Cold From The North, page 12
part #1 of The Onyxborn Chronicles Series
‘We won’t be staying long, so I am not sure I can,’ Melcun said as he looked at Ogulf. Crindasa’s soft face changed again, and this time, her expression was full of disappointment. Ogulf could tell she really was fascinated by those new to her craft.
‘A few days,’ Ogulf said.
‘What?’ said Melcun.
‘We’re here for a few days. That should give you enough time to grasp the basics and learn what you can from Crindasa. I think it will help you, and all of us, in the long run if you know more about what you’re capable of.’
‘But what abou–’ Melcun began.
‘–I’ll keep the other captains at bay. All you need to do is let me help you,’ Ogulf said to Melcun before he turned to the dark-haired woman, whose bright smile was brimming. ‘Crindasa, if the offer still stands, I would like to accept on my friend’s behalf.’
She smiled and nodded at Ogulf, then turned to Melcun, her eyes filled with excitement. ‘My uncle has a feast prepared for your people this evening. I will come and find you at dusk so that we can speak for an hour before we are due there,’ she said. Giving a slight curtsy, she was just about to make her way out of the room when she stopped and turned to Ogulf. ‘Your necklace – pure onyx! I have never seen one like it.’ Before she could finish the first step towards Ogulf, a man came crashing into the room, bumping into Crindasa and dashing the young sorceress to the floor. It was Cohl, the butcher.
‘Gods, lass, I am so sorry,’ he said, while Ogulf and Melcun darted forwards to help Crindasa to her feet. ‘Ogulf, you need to come with me. I think we may have worked out why Broadheim was invaded.’
Chapter 14
Ogulf followed Cohl through the long, elegant corridors of Lord Hanrik’s home, and Melcun’s heavy steps echoed a few paces behind them as they marched. Cohl had seemed nervous and was still uttering apologies to Crindasa despite the fact she had not come with them. The butcher’s shovel-like hands were shaking, and a butcher’s hand should never shake.
Their journey ended in a large room with an incredibly high ceiling that defied the height of the building. At the back of the room was a window almost as tall as the walls. The sun shone through the window, flooding the long, oak table in the centre of the room with light and making the room comfortably warm without the need for a firepit. Ogulf noticed his father chatting with Lord Hanrik beside the table at the other end of the room. Hanrik’s son, Danrin, was standing tall next to his father, holding his helm under his arm. Ogulf was surprised to see that there was no sign of Prundan.
Stooped next to Lord Hanrik was a very slight man. His long overshirt was riddled with holes. His grey hair was lank, and he was missing some teeth, leaving the two at the top front looking prominent and rat-like. Of all the people Ogulf had met so far in Luefmort, this man was the first that he had seen who was not well groomed. Something about him filled Ogulf with intrigue; his eyes were mysterious, full of wonder, like the real him lived inside them in a world of his own. Ogulf knew that, regardless of what this man looked like, he must have been important, otherwise why would he have been in the lord’s own chambers?
The small, skinny man dropped a large tome down on the table, causing a whirl of dust to erupt from its pages. It landed with a thud in the centre of a ring of already opened books. With frenzied looks and fingertip touches, the slight man scanned each book and then went back to the dirty book he’d just thrown down.
‘Ah, yes,’ the man said, speeding through the tight lines of text. He gave himself a slight slap on the forehead as if he had realised something obvious.
‘Trayvan, are you all right?’ Hanrik asked. The old man continued his mutterings, and then, with a clap, he gave a yell of triumph.
‘Maledict. Evil. Bad. Not nice. From the north. The far north. A prophecy. A promised one,’ he said, and with every word, he pointed to a different book for reference. He spoke incredibly fast, which made the words inaudible at times. ‘Prath.’
‘Prath?’ Rowden said. ‘Visser?’
Trayvan let out a wild howl of laughter. ‘Yes. Yes, that’s the one. The wilds of Visser. That’s the home. The home of bad. The home of the Order.’
‘Trayvan, slow down, and please, try to explain. This is a grave situation,’ Lord Hanrik said, clasping the tiny man’s shoulder and looking him in the eyes. ‘Danrin, fetch some of that harsh spirit he likes, perhaps it will help to calm him.’
Danrin bowed and hurried out of the room. The old man moved away from Hanrik’s grasp and continued to ramble, then he let out another howl, occasionally snapping his fingers. Ogulf watched on, mesmerised, as the man cycled through a series of words and phrases, some that Ogulf recognised and others that he didn’t. ‘Yes. Peak of Influence. Ridmir. No more power.’
‘I’m sorry, Rowden, he gets like this sometimes. His mind is ... affected. Years of drinking whatever he could get his hands on has left him like this.’ Lord Hanrik turned to Trayvan. ‘We try to keep him away from it, but sometimes he needs it if we want him to make any sense. Believe it or not, you’re looking at the strongest mind in all of Shingal; this man was the very first Sage.’
Cohl looked on in distress at the dithering man and addressed Lord Hanrik. ‘This man was a Sage?’ he asked. ‘One of the All Knowing?’
‘Yes. He founded The School of the Learned before becoming Sage of the All Knowing. Accolades like you wouldn’t believe, he truly was the smartest man in the known world – in fact, I would go as far as to say he was the smartest man in the unknown world as well. There wasn’t a mind that could keep up with him. He almost united Gelenea,’ Lord Hanrik said. ‘Now, though, he is a troubled man. He came to Luefmort from Shingal city, looking for respite from his problems. We took him in, and he has been with us ever since. You still see glimmers of his greatness from time to time, it’s all in there somewhere.’ He continued talking as if Trayvan wasn’t there.
Soon Danrin appeared with a flagon and filled a large cup with a red substance before handing it to Trayvan with a slight, sympathetic smile. Ogulf watched the old man go from his shuffling, senseless ramble to something entirely different; he stopped moving, his spine straightened, and he looked at the cup with caution in his eyes. The former Sage’s eyes went wide and he looked at Lord Hanrik, eagerness eclipsing his distrust as he hunched again closer to the cup, this time sniffing at it mindfully.
‘For me, my lord?’ he said. His eyes bulged from his head.
‘Yes, Trayvan. Please, drink deep, calm your hands and that mind of yours. I need your assistance, old friend.’
Trayvan snatched the cup from Danrin and began to gulp the liquid down greedily. There must have been at least a pint of whatever it was in a cup that size, but it was empty in seconds. Ogulf watched on in disbelief; he had never seen a drink go down that quickly in all of his years, not even in the roughest taverns in Broadheim. Trayvan’s hands seemed to stop shaking as he placed the cup on the table in a soft and controlled manner. Ogulf watched the man open and close his mouth to savour the taste.
‘Oh, how I have missed the taste of those berries,’ Trayvan said. His voice was clear, now, and his words were concise. ‘Apologies, welcomed guests. My mind betrays me at times.’
Ogulf tried to remain indifferent out of politeness, but he was completely perplexed; the frenzy of this man had disappeared, and now he was acting and speaking with more clarity than anyone else in the room. Trayvan’s clothes were still ragged, though it didn’t seem to bother him much as he began carefully scanning the texts in front of him, now with an occasional sound as he found his train of thought. His fingers moved elegantly across the pages of the open books. Before, he had run them down the pages roughly, but now he traced over them like they were precious, delicate things.
‘The Order of Maledict. They are dangerous, or they were, books say that the last of them were burned at the stake half a millennium ago. Anyone who believes that is a fool,’ Trayvan began. ‘They ruled all of Visser. Truly, that country never recovered after their last attempt at a power grab, though this would be common knowledge in Broadheim, I assume?’
‘No, I had never heard of them before now,’ Rowden said. ‘We haven’t had proper dealings with Visser since well before my birth.’
‘Understandable. What they did to the people of Broadheim was atrocious. It is no surprise all mentions of the Order were struck from your history books,’ Trayvan said, looking up from the books at Rowden, and then turning to Ogulf. ‘You know of The Chasm and The Throws?’
‘Of course,’ Rowden said.
‘The original Order was headed by a horrible man named Medin. He was a mage who ruled Visser for many years. He pulled power from the Peak of Influence there, and did everything he could to strengthen his hold on his lands. He relied on the power from the Peak to create a huge army – strong beyond measure, with numbers so vast they were truly unthinkable at the time. As the story goes, he wanted to fulfil an ancient prophecy. He even thought he was the one who was promised, and the people of Visser believed him. It took years of planning, but eventually, he set off with his army and took the North of Broadheim with ease. At this time, he was still drawing from the Peak in Visser and using it to fuel his efforts – but, unbeknownst to him, or anyone else back then, the power given by the Peak was not infinite.’
Cohl nodded. ‘I’ve heard of this. The peak in Visser was Mount Ridmir.’
‘Not just a simple butcher, then, are you, Cohl?’ Ogulf said in disbelief as a boyish smile filled Cohl’s chubby cheeks.
‘Yes, that’s right,’ Trayvan said, pointing and smiling at Cohl. ‘Visser was one of the only known places to have just one Peak of Influence in those times. So, eventually, Medin used all of the power it was able to give. He did it too quickly, so he wore it out and it gave no more. It never recovered, and that left him panicked, in need of a new source to continue the march of his forces. Medin hurried from the northern front of his invasion back to Visser, leaving his army behind to protect the lands they had taken; he was eager to pick up where he had been forced to leave off as soon as the power returned. Medin tried and tried with all of his abilities to keep drawing from the Peak, but to no avail. All the while, his army was left resourceless in the damning cold of the mountains, without orders, with less faith in their leader, and without the magical power that had been keeping them warm and strong.
‘Medin wouldn’t stop trying to pull power from the Peak, and eventually, Mount Ridmir exploded. Whether that was coincidence or consequence no one knows,’ Trayvan continued. ‘The eruption was huge and coated the northern edges of the world in a thick, black dust. This blanket kept the sun and the warmth from reaching the soil and pushed some regions into the worst winter known at the time. Medin perished in the explosion. Most of his directionless army died in the cold of the plains as the unexpected winter gripped the region. Some members of his cause made it back to Visser, but those suspected of being high ranking affiliates of the Order of Maledict were burnt alive. Their name and support for their ideals were outlawed, punishable by death. Most of the people of Visser were supportive of this and looked to repair the damaged ties with their neighbours. But some stayed loyal to their dead ruler – and more importantly, loyal to his cause, but kept their support hidden.’
The old man looked up at Rowden and then at Lord Hanrik, his eyes and voice as clear as they could be. ‘I suspect that those invading Broadheim now may follow the same cause – they look to fulfil this prophecy and return dark magic to prominence. They will seek a source of power like the one Medin had. Only with the power of those Peaks can they obtain what they want.’
Ogulf was confused. ‘If that’s the case, then why attack Broadheim? We’re not a magical country by any means. We don’t even have a Peak of Influence.’
Trayvan let out a laugh, but unlike the howl before, this one was somewhat normal. This distressed Ogulf, irking him because this was not a laughing matter.
‘You know of the Long Peaks?’ Trayvan asked. Ogulf looked at his father before nodding at the old sage. ‘What about the Short Peaks?’ Again, Ogulf nodded. ‘Falvail Peak? The Widow’s Trail?’
Ogulf and Melcun exchanged confused looks then looked back to Trayvan.
‘They were all Peaks of Influence. At one time, Broadheim was the strongest country in all the realm when it came to magicka and all things arcane. But when Medin tried to invade, they used the collective powers of all the Peaks in Broadheim to create The Chasm and the great expanse of The Throws. They intentionally drained all the life of their Peaks in the hope that doing so would keep any further invaders from the north at bay.’
This time, Melcun attempted to cut in. ‘But why wou–’
‘–Fear. Peace had held the realms together for so long, and then magic, from the Peaks in particular, became a commodity some sought in an effort to break that peace. Without these resources, and with some way to deter invaders, your leaders at the time must have thought this made them less of a target,’ Trayvan said, going back to his books.
‘I mean no disrespect, but this is all told in tales and fables where we come from,’ Ogulf said. ‘Do you know anything about this?’ he asked Rowden.
‘Nothing. History was never a focus of mine. Like you said, this is only mentioned in tales, and those same tales were laced with goblins and men that could fly, so I always assumed they were just that – tales, fables, stories. Even at council meetings in Tran, when they still happened, not one word was said about any Peak of Influence. Was it common knowledge here, Lord Hanrik?’
‘Perhaps to Sages and masters of knowledge like Trayvan here, but not in the minds of the wider populace. Myths, musings, legends, yes, those stories are well known, but like you said, they’re thought of as nothing more than bedtime stories,’ Hanrik said. ‘We know of our own Peaks of Influence, everyone in the Shingal does, but we use them for peaceful means, to support the people who reside here. It’s in our code not to use them for anything else, that has always been the way.’
‘Well, this story of Medin is fact. And this is why I think there is a resurgence. This is a new version of the Order of Maledict, which exists for only one reason: to fulfil the prophecy and use magic for the means of evil. I can see no other reason why they would want to invade the South,’ Trayvan said. ‘The army they bring, it is vast, yes?’
Ogulf looked on at Rowden, expecting him to speak, but his father was propped against the table, stroking his beard, apparently lost in his thoughts.
‘Immense,’ Ogulf said. ‘Broadheim has fallen without so much as a fight. Even in a winter this cold, I still would have expected some kind of resistance, but the fact they’ve taken it so quickly, it’s like there was no one there to oppose them. I can’t fathom how powerful an army like that must be.’
‘Too powerful,’ Melcun said. ‘To pass through The Throws with those numbers, make it that far south in a harsh winter, and to take the citadels the way they did – that can’t be normal, can it?’
‘Very good, young man,’ Trayvan said, glancing at Melcun with a wicked smile and pointing his finger at him. ‘Something must be aiding them. Something very powerful indeed.’
‘What is this prophecy?’ Ogulf asked.
‘It is the prophecy of the Onyxborn, the one born to inherit Loken’s powers and lead the armies of the Order of Maledict to the domination of the world.’
‘That’s what Yadlin mentioned. Is it possible they could have fulfilled the prophecy already, and that’s how they took Broadheim so easily?’
‘Oh no, my boy, that’s what makes this all the more frightening. They have gotten as far as they have with the might of swords, and possibly some magic, but nothing on the level of power that the Onyxborn would bring them. If they had that then we would know about it; the world would be in darkness and hope would be lost. They seek to capture the Stone of the Night, a Peak that’s long lain dormant but is said to have been crafted by Cormag’s own hand. It is said that the Peak will come back to life when touched by Loken’s heir, so they will fight to the last man to get into the old Altar Loken built to house it. The Esselonians have defences in place to deter people from trying – the Altar entrance was collapsed years ago, and a range of Peaks flank Cormag’s dead stone; they fuel powerful enchantments to keep people away from it.’
‘Esselonia?’ Ogulf said, the hairs on the back of his neck standing up at the utterance of the word. He turned to his father. ‘That’s where Wildar wanted to go.’
‘I wouldn’t advise it; they’re in the middle of a civil war,’ Danrin said.
‘Yes. Terrible news. I don’t think Feda Essel will be able to hold onto power much longer, the way things are going. The South has all the gold, and rumour has it, they have paid for mercenaries to back up their already large force.’ Lord Hanrik said. Ogulf glanced at his father, looking for some kind of reaction at the mention of the name Feda. It was the name Wildar used before he fell, and Ogulf had a feeling it could be the same person.
‘Who is Feda Essel?‘ Rowden curiously asked, still stroking his beard. ‘She is the rebel leader?’
‘No. In fact, she is the Princess of Esselonia, the daughter of the recently deceased king. Her uncle challenges her claim to the crown, so you could say he is leading the rebellion. She has the support of the North. He has wealth and support from the South. It’s a very messy affair and we are trying to remain somewhat neutral.’
‘This Feda, is she–’
Rowden interrupted his son before he could get the rest of the question out. ‘–We have more important things to discuss than the internal wars of foreigners, Ogulf. For now, we focus on the matter at hand, which is a war of sorts that we are in the middle of,’ he said, giving a subtle shake of his head. ‘Lord Hanrik, this has been very helpful. I would ask for a couple of days more of your hospitality while we regroup.’
