods and the barren hills by the people of Sterich. There was little love between the stersh and fay. This fay looked pecuilar. Bastion thought him exotic, foreign, and he wondered who he was and whether he came from some distant land were the fay were friendlier and on better terms. Bastion stared. He let go of his dance partner. She responded by pressing herself against his shoulder. Bastion saw concern, almost fright on her face.

“Theanthal!” Lothar shouted from Naeldric’s table. He rose, held his arms out wide, and bound across the hall to the fay with a bright smile stretched across his wide face.

The crowd parted. A stunned hushed remained. Only the children were heard chattering away, clanking their bowls and asking for more food, or drink. Parents ‘shhhhhed’ them to quiet.

The two stopped and embraced. A gasp was heard. The fay caught a glimpse of a tapestry that hung just behind them and then turned to take it in. It depicted a scene from the Coming, when the welklings first found these lands, and chased the fay into the darkness of the forests. Bloodied swords, scattered bodies of fay lay at the feet of a towering man bathed in a heavenly light. The fay cocked his head to the tapestry and both he and Lothar shared a laugh.

Lothar waved for servant to bring him a chair. He stepped onto it and addressed the crowd. “May I introduce Theanthal. He has come all this way, from the Inderalath. He has long been a friend to Fael and our Dux,” Lothar bowed his head in the direction of Naeldric, and remained silent for a moment. Naeldric’s sat motionless, expressionless. Lothar continued, “Theanthal was entrusted to deliver unto this festivity our Dux’s ending-gift to us all: wines from Leyden. Yes, the famed wines of Leyden.” A gasp then a cheer went up from those in the hall. “Now, now, now, let’s not cheer too loudly. We wouldn’t want our friends,” Lothar said the word with a sarcastic raise of his eyebrow and roll of his eyes, “in Leyden to hear. They wouldn’t be too happy to find their wines in our bowls.” Laughter echoed off the walls of the hall. “Let’s toast our Dux, his gift, and our friend Theanthal who delivered it to our bowls.”

Members of Theanthal’s company tapped the barrels, and after the Dux was served (Naeldric declined the first bowl and instead offered it to the server in a traditntal display of gratitude) a line formed of eager people draining and wiping clean their bowls.

Bastion noticed Raban spoke with one of Theanthal’s company, a tall man without a beard -- unusual for men of the realm -- only a small patch of hair under his lower lip. His face looked carved from wood and wore a smug, self-assured expression. He was older than Raban and listened as if he did Raban a favor. Then Raban motioned for Bastion to join them.

Raban was only eight years older than Bastion, but those eight years were the long years at the end of youth, when a young man matures into a grown man both physically and in character. Raban was tall, the tallest man in the room. He had a long narrow face, a prominent nose like a carved beak and a trim beard. Both he and the man he spoke to had an austere air to them, as if they had figured out some game that no one else saw being played and enjoyed keeping this secret to themselves. “This is Deander,” said Raban. “He is a friend of ours. And he has found something you have been looking for. Would you like to tell him yourself?”

Deander pursed his lips and said, “No, go ahead.”

“The Taphos tuc Larynisis (The Tomb of Larynisis).”

Bastion heard the words and for a moment, that was all they were, words: sounds that were symbols, pregnant with meaning. Then the meaning of these sounds registered, became words. “The book of tombs?” He asked with an excited trepidation.

“What else could it be?” Deander laughed. Bastion took to Deander. The calm, careless attitude, easy posture. He had a manly bearing. When Deander laughed it sounded preposterous and judging. Bastion received it with humility, like the playful scorn from an admired uncle.

“My apologies, I’m just surprised.” Bastion said the words and felt like a child talking to adults.

Deander placed a reassuring hand on his shoulder, “Prins don’t apologize. Now, before you get carried away, you should know that the tome is in Larynn. It took me some time to locate a copy, and even more time to find a scribe to copy it. I hoped to bring it with me, but things didn’t line up.”

“How long until it’s complete?”

Deander’s head swayed from side to side as he hemmed, “Hmmm, from what I saw, a couple weeks. But the snows will have blocked up the roads. You’ll have to wait past the thaw before a caravan will fetch it from Larynn. Best guess, it will get here in Frostkill.”

Bastion didn’t want to believe that. It seemed like an easy thing to arrange for a courier to fetch it from Larynn, but he remained silent. He feared looking naive. Instead he said, “I see, that makes sense.” Bastion clasped Deander’s hand in his own and thanked him with wide eyes, a broad smile and a rigorous shake. It was an exuberant display of gratitude performed too vigorously. Deander deflected the gratitude and pushed the credit to Raban. “He did the hard work, told me where to find it, who to take it to. I just sat atop a horse and enjoyed the mountain climbs.”

Raban made a happy frown and held his hands out as if he also wanted to deflect the credit. “My prins, I just do as you ask.”

“And you do it well!” Again, Bastion’s enthusiasm undeterred. It was an odd habit he had, of thinking that the gratitude he offered as a prins would somehow raise the person he spoke to a higher position, to an equal footing with him, and in doing so, they would see him in a better light. They would see him as someone they could relate to. Bastion hoped Deander liked him.

“How else is there to do a thing other than well?” Raban laughed. “Now, we should disperse. Keep this quiet. Your father is watching and I am sure he wonders. He will not be pleased to know what you are up to.”

Bastion glanced in the direction of his father. “I’ll think of something. And yes. Yes. This is truly great. Must it truly wait until Frostkill?” He couldn’t contain his anxious curiosity. He regretted the question as soon as he asked it. He chided himself and thought, “You look too eager!”

“No trader risks the mountain passes in winter. And then there’s the giants along the road through the Uest Veld”

“You sound like my father.”

Deander looked confused and still maintained his smug grin.

Raban explained that Naeldric obsessed over the risk of the giants. “The Dux predicts they (the giants) will rise up.”

Deander nodded. Bastion thought he saw the same doubt on Deander’s face as everyone outside his father’s ministers shared.

“You agree then, it’s folly?”

“Prins, the Dux’s mind is not something I comment upon.” He laughed.

Raban slapped Deander on the shoulder and laughed as well.

The three broke their circle and Bastion returned to his table to find Kathe was no longer there.