Flame of Life
- Arrival
Liana stopped her horse and squinted ahead. She thought she could see what she was looking for: in the otherwise nearly intelligible blur of yellow-brown ground and blue sky she saw a fuzzy patch of something darker. “Maybe that’s the tree I’m looking for,” she thought. She got out her little telescopic lens, an inch and a half long, made of carefully craft metal with a glass lens at each end, then pressed the eyepiece firmly against her own thick right lens. Alas in paying for such thick lenses, she had little money left to pay for the powerful telescope that she often needed: all this one did is make fuzzy distant things a little less fuzzy and distant. But despite this and the way it slid around on the flat front of her lens, she realised that what she was looking at was indeed a tree, probably the right one too.
She put away the telescope and took out her map. Liana wasn’t that good at finding her way in such unfamiliar territory, and being so poor-sighted didn’t help either, thus she relied heavily on maps; she brought it near to her left eye, inspecting it closely. She decided that she needed to travel a little further west. She then looked at the sun high in the sky through her thick lenses: for her it was no problem to do so unblinkingly, being as her vision was too poor to see it beyond a bright smear in the sky.
Liana had always had trouble seeing things: her eyesight had become steadily worse as she grew from a girl into a woman. This, perhaps rather surprisingly, did not prevent her from being recruited into the Varenna city guard at the age of twenty-one. Now 4 years later, she was tall, well muscled and lithe, easily able to pass muster with a sword. It was these things, and the fact that her native city-state was at war with one of the neighbouring states that got her the job. Alas since the war finished a few months ago, things had changed: in order to cut down on expenses, the Prince of Varenna has ordered a reduction in the armed forces on health grounds. One of the criteria was eyesight, and of course Liana had fallen foul of it, despite being one of the best guards. Now she was on her way to the fortress of Dasdar, looking for some sort of new job. It wasn’t the easiest of times for her: there were a quite a few unemployed ex-soldiers around looking for work in Varenna, and most of them with better eyesight than hers. She hoped that this would be a better place to find employment, that not everywhere would be so fussy about eyesight.
After a couple of hours of riding along on the brown track that passed for a road, even her limited vision could discern that the scenery had changed: indistinct, dark grey mountains filled her view of the world to the west and north. A check on the position of the bright smear that passed for her view of the sun told her she was at least going the right way. Slowly the mountains took over her visible world, until she was able to see the slight dip that indicated the mountain pass that the fortress of Dasdar commanded; then it was around the corner of this particular grey mass, and thus before her was the fortress.
She did not initially distinguish it by means of vision, but instead by the sound of people: it was in fact a busy and bustling town built into the side of a mountain, considered impregnable with high walls encompassing that part of it not actually inside the mountain. That sort of detail eluded her fuzzy vision until she was very near the main gate in the outer wall: a thick grey projection into the dusty land beyond. As she went in she heard a male voice cry out to her, ‘hey! Darling! Stop there and show me your papers!’ Someone moved in the dimly-lit fuzz toward her. Liana answered innocently, ‘papers?’ She didn’t have the vision to read the sign pasted on the wall asking for them as anything other than a meaningless white blur; small and featureless, and for her unworthy of attention. Nor had she seen an identical sign in her home city of Varenna, high up and similarly unreadable.
He told her to dismount, which she did readily enough; she stood before the man, just a little taller than him, slender but ample in her undisguised femaleness and lithe strength. He addressed her severely, ‘you should have identity papers, so that we know you are not a spy or something.’ Liana looked and sounded a little hurt by that. She replied ‘I am not a spy. I am looking for work here.’ ‘You’ll have to come with me.’
He led her through the gate and toward a grey building, featureless apart from the barred windows. Liana completely failed to notice these details, and once inside, her high myopia similarly denied her those inside too. She could only see the faint outline of the man, relying more on the sound of his footsteps and voice to guide her: she’d had to get used to this sort of thing in the last few years. He pulled out a key and she heard him open a door, and then he told her, ‘give me your sword.’ ‘Why?’ ‘You are under arrest, and to be detained until we are convinced you are who you say you are.’ He glanced at her, an expression on his face as if he thought that she was utterly simple, which thankfully for him she missed entirely: part of her hoped to “leave” by whatever means necessary, but then again, she hoped that they would resolve the problem quickly and without violence. Thus she unbuckled her sword-belt and handed it to him. Abruptly she was shoved from behind into a prison cell, then the door slammed behind her.
- Meeting
I looked up as the door was unlocked and pushed open: in the doorway stood one of the Guards with what looked like a tall female warrior. She was reluctantly parted with her sword, then shoved into the cell with me. My cell had admittedly been a bit dull before she arrived: endless grey slabs of mountain rock with a barred window just above head height, which let a wide shaft of light in, but would hardly allow me out. Into this shaft of illumination the woman stumbled, then stood up. I could see her well enough from my vantage point in the corner: she was tall, an imposing six feet tall or thereabouts, lithe and well-muscled, looking as if she could swing the sword that she’d been deprived of to good effect. The protective qualities of the rather tired leather armour she wore was enhanced by strips of metal attached in various places; despite which she moved with considerable grace and her ample bust was only partially disguised. Yet it was her head that drew my attention.
She turned, then walked toward the light, and as she did so, I could see sunlight flashing and reflecting off her glasses. They looked strangely incongruous, yet oddly interesting and attractive on someone with her certain steely beauty: they looked awkward and heavy, and needed to be held on her face with a wide strap passing behind her head, ill-disguised over her tied-back blonde hair. She walked to the window, then stood on tip-toes and peeked out of the window; seemingly she squinting and strained to see the world outside. I was further surprised to see how little time she devoted to looking outside. It seemed to me that she had no idea anyone else was in the cell with her.
I decided to announce my presence; that seeming better than being tripped over during any further exploration of the cell on her part. Perhaps she might even help me escape and do something more profitable than being detained at the pleasure of the Duke of Dasdar. I called out to her, ‘hello!’ At that she looked around, slightly confused and surprised. She squinted roughly in my direction, then asked uncertainly, ’there is someone here?' I wasn’t entirely surprised she’d missed me: I was sitting in the gloomiest, darkest corner of the prison cell.
She took a step toward the sound of my voice, and asked uncertainly, ‘hello? Who are you? And where are you?’ I waved my arm but her gaze was one of squinting unrecognition. In a voice of clear command, she told me, ‘come out into the light where I can see you.’ I shrugged, got up and shambled over. Her nose wrinkled as I got nearer to her: I did smell a bit, but if you’d been the places I’ve been, you’d smell too.
She seemed to examine me, looking closely at my face: the way the light sparkled on her thick lenses was so enticing. Then she straightened, and asked sharply, ‘so, who, or what are you? Why are you in here?’ ‘Oh, they call me “Puffin”: it’s sort of a nickname. My real name, well that’s not really important. As to why I’m in here, well, I’ve been know to steal a few things before, you know: I was caught this time.’ Her expression fell into frank disapproval, then she asked with faint disgust, ‘you are a thief?’ She backed away from me, and shook her head, muttering unhappily to herself ‘I come all this way, and I get locked up with a criminal. Now, I hardly think that’s right, do you? To be treated like a common criminal?’
She went to sit down as far as she possibly could get from me, and then told me, ‘go back to your corner! No, actually stay there where I can see you better.’ She fell silent, so I sat down and then asked, ‘who are you, then?’ ‘I am Liana, ex-lieutenant of the Varenna city guard.’ Her face looked rather angry, although her statement begged further questions. I asked, ‘why “ex”?’ ‘Oh, they now have this policy of getting rid of those guards who do not pass their physical requirements.’ ‘Really? I can’t imagine you failing something like that!’ She raised her eyebrow, and then replied sourly, ‘Yeah, right. The one I failed was visual,’ she pointed to her glasses and concluded, ‘I can’t see that well, you know; haven’t you noticed these?’
- Escape
After a short time, during which Liana sat seeming to glare into space angrily, her brawny arms folded over her chest, she then asked, ‘well, do you know how to get out of here, thief?’ Perhaps rather pointlessly I raised an eyebrow as if to question her assertion: but as she said, I was indeed a thief. That’s why my gaolers had taken from me everything that they thought I could use to escape, and some things I couldn’t: basically I was left in my ragged, smelly clothing. I enquired hopefully, ‘you wouldn’t happen to have a lockpick on you?’ Liana gave an irritated “tut”, then said, ‘of course not. Do you really think I would?’ ‘oh, it doesn’t have to be a real lockpick. Just a skinny bit of metal a couple of inches long might do it.’ ‘oh, OK. Maybe my armour…’ She sounded remotely interested. I then got up, and started walking toward her, asking, ’let me see what you are wearing more closely.' ‘Oh, no, you stay over there.’
She went over to the lit section of the cell, then began closely inspecting parts of her armour with, curiously, just her left eye. Then she bent double and looked at her leg armour, more feeling it than looking, and then with a hiss, asked unhappily, ‘come and help me. I’m not the best at looking for small things.’ I went over and saw something on her stomach padding that might do the job. I pointed it out to her; she slapped my hand away then pulled at it herself. She was stronger than she looked, this Liana, even considering the muscles in her shoulders and arms. Maybe that was why she couldn’t see that well? I was no expert on muscles, more subtle crafts were my forte. However this was not the time for such thoughts. Having pulled it from her armour, she handed it to me. Instantly I went over to the door, bent over and started fiddling with the lock: it was a crude affair, so it took me very little time to open it. Carefully I pushed the door open, then glanced back to find Liana right behind me. She evidently had no desire to remain here indefinitely.
We crept up the corridor, and as we did so, Liana asked, ‘do you know where my sword is? They took it from me!’ ‘Usually they just chuck it in the guardroom, they’re too complacent to do much else.’ ‘Take me there then, please.’ She caught a whiff of my smell, and commented, ‘perhaps they might smell you before they hear or see us.’ Despite this, we arrived at the guardroom safely, found it empty of guards, with only the sound of one grumbling in the toilet to indicate that there were any guards on duty whatsoever. Quickly I grabbed what I presumed was Liana’s sword, then handed it to her. She thanked me, then headed for the door.
She stopped just outside, and judging by her expression seemed to realise that she had no idea which way to go. She probably could have found her way out of here, but it would have taken her far longer than me. She asked, squinting rather uselessly into the distance, ‘can you see my horse? It’s big, a sort of dark brown and black colour. With a bit of luck my things might still be on it.’ I looked at the bar where the horses had been tied up, and instantly one of them whinnied at nothing. Liana started off in that direction, thinking it was hers. I said to her, ’no, it’s this one.' Thus Liana and horse were reunited.
Just then there was a hoarse shout from behind me of, ‘hey! Come back!’ Liana asked, ‘what was that?’ ‘we’ve been spotted!’ Liana instantly jumped onto the back of her horse, and made to leave, then looked down on me. She looked a bit abashed, then put out her arm. I felt her lift me up onto her horse; she dug her heels in, and we were off. As we charged through the main gate, she shouted at me, ’this isn’t because I’ve lost my sense of smell!' Her horse proved to be swift enough to outdistance our pursuers, even though it took nearly an hour of hard riding before I lost sight of them. Liana asked me several times if I could see them, and when I finally told her I couldn’t, that seemed to satisfy her.
- The Cave
We rode on south-eastward for a few more hours, not speaking apart from Liana asking occasionally for guidance: evidently landmarks were as important to her as anyone else, it was just that she was particularly bad at seeing them. Then Liana spoke, ‘it’s getting darker. Can you see any suitable place to rest for the night?’ I looked around as the horse trotted on underneath us, and then said, ‘what kind of place are you looking for?’ She made an irritated “tut” sound, then said, ’either some trees to make a shelter, or a cave. Haven’t you ever lived out of a town or city before?' ‘Not really. Never had to.’ ‘Yeah, I suppose you just lived off other people.’ I ignored her jibe then said, as we went past a rise in the ground, ‘maybe there’s a cave or something over there.’ Liana squinted did her best squint, but all she could say was a vague, ‘really? Where?’ ‘Over there to the left.’
I had to direct Liana over to the exact spot: we were amazingly close, perhaps not much more than forty yards from it, before Liana realised where we were heading and thus took over directing the horse. She said rather unhappily, ‘it’s getting dark, I can’t see so well now.’ ‘Really?’ ‘Yeah, I’m blind at night. I can see lights and fires as fuzzy glows, even the moon as a silver patch in the sky when it’s big enough and not cloudy, but that’s about it.’ ‘However did you get to be a City Guard then?’ She patted her sword, and smiled. I supposed that was the way she survived: on her wits and strength. She obviously didn’t rely that much on her vision, certainly not at night. How could she, if she had that much trouble seeing a cave? But she seemed better off in daylight, whether out in the open or in the prison cell back in Dasdar.
The horse came to a halt near the cave and we got off. I was heartily glad to do so: I am no horseman, and my back and legs ached horribly. I turned around, and Liana was off the horse and looking at me again. She had this strange, rather ugly yet beguiling look about her with those thick lenses of hers, assisting yet not entirely correcting her vision, looking at me with more her right eye than her left. She then turned away from me and led the horse into the cave. In the cave, it was predictably dark, so much so that I had trouble seeing things that were not large and nearly on top of me. I could see Liana feeling and groping her way over the horse, to the pack. I almost offered to help, but then she said ‘I have only one bedroll. You’ll have to lie on the ground or something. I wish I could make you sleep outside, but someone might see you. That’s if they don’t catch your smell…’ I shrugged and bedded down for the night.
- Discovery
I woke first, and began exploring at the back of the cave: I don’t know why I did it, maybe my instincts told me that there was a good reason. It wasn’t a particularly deep cave, no more than about twenty yards long even at the deepest, and at that part very narrow, not much more than a crack that I could just about slip into. There was just sufficient light to see by, however some chance beam of sunlight caught a few rocks above my head, so I inspected them more closely. Perhaps I was hoping they might contain some precious stone or a vein of metal once smashed open. I pulled at one and it came away very easily, almost seeming to fall away: alas it was plain black stone, which to me seemed quite worthless. But what caught my eye was the hole left behind: it seemed deeper than it should given the size of stone I’d removed. I put my hand up into it, and felt… Paper.
I took it down and found it was a sort of scroll: very old and tatty, but upon opening it I saw that it had a particularly old form of writing on it, a bit archaic, really. It wasn’t easy to read, but what it did say was, well, amazing: this document was written in the old language used by the ancient people of Talesa to the east - the words ‘Flame of Life’ jumped out at me. It appeared to be a description of where exactly to find the said ‘Flame of Life’.
Just then I heard a movement behind me, and the bespectacled Liana peeked into the crack, then asked, with her usual suspicion, ‘what you doing? What have you found?’ She did her inevitable squinting, but all I imagine she saw was a fuzzy yellowish thing in my hands. I pushed my way of the crack into the main part of the cave and - slightly reluctantly - handed it to her.
Liana held it close to her left eye and read it. I could see the surprise, nay shock on her face. When she’d read it her muscled arms flopped down at her front, holding it loosely in both hands. She stared at me, then said, ‘do you know what this is about?’ ‘Yes - the Flame of Life. It tells exactly where to find it in the ancient, ruined city of Talesa.’ ‘This is mad. I thought it was common knowledge that someone went there, stole it, then realised it was fake. It’s supposed to be some lovely jewel possessed of magical powers, or maybe containing some demon, bound up in it with some power from the Ancients of Talesa, or else some other ridiculous fireside tale. Nobody really believes it actually exists. As for the Talesans, they certainly knew all about madness - which is why there’s just ruins there now. Ever been there?’ ‘No.’ ‘Me neither. No right thinking person would set foot there.’ ‘Unless there really was such a thing as the Flame of Life?’
Liana looked at me quite disgustedly, and said, ‘well, I’m not surprised at you wanting to go there. Some nice treasure to plunder, and you’d probably have no idea what to do with it other than sell it.’ ‘Let me have that scroll again, please?’ She handed it back, then I started reading from it. The key passage that caught my eye was the bit where it said something along the lines of “The Flame of Life is not such as it appears. Within the aforementioned building lies a well, and The Stone lies within the Well’s structure, a pentagonal-faced stone on the third course of stones down from the brim, a quarter turn around from the winch that brings up the bucket. It is a rough-finished stone, and only those who know it well or this description will find it.”
I said to Liana, who had fallen into silent thought, ’this thing does exist. The reason why nobody found it is that it looks just like any other grotty, worthless old stone, not some precious gem. Look, Liana, you came to Dasdar looking for a job, some way to make a living. This,’ I said shaking the scroll, ‘is the way to do it. Anyway, it wouldn’t be theft, because the people who owned it are long gone.’ She shrugged, and admitted, ’that’s true. Perhaps I have a good reason for finding the stone…’ She tapped her glasses, and I realised what she meant. She evidently hoped there might be some way to use the stone’s power to fix her vision. She then abruptly told me, ‘give me the scroll, and I’ll go find it.’ I shook my head, and pointed out, ’there’s a description of which building the well is in. It has a gargoyle on the third level up. Can you see up that high?' Liana looked uncomfortable, and then admitted ‘I doubt it. OK, you come and help me, and after I get my eyes fixed, however long that takes, then we can sell it and split the profits.’ ‘That sounds more like me.’ ‘I really hope that’s not the case - and if I ever smelt like you, I’d be retching. Look, if you want to stay with me, you’ll do me a favour and bathe in the river Sertra, it cannot be far away.’ I agreed to that.
- Treasure Hunt
As soon as we could we set off for the Ancients’ city, which was at least a couple of days hard riding away. I was really impressed with Liana’s sense of direction, considering the fact she couldn’t see that well, with little or no detail. She said that she did it by following the sun. I asked, ‘what happens if it’s cloudy?’ ‘I get lost,’ she said glumly. Thankfully it was summertime here, so cloudy days were not common.
Around midday we found the River Sertra tumbling along in its course, here 30 yards wide, but not too deep for a horse to swim and walk across. Liana saw it too when we were almost in it; when we were half way across she asked me, ‘you haven’t forgotten have you?’ ‘Forgotten what?’ She tutted and said, ‘go for a bath, please. When we get to the other side!’
When we reached the far bank Liana came close to simply pushing me in. She cried out, ‘go on, then, get in - I’m sick of riding in front of what smells like a dead sheep!’ I waded in and swam around for a bit. She watched me from the riverbank, not entirely convinced I was doing my best to scrub myself clean. She got up, went to her horse and fetched something out of her pack, then threw it at me. Well, that proved she could see where I was, if not exactly what I was doing. I had to dive to catch it, and it turned out to be a piece of soap! She called out ‘I bet you don’t recognise that!’
Well, with the aid of the soap I managed to get myself clean and washed my clothes. When I’d done that, I called out to her ‘hey! Liana! Catch!’ And tossed the soap back at her from a few yards. She didn’t see it till far too late, so missed it and thus it landed behind her. Irritably she said, ’that’s not fair, I can’t see that well.' She turned around and started looking for it on the riverbank: alas, it had landed in some pebbles, thus Liana’s chances of finding it quickly were really quite slim. She stooped and looked, straightened up and walked to another spot, and squinted briefly but to no effect. I had to put her out of her misery, telling her, ‘go forward another step. That’s it. To your right. Further. A little more.’ She picked it up, walked over to her horse, stowed it away, then turned to me a few feet away, and glared into my face, saying angrily ‘I suppose you think that’s funny!’ Actually I did, a bit. But I could see why she’d been chucked out of the City Guard: someone who couldn’t see a bit of soap thrown at them wasn’t much use, even if they were proficient in the use of arms, and also because Varenna was then at war with Ciera, I mused. Anyway, her irritation soon vanished, after which she mounted her horse and helped me up behind her, then we promptly set off again. After a few minutes she said, ’now that’s better.' ‘What is?’ ‘You don’t smell half as bad as before.’ ‘Ahh, but it did help you know when I was around.’ ‘Hmmph!’
The rest of that day was quite uneventful, as we travelled southeastwards into territory marked only by ever increasing barrenness, the scrubby bushes becoming sparser and smaller until it got to the stage in the late afternoon that I hadn’t seen one for nearly an hour. I commented on this, so Liana replied ‘I haven’t seen any at all today. Please tell me if we do go the wrong direction, I am not infallible you know, and my horse does not know which way we are going either.’
That night we spent under the stars, lacking any shelter. Liana said to me ‘I only feel comfortable doing this because you are here. I would not like to do this at all alone. I can see absolutely nothing.’ Some time later I noticed the moon rising in the east, and watched it emerge silver-grey from the rolling hills. When it was above the horizon, I asked Liana, ‘can you see the moon? It’s so beautiful.’ ‘You tell me,’ she replied flatly, seemingly uninterested.
We spent a day and another night travelling then resting when Liana’s horse tired, during which we found a rare waterhole for Liana’s horse and ourselves, and then on the next morning I peeked into the distance from over Liana’s shoulder and said, ’there’s something ahead. Looks like some buildings.' Liana replied ‘I hope that’s what we are looking for!’
- City of the Ancients
Within a few minutes it was quite obvious that we were in the right place: Talesa, the city of the Ancients, was a bit of a mixture, some buildings relatively unscathed by time, some half-buried, others reduced to rubble, and a few, well, they seemed to have been melted. I did not speculate on why this was so; as for my fellow treasure hunter, Liana, not noticing such things, said nothing. We rode up one of the streets, during which Liana said, ‘well, have you seen it yet?’ ‘No. Try the next turn left.’
We spent a fruitless half hour trotting around the ruins on horseback, with me occasionally dismounting in order to investigate buildings more closely, even cautiously entering a couple of them. During one such stop, I wandered off a short distance to look down another street, then some way down I had this uncomfortable feeling, as if I was being watched, then suddenly it struck me why this place seemed so creepy: there was utter silence here, no trace of life, no birds, no trees, no grass, not even moss or creepers. It seemed quite oppressive and disturbing. I turned around, and there was Liana standing right behind me; she’d tied her horse on something further back. I jumped, to say the least. She said to me angrily, ’there you are! Don’t wander off, I had so much trouble finding you. You’re too near the colour of these buildings!' Then she peered closely at me and asked, ‘are you OK? You look - troubled.’ ‘Troubled is about right. This place is creepy. It seems to swallow everything: life, sound, you name it.’ ‘Now I understand why no-one wants to come here. Whatever the Ancients did here, it sure wasn’t good and certainly isn’t a good idea to do it again.’ ‘Once we’ve finished here, I don’t want to come back!’ ‘I can’t disagree with that.’ We walked back to her horse, she unhitched it, then we both got back on and resumed our search.
Presently we happened upon a large square in the middle of the city. It must have been an impressive place, with large stone statues and suchlike, and also patches of barren earth that seemed to have once had trees in them: a paradise ruined. Over at the other side of the square, oh it must have been about 40 or 50 yards away, there was a group of men there: some dressed as warriors, some obviously labourers or slaves. One of them seemed particularly well dressed and carried an air and look of authority. Altogether I counted five warriors and nine labourers. It looked like the well-dressed one was speaking, but as usual in this eerie place, the sound did not carry to us.
Unthinkingly, I glanced at Liana, and then asked ‘I wonder who they are?’ She had her little telescope pressed firmly against the front of her right lens, straining to see detail, which from her facial expression seemed something she wasn’t getting far with. She commented unhappily, ‘just what I was thinking. I’m hardly the best person to ask, I can’t see their faces from here.’ I told her, ’there’s some slaves, a few warriors and well-dressed man, looks as if he likes himself, too.' ‘Mmmm. Suppose we could do worse than introduce ourselves.’ And thus we did. They did not see or hear us until we got quite close, not surprising in this eerie place, but when we did, they were reasonable. The well-dressed man turned out to be a certain Prince Chanderon of Ciera. Liana sounded as if she knew him, if not personally then of him. He told us in a supercilious tone, ‘ah, we are on an archeological mission, to find out about the lives of the Ancients.’ We told him were just passing through, but I don’t think our story was believed: we certainly didn’t take his at face value. That didn’t really bother us.
After a brief talk about such basic topics such as where to find water and shelter, we left them to it. Liana told me, as soon as they were out of earshot, ‘Prince Chanderon! He is such a fool - he thinks himself such a wise man, spending his time and money trying to learn about sorcery, but without the wit nor power to actually do anything. He’s here to try to find the Stone, you know. He’s been here before, sniffing around after it. If he knew what we knew, then he would have it for himself and cause who knows what trouble. As it is, he is just a fairly harmless idiot.’ She then strode up the street, looking around as best she could, and then saying to me, ‘comon, eyes, we need to find this building so we can get out of here!’
It was another half hour of fruitless, seemingly pointless wandering before I saw the building with the gargoyle at the top. Liana squinted at it, then tried her telescope, but she couldn’t be sure that there was anything up there, let alone what it was. She told me, ‘It all looks the same to me. And - I hope you are right. I don’t want to be here come nightfall, even if I could see.’ We went inside to have a look. Actually “inside” wasn’t quite right, being as most of the roof had collapsed: we spent some minutes picking our way over broken, desiccated timbers. Then we went through another doorway, Liana pushing aside the shattered remains of a double door. Once in this second chamber I saw - a well! I walked over, then said ‘Liana… Liana! This is it!’
Quickly we matched up the position on the well with the description, and there it was: a dull grey piece of stone, much the same as all the rest, with an irregular pentagonal face sticking out. I sighed, and said, ‘how will we sell that?’ Liana tutted yet again, then started to pick the stone out with her sword. It wasn’t well stuck in: perhaps so that it could be retrieved later by whoever had hidden it here in plain sight. Then it fell out of its hole, into my waiting hands.
Well, it may have looked like any other stone, but it didn’t feel like it: it felt unnaturally heavy, and the edges caught and plucked at my hands with incredible roughness and sharpness. Immediately I hid it about my person. I had barely done so when in marched Chanderon with six of his henchmen. He gave us an evil sneer, and snapped, ‘well, well, I think you just found something interesting didn’t you? A stone perhaps? Just as I thought: you’re not really passing through. Hand it over at once, or my friends will have some fun with you!’ One of them came for me, but then Liana seemed to come alive, more than I’d ever seen her do so before. In a single lithe movement she seemed to dance forward and chop the man’s sword hand off. He fell back, groaning and clutching his bleeding stump.
At that they all came at her; now I saw exactly why Liana had been able to gain employment in the Varenna city guard in the first place. She was a really good fighter, much better than me, I thought, as I watched her ducking and parrying, then finding holes their defences in order to keep them at bay. But against five, despite her natural speed, skill and strength, she was well-matched and thus unable to gain much ground, nor wound any of them seriously enough to knock them out of the fight. Thus I grabbed the sword dropped by her first assailant and went to aid her. Chanderon’s warriors were no bad swordsmen and I really felt I could do little to help Liana, beyond taking some pressure off her. Two of them came for me, and I was hard put to defend myself: but Liana was brilliant, she put her sword though one of her opponents, and he fell dead. A couple of minutes later she’d poked another in the shoulder of his sword arm, forcing him to retire. Alas I was tiring: I was no swordsman, more a dagger merchant. My borrowed long sword made my arm ache, and all the more so from the blows raining down on me. I got a kick in the stomach and I was down, then a kick to the head addled me. I was out of the fight.
Unexpectedly Chanderon ordered the remaining warriors to leave Liana and take the stone from me. He called ‘Resna!’ Moments later a large shadow fell across the doorway, then a huge muscular bulk forced its way in: it was the largest warrior I’d ever seen, over seven feet tall, heavy and ponderous, carrying a huge sword and an even huger club. Chanderon pointed at Liana, and he charged at her growling.
Liana didn’t need sharp eyesight to realise that she was in trouble. She did her best to duck and thus avoid his swishing, piledriver club swings and the murderous sword he carried in his left hand: I wished I could have helped but my legs were like jelly, and besides, the other warriors were in the process of relieving me of the Stone. If the giant could just pin her in a corner, he’d have her - but she ducked and swerved again. One of the warriors took the Stone to Chanderon, and the other two went to help cordon off Liana. Now they weren’t so wary of her as they had previously. Liana’s head swished around, her narrow field of vision a serious handicap here. One of the warriors feinted at her, distracting her, then quickly fell back just in time to allow the giant to swish his club at her. She barely saw it coming, ducked, thus saving her head from being crushed, instead it only clipped her skull just hard enough to knock her senseless. She fell with a sigh, fell in a heap and didn’t move. A few moments later I received a similar blow to the head and thus I was beyond helping her.
- Pursuit
I opened my eyes, and found myself looking up at Liana, who was crouched beside me with a look of concern both on her face and in her tiny, shrunken blue eyes blinking softly behind her thick, powerful lenses. That faded, but her voice asked softly, ‘are you OK? How do you feel?’ I groaned and replied, ‘dizzy… Head… Aches…’ ‘Well, I’m glad you’re awake, I didn’t want to get jumped.’ She smiled at me surprisingly kindly, then said a little softly, ‘you’re not so bad, really, for a thief.’ I said nothing, then after a pause, asked her, ‘what do we do now?’ ‘Try our best to catch up with Prince Chanderon… Wherever he’s gone. If he has the Stone, who knows what devilish mischief he’ll get up to!’
She helped me up, after which I had an idea. I went over to the well again and started inspecting the stones as before. I mumbled, ‘maybe there is…. Yes… That one seems very similar.’ That gained her attention, so asked me, that trace of softness gone from her voice, ‘what are you doing?’ Liana came over to see, and with a little of her usual squinting, realised what I was doing: there was a stone of similar colour and size to the Flame of Life. She breathed, ‘you’re not serious.’ Seeing me set to prising it out with the point of my borrowed sword, she said, ‘you are serious. You really don’t think we can switch them, can we?’ I shrugged, and said ‘I don’t have a better plan, do you?’ Liana shook her head slowly, so started helping me get this second stone out of the well.
After a bit it came out, and it fell to the floor: it seemed exactly the right colour all round, but not the right shape, being more squarish. I started chipping off a corner to make it roughly the right shape. When I’d done it, I let Liana inspect it. She held it close to her left eye, and said, ‘well, it looks the same to me, but I’m not the best person to ask anyway. The real thing seemed to be just a fuzzy blur for me most of the time. And it doesn’t feel the same. It doesn’t have that odd roughness and heaviness that the original has. But I suppose that it might work.’
We got ourselves together and went outside to look. I stopped in amazement. Liana looked at me, and asked, ‘what is it? What do you see?’ All around on the ground were what looked like little craters or eruptions, each about a foot or so round and a few inches high. Liana could not have noticed them, because the nearest one was more than twenty yards away and not really any different in colour to the rest of the soil. I told her what I saw, and her face reflected her horror.
‘Oh my… He’s really gone and done that? I don’t believe it! How could he know how to do that?’ ‘Done what?’ ‘Raised the Ancient Dead…. If he has done this all over the city, he has enough for a whole army!’ ‘What’s he want with that?’ ‘Oh, probably attack Varenna or something…. Just the sort of grandiose self-serving nonsense he likes.’
So we were obliged to set out with the intent of pursuing Chanderon and his new army. To be honest, it wasn’t very hard to follow the trail, being as it left quite a lot of footsteps in the sand and dirt around the Ancients’ city, heading straight for Varenna as Liana had surmised. After a few hours, I espied something black in the distance, shimmering and distorted in the heat haze. Liana asked, ‘well, eyes, what do you see?’ ‘I can see - something. I think it is the Army of the Dead.’ ‘Well, I’ll have to get a lot closer to see them, you know. Let’s carry on and try to catch them.’
The black smear on the horizon grew and expanded till it filled most of the western quadrant of my view. As afternoon came, I began to see individual entities - they were black, emaciated beings, once human but now raised from the dead and forced to march by the power of the Stone: marching something like an insect and each armed with some short sword, club or other weapon, they silently but efficiently headed toward Varenna. And there were thousands upon thousands of them. I had to tell Liana what I saw, and she did not look pleased. She fetched out her telescope, but did not dare bring us close enough to see them as well as I did. We followed them from a safe distance, not quite sure what to do: despite Liana’s considerable prowess with the sword, she could hardly defeat an entire army on her own. Later that evening darkness fell, so Liana wanted to stop, despite her wish to follow the army; but in the dark she felt rather more vulnerable, so preferred to let the army march on without us. After a while she exclaimed that she could see the moon - it was almost a half moon, but she relied on me to confirm that detail.
The next morning, aside from its tracks, there was no sign of the army. Perhaps rather foolishly we had both assumed this army would rest overnight, but on reflection it seemed obvious that such a malign force would not need something so mundane as rest and food: it had evidently marched on all night long without pause and thus we set off again in search of it. A couple of hours later we found it, and this time we got closer and closer to it. Even Liana could make out the individuals: she seemed appalled. Then, experimenting further, we actually rode amongst their ranks: they did not seem to notice us. Liana said ‘I cannot believe this. Perhaps Chanderon knows enough to raise this foul army but not enough to control it. He cannot get them to take notice of anything: they are like machines.’ ‘Ah, but in doing so we have a chance. Perhaps we can slip in undetected, and switch the stone for our fake one?’ Liana did not look keen, but with the territory around us slowly showing signs of nearing Varenna, we had few other options. This army was far larger than anything Varenna could field, and could simply be thrown at the city walls until they crumbled under its weight, assuming Chanderon knew how to get them to do that.
- Choice
To be honest, we left our attempt quite late; that evening the entire army was waiting, bristling, leashed back from attacking the city of Varenna before it. Rank upon rank of motionless raised dead encircled the place, some along the cliffs, some near the gates, others around the walls. Shooting them with arrows did nothing to them: they were dead already. Only breaking the spell would release them. And the key to that spell was in the hands of Prince Chanderon.
We eased our way through the ordered crowds of dead toward what was obviously Chanderon’s tent. Liana said to me, ‘you look inside, I’ll stand guard in case these attack us, or in case some of his cronies turn up.’ So I went in. Once inside, I saw with some surprise that there was no sign of anyone. There was a locked chest, which I hoped might contain the stone, so I went over to it, crouched down and started fiddling with the lock: it was a lot more difficult to open than an old prison door lock. Liana came in; she peeked through a hole in the tent fabric with her right eye and lens. I asked her, ‘see anyone?’ ‘I don’t know.’ As usual, Liana was far from the best person at being a lookout. But then again I had to open the lock, so there was no-one else. And as I knew, her other senses seemed perfectly fine.
She hissed, ‘hurry up! I think there’s someone coming!’ Whether there actually was or not was a considerably open question, but I hurried up anyway and got the lock open. I flipped the top up, and there, sitting amongst some papers and stuff, was the Stone. Quickly I switched my version for the original and relocked the chest, then we exited the tent and quickly headed for the city. We’d got some 40 yards away when I heard an angry bellow from the tent, so I glanced back and saw Chanderon pursuing us, red-faced and angry: carelessly he’d sent some of his followers down to parley with the Varenese, and the rest on more menial tasks, leaving him and his army to deal with us. Except now, lacking the Stone, he could do nothing to order them to attack us or anything else.
We scampered across to the clifftops with Chanderon running hotly after us. He bellowed at us, ‘you two! Come back or I shall make your lives a miserable hell!’ We weren’t buying that threat. After a few minutes of scrambling around we found ourselves at the cliff edge with no escape. Liana’s limited vision had let us down a bit, leading us somewhere she’d never been or seen before: Chanderon had us trapped. Liana then took out the Stone, held it up over the cliff edge, and said, ’leave us alone, or I’ll drop it.’ ‘Don’t be a fool! So much can be done with it!’ ‘I said back off!’ Chanderon paused, then cried, ‘I can fix your vision if you give me the Stone!’
I could see an awful dilemma: dropping the stone would surely break it and hopefully the spell with it, as the cliffs around Varenna were very high. But Liana, well, she obviously wanted to see clearly. I waited for her answer. She drew back, and for a moment I thought she really would give it to him. But then, convulsively, she threw the stone, and Chanderon cried out, ’noooooo!’ The Stone landed below us, smashed into fragments, some of which fell into the river Setra far below. Liana cried out ‘I’m not letting you destroy my city!’
An instant later, the Ancient dead started to melt like candles, oozing into the ground where they stood; the spell that had brought them here now broken. In moments all that was left was a thin grey slime on the earth, and the soil soon drank that away leaving nothing. Chanderon turned and ran back to his tent, jumped onto his horse and rode away as fast as he could.
Well, things got a lot better for Liana and me after that: we were the heroes of the hour. There was some discomfort for those who had decided to dump Liana out of the City Guard, and there was talk of reinstating her, but she refused, saying that we’d worked well together and was hoping we could continue our partnership. Some city funds were forthcoming to set ourselves up, and in a few months, well, we were having a fine time of it…